Kerry Chastises Rice for 9/11 Commission Absence (Politicized Hearings- Weasel Alert!)

CNN.com ^ | 3/27/04 | CNN

[NYC Republican]

Presumptive Democratic nominee John Kerry chastised national security adviser Condoleezza Rice on Saturday for refusing to testify publicly before the 9/11 commission and accused the Bush administration of conducting "character assassination" against people who say things the White House doesn't like.

[NYC Republican]

Scumbag weasel opportunistic schmuck doesn't begin to describe how I feel about horsefaced French-looking ketchup boy Botox Lerch Kerry.

[silverleaf]

Well, after all, Sandy Berger, Clinton's national security advisor, DID find time to tesify about democrat campaign finance abuses. Or was he subpoenaed?

Any political historians out there who know when was the last time a sitting president's national security advisor testified under oath in a public inquisition??

[the Real fifi]

Bush has nothing to fear from this hilarious work of fiction
By Mark Steyn
(Filed: 28/03/2004)


In January 2002, the Enron story broke and the media turned their attention to the critical question: how can we pin this on Bush? As I wrote in this space that weekend: "Short answer: You can't."

So Enron retreated to the business pages, and, after a while, the media and the Democrats came up with an even better wheeze: how can we pin September 11 on Bush? Same answer: you can't. But that doesn't stop them every month or so from taking a wild ride on defective vehicles for their crazy scheme.

The latest is a mid-level bureaucrat called Richard Clarke, and by the time you read this his 15 minutes should be just about up. Mr Clarke was Bill Clinton's terrorism guy for eight years and George W Bush's for a somewhat briefer period, and he has now written a book called If Only They'd Listened to Me - whoops, sorry, that should be Against All Enemies: Inside the White House's War on Terror - What Really Happened (Because They Didn't Listen to Me).

Having served both the 42nd and 43rd Presidents, Clarke was supposed to be the most authoritative proponent to advance the Democrats' agreed timeline of the last decade - to whit, from January 1993 to January 2001, Bill Clinton focused like a laser on crafting a brilliant plan to destroy al-Qa'eda, but, alas, just as he had dotted every "i", crossed every "t" and sent the intern to the photocopier, his eight years was up, so Bill gave it to the new guy as he was showing him the Oval Office - "That carpet under the desk could use replacing. Oh, and here's my brilliant plan to destroy al-Qa'eda, which you guys really need to implement right away."

The details of the brilliant plan need not concern us, which is just as well, as there aren't any. But the broader point, as The New York Times noted, is that "there was at least no question about the Clinton administration's commitment to combat terrorism".

Yessir, for eight years the Clinton administration was relentless in its commitment: no sooner did al-Qa'eda bomb the World Trade Center first time round, or blow up an American embassy, or a barracks, or a warship, or turn an entire nation into a terrorist training camp, than the Clinton team would redouble their determination to sit down and talk through the options for a couple more years. Then Bush took over and suddenly the superbly successful fight against terror all went to hell.

Richard Clarke was supposed to be the expert who could make this argument with a straight face. And, indeed, his week started well. The media were very taken by this passage from his book, in which he alerts Mr Bush's incoming National Security Adviser to the terrorist threat: "As I briefed Rice on al-Qa'eda, her facial expression gave me the impression that she had never heard of the term before, so I added, 'Most people think of it as Osama bin Laden's group, but it's much more than that. It's a network of affiliated terrorist organisations with cells in over 50 countries, including the US.' "

Mr Clarke would seem to be channelling Leslie Nielsen's deadpan doctor in Airplane!: "Stewardess, we need to get this passenger to a hospital."

"A hospital? What is it?"

"It's a big building with patients, but that's not important right now."

As it turns out, Clarke's ability to read "facial expressions" is not as reliable as one might wish in a "counter-terrorism expert". In October the previous year, Dr Rice gave an interview to WJR Radio in Detroit in which she discoursed authoritatively on al-Qa'eda and bin Laden - and without ever having met Richard Clarke!

I don't know how good Clarke was at counter-terrorism, but as a media performer he is a total dummy. He seemed to think that he could claim the lucrative star role of Lead Bush Basher without anybody noticing the huge paper trail of statements he has left contradicting the argument in his book.

The reality is that there is a Richard Clarke for everyone. If you are like me and reckon there was an Islamist angle to the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, then Clarke's your guy: he supports the theory that al-Qa'eda operatives in the Philippines "taught Terry Nichols how to blow up the Oklahoma Federal Building".

On the other hand, if you're one of those Michael Moore-type conspirazoids who wants to know why Bush let his cronies in the House of Saud and the bin Laden family sneak out of America on September 11, then Clarke's also your guy: he is the official who gave the go-ahead for the bigshot Saudis with the embarrassing surnames to be hustled out of the country before they could be questioned.

Does this mean Clarke is Enron - an equal-opportunity scandal whose explicitly political aspects are too ambiguous to offer crude party advantage? Not quite. Although his book sets out to praise Clinton and bury Bush, he can't quite pull it off. Except for his suggestion to send in a team of "ninjas" to take out Osama, Clinton had virtually no interest in the subject.

In October 2000, Clarke and Special Forces Colonel Mike Sheehan leave the White House after a meeting to discuss al-Qa'eda's attack on the USS Cole: "'What's it gonna take, Dick?' Sheehan demanded. 'Who the s*** do they think attacked the Cole, f****** Martians? The Pentagon brass won't let Delta go get bin Laden. Does al-Qa'eda have to attack the Pentagon to get their attention?'"

Apparently so. The attack, on the Cole, which killed 17 US sailors, was deemed by Clinton's Defence Secretary Bill Cohen as "not sufficiently provocative" to warrant a response. You'll have to do better than that, Osama! So he did. And now the same people who claim Bush had no right to be "pre-emptive" about Iraq insist he should have been about September 11.

As for Clarke's beef with Bush, that's simple. For eight years, he had pottered away on the terrorism brief undisturbed. The new President took it away from him and adopted the strategy outlined by Condoleezza Rice in that Detroit radio interview, months before the self-regarding Mr Clarke claims he brought her up to speed on who bin Laden was: "We really need a stronger policy of holding the states accountable that support him," Dr Rice told WJR. "Terrorists who are just operating out there without basis and without state support are a lot less dangerous than ones that find safe haven, as bin Laden does sometimes in places like Afghanistan or Sudan."

Just so. In the 1990s when al-Qa'eda blew up American targets abroad, the FBI would fly in and work it as a "crime scene" - like a liquor-store hold-up in Cleveland. It doesn't address the problem. Sure, there are millions of disaffected young Muslim men, but, if they get the urge to blow up infidels, they need training and organisation. Somehow all those British Taliban knew that if you wanted a quick course in jihad studies Afghanistan was the place to go. Bush got it right: go to where the terrorists are, overthrow their sponsoring regimes, destroy their camps, kill their leaders.

Instead, all the Islamists who went to Afghanistan in the 1990s graduated from Camp Osama and were dispersed throughout Europe, Asia, Australia and North America, where they lurk to this day. That's the Clarke-Clinton legacy. And, if it were mine, I wouldn't be going around boasting about it.

Information appearing on telegraph.co.uk is the copyright of Telegraph Group Limited and must not be reproduced in any medium without licence. For the full copyright statement see Copyright

[NYC Republican]

I JUST finished reading that on another thread. Excellent article by Mark Steyn. EXCELLENT. Thanks for posting!

[Right_in_Virginia]

Has Kerry EVER said anything positive?

[NYC Republican]

"If Condoleezza Rice can find time to do '60 Minutes' on television before the American people, she ought to find 60 minutes to speak to the commission under oath," Kerry said while campaigning Saturday. Rice met privately for several hours with the commission in February...

She's already met with the commission... Why is he LYING? Easy, he's a liberal. Without the lies, they'd have NOTHING and nearly no support.

[NYC Republican]

Has Kerry EVER said anything positive?

Yep -his delusional, lying, manipulative claim of 10 million jobs under a (S)Kerry administration.

[hoosiermama]

As for Clarke's beef with Bush, that's simple. For eight years, he had pottered away on the terrorism brief undisturbed. The new President took it away from him and adopted the strategy outlined by Condoleezza Rice in that Detroit radio interview, months before the self-regarding Mr Clarke claims he brought her up to speed on who bin Laden was:

Think he's just stated the problem in a "Nut Shell" (We all know who the nut is!)

[NYC Republican]

Agree. Good point.

[Stirner]

"She's already met with the commission... Why is he LYING?"

According to my Dem friend, the operative words are "under oath". She claims that Rice met with the commission (in private), but did not give her remarks under oath. Don't know whether she's right or wrong about that. Cabinet appointees appear for confirmation hearings under oath, but I'm not sure if National Security advisors also do so.

[NYC Republican]

What's up with Drudge's headline item, "GET HIM", up there all day, as if the GOP is being vindictive... All they're doing is exposing his inconsistencies (aka LIES).

[section9]

You realize, of course, that Kerry assumes that Condi will not testify. Methinks he is making yet another mistake.

Be Seeing You,

Chris

[hoosiermama]

Of course she gave her testimony under oath...Clarke gave his under oath too....That's why he's going to be charged with perjury......They're upset because in public she could be asked sensitive questions, which she could not answer because they are classified and they don't get a chance to make her looks like she' dodging the questions....thereby look bad. Sorry I'm rattling..do you understand?

[Lakeside]

Well, at least he's rested and relaxed and up on all the talking points. Look for the new and improved, no gaffs,well coached Kerry. And he used to be so darned entertaining.

[hoosiermama]

He always uses some attention getting headline.....That usually doesn't pan out......The sky is falling! The sky is falling! Translates: expect showers in the mid afternoon and evening.

[the Real fifi]

No--he's going into the hospital for a few days, claiming a shoulder injury. I think he's taking Kaus' suggestion--stay on vacation and let the media campaign for you.

[TheSpottedOwl]

In other news, after that chicken livered weasel quit talking out his ass, he was bbq'd and fed to hedgehogs. They turned down the invitation...

[NYC Republican]

Well, at least he's rested and relaxed and up on all the talking points. Look for the new and improved, no gaffs,well coached Kerry. And he used to be so darned entertaining.

He's probably not going to make a single statement (unless it's unavaoidable- i.e.- a debate) without first vetting it with his handlers...

[LisaMalia]

Kerry's not fit to lick the bottom of Condi's shoes. I hope he keeps talking, he just keeps making a bigger and bigger a$$ out of himself.

[Miss Marple]

Drudge is not our friend. I don't trust him, regardless of things he has exposed in the past. He has a definite animus towards the President.