How One Can Tell Bush Gave A Good Speech?

[Annie]

http://www.nationalreview.com/mccarthy/mccarthy200506290912.asp

June 29, 2005, 9:12 a.m.
It’s All About 9/11
The president links Iraq and al Qaeda — and the usual suspects moan.

President George W. Bush forcefully explained last night — some of us would say finally forcefully explained last night after too long a lull — why our military operations in Iraq are crucial to success in the war on terror.

It was good to hear the commander-in-chief remind people that this is still the war against terror. Specifically, against Islamo-fascists who slaughtered 3000 Americans on September 11, 2001. Who spent the eight years before those atrocities murdering and promising to murder Americans — as their leader put it in 1998, all Americans, including civilians, anywhere in the world where they could be found.

It is not the war for democratization. It is not the war for stability. Democratization and stability are not unimportant. They are among a host of developments that could help defeat the enemy.

But they are not the primary goal of this war, which is to destroy the network of Islamic militants who declared war against the United States when they bombed the World Trade Center on February 26, 1993, and finally jarred us into an appropriate response when they demolished that complex, struck the Pentagon, and killed 3000 of us on September 11, 2001.

That is why we are in Iraq.

On September 12, 2001, no one in America cared about whether there would be enough Sunni participation in a fledgling Iraqi democracy if Saddam were ever toppled. No one in lower Manhattan cared whether the electricity would work in Baghdad, or whether Muqtada al-Sadr’s Shiite militia could be coaxed into a political process. They cared about smashing terrorists and the states that supported them for the purpose of promoting American national security.

Saddam Hussein’s regime was a crucial part of that response because it was a safety net for al Qaeda. A place where terror attacks against the United States and the West were planned. A place where Saddam’s intelligence service aided and abetted al Qaeda terrorists planning operations. A place where terrorists could hide safely between attacks. A place where terrorists could lick their wounds. A place where committed terrorists could receive vital training in weapons construction and paramilitary tactics. In short, a platform of precisely the type without which an international terror network cannot succeed.

The president should know he hit the sweet spot during his Fort Bragg speech because all the right people are angry. The New York Times, with predictable disingenuousness, is railing this morning that the 9/11 references in the speech are out of bounds because Iraq had “nothing whatsoever to do with the terrorist attacks.” Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid and the tedious David Gergen, among others, are in Gergen’s words “offended” about use of the 9/11 “trump card.”

If the president is guilty of anything, it's not that he's dwelling on 9/11 enough. It's that the administration has not done a good enough job of probing and underscoring the nexus between the Saddam regime and al Qaeda. It is absolutely appropriate, it is vital, for him to stress that connection. This is still the war on terror, and Iraq, where the terrorists are still arrayed against us, remains a big part of that equation.

And not just because every jihadist with an AK-47 and a prayer rug has made his way there since we invaded. No, it’s because Saddam made Iraq their cozy place to land long before that. They are fighting effectively there because they’ve been invited to dig in for years.

The president needs to be talking about Saddam and terror because that’s what will get their attention in Damascus and Teheran. It’s not about the great experiment in democratization — as helpful as it would be to establish a healthy political culture in that part of the world. It’s about making our enemies know we are coming for them if they abet and harbor and promote and plan with the people who are trying to kill us.

On that score, nobody should worry about anything the Times or David Gergen or Senator Reid has to say about all this until they have some straight answers on questions like these. What does the “nothing whatsoever” crowd have to say about:

Ahmed Hikmat Shakir — the Iraqi Intelligence operative who facilitated a 9/11 hijacker into Malaysia and was in attendance at the Kuala Lampur meeting with two of the hijackers, and other conspirators, at what is roundly acknowledged to be the initial 9/11 planning session in January 2000? Who was arrested after the 9/11 attacks in possession of contact information for several known terrorists? Who managed to make his way out of Jordanian custody over our objections after the 9/11 attacks because of special pleading by Saddam’s regime?

Saddam's intelligence agency's efforts to recruit jihadists to bomb Radio Free Europe in Prague in the late 1990's?

Mohammed Atta's unexplained visits to Prague in 2000, and his alleged visit there in April 2001 which — notwithstanding the 9/11 Commission's dismissal of it (based on interviewing exactly zero relevant witnesses) — the Czechs have not retracted?

The Clinton Justice Department's allegation in a 1998 indictment (two months before the embassy bombings) against bin Laden, to wit: In addition, al Qaeda reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al Qaeda would not work against that government and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al Qaeda would work cooperatively with the Government of Iraq.

Seized Iraq Intelligence Service records indicating that Saddam's henchmen regarded bin Laden as an asset as early as 1992?

Saddam's hosting of al Qaeda No. 2, Ayman Zawahiri beginning in the early 1990’s, and reports of a large payment of money to Zawahiri in 1998?

Saddam’s ten years of harboring of 1993 World Trade Center bomber Abdul Rahman Yasin?

Iraqi Intelligence Service operatives being dispatched to meet with bin Laden in Afghanistan in 1998 (the year of bin Laden’s fatwa demanding the killing of all Americans, as well as the embassy bombings)?

Saddam’s official press lionizing bin Laden as “an Arab and Islamic hero” following the 1998 embassy bombing attacks?

The continued insistence of high-ranking Clinton administration officials to the 9/11 Commission that the 1998 retaliatory strikes (after the embassy bombings) against a Sudanese pharmaceutical factory were justified because the factory was a chemical weapons hub tied to Iraq and bin Laden?

Top Clinton administration counterterrorism official Richard Clarke’s assertions, based on intelligence reports in 1999, that Saddam had offered bin Laden asylum after the embassy bombings, and Clarke’s memo to then-National Security Adviser Sandy Berger, advising him not to fly U-2 missions against bin Laden in Afghanistan because he might be tipped off by Pakistani Intelligence, and “[a]rmed with that knowledge, old wily Usama will likely boogie to Baghdad”? (See 9/11 Commission Final Report, p. 134 & n.135.)

Terror master Abu Musab Zarqawi's choice to boogie to Baghdad of all places when he needed surgery after fighting American forces in Afghanistan in 2001?

Saddam's Intelligence Service running a training camp at Salman Pak, were terrorists were instructed in tactics for assassination, kidnapping and hijacking?

Former CIA Director George Tenet’s October 7, 2002 letter to Congress, which asserted: Our understanding of the relationship between Iraq and Al Qaeda is evolving and is based on sources of varying reliability. Some of the information we have received comes from detainees, including some of high rank.

We have solid reporting of senior level contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda going back a decade.

Credible information indicates that Iraq and Al Qaeda have discussed safe haven and reciprocal nonaggression.

Since Operation Enduring Freedom, we have solid evidence of the presence in Iraq of Al Qaeda members, including some that have been in Baghdad.

We have credible reporting that Al Qaeda leaders sought contacts in Iraq who could help them acquire WMD capabilities. The reporting also stated that Iraq has provided training to Al Qaeda members in the areas of poisons and gases and making conventional bombs.

Iraq's increasing support to extremist Palestinians coupled with growing indications of relationship with Al Qaeda suggest that Baghdad's links to terrorists will increase, even absent U.S. military action.​

There's more. Stephen Hayes’s book, The Connection, remains required reading. But these are just the questions; the answers — if someone will just investigate the questions rather than pretending there’s “nothing whatsoever” there — will provide more still.

So Gergen, Reid, the Times, and the rest are “offended” at the president's reminding us of 9/11? The rest of us should be offended, too. Offended at the “nothing whatsoever” crowd’s inexplicable lack of curiosity about these ties, and about the answers to these questions.

Just tell us one thing: Do you have any good answer to what Ahmed Hikmat Shakir was doing with the 9/11 hijackers in Kuala Lampur? Can you explain it?

If not, why aren't you moving heaven and earth to find out the answer?

— Andrew C. McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor, is a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.

 

[Gem]

Adding to the Hussien-bin Laden connection:

ABC News reported on a connection between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden and numerous other terrorists in 1999.

If anyone wants to hear the report, a talk radio host in Pittsburgh has it archived. You can actually listen to the ABC report discussing in detail the relationship between Bin Laden, Hussein, and numerous other terrorists. I can tell you how to get there, just PM me. I would link it...but its another private site and I'm not sure about the legality of that.

It is truly fascinating to see how things like this, the understanding that Hussein and Bin Laden had numerous connections, just completely disappeared from the public discourse and the main-stream media once Bush took office.

 

[Bullypulpit]

Were he to simply remain silent, thus lending doubt to his cognitive abilities, rather than talking and removing all doubt as to his lack thereof, would he give a good speech.

You've drunk too deeply of the kool-aide dear lady.

 

[Bullypulpit]

Adding to the Hussien-bin Laden connection:

ABC News reported on a connection between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden and numerous other terrorists in 1999.

If anyone wants to hear the report, a talk radio host in Pittsburgh has it archived. You can actually listen to the ABC report discussing in detail the relationship between Bin Laden, Hussein, and numerous other terrorists. I can tell you how to get there, just PM me. I would link it...but its another private site and I'm not sure about the legality of that.

It is truly fascinating to see how things like this, the understanding that Hussein and Bin Laden had numerous connections, just completely disappeared from the public discourse and the main-stream media once Bush took office.

They disappeared because there were no demonstrable links. You think if there were such links Dubbyuh and his merry band wouldn't have had them plastered all over the news? They're desperate for any straw they can grasp at to support their sagging poll numbers.

 

[Annie]

Were he to simply remain silent, thus lending doubt to his cognitive abilities, rather than talking and removing all doubt as to his lack thereof, would he give a good speech.

You've drunk too deeply of the kool-aide dear lady.

Bully, why don't you address even some of the questions posed?

 

[no1tovote4]

Bully, why don't you address even some of the questions posed?

Because he has drunk too deeply of the Kool-Aid, dear Lady...

It always is amusing to me to see the same information that was used to defend Clinton's actions, while bombing the crap out of an already defeated country, denied entirely by the left now that they want something to use against Bush.

Much like the way they defend the bombing of the Pill Factory in the middle of his Grand Jury Testimony, yet cannot see direct evidence. That there was no direct link between Saddam and 9/11, there are certainly links between Saddam and terrorist organizations that are undeniable. Shoot, he would go on TV with big Lotto-style checks for the families of suicide bombers in Isreal. He made no effort to hide the fact that he funded Hezbollah, that there were connections between him and Al Qaeda are clear as well.

This is like three people that work together to rob banks on occasion, but two decide to rob a bank while the third isn't in the city that day. This means that he didn't help rob that bank, not that he was never associated with the other two.

 

[freeandfun1]

They disappeared because there were no demonstrable links. You think if there were such links Dubbyuh and his merry band wouldn't have had them plastered all over the news? They're desperate for any straw they can grasp at to support their sagging poll numbers.

Ok Bully, then why doesn't the network run a story retracting the story and pointing out with FACTS why they are retracting the story? They won't because they know the story was true. You are the only one ignoring facts. How have you made it this far through life? Relying on the assistance of others?

 

[nakedemperor]

We have solid reporting of senior level contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda going back a decade.

No, we don't. Remember when Cheney made a complete jackass of himself saying "Iraqi agents met with Al Qaeda operatives in Prague" and then a few weeks later "I never once said that Iraqi agents met with Al Qaeda in Prague"? No, we don't have "solid reporting" of "senior level contacts". What was reported "most credibly" was a series of letters between LOW level contacts a DECADE ago.

Credible information indicates that Iraq and Al Qaeda have discussed safe haven and reciprocal nonaggression.

Potentially, because of mutual enemies in the North.

Since Operation Enduring Freedom, we have solid evidence of the presence in Iraq of Al Qaeda members, including some that have been in Baghdad.

Yeah, because they came there AFTER the invasion of aforementioned Orwellian name because Iraq has become, according to the CIA, the planet's most fertile terror breeding ground. GOOD POINT.

We have credible reporting that Al Qaeda leaders sought contacts in Iraq who could help them acquire WMD capabilities.

Whoa whoa, hold the phone. Al Qaeda was seeking WMDs!? No. Way. And they were ASKING people?? Un. freakin. believable.

These are the most inane selections I could find. The author made NO case for ANY collaboration WHATsoever between Baghdad and Al Qaeda on 9/11. Hence, again, finally, pleaseohplease for the last time, Iraq had NOTHING ot do, WHATSOEVER with the attacks on 9/11.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

No, we don't. Remember when Cheney made a complete jackass of himself saying "Iraqi agents met with Al Qaeda operatives in Prague" and then a few weeks later "I never once said that Iraqi agents met with Al Qaeda in Prague"? No, we don't have "solid reporting" of "senior level contacts". What was reported "most credibly" was a series of letters between LOW level contacts a DECADE ago.



Potentially, because of mutual enemies in the North.



Yeah, because they came there AFTER the invasion of aforementioned Orwellian name because Iraq has become, according to the CIA, the planet's most fertile terror breeding ground. GOOD POINT.



Whoa whoa, hold the phone. Al Qaeda was seeking WMDs!? No. Way. And they were ASKING people?? Un. freakin. believable.

These are the most inane selections I could find. The author made NO case for ANY collaboration WHATsoever between Baghdad and Al Qaeda on 9/11. Hence, again, finally, pleaseohplease for the last time, Iraq had NOTHING ot do, WHATSOEVER with the attacks on 9/11.

Please educate yourself.

http://www.nationalreview.com/mccarthy/mccarthy200506290912.asp

What does the “nothing whatsoever” crowd have to say about:

Ahmed Hikmat Shakir — the Iraqi Intelligence operative who facilitated a 9/11 hijacker into Malaysia and was in attendance at the Kuala Lampur meeting with two of the hijackers, and other conspirators, at what is roundly acknowledged to be the initial 9/11 planning session in January 2000? Who was arrested after the 9/11 attacks in possession of contact information for several known terrorists? Who managed to make his way out of Jordanian custody over our objections after the 9/11 attacks because of special pleading by Saddam’s regime?

Saddam's intelligence agency's efforts to recruit jihadists to bomb Radio Free Europe in Prague in the late 1990's?

Mohammed Atta's unexplained visits to Prague in 2000, and his alleged visit there in April 2001 which — notwithstanding the 9/11 Commission's dismissal of it (based on interviewing exactly zero relevant witnesses) — the Czechs have not retracted?

The Clinton Justice Department's allegation in a 1998 indictment (two months before the embassy bombings) against bin Laden, to wit: In addition, al Qaeda reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al Qaeda would not work against that government and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al Qaeda would work cooperatively with the Government of Iraq.

Seized Iraq Intelligence Service records indicating that Saddam's henchmen regarded bin Laden as an asset as early as 1992?

Saddam's hosting of al Qaeda No. 2, Ayman Zawahiri beginning in the early 1990’s, and reports of a large payment of money to Zawahiri in 1998?

Saddam’s ten years of harboring of 1993 World Trade Center bomber Abdul Rahman Yasin?

Iraqi Intelligence Service operatives being dispatched to meet with bin Laden in Afghanistan in 1998 (the year of bin Laden’s fatwa demanding the killing of all Americans, as well as the embassy bombings)?

Saddam’s official press lionizing bin Laden as “an Arab and Islamic hero” following the 1998 embassy bombing attacks?

The continued insistence of high-ranking Clinton administration officials to the 9/11 Commission that the 1998 retaliatory strikes (after the embassy bombings) against a Sudanese pharmaceutical factory were justified because the factory was a chemical weapons hub tied to Iraq and bin Laden?

Top Clinton administration counterterrorism official Richard Clarke’s assertions, based on intelligence reports in 1999, that Saddam had offered bin Laden asylum after the embassy bombings, and Clarke’s memo to then-National Security Adviser Sandy Berger, advising him not to fly U-2 missions against bin Laden in Afghanistan because he might be tipped off by Pakistani Intelligence, and “[a]rmed with that knowledge, old wily Usama will likely boogie to Baghdad”? (See 9/11 Commission Final Report, p. 134 & n.135.)

Terror master Abu Musab Zarqawi's choice to boogie to Baghdad of all places when he needed surgery after fighting American forces in Afghanistan in 2001?

Saddam's Intelligence Service running a training camp at Salman Pak, were terrorists were instructed in tactics for assassination, kidnapping and hijacking?

Former CIA Director George Tenet’s October 7, 2002 letter to Congress, which asserted: Our understanding of the relationship between Iraq and Al Qaeda is evolving and is based on sources of varying reliability. Some of the information we have received comes from detainees, including some of high rank.

We have solid reporting of senior level contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda going back a decade.

Credible information indicates that Iraq and Al Qaeda have discussed safe haven and reciprocal nonaggression.

Since Operation Enduring Freedom, we have solid evidence of the presence in Iraq of Al Qaeda members, including some that have been in Baghdad.

We have credible reporting that Al Qaeda leaders sought contacts in Iraq who could help them acquire WMD capabilities. The reporting also stated that Iraq has provided training to Al Qaeda members in the areas of poisons and gases and making conventional bombs.

Iraq's increasing support to extremist Palestinians coupled with growing indications of relationship with Al Qaeda suggest that Baghdad's links to terrorists will increase, even absent U.S. military action.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

woops. Article already cited. Oh well. The truth bears repeating.

 

[freeandfun1]

woops. Article already cited. Oh well. The truth bears repeating.

As we all know, NE is not at all interested in the truth.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

NE. Even if on this one point "that is was a low level connection form a decade ago" is correct. Isn't that still a connection? And even if they were conspiring against a "common enemy to the north" isn't that still a connection?

Iraq is just another frong against alqaeda and terrorism.

Should we not have attacked germany in wwII because it was the Japanese that attacked us? Or she would have made the connection, the very real connection, that the Japanese had an alliance with germany? I'm certain al quaeda has a connection to alquaeda.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

NE. another question: Why does alquaeda care if Iraq becomes free and democratic? Do you think they're afraid of losing a sympathetic government or something?

 

[archangel]

Why waste ones time arguing with super liberals....let's be blunt here..they are just to plain "Chicken shit" to risk their minimal lives to help others...They are afraid of dying or getting hurt...so they attack those who do as "war mongers" to save face...end of discussion!

 

[Jimmyeatworld]

No, we don't. Remember when Cheney made a complete jackass of himself saying "Iraqi agents met with Al Qaeda operatives in Prague" and then a few weeks later "I never once said that Iraqi agents met with Al Qaeda in Prague"? No, we don't have "solid reporting" of "senior level contacts". What was reported "most credibly" was a series of letters between LOW level contacts a DECADE ago.



Potentially, because of mutual enemies in the North.



Yeah, because they came there AFTER the invasion of aforementioned Orwellian name because Iraq has become, according to the CIA, the planet's most fertile terror breeding ground. GOOD POINT.



Whoa whoa, hold the phone. Al Qaeda was seeking WMDs!? No. Way. And they were ASKING people?? Un. freakin. believable.

These are the most inane selections I could find. The author made NO case for ANY collaboration WHATsoever between Baghdad and Al Qaeda on 9/11. Hence, again, finally, pleaseohplease for the last time, Iraq had NOTHING ot do, WHATSOEVER with the attacks on 9/11.

Terrorists are terrorists, and a "low level" link is still a link. While there is no evidense that Saddam's Iraq had a direct connection to the 9/11 attack (and I might add that nobody EVER said there was), there IS a link to terrorism. It's ignoring things like that that led to attacks on U.S. soil in the first place.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

Why waste ones time arguing with super liberals....let's be blunt here..they are just to plain "Chicken shit" to risk their minimal lives to help others...They are afraid of dying or getting hurt...so they attack those who do as "war mongers" to save face...end of discussion!

Because their lies and bad logic must be continually countered, lest someone reading this get the wrong idea. I know you know, and you know I know, but someone else may not know.

 

[archangel]

Because their lies and bad logic must be continually countered, lest someone reading this get the wrong idea. I know you know, and you know I know, but someone else may not know.

Point taken..it just gets so annoying...sorry!

 

[rtwngAvngr]

Point taken..it just gets so annoying...sorry!

No apology necessary, bro. I know it's annoying. We're in a battle for the mind of america.

 

[nakedemperor]

NE. Even if on this one point "that is was a low level connection form a decade ago" is correct. Isn't that still a connection? And even if they were conspiring against a "common enemy to the north" isn't that still a connection?

The president and his propaganda machine willfully misled the American public that Iraq had something to do with 9/11, SPECIFICALLY. If some low-level Iraqi officers (that is, people who would not at all be in a position to offer WMD support to Al Qaeda, as has been directly and indirectly alleged by Cheney et al since the beginning) had had contact with Al Qaeda operatives YEARS ago, this is NOT a rationale for war.

Iraq is just another frong against alqaeda and terrorism.

Now it is, thanks to our president of mass destruction.

Should we not have attacked germany in wwII because it was the Japanese that attacked us? Or she would have made the connection, the very real connection, that the Japanese had an alliance with germany? I'm certain al quaeda has a connection to alquaeda.

Circular logic at its most potent. Al Qaeda did not operate with impunity in Iraq under the iron-fisted regime of the control freak Saddam like they do now, since we invaded and sent out a personalized invitation to every single jihadist in the entire region to come take potshots at our soldiers.

What a dumb analogy. Japan and Germany had an explicitly defined and fully public military alliance which they're country's leaders shook on. Are you saying that Saddam and Bin Laden sat down together and signed some sort of agreement? Bin Laden constantly expressed his complete and utter hatred and contempt for the secularist Saddam regime. I'm not surprised you've fallen into the trap of 'all our enemies are friends' binary bullshit that the "with us or against us", "evildoers" black and white propaganda you've been spoonfed for years.

 

[-Cp]

For whatever nonsensical logic, President Bush cannot mention Iraq and 9/11 in the same sentence without Liberal nutjobs blowing a gasket and falsely accusing him of blaming Saddam for 9/11.

As nonsensical as blaming Roosevelt if he were to mention US soldiers fighting Germans in North Africa when we were attacked by Japan in Hawaii. D'UH....