Politics Extra: Giving Chabot a peace of their mind

Wednesday, September 27, 2006

Giving Chabot a peace of their mind

Quan Truong reports:

Update, 9 am!

Two minors and five adults were arrested were taken to police headquarters in district one and charged with criminal trespassing. Shannon Isaacs, one of the seven, said the staff members and police were very professional.

A handful of people were arrested at U.S. Rep. Steve Chabot’s office downtown tonight after a seven hour sit-in.

The group arrived at Chabot’s office on the 30th floor of Carew Tower around 1 p.m. Tuesday, stating they would not leave the premises until Chabot signed a Congressional pledge to end the U.S. war and occupation in Iraq.

During the seven hours, supporters of Greater Cincinnati Declaration of Peace drifted in and out of the office. At one point, up to 20 people were inside. About nine people participated in the sit-in, issuing a group statement on why they were risking arrest.

Both sides maintain there was cooperation and mutual respect. Chabot’s staff accommodated the group with refreshments and bathroom keys. The group remained cordial and asserted their actions were aimed at the issue and not a personal vendetta against those at the Chabot’s office.

They were first asked to leave around 6:30 p.m. Security were called at 7 p.m. and about an hour later, Cincinnati police showed up to arrest those who remained.

Gary Lindgreen, Chabot’s chief of staff, said the arrest was peaceful and there was no commotion. The group’s spokesperson, Ellen Dienger, could not be reached Tuesday night.

34 Comments:

at 10:59 PM, September 27, 2006

Anonymous said...

What else do a bunch of unemployed loser liberals have to do?

at 8:40 AM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

THE IRAQ WAR

Waging war on a sovereign nation that had not attacked
us and without the backing of the United Nations or
many of our allies...

$11.5 million per hour
$275 million per day
$1.9 billion per week
$8.4 billion per month

U.S. Debt with China
PRICELESS

at 9:12 AM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

The "loser liberals" were not all unemployed; I prepare the pay check for one of them. Refrain from commenting on issues when you are ignorant of the facts, please.

at 9:24 AM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

It sure would be interesting to see who these people are, where they work (especially if they are government or tax-dollar supported non-profits), and if they were taking vacation days.

Not to pick on these war protestors, but it is something about which I frequently wonder.

at 9:54 AM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

wait wait wait. cincy911 truth is telling someone to read actual facts? i'm assuming (by your name) youre one of those kook tin foil hat wearing liberals who think bush himself went to the WTC and Pentagon and placed the explosives himself, eh? how..ironic. and the NIE report also said:

United States-led counterterrorism efforts have seriously damaged the leadership of al-Qa’ida and disrupted its operations

We assess that the global jihadist movement is decentralized, lacks a coherent global strategy, and is becoming more diffuse.

Should jihadists leaving Iraq perceive themselves, and be perceived, to have failed, we judge fewer fighters will be inspired to carry on the fight.

The jihadists greatest vulnerability is that their ultimate political solution: an
ultra-conservative interpretation of sharia-based governance spanning the Muslim world is unpopular with the vast majority of Muslims.

Recent condemnations of violence and extremist religious interpretations by a few
notable Muslim clerics signal a trend that could facilitate the growth of a constructive alternative to jihadist ideology: peaceful political activism. This also could lead to the consistent and dynamic participation of broader Muslim communities in rejecting violence, reducing the ability of radicals to capitalize on passive community support.

If democratic reform efforts in Muslim majority nations progress over the next five years,
political participation probably would drive a wedge between intransigent extremists and
groups willing to use the political process to achieve their local objectives.

what does that mean cincy911truth? i'll type it slowly so you understand. STAY IN IRAQ.

of course going after terrorists are going to anger them more. if you chase a bee around, other bees will soon come too. it really isnt that difficult to understand. what are our options then? well, we can go back to the clintonian way of dealing with terrorism which is accept what happens and hope for the best (which got us 9/11, the cole, the first WTC attack, the embassies in kenya and tanzania, etc) or we can actually do something about it. obviously, you want to choose the first. people like you are a threat to america and god forbid you guys actually get to decide our foreign policy. we cut and ran from somalia, bin laden laughed, pointed his finger, called us a paper tiger and said "NEXT". now you want to do that in iraq? no thanks.

at 10:37 AM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

Seems like 60% of Ohioans would disagree with your position Cincy911. Looks like John, and Vic, and Ted's message may not be resonating so well with Ohioans after all.

at 10:52 AM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

I applaud those who feel compelled to stand against torture. What have we become? Do any Christians out there really think Jesus who advocate torture?

at 11:25 AM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

anon 10:52: I assume you're speaking of the torture that occurred to innocent civilians under saddam husseins regime? (would you also consider gassing your own people as torture? i would.) or maybe you're referring to the torture that occurs to our brave men and women in uniform. you know..getting your head cut off with a dull nail file, having your body hung from a bridge and set ablaze, having your body dragged in the streets of fallujah like a parade, etc? then yes, i also applaud those who stand against torture (like george bush, jean schmidt, steve chabot, and generally anyone else with a big "R" by their name)...

at 12:58 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

Saddam Hussien killed 35,000of own people over 20 years. Our ill-thought, ill-executed iraq misadventure (what happened to the WMD's, and the people "welcoming us with roses and chocolate"?)is causing the lifes of 3000 Iraqis per month. Over 200,000 Iraqis have died since we invaded. Torture? Bush and his gang are legalizing torture now, and have enganged in it from day 1 in Iraq. Just ask Maher Arar, the Canadian who the US sent to Syria to be tortured. It turned out he was innocent. The government 'made a mistake. Oops.

The NIE is damning of the administration, and no amount of spin will make it read otherwise.

at 1:53 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

I find humorous and somewhat sad that a group of people are so naïve to think that if they sit in an office all day and watch people work it will surely get the government to change their policies. Only if they started a “hey, hey, oh, oh,” chant. Maybe that would cause real change to happen. I did hear they banged a gong. Yeah, that should stir things up or how about a hunger strike!!! Didn’t Cindy Sheehan start one of those a few months back? Any news how that’s working out for her? I know how!!! How about paper Mache head of George Bush!!! That will convince people to change their minds.

at 2:18 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

Terrorism is to the poor as war is to the rich-WRONG! We invaded Iraq WITHOUT grounds. The Administration cherry picked intel to fit their agenda. This is morally and legally wrong. The constitution and the Geneva Convention has stood the test of previous presidents, it is DANGEROUS to side track from it.

The Bush Adminstration has failed at everything and has been disastrous for our country. They have weakened our military and raided the coffers for their own profit. They failed to properly armor the brave men and women who are fighting for our country (TO DEFEND OUR CONSTITUTION & RIGHTS) and cut their military benefits, all while allowing crony corporations to profit obscenely.

They ignored warnings to protect the country regarding 911 (ignored the Aug 6th PDB: OBL determined to strike), warnings from Richard Clarke, German and French Intelligence, as well as others. They have out-sourced our port security to middle eastern countries(Dubai Port).

They have also out-sourced our votes to partisan corporations which provide results without verifiable outcomes, while spending billions for electronic voting machines that fail.

Ask yourself: Who is profitting from their policies? Corporate cronies and the very rich. The poor have become poorer, the middle class have seen their pensions evaporate and jobs move overseas; and the military are not properly protected and receive low pay while Halliburton et al are raking in the big bucks without oversight. 9 BILLION DOLLARS is missing from Iraq.

Bush Administration = FAILED LEADERSHIP!

at 2:43 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

a touch of gray..what are you smoking? first, your argument is that bush is worst than saddam. welcome to the modern democratic party. secondly, who told you saddam only killed 35,000 people? did you hear that from saddam himself during your legal defense meeting with him? no doubt innocent civilians have died during this conflict. thats unfortunate, but the difference is saddam intentionally killed them, whereas the civilian deaths in iraq are A) occurring mostly at the hands of terrorist who want to kill YOU as well (despite your love obsession with saddam), and B) occuring as a result of going after the insurgents you support. try again, friend. on a separate note, how did i try to spin the NIE report? i simply quoted it. well, i guess in your liberal tree hugging, saddam loving mind, whenever anyone quotes FACTS, you consider it wrong. wow. people like you make me sick, but if it wasnt for people like you, we wouldnt be working so hard to make sure you dont win control of the house and/or senate, so i guess i should be thanking you. preach on "patriot", and please, have some more kool aid.

at 2:52 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

1:53 PM

Sadder yet is those who blindly follow failed leadership.

-failed to protect against 911 attacks (despite warnings)
-failed to capture OBL
-failed to secure Afghanistan (now a narco-state in Taliban hands)
-failed to protect the troops w body armor.
-failed to implement a contingency plan in Iraq.
-failed to heed warnings from Generals RE: Iraq (Colin Powell-you break it you own it)
-failed at Katrina Disaster (too busy eating cake)
-failed to defend the constitution.
-failed to secure our ports.
-failed to implement the 911 Commission recommendations.
-failed at balancing the budget.
-failed at losing 9 billion dollars in Iraq

Bush Legacy-FAILED LEADERSHIP!

at 3:41 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

yes, thank god clinton killed bin laden during the multiple times he had the chance to and went after the hijackers when he found out they were in the U.S. (coughABLE DANGERcough)

hell, if every president performs as well as clinton did because of getting oral sex from a fat intern, FAT INTERNS FOR ALL!!!

Clinton Legacy - many terror attacks, a few grand juries, and lots of apologies

at 4:17 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

(coughAble Dangercough):

Bush administration officials ordered Lt. Col. Schaffer's duplicate Able Danger files destroyed in 2004. Why? Surely they were not covering for Clinton.

According to Rep. Weldon, two weeks after 9/11 he was provided with data from Able Danger that included "an extensive analysis chart of Al Qaeda, which I immediately took to the White House and personally delivered to then-Deputy National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley. Mr. Hadley was extremely interested in the chart and said that he would take it to the President."

During his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on September 21, Rep. Weldon said: "And I can tell you this — I talked to Mr. Hadley three months ago when I briefed him on another issue, and I said, remember that chart that I gave you? And he said, yes, I remember it." However, Mr. Hadley, who has since been promoted to national security adviser, has been mum on the issue of that meeting.

One of the peripheral issues that has become a main bone of contention in the whole matter is whether or not the chart provided to Hadley actually included a photo of Mohammed Atta. According to Lt. Col. Schaffer and other Able Danger team members, the chart (roughly four-and-a-half feet by five feet) included a photo of Atta and showed his linkage to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and the blind sheik Omar Abdul-Rahman, who was convicted and sent to prison on bombing conspiracy charges.

http://www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20051110202854511

at 4:29 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

Bush's Faustian Deal With the Taliban
By Robert Scheer
Published May 22, 2001 in the Los Angeles Times

Enslave your girls and women, harbor anti-U.S. terrorists, destroy every vestige of civilization in your homeland, and the Bush administration will embrace you. All that matters is that you line up as an ally in the drug war, the only international cause that this nation still takes seriously.

That's the message sent with the recent gift of $43 million to the Taliban rulers of Afghanistan, the most virulent anti-American violators of human rights in the world today. The gift, announced last Thursday by Secretary of State Colin Powell, in addition to other recent aid, makes the U.S. the main sponsor of the Taliban and rewards that "rogue regime" for declaring that opium growing is against the will of God. So, too, by the Taliban's estimation, are most human activities, but it's the ban on drugs that catches this administration's attention.

Never mind that Osama bin Laden still operates the leading anti-American terror operation from his base in Afghanistan, from which, among other crimes, he launched two bloody attacks on American embassies in Africa in 1998.

Sadly, the Bush administration is cozying up to the Taliban regime at a time when the United Nations, at U.S. insistence, imposes sanctions on Afghanistan because the Kabul government will not turn over Bin Laden.

_snip

http://www.robertscheer.com/1_natcolumn/01_columns/052201.htm

at 4:46 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

Saddm gassed his own people with US weapons given to him by Rummy. The US supported him after he did it. Things are worse under the US occupation. They want us to leave.

I applaud those who got arrested for a just cause. The American people ended the war in Vietnam and they will end this war one day. They have been silenced but won't remain silent for much longer.

at 4:58 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

History Lesson(FACTS): If US was so against gassing cilivians, why did it wait until Aug 1990 to turn against Saddam?

Turning against Saddam

It wasn't until Iraq invaded Kuwait on August 2, 1990, that the United States turned against Saddam. Iraq was now seen as big a danger to U.S. interests as Iran.

-snip

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/US/09/30/sproject.irq.regime.change/

Soon thereafter, Donald Rumsfeld (who had served in various positions in the Nixon and Ford administrations, including as President Ford's defense secretary, and at this time headed the multinational pharmaceutical company G.D. Searle & Co.) was dispatched to the Middle East as a presidential envoy. His December 1983 tour of regional capitals included Baghdad, where he was to establish "direct contact between an envoy of President Reagan and President Saddam Hussein," while emphasizing "his close relationship" with the president [Document 28]. Rumsfeld met with Saddam, and the two discussed regional issues of mutual interest, shared enmity toward Iran and Syria, and the U.S.'s efforts to find alternative routes to transport Iraq's oil; its facilities in the Persian Gulf had been shut down by Iran, and Iran's ally, Syria, had cut off a pipeline that transported Iraqi oil through its territory. Rumsfeld made no reference to chemical weapons, according to detailed notes on the meeting [Document 31].

Rumsfeld also met with Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz, and the two agreed, "the U.S. and Iraq shared many common interests." Rumsfeld affirmed the Reagan administration's "willingness to do more" regarding the Iran-Iraq war, but "made clear that our efforts to assist were inhibited by certain things that made it difficult for us, citing the use of chemical weapons, possible escalation in the Gulf, and human rights." He then moved on to other U.S. concerns [Document 32]. Later, Rumsfeld was assured by the U.S. interests section that Iraq's leadership had been "extremely pleased" with the visit, and that "Tariq Aziz had gone out of his way to praise Rumsfeld as a person" [Document 36 and Document 37].

Rumsfeld returned to Baghdad in late March 1984. By this time, the U.S. had publicly condemned Iraq's chemical weapons use, stating, "The United States has concluded that the available evidence substantiates Iran's charges that Iraq used chemical weapons" [Document 47]. Briefings for Rumsfeld's meetings noted that atmospherics in Iraq had deteriorated since his December visit because of Iraqi military reverses and because "bilateral relations were sharply set back by our March 5 condemnation of Iraq for CW use, despite our repeated warnings that this issue would emerge sooner or later" [Document 48]. Rumsfeld was to discuss with Iraqi officials the Reagan administration's hope that it could obtain Export-Import Bank credits for Iraq, the Aqaba pipeline, and its vigorous efforts to cut off arms exports to Iran. According to an affidavit prepared by one of Rumsfeld's companions during his Mideast travels, former NSC staff member Howard Teicher, Rumsfeld also conveyed to Iraq an offer from Israel to provide assistance, which was rejected [Document 61].

Although official U.S. policy still barred the export of U.S. military equipment to Iraq, some was evidently provided on a "don't ask - don't tell" basis. In April 1984, the Baghdad interests section asked to be kept apprised of Bell Helicopter Textron's negotiations to sell helicopters to Iraq, which were not to be "in any way configured for military use" [Document 55]. The purchaser was the Iraqi Ministry of Defense. In December 1982, Bell Textron's Italian subsidiary had informed the U.S. embassy in Rome that it turned down a request from Iraq to militarize recently purchased Hughes helicopters. An allied government, South Korea, informed the State Department that it had received a similar request in June 1983 (when a congressional aide asked in March 1983 whether heavy trucks recently sold to Iraq were intended for military purposes, a State Department official replied "we presumed that this was Iraq's intention, and had not asked.") [Document 44]

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/

PS CHECK OUT THE PHOTO OF RUMSFELD SHAKING SADDAM'S HAND.

at 5:05 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

Darn it I didn't get responded to by the conspiracy theorists. Does that mean I was right? YES!

at 5:21 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

Anonymous 5:05 pm said...
Darn it I didn't get responded to by the conspiracy theorists. Does that mean I was right? YES!

No..that probably means your comments were irrelevant or just plain 'stoopid'.

at 7:07 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

TO: It sure would be interesting to see who these people are, where they work (especially if they are government or tax-dollar supported non-profits), and if they were taking vacation days.

I am a war protestor. I even travelled with my husband and young children to DC to protest this immoral war along side 600,000 of my closest friends. I was a small business owner who closed her business after the blatant theft of the '04 election in Ohio. We are not wealthy, but feel so strongly that this administration is ruining our country that we feel compelled to live on one salary until things have changed.

This administration is doing such damage to our environment, our diplomacy and image around the world, oureconomy (national debt) that I think we have to fight for the sake of our children and future generations.

I urge others to research the facts instead of following blindly.

at 7:09 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

Gulf of Tonkin was a lie.

Those 16 words in the State of the Ynion were based on crudely forged documents.

Bush also misrepresented the history of the prewar conflict with Iraq over weapons inspections, telling reporters on July 14, "We gave him a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in." In fact, after a Security Council resolution was passed demanding that Iraq allow inspectors in, they were given complete access to the country.

So which is it. Is this man deluded or does he lie?

at 7:38 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

US war costs since September 11 exceed $500bn
Peter Walker
Thursday September 28, 2006
Guardian Unlimited

The Iraq war is currently costing US taxpayers around $2bn a week, as the military replaces damaged equipment and tries to establish more permanent bases, reports in US newspapers said today.

A report by the non-partisan Congressional Research Service projected that the war would cost $110bn for the fiscal year 2007, the Houston Chronicle said.

This would be a 20% rise on last year and almost double the monetary cost of the first year of the war, a report in the Boston Globe said.

According to the Globe, the report estimated that once Congress approved two pending bills on military spending, total war costs since the September 11 2001 attacks would have exceeded $500bn, of which $379bn had been spent on Iraq, $97bn in Afghanistan and $26bn on improving the security of US military bases elsewhere.

The costs had increased despite a levelling off of US troop numbers in Iraq and Afghanistan. According to the report, the extra money was being used in part because of a greater intensity of attacks on American forces, the Boston Globe said.

at 7:47 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

It is good to know the true feelings of the democrats. They come out really well on this blog. You guys are a bunch of kooks, that is why I stopped voting for you.

at 9:26 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/11/01/binladen.tape/

CNN) -- The Arabic-language network Al-Jazeera released a full transcript Monday of the most recent videotape from Osama bin Laden in which the head of al Qaeda said his group's goal is to force America into bankruptcy.

Al-Jazeera aired portions of the videotape Friday but released the full transcript of the entire tape on its Web site Monday.

"We are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy. Allah willing, and nothing is too great for Allah," bin Laden said in the transcript.

He said the mujahedeen fighters did the same thing to the Soviet Union in Afghanistan in the 1980s, "using guerrilla warfare and the war of attrition to fight tyrannical superpowers."

"We, alongside the mujahedeen, bled Russia for 10 years until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat," bin Laden said.

He also said al Qaeda has found it "easy for us to provoke and bait this administration."

"All that we have to do is to send two mujahedeen to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al Qaeda, in order to make generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic and political losses without their achieving anything of note other than some benefits for their private corporations," bin Laden said.

Al-Jazeera executives said they decided to post the entire speech because rumors were circulating that the network omitted parts that "had direct threats toward specific states, which was totally untrue."

"We chose the most newsworthy parts of the address and aired them. The rest was used in lower thirds in graphics format," said one official.

U.S. intelligence officials Monday confirmed that the transcript made public Monday by Al-Jazeera was a complete one.

As part of the "bleed-until-bankruptcy plan," bin Laden cited a British estimate that it cost al Qaeda about $500,000 to carry out the attacks of September 11, 2001, an amount that he said paled in comparison with the costs incurred by the United States.

"Every dollar of al Qaeda defeated a million dollars, by the permission of Allah, besides the loss of a huge number of jobs," he said. "As for the economic deficit, it has reached record astronomical numbers estimated to total more than a trillion dollars.

The total U.S. national debt is more than $7 trillion. The U.S. federal deficit was $413 billion in 2004, according to the Treasury Department.

"It is true that this shows that al Qaeda has gained, but on the other hand it shows that the Bush administration has also gained, something that anyone who looks at the size of the contracts acquired by the shady Bush administration-linked mega-corporations, like Halliburton and its kind, will be convinced.

"And it all shows that the real loser is you," he said. "It is the American people and their economy."

As for President Bush's Iraq policy, Bin Laden said, "the darkness of black gold blurred his vision and insight, and he gave priority to private interests over the public interests of America.

"So the war went ahead, the death toll rose, the American economy bled, and Bush became embroiled in the swamps of Iraq that threaten his future," bin Laden said.

at 9:29 PM, September 28, 2006

Anonymous said...

To 7:47 PM,

Funny, the Dems on this blog post facts backed up with links, while you seem happy to let disparaging remarks be the sole crux of your argument. Typical Bush supporter. Can't be bothered with those silly antiquated annoyances known as FACTS. Reality is so passe with you folks.

at 9:19 AM, September 29, 2006

Anonymous said...

*****

It is good to know the true feelings of the democrats. They come out really well on this blog. You guys are a bunch of kooks, that is why I stopped voting for you.

Another wRong wingnut whacko that doesn't know schmidt !

HAD ENOUGH, VOTE DEMOCRAT 2006 !

*****

at 9:46 AM, September 29, 2006

Anonymous said...

Where on earth is the Schmidt response to Wulsin's "political idol's" plaigarism?!?!?!

at 9:25 PM, September 29, 2006

Anonymous said...

Second; there is a chance Bin Laden may have been caught but someone from the Democratic party went on national TV and said we had his cell phone number and he stopped using it.

No one from the democratic party went on TV and said they had Bin Laden's cell phone number.

Misinformation. Let me guess you listen to a lot of talk radio.

File the Bin Laden Phone Leak Under 'Urban Myths'

By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, December 22, 2005; A02

President Bush asserted this week that the news media published a U.S. government leak in 1998 about Osama bin Laden's use of a satellite phone, alerting the al Qaeda leader to government monitoring and prompting him to abandon the device.

The story of the vicious leak that destroyed a valuable intelligence operation was first reported by a best-selling book, validated by the Sept. 11 commission and then repeated by the president.

But it appears to be an urban myth.

The al Qaeda leader's communication to aides via satellite phone had already been reported in 1996 -- and the source of the information was another government, the Taliban, which ruled Afghanistan at the time.

The second time a news organization reported on the satellite phone, the source was bin Laden himself.

Causal effects are hard to prove, but other factors could have persuaded bin Laden to turn off his satellite phone in August 1998. A day earlier, the United States had fired dozens of cruise missiles at his training camps, missing him by hours.

Bush made his assertion at a news conference Monday, in which he defended his authorization of warrantless monitoring of communications between some U.S. citizens and suspected terrorists overseas. He fumed that "the fact that we were following Osama bin Laden because he was using a certain type of telephone made it into the press as the result of a leak." He berated the media for "revealing sources, methods and what we use the information for" and thus helping "the enemy" change its operations.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Monday that the president was referring to an article that appeared in the Washington Times on Aug. 21, 1998, the day after the cruise missile attack, which was launched in retaliation for the bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa two weeks earlier. The Sept. 11 commission also cited the article as "a leak" that prompted bin Laden to stop using his satellite phone, though it noted that he had added more bodyguards and began moving his sleeping place "frequently and unpredictably" after the missile attack.

Two former Clinton administration officials first fingered the Times article in a 2002 book, "The Age of Sacred Terror." Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon wrote that after the "unabashed right-wing newspaper" published the story, bin Laden "stopped using the satellite phone instantly" and "the United States lost its best chance to find him."

The article, a profile of bin Laden, buried the information about his satellite phone in the 21st paragraph. It never said that the United States was listening in on bin Laden, as the president alleged. The writer, Martin Sieff, said yesterday that the information about the phone was "already in the public domain" when he wrote the story.

A search of media databases shows that Time magazine had first reported on Dec. 16, 1996, that bin Laden "uses satellite phones to contact fellow Islamic militants in Europe, the Middle East and Africa." Taliban officials provided the information, with one official -- security chief Mulla Abdul Mannan Niazi -- telling Time, "He's in high spirits."

The day before the Washington Times article was published -- and the day of the attacks -- CNN producer Peter Bergen appeared on the network to talk about an interview he had with bin Laden in 1997.

"He communicates by satellite phone, even though Afghanistan in some levels is back in the Middle Ages and a country that barely functions," Bergen said.

Bergen noted that as early as 1997, bin Laden's men were very concerned about electronic surveillance. "They scanned us electronically," he said, because they were worried that anyone meeting with bin Laden "might have some tracking device from some intelligence agency." In 1996, the Chechen insurgent leader Dzhokhar Dudayev was killed by a Russian missile that locked in to his satellite phone signal.

That same day, CBS reported that bin Laden used a satellite phone to give a television interview. USA Today ran a profile of bin Laden on the same day as the Washington Times's article, quoting a former U.S. official about his "fondness for his cell phone."

It was not until Sept. 7, 1998 -- after bin Laden apparently stopped using his phone -- that a newspaper reported that the United States had intercepted his phone calls and obtained his voiceprint. U.S. authorities "used their communications intercept capacity to pick up calls placed by bin Laden on his Inmarsat satellite phone, despite his apparent use of electronic 'scramblers,' " the Los Angeles Times reported.

Officials could not explain yesterday why they focused on the Washington Times story when other news organizations at the same time reported on the satellite phone -- and that the information was not particularly newsworthy.

"You got me," said Benjamin, who was director for counterterrorism on the National Security Council staff at the time. "That was the understanding in the White House and the intelligence community. The story ran and the lights went out."

Lee H. Hamilton, vice chairman of the Sept. 11 commission, gave a speech in October in which he said the leak "was terribly damaging." Yesterday, he said the commission relied on the testimony of three "very responsible, very senior intelligence officers," who he said "linked the Times story to the cessation of the use of the phone." He said they described it as a very serious leak.

But Hamilton said he did not recall any discussion about other news outlets' reports. "I cannot conceive we would have singled out the Washington Times if we knew about all of the reporting," he said.

A White House official said last night the administration was confident that press reports changed bin Laden's behavior. CIA spokesman Tom Crispell declined to comment, saying the question involves intelligence sources and methods.

at 10:28 AM, September 30, 2006

Anonymous said...

Win at any cost is the GOP motto, even when it means overlooking serious ethics violations:

Foley Interviewed About Page Last Year; Democrats Not Told-Ethics Inquiry

Ethics Inquiry Ordered

Ex-Rep. Mark Foley (R-Fla.), who resigned Friday after reports of his improper communications with a former male House page were made public, was interviewed about some of those contacts by the chairman of the House Page Board and the then-Clerk of the House last year.

And late Friday night, the House passed a resolution directing the ethics committee to begin an inquiry into Foley’s behavior.

(snip)

Both Hastings and Berman declined to comment when asked if they would look specifically into leadership and when they knew information about Foley.

At least four Republican House Members, one senior GOP aide and a former top officer of the House were aware of the allegations about Foley that prompted the initial reporting regarding his e-mail contacts with a 16-year-old House page. They include: Majority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio), National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Tom Reynolds (N.Y.) and Reps. Rodney Alexander (R-La.) and John Shimkus (R-Ill.), as well as a senior aide to Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) and former Clerk of the House Jeff Trandahl.

more…
http://www.rollcall.com/issues/1_1/breakingnews/15259-1.html

at 12:03 PM, September 30, 2006

Anonymous said...

Bush, Rice, Cheney and Rumsfeld all ostriches with their heads in the sand. The system was blinking red and they diddled!

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.

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. 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.

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.

And on August 6, 2001 they ignored a Presidential Daily Brief titled Bin Laden Determined to Attack inside US.

August 6, 2001 Presidential Daily Brief (PDB):
“Al-Qa'ida members -- including some who are US citizens -- have
resided in or traveled to the US for years, and the group apparently
maintains a support structure that could aid attacks. Two al-Qa'ida
members found guilty in the conspiracy to bomb our Embassies in E. Africa were US citizens, and a senior EIJ member lived in California in the U.S. in the mid-1990s. A clandestine source said in 1998 that a Bin Ladin cell in New York was recruiting Muslim-American youth for attacks. We have not been able to corroborate some of the more sensational threat reporting, such as that from a ... (redacted
portion) ... service in 1998 saying that Bin Ladin wanted to hijack a US aircraft to gain the release of ‘Blind Shaykh’ 'Umar 'Abd
al-Rahman and other US-held extremists. Nevertheless, FBI information since that time indicates patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York.”

And then you have Rice trying to use this excuse:

"I don't think anybody could have predicted that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the World Trade Center . . . that they would try to use . . . a hijacked airplane as a missile."

No the Bush admin came into office convinced a missile shield was the most important focus and they rebuffed Richard Clarke.

unfrigging believable. Could this group be anymore incompetent?

at 10:40 AM, October 01, 2006

Anonymous said...

OMG more info on how littele Miss Sovietologist (Rice) was absolutely the wrong choice by a president with no foreign policy experience who looked to his dad's pals for direction on how to be a president.

Two Months Before 9/11, an Urgent Warning to Rice

Sunday, October 1, 2006; A17

On July 10, 2001, two months before the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, then-CIA Director George J. Tenet met with his counterterrorism chief, J. Cofer Black, at CIA headquarters to review the latest on Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda terrorist organization. Black laid out the case, consisting of communications intercepts and other top-secret intelligence showing the increasing likelihood that al-Qaeda would soon attack the United States. It was a mass of fragments and dots that nonetheless made a compelling case, so compelling to Tenet that he decided he and Black should go to the White House immediately.

Tenet called Condoleezza Rice, then national security adviser, from the car and said he needed to see her right away. There was no practical way she could refuse such a request from the CIA director.

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. Perhaps a dramatic appearance -- Black called it an "out of cycle" session, beyond Tenet's regular weekly meeting with Rice -- would get her attention.

Tenet had been losing sleep over the recent intelligence he'd seen. 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 and Black hoped to convey the depth of their anxiety and get Rice to kick-start the government into immediate action.

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 National Security Agency intercepts and other intelligence. Could all this be a grand deception? Rumsfeld had asked. Perhaps it was a plan to measure U.S. reactions and defenses.

MORE EVIDENCE THAT RUMMY SHOULD BE FIRED

Tenet had the NSA 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 hoped his abrupt request for an immediate meeting would shake Rice. He and Black, a veteran covert operator, had two main points when they met with her. First, al-Qaeda was going to attack American interests, possibly in the United States itself. Black emphasized that this amounted to a strategic warning, meaning the problem was so serious that it required an overall plan and strategy. Second, this was a major foreign policy problem that needed to be addressed immediately. They needed to take action that moment -- covert, military, whatever -- to thwart bin Laden.

The United States had human and technical sources, and all the intelligence was consistent, the two men told Rice. Black acknowledged that some of it was uncertain "voodoo" but said it was often this voodoo that was the best indicator.

Tenet and Black felt they were not getting through to Rice. She was polite, but they felt the brush-off. President Bush had said he didn't want to swat at flies.

As they all knew, a coherent plan for covert action against bin Laden was in the pipeline, but it would take some time. In recent closed-door meetings the entire National Security Council apparatus had been considering action against bin Laden, including using a new secret weapon: the Predator unmanned aerial vehicle, or drone, that could fire Hellfire missiles to kill him or his lieutenants. It looked like a possible solution, but there was a raging debate between the CIA and the Pentagon about who would pay for it and who would have authority to shoot.

Besides, Rice seemed focused on other administration priorities, especially the ballistic missile defense system that Bush had campaigned on. She was in a different place.

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.

BECAUSE WE KNOW A VACATION IN CRAWFORD AND STEM CELLS HAVE PRIORITY

The July 10 meeting between Tenet, Black and Rice went unmentioned in the various reports of investigations into the Sept. 11 attacks, but it stood out in the minds of Tenet and Black as the starkest warning they had given the White House on bin Laden and al-Qaeda. Though the investigators had access to all the paperwork on the meeting, Black felt there were things the commissions wanted to know about and things they didn't want to know about.

Philip D. Zelikow, the aggressive executive director of the Sept. 11 commission and a University of Virginia professor who had co-authored a book with Rice on Germany, knew something about the July 10 meeting, but it was not clear to him what immediate action really would have meant. In 2005 Rice hired Zelikow as a top aide at the State Department.

Afterward, Tenet looked back on the meeting with Rice as a tremendous lost opportunity to prevent or disrupt the Sept. 11 attacks. Rice could have gotten through to Bush on the threat, but she just didn't get it in time, Tenet thought. He felt that he had done his job and had been very direct about the threat, but that Rice had not moved quickly. He felt she was not organized and did not push people, as he tried to do at the CIA.

Black later said, "The only thing we didn't do was pull the trigger to the gun we were holding to her head."

Editor's Note: How 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."

And some people think this shoe buying twit is presidential caliber.

at 9:40 PM, October 01, 2006

John in Cincinnati said...

Hats off to those who faced arrest to express their values. It took roughly ten years before the majority of the country realized we didn't belong in Vietnam. I trust reason will prevail long before that about Iraq.

We were mistakenly involved in a civil war then, and have now become embroiled in a civil war in Iraq. It's a no-win situation for both the Iraqi and American people. The only ones to benefit are the terrorists. Every day our presence there makes our troops less safe, America less safe and the world less safe.

Unfortunately many of our well-meaning but gullible citizens are being duped by the signatories of the Project for a New American Century. http://www.newamericancentury.org/

at 9:35 PM, October 03, 2006

Anonymous said...

Rice's lies are continuing to unravel. What is next, checking into alcohol rehab?

Rumsfeld, Ashcroft received warning of al Qaida attack before 9/11

By JONATHAN S. LANDAY, WARREN P. STROBEL and JOHN WALCOTT
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and former Attorney General John Ashcroft received the same CIA briefing about an imminent al-Qaida strike on an American target that was given to the White House two months before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

The State Department's disclosure Monday that the pair was briefed within a week after then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice was told about the threat on July 10, 2001, raised new questions about what the Bush administration did in response, and about why so many officials have claimed they never received or don't remember the warning.

One official who helped to prepare the briefing, which included a PowerPoint presentation, described it as a "10 on a scale of 1 to 10" that "connected the dots" in earlier intelligence reports to present a stark warning that al-Qaida, which had already killed Americans in Yemen, Saudi Arabia and East Africa, was poised to strike again.

Former CIA Director George Tenet gave the independent Sept. 11, 2001, commission the same briefing on Jan. 28, 2004, but the commission made no mention of the warning in its 428-page final report. According to three former senior intelligence officials, Tenet testified to commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste and to Philip Zelikow, the panel's executive director and the principal author of its report, who's now Rice's top adviser.

A new book by Bob Woodward of The Washington Post alleges that Rice failed to take the July 2001 warning seriously when it was delivered at a White House meeting by Tenet, Cofer Black, then the agency's chief of top counterterrorism, and a third CIA official whose identity remains protected.

Rice's deputy, Stephen J. Hadley, who became national security adviser after she became secretary of state, and Rice's top counterterrorism aide, Richard Clarke, also were present.

Woodward wrote that Tenet and Black considered the briefing the "starkest warning they had given the White House" on the threat posed by Osama bin Laden's terrorist network. But, he wrote, the pair felt as if Rice gave them "the brush-off."

Speaking to reporters late Sunday en route to the Middle East, Rice said she had no recollection of what she called "the supposed meeting."

"What I'm quite certain of, is that it was not a meeting in which I was told that there was an impending attack and I refused to respond," she said.

Ashcroft, who resigned as attorney general on Nov. 9, 2004, told the Associated Press on Monday that it was "disappointing" that he never received the briefing, either.

But on Monday evening, Rice's spokesman Sean McCormack issued a statement confirming that she'd received the CIA briefing "on or around July 10" and had asked that it be given to Ashcroft and Rumsfeld.

BEGIN SPIN

"The information presented in this meeting was not new, rather it was a good summary from the threat reporting from the previous several weeks," McCormack said. "After this meeting, Dr. Rice asked that this same information be briefed to Secretary Rumsfeld and Attorney General Ashcroft. That briefing took place by July 17."

Lt. Cmdr. Joe Carpenter, a Pentagon spokesman, said he had no information "about what may or may not have been briefed" to Rumsfeld at Rice's request.

David Ayres, who was Ashcroft's chief of staff at the Justice Department, said that the former attorney general also has no recollection of a July 17, 2001, terrorist threat briefing. Later, Ayres said that Ashcroft could recall only a July 5 briefing on threats to U.S. interests abroad.

He said Ashcroft doesn't remember any briefing that summer that indicated that al-Qaida was planning to attack within the United States.

The CIA briefing didn't provide the exact timing or nature of a possible attack, nor did it predict whether it was likely to take place in the United States or overseas, said three former senior intelligence officials.

They spoke on condition of anonymity because the report remains highly classified.

The briefing "didn't say within the United States," said one former senior intelligence official. "It said on the United States, which could mean a ship, an embassy or inside the United States."

In the briefing, Tenet warned in very strong terms that intelligence from a variety of sources indicated that bin Laden's terrorist network was planning an attack on a U.S. target in the near future, said one of the officials.

"The briefing was intended to `connect the dots' contained in other intelligence reports and paint a very clear picture of the threat posed by bin Laden," said the official, who described the tone of the report as "scary."

It isn't clear what action, if any, the administration took in response, but officials said Rumsfeld was focused mostly on his plans to remake the Army into a smaller, high-tech force and deploy a national ballistic missile defense system.

Nor is it clear why the 9/11 commission never reported the briefing, which the intelligence officials said Tenet outlined to commission members Ben-Veniste and Zelikow in secret testimony at CIA headquarters. The State Department confirmed that the briefing materials were "made available to the 9/11 Commission, and Director Tenet was asked about this meeting when interviewed by the 9/11 Commission."

The three former senior intelligence officials, however, said Tenet raised the matter with the panel himself, displayed slides from the PowerPoint presentation and offered to testify on the matter in public.

Ben-Veniste confirmed to McClatchy Newspapers that Tenet outlined for the 9/11 commission the July 10 briefing to Rice in secret testimony in January 2004. He referred questions about why the commission omitted any mention of the briefing in its report to Zelikow, the report's main author. Zelikow didn't respond to e-mail and telephone queries from McClatchy Newspapers.

Clarke, the former White House counterterrorism chief, Ben-Veniste and the former senior intelligence officials all challenged some aspects of Woodward's account of the briefing given to Rice, including assertions that she failed to react to the warning and that it concerned an imminent attack inside the United States.

Clarke told McClatchy Newspapers that Rice focused in particular on the possible threat to President Bush at an upcoming summit meeting in Genoa, Italy, and promised to quickly schedule a high-level White House meeting on al-Qaida. That meeting took place on September 4, 2001.

Ben-Veniste said the commission was never told that Rice had brushed off the warning. According to Tenet, he said, Rice "understood the level of urgency he was communicating."

McClatchy Newspapers correspondents Matt Stearns and Drew Brown contributed to this report.

Previous Posts

Wednesday, September 27, 2006

Giving Chabot a peace of their mind

34 Comments: