Posted on 08/17/2005 8:51:04 AM PDT by spycatcher
Interesting e-mail from reader B.G.: "I believe your skepticism regarding Lt. Col. Shaffer’s memory – 'whether the otherwise obscure name of "Mohammed Atta" might have become part of their recollections after the fact because it became so famous' – deserves your reevaluation.
"I would contend that whatever Shaffer knew about Mohammed Atta and the Brooklyn cell would have been reinforced in, and not 'become part of,' Shaffer’s memory on and in the days immediately after 9/11. Other elements of the story, such as having three meetings to transfer this information cancelled at the last minute, and the resulting feelings of frustration, would suggest that these inter-related memories were more strongly ingrained in his memory—at the time they occurred—than other things of which he was also aware. There’s also the issue of associative memory—Able Danger was engaged in linking information and as a liaison Shaffer undoubtedly understood the nature of its work—in that (if Shaffer indeed has a strongly associative memory) his conciously recallable memories would have expanded as he probed his memory for relevant information, after the stimulus of hearing Atta’s name and seeing his face immediately after 9/11.
"It would be worthwhile to ask Lt. Col. Shaffer if he has a visual memory. It has been my experience that many of those who do not have a visual memory (and they vary in the way the function) do not appreciate or understand the associative power that a person’s memory may possess. If Shaffer’s memory (and thinking) is visually based, it’s likely that he had a flood of associated memories triggered by seeing Atta’s face on TV after the 9/11 attack."
If any of the radio talk-show hosts who will be interviewing Lt. Col. Shaffer today is reading this, it might make for an interesting question -- does he have an associative memory? How can he be sure about Atta's name when it was among a list of 60 others? Not to mention the other three hijackers he mentions?
What's next? Does Lt Col Schaffer have homonymous quadrantanopia or complete bitemporal hemianopia? Yeah that's the ticket! Heck there's no story here, Shaffer is legally blind!
Or does Lt Col Shaffer have schizophrenia? It's clear he was hallucinating, right? So it's either that or he was on LSD. We have to dig into Shaffer's medical records now to get to the truth of Able Danger!
He's just joining the chorus of CYA politics.
Yes!!!!!!!!! He was on Acid, and suffering from Quadrophenia....
Obscure name "Mohammad Atta"?
How is it obscure....
Mohammad you don't even have to try to remember, its unbeliveably common (due to the arabic practice of giving the first name of somoene you greatly admire).
And Atta... its 4 letters, 2 of which are repeated. If I saw that name is sure as well would be easy to remember.
Why is Jpod the clown seemingly working so hard to discredit this every day?
I fart in his general direction...
J Pod revised this thought, you should post his latest.
If his medical records and drug tests are clean, then he must have been an MK ULTRA baby!
Er...that would be Crainial-Rectal Insertion Syndrome
more idiocy from podhoretz.....we won't forget this!!!
He's backtracking now after Andy McCarthy spanked his silly ass.
THE POINT IS TRAINING AND FOCUS, NOT ASSOCIATIVE MEMORY [Andy McCarthy ]
John, not to reopen this whole can of worms again – let’s please just agree to disagree about “blather and palaver” – one of your least impressive arguments (which is not to suggest that you haven’t made several good ones) has been this notion that “Mohammed Atta” is an obscure name that no one would remember. As you put the question to me a couple of days ago, making the same argument in the context of the naval intelligence officer who came forward in July 2004: “let's be honest here -- would you have remembered a specific name like ‘Mohammed Atta’ from a list of 60 names in 2000?”
In fact, if my job had been to investigate Islamic terrorist organizations, I would almost surely have remembered it. I can attest first-hand, just as you are suggesting, that I had a steep learning curve when I first began confronting a lot of Arabic names. It’s not hard, though, once you get steeped in it. In very short order, I knew my Mohammeds from my Muhammads.
Sixty names, moreover, is not a lot of names when we’re talking about something the observer has a heightened interest in – whether for professional or other reasons. I could probably, for example, give you the names of many more than 60 guys who have played for the Mets and the Yankees over the last decade or so. If I suddenly read that one of them had accomplished some breathtaking baseball feat, that would almost surely jar my memory that I had once known the guy as a journeyman utility infielder.
So when we’re talking about intelligence officials whose job was to focus on militant Islamic terror groups, I don’t think their memories of suspected terrorists can be judged in accordance with what a civilian or lay person would likely remember. It is instead a matter of what someone of that official’s training, occupation and focus might reasonably recall. That, by the way, is very similar to how courts evaluate whether there is probable cause for a search warrant: it is not a matter of how the layman would evaluate the evidence but what the police officer would believe it showed based on his unique training and experience.
To be clear, I am not vouching for the naval intelligence officer or Col. Shaffer. As I've noted with respect to the former, we don't know enough about what happened, and the fact that someone as able as commission staffer Dieter Snell appears to have rejected the naval officer's information gives me cause for pause. My only point is that it would be unwise to reject out-of-hand the accounts of intelligence officials whose job was tracking militant Islam by theorizing that they are unlikely to have remembered the names of those they were tracking.
ping!
Has Podhoretz gone 'round the bend'? Why not just shut up and let events play out. Weldon, after all, sits with an ace in the hole, a naval officer who apparently knows even more than Lt. Colonel Shaffer and is yet to be heard from. You have to ask, given his desperation, who is Podhoretz covering for?
"He's just joining the chorus of CYA politics."
He just posted another response to Andrew McCarthy basically retracting everything he said in this post. He just can't seem to get his mind around the possibility that something this outrageously corrupt could be perpetrated in full view and in broad daylight and seems to think that cynicism will be mistaken for intelligence.
My response to him on that is simply where else but sitting on the Commission itself could Jamie Gorelick have avoided being forced to testify. Nowhere. Hiding in plain sight.
I guess the fact that three other intel officers have affirmed Shaffer's claims doesn't enter into Podhertz's thinking.
After all the years of Clintonian obfuscation, stonewalling and denial, how some so-called conservatives can still want to shoot the messenger and believe the political hacks is beyond me. The 9/11 Commission has changed its story several times since the Able Danger story broke. Normally, that would indicate that the source has more veracity than the target. I don't know what Podhertz is up to, but it sure doesn't smell right.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/08/17/terror/main781949.shtml
Shaffer's interview on CBS News morning program. Broadband suggested.
I heard we have about a dozen sources on this story waiting to drop the hammer once they feel the personal attacks won't work.
No dude, he was luded. LOL
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