Ten Terror Plots Foiled Since 9/11?

Hard to know what to make of this:

The Sept. 11 commission had said in its report last year that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed had originally envisioned a broader operation in which as many as 10 aircraft would be hijacked and crashed into targets on both coasts. That report said Mr. Mohammed had described such a plot to his American interrogators.

But it had not previously been disclosed publicly that Mr. Mohammed envisioned carrying out a new plot on targets in the West Coast in 2002, after the Sept. 11 attacks. Some other plots listed by the White House have been known, including a thwarted attack in Britain in 2004.

The list also included other plots to bomb several sites in Britain in 2004; to attack Heathrow Airport in London using hijacked commercial airliners in 2003; to attack Westerners at several places in Karachi, Pakistan, in spring 2003; to attack ships in the Persian Gulf in late 2002 and 2003; to attack ships in the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow part of the gulf where it opens into the Arabian Sea, in 2002; and to attack a tourist site outside the United States in 2003.

Is it really plausible that these were real terror plots broken up, particularly the 2002 airplane one, and that we are just hearing about it now for the first time?

Isn't it clear that this is an increasingly desperate White House.

It sure doesn't help that (earlier in the article):

A senior White House official said Thursday evening that the president's 40-minute speech arose from Mr. Bush's desire to remind Americans, after "a lot of distractions" in recent months, that the country was still under threat...

"Distractions", I assume means bad news for Bush. And once again we see the utter shamelessness of this White House, playing the terror card whenever they need some relief from current events.

In other words, they are playing the "It's not my fault" card, that whatever problems we have are a result of terrorists, and not the ineptness of this president.