Originally posted by ThAnswr
Huh..........they weren't reading the book when he was told "America is under attack". There was a little pause and then they started reading the book.
I checked it out again to make sure--the teacher was telling them to open up their books before Andrew Card came in the room. They had started the lesson. You can clearly see Bush is looking at the back of the room, not looking at the book. Seems pretty clear he was getting info from his staff about what to do.
Why the hell is a press secretary telling the President of the United States what he has to do? Who's running the show?
That's part of the press secretary's job.
The President has as much control as he wants to have.
That's just not true. A president has a working relationship with his security. Even upon boarding the plane, he wanted to head back to DC, but deferred to the Secret Service who didn't feel it was secure. They are the ones controlling the scene. Now you're just throwing stuff out there. I read an article recently that mentioned Kerry getting his briefings over secure lines provided by the Secret Service. If they tell him he needs to do something or go somewhere or not go somewhere for security reasons, I would hope he would listen. That's their job and they know what they're doing. If you've ever seen a presidential security detail, you know that everything is extremely choreographed.
Every eyewitness report puts Bush being told "America is under attack" somewhere between 9:05 and 9:07. Those same eyewitness reports put him as leaving between 5 to 7 minutes later.
Listen, you posted the video. I watched it. He ended the event a little over 4 and a half minutes after Andrew Card came in the room. He allowed the teacher to finish the story, he thanked the kids and that was it. In the meantime, according to the principal, there was a lot going on in the classroom, and, according to your links, he was told by Ari Fleischer not to say anything yet.
Now, since we have the proof on video, you're moving on to a different argument--he may have
walked out of the classroom 7 minutes later, but that's not how long he sat there reading a story with the kids, as alleged by Michael Moore. The room was cleared while he informed the principal what was going on before he left for the holding room--also shown in your video. Once he got in the holding room, he conferenced with advisors and had a briefing with the congressmen at the event, as well as worked on a statement to the nation.
The 9/11 Commission reported that Cheney did order planes to be shot down. It appears that order never went anywhere.
Because the plane had already crashed. In fact, many thought it had been shot down and it took hours to establish that it had actually crashed. If the plane had gotten closer, it probably would have been shot down, and then we'd be dealing with the hate over that, too.
I pulled some quotes from the archived thread that was posted a few weeks ago:
What do you mean military? What are they going to do, shoot down a civilian plane? This is tragic, but let's not overreact."
There's nothing the military can do over heavily populated areas like New York City. Imagine what would happen if a jumbo jet was shot down over the city?"
Would the military shoot down a hijacked jet?"
You make the implication that had Bush walked out of that classroom 5 minutes earlier than what he did, the plane may not have crashed into the Pentagon. By the time the planes got there from Langley, how many people would have been spared by shooting it down over Northern Virginia? Or what if there would be more deaths--what if it was shot down over a school? I mean, you make it seem so simple--he could have walked out that instant and ordered planes be shot down and then the Pentagon might not have happened.
But the Pentagon would have happened no matter what. They had to decide what guidelines the pilots would have, what measures would be taken before the plane was shot down, etc. They weren't going to just shoot it down on sight. And would we really want it any other way?
