“In justifying the need for the warrantless eavesdropping programs, President Bush, former NSA [National Security Agency] director [Michael] Hayden, and other senior administration officials repeatedly stressed that the program had delivered critically important intelligence, but naturally they have provided no details. All Hayden admitted [in a press conference on December 19, 2005] is that the […]
Category: quotes
12/19/2005
“As NATO expanded its role in Afghanistan in late 2005, on December 19 [Secretary of Defense Donald] Rumsfeld ordered that three thousand U.S. soldiers, a sixth of the force, be pulled out of the country. Though this was little noticed in the United States…Lieutenant General David Barno, who was then commanding U.S. forces in Afghanistan, […]
12/19/2005
“On December 19, 2005, [Secretary of Defense Donald] Rumsfeld signed orders pulling out three thousand U.S. troops from the south [of Afghanistan], reducing the total number to sixteen thousand. It was the worst possible moment, as the largest Taliban offensive was about to unfold, but Rumsfeld refused to accept that the Taliban insurgency was expanding.” […]
12/18/2005
President “Bush wrapped up his Iraq speeches with a prime-time Oval Office address on December 18 [2005], his first since launching the war thirty-three months earlier. …’This work has been especially difficult in Iraq, more difficult than we expected,’ he acknowledged to thirty-seven million viewers. ‘Reconstruction efforts and the training of Iraqi security forces started […]
12/18/2005
President Bush gave a prime-time speech from the Oval Office on December 18, 2005. “As the war continued, he acknowledged, many people were arguing that the U.S. was ‘creating more problems than we’re solving’ by remaining in Iraq. He rejected the notion. ‘Defeatism may have its partisan uses, but it is not justified by the […]
12/18/2005
On December 18, 2005, President “Bush told the nation in a Sunday-night address from the Oval Office: ‘It is true that Saddam Hussein had a history of pursuing and using weapons of mass destruction. It is true that he systematically concealed those programs, and blocked the work of U.N. weapons inspectors. It is true that […]
12/18/2005
In defense of enhanced interrogation techniques, Vice President Dick Cheney told ABC News, on December 18, 2005, ” ‘The rule is whether or not it shocks the conscience… Now, you can get into a debate about what shocks the conscience and what is cruel and inhuman. And to some extent, I suppose that’s in the […]
12/17/2005
On December 17, 2005, President “Bush discussed the NSA [National Security Agency] [warrantless surveillance] program in his Saturday radio address. ‘In the weeks following the terrorist attacks on our nation,’ he said, ‘I authorized the National Security Agency, consistent with U.S. law and the Constitution, to intercept the international communications of people with known links […]
12/16/2005
After journalists James Risen and Eric Lichtblau exposed the National Security Agency’s (NSA’s) warrantless surveillance controversy in a New York Times article on December 16, 2005, “President Bush, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, the head of the NSA at the beginning of the program, [former NSA Director] General Michael Hayden, and others all defended the program […]
12/16/2005
A New York Times article on December 16, 2005, “reported that the super-secret National Security Agency had intercepted telephone calls and e-mails traveling into and out of the United States, so long as one of the parties to the communication was suspected of being a member of al Qaeda. Surveillance took place without a FISA […]