Posted on 08/15/2005 8:08:34 PM PDT by wagglebee
Ex-president Bill Clinton now says he would have taken out Osama bin Laden before the 9/11 attacks if only the FBI and CIA had been able to prove the al-Qaida mastermind was behind the attack on the U.S.S. Cole.
"I desperately wish that I had been president when the FBI and CIA finally confirmed, officially, that bin Laden was responsible for the attack on the U.S.S. Cole," Clinton tells New York magazine this week. "Then we could have launched an attack on Afghanistan early."
"I dont know if it would have prevented 9/11," he added. "But it certainly would have complicated it.
Despite his failure to launch such an attack, Clinton said he saw the danger posed by bin Laden much more clearly than did President Bush.
"I always thought that bin Laden was a bigger threat than the Bush administration did," he told New York magazine.
Sorry, Bill, there were no aspirin factories in Kabul.
Correct, a small man with small ideas and large character flaws. Not your ideal combination so to speak.
God Almighty, he will say anything for attention.
What a colossal embarrassment.
Keep Talking Bill
Face it .. When history books are written about you .. the word FAILURE will be the first chapter
YOU FAILED THE COUNTRY .. YOU FAILED THE PEOPLE and YOU FAILED THE PRESIDENCY
"Despite his failure to launch such an attack, Clinton said he saw the danger posed by bin Laden much more clearly than did President Bush."
Richard Clarke Flashback: Clinton Dropped Ball on Bin Laden
NewsMax.com ^ | 3/20/04 | Carl Limbacher and NewsMax.com Staff
Posted on 03/21/2004 12:33:41 AM EST by kattracks
Former Clinton White House terrorism czar Richard Clarke is preparing to tell the Independent Commission Investigating the Sept. 11 Attacks this week that the Bush administration failed to act on a Clinton administration plan to attack Osama bin Laden.
And in a "60 Minutes" interview set to air Sunday night, Clarke blasts Bush for doing "a terrible job on the war against terrorism."
But just a year ago Clarke was singing a different tune, telling reporter Richard Miniter, author of the book "Losing bin Laden," that it was the Clinton administration - not team Bush - that had dropped the ball on bin Laden.
Clarke, who was a primary source for Miniter's book, detailed a meeting of top Clinton officials in the wake of al Qaeda's attack on the USS Cole in Yemen.
He urged them to take immediate military action. But his advice found no takers.
Reporting on Miniter's book, the National Review summarized the episode:
"At a meeting with Secretary of Defense William Cohen, Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Attorney General Janet Reno, and other staffers, Clarke was the only one in favor of retaliation against bin Laden."
The list of excuses seemed endless:
"Reno thought retaliation might violate international law and was therefore against it.
"Tenet wanted to more definitive proof that bin Laden was behind the attack, although he personally thought he was.
"Albright was concerned about the reaction of world opinion to a retaliation against Muslims, and the impact it would have in the final days of the Clinton Middle East peace process.
"Cohen, according to Clarke, did not consider the Cole attack 'sufficient provocation' for a military retaliation."
And what about President Clinton? According to what Clarke told Miniter, he rejected the attack plan. Instead Clinton twice phoned the president of Yemen demanding better cooperation between the FBI and the Yemeni security services.
Clarke offered a chillingly prescient quote from one aide who agreed with him about Clinton administration inaction. "What's it going to take to get them to hit al Qaeda in Afghanistan? Does al Qaeda have to attack the Pentagon?" said the dismayed Clintonista.
Clarke's testimony before the 9/11 commission will surely boost sales for his new book, "Against All Enemies," which his publisher is releasing on the eve of his appearance before the panel.
The book's bombshell news hook is Clarke's claim that after the 9/11 attacks, President Bush wanted him to look for evidence of Iraqi involvement.
But it's not clear how much politics has tempered his recollections. Clarke certainly sounded partisan on the morning of December 15, when, as the nation was celebrating Saddam Hussein's capture, he was complaining that the brutal dictator's apprehension was actually bad news.
"I don't think it's going to have a near-term positive effect on security," Clarke told ABC's "This Week."
"In the short term, we may have actually a worse problem," he insisted.
A single sack doesn't begin to encompass all that is Bill Clinton.
I say we give Bill his chance. Bush should give him a special appointment as an envoy to the middle east with the primary objective to kill or capture bin laden. He can take any of his former administration with him, and also his loving wife. Drop them off near the Pakistan border
with an agreement to pick them up in one year or when the mission is accomplished. Of course they will have security,
Mr. President, you know Craig Livingstone don't you?
There is nothing, zero, zip, nada, no amount of evidence could ever be produced that will convince me that clinton is anything more than a lying morally corrupt POS.
Actually, don't you think Clinton indicted his own self when he said that he "saw the danger posed by Bin Ladin more clearly than President Bush"?
IF that is true...and he saw the danger more clearly, then he really DID FAIL AT THE MAIN JOB OF POTUS...to protect the citizens of the USA...
He kinda points the finger at himself....IMHO!
Good description of clinton, I agree with you.
He was a good SecNavy, but the world's full of folks likehime who are brilliant administrators and pathetic politicians or vice versa.
What did he do right after 9/11?
8:02 Taps smiles
From what I've seen, we'll meet with plenty of kindred spirit in Little Rock. Or will it be Chappaqua, or Hope, or Hot Springs?
(I'd actually prefer Hot Springs, there is a great Mexican restaurant south of the city.)
two words "ABLE DANGER"
I thought he already attacked Bin Laden once? Didn't he bombed that aspirin factory in Sudan!? What the Hell was that?? Would've...could've.....should've.....DID(half-assed)!
Yeah, Bill ... you'd KILL to have been a wartime President .. that quivering lip and those buckets of ice would have had a real workout.... and you coulda said how much you "feel their pain" with such heartfelt sympathy and been in our faces with your statesmanlike speeches week after week, over and over. And just think how many photo ops and good PR Hillary coulda received, visiting the military families, looking nurturing, making pleas for military support, etc. Coulda been the catalyst right there for her ascension to the presidency.
THERE IS A GOD, and if this was His plan .. OK .. then thank you, God. CLINTON as a wartime president could've actually DESTROYED THIS COUNTRY!!!
Mike ... DEVIL WITH THE BLUE DRESS, for sure!!
Anyone who wants to read what the 9/11 Commission creatively wrote about Clinton's dabble with Al Queda, take a look at this thread. This post #304 is an incredible resource. Even creative writing can't totally whitewash the abysmal negligence this debauched president and his administration rendered to US.
I suppose tomorrow we'll be hearing about how Hillary tired to be a fire breathing devil dog but the fickle finger of fate prevented the Marine Corps from being endowed with Miss Hillary.
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