Posted on 09/23/2006 1:49:25 PM PDT by Brian Mosely
The liberal website Thinkprogress has published a rough transcript of Bill Clinton's interview with Fox News' Chris Wallace, and it appears to be even more contentious than the brief clip that has been released shows. Here are some excerpts from Clinton's angry defense of his conduct of the war on terrorism, beginning when Wallace asked him "Why didn't you do more, connect the dots and put [al Qaeda] out of business?"
I will answer all of those things on the merits but I want to talk about the context of which this arises. I’m being asked this on the Fox network…[note — these ellipses are in the Thinkprogress transcript]. ABC just had a right wing conservative on the 'Path to 9/11' falsely claim that it was based on the 911 commission report with three things asserted against me that are directly contradicted by the 9/11 commission report. I think it’s very interesting that all the conservative Republicans who now say that I didn’t do enough, claimed that I was obsessed with Bin Laden. All of President Bush’s neocons claimed that I was too obsessed with finding Bin Laden when they didn’t have a single meeting about Bin Laden for the nine months after I left office. All the right wingers who now say that I didn’t do enough said that I did too much. Same people….
I authorized the CIA to get groups together to try to kill him. The CIA was run by George Tenet who President Bush gave the medal of freedom to and said he did a good job.. The country never had a comprehensive anti terror operation until I came to office. If you can criticize me for one thing, you can criticize me for this, after the Cole I had battle plans drawn to go into Afghanistan, overthrow the Taliban, and launch a full scale attack search for Bin Laden. But we needed basing rights in Uzbekistan which we got after 9/11. The CIA and the FBI refused to certify that Bin Laden was responsible while I was there. They refused to certify. So that meant I would have had to send a few hundred special forces in helicopters and refuel at night. Even the 9/11 Commission didn’t do that. Now the 9/11 Commission was a political document too. All I’m asking is if anybody wants to say I didn’t do enough, you read Richard Clarke’s book…
At least I tried. That’s the difference in me and some, including all the right wingers who are attacking me now. They ridiculed me for trying. They had eight months to try and they didn’t….. {ellipses in the Thinkprogress transcript]. I tried. So I tried and failed. When I failed I left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy and the best guy in the country, Dick Clarke… [ellipses in Thinkprogress transcript] So you did Fox's bidding on this show. You did you nice little conservative hit job on me….
I worked hard to try and kill him. I authorized a finding for the CIA to kill him. We contracted with people to kill him. I got closer to killing him than anybody has gotten since. And if I were still president we’d have more than 20,000 troops there trying to kill him. Now I never criticized President Bush and I don’t think this is useful. But you know we do have a government that think Afghanistan is 1/7 as important as Iraq. And you ask me about terror and Al Qaeda with that sort of dismissive theme when all you have to do is read Richard Clarke’s book to look at what we did in a comprehensive systematic way to try to protect the country against terror. And you’ve got that little smirk on your face. It looks like you’re so clever…
Clinton's answers raise many points that call for answers. More tomorrow.
DUmbass doesn't know when to quit! Keep speaking, BJ!
I expect to see him on Meet the Cuomo Aid.
There is no ice left to put on anything,according to Bill's Veep, global warming has taken it all. He'll just have to tough ot out.
Oh yeah but if it was not I am sure he would say I never said that. That is just the right wing nuts out there to get me.
Sounds like bubba saw "The Path to 9/11" and has come out swinging.
Okay, that wasn't the best choice of words.
You must have read Slick's book
LIAR!
Osama was still running TRAINING CAMPS in Afghanistan when you left office, you lousy excuse for a President! Only after PRESIDENT GEORGE W BUSH started whacking the Taliban and Al Qaeda training camps did Useless Bin Laden go into hiding.
I wonder if Chris Wallace CHALLENGED Impeached42 on this FACT? I doubt it.
Bump that, Cincinna!
"All of President Bush’s neocons claimed that I was too obsessed with finding Bin Laden when they didn’t have a single meeting about Bin Laden for the nine months after I left office."
This is simply not true and another example of how he tries to re-write history to fit his legacy. There is plenty of documented evidence that Condi met with Clark, Tenent, and others on a regular basis prior 9-11 re: terrorism. Is he impying that Clark did not tell Condi about OBL?
One more point - how can he drop a bomb another soveriegn nation without an OK from Congress, the UN and 17 years of sanctions //sarcasm// - such as the dems require of GWB?
I can't stand Clinton but, to be fair, the cruise missile thing was OK and would probably have worked if Halfbright and whoever it was in the Pentagon hadn't alerted the Pakis so early.
Yeah, ABC is so right wing.
It was sarcasm, my friend, delicious sarcasm.
Of course, not to the DUmmies. They will somehow see Rove's fingerprints all over this most spectacular implosion of their main man!
Said in Rush's parody-voice, "I...I...never worked HARDER on anything in my lie-ef. To stop terrorism and to protect the American People? I lost plenty of sleep over that."
What a jack@ss. I loathe that man and his pseudo-wife, too.
I LOVE to see the Clinton Legacy going down in flames! Tee-Hee! Let's keep the fire stoked through '08, shall we?
The Sunday Talk Thread by Alas Babylon! will be armed and ready.
So was mine. I was playing along.
Okay, jes checkin'! lol
Anothe great point! I feel the same way. It seemed wasteful to linger on the Clinton culpability in 9-11...but now that he is agressively lying to protect his legacy and hurt the GOP/upcoming election...now he's really got me ticked off!!
AND dangerous, MM. Like El Diablo. :-)
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