Politicizing the terror alerts

Tom Ridge confirms a long-held suspicion among Bush critics, writing in his new autobiography that he "was pushed to raise the security alert on the eve of President Bush's re-election, something he saw as politically motivated and worth resigning over."

Weigel adds:

If Ridge really quit DHS because it became so politically rotten, good for him; his successor Michael Chertoff, however, somehow managed to hold the job for four years without issuing a conveniently timed alert. And it’s worth remembering that the idea that Ridge might do this was seen, in 2004, as political conspiracy-mongering.



An abuse so gross — if Ridge is right — shows, among other things, what a powerful influence on the all-important tracking polls terror alerts must have had. And it suggests that Obama's efforts to keep terror arrests out of the national news are good politics too.