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2008 candidate Giuliani’s speech just one of a slew of issues causing anger NEW YORK - Once again, the city will pause for four moments of silence to mark the attacks that killed more than 2,700 people. Family members will lay flowers where the twin towers fell, and the names of victims will be read. But much will be different on the sixth anniversary of Sept. 11, after tense arguments about where to hold the ceremony, whether a presidential candidate should be allowed to speak and if it's still fitting to put on such a large-scale commemoration. Firefighters, first responders...

The next attorney general will inherit a demoralized Justice Department that has been cut adrift from its historical values and well-honored traditions. New leadership offers an opportunity for Justice to return to its best traditions under both Democrats and Republicans. Here are 10 priorities that would help the next attorney general guide the department back on course:(snip) "Take care that the laws be faithfully executed." (snip) Depoliticize hiring. Stop considering applicants' political backgrounds in the hiring and promotion of career lawyers. Equally important, political appointees should have experience in the areas they are overseeing, rather than experience as political operatives....

WASHINGTON - It took an act of Congress to force the CIA to lift the veil on its watchdog's internal investigation that lays out the agency's many failures in the months and years before Sept. 11, 2001. Three CIA directors disparaged the document. Multiple requests under the Freedom of Information Act collected dust. Finally, on Tuesday, with the clock ticking on Congress' 30-day deadline to release the report, CIA Director Michael Hayden reluctantly caved in. Completed in June 2005, the report lays out in greater detail what has long been known: The CIA's top leaders failed to use their available...

The CIA's top leaders failed to use their available powers, never developed a comprehensive plan to stop al-Qaida and missed crucial opportunities to thwart two hijackers in the run-up to Sept. 11, the agency's own watchdog concluded in a bruising report released Tuesday. Completed in June 2005 and kept classified until now, the 19-page executive summary finds extensive fault with the actions of senior CIA leaders and others beneath them. "The agency and its officers did not discharge their responsibilities in a satisfactory manner," the CIA inspector general found. "They did not always work effectively and cooperatively," *snip* Yet the...

WASHINGTON - The CIA's top leaders failed to use their available powers, never developed a comprehensive plan to stop al-Qaida and missed crucial opportunities to thwart two hijackers in the run-up to Sept. 11, the agency's own watchdog concluded in a bruising report released Tuesday. Completed in June 2005 and kept classified until now, the 19-page executive summary finds extensive fault with the actions of senior CIA leaders and others beneath them. "The agency and its officers did not discharge their responsibilities in a satisfactory manner," the CIA inspector general found. "They did not always work effectively and cooperatively," the...

Investigation into pilfered documents reveals former president signed letter President Bill Clinton signed a letter authorizing former National Security Adviser Sandy Berger's access to classified documents that later came up missing, according to a newly released investigation report by the National Archives and Records Administration. The sensitive drafts of the National Security Council's "Millennium After Action Review" on the Clinton administration's handling of the al-Qaida terror threats in December 1999 suspiciously disappeared after Berger said he intended to "determine if Executive Privilege needed to be exerted prior to documents being provided to the 9/11 Commission." Then-Attorney General John Ashcroft testified...

Nearly 11 years after a fuel tank exploded on TWA Flight 800, killing 230 people off the South Shore of Long Island, a congressional committee voted yesterday to force the Federal Aviation Administration to act to prevent similar explosions. The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee added language to the Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization Act that would require the federal government to make so-called inerting systems standard equipment on commercial airlines. If passed by the full Congress, the FAA would have to require the installation of the safety equipment on the nation's commercial fleet to begin by the end of the...

Most terrorists seem like bumbling losers if they're caught before the act: That's certainly true of the Fort Dix jihadists who took their terrorist training DVD to the local audio store to be copied. It was also true of the Islamists arrested in Toronto last year for plotting to behead the prime minister, one of whose cell members had a bride who wanted him to sign a prenup committing him to jihad. The Heathrow plotters arrested while planning to blow up U.S.-bound airliners included a Muslim convert who'd started out as the son of a British Conservative Party official with...

"After a thorough reading of the report it would not be unreasonable to conclude as I have that there was a cover-up at high levels of our government and, it appears to have been substantial and coordinated...The question is why? And that question regrettably will go unanswered. Unlike some other cover-ups, this one succeeded.” – Independent Counsel David M. Barrett on the censoring of The Barrett Report. If you have been experiencing a sneaking suspicion that there is a lot of one-sided interest where investigations into political malfeasance are concerned at the US Justice Department, you’re not alone. From the...

The recent disbarment of Lynne Stewart is one of the latest examples of what is wrong with using the law-enforcement approach to dealing with terrorism. Not only is there the fact that all too often, treating terrorism as a criminal matter to be dealt with by law enforcement agencies, leads to terrorists going back onto the street, but there are problems with the lawyers. Stewart was convicted for providing material support to terrorists while she was representing Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman during his terrorism trial. One of the things she did was pass messages to Rahman's supporters – including exhortations...

I visited Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse in Florida, one of the tallest in the nation. I climbed to the top of the 175 foot tower. Though totally protected by a fence, a mild case of vertigo kept my back pressed against the hall while I enjoyed the spectacular view. Then it hit me. On 9/11 thousands of my fellow Americans, who simply showed up for work, were faced with the unimaginable horrifying choice of whether to be consumed by fire or jump from the towers. Innocent moms, dads, sisters, brothers, sons and daughters clueless of the danger were tortured...

If anyone watched the Fox News report titled, "Socks, Papers, Scissors" hosted by David Asman, the conclusion was that the Justice Department was aware that Berger stole and destroyed some of the most sensitive documents in the National Archives - and yet failed to notify the 911 Commission priof to Berger testifying. Berger was sworn in under oath - and gave his testimony to the commission who was unaware of what he did? It wasn't until much later that they were told - after the report was printed and distributed. A commission member said he was shocked to hear that...

The first face-to-face confrontation of the 2008 presidential race is looming over a US Senate inquiry into health problems suffered by workers at New York’s ground zero after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. As the chairwoman of a Senate subcommittee investigating complaints that workers were misled about air quality after the collapse of the twin towers, Senator Hillary Clinton, the Democrat front-runner for the presidential nomination, confirmed last week that she is considering calling Rudolph Giuliani, the former mayor of New York and the leading Republican contender, to testify at a public hearing. The health committee’s inquiry has...

The bell has just rung on the 2008 presidential sweepstakes and already more entries have crowded into the gates than the American grandstand can count, much less account for. That's all to the good, as the only winners over the past two decades have been named either Bush or Clinton. Still, since nothing less than the fate of the nation seems to be at stake, it is imperative that all candidates be measured... --snip--     Deeply frustrated by nine seasons of blockading by Clinton lawyers and Democratic congressmen, Mr. Barrett issued a statement saying, "An accurate title for the report would...

On July 6, 2006, Stonebridge International, a global strategy firm, announced that it had added a new member to its high-profile, five-member advisory board – former Democrat Rep. Lee Hamilton. True to form, the major media ignored the Hamilton appointment. They should not have. Hamilton, who had served as vice chairman of the 9/11 Commission, had just joined a firm headed by the man who had criminally undermined that very Commission, Stonebridge chairman and founder Samuel "Sandy" Berger. In the words of a recent House Committee report, Berger had perpetrated "a disturbing breach of trust and protocol that compromised the...

(AP) WASHINGTON -- A lengthy Senate investigation has debunked charges by a Republican congressman that military analysts identified Mohamad Atta and other Sept. 11 hijackers before the attacks, according to a committee aide familiar with the report. In a letter to members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sens. Pat Roberts and John D. Rockefeller dismissed suggestions by Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa., that defense analysts ignored analysis that could have prevented the attacks. Roberts, R-Kan., is outgoing chairman and Rockefeller, of West Virginia, is the senior Democrat who will assume the chairmanship next month. They concluded "there was no evidence Mohamad...

WASHINGTON (AP) - The FBI failed to fully investigate information suggesting other suspects may have helped Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols with the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, allowing questions to linger more than a decade after the deadly attack, a congressional inquiry concludes. The House International Relations investigative subcommittee will release the findings of its two-year-review as early as Wednesday, declaring there is no conclusive evidence of a foreign connection to the attack but that far too many unanswered questions remain. The subcommittee's report will conclude there is no doubt McVeigh and Nichols were the main perpetrators, and it discloses...

bulletin FANNIE MAE'S FORMER CEO, OTHERS CHARGED WITH MANIPULATING EARNINGS Ex-Fannie Mae CEO, others charged with manipulating earnings Last Update: 3:04 PM ET Dec 18, 2006 NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Federal regulators said Monday they have filed charges against three former Fannie Mae executives, former Chairman and CEO Franklin Raines, former Vice Chairman and Chief Financial Officer J. Timothy Howard, and former Senior Vice President and Controller Leanne G. Spencer. The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO)said the charges, "reveal how the individuals improperly manipulated earnings to maximize their bonuses, while knowingly neglecting accounting systems and internal controls, misapplying...

<p>WASHINGTON (AP) The government has filed civil charges against former Fannie Mae chief executive Franklin Raines, former chief financial officer Timothy Howard and former controller Leanne Spencer.</p>

NYSE to Permit Fannie Mae to Keep Trading but Must Meet March 15 Deadline for Filing 2005 Financials WASHINGTON (AP) -- Fannie Mae has until March 15 to file its 2005 annual report, the New York Stock Exchange said Tuesday. The exchange will permit the mortgage giant's shares to continue trading if it complies with additional listing requirements, as expected, in the interim, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing from Fannie Mae. If the annual report has not been filed by Dec. 31, 2007, Fannie Mae's shares face delisting, the exchange said. Fannie Mae is delinquent in filing...

WASHINGTON — Fannie Mae erased $6.3 billion in profit in a long-awaited restatement Wednesday capping the accounting scandal that stunned financial markets and brought the ouster of top executives and a record fine against the government-sponsored mortgage leader. The correction of its earnings from 2001 through June 30, 2004, ordered by the Securities and Exchange Commission two years ago, was well below Fannie Mae's earlier estimate of $10.8 billion. The reworking of its accounting is costing the company some $1 billion this year to conduct. It is the first earnings statement filed by Fannie Mae, which finances one of every...

Former Attorney General John Ashcroft this week became the only Cabinet-level Bush official to attack the Sept. 11 Commission, writing in his memoirs it "seemed obsessed with trying to lay the blame for the terrorist attacks at the feet of the Bush administration, while virtually absolving the previous administration of responsibility." Ashcroft also writes that the commission's hearings "were not so much about discovering the truth as they were about assessing blame and grandstanding," adding that they "degenerated into show trials."

HILLARY'S FECKLESS 'DEFENSE' OF BILL WILL DAMAGE BOTH CLINTONSTHE CHRIS WALLACE INTERVIEW BLOWBACK by Mia T, 9.27.06 I think my husband did a great job in demonstrating that Democrats are not going to take these attacks. All you have to do is read the 9/11 Commission [Report] to know what he and his administration did to protect Americans and prevent terrorist attacks against our country. hillary clinton, 9.26.06 hat was it exactly that impelled missus clinton to rush to her husband's 'defense' within hours of the broadcast of his now infamous interview by Chris Wallace? 1 Was it the...

WASHINGTON, Sept 13 (Reuters) - The former top two executives of Fannie Mae who were ousted due to a massive accounting scandal at the mortgage finance giant are likely to be sued by the company's federal regulator, the regulator's chief said on Wednesday. James Lockhart, head of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, said Fannie's former chief executive, Frank Raines, and former chief financial officer, Timothy Howard, are expected to be among those named in any litigation. "We will more than likely be filing litigation against them," James Lockhart, head of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, told...

What's more, Mr. Ashcroft noted, the wall did not mysteriously arise: "Someone built this wall." That someone was largely the Democrats, who enshrined Vietnam-era paranoia about alleged FBI domestic spying abuses by enacting the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Mr. Ashcroft pointed out that the wall was raised even higher in the mid-1990s, in the midst of what was then one of the most important antiterror investigations in American history--into the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. On Tuesday the Attorney General declassified and read from a March 4, 1995, memo in which Jamie Gorelick--then Deputy Attorney General and now...

This may be useful at various 9/11 events. Poster has a 9/11/2001 image of New York City and New York Harbor. I've added some information about Able Danger and appropriate quotes for this solemn, sad day. Never Forget. Never Again. Download instructions to download/save PDF version to desktop. : Scroll down to the Click on the Download for free with... Basic Scroll to the Click here to begin your download link. Left click to download/save. Double click to open, then and print the 9-sheet color artwork (trim 1-2 edges, then glue stick or tape into the large poster) Takes only...

'The Path to 9/11' Annotated: CLIPS, SYNOPSIS, THE CLINTON-9/11 NEXUS, THE CLINTON JACKBOOT annotated by Mia T, 9.10.06 (clips, synopses from Redstate.org) he islamofascist terrorists declared war on America and committed acts of war against America when BILL CLINTON was president of America. But bill clinton IGNORED the declarations and acts of war because he is a coward and because crushing the muslim terrorists didn't comport with his personal goals. This self-absorbed postmodern blight on America thought he could perform his usual deconstructionist sleight of hand, fool the people and define away the threat ("It all depends on what...

BILL CLINTON responded furiously yesterday to an American television mini-series about the September 11, 2001, terror attacks, which portrays him as so distracted by the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal that he failed to focus on the emerging threat of Osama bin Laden. Senior Clinton Administration officials, including Madeleine Albright, the former Secretary of State, and Sandy Berger, the former National Security Adviser, also demanded yesterday that ABC either substantially edit or cancel its two-part The Path to 9/11, claiming that the drama was defamatory. The programme is also being shown by the BBC. The five-hour drama, which will be shown...

Preview and Analysis of the Weekend Talk Shows for 9/9 and 9/10/2006The fifth anniversary of 9/11 is Monday, and the drive by media wants to make sure you know what you are supposed to think.  They also really don't want you to get a chance to hear any other versions of the 9/11 narrative that might raise questions about their approved one.Meet the press has Vice President Dick Cheney ("for the first time in three years" - gee I wonder why?) for the "full hour" (not counting commercials, promos, asides, other business, etc., etc.).  The drive by media is beginning...

"The Path to 9/11" is looking a lot like "The Reagans, Part II." Bill Clinton loyalists are demanding wholesale changes to the upcoming miniseries -- and while ABC is making some snips, the alterations, insiders say, may not please the Dems. Net found itself in the middle of a media maelstrom Thursday as the 9/11 mini came under attack from a slew of interest groups, former Clinton administration aides and the Democratic Party. As for specific criticisms -- and changes -- the original mini contained a scene in which then-National Security Adviser Sandy Berger declines to give the CIA authority...

See for example this thread first. Senate Democrats (and the House?) ABC's free speech threatened to douse The show's got them mad (It makes Clinton look bad) this whole thing is so ... Mickey Mouse!

Scholastic (SCHL - commentary - Cramer's Take) pulled its online materials posted in support of ABC's "Path to 9/1l," the terrorist-attack docudrama criticized by former President Bill Clinton. New York-based Scholastic said it will replace the yanked material with a new classroom discussion guide focusing "more specifically on media literacy, critical thinking, and historical background." Congressional Democrats have urged Disney's (DIS - commentary - Cramer's Take) ABC to cancel the miniseries, calling it "a work of fiction." ABC issued a statement saying the production was still being edited and that criticism of the film's specifics were thus "premature and irresponsible,"...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: I warned you people about this. I told you this was going to happen. Bill Clinton and the Democratic Party are just a bunch of thin-skinned bullies now trying to pressure ABC and the Disney CEO, Robert Iger, into dropping the mini-series, The Path to 9/11. The entire Democratic establishment is now involved. They are essentially demanding censorship. I told you that this was going to happen. I warned you about it, and I don't know how this is going to end up, I really don't. I don't want to talk about how this is going to...

I told you people yesterday and the day before of a movie, a mini-series running on ABC on September 10th and 11th, called The Path to 9/11 and I told you that I have the DVDs. I also told you because I am in touch -- I am poor when I'm in New York -- I do not have a DVD player. I don't. My apartment's got an old media room in it, it's got a laser disk player in it, but it doesn't have a DVD. Well, actually it has a DVD player in it, but the TV doesn't...

A new book reveals how much was known about al-Qaeda before the attack, says charles laurence September 11 in New York still comes as a bitter end to all the hopes and pleasures of summer, and this year marks the fifth anniversary of the day al-Qaeda destroyed the twin towers of the World Trade Centre. Those five years have done remarkably little to heal wounds, both national and personal. But the sense of dread seems more acute than ever because I have been reading The Looming Tower by journalist and academic Lawrence Wright, which is in its second week on...

June 27, 2006 | According to Dylan Avery, a 22-year-old filmmaker in upstate New York, no terrorists hijacked United Airlines Flight 93 on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, and no passengers heroically revolted. The plane didn't even crash in that Shanksville, Penn., field, he says, but instead landed safely in Cleveland. And not only that. As Avery sees it, the true 9/11 attackers brought down the World Trade Center in a controlled demolition, most likely to get at $160 billion in gold bars he believes were buried under the towers. As for the attack on the Pentagon, Avery insists...

Study: 'Extensive financial fraud' by Fannie Mae execs By Kathleen Day Washington Post WASHINGTON - Fannie Mae engaged in "extensive financial fraud" over six years by doctoring earnings so executives could collect hundreds of millions of dollars in bonuses, federal officials said Tuesday in a report that portrayed a company determined to play by its own rules. Regulators at the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, in announcing a settlement with Fannie Mae that includes $400 million in penalties, provided the most detailed picture yet of what went wrong at the congressionally chartered firm....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Employees at mortgage giant Fannie Mae manipulated accounting so that executives could collect millions in bonuses as senior management deceived investors and stonewalled regulators at a company whose prestigious image was phony, a federal agency charged Tuesday. The blistering report by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, the product of an extensive three-year investigation, was issued as the government-sponsored company struggles to emerge from an $11 billion accounting scandal. Earlier, a person familiar with the situation said that Fannie Mae was being fined between $300 million and $500 million for the alleged manipulation of accounting to...

After too many years tilting at Washington's windmills, there are few subjects left that can trigger my feelings of outrage. Fannie Mae is one of them. The White House is hardly in a position to provide leadership since presidents Bush and Clinton have significant responsibility for what went wrong. They appointed board members at Fannie and Freddie, reflecting their unique status. The failure of that system is obvious. The White House traditionally treated appointments to the boards as political plums: not as cushy as, say, being named ambassador to the Vatican but as nice a job as you can get...

Mueller: FBI Probes Classified Data Leaks By TIM WHITMIRE, Associated Press Writer 12 minutes ago The FBI is conducting investigations similar to the one that resulted in last week's firing of a senior CIA analyst who acknowledged leaking classified information, director Robert Mueller said Monday. "We do have investigations going," Mueller said following a visit to the FBI's Charlotte office, which oversees the agency's operations in North Carolina. "Leaking of classified materials is a concern for those agencies that have classified materials." Mary McCarthy, who was nearing retirement at the CIA, has been identified as being fired after leaking information...

Grab yourself a cup of coffee and head on over to TKS for the best summation of Able Danger as things presently stand. Or stay here and I'll summarize it for you. In very, very brief summation: The 9-11 commission did know about Able Danger; some of its staff were briefed on it twice, and the information got to some but not all of the commissioners What seems increasingly likely, based on the TKS summary and others, is that the commissioners who knew of Able Danger dismissed it because its Mohammed Atta timeline didn't agree with theirs. That in and...

The principals in the Able Danger story have filed suit to restrain the Department of Defense from retaliating against Tony Shaffer and to allow these witnesses to retain counsel during the closed hearings that Congress has scheduled into the data-mining program. Mark Zaid, representing Shaffer as well as contractor J. D. Smith, filed the suit on Monday against the DoD, DIA, the Army, and their attorneys in the DC district court. I've copied the text into the extended entry of this post. Most of those who have followed Able Danger will not be surprised by the allegations in the lawsuit....

I've created an Able Danger Podcast blog to generate a podcast feed so folks can subscribe to this feed and easily obtain any Able Danger audio (mp3) files. Here is the podcast feed for the Able Danger podcasts. The link to this feed is easy to find at the top left corner of my main blog, QT Monster, just above the Able Danger blog roll. Folks can subscribe to this podcast feed through iTunes. From the iTunes interface pull down the Advanced menu, click on subscribe to podcast, and in the dialogue box paste the URL for this podcast feed:...

Sources close to the ongoing Department of Defense investigation into the controversial Able Danger data mining intelligence program, which purportedly identified Mohammed Atta and three other 9/11 hijackers a year before the worst terror attacks in US history, say the mystery person who actually obtained a much-disputed photograph of Atta for the Able Danger team has now been identified. Ever since the Pentagon-ordered destruction in 2000 of 2.5 terabytes of data unearthed by Able Danger – allegedly including a chart featuring Atta’s photograph that revealed terrorist links and patterns when clicked on – skeptics have long raised doubt about the...

The first 20 minutes or so of the Able Danger conference call was previously posted here. The next three audio clips are here, here and here. Attending this conference call with Congressman Weldon were: AJ Strata from The Strata-Sphere, Dana from Common Sense Political Thought, Curt from Flopping Aces, Mike of Able Danger Blog, QT Monster, Rory O’Connor, Pierre from Pink Flamingo Bar & Grill, Bluto from Jawa Report and The Dread Pundit Bluto.

Some traditional intelligence officials, however, seemed either skeptical or jealous of LIWA's capability. At one conference, "Able Danger" analysts identified four major al-Qaida hubs - the Middle East, East Africa, Balkans and the Far East - in about 90 minutes."Because we weren't an intelligence organization, we got a lot of bad press," he said. "Folks thought we were running fast and loose with the data."By April, the "Able Danger" team was told to end its support of SOCOM. During the month's long work stoppage, SOCOM's patience ran out, and the military command transferred the work to a Raytheon facility in...

Able Danger identified Mohammad Atta and at least 2 other 9-11 hijackers more than a year before the 9-11 attacks. Why was the data that connected Mohammad Atta as a possible terrorist threat to the United States destroyed, and why wasn't this information shared with the FBI so the 9-11 attacks might have been prevented? 1. Dr. Stephen A. Cambone, U.S. Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence, explains that there wasn't any prohibition against sharing Able Danger information with the FBI. One of Dr. Cambone's colleagues says, "...we share in Army intelligence and DoD intelligence, we share information with the FBI...

Security: What are we to make of the apparent fact that a 9-11 conspirator has more interest and confidence in a secret intelligence operation that could have prevented 9-11 than does Congress or the media? Not many Americans know who Rep. Curt Weldon is, but Zacarias Moussaoui does. Moussaoui pleaded guilty 10 months ago to conspiring with al-Qaida to turn passenger jets into manned cruise missiles and fly them into buildings. He has denied involvement in the 9-11 attack, admitting only to being trained and involved in plans for future similar attacks. A week ago, Moussaoui's defense team said it...

China Study Rocks The Hill and Unleashes The Purge: While Cambone tried to link the data purge to this 90-day rule, Weldon and the other witnesses (with first hand knowledge) pointed to the LIWA China Study that was being done in parallel to the Able Danger study. I have stated all along this was the lynchpin, the source of all later cover ups and mistakes and lost opportunities. We all know the story so I will not repeat it here, but what we learned from the hearings is how far up this went. Weldon let slip that the initial China...

No you're right Tony, and the significance here is that the FBI Director back then, Louis Freeh said in October of last year on national television, that if he had had the Able Danger information the FBI might well have been able to stop the hijacking. In our hearing past week, and we had both classified and unclassified, we had five people that testified under oath that they believed the same thing. That if the data they collected, that if the analysis they did had been able to be passed to the FBI, they agree with Louis Freeh, that would...