Bill Clinton chief liar lies again.

AAAintheBeltway · Sep 24, 2006

Quote from hapaboy:

Bill Clintonâs Excuses

No matter what he says, the record shows he failed to act against terrorism.

By Byron York

âI worked hard to try and kill him,â former president Bill Clinton told Fox News Sunday. âI tried. I tried and failed.â

âHimâ is Osama bin Laden. And in his interview with Fox Newsâ Chris Wallace, the former president based nearly his entire defense on one source: Against All Enemies: Inside Americaâs War on Terror, the book by former White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke. âAll Iâm asking is if anybody wants to say I didnât do enough, you read Richard Clarkeâs book,â Clinton said at one point in the interview. âAll you have to do is read Richard Clarkeâs book to look at what we did in a comprehensive systematic way to try to protect the country against terror,â he said at another. âAll you have to do is read Richard Clarkeâs findings and you know itâs not true,â he said at yet another point. In all, Clinton mentioned Clarkeâs name 11 times during the Fox interview.

But Clarkeâs book does not, in fact, support Clintonâs claim. Judging by Clarkeâs sympathetic account â as well as by the sympathetic accounts of other former Clinton aides like Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon â itâs not quite accurate to say that Clinton tried to kill bin Laden. Rather, he tried to convince â as opposed to, say, order â U.S. military and intelligence agencies to kill bin Laden. And when, on a number of occasions, those agencies refused to act, Clinton, the commander-in-chief, gave up.

Clinton did not give up in the sense of an executive who gives an order and then moves on to other things, thinking the order is being carried out when in fact it is being ignored. Instead, Clinton knew at the time that his top military and intelligence officials were dragging their feet on going after bin Laden and al Qaeda. He gave up rather than use his authority to force them into action.

Examples are all over Clarkeâs book. On page 223, Clarke describes a meeting, in late 2000, of the National Security Council âprincipalsâ â among them, the heads of the CIA, the FBI, the Attorney General, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the secretaries of State, Defense. It was just after al Qaedaâs attack on the USS Cole. But neither the FBI nor the CIA would say that al Qaeda was behind the bombing, and there was little support for a retaliatory strike. Clarke quotes Mike Sheehan, a State Department official, saying in frustration, âWhatâs it going to take, Dick? Who the shit do they think attacked the Cole, fuckinâ Martians? The Pentagon brass wonât let Delta go get bin Laden. Hell they wonât even let the Air Force carpet bomb the place. Does al Qaeda have to attack the Pentagon to get their attention?â

That came later. But in October 2000, what would it have taken? A decisive presidential order â which never came.

The story was the same with the CIA. On page 204, Clarke vents his frustration at the CIAâs slow-walking on the question of killing bin Laden. âI still to this day do not understand why it was impossible for the United States to find a competent group of Afghans, Americans, third-country nationals, or some combination who could locate bin Laden in Afghanistan and kill him,â Clarke writes. âI believe that those in CIA who claim the [presidential] authorizations were insufficient or unclear are throwing up that claim as an excuse to cover the fact that they were pathetically unable to accomplish the mission.â

Clarke hit the CIA again a few pages later, on page 210, on the issue of the CIAâs refusal to budget money for the fight against al Qaeda. âThe formal, official CIA response was that there were [no funds],â Clarke writes. âAnother way to say that was that everything they were doing was more important than fighting al Qaeda.â

The FBI proved equally frustrating. On page 217, Clarke describes a colleague, Roger Cressey, who was frustrated after meeting with an FBI representative on the subject of terrorism. âThat fucker is going to get some Americans killed,â Clarke reports Cressey saying. âHe just sits there like a bump on a log.â Clarke adds: âI knew he was talking about an FBI representative.â

So Clinton couldnât get the job done. Why not? According to Clarkeâs pro-Clinton view, the president was stymied by Republican opposition. âWeakened by continual political attack,â Clarke writes, â[Clinton] could not get the CIA, the Pentagon, and FBI to act sufficiently to deal with the threat.â

Republicans boxed Clinton in, Clarke writes, beginning in the 1992 campaign, with criticism of Clintonâs avoidance of the draft as a young man, and extending all the way to the Lewinsky scandal and the presidentâs impeachment. The bottom line, Clarke argues, is that the commander-in-chief was not in command. From page 225:

Because of the intensity of the political opposition that Clinton engendered, he had been heavily criticized for bombing al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan, for engaging in âWag the Dogâ tactics to divert attention from a scandal about his personal life. For similar reasons, he could not fire the recalcitrant FBI Director who had failed to fix the Bureau or to uncover terrorists in the United States. He had given the CIA unprecedented authority to go after bin Laden personally and al Qaeda, but had not taken steps when they did little or nothing. Because Clinton was criticized as a Vietnam War opponent without a military record, he was limited in his ability to direct the military to engage in anti-terrorist commando operations they did not want to conduct. He had tried that in Somalia, and the military had made mistakes and blamed him. In the absence of a bigger provocation from al Qaeda to silence his critics, Clinton thought he could do no more.

In the end, Clarke writes, Clinton âput in place the plans and programs that allowed America to respond to the big attacks when they did come, sweeping away the political barriers to action.â

But the bottom line is that Bill Clinton, the commander-in-chief, could not find the will to order the military into action against al Qaeda, and Bill Clinton, the head of the executive branch, could not find the will to order the CIA and FBI to act. No matter what the former president says on Fox, or anywhere else, that is his legacy in the war on terror.

___________________________

Member of the ET Anti-Troll Brigade

Iustus ignarus troll
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Clarke seems confused about who runs the government. The Republicans in the congress did not prevent Clinton from sending adequate tanks and other armored divisions to Somalia, his Secretary of Defense was against it. The absence of American armor was crucial in the Black Hawk down debacle, as was the administration's refusal to bring in air strikes that would kill "innocent' civilians, who were attacking our troops. It's telling that democrats have apparently learned nothing and continue to find fault if any "civilians" in terrorist enclaves are harmed.

As for bin Ladin, it is pretty clear that the Clinton administration had a plan in place to grab or kill him in Afghanistan and called it off at the last minute because women and children were in bin Ladin's camp. Again, Democrats have learned nothing and would probably make the same decision today. Curiously, they didn't mind sending in cruise missiles in the aftermath of the Lewinsky scandal. I guess they trusted missiles more than trigger pullers.

They didn't seem too concerned about killing civilians when they were terror bombing the former yugoslavia to support establishment of an islamic state in ksosovo. But that war had been authorized by the unofficial Secretary of State, horse-faced CNN correspondent Christianne Ammanpour.

Clinton's problem with louis Freeh, his FBI Director, stemmed from Clinton's criminal conduct which Freeh refused to whitewash. He didn;t seem tounderstand the first rule of working for a Clinton, that you have to bepreapred to do anything to save the Great Man's ass. Fro example, Sandy Berger learned that rule so well he continued to risk prison even after he left office. Butnot Freeh, he wasn't a team player.

No doubt they FBI was a mess and Freeh wasn't an inspired choice to lead it from its role tracking down old guys downloading porn and buying bongs ove rthe internet to going after real terrorists. But the real problem was the infamous Jamie Gorelcik directive that prevented sharing of intell and law enforcement resources. As dysfunctional as it was, FBI field offices were on to the 9/11 plot. The ball was dropped at headquarters.

Clinton's complaints about the CIA are hysterical. He was the one who put in leaders like Tennant who oversaw forcing out experienced professionals and replaced them with affirmative action and political hacks like Valery Plame.

Bottom line is Clinton has to take responsibility for his administration, just as Bush does his. To the extent the Lewinsky and impeachment scandals distracted him, that is precisely why a President shouldn't be putting himself in compromising positions, either with interns or crooked political cronies.

Optionpro007 · Sep 24, 2006

Are you out of your mind ?

I will take any chance to talk down the bastid.

Quote from bsmeter:

Talk about a con-job on the dumb americans. Right before the elections the subject is changed to Clinton. And the result, well just look at the evil faggots who voted for Bush jumping on clinton like Clinton is running for election. Like I said, dumb fucking americans.
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ZZZzzzzzzz · Sep 25, 2006

More, for those who have a brain:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eat-the-press/2006/09/25/nice-little-conservative_e_30179.html

flytiger · Sep 25, 2006

Quote from vhehn:

proof? i would be interested in seeing your proof on this. considering that you posted it i doubt its true but i am willing to change my mind if you provide evidence. you have no credibility. you see a conspiricy behind every corner.
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Because I love you, and I breathe only for the hope of your almighty approval:

Thank you for your interest. You might be looking for "Spying on Saddam." Here is the Web site for more information:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/unscom/

Here is the full archive of war on terror and Iraq reporting:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/terror/

-FRONTLINE

On Sep 23, 2006, at 8:21 AM, XXXXXXXXX wrote:

There was a Frontline I know I saw a few years ago where Spec Forces troops searched Secret Police Headquarters in Baghdad, and found a mock up of an Airport Terminal, complete with VCR boxes loaded with explosives. I'm trying to find that piece, and I'm lost. Can someone direct me to it?

Thanks.

Also, you might enjoy my latest post in OSTKCEO. It's the one where Matthew Goldstein breaks the story of a major hedge fund naked shorting Hibernia bank during their merger w/Capitol One in the hopes of profiting from a renogation of the deal post Katrina. It follows his story of a Federal INvestigation into Stock Lending on Wall St.

These threads are filled with dickheads like you who do nothing, and criticize everything. Why not get off your dead ass and contribute? ......or not.

Kisses:
Flytiger

PS... "at least I tryyyyd. The other fellas didn't even tryyyyy."

flytiger · Sep 25, 2006

Now that I've got that off my chest......

If you saw the movie or read the book "BlackHawk Down", there was a Ranger buck sergeant, Casey Joyce. He was the Ranger who didn't wear his body armour, was shot in the back and killed. His father was a retired Colonel who approached Clinton at the services, and demanded to know why, when Clinton knew he was negotating behind the scenes with the Warlord, he sent those Rangers in for no good reason. Clinton glared at the Colonel and pulled away.

In 1974, Just out of the Army, I read Kissenger's memoirs of Nixon's final days. Nixon, when approached by Kissenger to review the days casualites from Vietnam, repllied "screw 'em".

Now I'll be challanged on these recollections, but Time has an archive site, so I'll hop right on it and start seaching .

I have the same opinion, by the way, of both Clinton and Nixon. Screw 'em.

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Bill Clinton chief liar lies again.

AAAintheBeltway

Optionpro007

ZZZzzzzzzz

flytiger

flytiger