Olbermann Timeline: How The Bush Administration Exploited Terror Threats For Political Gain, 2002-2008

In case you missed it, on Thursday night's "Countdown" Keith Olbermann presented an impressively detailed timeline he called "The Nexus of Politics and Terror," in which he chronicled the Bush administration's exploitation of terror threats for political gain. Olbermann's exhaustive account weaves from each revelation of an intelligence failure or a Democratic political victory to an almost immediate orange alert or "new threat" from al Qaeda.

The clip is 17 minutes long and entirely worth it, and its conclusion — "what we were told about terror, and not told, for security reasons, has overlapped considerably with what we were told about terror, and not told, for political reasons" — is a dutiful summary of the past six years.

Watch:

Comments

[Pleidian]

Just eaxctly HOW much lying qualifies one as a "bushie"? Has to be a lot!

[Pleidian]

If it wasn't for Keith Olbermann, I would never watch MSNBC. I hope he just keeps going as long as those crooks run the governmant.

[Witchitalineman]

Totally agree!

[GingerB]

Keith Olbermann is MSNBC's saving grace. His is the only MSNBC show worth watching.

[dreamgypsy]

GingerB,
Keith Olbermann IS Americas saving grace HE should be HEARD on NBC ABC and CBS go beyond 'cable'!
WE the People have scarified our blood and souls for this overthrow of OUR democracy enough is enough; wake up corporate bought media your not above the law for you are the Fourth Estate for WE the People YOU need to speak truth to power and question authority and for NOT doing that is contemptuous period!
peace

[nancytheragingliberal]

I agree that Keith O. is worth watching, however, Dan A. is getting better and maybe Rachel M. will be given her own show. Tucker needs to be placed on his old 11:00 p.m. slot to make way for Rachel at 6:00 p.m. That will be quite a line-up.
MSNBC --Your Faux-Fake News alternative.

[dax49]

these incidents make the people we have elected to congress in an effort to balance government worse than traitors. it seems they steal ,lie, co-erce, have deviany sexual practices, sell out the american people to lobbyists, and we get to pay them whether they work or not, then support them til they die, all of this i could forgive, if they just did the job of checks and balances, but they don't even do that

[thatsitfortheotherone]

Republicans. if their lips are moving, they're lieing.

Or prepping to cop your joint.

About which they will later lie.

( . )

[thatsitfortheotherone]

I'm headed to the mailbox to drop my absentee Texas Dem primary ballot off, with a nice circle marked next to Obama.

God damn, that feels good.

[ratmach]

From the favorite law of all Busheep, the "Patriot Act":

Title VIII, Section 801, a(7) says,

"Whoever willfully conveys or causes to be conveyed false information, knowing the information to be false, concerning an attempt or alleged attempt being made or to be made, to do any act which would be a crime prohibited by this subsection .... shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both"

Wouldn't it be the sweetest thing EVER if Bush was brought down by his very own, cute little Patriot Act?!

[GingerB]

It would be very sweet!

That's why we have to make sure to elect a Dem to the White House, pack the House and Senate with BIG majorities, and then hold their feet to the fire to investigate, indict, and imprison the criminals in this BushCo maladministration.

[Johnbo]

We SO need to hold these people accountable!! And, it will have to come from the Congress because I don't think Obama is going to be taking the point on something as "partisan" as holding these scumbags accountable.

Most of the major players in the incredibly corrupt Bush Administration were involved in the Iran Contra scandal. The fact that more people weren't made to pay for what happened then just allowed these scumbags to learn how to better scam the system and they emerged later ready to take it to the next level. They are like parasites on the body politic and, if they aren't killed (speaking figuratively) they will only come back stronger at another time. Stamp those mother fuckers into the dirt! The evidence is there. Let's all make sure they don't get away with it.

And watch 60 Minutes about Don Siegelman this Sunday (during the Oscars, wouldn't you know). If they do any kind of job of documenting what happened in Alabama involving a stolen election and bogus prosecution by the U.S. Attorneys working with the local ReTHUGlican machine with Karl Rove directing from the White House, that should get you fired up. Siegelman got seven years for nothing thanks to these lowlife cretins.

[michaelsmolder]

you are so right ratmach
I can hardly wait till Atturny General John Edwards or Denis Kusinich is sworn in!
Bush will Soil Himself!
Cheney will have the BIG ONE!
Condi will take to the sea on her Ship.
and Andrew Gonzelez will move back to Mexico!

[kfdan]

Keith is one of the sharpest cookies in the American media and has consistently called the Bush administration on it's actions! Keep it up!

[cruisepuppy7452a]

let me say this, as a child who lived in Europe for months, I recall acts of terrorism in Rome, London, Ireland, Munich. It does exsist. The thing is this, Bush, Rove, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice took this fact, ran with it, knowing the gullible would buy a bag of rocks from them, if they said it was gold. They knew there is profit in fear, power in fear mongering, all the while laughing all the way to the bank.
They paid osamma years back, trained him in our own camps, funded him, provided him with weapons and now, are using that to continue this cycle of fear. They have him in thier payroll, which is why they refuse to find him. If they do, the fear mongering ends, the contracts end, as does thier power trip. Its been a con job since the Gore/Bush elections. Do the math, does it add up? No. yet we had an attack what months after gore was pushed out. Then Bush rushed to war to continue the cycle of fear and anger. Its been the emporers new clothes for sometime folks.

[ltfcrazy]

It is a video like this that underscores our need to be completely united against these "people". I think Hillary Clinton's biggest fear in losing the nomination is that Barack may be too naive, too idealistic. She knows what's at steak and so do the neo-cons. It's a fight for their very existence to them. We have to come together and get anyone who won't bow to these murderous liars in our government. Barack won't, Hillary won't, and I even thought McCain wouldn't at one time. McCain has changed his mind, at least to get votes from the republican base. In any case it makes him suspect. Hillary trusted Bush with the power to invade Iraq before there were even inspections done. That definitely makes her suspect. Barack is the last candidate above suspicion. He does not have blood on his hands. He is also highly versed on every subject, extremely intelligent, Sensitive to struggle and poverty, and willing to use force only when and where it is absolutely necessary. Texans and Ohioans, I implore you to give Barack the landslide victory that this country deserves.

[apcalc]

I'm not sure he can win. He has a huge amount of repair work to do within his own party.

Pat Buchanan has said it'll take about two weeks for the Republicans to take him down.

Already they are starting.

[Marlyn]

I'll tell you who can't win ... John McCain. The Republicans know this. They don't really want McCain. His is just a vanity campaign.

You say "Already they are starting" to take Obama down?
I say they aren't very successful, are they?

[cruisepuppy7452a]

Anyone who didn't see what he was doing had to be blind. It was so obvious, it was so transparent, so in keeping with who Bush was. I kept telling people this was what he was doing and I was called a hysterical female. If I could see through him why couldn't the rest of the country? I will tell you why, he fed on thier anger, emotional state. He studied how to play them, took notes on what he knew would be thier gullible points. He played the evangelicals and republicans like a stratevarious. You have to give him credit, as evil, guilty, slimey as he is, he succeeded. He conned the country and the senate and congress. He should be tried for treason and jailed for war crimes.

[Veri]

Actually, I would go the "American voters are dumb" route. And Bush played everyone like a master violinist using a Stradivarius. Americans let emotions choose our President and we suffered. Remember "Security Moms", formerly "soccer moms", became a targeted demographic during the 2004 election cycle. Wow. Just wow.

Intelligent debate with point and counterpoint is just about dead in America. Well, among the peasants, that is. And we are peasants to our ruling class.

Props to Keith Olbermann. Some Americans realized that "terror" is the new control medium to shape the peasants into a compliant Citizens. Now get in that breadline!

[GingerB]

"And Bush played everyone like a master violinist using a Stradivarius."

Not even close to everyone. There were millions upon millions of us who were onto him long before his 2000 campaign.

[TheSecularist]

GingerB is right. Millions of Americans were against this war and the Republican politics of fear. We watched on helplessly as the MSM hopped on tanks and played for higher ratings (they're all despicable). Most Americans are to blame, too. Like the sniveling pansies most of them are, they bought into politics of fear and rushed to give up their rights in the name of "protecting them". How do you protect anything by relinquishing it? If they'd been well read, they'd already have known that you cannot impose democracy on a people (an oxymoron, that). And they would have known that countries in Europe have dealt with terrorism before without eroding civil liberties. Who's to blame? Americans who voted Republican, those who didn't vote at all, the MSM, and the cowards in Congress who have rolled over for the last seven years as Bush, Rove, Cheney, and Delay destroyed this country and all it stood for. And it didn't just happen in the last seven years. It began with Reagan when he began turning our "democracy" over to corporate America with his "trickle down" economics BS, shipping American jobs overseas in the global economy that favors corporate exploitation of developing countries, and demonizing the poor and the non-white. I hope progressiv­es/liberal­s are back to stay. Let's put Democrats in Congress and then boot them out one by one if they don't run things for the benefit of ALL Americans.

[Marlyn]

"He should be tried for treason and jailed for war crimes."

YES, ITMFA!

[NotGuilty]

Toyota (O'Reilly) outsells Cadillacs everyday but I'd rather drive a Caddy (Olbermann) than a Toyota, anytime.
O'Reilly appeals to mediocre people who struggle to think for themselves.

[NATIONALSECURITY4US]

WHY WON'T YOU FUCKING SCUMBAGS LET THE TRUTH BE TOLD OR BURN IN HELL WITH BUSH & COMPANY..

STOP DELETING THE TRUTH FROM BEING TOLD TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE...

My life was utterly destroyed for doing what I did, & by telling the truth while trying to resolve these matters...

The other link is a site I made to put the truth out there, for all the world to know, & the legal e-mails that I sent to various
members Congress...

The worst part is the one on the bottom left was captured & he was held for like 30+ months,
& then dumped in Somalia in 1/2007 & highly likely was on some of the CIA tapes that were
destroyed, thus hiding any evidence of him being captured...

http://www.fbi.gov/page2/may04/bolo052604.htm

Top middle = Aafia Siddiqui = 5/29/2004
Bottom left = Fazul Abdullah Mohammed = 5/29/2004 captured & dumped in Somalia 1/2007 after being held for 30+ months...

Bottom right = Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani = 7/??/2004 = he was flown 2 Pakistan 4 Pakistan to say that they found him to get out of payin his reward...

Plus it gets much more complex, since both were captured with laptops in their possession...

http://360.yahoo.com/caspereraser1

U.S.A.G. MUKASEY WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR INDICTING
F.A.M. & A.K.G. + 17 OTHERS IN 1998 FOR THOSE 2
AFRICAN EMBASSY BOMBINGS IN 1998...

[guntotinganglion]

This string of politically motivated actions to drive the herd with fear, is a clear indicator to me, that the so called "threat" that we've been made to believe will kill us all any moment, is nothing of the kind. The fear mongers know how to drive the herd, and it doesn't take anything other than a shot in the air. And that is what they've done over and over again. They no the "threat" they are claiming, is a red herring, or more appropriately, a condom that's been blown up to the size of the Hindenberg!


Four years ago, my wife and I took a train trip from where we live in the northwest, to Southerm California. I was quite surprised to find that there was zero security on Amtrack...none. You could walk on the train with a case of dynamite, and no one would have noticed. This was a wake up call for me. Basically, if they could have attacked us by now, they would have...the rail system in particular is wide open, and accesses intercity areas with impunity, every day of the week. The ports are unsecured, and nothing has happened. We are wide open in our society, even with the hundreds of billions wasted on Homeland Security, and yet no attacks have occurred in areas of our society that are just screaming to be taken advantage of, and are virtually indefensible.


Another area of obvious clarity, came after hearing a discussion on some talk radio show, about how in Israel, people can't get into a mall, or a shop, without multiple ID's...and yet, bombings still happen there regularly, with the tightest security in the world. We have wide open borders, all the way round, not just with Mexico. The boogiemen "terrorists" have millions of access points with which to infiltrate this country, but oddly, there has never been a known act of this form of terrorism in any malls in America, malls with ZERO security. No shops blown up, no attacks of any kind. Considering the obvious incompetence of the current administration, the only conclusion can be, the threat has been inflated beyond all reason...but for very nefarious reasons nonetheless.


I occurred to me when the beltway sniper attacks happened, that this might be a terrorist action. What better way to tie down a vast urban area than to have random shootings at random intervals. The area where this happened was gripped with fear until they figured out what was going on. It seemed so obvious to be terrorism, but as it turned out, it was nothing of the sort. Just good old fashioned American psychopaths shooting Americans for the fun of it. One guy, moves anonymously into an apartment in some urban area, with a gun...this would be so easy for a terrorist to do!


We have been played people. The carnival came to town, with the hairy boogieman in a dimly lit tent, and we bought it! It worked because a handful of bad guys pulled off an attack before the carnival hit town...and instantly, the powers that be saw their opportunity. And Olbermann's expose shows it all, in brilliant detail, and reveals the pattern of behavior that has stampeded the American herd so effectively, for so long. Time to calm down people, look around, and realize the world's as it always was, a dangerous place to be certain, but a boogieman behind every tree, and Bush...I think not.

[MGhamma]

Guntotinganglion, Very nicely put.

[Veri]

Educated people actually still do live in America. Nice reasoning, clear, concise. Unlike so many peasants who post here on HuffPo. Unfortunately, educated voters capable of seeing through machinations of this sort are few and far between. Seems to be the norm in America now.

[Rendon76]

“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.” -Joseph Goebbels

[1differentdrummer]

On a recent trip from Denver to Phoenix the Orange alert message from TSA was being read almost nonstop in Denver. In Phoenix it was read every once in awhile, at perhaps one sixth the frequency as in Denver. I'm unsure what this means.

[Acebass]

Which makes me ask the question, why would we ever elect another Republican to high office again?

[GDAEman]

The failure of Bill Clinton to prosecute the Iran/Contra actors has led to their damaging actions in the Bush administration:

^John Poindexter (Total Information Awareness);
^Elliot Abrams (Iraq War);
^Otto Reich (Attempted Venezuela Coup);
^John Negroponte (Iraq Death Squads);
^James Steele (Iraq Death Squads).
^Richard Armitage (Iraq War)

These are but the most well known. Help spread teh word using this 3-min video:
........"Prosecute Bush et al. Chapter 1"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IarusvKmTJ4

[Meah]

Ever hear about the Iran Contra Hearings?

Yea, yea, yea, blame Bill Clinton for everything!

Republicans are getting desperate. It is Bill Clinton's fault that George Bush et al flushed the country down the toilet.

Punk!

[imsosure]

Did you watch and listen to the link this guy offered or are you just blowing off because you feel like it? Check out the clip, it's only a couple minutes long then let's hear about it.

[imsosure]

I watched and listened to the video and I wish I was that eloquent. To be able to put in order and names and faces to crimes the way this guy does is great. Here's another one which is actually a movie I would like to see and hears more about too.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1656880303867390173

[TheSecularist]

Go promote your anarchistic, anti-tax movie elsewhere. Taxes are good! They give us roads, schools, the military, and safety regulations. Our government's not perfect, but what is?