Tom Clancy transcript from O'Reilly Factor

O'Reilly factor | 9/20/01 | kcpopps

[Oldsailor]

I think O'Reilly showed his but to the country by allowing Bill Maher
to Weasel ..........or try to weasel out of his jam.
O'Reilly lost a lot of credibility with this one.

[jmp702]

Good post. Clancy is very wise.

[doc]

I totally agree. Isn't part of the governments job is to protect our borders. Clancy stated that our armed services are there to kill, then why are they handing out meals around the world? I was very disappointed in some of his answers.

[ChemistCat]

The FBI are cops. They are required by law to react to a crime. You can't arrest people for visiting the country. They have to do something illegal. These guys did their illegal thing and died in the process; it's a little late. Now the FBI is working on solving the crime. That's their job. They're getting evidence and netting other people who are here. I think I'm seeing evidence of them collecting copycats too (couple arrested today after downloading lots and lots and lots of photos of gov't buildings & bridges and other targets.) Great! More power to them! Let them do it right this time--no lost documents, no inadmissable evidence, warrants all in order when they're needed, don't let a single fly out of the web! It's amazing to see a force not long ago so very demoralized pulling it together and finding their mission again. Pray for them. Bake them cookies. (Well, I don't know about the cookies. Order them pizzas?)

[america-rules]

Good answer.

People seem to be ignorant (Ignorant as in they don't know) the different missions of the Gov't agencies.

FBI: Cops and robbers

CIA: Intel on foreign Gov'ts

INS: Border patrol etc.

Pres: Commander in chief - not dictator - 1/3 of US Gov't

Congress: Declares war

Mil: Defend against foreign attacks

[lara]

Thank you so much for posting this. It was such good reading I didn't notice any typos. I wish Bill had asked Tom what he thought about Hollywood changing the nationality of the bad guys in the movie version of his book coming out. Ben Affleck, gross, plays Jack Ryan now, replacing Harrison Ford. In the book, the villains were Arab terrorists but that was politically incorrect, so Hollywood changed them to "right wing neo Nazis."

[holdonnow]

Let's see ... Hannity had Buchanan on his radio show yesterday, O'Reilly has him on his TV show; Hannity had Maher on his radio show today, O'Reilly had Maher on his TV show today. And Tom Clancy was, as usual brilliant; Bill O'Reilly was way out of his league.

[ChemistCat]

My friend Todd said if we do this right, we could give every single Mexican who wants it 40 acres and a camel. The camel might need a little aloe vera burn gel at first, though.

As far as the military goes, my husband says our job is to kill people and break their stuff. IF we do it well enough, they decide not to screw with us. Somebody's going to learn not to screw with us. (I'm standing here being dictated to as I type...not my words! But he spent 24 years hoping he'd have the chance to do this and do this right...and he was forced out...High Year of Tenure, mandatory retirement...and the military threw out I don't know how many thousands or tens of thousands in training in satellite communications technology...makes me mad when I start thinking about...you can tell I'm mad because these little DOTS keep appearing in my posts....)

[ChemistCat]

My friend Todd said if we do this right, we could give every single Mexican who wants it 40 acres and a camel. The camel might need a little aloe vera burn gel at first, though.

As far as the military goes, my husband says our job is to kill people and break their stuff. IF we do it well enough, they decide not to screw with us. Somebody's going to learn not to screw with us. (I'm standing here being dictated to as I type...not my words! But he spent 24 years hoping he'd have the chance to do this and do this right...and he was forced out...High Year of Tenure, mandatory retirement...and the military threw out I don't know how many thousands or tens of thousands in training in satellite communications technology...makes me mad when I start thinking about...you can tell I'm mad because these little DOTS keep appearing in my posts....)

[ChemistCat]

That was so good, and so disjointed, and written so late at night, I was sure it was good for another round....

[Movemout]

I am not trying to provoke an argument. I am pointing out that the FBI has a slew of intelligence gathering resources. They are not a pure reaction force as Clancy painted the picture. The lack of communication between the CIA and FBI has been recognized long before the attack on our country and is deplorable. Both agencies were tracking some of the actors prior to the attack and apparently did not share the intel with each other to try to interpret what it all meant. This is not what I want. The blame for the attacks rest squarely on the terrorists but I think that we should be able to count on the CIA and FBI to communicate and coordinate on a routine basis.

[Movemout]

"People seem to be ignorant (Ignorant as in they don't know) the different missions of the Gov't agencies.

FBI: Cops and robbers "

Truer words were never spoken. Go out and educate yourself on the the FBI mission in intelligence gathering. Their mission is domestic in nature but they have literally infiltrated every domestic militia unit,KKK chapter, and Black Panther get together for the last 35 years. If that isn't intelligence gathering then I do not know what is.

[Texas2step]

"Bill soldiers don't arrest people, soldiers kill people. That's their function."

Absolutely classic!

By the way, if you don't read Tom Clancy, you should! Every single book he's written is absolutely incredible. At least the novels. I don't get into his "special ops" co-written books much, but the novels featuring Jack Ryan are incredible! Must reads! His last book, The Bear and The Dragon, whoa...awesome!

[MissAmericanPie]

ROFL ship them all to a new Azat Land? Now I have heard everything.

I agree with your husband, we are suppose to kill people and break things, you both sound like my kind of people. Where you spit grass doesn't grow for 50 years, lol.

I bet the service would love to have your husband back now, in fact your phone may be ringing soon. We lost so many good soldiers and commanders in the Clinton Calamity. I remember General's taking early retirement and the loss of the brightest and the best. It made me sick then, it makes me sick now.

[Right Face]

PING!

[WRhine]

He had O'Reilly on his heels the whole interview--it was a complete mental mismatch.

Maybe, only because Clancy was consistent. What floored me was his attitude that yeah some terrorists could do something really bad to us, like Nuke us, but we shouldn't protect our borders anyway and, oh well, we are an open society...what can we do? It was quite unreal for me to hear him talk like that.

[whenigettime]

Thank you so much for this post! Debt of Honor is what immediately came to mind while listening to my favorite radio station KNRS that dark morning. I had wondered what Clancy would have to say and because of your post, I got to read it!

[kcpopps]

You're welcome. I want it to be known that my daughter typed the last four questions for me, because I was pooped and she is faster than me anyway.... but she is the one who did not capitalize United States - I'll will bring that to her attention tomorrow!

[onyx]

Thanks so much! I watched the interview, but thanks to you I can now read Clancy's words to my husband! Clancy stung O'Reilly with his blunt honesty! You must remember that O'Reilly practically worships RFK!

[rebelsoldier]

Tom Clancy should stick to fictional political thrillers, because when it comes to the real world, he is clueless. I found his assessments of terrorist threats worthless and hollow. Firstly, Clancy claimed that the Mossad has basically been a failure in stopping the Islamic terrorist threat because they have been at it for decades and the threat still exists. The fact is that Israel, a tiny nation barely the size of Rhode Island surrounded by extremely hostile, heavily armed Arab/Islamic terrorists and suicide bombers, still endures with precarious assistance by the United States. Secondly, Clancy also said that the US counldn't really do anything about its pourous national borders and gave no alternatives to wide open, unsecure borders, and then claimed the military had no role in guarding or protecting our nation's borders. Clancy is out of his mind as well as out of his field. For one, thousands of our troops are already overseas guarding the borders of other, foreign countries at our expense, and these countries are not at war with us. Also, Clancy compared the wide open US borders with masses of people streaming in to visit the Statue of Liberty. This comparison is bad and preposterous. If you want to visit the Statue of Liberty, you must pay your own way, get in line, and wait patiently to be admitted, the antithesis of the massive illegal immigration Clancy attempts to compare it to. His "considered" opinion is not one I'd give credible consideration.