An intimate portrait of the aftermath in the home of the new president. While traveling this weekend I was engrossed in this post by humanodon. My general knowledge on the sheer number of assassination attempts on U.S. presidents was lacking, as I found the article shocking. Dickerson's article is a timely underscore to but one of the incidents. I found the level of paranoia, fear, and lack of intelligence (information) Johnson was expressing to be an interesting juxtaposition to the aggressive information omnipotence people are increasingly ascribing to the executive branch in light of the Snowden revelations about our intelligence services.
I found the level of paranoia, fear, and lack of intelligence (information) Johnson was expressing to be an interesting juxtaposition to the aggressive information omnipotence people are increasingly ascribing to the executive branch in light of the Snowden revelations about our intelligence services.
-My guess is that the more data you have, the more paranoid one becomes. Unless you have an absolutely clear picture of intelligence, you are somewhat forced to be "paranoid." You have to color in the missing bits of information. You have analysts that are supposed to do this for you and paint you the most accurate picture possible, but when you know that the truths you are being told are narratives constructed by minimal amounts of data, anyone would be a bit paranoid.
Yeah, and I don't mean to suggest that I think that a sitting president now wouldn't be gripped by fear and bewilderment in a crisis, -that's why I juxtaposed it with what we ascribe to current presidents utilizing the current intelligence capabilities. I mean, George W. received a report in hard copy on his desk entitled 'Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US' and he looked damn confused while reading My Pet Goat...