RIDGE: AL-QAEDA PLANNING ATTACK ADS
Attempt to Influence Fall Election, Homeland Chief Warns
Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge today revealed that there is credible evidence that al-Qaeda is preparing attack ads to be aired in key battleground states in the hopes of influencing the fall election.
“According to our information, al-Qaeda plans to run ads attacking President Bush’s record on the economy, Iraq, and the war on terror,” said Mr. Ridge, who called the potential effect of such ads on President Bush’s reelection campaign “sobering.”
While Mr. Ridge said it was not yet known when and where the ads would run, he said that there was evidence that the attack ads could include grainy footage of presumptive Democratic nominee John Kerry serving in Vietnam.
Additionally, Mr. Ridge said there is evidence that Osama bin Laden was behind the successful plot to destroy President Bush’s military service records which recently vanished from the Pentagon.
“Our preliminary investigation indicates that al-Qaeda destroyed President Bush’s military payroll files in an effort to expunge all evidence of his wartime heroism and thus influence our election,” said Mr. Ridge, who called al-Qaeda’s destruction of those files “sobering.”
Mr. Ridge said that the onslaught of anti-Bush attack ads could come “without warning,” but offered the American people the following advice: “If you see an ad on TV that seems to be attacking President Bush, close your eyes, stick one finger in each ear and go ‘la, la, la.’”
In other news, New York Post owner Rupert Murdoch denied he was the source for the Post’s front-page headline, SMARTY JONES WINS TRIPLE CROWN.