Sen. Clinton hits back at Rice over 9/11

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060927/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/rice_clinton

*Interesting pissing game. Here's a cut and paste run-down.

**What's your opinion of the given context this article presents?

Hillary: The senator was referring to a classified brief given to Bush in August 2001['Bin Laden Determined To Attack Inside the United States' ], one that Democrats say showed the Bush administration did not do enough to combat the growing threat from al-Qaida.

Hillary:"I think my husband did a great job in demonstrating that Democrats are not going to take these attacks,"
Hillary Clinton said. "I'm certain that if my husband and his national security team had been shown a classified report entitled 'Bin Laden Determined To Attack Inside the United States' he would have taken it more seriously than history suggests it was taken by our current president and his national security team."
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Clinton's response came a day after Rice denied Bill Clinton's claim in the television interview that the Bush administration had not aggressively pursued al-Qaida before the attacks of 2001.

Rice:"What we did in the eight months was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton administration did in the preceding years," Rice said during a meeting with editors and reporters at the New York Post. "The notion somehow for eight months the Bush administration sat there and didn't do that is just flatly false, and I think the 9/11 commission understood that."

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Rice also took exception to Clinton's statement that he "left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy" for incoming officials when he left office.

Rice:"We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al-Qaida," she told the newspaper, which is owned by News Corp., the company that owns Fox News Channel.
----------------------------------------------------------------------

 

And in fact, Fox uncovered a NIE from 1998 that showed Clinton was briefed specifically on al qaida and that they wanted to harm our country including hijacking planes. Not sure whether she will correct that statement or not. Probably not.

 

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/03/19/60minutes/main607356.shtml

An article about the missile strikes on Al Qaeda targets that Clinton ordered in 1998:
http://www.cnn.com/US/9808/20/us.strikes.02/

Bush simply didn't care about terrorism before 9/11. Now they're trying to rewrite history, something this administration seems to have a fondness for.

 

Clarke was pissed off he didn't get promoted (not demoted, as some suggest) to Chief of Homeland Security. Prior to being overlooked for the promotion, he praised Bush's efforts to fight terrorism. After not being promoted to a higher position he was pissed off, resigned, and went on to write a book. At a hearing, he offered:

"Don't believe my prior statements praising President Bush's decision to combat terrorism far more aggressively than President Clinton had."

One way or another, Clarke was lying. Either before he was passed over for promotion, or after.

Rice had every reason to hit at Clinton:

http://washingtontimes.com/national/20040406-121654-1495r.htm

 

Of course Clarke is lying. Anyone who doesn't follow in step with this administration is either lying or is unpatriotic. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Richard Clarke is an actual member of Al Qaeda. In fact he's probably behind the Bill O'Reilly death threat.

 

I thought GTech would have proved you correct by now. He's getting slow I guess.

 

Cool, I didn't think you would have anything better than that, but it was worth a shot. Kind of hard to address those issues! When all else fails, make yourself a victim. Victimology 101

 

What are those issues? And how can you say "make yourself a victim" when you don't even know me. You sound like an Ann Coulter or Rush Limbaugh parrot who invariably falls back on accusing someone of being a whiny liberal whenever they don't agree with them.

I would never become so entrenched on one side or the other that I block out reason and/or critical thinking.
I would also never subscribed to any particular political ideology to the point that I would not question anything
that comes from the "base camp".

One of the great geniuses of the founding fathers was to believe that a mindful distrust in your government was a healthy thing. To say that the Bush camp questions the patriotism of anyone who disagrees with them is not being a "victim", it is just
fact.
If you would like I'm sure I could find an abundance of quotes to back my assertion up.

Also, I'm not saying that Clinton was great on terrorism, just that he probably didn't suck as hard as Bush. Frankly
it would be hard to suck at anything as hard as Bush does. Even Monica Lewinsky admires Bush's sucking ability.

 

Spare me the mule tears, please!

Your gut reaction? Paint yourself a victim because you couldn't deal with the issues. And you further round it off with:

Work on your game. Ray Charles could spot it a mile away. It's lame, old and out dated. Let me know if you want to get back to the real issues. We can pick up where I responded to your initial lameness with facts that seemed to cause your confusion

 

What's lame, old and out dated? Your Ray Charles joke? Didn't you just recently use the Ray Charles joke in another thread?

I'll post some links tomorrow to back up my position that Bush initially(and I say still does) sucked donkey nuts on terrorism. Then that will be it because we could go back and forth forever which would just waste my time because you seem to be way beyond the point of salvation.

 

Look forward to it. Something besides emotional personal opinion lacking substance for how it was derived would be refreshing.

 

Two guys w/ NO credibility (ZERO) going at it like this cracks me up.

How can anyone believe either of them?!

 

Transcript taken from the National Security Archives:

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB147/index.htm

So the Bush administration, in all its wisdom and infallibility, bumps Richard Clarke, its leading advisor on al Qaeda, and Richard Clarke's team,
to a sub-cabinet level. Being able to discuss the issues of al Qaeda with the President and his closest advisors becomes
an effort equivalent to that of pulling teeth.




Transcript from the Bill Moyers show on PBS which includes transcript excerpts from 9/11 commission testimony:


http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript337_full.html

Paul Kurtz was the NSC Director of Counter Terrorism from 1998 to 2002.

Here's a snippet from his interview with Keith Olbermann last night.

See the video clip here(Pre-9/11: The inside story) : http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677/

From the 9/11 Commission Report :

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/911/pdf/sec8.pdf

Remember that it was the sleeper cell question Rice didn't want to answer during her testimony in front of the 9/11 commission.


================

Your position is weak and will only get worse since the facts are on my side. However I am a compassionate man,
so I will suggest a few things that you could do which may help you with your predicament:


1. Even though I've taken excerpt's of transcripts from credible sources that clearly show the Bush administration did not act as aggressively as they could have on warnings prior to 9/11, ignore that fact and
boldy assert that I have not used facts at all, and that I am emotional and thoughtless.
2. Attempt to discredit the subjects(Richard Clarke, etc) cited in my sources(the 9/11 commission report, Bill Moyers, etc) by linking to the article(s) of a right-wing-slanted editorial writer. After having done so, treat the information
cited in the article that you've linked to as some sort of fundamental, cosmic truth.
3. Even though your position is weak and you haven't won the debate, ignore that and declare
victory anyway. If you can muster the resources, rent a big boat and get a huge "mission accomplished" banner that can hang behind you while you give your victory speech.
4. Claim that DP is in league with al Qaeda and urge an attack to "liberate" DP so that you can have my posts
edited to your liking.
5. Ask yourself WWACD?(What Would Ann Coulter Do?). Once you've reached a definitive answer, act on it, and
make sure you use a high pitched, annoying cackle while carrying it out.
6. Apologize and blame your flame war incitement on a neurological condition caused by watching too much FOX news.
7. As an alternative to the second part of #6, blame it all on the theory of evolution, and science in general, which somewhat ironically, would include the internet.

 

Excellent work edD. This is much better than the previous BDS rants offered.

Much of your focus is on Clarke's testimony, which was very controversial because he admittedly lied either before his testimony, or during his testimony. There is no mistaking this.

Clarke offered:

"I believe the Bush administration in the first eight months considered terror an important issue but not an urgent issue."

As I pointed out above, he also offered:

"Don't believe my prior statements praising President Bush's decision to combat terrorism far more aggressively than President Clinton had."

Clarke also wrote a letter to Bush with:

The problem though, is that one way or another, Clarke was lying. He was disgruntled for not having received a promotion for a new office he thought he was entitled to, left the administration and subsequently went on to write a book in which you either have to take his word PRIOR to his disgruntledness when he praises Bush, or take his word after where his tune changes to one of admonishment. He is not a trustworthy source.

Secondly, you selected the hostile democrat, Richard Ben-Veniste to highlight his badgering of Rice by refusing to give her lattitude in answering questions. In fact, once Rice can get past Ben-Veniste's biased routine, Rice goes on to answer the question which you omitted intentionally with:

To further illustrate Ben-Veniste's obvious hostility and bias against Rice, he goes on with:

Yes, Ben-Veniste did in fact ask if it warned of possible attacks, but he already knew the answer and it wasn't what he wanted to hear. So he diverts by saying he asked the title.

A very hostile session by the democrat. One would not come to the conclusion that he was looking for the truth, but rather trying to direct his own interpretation of the truth.


Your choice to use Pickard's testimony is illuminating. However you failed (I'm sure it wasn't intentional, right?) to also note that Ashcroft disputed this during his own testimony before the commission:
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/04/13/911.commission/index.html

So, no, my position is not weak in the least bit. You actually made my position even stronger by intentionally relying on the testimony of Clarke, the turncoat darling of the democrat party who openly tells others not to take his own word and either lied before he was passed over for promotion, or lied afterwards. Next, you make my position even stronger by selecting Ben-Veniste's biased questioning and badgering of Rice and openly demonstrating on my behalf that he was a partisan through his line of questioning and helping me portray that he wasn't interested in answers to his own questions.

Further, I stand behind the original source that clearly shows that the Clinton administration did not pass on critical information to the new Administration in their final report:

http://washingtontimes.com/national/20040406-121654-1495r.htm

Lastly, I would suggest that your assertion that "Bush simply didn't care about terrorism before 9/11" is lacking in substance. But more importantly, we see exactly the difference between the two presidents AFTER an attack on our country. While Clinton did relatively nothing in response to attacks on our country, Bush did absolutely everything in response to terrorist attacks on our country. The difference couldn't be more obvious.

What is really troubling here, is that the people that would argue Bush didn't do enough, are the same ones complaining today that he is doing TOO MUCH. The same people that want to take away the tools he uses to fight the terrorists that people said he didn't care about in the first place. The same people that want to coddle and appease terrorists by tying the president's hands behind his back to fight them. The irony is overwhelming. On one hand, he didn't do enough, on the other, he's doing TOO MUCH.

No, my argument is not weak in the least bit. You simply made it stronger for me

 

Is there a link on that? I'm not disputing it, I'd just like to see where it's coming from.

I don't really see much relevance in all this stuff you're quoting. The memos he sent(we'll some of them) have been declassified(I think there's one from Sept 4 that hasn't been declassified, or at least I couldn't find it). The declassified ones are on that national security archive site.

His urging to the administration to give Bin Laden and al Qaeda more focus is now a matter of public record. The fact that
he and his team were basically demoted and given second-rate access cannot be denied. The fact that
the number of meetings on al Qaeda up until Sept were almost non-existent, cannot be denied.

Who really cares what the terms of his departure were? It still doesn't change the events that took place between Jan 2001 and Sept 2001. He was basically screaming at the administration
to do something more, whether it just be more meetings of the principals or whatever, and they just seemed to keep ignoring him.

Whether Richard Clarke has made conflicting statements since, regarding Bush's effort on terrorism, is
irrelevant to me. Enough has been made public for me to see that he was trying to get them to listen to him
for nine months and they weren't as interested as I think they should have been.

[snip]

Yes, I agree Ben-Veniste is/was hostile towards the administration. He was probably trying to set her up. But at the same
time, if you remember, Rice was very reluctant to testify at all. It seemed that she was trying to avoid the question and he wanted to try to stop the evasion in its tracks. Did she go on to answer it? Yes. Would she have offered it initially
without the prodding? I don't know. Did Ben-Veniste take some cheap shots? Of course. Both sides do that equally. It's one of the things that pisses me off whenever I watch any of the congressional committees meet. When it comes
to stuff that could effect elections, getting to the truth seems to be not so important, and point scoring becomes the main goal. My point in posting that snippet was to show Rice's reluctance to give a straight answer. Of course, maybe she just believed that Ben-Veniste was trying to set her up so she felt she needed to preface it with something. I concede that that example doesn't help my argument. I withdraw it from the record.

I admit I was being hyperbolic. I don't think the Bush administration didn't care. But terrorism wasn't as much of a priority as it should have been. And they shouldn't of treated Richard Clarke and his team as second rate advisors.
I really do believe that the Clinton administration took the Bin Laden threat more seriously and that they DID communicate
the seriousness of the threat to the incoming administration, which chose to not give it a very high priority.


Keith Olbermann was talking last night about Rice's charges that they weren't left a plan to deal with terrorism.
Now Keith definitely is a biased lefty, but he doesn't just make stuff up(but of course he could present it with
his own biased perspective).

Here's a partial transcript from last night's show:

The whole thing is here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15045576/

The original(well, a copy of the original ) Jan 25 memo that is referenced in the transcript can be seen here: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB147/clarke memo.pdf

One of many memos sent by Clarke that seemed to not be taken very seriously.

The reason I'm placing Clarke at the center of my argument is to refute the allegation by Rice that they weren't handed a plan. It is obvious that the Clinton staff tried to communicate a plan, but it wasn't a priority in the new administration.

Whether Clarke said nice things about Bush and then said bad things about him is irrelevant in the face
of factual evidence like this.

Well it is possible to do too much of one thing and not enough of another. I don't think we should be reinterpreting the Geneva Convention. All the respectable military guys seem to feel the same way.

But I'm all for internal spying as long as there is a strong system of oversight in place. This administration seems to not like oversight as much as previous administrations, though.

I still disagree with it but its a hell of a lot better to go point for point than to just
put each other in a box from the outset. There's nothing wrong with disagreeing.
Just because I take a point a view that many crazy liberals share(and I do believe in the notion of a crazy liberal, just as I do the notion of crazy conservatives) doesn't mean I'm one. In fact, I hope I get the chance to vote for McCain for President in 2008.

 

Sure. What I do when needing to verify quotes is take a portion of the quoted text, enter it between quotes in google and follow the results:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&...in+the+first+eight+months"&btnG=Google+Search

There are quite a few sources this way, to verify it's not a one off. Hope that helps.

They are very important, if the facts matter. I do submit that if someone is vehemently against Bush, then they probably won't matter. Why do they matter? They show what Clarke wrote and his train of thought regarding Bush. It shows that at one point in time, Clarke praised Bush in what he was doing. In another, after he was passed over for promotion, he resigned and went on the negative against Bush. I think it's very important. Other than just generally not liking Bush and being against him in general, I can't see why anyone would not be in favor of the facts. Facts do matter.

This is opinion. I've not seen anything that would suggest this. What cannot be denied is, the final briefing the Clinton administration prepared entitled "A National Security Strategy for a Global Age" had virtually nothing about bin laden (four mentions in 45,000 words) and not a single word on al qaida. Not one single word. I'm not sure how one can suggest that Clinton did more on terrorism than Bush did when his administration all but ignored it in it's final assessment. It also discredits Clarke's assertion that the Clinton administration claimed bin laden was "an urgent threat." If so, why was he only mentioned by name four times in a 45000 page assessment? Why was al qaida not mentioned at all? These are fair questions, no?

I submit a lot of people "really cares" about the terms of his departure. It's very important. On one hand, you have someone praising Bush's efforts towards fighting terrorism prior to his departure, then after his departure (when he wasn't promoted to a position he felt he deserved), his position changed. How could that not be important? Set aside, for a moment, the obvious dislike for Bush. Look at it objectively and think about it. Why would it not be important?

If I read this correctly then, you are saying "the facts don't matter." You say the facts are not relevant to you. This is simply personal opinion, chosen in lieu of what the facts say.

Ben-Veniste was hostile towards her. Any reasonable and rationale person should be able to come to this conclusion. He was not prodding her for an answer, he was intentionally trying to prevent her from giving a detailed answer. He did not want the truth, he wanted her to answer a setup question with a simple yes or no without allowing her the opportunity to expand. She didn't need prodding. She wanted to answer, she had to get past Ben-Veniste's repeated attempts to squelch her response.

Fair enough.

Debatable for sure. In hindsight, we can always second guess our leaders and that they could have done a better job. Terrorism was probably not as much as priority that we would have liked because it wasn't a huge issue at the time. Or at least "we" thought.

Ironically, it has become a very important issue and as we've seen countless times since 9/11, plots continue to unfold and we now catch these guys before they strike. If we compare this to what happened AFTER the first world trade center bombing, it's an interesting observation.

Facts do not support this conclusion. The facts show that Clinton was consumed with the lewinsky scandal and that they were simply afraid to make critical decisions because of fear of what might happen if something didn't go exactly right. Your assessment is further not supported by the fact that the final assessment the Clinton administration provided, a 45,000 word document on global security, made virtually no mention of this threat. I simply ask you to look at the facts.

Olbermann can talk all he wants, but the truth of the matter as I've noted with source, numerous times, is that there was no plan left. That final assessment on global security was not indicative by any means of a detailed plan left for the new administration.

I've seen no plan, zero plan offered to the administration. I continue to reference the global security threat document. It had no plan. Al qaida was not mentioned at all, bin laden merely four times in 45,000 words. I simply cannot grasp that a plan was handed the new administration based on this. Further, Clarke has clearly demonstrated that he lied. Either before, or after, but he lied. His story changed, after he became disgruntled for not receiving an appointment to a newly created office he felt he deserved. That's critical to his credibility. I could just as easily use info from Clarke PRIOR to his departure to counter your claims, but his credibility is questionable. At some point, facts must matter and the credibility of those presenting facts must matter.

So which set of facts do you accept? The ones ONLY that form your *opinion*? The ones that are *only* critical? I accept neither. His credibility is in question. He's openly lied and even told people he's done such and not to accept his lies.

I can see only one reason why anyone would place credibility here, based only on the negative claims (not the positive). The facts do not matter. Only that Bush is demonized. Sorry, I don't see that as being "open minded."

I'm not aware of anyone wanting to reinterpret it. The issue here, though separate from the discussion, is not to reinterpret or redefine it, but rather define it in the first place. The issues at hand were simply not defined. Of course our enemies do not adhere to this convention anyway, but we should at least have reasonable definitions of what is and what is not allowed.

Oversights have been in place. That was what was so incredible about the first time the NYT committed treason against our country by releasing secret classified information about a program used to fight enemies of our country. It had congressional oversight. Congress was kept in the loop.

I agree, disagreement is fine. It should be welcomed. I don't always treat it in the same manner with each person here, but I can appreciate well thought out and reasonable discourse very much.

For me, facts matter. I treat debate like I would at a trial in a court of law. Debating on personal opinion and wishful thinking or biased hatred will never win over debate with facts that can be verified and proven. I'm often amazed that people try to debate based upon personal feelings. I can't do it myself. I need the facts. When facts are in your corner, people can do just about anything, but dispute them.

I can appreciate that. Thanks for the civil debate (and more if you'd like). It's a refreshing change!

 

You make it sound as if you engage in civil debates. Calling people angry white males is real civil, right? That's only one example of your antics when you get owned. hehe

You are a gem.

 

I try my best to afford people what they afford me. Just tried the same with Matt, yet again. For some, it just doesn't work, no matter how hard you try. Interesting to see who you point it out on, and who you do not. I must admit, it's a great opportunity for you and others to offer flybys and build alliances off of. The count down begins. Well done, excellent strategy!

Know what I mean, Vern?

 

Flybys? I aint running away. I've owned your debates twice in the last three days and you ran around both.

I'm enjoying this alot. I haven't even called you a moron yet. So as you can see, I really like you in the big picture.

Are you white? What kind of hair cut do you wear? What makes you angry? I mean really angry, not the what a moron he is angry when you own someone with your little quips.

 

I must have missed those all together. Since it probably happened in your mind, did it make you feel real manly?

That's refreshing! I've heard about your rage, so I try to be as cordial as I can with you. Bipolar disorder?

I'll let you use your imagination. You seem to be pretty good at that