Condi Rice 60 Minutes Fact Checker - americanprogress.org

[gary350 0]

Bush Admin Motto: If at first you don't deceive, lie, lie again.

(note to character assassinating whiners in deep denial - not one word here from Richard Clarke.)

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National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice appeared on CBS's 60 Minutes in an effort to quell growing questions surrounding the Administration's inconsistent claims about its pre-9/11 actions. Not only did Rice refuse to take Richard Clarke's lead and admit responsibility for her role in the worst national security failure in American history, but she continued to make unsubstantiated and contradictory assertions:

RICE CLAIM: "The administration took seriously the threat" of terrorism before 9/11.

FACTS: President Bush himself acknowledges that, despite repeated warnings of an imminent Al Qaeda attack, before 9/11 "I didn't feel the sense of urgency" about terrorism. Similarly, Newsweek reports that Bush's attitude was reflected throughout an Administration that was trying to "de-emphasize terrorism" as an overall priority. As proof, just two of the hundred national security meetings the Administration held during this period addressed the terrorist threat, and the White House refused to hold even one meeting of its highly-touted counterterrorism task force. Meanwhile, the Administration was actively trying to cut funding for counterterrorism, and "vetoed a request to divert $800 million from missile defense into counterterrorism" despite a serious increase in terrorist chatter in the summer of 2001.
Source: "Bush At War" by Bob Woodward
Source: Newsweek & vetoed request - http://foi.missouri.edu/terrorismfoi/whatwentwrong.html
Source: Refusal to hold task force meeting - http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A8734-2002Jan19?language=printer
Source: Only two meetings out of 100 - http://www.detnews.com/2002/politics/0207/01/politics-526326.htm

RICE CLAIM: "I don't know what a sense of urgency any greater than the one we had would have caused us to do anything differently. I don't know how...we could have done more. I would like very much to know what more could have been done?"

FACTS: There are many more things that could have been done: first and foremost, the Administration could have desisted from de-emphasizing and cutting funding for counterterrorism in the months before 9/11. It could have held more meetings of top principals to get the directors of the CIA and FBI to share information, especially considering the major intelligence spike occurring in the summer of 2001. As 9/11 Commissioner Jamie Gorelick said on ABC this morning, the lack of focus and meetings meant agencies were not talking to each other, and key evidence was overlooked. For instance, with better focus and more urgency, the FBI's discovery of Islamic radicals training at flight schools might have raised red flags. Similarly, the fact that "months before Sept. 11, the CIA knew two of the al-Qaeda hijackers were in the United States" could have spurred a nationwide manhunt. But because there was no focus or urgency, "No nationwide manhunt was undertaken," said Gorelick. "The State Department watch list was not given to the FAA. If you brought people together, perhaps key connections could have been made."
Source: Slash counterterrorism funding -http://www.criminology.fsu.edu/transcrime/articles/How%20Sept_%2011%20Changed%20Goals%20of%20Justice%20Dept.htm
Source: CIA knew 2 hijackers in the U.S. - http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2002/6/2/111044.shtml

RICE CLAIM: “Nothing would be better from my point of view than to be able to testify, but there is an important principle involved here it is a longstanding principle that sitting national security advisors do not testify before the Congress.”

FACTS: Republican Commission John F. Lehman, who served as Navy Secretary under President Reagan said on ABC this morning that "This is not testimony before a tribunal of the Congress…There are plenty of precedents for appearing in public and answering questions…There are plenty of precedents the White House could use if they wanted to do this.” 9/11 Commissioner Jamie Gorelick agreed, saying “Our commission is sui generis…the Chairman has been appointed by the President. We are distinguishable from Congress.” Rice's remarks on 60 Minutes that the principle is limited to "sitting national security advisers" is also a departure from her statements earlier this week, when she said the "principle" applied to all presidential advisers. She was forced to change this claim for 60 Minutes after 9/11 Commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste “cited examples of non-Cabinet presidential advisers who have testified publicly to Congress." Finally, the White House is reportedly moving to declassify congressional testimony then-White House adviser Richard Clarke gave in 2002. By declassifying this testimony, the White House is breaking the very same "principle" of barring White House adviser's testimony from being made public that Rice is using to avoid appearing publicly before the 9/11 commission.
Source: Quote from Tony Snow Show - http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2004-03-23-911-rice-usat_x.htm

RICE CLAIM: "Iraq was put aside" immediately after 9/11.

FACTS: According to the Washington Post, "six days after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, President Bush signed a 2-and-a-half-page document" that "directed the Pentagon to begin planning military options for an invasion of Iraq." This is corroborated by a CBS News, which reported on 9/4/02 that five hours after the 9/11 attacks, "Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was telling his aides to come up with plans for striking Iraq." In terms of resources, the Iraq decision had far-reaching effects on the efforts to hunt down Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. As the Boston Globe reported, "the Bush administration is continuing to shift highly specialized intelligence officers from the hunt for Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan to the Iraq crisis."
Source: September 17th directive - http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A43909-2003Jan11?language=printer
Source: Rumsfeld orders Iraq plan - http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/09/04/september11/main520830.shtml
Source: Shifting special forces - http://www.iht.com/articles/106783.html

[bertusgeert 1]

Not having spent a lot of time reading the news, I am wondering.

What exactly is the point of going back and trying to find out exactly what happened? What is the purpose? To simply be able to point fingers?

Or maybe to try and find a link between 9/11 and the Iraq invasion?

In any case, I think a lot of statements made by Rice and others are pretty vague, (probably intentionaly so) and now people try to accuse them of things they didnt say. But it looks like they are just covering up each others lies.

---------------------------------------------
As jy dom is moet jy bloei!

[billvon 3,080]

>What exactly is the point of going back and trying to find out exactly
> what happened? What is the purpose?

To help ensure it does not happen again.

[turtlespeed 226]

So how far back are you suggesting?

I'm not usually into the whole 3-way thing, but you got me a little excited with that. - Skymama
BTR #1 / OTB^5 Official #2 / Hellfish #408 / VSCR #108/Tortuga/Orfun

[Mirage63 0]

Nope.

It SHOULD BE - but it's not.

It's finger pointing, both parties do it. The sad fact is that all decisions made in Washington have to have a fall position due to the above. Rather than learn from mistakes made, we learn how to cover up better.

What tickles me is that the GWB haters or the Kerry haters seem to believe that "there party" would never do that.

Nader for president :-)

[ChasingBlueSky 0]

The Clinton Admin and GWB Admin both dropped the ball. Do you really think all this political finger pointing will prevent anything?

The only good thing about Nader is that he isn't Bush or Kerry - I don't want either one of those guys in office.

_________________________________________
you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me....
I WILL fly again.....

[billvon 3,080]

>So how far back are you suggesting?

As far back as it needs to go. You could go back to the support of the Mujahideen, as that definitely has some bearing on Al Qaeda.

[gary350 0]

Quote

>What exactly is the point of going back and trying to find out exactly
> what happened? What is the purpose?

To help ensure it does not happen again.

Part of preventing it from happening again is understanding not only what happened, but WHY it happened. In this case, a big part of why it happened is the extremely poor judgment and priorities of the current administration.

This incompetence, combined with an amazing ability to brazenly lie, blame, weasel, and avoid apologies or responsibility for mistakes, does not instill much confidence that we are preventing it from happening again. Quite the opposite.

The small percentage of voters who are able to swing their votes must understand the character and judgment of this administration - they must know how incompetent AND untrustworthy these people are, and the consequence of keeping them in power. The way to do that is to examine the facts.

What's the point? The truth is the point.

[gary350 0]

This (in bold) astonishes even me. We all know the GOP priorities, but geez. . .

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Beat the Progress Report

Yesterday, on Hannity and Colmes, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice said "the assertion that somehow the Bush administration wasn't paying attention when we came into office is just false." But, despite Rice's comments, we were unable to find a single instance where Rice, Vice President Cheney or President Bush said "al Qaeda" or "bin Laden" in public between Bush Inauguration and 9/11. (The closest thing we could dig up – despite extensive searches on Nexis and the White House website – was a routine written extension of an executive order dealing with the Taliban.) During the same period, however, we were able to identify roughly 400 times that Rice, Cheney and Bush publicly mentioned "tax relief" or "tax cut." Prove you're better than the Progress Report! Send any instance of Rice, Cheney or Bush uttering the words "al Qaeda" or "bin Laden" in public between 1/20/01 and 9/10/01 to pr@americanprogress.org. The first person to submit a successful entry (which we can verify) will receive a free copy of "Deliver Us From Evil" by Fox News Anchor Sean Hannity signed by the members of the Progress Report team.

Note: James Carville has sweetened the pot by also promising a copy of his book to the first person to win the " Beat the Progress Report" contest!

[cloudseeker2001 0]

Ms. Rice does not want to go before the panel because she cannot lie and she knows it! Just watch her on any given Sunday morning, she is a joke!They will eat her alive! I think she should be arrested if she refuses to speak publicly, but our government has no BALLS whatsoever when it comes to policing themselves......

"Some call it heavenly in it's brilliance,
others mean and rueful of the western dream"

[gary350 0]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=533&e=2&u=/ap/20040329/ap_on_re_us/sept_11_commission

Fucking slimy weasels, all of them. How on earth can this woman still have a job, and how can Bush even be running again, let alone be remotely close in the polls? God and Greed. Disgusting.

[tunaplanet 0]

The herd has come back. Where is Little Bo Peep when you need her.

Forty-two

[kallend 2,112]

Quote

The herd has come back. Where is Little Bo Peep when you need her.

What exactly is untrue in the assertions in this thread? Does name calling substitute in some way for facts and logic?

The current administration does not seem able to tell the difference between truth and untruth. There are many well documented examples, covering such issues as nation building, unemployment, veterans' benefits, education, WMDs ("we KNOW where they are"), the deficit, the Medicare act fiasco, etc etc etc.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[gary350 0]

Quote

The herd has come back. Where is Little Bo Peep when you need her.

WOW! What a convincing retort! What withering logic! What a brilliant counter-attack of arguments in defense of your heros! My, oh my - your facts, your quotes, your conclusions. . . I think I'm just going to rush right out and write a check to the RNC!

Ah ha ha ha ha ha! THAT is the best ANY of you can do? Silence. . . . . Silence. . . . Truly pathetic, but not surprising.

[gary350 0]

Again courtesy of americanprogress.org. I love these guys - EVERYTHING is sourced (actual links in original story) and directly quoted.

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http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=40520

A point-by-point analysis of how one of America's top national security officials has a severe problem with the truth

Pre-9/11 Intelligence

CLAIM: "I don't think anybody could have predicted that they would try to use an airplane as a missile, a hijacked airplane as a missile." – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 5/16/02

FACT: On August 6, 2001, the President personally "received a one-and-a-half page briefing advising him that Osama bin Laden was capable of a major strike against the US, and that the plot could include the hijacking of an American airplane." In July 2001, the Administration was also told that terrorists had explored using airplanes as missiles. [Source: NBC, 9/10/02; LA Times, 9/27/01]

CLAIM: In May 2002, Rice held a press conference to defend the Administration from new revelations that the President had been explicitly warned about an al Qaeda threat to airlines in August 2001. She "suggested that Bush had requested the briefing because of his keen concern about elevated terrorist threat levels that summer." [Source: Washington Post, 3/25/04]

FACT: According to the CIA, the briefing "was not requested by President Bush." As commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste disclosed, "the CIA informed the panel that the author of the briefing does not recall such a request from Bush and that the idea to compile the briefing came from within the CIA." [Source: Washington Post, 3/25/04]

CLAIM: "In June and July when the threat spikes were so high…we were at battle stations." – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04

FACT: "Documents indicate that before Sept. 11, Ashcroft did not give terrorism top billing in his strategic plans for the Justice Department, which includes the FBI. A draft of Ashcroft's 'Strategic Plan' from Aug. 9, 2001, does not put fighting terrorism as one of the department's seven goals, ranking it as a sub-goal beneath gun violence and drugs. By contrast, in April 2000, Ashcroft's predecessor, Janet Reno, called terrorism 'the most challenging threat in the criminal justice area.'" Meanwhile, the Bush Administration decided to terminate "a highly classified program to monitor Al Qaeda suspects in the United States." [Source: Washington Post, 3/22/04; Newsweek, 3/21/04]

CLAIM: "The fact of the matter is [that] the administration focused on this before 9/11." – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04

FACT: President Bush and Vice President Cheney's counterterrorism task force, which was created in May, never convened one single meeting. The President himself admitted that "I didn't feel the sense of urgency" about terrorism before 9/11. [Source: Washington Post, 1/20/02; Bob Woodward's "Bush at War"]

CLAIM: "Our [pre-9/11 NSPD] plan called for military options to attack al Qaeda and Taliban leadership, ground forces and other targets -- taking the fight to the enemy where he lived." – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04

FACT: 9/11 Commissioner Gorelick: "There is nothing in the NSPD that came out that we could find that had an invasion plan, a military plan." Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage: "Right." Gorelick: "Is it true, as Dr. Rice said, 'Our plan called for military options to attack Al Qaida and Taliban leadership'?" Armitage: "No, I think that was amended after the horror of 9/11." [Source: 9/11 Commission testimony, 3/24/04]

Condi Rice on Pre-9/11 Counterterrorism Funding

CLAIM: "The president increased counterterrorism funding several-fold" before 9/11. – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/24/04

FACT: According to internal government documents, the first full Bush budget for FY2003 "did not endorse F.B.I. requests for $58 million for 149 new counterterrorism field agents, 200 intelligence analysts and 54 additional translators" and "proposed a $65 million cut for the program that gives state and local counterterrorism grants." Newsweek noted the Administration "vetoed a request to divert $800 million from missile defense into counterterrorism." [Source: New York Times, 2/28/04; Newsweek, 5/27/02]

Richard Clarke's Concerns

CLAIM: "Richard Clarke had plenty of opportunities to tell us in the administration that he thought the war on terrorism was moving in the wrong direction and he chose not to." – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04

FACT: Clarke sent a memo to Rice principals on 1/24/01 marked "urgent" asking for a Cabinet-level meeting to deal with an impending al Qaeda attack. The White House acknowledges this, but says "principals did not need to have a formal meeting to discuss the threat." No meeting occurred until one week before 9/11. [Source: CBS 60 Minutes, 3/24/04; White House Press Release, 3/21/04

CLAIM: "No al Qaeda plan was turned over to the new administration." – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04

FACT: "On January 25th, 2001, Clarke forwarded his December 2000 strategy paper and a copy of his 1998 Delenda plan to the new national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice." – 9/11 Commission staff report, 3/24/04

Response to 9/11

CLAIM: "The president launched an aggressive response after 9/11." – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04

FACT: "In the early days after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the Bush White House cut by nearly two-thirds an emergency request for counterterrorism funds by the FBI, an internal administration budget document shows. The papers show that Ashcroft ranked counterterrorism efforts as a lower priority than his predecessor did, and that he resisted FBI requests for more counterterrorism funding before and immediately after the attacks." [Source: Washington Post, 3/22/04]

9/11 and Iraq Invasion Plans

CLAIM: "Not a single National Security Council principal at that meeting recommended to the president going after Iraq. The president thought about it. The next day he told me Iraq is to the side." – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04

FACT: According to the Washington Post, "six days after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, President Bush signed a 2-and-a-half-page document marked 'TOP SECRET'" that "directed the Pentagon to begin planning military options for an invasion of Iraq." This is corroborated by a CBS News, which reported on 9/4/02 that five hours after the 9/11 attacks, "Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was telling his aides to come up with plans for striking Iraq." [Source: Washington Post, 1/12/03. CBS News, 9/4/02]

Iraq and WMD

CLAIM: "It's not as if anybody believes that Saddam Hussein was without weapons of mass destruction." – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/18/04

FACT: The Bush Administration's top weapons inspector David Kay "resigned his post in January, saying he did not believe banned stockpiles existed before the invasion" and has urged the Bush Administration to "come clean" about misleading America about the WMD threat. [Source: Chicago Tribune, 3/24/04; UK Guardian, 3/3/04]

9/11-al Qaeda-Iraq Link

CLAIM: "The president returned to the White House and called me in and said, I've learned from George Tenet that there is no evidence of a link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11." – National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04

FACT: If this is true, then why did the President and Vice President repeatedly claim Saddam Hussein was directly connected to 9/11? President Bush sent a letter to Congress on 3/19/03 saying that the Iraq war was permitted specifically under legislation that authorized force against "nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11." Similarly, Vice President Cheney said on 9/14/03 that "It is not surprising that people make that connection" between Iraq and the 9/11 attacks, and said "we don't know" if there is a connection. [Source: BBC, 9/14/03]

[gary350 0]

Quote

Ms. Rice does not want to go before the panel because she cannot lie and she knows it! Just watch her on any given Sunday morning, she is a joke!They will eat her alive! I think she should be arrested if she refuses to speak publicly, but our government has no BALLS whatsoever when it comes to policing themselves......

So they caved in and she is going to testify. This should be good, seeing her squirm and weasel, finally under oath. Truth is not their friend.

[kallend 2,112]

All quiet on the right.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.