Tweet
CNN is reporting that the U.S. Coast Guard has fired on a "suspicious" boat that challenged them within the restricted area near the Pentagon.
More as this develops…
Update: CNN now reporting "a boat" or "boats" entered a restricted area on the Potomac in the vicinity of the Memorial Bridge and 14th Street Bridge. Also reporting that 10 shots were fired at one boat when it either failed to respond or failed to move out of a restricted zone.
UPDATE: CNN is now reporting that apparently this was all just a training exercise.
But on 9/11? During the Pentagon memorial service? If this is true, maybe they’ll fly some more planes over NYC today for some photo ops.
38 Comments
Paging Karl Rove to tell us what color the Terror Alert should be.
With the perps from eight years ago still on the prowl, there will be no end to these types of incidents.
Dickless Cheney and Twitchy Bush, The Hague ‘10
Appears to be a training exercise…
WaPo calling it a “training exercise.”
Heh.
This is near the Watergate, maybe it’s the CREEPS coming back. Someday they think they’ll get that smoking gun.
Who the fuck thought it would be a good idea to have a training exercise on 9/11?!!
Hopefully this is not serious…On a lighter note
Are any of Cheney’s boats misssing from his home on the Cheasapeake bay?
Did they hear Borat again?
Are we faking it again?
http://emptywheel.firedoglake……-it-again/
http://emptywheel.firedoglake……rom-a-ufo/
The stupid it hurts.
Seriously, this is all odd…
what moran is in charge?
Shiny object alert.
The person who might snatch away Joe Wilson’s Genius Prize for the week in a last-minute upset.
Tryouts for the Darwin awards?
Might be best to move Obama to some bunker for the day, and keep any current or past CIA far, far away. Where’s H.W. Boosh or Cheney today?
Is the Filipino Monkey at it again?
Found a way to get one without physically crashing something.
And what is it with these brilliantines and obvious 9-11 evocations? That flyover was the last time Principal Obama had to call one of the kids into his office for a dumb stunt; I’d actually forgot what it was, but knew there’d been something.
Hel-looooooo? Is anybody with a triple-digit IQ in charge here? Anybody?
Sheesh!
Oy!
CNN thought it made sense to let Fran Townsend on for the half hour to comment on what a moron Janet Napolitano must be for allowing this, how “this government” has made these kind of mistakes before, and how heads should roll. And she was grinning while she said all this.
Jean Meserve solemnly told us, “I would trust Fran Townsend” as much as anyone else to comment on this. HUH? Townsend is an ex-Bush admin member who takes every opportunity to criticize the current administration. She’s not an impartial actor here.
Maybe Anderson will invite Liz Cheney on tonight to ask for her thoughts.
My dear moderator,
I wasn’t referring to you, I was referring to the Coast Guard.
Training exercise?!
You LIE!
Well, I’d say a Coast Guard head ought to roll.
right.
Didn’t she get kicked out of her job for being such a moron?
I can bet my last dollar someone will be out of a job my sundown…
Can’t wait for the left to blame GB for this one…
No one’s said anything about moles.
No we just blame Bush and Cheney for ignoring the warnings of counter terroism expert Richard Clarke, the immoral and illegal invasion of Iraq, the unnecessary deaths of close to a million Iraqi people, thousands of American soldiers, thousands injured, the outing of Plame, the undermining of the DOJ, illegal and immoral torture, never releasing the names of Corporations that divided up Iraq etc. Many of us are willing to leave it at that
Another “push” for BO? After reading this link over on rawstory I agree where’s shrubs & friends?
http://www.fromthewilderness.c…..rlyle.html
http://rawstory.com/08/news/20…..-plotter/#
Oddly I don’t react with this same outrage. I saw the headlines this morning and watched and read a bit. Here’s what I saw:
CNN talking heads listened to a radio that said shots were fired. They put cameras on the scene and there was no evidence of a rogue boat, just three or four coast guard vessels. They proceeded to wonder what was up, praise the coast guard, note that the coast guard and various agencies (and “the federal government”) have good, quick communication on matters like this. They also said that the coast guard had notified “the federal government” and some agencies.
Then they had nothing to talk about so they meandered for a bit, and at some point started talking about a training exercise as a hypothetical possibility. They stated that it would be “criminally negligent” to have a training exercise on 9/11, and went on to say, “they told the federal government, they told police agencies, they did not tell us. The question still remains: WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?”
Subsequently these CNN talking heads started to question whether any interagency communication had occurred (on what basis?) and to continue to talk about how awful the coast guard was, and how bad the federal government apparently is for permitting this. And I was sort of thinking, “Wait, if the coast guard had training exercises every other day of the year, and this is a routine function for the sake of alertness, shouldn’t this maybe be a non-story?”
The feeling I got was that CNN could have reacted, but they overreacted. The “breaking news” and visible links to this story promptly disappeared from their site and they went to commercial for a while. But not before saying things like:
“Why didn’t they put a notification out to the press?” ”That is the KEY QUESTION.”
And stating that the commendant of the coast guard owes an apology to “american people… and the victims of 9/11.”
So if the coast guard was doing a training exercise, the appropriate agencies were notified, nobody freaked out about this but heaven forfend nobody tell the media, that doesn’t exactly seem like the worst thing on earth to me. There was no immediate danger, this was not a crazy flyover to freak people out, and I imagine this sort of exercise happens on various days of the year. (I’m sure the ensuing media cycle will prompt someone to verify as much).
And I say all of this as someone whose office was directly adjacent to a bridge supposedly targeted by ‘terra’ within the year after 9/11 (hard to tell how much of the Bush-era ‘terra’ warningness to believe). I don’t diminish the whole event, but I do wonder if letting the folks protecting us do their jobs to remain vigilant (practicing! training!) should be blown out of proportion. The media megaphone and their attitude seems a bigger problem here. (Is the media notified every other time a training exercise occurs?)
Just my two cents…
Fly bys, 911 training(?) exer on 911, guns at town hall meetings.
Were supposed to believe this was planned?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_…..F0cmFpbmk-
These events could come across as threats to our Pres. By who, that secret gov of shooters? Or am I just paranoid? Why am I remembering JFK, RFK, MLK? Please keep BO safe!
CNN reporting that a man in a ski mask with a chain saw just got out of his SUV and walked into a strip club. Screams could be heard and a number of scantily-clad women were seen running out the back door. Police are on the scene and have surrounded the building, and are currently in the middle of tense negotiations, with several strip club employees apparently being taken as hostages.
UPDATE: CNN is reporting that this is the set of a movie.
This is no excuse for a training exercise in the Potomac today!!!
The AP reported it first and when CNN contacted the Coast Guard they said they knew nothing about this so don’t go blaming CNN for this “mishap”!!!
Who made the call for the airports to shut down?
I put up more information here: http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/8049
I love the fact that the left is so damn soft and weak when it comes to fighting terriosm: Here is what happened under Clinton when he was president and didn’t do a damn thing to address it.
1993 WTC Bombings
1996 Khobar Towers
1998 bombings of U.S Embassies in both Kenya and Tanzania
2000 Bombing of the USS Cole.
And you talk about some memo that told Bush we were going to be attacked? If Clinton only did half of what he should have, I’m willing to bet 9-11 could have been avoided. How long do you think it took for them to plan and execute 9-11? I bet it was more then the 8 months Bush was in office…I can care less about the pouring of water on the mastermind of 9-11 or running a drill behind his ear…
It wasn’t Clinton and it wasn’t Muslims.
http://www.takeourworldback.com/itwasntmuslims.htm
“Identity of CIA Officer Responsible for pre-9/11 Failures, Tora Bora Escape, Rendition to Torture Revealed”
http://hcgroups.wordpress.com/…..-revealed/
1993 WTC Bombings
1996 Khobar Towers
1998 bombings of U.S Embassies in both Kenya and Tanzania
2000 Bombing of the USS Cole.
So you tell me Clinton wasn’t the President with this happened? How many times did Clinton have the capability of nailing Bin Laden? Instead he is laid up with some intern….
..but not for 911..Why do you think that is?
*******
“USAMA BIN LADEN IS WANTED IN CONNECTION WITH THE AUGUST 7, 1998, BOMBINGS OF THE UNITED STATES EMBASSIES IN DAR ES SALAAM, TANZANIA, AND NAIROBI, KENYA. THESE ATTACKS KILLED OVER 200 PEOPLE. IN ADDITION, BIN LADEN IS A SUSPECT IN OTHER TERRORIST ATTACKS THROUGHOUT THE WORLD. “
http://www.fbi.gov/wanted/topt…../laden.htm