Posted on 12/04/2004 11:39:17 AM PST by ApesForEvolution
WASHINGTON - President Bush (news - web sites) expressed no alarm Saturday about a warning from his outgoing top health official that the U.S. food supply is vulnerable to terror attacks but would not deny the assessment and assert that the nation's food is safe.
Reuters Photo
Thompson Resigns From Cabinet Post (AP Video)
Bush was questioned, after an Oval Office meeting with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, about comments by Health and Human Services (news - web sites) Secretary Tommy Thompson about the vulnerability of the U.S. food supply. Thompson spoke Friday as he announced his coming departure from the Bush administration.
"We're a large country with all kinds of avenues where somebody can inflict harm," Bush said. "We're doing everything we can to protect the American people. There's a lot of work to be done."
Thompson had said he worries "every single night" about a possible terror attack on the food supply, and despite dramatic increases in inspections of food imports, only "a very minute amount" of food is tested at ports and airports.
"For the life of me, I cannot understand why the terrorists have not attacked our food supply because it is so easy to do," Thompson said. "We are importing a lot of food from the Middle East, and it would be easy to tamper with that."
Thompson was the latest of eight members to quit Bush's 15-member Cabinet as the president moves into a second term.
Bush himself decided that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld would not go, ignoring criticism about Rumsfeld's handling of Iraq (news - web sites) and giving the secretary a strong vote of confidence to remain at the Pentagon (news - web sites). That decision, sealed Monday in an Oval Office meeting with Bush but not announced until Friday, settles one of the last major questions about who in the Cabinet goes and who stays.
Besides the eight members whose departure has been announced, Treasury Secretary John Snow has not received a public endorsement of continued service, even though White House officials have described him as a valuable member of the president's economic team.
Snow, who has been in the job less than two years, declined in an appearance Friday on CNBC to reveal whether he has submitted or offered to submit his resignation.
Rumsfeld's tenure has been marked by unanticipated postwar violence in Iraq and more than 1,250 U.S. deaths, as well as enormous increases in spending on the military after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. Despite controversies, the hawkish, sometimes acid-tongued Rumsfeld has kept Bush's confidence.
Rumsfeld also has a long history of influential support from Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) from their days together in the Ford administration in the mid-1970s.
Rumsfeld has a full plate: continuing military operations in Iraq, focused now on securing the country ahead of January elections; the ongoing effort in Afghanistan (news - web sites) and a plan to modernize the military.
Bush believes Rumsfeld is "the right person at this moment in our history in fighting the war on terror to lead our armed forces," a senior administration official said in describing the president's decision.
The secretary's future had been the subject of much speculation, after revelations about abuses at Abu Ghraib and other U.S.-run prisons in Iraq. Though Bush steadfastly backed his defense chief — one of the more hawkish members of his administration — Rumsfeld had many detractors in Congress and the military.
It had been widely believed at the Pentagon that Rumsfeld wanted to stay on, at least for a time, in order to oversee the continuing transition in Iraq and shepherd his plan for a fundamental transformation and modernization of the U.S. military.
Rumsfeld, 72, is the oldest person to serve as secretary of defense. He also was the youngest when he ran the Pentagon for President Ford.
Rumsfeld took intense criticism from members of Congress last spring when the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal became public. He told the Senate Armed Services Committee (news - web sites) that he would quit if he thought that would help, but not simply to satisfy the administration's political enemies.
Rumsfeld said he would take the blame for the scandal. After the completion and publication of several in-depth investigations, the pressure for him to resign abated during the summer.
In recent interviews, Rumsfeld had refused to talk about his future, except to say he remained committed to transforming the military to make it more capable of fighting wars of the 21st century.
Many have criticized him for failing to foresee the insurgency that has taken thousands of Iraqi lives and killed hundreds of American troops since Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s regime was toppled in April 2003.
Rumsfeld has acknowledged that the strength and resilience of the insurgency was underestimated.
It was not clear how long Rumsfeld's top deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, and chief policy adviser, Douglas Feith, would remain. Pentagon spokesman Lawrence Di Rita said Friday that Feith told his staff he intended to stay for a while.
Yes, they do but they've been through years of testing while Mexico is using pesticides that we have banned because someone thought they were unsafe.
"What a brain dead statement to make, I always thought this guy had a screw loose."
Ain't that the truth! These days, it is absolutely critical to appoint people who understand how the media will seek to twist everything you say into propaganda. With Tommy, the media doesn't even have to try very hard. This poster child for Retards-R-Us just gives the enemy all the information they need. What the hell.
PS : Is it just me,or does he look like a ventriloquist's dummy?
Yes, what a loaded comment. It's like saying, "And every night I worry about them coming across the weak links in the Mexican border and then going into any hardware store to buy bomb parts and then walking into a crowded airport terminal in the unguarded public entries and setting it off"
Our ports are our borders, look at a map sometime.
Man, what was I thinking!?
lol
Hey, who's buried in Grant's tomb??
G'night...
Yet another Beltway gasbag with "insert foot fully into mouth" disease: "Come to think of it, this problem I haven't done anything about for the past four years could end up being pretty serious, now that I think about it."
Don't think that qualifies as 'the bright side', but unfortunately you are right otherwise. It does have the potential for greater governmental meddling and power.
Maybe it was the kneejerk utterance of an inveterate statist.
Or maybe the culture of the agency he headed made mush of his brain.
We had a poster here on FR years ago who worked in the agriculture inspection industry. He told us some areas of potential sabotage (chickens) but refused to get specific for reasons of security. Thompson said a correct and true thing. But he held up a big flag and said, "Terrorists, are we ever weak in this dept!"
Isn't Thompson a Democrat? Reason enough to speak like this, don't you think?
No, he's a Republican and the former governor of Wisconsin.
He gained much notice in the areas of both welfare reform and school choice when he was governor.
What food are we importing from the Middle East? The only thing I eat that comes from Europe is canned olives I picked up at Trader Joes. What the hell was Thompson railing on about?
I sure wish our enemies would be so "forthright" in telling us where their vulnerabiliites lie. Other countries must be amazed as they watch the American officials identify for their enemies where they are weak.
Dick Cheney is right in saying that it's not a matter of "if" we will be attacked again, but "when."
I totally agree with your conclusion. TT is no idiot, and if he feels we are vulnerable in this area, why not give the American people a "Heads up?"? Additionally, to believe he has somehow now planted this is terrorist's minds is naive. Poisoning foods is as old as the hills. It is the reason kings employed food and wine tasters. If the tasters dropped dead, the king would go for meal "B." I'm quite sure this tactic was on the terrorists agenda before TT spoke.
"Ain't I somethin"?
Come on now. Let's use a little common sense.
You actually think that al Qaeda and company HAVEN'T thought about poisoning the food and/or the water???!!!
It's NOT as easy as it may seem, and can be detected early on. Besides, they (al Qaeda) aren't likely to go for killing small amounts of people, which is all that it would effect before detection would occur, they want the big numbers of deaths (bang for the buck), like deadly chemicals spread through the air over and around large cities.
No sense panicking on this kind of crap.
My guess is that he was lashing out at someone in his department who stonewalled his efforts in this area.
Seemed stupid none the less.
"Damfool comment from Thompson. Buh-bye Tommy-boy."
... and don't see you again!
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