She said the System Worked. It Didn't. Was That Hypocrisy?


I've waited a while to see if anyone would accuse the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano (shown with the President), of hypocrisy. I'm glad to see that I can't find anyone making this accusation. Sure she has been accused of incompetence, ignorance, stupidity, etc. but I don't have a blog about that.

Even though I'm pleased, I'm a bit surprised. Back on December 26 she said "...the system worked..." and on December 27, she said, "...everything went like clockwork...". By December 28 she said "...the system did not work in this instance...". By Dec 29, the President said, "...[there was a] systemic failure...".

Lets take this one at a time.

In the "...the system worked..." and "...the system went like clockwork..", it seems to me that she was speaking about only the aspect of the system that includes getting people off an airplane and getting an offender in custody (it is less clear in the '..system worked.." case and more clear in the "...like clockwork..." case.)

Of course the 'empty the plane after the terrorism attempt' system is far less important than the 'prevent the terrorism' system. I think people intuitively saw that even if no one articulated it (or at least I can't find a case of that). Thus, to me she was attempting the old denotation/cognition trick and it failed (one might say that the spin system failed - especially when the President made his statement).

Thus, like the commentators at large I'm not calling Secretary Nepolitano a hypocrite.


December 26 report (which is a Dec 27 update of a previously reported story) here
December 27 report here.
December 28 report here.
December 29 report here.