Posted on 08/21/2005 1:04:32 PM PDT by ovrtaxt
One of the arguments at places like Think Progress and other sites which have made themselves the defenders of former Deputy AG Jamie Gorelick consists of pointing out that Gorelick didn't work at the DoD when she erected the "wall" separating intelligence and law enforcement operations. Therefore, they argue, she had no effect on the DIA's decision not to share information with the FBI. As I pointed out earlier, that argument fails for two reasons. The first is Gorelick's earlier assignment at the DoD as general counsel for ten months, during which one supposes she promulgated Bill Clinton's policies as the top attorney at Defense just as she did later at Justice. The second, and most obvious, is that as the number-two person at Justice, she still set policy for the FBI. Since sharing and cooperation require two parties to work together, her wall would have made any attempt to engage the FBI pointless.
Now William Tate at What's In The News points out another reason why the "wall" constrained Defense. Gorelick addressed her 1995 memo to several different people:
* Mary Jo White, US District Attorney, prosecuting the 1993 WTC bombing terrorists
* Louis Freeh, FBI Director
* Jo Ann Harris, Assistant Attorney General, Criminal Division (DoJ)
* Richard Scruggs, Chief Counsel, Office of Intelligence Policy and Review
This last addressee makes the connection to the Department of Defense that the Gorelick defenders claim didn't exist. As Tate points out and as the OIPR website makes clear, the DoD looked to the OIPR for legal opinions on anything having to do with the legality of their operations, especially in regard to those involving domestic targets:
The Office of Intelligence Policy and Review, under the direction of the Counsel for Intelligence Policy, is responsible for advising the Attorney General on all matters relating to the national security activities of the United States. The Office prepares and files all applications for electronic surveillance and physical search under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, assists Government agencies by providing legal advice on matters of national security law and policy, and represents the Department of Justice on variety of interagency committees such as the National Counterintelligence Policy Board. The Office also comments on and coordinates other agencies' views regarding proposed legislation affecting intelligence matters.
The Office serves as adviser to the Attorney General and various client agencies, including the Central Intelligence Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Defense and State Departments, concerning questions of law, regulation, and guidelines as well as the legality of domestic and overseas intelligence operations.
The inclusion of Richard Scruggs, the lead counsel at the OIPR, intended to send the message that any advice given to the DoD, CIA, and State regarding the sharing of files had better fall in line with her new stated policy of going "beyond the law" to avoid any appearance of impropriety. Given that Gorelick held a high-profile position within Justice as a political appointee of Bill Clinton, this policy would rightly get attention as an official directive of the President's wishes. The one office that all of these intelligence agencies would consult in terms of sharing and coordination between themselves and law-enforcement operations would therefore have advised all agencies to follow the Gorelick Wall as a standard and as White House policy.
Given that kind of connection, it doesn't take much imagination to understand why all of these agencies became shy about even attempting to stretch the limits of the Gorelick policy.
The notion that Gorelick's memo had no effect outside the DoJ does not stand up to scrutiny at all, once the fact and intent of including Scruggs and the OIPR become known. This shows why Mary Jo White objected so strenuously to this memo and its implementation, and why she went out of her way to antagonize her bosses at the DoJ with a second and more heated memo predicting, correctly, that such a policy would leave America unprotected against the very people she had just successfully prosecuted.
It's bad enough that Gorelick erected that wall in 1995. It's ludicrous that four years after 9/11, people waste their time defending her and her participation in the 9/11 Commission as a panel member instead of a witness.
Addendum: Relating this to Able Danger, one can easily see why the Wall kept the DoD from pursuing an FBI investigation of the program's findings. The AD team would have asked for permission from DoD attorneys, as Col. Tony Shaffer has said was done three times, and all three times the attorneys denied the request. Either they already had great familiarity with Clinton's policies -- which probably was the case -- or they consulted with the OIPR and got the Gorelick policy from Scruggs and his team.
Scruggs, by the way, was no mere bystander in this issue. He pressed for stricter constraints on information sharing in 1994, after the prosecution of Aldrich Ames for espionage. He complained about the supposedly loose interpretations of FISA at the FBI and in the intel communities, and on his own began imposing his own "wall" even without direction to do so from Reno or Gorelick. This action gets Scruggs his only mention in the Commission report (page 78).
What did the special say about Snell and 9/11.
Below is the Yahoo search on Snell.
http://search.yahoo.com/bin/search?p=DIETRICH%20SNELL
With probably some involvement from Janet ElRenio.
On the National Geographic Inside 9/11 Site
click on Enter the Archive on the left side.
Then count down to the 6th row, and count over to the 7th person, and you can hear Snell's comments there. He was shown 2 or 3 times with comments during the show.
Here's a HUGE link to 9/11 issues:
http://www.truthusa.com/911news.html
"Why don't these people just 'Butt out'" - Tom Kean, former Governor of New Jersey, CHairman of 9-11 Commission, Rockefeller Republican, Limousine Liberal and RINO par excellance.
Thanks. My grandkids blew my sound board on their last visit. So my puter is soundless.
MAKE SURE YOU READ PETER LANCE!!! His comments are STUNNING AND FOREBODING.
On the Inside 9/11 site, count 4 rows down, and 2 people over .. says he's a former ABC Correspondent.
After you read his comments, look down under "see also," and you see Robert Oakley. Click on that .. and click on "see also," under him click on ROBERT BLITZER -- he was on the '93 bombing for the FBI .. his info foretells their strategies and our missteps, and says one of the group "escaped to Iraq" -- and details how ineffective our INS was/IS.
The blueprint is all there of our failures. And granted, much can only be gleaned from the forensic analysis in hindsight, but it makes you wanna just cry at some of the ineptitude and missed connections and opportunities and just how much they used some of our laxities and freedoms to their very best advantage.
God love these agents and agencies -- so many times, you just know they were working so hard, but their adversaries were cunning and their hands were tied by walls or other obstacles
Spineless RINOs continue to bend over for the commie democrats. NSNR
Maybe Jamie will go down for the Fannie Mae fiasco also!!
"Firstly, BOTH Parties were involved in the fix. Make NO mistake about it...
Secondly, now there are several cases of a "conspiracy to cover-up" the original 9/11 Commission findings. There is NO way Gorelick didn't have plenty of help from Republicans. WHO are they??"
All the evidence that I have seen is against the Democrats. Where do you come up with both parties were involved? What evidence do you have that any Republicans were involved in this mess?
What coverup of 9/11 commission findings are you talking about? What was covered up? Who was involved? Name names. Give details. Who else was involved and what was their involvement? Don't throw accusations around without facts.
I do not buy into "BOTH parties are involved", just because someone said it. Facts are important. Give facts.
What coverup of 9/11 commission findings are you talking about? What was covered up? Who was involved? Name names."
It was disclosed that Jamie Gorelick was responsible for the "wall of silence" during the 9/11 Hearings.
That means EVERYONE knew her presense on the committee was not only a conflict of interest, BUT planted as part of an obvious coverup.
Who else is "involved in this mess"?
The entire 9/11 Committee itself for one. The Democrats. AND the Republicans who chose to bite the bullet rather than expose the truth and Gorelick as a Clinton Operative...
Btw, in case you blacked out during the Clinton regime, they (and he) managed to pilfer 900 confidential FBI files while beating unbeatable raps for treason, rape, breach of national security, purjury, and impeachable offenses ad infinitum.
One must easily assert Bubba does NOT beat ANY of his clearly impeachable offeses without the complicity of certain members of the GOP.
Simply, the elites and powerful protect their own.
Oh, I just had the most wonderful vision:
Horribillery becoming president, and appointing Jamie Gorelick as AG! 8-D
/sarc, OF COURSE!
Ponder it just a little. Given one, the second is our worst nightmare, and likely to happen.
Is there a "missing person" milk carton out yet for Gonzales? I know his first name's Edwardo, but "Casper" would be more fitting.
If you are dealing with a very important issue and want to get to the bottom of things, the last thing you'd ever do is set up a commission to investigate.
"The entire 9/11 Committee itself for one. The Democrats. AND the Republicans who chose to bite the bullet rather than expose the truth and Gorelick as a Clinton Operative..."
I like the way you say this right after saying: "It was disclosed that Jamie Gorelick was responsible for the "wall of silence" during the 9/11 Hearings."
Do you not remember that it was the Republicans that revealed this?
"Btw, in case you blacked out during the Clinton regime, they (and he) managed to pilfer 900 confidential FBI files while beating unbeatable raps for treason, rape, breach of national security, purjury, and impeachable offenses ad infinitum."
Have you forgotten all of the investigations and the impeachment that also happened during that time? Here are a couple of clues. It was not Democrats who called for these, they are the ones who said that Clinton's actions were "No big deal" and "nothing to see here" etc. It also was not the independents that got investigations and the impeachment going. It was the Republicans.
Now, again I ask you, what evidence do you have that Republicans were behind the coverups?
Ok, then tell me exactly how the GOP exploited this little tidbit? Did they tear into it like a dog with a bone? Hellooo -- Anybody home?
No.
Gorelick was afforded the opportunity by the 9/11 Panel, and GOP machination to carry on with the charade instead of treating it like the Kangaroo Court it was. And Kean & Co. were complicit at best, and co-conspirators at worst.
"Have you forgotten all of the investigations and the impeachment that also happened during that time?...It was not Democrats who called for these, they are the ones who said that Clinton's actions were 'No big deal' and "nothing to see here" etc....It was the Republicans."
House Republicans...
Meanwhile Senate Republicans folded up like a cheap camera and refused to listen to ALL the evidence against Bubba. Remember that??
They were cowards then, and they're still cowards who remain more concerned with power over principle.
"Ok, then tell me exactly how the GOP exploited this little tidbit? Did they tear into it like a dog with a bone?"
Yes, and the media covered it up like they always do, so that most people would not know about it.
"Gorelick was afforded the opportunity by the 9/11 Panel, and GOP machination to carry on with the charade instead of treating it like the Kangaroo Court it was. And Kean & Co. were complicit at best, and co-conspirators at worst."
What exactly were they supposed to do when the MSM worked to ignore it, or down play it? There were many in the GOP talking about it constantly. They could not make any change since there were an even number of Republicans and Democrats. None of the Democrats would consider throwing her off the committee, so she was able to stay. I still do not see where there is evidence of GOP being part of the problem, except in your mind.
"Meanwhile Senate Republicans folded up like a cheap camera and refused to listen to ALL the evidence against Bubba. Remember that??
They were cowards then, and they're still cowards who remain more concerned with power over principle."
I agree that the Republican senators were and are cowards, but, nearly all of them voted to impeach. How is that complicit? Because you don't like the rules? I don't either. None the less, the Republicans did vote to impeach. Now, where is your evidence to the contrary? Not inuendo, not opinion. Show some facts.
Never mind them, check out Debbie Schlussell !
Ya think? She also collected a million dollars a year in salary and bonuses as she presided over the collapse of Fannie Mae, a far bigger and egregious scandal than Enron, but swept under the rug by the media.
But the Republicans "knew" about it.
Are you implying as long as the MSM won't address a story, it can't be blown to smithereens and RATS exposed?
No, this is sheer indifference and/or cowardice by the GOP. They'd seen what'd happened to Gingrich and Lott and DeLay etal. and don't think principle is worth jeopardizing their careers.
If you can't see that as "fact," then there's no opening your eyes.
I am not implying anything. It has been shown again and again that when Republicans come out to expose anything that the media condemn them and then the population does the same. Kind of like what you are doing on this thread. And the simple fact of the matter is that without the media reporting, a story can not be blown to smithereens and the RATS can not be exposed.
Laurie Mylroie wrote about "The Wall" in this 1995 article, and quite accurately predicted that, as this "Wall" had compromised the investigation of the 1993 WTC attack, it would result in a national security "train wreck" to come someday in the future..
http://www.fas.org/irp/world/iraq/956-tni.htm
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