I forced myself to watch the CNN "as it happened" coverage of 9/11 today. I was on a sales call during 9/11 and did not get in front of a television until much later in the day. The is the first time I have seen the actual live footage and a couple of things struck me. First of all it is almost as shocking watching it now as it was five years ago and I could feel myself getting angry all over again. The other thing was how strange it was to see the pre-9/11 mentality on display.
At 9:03 AM CNN has broken away to a local affiliate (WABC) who was interviewing an eyewitness. The have live footage of the second plane hitting the second tower but somehow the talking Ken doll misses it completely and is convinced that the fuselage of the first plane has caused another explosion in the first tower. Minutes go by as the broadcasting is still convinced of this even though the live pictures are telling another story. He literally would not let himself believe the second tower was hit. CNN then breaks back in and their own Ken doll interviews a former NTSB spokesman. During the interview the CNN host is asking if there could have been some malfunction on the planes that caused them to crash into the planes. The NTSB spokesman tries to explain that planes should never be the close to the towers in the first place. The host continues on the guidance malfunction theory when the spokesman explains that a pilot would not fly into the towers. Again, not letting his lying eyes decieve him, the host asks if maybe the pilots could not see the towers. The spokesman answers are very large in the skyline and in the second case there is a huge plume of smoke coming out of one of them - obviously it was impossible for a pilot not to see them. By 9:17 they are "less convinced that this is an accident", by 9:18 they report that it is a possible hijacking but "not yet determined a terrorist act" and it is not until 9:25 that it finally an "Act of Terrorism". Even with that CNN reports at 9:27 that it is unclear if this is an accident or terrorism. This is 14 minutes after the second tower is struck and after replaying the second plane turning into the second tower at least a dozen times.
Remember, CNN is reporting on this live, with aerial cameras focused clearly on the towers and they still refuse to believe what is going on. Do you think that it may have taken President Bush, who was in a classroom full of children and therefore did not have live access to the images coming out of New York, some time to piece it all together as well?
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Those famous moments of inaction
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This page contains a single entry from the blog posted on September 11, 2006 2:05 PM.
The previous post in this blog was Did it change me?.
The next post in this blog is Please tell me.
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Comments (1)
I don’t disagree at all, and I thought it was always silly, and a bit of a canard to attack Bush for not instantly jumping in to action.
The one thing I would point out, in defence of the argument that he didn’t respond quickly enough was that all that time that elapsed, and was the focus of so much attention, was not immediately after the planes had hit the towers (the planes, or at least the first one, actually hit the towers, and the President was informed of it, BEFORE he went in to the classroom) but was after his Chief of Staff Andrew Card leaned over the President and said “Mr. President, America is under attack.” All that Farenheit 9/11 ticking clock stuff starts the moment Card says this to the President, not the moment the planes hit. The President was already aware of the plane crash before he went in to read “My Pet Goat” to the kids, and no doubt felt the situation was being handled. The criticism, silly as it was, was always focused on his reaction to word that this was a deliberate attack.
Now, again, I think it’s a silly argument to make, and any one of us might have needed the same amount of time, or more, to process what was happening, I just thought I should clear up the criticism, lame as it is. I don’t think it was ever a criticism of him not responding immediately to the crash (which, again, happened before he went into the classroom) but for not responding immediately to word that it was a deliberate attack. It was only about 9 or 10 minutes I think, but it does feel like an awfully long time when you’re watching it, and you know the President was just informed that the nation was under attack.
Posted by Lord Kitchener's Own | September 11, 2006 3:29 PM
Posted on September 11, 2006 15:29