Grim Obama says terror attack 'dots' not connected

[unhappycamper]

Grim Obama says terror attack 'dots' not connected
By BEN FELLER
Associated Press Writer
Jan 6, 6:32 AM EST

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama scolded 20 of his highest-level officials on Tuesday over the botched Christmas Day terror attack on an airliner bound for Detroit, taking them jointly to task for "a screw-up that could have been disastrous" and should have been avoided.

After that 90-minute private reckoning around a table in the super-secure White House Situation Room, a grim-faced Obama informed Americans that the government had enough information to thwart the attack ahead of time but that the intelligence community, though trained to do so, did not "connect those dots."

"That's not acceptable, and I will not tolerate it," he said, standing solo to address the issue publicly for the fifth time - and the first in Washington - since the Dec. 25 incident.

Afterward, the White House released quotes from the Situation Room session. Disclosing Obama's words during a private meeting is normally strictly off-limits for this White House and most others before it. In this case, Obama advisers are eager to portray the president as aggressively on the job - even as he has little, or in this case nothing, new to announce about how to tackle the security lapses that allowed the airline plot to almost succeed.

Obama did not say who, if anyone, in the government might be held accountable. Earlier in the day, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the president still has full confidence in his three top national security officials: the director of national intelligence, Dennis Blair, CIA Director Leon Panetta and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano - all of whom were among those around the table with Obama later.


Rest of article at: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_OBAMA_AIRLINE_SECURITY?SITE=DCSAS&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

[Rosa Luxemburg]

1. Obama inherited Bush's intelligence (or not so intelligent) system

Obama is getting the blame but he inherited Bush's system which didn't connect any dots.

[unhappycamper]

2. bu$hCo = doo doo, not dots. n/t

[whyverne]

3. Do you think he is just posturing?

Close to 100,000 people fly every day. Twenty million+ over the major holidays.

Who's the hells going to pat down 20 million people?

Seems like an intelligent person would say to himself, "Hey we do the best we can". Perfection is impossible.

[applegrove]

4. He really looked quite concerned when he first came out. Not the happy guy we are used to.