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9/11 widows blast Bush Administration over Rice, Tenet meeting

Larisa Alexandrovna
Published: Friday October 6, 2006

In an October 5th response to recent news of yet another pre-September 11th warning that was ignored by senior Bush administration officials, four widows who lost their husbands during the terrorist attcks have issued a statement about what they see as the failure of White House officials to act upon warnings that Al Qaeda was planning a strike on the United States.

Lorie Van Auken, Mindy Kleinberg, and Patty Cazaza – who are among the four widows from New Jersey known as the Jersey Girls (the fourth, Monica Gabrielle, is not a member of the group) – have issued a compilation of pre-9/11 terrorism warnings that they believe paints a disturbing picture of a negligent Presidency.

They also address the latest revelation from Watergate reporter Bob Woodward that then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice was warned of a possible attack on July 10, 2001 by then-CIA Director George Tenet.

The allegation in Woodward's book, State of Denial, is that Tenet was so concerned about the intelligence showing a possible attack that he phoned Rice and asked for an immediate meeting, which he got that same day, along with the CIA's top counterterrorism expert, Cofer Black. During the meeting, Tenet says, they expressed "in the starkest of terms" to Rice that an attack was imminent.

Rice has denied that such a meeting took place, citing the 911 Commission Report, which never mentioned any such meeting.

"It kind of doesn't ring true that you have to shock me into something I was very involved in," she stated when asked about the allegation.

In addition to Rice, then-Attorney General John Ashcroft was also warned by Tenet, as was Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, according to Woodward.

Ashcroft began to charter private jets shortly afterwards, avoiding all travel by commercial airliners in July and continuing to do so up until the attacks. According to a July 26, 2001 CBS news report, Ashcroft began flying by private plane after an FBI "threat assessment."

"In response to inquiries from CBS News over why Ashcroft was traveling exclusively by leased jet aircraft instead of commercial airlines, the Justice Department cited what it called a 'threat assessment' by the FBI, and said Ashcroft has been advised to travel only by private jet for the remainder of his term."

It remains unclear whether or not this concern for personal safety was in any way brought on by the Tenet warnings.

Initially backing Rice's denial were the 911 Commissioners themselves, who also denied having knowledge or having been briefed on such a meeting.

In a remarkable turn of events, however, records of the meeting between Commission members and Tenet counter that claim – as does a State Department log book – and support Woodward's assertions about the warnings that Rice and Ashcroft had received from the CIA. As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle:

    Members of the commission – an independent, bipartisan panel created by Congress to investigate the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks – have said for days that they were not told about the July 10 meeting. But it turns out that the panel was, in fact, told about the meeting, according to the interview transcript and Democratic commission member Richard Ben-Veniste, who sat in on the interview with Tenet. The meeting was not identified by the July 10 date in the commission's best-selling report.

    Rice added to the confusion by strongly suggesting that the meeting may never have occurred at all – even though administration officials had conceded for several days that it had. A State Department spokesman said later that while the meeting definitely happened, Rice and Tenet disputed Woodward's characterization of her response.

Why the meeting and Tenet's interview never made it into the official 911 Commission Report remains a mystery and adds to the concern of many 911 family members and activists that a second investigation is needed.

The four women, Van Auken, Kleinberg, Cazaza, and Gabrielle – who initially made news by forcing the Bush administration to acquiesce to forming the first 911 Commission and holding hearings – have issued a scathing response to this latest turn of events, citing many additional warnings that the Bush administration was given but that the 911 Commission failed, in their view, to adequately address.

Their statement, in its entirety, follows:
#

Statement Regarding al Qaeda Threats
October 5, 2006

Astonishingly, five years post 9/11 the public is made aware about an urgent July 10, 2001 meeting that took place between former CIA Director George Tenet and then, National Security Advisor, Condoleezza Rice. This information comes from Bob Woodward's newly released book, "State of Denial".

Despite this Administration's rhetoric that they had "no warnings" leading up to 9/11, it has become abundantly clear, that key Administration officials were made aware of the vast array of Al Qaeda threats and warnings that existed in years prior, and more importantly, in the weeks leading up to September 11, 2001.

When we add the July 10, 2001 meeting to the plethora of other clear warnings that our government had, a very concise view of the al Qaeda threat emerges. Those other warnings include, but are not limited to:

    *

      Warnings from leaders of other nations and foreign intelligence apparatus' of terrorist threats
    *

      June 30, 2001 Senior Executive Intelligence Briefing (SEIB) entitled "bin Laden Threats Are Real"
    *

      The threat of President Bush's assassination at the G-8 Summit by al Qaeda in July of 2001 – using aircraft to dive bomb the summit building
    *

      July 2001 Phoenix memo, which told of potential terrorists taking flight lessons
    *

      52 FAA warnings – five of which mentioned al Qaeda's training for hijacking
    *

      August 6, 2001 Presidential Daily Brief entitled "bin Laden Determined to Strike in US"
    *

      National Intelligence Estimate (NIE)entitled "Islamist Extremists Learn to Fly"
    *

      Intelligence agency heads describing themselves with their "hair on fire" to characterize the imminent nature of the threats they were intercepting from Al Qaeda and their sense of urgency in relating them to the Bush Administration
    *

      The arrest of Zacharias Moussaoui in August of 2001
    *

      FBI Agent Harry Samit's 70 unsuccessful attempts to get a FISA Warrant to examine Moussaoui's belongings

Aside from scheduling a National Security Council meeting on September 4, 2001, two months after the July 10 "connect the dots" briefing from CIA director, George Tenet, the abundance of post 9/11 reports and commissions found no evidence of any action taken by appropriate officials. The 9/11 Commission itself concluded that in spite of an unprecedented attack threat in the months before 9/11, US "domestic agencies never mobilized in response to the threat. They did not have direction, and did not have a plan to institute. The borders were not hardened. Transportation systems were not fortified. Electronic surveillance was not targeted against a domestic threat. State and local law enforcement were not marshaled to augment the FBI's efforts. The public was not warned."

While certain members of the 9/11 Commission recalled a January 28, 2004 closed session meeting with former CIA Director, George Tenet, where this urgent July 10, 2001 meeting was discussed, this meeting was not referenced in the Commission's final report.

In the transcript testimony, the former CIA Director described the non-routine meeting that he and Cofer Black called for with then National Security Advisor, Condoleeza Rice as one of the "starkest warnings" ever given by the CIA to the White House on Al Qaeda.

To our continued dismay, both the Bush Administration and the 9/11 Commission have consistently failed to give a complete and honest accounting to the American public with regard to their actions and inactions leading up to the devastation of September 11, 2001.

The inexcusable result of this less than truthful accounting has resulted in America making important national security decisions and passing legislation using the 9/11 Commission's conclusions and recommendations. Chillingly, these decisions appear to be based upon an unclear combination of partial truths mixed with distortions and omissions of important facts.

Incredibly, five years post 9/11 we have come full circle. In spite of all the clear warnings that our government received, why did those in power fail to invoke any defensive measures to protect our nation from the attacks of September 11, 2001?

We demand the immediate declassification and release of these latest documents and transcripts. The American public has the right to know what their government did or did not do to protect us from terrorist actions.

Finally, instead of reorganizing an entire intelligence community because they "weren't sharing information", and rather than telling us that "9/11 was a failure of imagination", what we needed was for the 9/11 Commission to state the truth and hold those responsible to account. The most effective change for America would be to have a National Security Council that understands that it is their job to translate vital information into action.

[Editor's note: Larisa Alexandrovna was involved in the writing of the film 9/11 Press for Truth.]

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/911_widows_blast_Bush_Administration_over_1006.html

Bush cites authority to bypass FEMA law
Signing statement is employed again

By Charlie Savage, Globe Staff  |  October 6, 2006

WASHINGTON -- President Bush this week asserted that he has the executive authority to disobey a new law in which Congress has set minimum qualifications for future heads of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Congress passed the law last week as a response to FEMA's poor handling of Hurricane Katrina. The agency's slow response to flood victims exposed the fact that Michael Brown, Bush's choice to lead the agency, had been a politically connected hire with no prior experience in emergency management.

To shield FEMA from cronyism, Congress established new job qualifications for the agency's director in last week's homeland security bill. The law says the president must nominate a candidate who has ``a demonstrated ability in and knowledge of emergency management" and ``not less than five years of executive leadership."

Bush signed the homeland-security bill on Wednesday morning. Then, hours later, he issued a signing statement saying he could ignore the new restrictions. Bush maintains that under his interpretation of the Constitution, the FEMA provision interfered with his power to make personnel decisions.

The law, Bush wrote, ``purports to limit the qualifications of the pool of persons from whom the president may select the appointee in a manner that rules out a large portion of those persons best qualified by experience and knowledge to fill the office."

The homeland-security bill contained measures covering a range of topics, including terrorism, disaster preparedness, and illegal immigration. One provision calls for authorizing the construction of a 700-mile fence along the Mexican border.

But Bush's signing statement challenged at least three-dozen laws specified in the bill. Among those he targeted is a provision that empowers the FEMA director to tell Congress about the nation's emergency management needs without White House permission. This law, Bush said, ``purports . . . to limit supervision of an executive branch official in the provision of advice to the Congress." Despite the law, he said, the FEMA director would be required to get clearance from the White House before telling lawmakers anything.

Bush said nothing of his objections when he signed the bill with a flourish in a ceremony Wednesday in Scottsdale, Ariz. At the time, he proclaimed that the bill was ``an important piece of legislation that will highlight our government's highest responsibility, and that's to protect the American people."

The bill, he added, ``will also help our government better respond to emergencies and natural disasters by strengthening the capabilities of the Federal Emergency Management Agency."

Bush's remarks at the signing ceremony were quickly e-mailed to reporters, and the White House website highlighted the ceremony. By contrast, the White House minimized attention to the signing statement. When asked by the Globe on Wednesday afternoon if there would be a signing statement, the press office declined to comment, saying only that any such document, if it existed, would be issued in the ``usual way."

The press office posted the signing-statement document on its website around 8 p.m. Wednesday, after most reporters had gone home. The signing statement was not included in news reports yesterday on the bill-signing.

Senator Susan Collins, a Republican from Maine and chairwoman of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, who has been one of the harshest critics of FEMA's performance during Katrina, yesterday rejected Bush's suggestion that he can bypass the new FEMA laws.

Responding to questions from the Globe, Collins said there are numerous precedents for Congress establishing qualifications for executive branch positions, ranging from the solicitor general's post to the director of the Fish and Wildlife Service.

She also said that Congress has long authorized certain officials from a variety of departments ``to go directly to Congress with recommendations," pointing out that the FEMA director statute was modeled after a law that gives similar independence to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon.

``I believe it is appropriate to extend this authority to the official tasked with leading the nation's response to disasters," she said.

Georgetown Law School professor Martin Lederman said Congress clearly has the power to set standards for positions such as the FEMA director, so long as the requirements leave a large enough pool of qualified candidates that the White House has ``ample room for choice."

``It's hard to imagine a more modest and reasonable congressional response to the Michael Brown fiasco," said Lederman, who worked in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel from 1994 to 2002.

The White House did not respond to requests for comment about its signing statement.

In the past, the administration has defended the legality of its signing statements. It has also argued that because Congress often lumps many laws into a single package, it is sometimes impractical to veto a large bill on the basis of some parts being flawed .

At a June hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, a Bush administration attorney, Michelle Boardman , noted that other US presidents have also used signing statements. She asserted that Bush's statements ``are not an abuse of power."

Bush's use of signing statements has attracted increasing attention over the past year. In December 2005, Bush asserted that he can bypass a statutory ban on torture. In March 2006, the president said he can disobey oversight provisions in the Patriot Act reauthorization bill.

In all, Bush has challenged more than 800 laws enacted since he took office, most of which he said intruded on his constitutional powers as president and commander in chief. By contrast, all previous presidents challenged a combined total of about 600 laws.

At the same time, Bush has virtually abandoned his veto power, giving Congress no chance to override his judgments. Bush has vetoed just one bill since taking office, the fewest of any president since the 19th century.

Earlier this year, the American Bar Association declared that Bush's use of signing statements was ``contrary to the rule of law and our constitutional separation of powers."

Last month, the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service concluded that Bush's signing statements are ``an integral part" of his ``comprehensive strategy to strengthen and expand executive power" at the expense of the legislative branch.
© Copyright 2006 Globe Newspaper Company.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/10/06/bush_cites_authority_to_bypass_fema_law/?page=full

Waterboarding Historically Controversial
In 1947, the U.S. Called It a War Crime; in 1968, It Reportedly Caused an Investigation

By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, October 5, 2006; Page A17

Key senators say Congress has outlawed one of the most notorious detainee interrogation techniques -- "waterboarding," in which a prisoner feels near drowning. But the White House will not go that far, saying it would be wrong to tell terrorists which practices they might face.

Inside the CIA, waterboarding is cited as the technique that got Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the prime plotter of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, to begin to talk and provide information -- though "not all of it reliable," a former senior intelligence official said.
   

Soldiers in Vietnam use the waterboarding technique on an uncooperative enemy suspect near Da Nang in 1968 to try to obtain information from him.
Soldiers in Vietnam use the waterboarding technique on an uncooperative enemy suspect near Da Nang in 1968 to try to obtain information from him. (United Press International)

Waterboarding is variously characterized as a powerful tool and a symbol of excess in the nation's fight against terrorists. But just what is waterboarding, and where does it fit in the arsenal of coercive interrogation techniques?

On Jan. 21, 1968, The Washington Post published a front-page photograph of a U.S. soldier supervising the questioning of a captured North Vietnamese soldier who is being held down as water was poured on his face while his nose and mouth were covered by a cloth. The picture, taken four days earlier near Da Nang, had a caption that said the technique induced "a flooding sense of suffocation and drowning, meant to make him talk."

The article said the practice was "fairly common" in part because "those who practice it say it combines the advantages of being unpleasant enough to make people talk while still not causing permanent injury."

The picture reportedly led to an Army investigation.

Twenty-one years earlier, in 1947, the United States charged a Japanese officer, Yukio Asano, with war crimes for carrying out another form of waterboarding on a U.S. civilian. The subject was strapped on a stretcher that was tilted so that his feet were in the air and head near the floor, and small amounts of water were poured over his face, leaving him gasping for air until he agreed to talk.

"Asano was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor," Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) told his colleagues last Thursday during the debate on military commissions legislation. "We punished people with 15 years of hard labor when waterboarding was used against Americans in World War II," he said.

A CIA interrogation training manual declassified 12 years ago, "KUBARK Counterintelligence Interrogation -- July 1963," outlined a procedure similar to waterboarding. Subjects were suspended in tanks of water wearing blackout masks that allowed for breathing. Within hours, the subjects felt tension and so-called environmental anxiety. "Providing relief for growing discomfort, the questioner assumes a benevolent role," the manual states.

The KUBARK manual was the product of more than a decade of research and testing, refining lessons learned from the Korean War, where U.S. airmen were subjected to a new type of "touchless torture" until they confessed to a bogus plan to use biological weapons against the North Koreans.

Used to train new interrogators, the handbook presented "basic information about coercive techniques available for use in the interrogation situation." When it comes to torture, however, the handbook advised that "the threat to inflict pain . . . can trigger fears more damaging than the immediate sensation of pain."

In the post-Vietnam period, the Navy SEALs and some Army Special Forces used a form of waterboarding with trainees to prepare them to resist interrogation if captured. The waterboarding proved so successful in breaking their will, says one former Navy captain familiar with the practice, "they stopped using it because it hurt morale."

After the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, the interrogation world changed. Low-level Taliban and Arab fighters captured in Afghanistan provided little information, the former intelligence official said. When higher-level al-Qaeda operatives were captured, CIA interrogators sought authority to use more coercive methods.

These were cleared not only at the White House but also by the Justice Department and briefed to senior congressional officials, according to a statement released last month by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Waterboarding was one of the approved techniques.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/04/AR2006100402005.html

When questions began to be raised last year about the handling of high-level detainees and Congress passed legislation barring torture, the handful of CIA interrogators and senior officials who authorized their actions became concerned that they might lose government support.

Passage last month of military commissions legislation provided retroactive legal protection to those who carried out waterboarding and other coercive interrogation techniques.

http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/2006/09/saras-sunday-rant.html

This comes from a woman who lived in the US and now livese in Canada. She compares the two systems.

 

State of Denial: Two months before 9/11, Rice gave the 'brush-off' to 'impending terrorist attack' warning

Ron Brynaert
Published: Saturday September 30, 2006



(Update: Former Counsel to the 9/11 Commission suggests that "[v]ery possibly, someone committed a crime" by engaging in a "cover-up" of the warning)

According to a new book written by Washington Post investigative reporter Bob Woodward, two months before the September 11 attacks, then National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice gave the "brush-off" to an "impending terrorist attack" warning by former C.I.A. director George J. Tenet and his counterterrorism coordinator.

An article in Friday's New York Times first mentioned the warning, and a front page book review of Woodward's State of Denial in Saturday's edition provides more details.

"On July 10, 2001, the book says, Mr. Tenet and his counterterrorism chief, J. Cofer Black, met with Ms. Rice at the White House to impress upon her the seriousness of the intelligence the agency was collecting about an impending attack," David E. Sanger reported on Friday. "But both men came away from the meeting feeling that Ms. Rice had not taken the warnings seriously."

Sanger also reported that Tenet told Woodward that before 9/11, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was "impeding" efforts to catch Osama bin Laden.

"Mr. Woodward writes that in the weeks before the Sept. 11 attacks, Mr. Tenet believed that Mr. Rumsfeld was impeding the effort to develop a coherent strategy to capture or kill Osama bin Laden," wrote Sanger. "Mr. Rumsfeld questioned the electronic signals from terrorism suspects that the National Security Agency had been intercepting, wondering whether they might be part of an elaborate deception plan by Al Qaeda."

Saturday's New York Times review claims that in Woodward's book, Rice "is depicted as a presidential enabler, ineffectual at her job of coordinating interagency strategy and planning."

"For instance, Mr. Woodward writes that on July 10, 2001, Mr. Tenet and his counterterrorism coordinator, J. Cofer Black, met with Ms. Rice to warn her of mounting intelligence about an impending terrorist attack, but came away feeling they’d been given 'the brush-off' — a revealing encounter, given Ms. Rice’s recent comments, rebutting former President Bill Clinton’s allegations that the Bush administration had failed to pursue counterterrorism measures aggressively before 9/11," writes Michiko Kakutani.

Saturday's Washington Post has more details regarding the meeting.

"The book also reports that then-CIA Director George J. Tenet and his counterterrorism chief, J. Cofer Black, grew so concerned in the summer of 2001 about a possible al-Qaeda attack that they drove straight to the White House to get high-level attention," Peter Baker reports for the Post.

"Tenet called Rice, then the national security adviser, from his car to ask to see her, in hopes that the surprise appearance would make an impression. But the meeting on July 10, 2001, left Tenet and Black frustrated and feeling brushed off, Woodward reported," the article continues. "Rice, they thought, did not seem to feel the same sense of urgency about the threat and was content to wait for an ongoing policy review."

Excerpts from Post article:
#

The report of such a meeting takes on heightened importance after former president Bill Clinton said this week that the Bush team did not do enough to try to kill Osama bin Laden before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) said her husband would have paid more attention to warnings of a possible attack than Bush did. Rice fired back on behalf of the current president, saying the Bush administration "was at least as aggressive" in eight months as President Clinton had been in eight years.

The July 10 meeting of Rice, Tenet and Black went unmentioned in various investigations into the Sept. 11 attacks, and Woodward wrote that Black "felt there were things the commissions wanted to know about and things they didn't want to know about."

Jamie S. Gorelick, a member of the Sept. 11 commission, said she checked with commission staff members who told her investigators were never told about a July 10 meeting. "We didn't know about the meeting itself," she said. "I can assure you it would have been in our report if we had known to ask about it."

White House and State Department officials yesterday confirmed that the July 10 meeting took place, although they took issue with Woodward's portrayal of its results. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack, responding on behalf of Rice, said Tenet and Black had never publicly expressed any frustration with her response.

"This is the first time these thoughts and feelings associated with that meeting have been expressed," McCormack said. "People are free to revise and extend their remarks, but that is certainly not the story that was told to the 9/11 commission."
#

FULL POST ARTICLE AT THIS LINK
'This is going to be the big one'

Another Post article slated for Sunday's edition provides even more details.

"For months, Tenet had been pressing Rice to set a clear counterterrorism policy, including specific presidential orders, called "findings," that would give the CIA stronger authority to conduct covert action against bin Laden," the uncredited Post article reports. "Perhaps a dramatic appearance -- Black called it an 'out of cycle' session, beyond Tenet's regular weekly meeting with Rice -- would get her attention."

J. Cofer Black later said that "[t]he only thing we didn't do was pull the trigger to the gun we were holding to her head."

Excerpts from Sunday's Post article:
#

Tenet had been losing sleep over the recent intelligence. There was no conclusive, smoking-gun intelligence, but there was such a huge volume of data that an intelligence officer's instinct strongly suggested that something was coming.

He did not know when, where or how, but Tenet felt there was too much noise in the intelligence systems. Two weeks earlier, he had told Richard A. Clarke, the National Security Council's counterterrorism director: "It's my sixth sense, but I feel it coming. This is going to be the big one."

But Tenet had been having difficulty getting traction on an immediate bin Laden action plan, in part because Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had questioned all the intelligence, asking: Could it all be a grand deception? Perhaps, he said, it was a plan to measure U.S. reactions and defenses.

Tenet had the National Security Agency review all the intercepts, and the agency concluded they were of genuine al-Qaeda communications. On June 30, a top-secret senior executive intelligence brief contained an article headlined "Bin Laden Threats Are Real."

....

Tenet left the meeting feeling frustrated. Though Rice had given them a fair hearing, no immediate action meant great risk. Black felt the decision to just keep planning was a sustained policy failure. Rice and the Bush team had been in hibernation too long. "Adults should not have a system like this," he said later.
#

An "editor's note" appended to the end of the article notes that "[h]ow much effort the Bush administration made in going after Osama bin Laden before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, became an issue last week after former president Bill Clinton accused President Bush's 'neocons' and other Republicans of ignoring bin Laden until the attacks."

"Rice responded in an interview that 'what we did in the eight months was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton administration did in the preceding years,'" the editor's note continues.

FULL SUNDAY WASHINGTON POST ARTICLE AT THIS LINK
'Very possibly, someone committed a crime'

Saturday night at Think Progress, former Counsel to the 9/11 Commission Peter Rundlet guest-blogged a post called "Bush Officials May Have Covered Up Rice-Tenet Meeting From 9/11 Commission."

"Most of the world has now seen the infamous picture of President Bush tending to his ranch on August 6, 2001, the day he received the ultra-classified Presidential Daily Brief (PDB) that included a report entitled 'Bin Laden Determined To Strike in US,'" Rundlet blogs. "And most Americans have also heard of the so-called 'Phoenix Memo' that an FBI agent in Phoenix sent to FBI headquarters on July 10, 2001, which advised of the 'possibility of a coordinated effort' by bin Laden to send students to the United States to attend civil aviation schools."

But Rundlet writes that a "mixture of shock, anger, and sadness overcame" him when he read about Tenet's "special surprise visit" to see Rice in July of 2001.

"If true, it is shocking that the administration failed to heed such an overwhelming alert from the two officials in the best position to know," writes Rundlet.

"Many, many questions need to be asked and answered about this revelation — questions that the 9/11 Commission would have asked, had the Commission been told about this significant meeting," adds Rundlet. "Suspiciously, the Commissioners and the staff investigating the administration’s actions prior to 9/11 were never informed of the meeting."

Rundlet suggests that the "withholding of information" from the Commission may constitute a crime, and scoffs at Cofer's excuse in Woodward's book.

"Was it covered up?" asks Rundlet. "It is hard to come to a different conclusion."

"If one could suspend disbelief to accept that all three officials forgot about the meeting when they were interviewed, then one possibility is that the memory of one of them was later jogged by notes or documents that describe the meeting," Rundlet continues. "If such documents exist, the 9/11 Commission should have seen them."

Rundlet quotes a line from Woodward's book which he says shows how "Black exonerates them all."

"Though the investigators had access to all the paperwork about the meeting, Black felt there were things the commissions wanted to know about and things they didn’t want to know about," wrote Woodward in the third volume of Bush at War.

"The notion that both the 9/11 Commission and the Congressional Joint Inquiry that investigated the intelligence prior to 9/11 did not want to know about such essential information is simply absurd," writes Rundlet. "At a minimum, the withholding of information about this meeting is an outrage."

"Very possibly, someone committed a crime," Rundlet concludes. "And worst of all, they failed to stop the plot."

RUNDLET'S ARTICLE CAN BE READ AT THIS LINK
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/State_of_Denial_Two_months_before_0930.html

Lt. General Odom Speaks Truth in Basement of U.S. Capitol. Dome Shakes.
Submitted by davidswanson on Tue, 2006-09-26 16:23. Congress

Rep. Woolsey and 15 Other Congress Members Hold Hearing on Iraq
By David Swanson

Photos. -- Video at PoliticsTV.

Present (whole time or briefly, in order of arrival): Representatives Lee, Woolsey, Jackson-Lee, Rothman, Kilpatrick, Conyers, Hinchey, Owens, Kaptor, Hoyer (Hoyer!?, yes Hoyer, but he left quickly and did not get a chance to speak), Tierney, Farr, Watson, Delahunt, Shakowsky.

Corporate media present: apparently none.

Panel 1: Witnesses: Lt. Gen. William Odom, Dr. Paul Pillar.

live blogging below...

Pillar spoke first. He addressed the question of whether the disaster in Iraq is the result of poor execution or of the initial decision to go in at all. "Most of what we are seeing," he said, "and in particular the communal violence, is an almost inevitable result of having ousted the dictator Saddam Hussein."

Odom spoke second and addressed points of argumentation that he hears too often and is tired of hearing, including being told to ignore the past and focus on the future, to ignore how we got into Iraq and only talk about what to do from here on. Unless, Odom said, we discuss whose interests this war served, we cannot decide what to do. It served no U.S. interests. It served the interests of al Qaeda and Iran.

Al Qaeda recruiting declined in 2002, Odom said, but spiked after the U.S. invaded -- rose in Asia as well as in the Middle East. And Iraq is a great training ground for terrorists now. In addition, Odom said, a wedge is being driven between the United States and its European allies. "Osama understands that; we seem not to." The invasion of Iraq, Odom said, probably saved al Qaeda from ceasing to exist.

"Iran's clerics," Odom added, "must have been equally surprised and delighted." Terrorists can now train in Iraq and engage in violence in Israel.

The longer the war goes on, Odom stressed, the more it benefits al Qaeda and Iran.

During questions and answers Odom addressed the notion that U.S. troops need to do a better job of training Iraqi troops. If we do that, he said, the military will take over and install a dictatorship. The problem is not one of soldiers' skills, he said, but of political loyalties.

Congresswoman Barbara Lee said that the House is voting today on more money for the war, and that she will vote against it, but that she is glad to have successfully included in the bill a stipulation that no money can be spent on permanent U.S. bases in Iraq during 2007.

Odom again spoke about what would happen when/if the United States pulls out. The aftermath is going to be great, he said. It was going to be great the day you went in, but the longer you wait the greater it will be. And, Odom added to noticable effect, this will be the greatest strategic defeat in American history.

Congressman Rothman said that he had voted for the war because he had believed Bush and Rumsfeld, and that he now understood they had been lying. He said he saw the same approach now underway with Iran, and that he thought it was aimed at the coming U.S. elections.

Odom again spoke of leaving Iraq and said "It takes a very high level of ignorance to believe America can leave behind in Iraq any government that will not be anti-American."

But Odom argued that staying longer in Iraq would make things worse, whereas getting out would dramatically improve America's standing in the world. Our standing went up as soon as we got out of Vietnam, he said.

"Beating the war drums on Iran," Odom said, "is a disaster that will make this one look small."

Odom did not hesitate to criticise the Congress Members in the room. He recalled the day on which Republicans in Congress, in response to Rep. John Murtha's bill, proposed a bill to simply withdraw from Iraq. The Democrats scattered in fear, Odom said. He recommended that they should have introduced a bill to send 600,000 more troops to Iraq.

Congressman Conyers replied that the Republican bill did not allow amendments, so the Democrats could not have done that.

Odom said that the most important thing for the United States to do now is to talk to Iran, a nation with which we have many common interests. Both nations, Odom said, oppose al Qaeda. One wants to sell oil, the other wants to buy. Iran's government hated Saddam Hussein and should appreciate what the US did. "We have two issues," Odom said, "Hezbollah and nukes, and they're going to get nuclear weapons - there's nothing we can do about that."

Conyers thanked Odom and Pillar but said that he and his colleagues who agree with him cannot convince other Congress Members. "There's one thing that gets to members, and that's constituents...." In the end, conyers said, the question is how do we get more of our people to tell their representatives that the Progressive Caucus members are right?

Pillar drew a comparison between Iraq and Afghanistan. The jihad in Afghanistan for 10 years against the Soviet Union served to train terrorists, he said, and we are still experiencing the results. Iraq is now that training ground, and we may see results for many years, he said.

Rep. Hinchey asked Odom "How do we get out?" Odom's reply came without a pause: "Well, the Constitution gives the House the right to impeach."

Photos.

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_________________________

NEWS from

CONGRESSWOMAN LYNN WOOLSEY

6th District, California

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Chris Shields

September 26, 2006 202-225-5187

WOOLSEY, COLLEAGUES HEAR TESTIMONY ON COST OF CONTINUED OCCUPATION OF IRAQ

Washington, D.C - One of the leading national figures in the anti-war movement, Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey (D-Petaluma) was joined by 15 of her colleagues today, including Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD), and Oakland's Barbara Lee in hearing testimony on the cost of the continued occupation of Iraq.

"This series of discussions, quite frankly, have been launched because I repeatedly requested for formal hearings from the relevant House committees and subcommittees...and was met with stone silence," Woolsey said in her prepared remarks. "They weren't interested in asking the tough questions, or in hearing anything other than spin and happy talk.

"I didn't think that was acceptable," Woolsey continued, and "given everything Americans have sacrificed for this occupation -- including nearly 2,700 of their fellow citizens - I believe we're entitled to some straight answers. If the majority party in Congress won't perform its oversight responsibilities, I guess we'll just do it for them."

This is the third in a series of forums that Woolsey has organized on the occupation of Iraq. Today's diverse group of panelists included General William Odom, who served as head of the NSA under President Reagan, and Dr. Paul Pillar who served in the CIA for 30 years. They addressed declining American influence in the region, the inadequate state of our military readiness, and the situation in Iraq, respectively. The panel also addressed the financial and opportunity costs of the continued occupation, a theme echoed by Woolsey:

"Congress has already appropriated $317 billion for the invasion and occupation [of Iraq], a staggering sum amounting to roughly $11 million every hour of every day," Woolsey said. "Of course in 2003, no one in the Bush Administration was prepared to admit that the price tag would climb this high. Had Americans been given the facts, about both the money involved and the lack of WMDs, the President would never have received the green light to go into Iraq in the first place."

Also on the panel were Chloe O'Gara (Save the Children), Anita Dancs (National Priorities Project), Peter Laufer (author) and Sergeant Patrick Cambell (Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America). Other members who attended include: Carolyn Kilpatrick; Sheila Jackson-Lee; Steve Rothman; John Conyers; Maurice Hinchey; Major Owens; Marcy Kaptur; Sam Farr; Diane Watson; John Tierney; Rush Holt, Jan Schakowsky and William Delahunt.

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http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/14319

 Congressman resigns after former page questions e-mails
POSTED: 4:22 p.m. EDT, September 29, 2006
From CNN's Dana Bash
CNN Washington Bureau
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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Rep. Mark Foley, a Republican from Florida, resigned Friday from the House, a day after a former congressional page questioned e-mails Foley had sent to him.

Foley apparently sent the e-mails in August 2005, when the male page was 16 years old.

"Today I have delivered a letter to the speaker of the House informing him of my decision to resign from the U.S. House of Representatives, effective today. I thank the people of Florida's 16th Congressional District for giving me the opportunity to serve them for the last twelve years; it has been an honor," Foley said in a written statement.

"I am deeply sorry and I apologize for letting down my family and the people of Florida I have had the privilege to represent."

According to ABC News, the young man who received the e-mails called them "sick, sick, sick."

A spokesman for Foley told CNN the congressman acknowledged he had an e-mail exchange with the former page but flatly denied that it was anything inappropriate.

According to GOP sources, Foley is concerned there may be other potential politically damaging e-mails or information out there and has concluded it's best not to run again for office.

Foley, who is considered a moderate, has been in office for six-terms.

His Democratic opponent in the race, Tim Mahoney, called for an investigation into the matter Thursday. Mahoney's campaign denied having anything to do with the information getting out.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/09/29/congressman.e.mails/index.html

Foley was also the co-chairman of the Missing and Exploited Children Caucus.
http://www.house.gov/apps/list/press/fl16_foley/072106senatesopass.html

    Cafferty: President Bush is trying to pardon himself. Here’s the deal: Under the War Crimes Act, violations of the Geneva Conventions are felonies, in some cases punishable by death. When the Supreme Court ruled that the Geneva Convention applied to al Qaeda and Taliban detainees, President Bush and his boys were suddenly in big trouble. They’ve been working these prisoners over pretty good. In an effort to avoid possible prosecution they’re trying to cram this bill through Congress before the end of the week before Congress adjourns. The reason there’s such a rush to do this? If the Democrats get control of the House in November this kind of legislation probably wouldn’t pass.

    You wanna know the real disgrace about what these people are about to do or are in the process of doing? Senator Bill Frist and Congressman Dennis Hastert and their Republican stooges apparently don’t see anything wrong with this. I really do wonder sometimes what we’re becoming in this country.
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2006/09/28/cafferty-what-are-we-becoming/