CNN.com-Rice Disputes Clinton on terror claims
ledvedderman
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http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/09/26/rice.clinton/index.html
NEW YORK (CNN) -- U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has taken on former President Clinton, rejecting his statement that President Bush failed to carry out adequate anti-terror efforts before the September 11, 2001, attacks.
"What we did in the eight months [between Bush's inauguration and 9/11] was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton administration did in the preceding years," Rice told the New York Post in comments published Tuesday.
"The notion that somehow for eight months the Bush administration sat there and didn't do that is just flatly false."
Rice's remarks followed Clinton's TV interview on "Fox News Sunday" in which the ex-president defended his efforts to track down and kill al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Clinton lashed out against "the right-wingers who are attacking me now," saying the same people had accused him of being "obsessed" with bin Laden. (Watch as Clinton says he tried to kill bin Laden -- 1:18)
"They ridiculed me for trying. They had eight months to try. They did not try. I tried. So I tried and failed," he told interviewer Chris Wallace.
He added that he "left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy" for the Bush administration. (Watch as analysts debate Clinton's effectiveness -- 2:36)
But Rice told the Post that "we were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al Qaeda."
Both Rice and Clinton pointed to the bipartisan commission that investigated the September 11 attacks, which also traced the steps the two administrations had taken before the September 11 attacks. In a 2004 report, the 9/11 commission criticized both for not having done enough.
In December, the commission slammed the Bush administration for failing to implement many critical recommendations from that report.
In Sunday's often contentious Fox interview, Clinton said he left behind former terrorism chief Richard Clarke, "the best guy in the country," to implement a comprehensive anti-terror strategy but said Bush officials had demoted him.
At one point, Clinton referred to Clarke as having been fired.
Clarke, who served under four presidents from both political parties, resigned in early 2003 after having been moved to a position in charge of battling cybersecurity. He later said he requested the move partly due to frustration with what he called the Bush administration's "lackadaisical attitude" toward terrorism before 9/11.
His testimony to the September 11 commission and his public remarks have included some of the harshest criticism President Bush has faced from a former member of his administration.
In 2004, Clarke told CNN that Bush did "virtually nothing about al Qaeda prior to September 11, 2001."
He said that while Clinton's national security adviser, Samuel Berger, held daily meetings after being warned of a possible terrorist attack and "shook out of their bureaucracies every last piece of information to prevent the attacks," Rice, as Bush's national security adviser, did not do so before the attacks.
"I would argue that for what had actually happened prior to 9/11, the Clinton administration was doing a great deal," he said. "In fact, so much that when the Bush people came into office they thought I was a little crazy, a little obsessed with this little terrorist bin Laden. Why wasn't I focused on Iraqi-sponsored terrorism?"
Clarke also is an outspoken critic of the Iraq war.
Members of the Bush White House questioned his credibility when he spoke out two years ago, contending he had voiced support for the administration while a member of it.
Rice painted a different picture of the situation in the Post article.
"Nobody organized this country or the international community to fight the terrorist threat that was upon us until 9/ 11," she told the paper. "I would be the first to say that because, you know, we didn't fight the war on terror in the way that we're fighting it now. We just weren't organized as a country either domestically or as a leader internationally."
Asked whether she is calling Clinton a "liar," she responded, "No, I'm just saying that, look, there was a lot of passion in that interview."
========================================================
"The notion that somehow for eight months the Bush administration sat there and didn't do that is just flatly false."- Sec. Rice
Really? With a little help from a previous post by El_Kabong and myself, maybe she should think about these events in their first 8 months in office.
Obviously the Bush Administration was focusing on the security needs of this country when they didn't have any meetings with Richard Clarke even after the 8/6/01 memo came out stating that Bin Laden was determined to attack the US using airplanes.
or when an FBI budget official told the Joint Inquiry that counterterrorism was not a priority for Attorney General Ashcroft before September 11, and the FBI faced pressure to make cuts in counterterrorism to satisfy his other priorities.
or when FBI officials sought to add hundreds more counterintelligence agents, they got shot down even as Ashcroft began, quietly, to take a privately chartered jet for his own security reasons.”
or the White House plan to sharply cut an emergency F.B.I. request for $1.5 billion in extra counterterrorism money after the attacks.
or in the months before 9/11, the U.S. Justice Department curtailed a highly classified program called "Catcher's Mitt" to monitor Al Qaeda suspects in the United States
or official annual budget goals memo mentions 7 strategic goals, not one is related to anti terror efforts. The same document by Janet Reno the previous year was delivered a month earlier and put counter terrorism as one of two top priorities
or upon taking office, the 2002 Bush budget proposed to slash more than half a billion dollars out of funding for counterterrorism at the Justice Department. In preparing the 2003 budget, the New York Times reported that the Bush White House "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
or when the Bush Administration opposed Clinton Administration-backed efforts by the G-7 and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development that targeted countries with "loose banking regulations" being abused by terrorist financiers. Meanwhile, the Bush Administration provided "no funding for the new National Terrorist Asset Tracking Center
or when Gen. Don Kerrick, who served in the Bush White House, sent a memo to the new Administration saying "We are going to be struck again" by al Qaeda, but he never heard back. He said terrorism was not "above the waterline. They were gambling nothing would happen
NEW YORK (CNN) -- U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has taken on former President Clinton, rejecting his statement that President Bush failed to carry out adequate anti-terror efforts before the September 11, 2001, attacks.
"What we did in the eight months [between Bush's inauguration and 9/11] was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton administration did in the preceding years," Rice told the New York Post in comments published Tuesday.
"The notion that somehow for eight months the Bush administration sat there and didn't do that is just flatly false."
Rice's remarks followed Clinton's TV interview on "Fox News Sunday" in which the ex-president defended his efforts to track down and kill al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Clinton lashed out against "the right-wingers who are attacking me now," saying the same people had accused him of being "obsessed" with bin Laden. (Watch as Clinton says he tried to kill bin Laden -- 1:18)
"They ridiculed me for trying. They had eight months to try. They did not try. I tried. So I tried and failed," he told interviewer Chris Wallace.
He added that he "left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy" for the Bush administration. (Watch as analysts debate Clinton's effectiveness -- 2:36)
But Rice told the Post that "we were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al Qaeda."
Both Rice and Clinton pointed to the bipartisan commission that investigated the September 11 attacks, which also traced the steps the two administrations had taken before the September 11 attacks. In a 2004 report, the 9/11 commission criticized both for not having done enough.
In December, the commission slammed the Bush administration for failing to implement many critical recommendations from that report.
In Sunday's often contentious Fox interview, Clinton said he left behind former terrorism chief Richard Clarke, "the best guy in the country," to implement a comprehensive anti-terror strategy but said Bush officials had demoted him.
At one point, Clinton referred to Clarke as having been fired.
Clarke, who served under four presidents from both political parties, resigned in early 2003 after having been moved to a position in charge of battling cybersecurity. He later said he requested the move partly due to frustration with what he called the Bush administration's "lackadaisical attitude" toward terrorism before 9/11.
His testimony to the September 11 commission and his public remarks have included some of the harshest criticism President Bush has faced from a former member of his administration.
In 2004, Clarke told CNN that Bush did "virtually nothing about al Qaeda prior to September 11, 2001."
He said that while Clinton's national security adviser, Samuel Berger, held daily meetings after being warned of a possible terrorist attack and "shook out of their bureaucracies every last piece of information to prevent the attacks," Rice, as Bush's national security adviser, did not do so before the attacks.
"I would argue that for what had actually happened prior to 9/11, the Clinton administration was doing a great deal," he said. "In fact, so much that when the Bush people came into office they thought I was a little crazy, a little obsessed with this little terrorist bin Laden. Why wasn't I focused on Iraqi-sponsored terrorism?"
Clarke also is an outspoken critic of the Iraq war.
Members of the Bush White House questioned his credibility when he spoke out two years ago, contending he had voiced support for the administration while a member of it.
Rice painted a different picture of the situation in the Post article.
"Nobody organized this country or the international community to fight the terrorist threat that was upon us until 9/ 11," she told the paper. "I would be the first to say that because, you know, we didn't fight the war on terror in the way that we're fighting it now. We just weren't organized as a country either domestically or as a leader internationally."
Asked whether she is calling Clinton a "liar," she responded, "No, I'm just saying that, look, there was a lot of passion in that interview."
========================================================
"The notion that somehow for eight months the Bush administration sat there and didn't do that is just flatly false."- Sec. Rice
Really? With a little help from a previous post by El_Kabong and myself, maybe she should think about these events in their first 8 months in office.
Obviously the Bush Administration was focusing on the security needs of this country when they didn't have any meetings with Richard Clarke even after the 8/6/01 memo came out stating that Bin Laden was determined to attack the US using airplanes.
or when an FBI budget official told the Joint Inquiry that counterterrorism was not a priority for Attorney General Ashcroft before September 11, and the FBI faced pressure to make cuts in counterterrorism to satisfy his other priorities.
or when FBI officials sought to add hundreds more counterintelligence agents, they got shot down even as Ashcroft began, quietly, to take a privately chartered jet for his own security reasons.”
or the White House plan to sharply cut an emergency F.B.I. request for $1.5 billion in extra counterterrorism money after the attacks.
or in the months before 9/11, the U.S. Justice Department curtailed a highly classified program called "Catcher's Mitt" to monitor Al Qaeda suspects in the United States
or official annual budget goals memo mentions 7 strategic goals, not one is related to anti terror efforts. The same document by Janet Reno the previous year was delivered a month earlier and put counter terrorism as one of two top priorities
or upon taking office, the 2002 Bush budget proposed to slash more than half a billion dollars out of funding for counterterrorism at the Justice Department. In preparing the 2003 budget, the New York Times reported that the Bush White House "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
or when the Bush Administration opposed Clinton Administration-backed efforts by the G-7 and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development that targeted countries with "loose banking regulations" being abused by terrorist financiers. Meanwhile, the Bush Administration provided "no funding for the new National Terrorist Asset Tracking Center
or when Gen. Don Kerrick, who served in the Bush White House, sent a memo to the new Administration saying "We are going to be struck again" by al Qaeda, but he never heard back. He said terrorism was not "above the waterline. They were gambling nothing would happen
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Comments
Let's argue over mediocrity some more. Here's to everyone trying hard and to mediocrity
http://www.despair.com/med24x30prin.html
...
And she has to give the worst blow jobs... I mean, just look at them choppers. Like the blades in a coffee grinder.
Hail, Hail!!!
wasnt Clinton catching blowjobs in the oval office? I always wondered if that was a distraction for him.
and he's still on vacation. it's funny, because usually presidents age 20 years or so while they're in office this long because of all the stress. they start looking tired, worn down, and have a few more wrinkles than when they first went in. bush is amazing. he looks great! he doesn't look as though he loses any sleep and seems to be in the best shape of his life. i wonder why??
Another habit says its long overdue
Another habit like an unwanted friend
I'm so happy with my righteous self
what if he whacked off in the licoln bedroom every night before bed?? would it matter??
Another habit says its long overdue
Another habit like an unwanted friend
I'm so happy with my righteous self
its in Gods hands...so really he doesn't have to do much...its all predestined anyway.....(-:
Actually he looks like shit..and I'm glad.
As for Condi...she's just covering her and Carl's ass.
what he does by himself is his business. when he is doing it with an intern instead of running the country, that matters.
capital punishment and making all the evil doers pay for their sins...good.
Go figure.
I'm thinking Clinton wasted 20 minutes with the "intern" if he was lucky....
If he got a blowjob from his wife every night, would that bother you too? Or is that doing something instead of running the country?
was like a picture
of a sunny day
“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.”
― Abraham Lincoln
That seems to be the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld plan...
was like a picture
of a sunny day
“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.”
― Abraham Lincoln
i would've taken a long vacation after an election like that so don't ask me.
This isn't a "Bush hating" thread. This is, here is what Sec. Rice is saying, and here are some things that go against what she is claiming.
http://www.reverbnation.com/brianzilm
I apologize, I don't know what I was thinking
http://www.reverbnation.com/brianzilm
well you can blame clinton as much as bush. wheres my evidence you ask? he (OBL) isnt caught or dead. thats the only evidence I need
That's what Clinton is saying. He didn't get the job done, but now the right wing nut jobs who called "Wag the Dog" when Clinton did go after Bin Laden, are now saying he didn't do enough and because of his actions 9/11 happened.
http://www.reverbnation.com/brianzilm
You can't criticize Clinton and accuse him of trying to cover up or hide the Monica Lewinski (non) issue ....when he actually was trying to protect our country....and then when it suites their needs, now say he didn’t do enough. What a crock of shit from the GOP.
i'm gonna get a BJ and protect the country too!!!
i dont think anyone is saying he is at fault for 9/11.
2001 memo to Rice contradicts statements about Clinton, Pakistan
Larry Womack
Published: Tuesday September 26, 2006
A memo received by United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice shortly after becoming National Security Advisor in 2001 directly contradicts statements she made to reporters yesterday, RAW STORY has learned.
"We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al Qaeda," Rice told a reporter for the New York Post on Monday. "Big pieces were missing," Rice added, "like an approach to Pakistan that might work, because without Pakistan you weren't going to get Afghanistan."
Rice made the comments in response to claims made Sunday by former President Bill Clinton, who argued that his administration had done more than the current one to address the al Qaeda problem before the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. She stopped short of calling the former president a liar.
However, RAW STORY has found that just five days after President George W. Bush was sworn into office, a memo from counter-terrorism expert Richard A. Clarke to Rice included the 2000 document, "Strategy for Eliminating the Threat from the Jihadist Networks of al-Qida: Status and Prospects." This document devotes over 2 of its 13 pages of material to specifically addressing strategies for securing Pakistan's cooperation in airstrikes against al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan.
The Pakistan obstacle
The strategy document includes "three levers" that the United States had started applying to Pakistan as far back as 1990. Sanctions, political and economic methods of persuasion are all offered as having been somewhat successful.
Other portions of the passages relating to Pakistan – marked as "operational details" – have been redacted from the declassified memo at the CIA's request.
The document also explores broader strategic approaches, such as a "need to keep in mind that Pakistan has been most willing to cooperate with us on terrorism when its role is invisible or at least plausibly deniable to the powerful Islamist right wing."
But Clarke also made it clear that the Clinton Administration recognized the problem that Pakistan posed in mounting a more sweeping campaign against bin Laden: "Overt action against bin Laden, who is a hero especially in the Pushtun-ethnic border areas near Afghanistan," Clarke speculated in late 2000, "would be so unpopular as to threaten Musharraf's government." The plan notes that, after the attack on the USS Cole, Pakistan had forbidden the United States from again violating its airspace to attack bin Laden in Afghanistan.
The memo sent by Clarke to Rice, to which the Clinton-era document was attached, also urges action on Pakistan relating to al Qaeda. "First [to be addressed,]" wrote Clarke in a list of pending issues relating to al Qaeda, is "what the administration says to the Taliban and Pakistan about ending al Qida sanctuary in Afghanistan. We are separately proposing early, strong messages on both."
A disputed history
The documents have been a source of controversy before. Rice contended in a March 22, 2004 Washington Post piece that "no al Qaeda plan was turned over to the new administration."
Two days later, Clarke insisted to the 9/11 Commission that the plan had in fact been turned over. "There's a lot of debate about whether it's a plan or a strategy or a series of options, but all of the things we recommended back in January," he told the commission, "were done after September 11th."
The memo was declassified on April 7, 2004, one day before Rice herself testified before the 9/11 Commission.
Excerpts from documents relating to the situation follow:
#
Pages 11-13 of the Clinton-era document sent to Rice from Clarke, detailing Pakistan's role in the al Qaeda problem. The plan was referred to by Clarke, and later by Rice in public statements:
http://www.rawstory.com/images/clarke3.jpg
http://www.rawstory.com/images/clarke4.jpg
http://www.rawstory.com/images/clarke5.jpg
#
Page 2 of memo from Clarke to Rice, urging "early, strong messages" to Pakistan on the al Qaeda problem. The Clinton "plan" was attached to this memo:
http://www.rawstory.com/images/clarke2.jpg