Why Is No One Blaming Bill Clinton for Understating Terror Threat?

[Insert image of Clinton fiddling while the Towers burned]

A few weeks ago, I got into a discussion about the Iraq war with a woman who hates Bush and the war.

I reminded her that Clinton signed the Iraqi Liberation Act and she said "At least he didn't go to war over it".

And I responded that if he believed half the frightening things about Iraq and their WMD program, didn't she think it was negligent that he didn't actually do anything about it.

That shut her up pretty quickly.

Why? B/c he's Bill Clinton, that's why.

The responsible (those who take care of themselves) are not responsible

The not responsible (those who demand from group #1) are responsible

Except if anything goes, wrong and then what are you looking at them for? They told you that they were not responsible.

BLAME a Clinton? For anything? Surely he jests....

What about Bill and 9-11?
On the second anniversary of September 11, there wasn't half as much solemnity and national unity on network TV coverage as last year.
Sep 17, 2003
by Brent Bozell ( bio | archive | contact )

Email to a friend Print this page Text size: A A On the second anniversary of September 11, there wasn't half as much solemnity and national unity on network TV coverage as last year. Bush administration officials were hammered by the TV interviewers for somehow straying from the war on al Qaeda into Iraq. Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton was being served cups of homage along with the coffee. CBS's Hannah Storm cooed: "You've fought so much for the heroes of 9/11 ... Has enough been done for the heroes, the people who fought so bravely on that day?"

In other words, we're back to normal. The imbalance was not only stunning for Team Bush, it was unfair to the viewing public. Several authors are now reviewing the Clinton legacy on terrorism, and it's a sorry one. Their new books should have caused CBS and the others to ask Sen. Clinton: Why didn't your husband seize Osama bin Laden when he had the chance?

It takes the passage of time for a true historical verdict to be reached, but the Clinton legacy on terrorism is one virtually no one wants to discuss. When they do touch on it, the authors seem very sensitive to appearing to be too anti-Clinton.

On Sept. 3, author Gerald Posner came on NBC's "Today" show to discuss his new book, "Why America Slept." Katie Couric bluntly asked if he blamed Clinton for failing to prevent the attacks. Posner tiptoed and mumbled into a yes, "unfortunately." But he added: "If the Republicans had been in power, it would've been the same situation, Katie. I'd be talking to you today about nobody paying attention. It just happened to fall on Bill Clinton's watch, unfortunately." After changing the subject to the Saudi connection to al Qaeda, Katie underlined that Posner's book should be read with a jaundiced eye: "a member of the National Security Council and a senior intelligence official in this country says the whole thing is fantasy."'

Posner was back on TV the next day on the hot morning show "Fox & Friends," and the change in the author's tone was dramatic. Co-host Steve Doocy asked how many times Posner voted for Clinton (both times), and then asked if he would so again in hindsight. Posner not only said there was zero chance of that, he rebutted himself from the day before: "I thought anyone who was in office (would have failed), we weren't paying attention as a country ... But Clinton was particularly bad."

Why? Clinton missed an opportunity to get Osama from the Sudan in 1996. "Worse than that," Posner told Fox, Osama landed in a jumbo jet with 150 family members and aides on the ground of our ally, Qatar: "They call up and say, 'What should we do with this guy?' And the White House says, 'Send him on.'" Posner even charged that Clinton did little because he was always doing polling to figure out if he should go after bin Laden, as opposed to leading the public against the building terror threat.

Conservative analysts from Rush Limbaugh on down have focused their minds and energies on the things Bill Clinton could have done to prevent the September 11 attacks. But our "objective" press corps can't even imagine blaming Clinton for anything. Posner's Clinton "bashing" was left out of the "Today" show Web site excerpt. The Sept. 8 Time magazine carried an "explosive" book review, but it was another interesting Posner story about the confession of top al-Qaeda leader Abu Zubaydah -- nothing on Clinton.

Even if it's negative, at least Posner's book is getting major media attention. Former Wall Street Journal writer Richard Miniter's book, "Losing Bin Laden," goes into detail on Clinton's failures, but he hasn't been invited on ABC, CBS or NBC. In an interview with National Review Online on September 11, Miniter listed 16 moments of opportunity when Team Clinton screwed up the chance to get Osama.

Miniter is most intrigued by the response to the 2000 bombing of the U.S.S. Cole, which took the lives of 17 U.S. soldiers. Except for counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke, the entire Clinton team wanted to take no military action in response. Janet Reno thought it was against "international law." Madeleine Albright thought it would hurt America in "world opinion." Even Defense Secretary Bill Cohen was a no. One friend told Clarke: "What's it going to take to get them to hit al Qaeda in Afghanistan? Does al Qaeda have to attack the Pentagon?"

Albright is the next major author who will make the TV rounds promoting a book. That's a good opportunity for the network stars to ask the tough questions about Clinton administration mistakes. But that's about as likely as Clinton doing the right thing about terrorism.

Brent Bozell is President of Media Research Center, a Townhall.com partner organization.

BUMP!/Pong

Get over this Bill Clinton obsession - he hasn't been President for 5 years now. It's over.

This kinding of looking over your shoulder stuff is exactly what we accuse the Democrats of... whining about the past. They whine that we went into Iraq on what they claim are lies by Bush, and we tell them to get over it.

Well - Get over Bill Clinton. If you want to worry about a Clinton, worry about Hillary.

Inside Report: Losing Bin Laden
By Robert D. Novak
CNSNews.com Commentary
September 01, 2003

On Oct. 12, 2000, the day of the devastating terrorist attack on the USS Cole, President Clinton's highest-level national security team met to determine what to do. Counter-terrorism chief Richard Clarke wanted to hit Afghanistan, aiming at Osama bin Laden's complex and the terrorist leader himself. But Clarke was all alone. There was no support for a retaliatory strike that, if successful, might have prevented the 9/11 carnage.

This startling story is told for the first time in a book by Brussels-based investigative reporter Richard Miniter to be published this week. "Losing bin Laden" relates that Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Secretary of Defense William Cohen, Atty. Gen. Janet Reno and CIA Director George Tenet all said no to the attack. I have contacted enough people attending the meeting to confirm what Miniter reports. Indeed, his account is based on direct, on-the-record quotes from participants.

Miniter, who was part of the Sunday Times of London investigation of Clinton vs. bin Laden, has written a bitter indictment of the American president (its subtitle: "How Bill Clinton's Failures Unleashed Global Terror"). But by the time of the Cole disaster with only weeks left in his presidency, Clinton had focused on the terrorist threat. The problem of the Oct. 12 meeting was the caution common to all councils of war. Arguments by participants sound valid, but collectively they built a future catastrophe.

Al Qaeda's bombing of the billion-dollar U.S. destroyer fulfilled Dick Clarke's prediction of the terrorists seeking U.S. military targets. Hours after the attack, Clarke presided over a meeting of four terrorism experts in the White House Situation Room. He and the State Department's Michael Sheehan agreed this almost certainly was bin Laden's doing, but the FBI and CIA representatives wanted more investigation.

That deadlock preceded a meeting of Cabinet-level officials that same day. Clarke proposed already targeted retaliation against bin Laden''s camps and Taliban buildings in Kabul and Kandahar. At least, they would destroy the terrorist infrastructure. A quick strike might also get Osama bin Laden. "Around the table," Miniter writes, "Clarke heard only objections." As related by Clarke, the meeting exemplified ministerial caution.

Atty. Gen. Reno, told by the FBI that the terrorists were still unidentified, argued that retaliation violated international law. Reno and the CIA's Tenet wanted more investigation. Secretary of State Albright is quoted as saying that with renewed Israeli-Palestinian fighting, "bombing Muslims wouldn't be helpful at this time." (Albright later told Miniter she would have taken a different position if she had "definitive" proof of bin Laden''s involvement.)

Defense Secretary Cohen's position at the meeting is most surprising. The only Republican in the Clinton Cabinet was architect of missile attacks on Afghanistan and Sudan after the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Africa. Clarke remembers Cohen saying the attack on the Cole "was not sufficiently provocative" and that heavy bombing of Afghanistan might cause upheaval in neighboring Pakistan. When I contacted him, Cohen said he did not recall this meeting but that "certainly I regarded the Cole as a major provocation."

The State Department's Sheehan, formerly with Special Forces and now with the New York City Police Department, did not blame Bill Cohen. "It was the entire Pentagon," he told Miniter, adding he was "stunned" and "taken aback" by the lack of Defense Department desire to retaliate. After the meeting, Sheehan told Clarke, prophetically: "What's it going to take to get them to hit al Qaeda in Afghanistan? Does al Qaeda have to attack the Pentagon?"

At the Cabinet-level meeting, only Dick Clarke wanted retaliation. Indeed, he was viewed as a hothead, always demanding bombs away. So much pain has been inflicted, and so much blood has been spilled since then, that the meeting has faded from the memory of its participants-until stirred up by Clarke in Miniter's book.

Less than a month after the Cole disaster, CIA analysts had concluded bin Laden was behind it (though the FBI was still clueless). Osama bin Laden had virtually claimed credit for the most successful attack on a U.S. naval vessel since World War II. He and his gang had escaped to plan greater misery for America.

Thanx for posting that

Are you kidding?

The Emperor William Clinton is blameless. He's more pure than a petri-dish of embyronic stem cells! He's the savior of all human kind. If only Republicans hadn't hated him so much, he could've rescued everyone of those hijacked planes with his bare hands!

"BLAME a Clinton? For anything? Surely he jests...."

Exactly!

Tis truly a charmed life I lead - I'm surrounded by conservatives in our community.

That shut her up pretty quickly.

Good work Peach! The lady would probably have a heart attack if presented with your list of quotes by prominent democrats on the threat of Saddam's WMDs.

The dem game plan figures that withdrawal from Iraq would enable Al Qaeda or clones to launch another attack in the US, and if big enough, it would doom republican chances in '06 and '08. They don't care about this country, only sitting in the WH.

We have a saying in our family. The horse is dead already. Get off. Instead of focusing on the past, let's focus on the present and future. That is where the threat is now.

Kean: 8 years of mistakes led to 9/11 attacks

Terror strikes can be traced to first WTC bombing, panel chief says

Friday, December 19, 2003

BY ROBERT COHEN
STAR-LEDGER WASHINGTON BUREAU

WASHINGTON -- The litany of government missteps leading to the 9/11 suicide hijackings began with the response to the first bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993, the chairman of the national commission investigating the 2001 terrorist attacks said yesterday.

"It goes back all the way to the first World Trade Center bombing. We didn't follow that up and link it to Osama bin Laden," said Thomas Kean, the former New Jersey governor and chairman of the 9/11 commission.

"There were mistakes made all the way through," Kean said in an interview with The Star-Ledger yesterday. "If some of the mistakes had not been made or if the threat had been taken more seriously, it is possible the Sept. 11 tragedy could have been prevented."

But he said it was "too early to tell if people in high places failed or didn't do their job." In a later interview for ABC's "Nightline," he added, "We have no evidence that anybody high in the Clinton administration or the Bush administration did anything wrong."

On Feb. 26, 1993, a truck bomb exploded in the B-2 level garage of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing six people and injuring about 1,000.

The investigation led to arrests and convictions of some radical Islamists, and the discovery of terrorist cells in the United States not directly linked to any country but united in their anti-American zeal.

The FBI also later discovered that an individual tied to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing received financial assistance from a wealthy Saudi named Osama bin Laden -- who at the time was not known to the FBI in New York. Bin Laden has since been identified as the mastermind of the 2001 strikes and numerous other terrorist attacks around the world.

In the telephone interview with The Star-Ledger, Kean did not elaborate on the 1993 bombing except to point out that it is "part of a whole thread of events" that, if pieced together, could have helped authorities be better prepared and more vigilant before Sept. 11, 2001.

On that day, four commercial airlines were hijacked and crashed into the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon and the Pennsylvania countryside, killing about 3,000 people.

Kean said evidence already in the public domain shows that in the years and months leading up to Sept. 11 and on that day, there were a number of government breakdowns involving the FBI, CIA, immigration service, airline security system and the nation's air defenses.

"There were a number of points at which people, had they acted differently, we could possibly have prevented the tragedy," said Kean.

"People could have stopped the hijackers at the gate before they got on airplanes. Immigration officials could have stopped some of them at the border because their credentials were not legal in some cases," said Kean.

"People in the FBI could have bucked up the information they had to higher levels rather than let it die in the middle of the bureaucracy," he said.

A congressional intelligence committee, in a report issued last year, detailed a number of missed signals by the FBI and CIA, including numerous reports suggesting that terrorists might use airplanes as weapons.

In a television interview earlier this week, Kean said some of the people who made mistakes should have lost their jobs. He said yesterday he was referring to midlevel people at various government agencies, not top administration officials.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan yesterday disputed the idea that steps could have been taken to avert the attacks.

"As we have previously said, there is nothing that we have seen that leads us to believe that September 11th could have been prevented. We previously said that. That still stands," McClellan said.

The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States is scheduled to issue its final report by May 27. In the next several months, it will hold a series of hearings with key witnesses from the FBI, CIA, Defense Department, National Security Council and others in positions of authority during the Clinton and Bush administrations.

The panel may also hear, either in private or public sessions, from President Bush and former President Bill Clinton.

Kean said he is "not prejudging" the commission's conclusions, pointing out the panel still has volumes of material to examine and about 600 additional witnesses to interview. The panel's investigators have already interviewed about 600 people, including witnesses overseas in such places as Pakistan, Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia.

"Some things will come out at the hearings that are different than the things we think we know," said Kean. "But it is all not in yet, and it would be unfair to talk about that."

"We are tracking down every conspiracy theory and a lot of questions raised by family groups," said Kean, now the president of Drew University in Madison. "From our research, we have found some things and are coming to some conclusions, but we still have a lot of work to do."

In the "Nightline" interview, Kean said it would be the commission's job to judge whether changes in security and intelligence procedures since 9/11 have been adequate to prevent a future attack. Asked whether he personally believes the nation is now safe from similar terrorism, Kean said, "No.

"In fact, unfortunately, most of the people who have testified before us say in all likelihood something will occur again," Kean said. "Unfortunately the forecasts by people who are knowledgeable in this country are not optimistic."

I'd agree except he doesn't seem to realize he's OUT OF POWER. He is a supremely skilled political thinker and so long as he's slandering his successor and positioning his wife for the White House, he cannot be ignored.

Saint Bill of the

"Wholly Clueless Democrat Church of the Big Lie?"