Slaughter Calls for ABC to Come Clean on New 9-11 Docudrama

[Mr. P]

And that's worse than a president who lied about a country having WMDs and then goes to invade them? A president who wiretaps his people illegally and without warrant? A president who, being fed up with all the crap he got, wrote out 750+ notes so he could have a claim in being able to interpret them the way he pleases, including torture bills and laws?

I'll take Clinton over Bush.

Why am I NOT surprised?

 

[Abbey Normal]

Bully, Clinton was in office for 8 years prior to 9/11. Logic alone says the blame lays in his lap. Not totally on W who was only in office 6 months beforehand. Start in 1993 with the first attack and work forward.

Ahhh, the scent of sweet logic.

 

[Mr. P]

Ahhh, the scent of sweet logic.

Kinda lawyerly, ain’t it?

 

[Abbey Normal]

Kinda lawyerly, ain’t it?

And you didn't even charge $300/hr.

 

[Bullypulpit]

Bully, Clinton was in office for 8 years prior to 9/11. Logic alone says the blame lays in his lap. Not totally on W who was only in office 6 months beforehand. Start in 1993 with the first attack and work forward.

And who had a PDB entitled "Bin Laden determined to strike in US" come across his desk on August 6th 2001?...While he was on vacation in Crawford?

Logic would suggest that we had a warning, several in fact, which were ignored. Apparently John Ashcroft had better things to, like covering up the breasts of a statue of Justice at the DOJ. And Condi was busy shopping for shoes.

 

[dilloduck]

And who had a PDB entitled "Bin Laden determined to strike in US" come across his desk on August 6th 2001?...While he was on vacation in Crawford?

Logic would suggest that we had a warning, several in fact, which were ignored. Apparently John Ashcroft had better things to, like covering up the breasts of a statue of Justice at the DOJ. And Condi was busy shopping for shoes.

Bush--------I'll take "Wackos" for $400, Alex.

 

[Stephanie]

And who had a PDB entitled "Bin Laden determined to strike in US" come across his desk on August 6th 2001?...While he was on vacation in Crawford?

 

[Bullypulpit]

But true dear.

 

[Avatar4321]

And who had a PDB entitled "Bin Laden determined to strike in US" come across his desk on August 6th 2001?...While he was on vacation in Crawford?

Logic would suggest that we had a warning, several in fact, which were ignored. Apparently John Ashcroft had better things to, like covering up the breasts of a statue of Justice at the DOJ. And Condi was busy shopping for shoes.

So what you're saying is that it's President Bush's fault for 911 because he didnt capture Osama Bin Laden when with vague knowledge that Osama was going to strike America at some future date in time.

Meanwhile Bill Clinton, who knew Osama wanted to attack us, turned him down atleast 3 times when he was offered to us on a silver platter somehow is not responsible. Clinton has 8 years and easy opportunities to capture him, yet Bush knows about Osama's desire to attack about a month before he does, when Bush is still trying to put together his cabinet because of Al Gore's attempt to steal the election delayed the transition of government, and therefore he is completely responsible while Bill Clinton is not responsible at all???

 

[Stephanie]

So what you're saying is that it's President Bush's fault for 911 because he didnt capture Osama Bin Laden when with vague knowledge that Osama was going to strike America at some future date in time.

Of course that's what their saying....

Meanwhile Bill Clinton, who knew Osama wanted to attack us, turned him down at least 3 times when he was offered to us on a silver platter somehow is not responsible. Clinton has 8 years and easy opportunities to capture him, yet Bush knows about Osama's desire to attack about a month before he does, when Bush is still trying to put together his cabinet because of Al Gore's attempt to steal the election delayed the transition of government, and therefore he is completely responsible while Bill Clinton is not responsible at all???

None of that means a damn thing to these people....

Why do you think their all up in arms over this movie, Path to 9/11

 

[Mr. P]

Bush--------I'll take "Wackos" for $400, Alex.

He occupied the White House and had at least three chances to take Osama Bin Laden on a silver plater.

 

[Bullypulpit]

He occupied the White House and had at least three chances to take Osama Bin Laden on a silver plater.

A please.

 

[Mr. P]

A please.

It's all over the net Bully, and very old news i'm not gonna dig it up. Feel free.

 

[Bullypulpit]

So what you're saying is that it's President Bush's fault for 911 because he didnt capture Osama Bin Laden when with vague knowledge that Osama was going to strike America at some future date in time.

Meanwhile Bill Clinton, who knew Osama wanted to attack us, turned him down atleast 3 times when he was offered to us on a silver platter somehow is not responsible. Clinton has 8 years and easy opportunities to capture him, yet Bush knows about Osama's desire to attack about a month before he does, when Bush is still trying to put together his cabinet because of Al Gore's attempt to steal the election delayed the transition of government, and therefore he is completely responsible while Bill Clinton is not responsible at all???

He could have, at least, feigned interest in the matter and started to tighten security and start the FBI looking for threats at home and the CIA and NSA looking for threats abroad. He did neither, considering it of "historical interest" only. As for Condi's protestations that "no one could've imagined" terrorists using commercial airliners as guided missiles, plenty of people did imagine it in the months and years prior to 9/11. He failed...She, as Chimpy's national security advisor failed. Deal with it.

But these issues are all water under the bridge. We now have the mess Chimpy and Co are leaving future generations of, not just Americans, but people all around the world, are going to be cleaning up for the forseeable future.

 

[Annie]

A please.

Here's one:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4540958/

Osama bin Laden: missed opportunities
The CIA had pictures. Why wasn’t the al-Qaida leader captured or killed?
By Lisa Myers
Senior investigative correspondent
NBC News

Updated: 5:40 p.m. CT March 17, 2004

As the 9/11 commission investigates what Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush might have done to prevent the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, one piece of evidence the commission will examine is a videotape secretly recorded by a CIA plane high above Afghanistan. The tape shows a man believed to Osama bin Laden walking at a known al-Qaida camp.

The question for the 9/11 commission: If the CIA was able to get that close to bin Laden before 9/11, why wasn’t he captured or killed? The videotape has remained secret until now.

Over the next three nights, NBC News will present this incredible spy footage and reveal some of the difficult questions it has raised for the 9/11 commission.

In 1993, the first World Trade Center bombing killed six people.

In 1998, the bombing of two U.S. embassies in Africa killed 224.

Both were the work of al-Qaida and bin Laden, who in 1998 declared holy war on America, making him arguably the most wanted man in the world.

In 1998, President Clinton announced, “We will use all the means at our disposal to bring those responsible to justice, no matter what or how long it takes.”

NBC News has obtained, exclusively, extraordinary secret video, shot by the U.S. government. It illustrates an enormous opportunity the Clinton administration had to kill or capture bin Laden. Critics call it a missed opportunity.

In the fall of 2000, in Afghanistan, unmanned, unarmed spy planes called Predators flew over known al-Qaida training camps. The pictures that were transmitted live to CIA headquarters show al-Qaida terrorists firing at targets, conducting military drills and then scattering on cue through the desert.

Also, that fall, the Predator captured even more extraordinary pictures — a tall figure in flowing white robes. Many intelligence analysts believed then and now it is bin Laden.

Why does U.S. intelligence believe it was bin Laden? NBC showed the video to William Arkin, a former intelligence officer and now military analyst for NBC. “You see a tall man…. You see him surrounded by or at least protected by a group of guards.”

Bin Laden is 6 foot 5. The man in the video clearly towers over those around him and seems to be treated with great deference.

Another clue: The video was shot at Tarnak Farm, the walled compound where bin Laden is known to live. The layout of the buildings in the Predator video perfectly matches secret U.S. intelligence photos and diagrams of Tarnak Farm obtained by NBC.

“It’s dynamite. It’s putting together all of the pieces, and that doesn’t happen every day.… I guess you could say we’ve done it once, and this is it,” Arkin added.

The tape proves the Clinton administration was aggressively tracking al-Qaida a year before 9/11. But that also raises one enormous question: If the U.S. government had bin Laden and the camps in its sights in real time, why was no action taken against them?

“We were not prepared to take the military action necessary,” said retired Gen. Wayne Downing, who ran counter-terror efforts for the current Bush administration and is now an NBC analyst.

“We should have had strike forces prepared to go in and react to this intelligence, certainly cruise missiles — either air- or sea-launched — very, very accurate, could have gone in and hit those targets,” Downing added.

Gary Schroen, a former CIA station chief in Pakistan, says the White House required the CIA to attempt to capture bin Laden alive, rather than kill him.

What impact did the wording of the orders have on the CIA’s ability to get bin Laden? “It reduced the odds from, say, a 50 percent chance down to, say, 25 percent chance that we were going to be able to get him,” said Schroen.

A Democratic member of the 9/11 commission says there was a larger issue: The Clinton administration treated bin Laden as a law enforcement problem.

Bob Kerry, a former senator and current 9/11 commission member, said, “The most important thing the Clinton administration could have done would have been for the president, either himself or by going to Congress, asking for a congressional declaration to declare war on al-Qaida, a military-political organization that had declared war on us.”

In reality, getting bin Laden would have been extraordinarily difficult. He was a moving target deep inside Afghanistan. Most military operations would have been high-risk. What’s more, Clinton was weakened by scandal, and there was no political consensus for bold action, especially with an election weeks away.

NBC News contacted the three top Clinton national security officials. None would do an on-camera interview. However, they vigorously defend their record and say they disrupted terrorist cells and made al-Qaida a top national security priority.

“We used military force, we used covert operations, we used all of the tools available to us because we realized what a serious threat this was,” said President Clinton’s former national security adviser James Steinberg.

One Clinton Cabinet official said, looking back, the military should have been more involved, “We did a lot, but we did not see the gathering storm that was out there.”

 

[Annie]

http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache...ion&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=6&client=firefox-a

Yeah, a bit more there.

 

[Mr. P]

He could have, at least, feigned interest in the matter and started to tighten security and start the FBI looking for threats at home and the CIA and NSA looking for threats abroad. He did neither, considering it of "historical interest" only. As for Condi's protestations that "no one could've imagined" terrorists using commercial airliners as guided missiles, plenty of people did imagine it in the months and years prior to 9/11. He failed...She, as Chimpy's national security advisor failed. Deal with it.

Bully, we knew about these threats already they started as early as 1993, Bush got sworn in when, February, after all the counts were done? He had what 6 months to evaluate the entire state of the Country? Handicapted of course by the Goatboys’ administration roadblocks to sharing intelligence information. THERE IS NO FUCKING WAY 9/11 CAN EVER LOGICALY BE HANDED TO BUSH! And you know it!

 

[Annie]

Just something with links, including to 9/11 Commission report:

http://occupied-territory.blogspot.com/2006/09/dear-sandy.html

07 September 2006
Dear Sandy

"There is nothing in the 9/11 Commission Report (the purported basis of your film) to support this portrayal and the fabrication of this scene (of such apparent magnitude) cannot be justified under any reasonable definition of dramatic license. In no instance did President Clinton or I ever fail to support a request from the CIA or US military to authorize an operation against bin Laden or al Qaeda."​

Sandy Berger in letter to Robert Iger of ABC in re "The Path to 9/11"
September 5, 2006

But Sandy, that's not what the National Commission Report says:

On May 29, “Jeff ” informed “Mike” that he had just met with Tenet, Pavitt, and the chief of the Directorate’s Near Eastern Division.The decision was made not to go ahead with the operation.“Mike” cabled the field that he had been directed to “stand down on the operation for the time being.”He had been told, he wrote, that cabinet-level officials thought the risk of civilian casualties—“collateral damage”—was too high.They were concerned about the tribals’ safety, and had worried that “the purpose and nature of the operation would be subject to unavoidable misinterpretation and misrepresentation—and probably recriminations—in the event that Bin Ladin, despite our best intentions and efforts, did not survive.”29
Impressions vary as to who actually decided not to proceed with the operation.
Clarke told us that the CSG saw the plan as flawed.He was said to have described it to a colleague on the NSC staff as “half-assed” and predicted that the principals would not approve it. “Jeff ” thought the decision had been made at the cabinet level. Pavitt thought that it was Berger’s doing, though perhaps on Tenet’s advice. Tenet told us that given the recommendation of his chief operations officers, he alone had decided to “turn off ” the operation. He had simply informed Berger, who had not pushed back. Berger’s recollection was similar. He said the plan was never presented to the White House for a decision. [emphasis added]
​

National Commission On Terrorist Attacks Upon The United States
"The 9/11 Comission Report"
Chapter 4, Page 7

While I will grant that ABC probably took dramatic license in presenting an operation that was planned, rehearsed, gamed and simulated over six plus months and compressed it into one scene, it still doesn't diminish the fact that the snatch plan was scrubbed by either someone in the White House, NSC or Cabinet and that at least one person thought you were the reason it was scrubbed.

And that is just one example of "missed opportunities" to do what was right and necessary, what about Kandahar in '99?

Of couse Chapter 4 also doles out this little paragraph that apparently you and the rest of the Democrats don't really want people to think about now do you?

"The indictment also charged that al Qaeda had allied itself with Sudan, Iran, and Hezbollah.The original sealed indictment had added that al Qaeda had “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.” This passage led Clarke, who for years had read intelligence reports on Iraqi-Sudanese cooperation on chemical weapons, to speculate to Berger that a large Iraqi presence at chemical facilities in Khartoum was “probably a direct result of the Iraq–Al Qida agreement.” Clarke added that VX precursor traces found near al Shifa were the “exact formula used by Iraq.” This language about al Qaeda’s “understanding” with Iraq had been dropped, however, when a superseding indictment was filed in November 1998"
​

Sure you don't want to rethink that statement there Sandy? You might open up a whole can of worms that y'all have fought to keep closed for a long time no? I mean, Saddam had nothing to do with terrorism right?

 

[Abbey Normal]

I do hope this movie points out that hypocrite Jamie Gorelick's key role in ham-stringing our Intelligence community with her infamous "wall". She should have insomnia and guilt for the rest of her life over it. To blame a six-month sitting President when these kinds of dangerously myopic activities went on for years is absurd. But pathetically typical.

 

[Kagom]

Bully, we knew about these threats already they started as early as 1993, Bush got sworn in when, February, after all the counts were done? He had what 6 months to evaluate the entire state of the Country? Handicapted of course by the Goatboys’ administration roadblocks to sharing intelligence information. THERE IS NO FUCKING WAY 9/11 CAN EVER LOGICALY BE HANDED TO BUSH! And you know it!

Yes we can. Clinton didn't know about 9/11 in advance. Bush is the one who received notice.