Re: "We'll see if anything happens... my guess is that obumble will blame Bush for this too..."
Maybe not... but it does seem that at least *some folks* have noticed some a rather glaring hypocritical tone in some of the commentary by media and political elites:
Obama criticized on airline incident when Bush wasn't
Eight years ago, a terrorist bomber's attempt to blow up a trans-Atlantic airliner was thwarted by passengers and revealed gaping holes in airline security only months after the Sept. 11 attacks.
By Josh Gerstein
Politico.com
seattletimes.nwsource.com
Eight years ago, a terrorist bomber's attempt to blow up a trans-Atlantic airliner was thwarted by passengers and revealed gaping holes in airline security only months after the Sept. 11 attacks.
But President George W. Bush, then on vacation, made no public remarks for six days about the so-called shoe bomber, Richard Reid, and there were virtually no complaints from the media or Democrats that Bush's response was sluggish or inadequate.
That stands in sharp contrast to the Republicans' withering criticism of President Obama — and some in the media — for his reaction to the Christmas Day incident on a Detroit-bound Northwest Airlines flight.
Obama commented publicly on Monday and ordered a full investigation of the incident.
Democrats are making the disparity a centerpiece of their efforts to counter GOP attacks on the White House. "This hypocrisy demonstrates Republicans are playing politics with issues of national security and terrorism," Democratic National Committee (DNC) spokesman Hari Sevugan said. "That they would use this incident as an opportunity to fan partisan flames ... tells you all you need to know about how far the Republican Party has fallen and how out of step with the American people they have become."
The Democrats' counterattack is aimed largely at two Republican congressmen who have been particularly critical of Obama: Reps. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., and Peter King, R-N.Y. Sevugan also criticized Hoekstra for sending out a fundraising e-mail that invoked the Christmas Day bombing attempt. "Raising money off it is beyond the pale," Sevugan said.
Neither congressman concedes applying a double standard to Obama, but the similarities between the 2001 and 2009 bombing attempts are striking.
This year's attack came on Christmas. The 2001 attempt took place Dec. 22. Obama was on vacation in Hawaii when the suspect, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, allegedly used plastic explosives in his bid to blow up the Amsterdam-to-Detroit flight. Bush was at Camp David when Reid used similar explosives to try to blow up a Paris-to-Miami flight, which diverted to Boston.
Like the Obama White House, the Bush White House said the president had been briefed and was following the incident closely. While the Obama White House issued a background statement calling the incident an "attempted terrorist attack" on the same day it took place, early official statements from Bush aides did not make the same explicit statement.
Bush did not address reporters about the Reid episode until Dec. 28, after he had traveled from Camp David to his ranch in Texas.
Democrats do not appear to have criticized Bush. Many were wary of publicly clashing with the commander in chief, who had lofty approval ratings after what appeared to be a successful military campaign in Afghanistan. The media also seemed to have little interest in pressing Bush about the bombing, or the fact that the incident had revealed a previously unknown vulnerability in airplane security — that shoes could be used to hide chemicals or explosive devices.
An Agence France-Presse story Dec. 27 was one of the few to call attention to the silence from Bush and other top officials.
During a 25-minute meeting with Bush the next day, reporters asked more than 15 questions, including queries about his New Year's Eve plans and a tree he'd planted. He never was asked about Reid, but mentioned the attempt in passing.
"The shoe bomber was a case in point, where the country has been on alert," Bush said. "A stewardess on an American Airlines flight — or a flight attendant on an American Airlines flight — was vigilant, saw something amiss and responded. It's an indication that the culture of America has shifted to one of alertness. And I'm grateful for the flight attendant's response, as I'm sure the passengers on that airplane. But we've got to be aware that there are still enemies to the country. And our government is responding accordingly."
Cable-TV regulars
While many congressional Republicans and their supporters have criticized Obama, Hoekstra and King have been the most ubiquitous, becoming cable-TV regulars, providing details about the case at a time the administration was still tight-lipped.
In an appearance Monday on WCBS-TV in New York, King said, "I'm disappointed it's taken the president 72 hours to even address this issue. Basically nobody, the president, the vice president, the attorney general, nobody except [Homeland Security] Secretary [Janet] Napolitano has come out. And she said yesterday everything worked well. What I hope the president would do is treat this in a bipartisan way, acknowledge that mistakes were made and promise we'll do all we can to make sure it doesn't happen again."
Hoekstra, the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, took a similar tack on Fox News, arguing that the slowness of Obama's reaction showed terrorism wasn't high on his agenda. "Why this is not a priority?" Hoekstra asked. "It should be his No. 1 priority."
Asked Tuesday about how Obama's response differed from Bush's, King said his "recollection" was that senior Bush administration officials such as Attorney General John Ashcroft did speak out about Reid's case soon after his arrest. Politico could not locate any public comment from Ashcroft before Reid was indicted in January.
"My point was there was no word coming from anyone except a press handout," King told Politico on Tuesday. "It didn't have to be the president. I'd have been fine if it were [Attorney General] Eric Holder or for that matter Napolitano. ... There should be a face for the administration. For the first 48 hours, nobody said a word."
Asked about a double standard for Bush's actions in 2001, Hoekstra spokesman John Truscott said Tuesday the congressman really was objecting more to the administration's clampdown on briefings to Congress than about Obama's public silence.
Truscott also dismissed Sevugan's criticism of his boss' terrorism-related fundraising appeal as part of an effort by Democrats to undercut his 2010 gubernatorial bid in Michigan.
While the White House has ramped up Obama's public profile on the bombing, officials insist he was neither reluctant nor slow to react.
"The president has been very engaged on this, has been leading our response effort, asking agencies to take a variety of steps including all the steps he outlined," National Security Council chief of staff Denis McDonough said Monday.
An Obama White House spokesman declined to comment Tuesday on the parallels.
Issue sidestepped
While King and Hoekstra have criticized Obama repeatedly for his response, former Bush aides and advisers have sidestepped the issue or endorsed Obama's approach.
On CNN's "Larry King Live" on Monday night, former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, a White House adviser at the time of Reid's attempted bombing, brushed aside a question about whether Obama should have waited three days to speak out. "I'm going to leave that to the White House," Ridge said. "I think he had Secretary Napolitano out there speaking."
And former Bush pollster Matthew Dowd was asked last weekend if Obama was correct when, like Bush, he held off speaking at the outset. "Yes," Dowd said on ABC's "This Week." "Part of the problem here is that all the facts that you think are true at the beginning turn out not to be true as the days go on."
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This story was edited for space reasons. The full version can be read at politico.com. |
