"All right. You've covered your ass, now."

What Bush said to the CIA briefer after hearing the August 6th PDB. What a piece of slime! Crass, classless, clueless, criminal.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/21/162612/616
http://salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/20/911pdb/index.html


Suskind's book is a gift that keeps on giving.

That is incredible, and it DOES show what a classless, clueless individual he is.

Ok, I go to the link and it makes me watch some bullshit ad. Then it doesn't take me back to the link, it takes me to their main page where I have to look for it. I don't see it so I do a search and the top search result takes me back to their front page that doesn't have the article. Then I try to paste the link in the browser and it goes back to the page that promises to let me see the whole site if I watch this ad I just finished watching, fucking liars. I then click on another article which is cut off short, but it promises me I can see the whole site if I just watch this ad, WHICH I JUST DID! FUCK YOU AND YOUR WILD GOOSE CHASE SALON.COM! How can an online magazine have such a shitty, difficult to use website!!! I'll be happy not to visit their site for another 4 months or more.

Really, I'm not crazy, but that was aggravating and I feel better now.

Salon can be aggrevating.

But if you wanted to paste the entire article I think it would be justified at this point.

Alright, I'll grant he didn't know what was about to happen (maybe) but if you are the duly elected leader of a nation and your intelligence service tells you that the leader of a known terrorist organization is determined to kill a large number of your citizens, you should at the very least show concern, not lash out with a snippy little retort to the poor slob who has been assigned to give you the unwelcome news and delay your trip to your private stocked lake.

Bush is a nasty little piece of work who in a decent society would never have been elected dogcatcher.

When they did the "debunking RFK Jr" article.

because it was the story on which dailykos was commenting.

that kind of quote exposes the level of Bush's inadequacy.

People will hear that and think of the most petty office politics they have witnessed firsthand.

The memo was a serious warning, and Bush misinterpreted it according to his own smallmindendess.

People will realize that the reason bin Laden succeeded was because unfortunately for us our leader was not up to the job.

n/t

thar the Bush administration knew what was going on but let it happen (LIHOP) or even made it happen (MIHOP)... (OP = ON Purpose)

I must say that the quote goes in their direction or else it's the purest criminal incompetence...

which doesn't minimize it one bit.

The President is required by law to take threats like this seriously. It's not a suggestion that he protect the country, he HAS TO.

let it happen because I am a dumbfuck or a clueless idiot... ?

...that they'll have to place armed guards at his grave.

I have already told all my friends and family that i hope to live to see the day dubya dies, cause i'm gonna go take a big shit on his grave...

do you think they'll arrest me for that?

nt

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2690272&mesg_id=2690272
(please nominate GDP threads don't get buried as quickly)
also in the 9-11 forum with this comment.

Why did he use that expression whereas other expressions could have dealt just as well with the staffer?

CYA "Cover your Ass files" are known throughout bureaucratic nomenclature as a way to deal with things that might destroy you or the reputation of the department.

Also looking at the bushenfurher history of ie. national guard, drug arrests and nefarious career
I don't think that this saying was used as something just to throw out in the face of a staffer and witnesses as a casual idiom.
He has "covered his ass" or had it covered by others many, many times in his life and knew exactly what it meant and the seriousness of the statement.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x95455

I was out most of the day and was really shocked when I saw this on kos. Not shocked that he said it but that it was reported.

But at another briefing at the ranch in August. Alarm bells were ringing at CIA HQ as they were picking up warnings of an upcoming attack. They were getting info from Arab country(s). The way Suskind explains it was that * was not a reader (as we all know). And he didn't base his knowledge on what he heard but more on the demeanor of the person who delivered the info. The CIA was flying briefers to Crawford to brief him on the alarming warnings. It was at one of these that * said "to a panicked CIA briefer. 'All right, you've covered your ass now.'

Further proof of either LIHOP or sheer damn incompetence when he went in to that classroom photo op then sat for those 5-7 minutes w/o reaction.

Another interesting * quote in the book. "I'm not going to be supportive of my father and all his Arab buddies," said to an unnamed old foreign policy hand.

He's the poster boy for Narcissistic Personality Disorder. He's incapable of any thought, word, or deed that's not driven by such interactions. He's got to be stoked with psychotropics and his "downtime" has to be devoted to giving him a narcissistic supply. The "stump speeches" he's been doing for seven years are carefully managed to serve his insatiable needs. It's a race to the end: how long can he go before they have to martyr him or he'll melt down completely. This guy won't be allowed to get out of the pResidency alive.

on how Chimpy perceives the person speaking feels about him. Yep, narcissistic to the extreme. In addition it mentions that * and his father are not close.

I hope I live long enough to read in history the crap that went on in the WH with this head case as CIC - he's gonna make Nixon look sane.

It was the July 12 briefing that sent him there, out of harm's way. IMO. Cheney too. Spent August in WY. Unprecedented. Skeered!

But at another briefing at the ranch in August. Alarm bells were ringing at CIA HQ as they were picking up warnings of an upcoming attack. They were getting info from Arab country(s). The way Suskind explains it was that * was not a reader (as we all know). And he didn't base his knowledge on what he heard but more on the demeanor of the person who delivered the info. The CIA was flying briefers to Crawford to brief him on the alarming warnings. It was at one of these that * said "to a panicked CIA briefer. 'All right, you've covered your ass now.'

Further proof of either LIHOP or sheer damn incompetence when he went in to that classroom photo op then sat for those 5-7 minutes w/o reaction.

Another interesting * quote in the book. "I'm not going to be supportive of my father and all his Arab buddies," said to an unnamed old foreign policy hand.

from the book....first page....

The alarming August 6, 2001, memo from the CIA to the President "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US" has been widely noted in the past few years.

But, also in August, CIA analysts flew to Crawford to personally brief the President--to intrude on his vacation with face to face alerts.

The analytical arm of the CIA was in a kind of panic mode at this point. Other intelligence services, including those from the Arab world, were sounding an alarm. The arrows were all in the red. They didn't know place or time of an attack, but something was coming. The President needed to know.

Verbal briefings of George W. Bush are acts of almost inestimable import in the affairs of the nation--more so than is the case for other recent presidents. (because he doesn't read so in these briefings) What does Beorge W. Bush do:? He makes it personal. ....the President tries to gauge how "certain" they are of what they say, even if the issues may be unfamiliar to him. Do they seem nervous or unsure? Are they gudging? Why do they think what they do...and what do they think of him? That last part is very important.

The trap, of course, is that while these tactile, visceral markers can be crucial--especially in terms of handling the posturning of top officials-- they sometimes are not. The thing to focus on, at certain moments, is what someone says, not who is saying it or how they're saying it.

And, and eyeball to eyeball intelligence briefing during this urgent summer, George W. Bush seems to have made the wrong choice.

He looked at the panicked CIA briefer.

"all right" he said, "You've covered your ass, now." end quote (italics in original)

I've read them all...Assassin's Gate, Cobra II...but this one is VERY scary.

Pick it up. It will make you madder than you ever imagined.