Thread: CHANEY'S THREAT OF TERRORISM COMES TOO LATE

CHANEY'S THREAT OF TERRORISM COMES TOO LATE

By Michael Cutler
February 11, 2009
NewsWithViews.com

Growing old(er) has its advantages and disadvantages.

I will focus on an advantage. I have been around long enough to have direct memories of so many events that to younger people are considered to be history.

During the presidency of Lyndon Johnson, a phrase that kept popping up was "credibility gap." It was most often used in conjunction with the controversial Vietnam War.

Today there is a need to revive that term in so many ways. Consider, if you will, the two news articles. The first of those articles in today's edition of the Washington Times entitled, "EXLUSIVE: Bailout recipients keep donating"
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/200 ... liticians/

The second of those two articles appeared about a week ago online at Newsmax and was entitled, "Cheney Warns of New Attacks." http://www.newsmax.com/headlines/cheney ... ode=7972-1

You may wonder what those two seemingly very different articles have to do with one another and my two word answer is "credibility gap!"

The Washington Times article disgusts me both as an American citizen and as a former special agent of the INS.

Law enforcement officers are prohibited from accepting any sort of gratuity they might receive for doing their jobs. If a police officer was out pounding his beat or directing traffic on a bitterly cold winter day and a compassionate shop keeper were to give that cop a cup of hot coffee or other such beverage to help keep him (her) warm and if the police officer's supervisor or a member of internal affairs saw the officer receive that cup of coffee, it is to be anticipated that they would investigate that cop into oblivion and perhaps take disciplinary action against him.

The fear is that a police officer or a federal agent, for that matter, might be swayed by such an insignificant "gratuity" and stop being completely dispassionate and objective in carrying out his sworn duties.

Apparently when you consider the expression that "Every man has his price," a cop might be "bought" for the price of a cup of java!

Many years ago, I was given a medal by the Japanese National Police for my assistance with a narcotics investigation that they had conducted and that required my assistance to enable them to take one of their targets of the investigation into custody. The Japanese Consul General in New York treated me to a lunch. I dutifully reported the medal and the lunch to my superiors to make certain I would not run afoul of regulations.

The Assistant District Director for Investigations who was the chief of all of the INS special agents in the New York office had headed internal affairs for the INS before he was assigned to our office. Before coming to the INS he was the deputy inspector for internal affairs for the NYPD and a really good guy. He estimated the value of the medal to be under $25.00 and he told me that I could accept a luncheon from the Japanese Consul General if by not accepting the offer for lunch would have insulted our colleagues from Japan.

The point was that any such situation needed to be reported and documented. Had I not reported this, I could have faced severe discipline. It might have resulted in the termination of my career.

Government employees are under strict orders about the use of government vehicles. I know of several agents who were suspended for driving their government assigned vehicles a block or two out of the way to run a personal errand.

Where elected officials are concerned, it appears that there are few controls and this apparently leads to the mind-set of our elected representatives that they can do nearly anything that they want to do!

If there are concerns that a cup of coffee might influence the cop on the beat, how might a campaign contribution influence an elected politician, who is, I might add, a government employee?

Politicians boast about being effective "fund raisers." Can you imagine a cop walking into his captain's office and bragging about being an effective "fund raiser?" How quickly would that police officer find himself in front of a grand jury, not as a witness but as a defendant?

What does it take in the wacky world of politics to be guilty of conflict of interest?

This story provides yet another example of the term "chutzpah!"

The second story also deals with a credibility gap, but of a different sort. Dick Cheney, for starters, was the former CEO of Halliburton, a company that often receives multi-billion dollar government contracts without having to compete against other companies for those huge contracts. The idea that he was then able to run for the position of Vice President and that the government continued to do business with Halliburton is disquieting. It certainly did not help matters that there were so many allegations of fraud and the sale of tainted food and contaminated water by Halliburton for the consumption of our valiant soldiers. As another former chief of investigations in New York, Frank Johnson was known to end virtually every meeting with what became his virtual mantra, "It is not enough that federal agents not engage in wrong doing, as federal agents you must never even create the illusion of doing wrong!"

The article about Mr. Cheney did not deal with Halliburton but dealt with his warnings about the potential for future massive terrorist attacks being launched against the United States. In point of fact, I share Mr. Cheney's concerns, the problem is that for the 8 year tenure of the Bush administration, in which he was the number two official, our government steadfastly refused to not secure the border that was supposed to separate our country from Mexico and insulate our nation and our citizens from not only the millions of illegal aliens who are now present in the United States, finding that border to be little more than a "speed bump" but that criminals including drug traffickers and violent gang members similarly found it easy to run our borders. There have also been numerous reports of OTM (Other Than Mexican) aliens including those from so-called "Special Interest" countries easily entering the United States with virtually no impediment. (Special interest countries are those countries that are associated with terrorism such as Iran, Syria and other such countries.)

So, to hear Mr. Cheney jump up and down yelling about the threat of terrorism is a bit like someone yelling about the threat of home invaders breaking into someone's home but then not just leaving the back door open, but taking the damned door off its hinges!

Furthermore, the drug cartels that are now destabilizing Mexico and resorting to the wholesale slaughter of anyone they believe is an impediment to their nefarious objectives including high ranking police officials, military officers, prosecutors, judges and elected politicians. They are also quick to torture and kill average folks who may have gotten in their way, owe much of the money that they have used to purchase weapons, vehicles and other items of logistic value and to also corrupt officials on both sides of the border to the proceeds from the drug trade that they conducted in our country because our government refused to secure that border.

A final thought.

As the administration and members of Congress continue God knows how many generations of Americans with the stated purpose of priming the economic pump of the United States to jump start our economy, there has been great resistance to doing those things that make the most commonsense imaginable. E-Verify must be a part of the strategy to make certain that when people are hired that they are legally entitled to work in the United States.

There is absolutely no reason for our nation to not attempt to do everything reasonable to make certain that the jobs go to American citizens and resident aliens.

As I noted in a recent interview, because most foreign workers come to the United States legally and illegally with the intention of sending money back to their home countries, as evidenced by the tens of billions of dollars in remittances that are wired from the United States to countries all over the planet, not removing foreign workers from the payrolls of those companies that are providing jobs, makes as much sense as attempting to fill a bathtub while not closing the drain at the bottom of the tub! You could run the hot water into that tub all day and never have enough water to take a bath!

This also means that there must not be an amnesty program that would provide millions of illegal aliens whose true identities, backgrounds, affiliations and intentions are unknown and unknowable with official identity documents that may well be issued to the the criminals and terrorists among them in false names.

We the People may, all too frequently, act foolishly and not in our own best interests, but as President Abraham Lincoln observed, "You can fool all of the people some of the time and some of the people all of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time!"

Now that we are getting down to "crunch time" even the most oblivious among us are paying attention. They may well remember a quote that President George W. Bush used after the terrorist attacks of September 11: "You are either with us or you are against us!"

The day is rapidly approaching when We the People will be asking their elected representatives, "Are you with us or are you against us?"

The answer to their question will be easy to find, they will be able to simply look for it in the Congressional Record!

The time has come for the government of the United States and our elected representatives to act in a manner consistent with the best interests of We the People!

Good citizenship does not end at the voting booth but it simply begins there. In order for our representative democracy to represent us, we need to communicate with our elected representatives to let them know in clear and unequivocal terms what we want.

I implore you to get involved!

We live in a perilous world and in a perilous era. The survival of our nation and the lives of our citizens hang in the balance

This is neither a Conservative issue, nor is it a Liberal issue- simply stated, this is most certainly an AMERICAN issue!

You are either part of the solution or you are a part of the problem!

http://www.newswithviews.com/Cutler/michael150.htm

"EXLUSIVE: Bailout recipients keep donating"
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/200 ... liticians/

Read the article, but enjoyed the comments MUCH more!!! LOVED this one:

By: caseclosed
Rep. Barney Frank is the poorest excuse of a person you will ever meet unless you know our President Obankruptu.


February 9, 2009 at 8:47 p.m.

[/u]

As much as I detest Cheney, I have to agree with him on these points in the second article.

[quote]

“When we get people who are more concerned about reading the rights to an al-Qaida terrorist than they are with protecting the United States against people who are absolutely committed to do anything they can to kill Americans, then I worry,â€