Hillary Blasts Bush

From Newsday:

WASHINGTON -- Ignoring GOP criticism that she's too angry for prime time, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton Wednesday walloped Karl Rove and President George W. Bush for "playing the fear card" on terrorism and for failing to kill "the tallest man in Afghanistan," Osama bin Laden.

Maybe we should announce a basketball try-out...

In related news, George Bush will provide some details about his masterful leadership in foiling a 2002 terror plot.  Any chance that the NSA surveillance was a factor?

Details will eventually appear at this White House site.

UPDATE:  Here is Bush's speech, and the associated press briefing.  A highlight - the Administration will not discuss sources and methods, the point of the Presidnt's anecdote was the importanc eof international cooperation, and no connection to the NSA program is meant to be implied.

From the speech:

Since September the 11th, the United States and our coalition partners have disrupted a number of serious al Qaeda terrorist plots -- including plots to attack targets inside the United States.  Let me give you an example. In the weeks after September the 11th, while Americans were still recovering from an unprecedented strike on our homeland, al Qaeda was already busy planning its next attack. We now know that in October 2001, Khalid Shaykh Muhammad -- the mastermind of the September the 11th attacks -- had already set in motion a plan to have terrorist operatives hijack an airplane using shoe bombs to breach the cockpit door, and fly the plane into the tallest building on the West Coast.  We believe the intended target was  Liberty [sic] Tower in Los Angeles, California.*

Rather than use Arab hijackers as he had on September the 11th, Khalid Shaykh Muhammad sought out young men from Southeast Asia -- whom he believed would not arouse as much suspicion.  To help carry out this plan, he tapped a terrorist named Hambali, one of the leaders of an al Qaeda affiliated group in Southeast Asia called "J-I."  JI terrorists were responsible for a series of deadly attacks in Southeast Asia, and members of the group had trained with al Qaeda.  Hambali recruited several key operatives who had been training in Afghanistan.  Once the operatives were recruited, they met with Osama bin Laden, and then began preparations for the West Coast attack.

Their plot was derailed in early 2002 when a Southeast Asian nation arrested a key al Qaeda operative.  Subsequent debriefings and other intelligence operations made clear the intended target, and how al Qaeda hoped to execute it.  This critical intelligence helped other allies capture the ringleaders and other known operatives who had been recruited for this plot. The West Coast plot had been thwarted. Our efforts did not end there.  In the summer of 2003, our partners in Southeast Asia conducted another successful manhunt that led to the capture of the terrorist Hambali.

As the West Coast plot shows, in the war on terror we face a relentless and determined enemy that operates in many nations -- so protecting our citizens requires unprecedented cooperation from many nations as well. It took the combined efforts of several countries to break up this plot.  By working together, we took dangerous terrorists off the streets; by working together we stopped a catastrophic attack on our homeland.

From the press briefing, about the NSA role (if any):

Q    I understand that the House Intelligence Committee was briefed yesterday on the NSA wire tapping program, and I understand that at least some of the members present asked either General Hayden or Mr. Gonzales why they couldn't tell more success stories.  So it's interesting to me that news of this is coming out today.  So my follow question is, did the NSA wire taps, did they play any role in any of these arrests that you talked about, and in disrupting this particular plot?

MS. TOWNSEND:  As I said to you, we use all available sources and methods in the intelligence community, but we have to protect them.  So I'm not going to talk about what ones we did or didn't use in this particular case. And I wasn't at the briefing yesterday, so I can't speak directly to that.

Q    So you can't say that this is a direct result, a successful result of that initiative?

MS. TOWNSEND:  I wouldn't say one way or the other.  I wouldn't comment on it.

Q    Hi.  I had essentially the same question related to the NSA.  Is there nothing at all that you can tell us in any regard as to whether the NSA surveillance was at all instrumental?

MS. TOWNSEND:  No, I'm sorry, I can't. It continues to be a very sensitive program.  It's resulted in successes, but I can't relate it in any way one way or another to this particular plot.

Q    As a follow up, because certainly in the light of the hearings going on this week, and the criticism for this surveillance, it would seem that the President talking about a success story such as this sort of skirts the question of the NSA.  Is it wrong for us to put two and two together?

MS. TOWNSEND:  The point -- as I said in my opening statement, the point of the President's speech was to talk about the international cooperation. This was not meant to be a speech about the NSA surveillance program.

QUESTIONS FOR OSAMA: Per the press briefing, there were to be four hijackers using a shoe bomb to break through the cockpit door.  What in the world was their crowd control plan, and why did they not think they would simply have a replay of United Flight 93?

NY Times coverage is here.

Comments

[danking70]

Have Pincus and/or Kristoff ever been asked their thoughts on Wilson's Senate testimony about their Wilson-based stories?

Was it "misreported", "misstated", "misrepresented" his sourced story?

[topsecretk9]

via fedora & Cboldt
"Buried in this story are the following ...

Libby has never claimed that Cheney encouraged him to disclose information about Plame to the media. ...
Finally, the new information indicates that Libby is likely to pursue a defense during his trial that he was broadly "authorized" by Cheney and other "superiors" to defend the Bush administration in making the case to go to war. Libby does not, however, appear to be claiming that he was acting specifically on Cheney's behalf in disclosing information about Plame to the press.

Note too, the article leads the reader to think in terms of "this is a leak case." But it's not. The charges against Libby are that he deliberately mislead investigators.

The thrust of the article in that regard is that Libby's defense team wants to show that Libby was pressed with bigger fish than affair de Plame, and therefore forgot that he knew for a fact that Plame worked for the CIA when he talked with investigators."

"Cbdoldt, you noticed the exact same parts of the article I did: the body of the text states that there was no testimony indicating Cheney authorized anything regarding the leaking of Plame's background, but Waas buries this information in such a way that the casual reader would not notice this and would go away with a false impression. "

food for thought

[richard mcenroe]

So all we have to do is keep telling Hillary she's too angry and by 2008 she'll either turn into Howard Dean or her head will pop like a cartoon thermometer?

[clarice]

Last week a report about a problem with the National Archives and the WH records was spun in the fever swamps to sugges t the WH had destroyed records. This week we have this Waasout disinformation. I suspect that having had some much success manipulating the media to pump the phony Wilson story the left is now loathe to let up.

[topsecretk9]

So, this would seem to be relying on leaked secret grand jury testimony to report on a leak. If tru, I'd like mustard with my irony.

[Rick Ballard]

TS,

I think (and there is no way I'm going to check) that there was no "leak" involved. This crap was pulled from Fitz documents or his affidavit - all previously published material.

Like I said earlier - it's a rehash with mud topping.

[topsecretk9]

This is the headline in NYT's

"Ex-Cheney Aide Testified Leak Was Ordered, Prosecutor Says"

Ordered?
An authoritative indication to be obeyed; a command or direction.
1st Graf

"WASHINGTON, Feb. 9 — I. Lewis Libby Jr., the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, told a grand jury that he was authorized by his "superiors" to disclose classified information to reporters about Iraq's weapons capability in June and July 2003, according to a document filed by a federal prosecutor...

...We also note that it is our understanding that Mr. Libby testified that he was authorized to disclose information about the NIE to the press by his superiors....

...The prosecutor's note of Jan. 23 does not, however, make any reference to Mr. Libby's involvement in the disclosure of Ms. Wilson's identity. It seems, rather, to be part of an effort by the prosecutor to demonstrate that Mr. Libby was engaged in using secret information to press the administration's case at the same time that Ms. Wilson's identity was leaked to reporters..."

Authorized
To grant authority or power to.
To give permission for

Man, gymnastics training must be a resume requirement for journalism these days. How blatantly misleading can you be?

[maryrose]

I don't think Hil makes it to 2008. Dems at least understand that if she's the candidate they will lose again. I also think many will be willing to take her on because they now sense her vulnerabilities and will go after them. Can you imagine her shunning Wal mart money after she served on their board and lived in Arkansas. There's another state she won't get. Kerry says " what states is she going to get that I didn't"

[topsecretk9]

Rick
I see that now. It is sort of funny though. Here Fitz bought in the media manufactured "smear" campaign of a whistle-blower and now his words have been pretzel twisted in the same media wish not fact fashion.

There is a word for this too. Irony?

[clarice]

Is there another candidate who as they said of Kerry is "electable"? This is going to be a huge intra party knife fight and Dean's puchback against Reid for trying to remove him is just a preliminary round.

[topsecretk9]

"Ex-Cheney Aide Testified Leak Was Ordered, Prosecutor Says"

Oh and forgot to point this out too. Headline, leak was ordered...

Story? Referring only to NIE and notes "The prosecutor's note of Jan. 23 does not, however, make any reference to Mr. Libby's involvement in the disclosure of Ms. Wilson's identity. " --OR SAYS A LEAK WAS ORDERED.

It's almost sad the biggies demeaned themselves with WAAS's lead. But then again, the word sheep comes to mind.

[danking70]

So after these new stories, will the press ask Fitzgerald why he didn't frog-march Cheney and Rove in front of the Grand Jury after Libby dropped this "bombshell"?

I can already see the made-for-TV movie...

Fitz: "Did you order the code red?"

[clarice]

Well, now Fitz will get a taste of what Libby has been getting..Maybe Tatel will add this to his press clippings to be cited as evidence file.

[topsecretk9]

Clarice--
maybe he won't like to see the word "authorized"

[clarice]

You can be sure that letters and emails will start pouiring in citing the article and demanding to know why he didn't go hiigher up. And given the normal incivility of the left, they will be unpleasant to read.

[topsecretk9]

Clarice
will Tatel be displeased to see "authorized", in the sense Fitz made it seem everything was classified

[clarice]

Maybe it will occur to him that the NYT can't read Fitz' affidavit any more accurately than he does.

[skinnydog]

Was Valerie Plame's name even in the NIA that is being referenced?

[JM Hanes]

owl

"Geesh..... Do you suppose Fitz ever looks at this stuff?"

Oh yeah. Fitz refers to articles in the press (the Post, Reuters, etc.) more than once in his filings -- which is probably where Judge Tatel picked up the habit.

[aaron]

Tallest man in Afghanistan...actually, the one time they did attack someone based on height, it turned out to be a herdsman or something.

Al Qaeda's Great Escape

[clarice]

skinnydog, Her name is n't on the NIE..neither is Wilson's .It is simply the consensus assessment of the intelligence agencies--in this case on Iraq's WMDs. As Rick noted during the spring and summer of 2003 various bits were bit by bit declassified and Tenet and Rice talked to reporters about it during that time.

[Lew Clark]

I never did fall for that "Valerie Plame" codename stuff. If she really was covert, I bet she had a codename that would not link to her "civilian identity". So whose to say her codename wasn't "yellowcake" or "Baghdad", and her secret name wasn't all over that report!

[Jeff]

the normal incivility of the left

I guess clarice thinks that if you're nastier about people than you are to them, that makes you civil, eh?

[clarice]

Certainly. Doesn't everyone?

[clarice]

Pincus again--this time with a front page story about an EX (thank God) CIA official Pillar who claims the Administration affected the assessment by asking questions..A nitwit, fo course. Pillar was the top analyst at the CounterTerrorismCenter for most of the 1990s. In April 2001, he published a book (Brookings Institution) which argued that terrorism was not a very serious problem.

More B.S>

[clarice]

Pincus again--this time with a front page story about an EX (thank God) CIA official Pillar who claims the Administration affected the assessment by asking questions..A nitwit, fo course. Pillar was the top analyst at the CounterTerrorismCenter for most of the 1990s. In April 2001, he published a book (Brookings Institution) which argued that terrorism was not a very serious problem.

More B.S>

[Lew Clark]

I can kind of sympathize with Pillar. During my federal career I was always having the perfection of my analysis marred by higher-ups asking questions.

[owl]

Since I am reporting on the Yahoo frontpage tripe, they left that "Libby" up until a few minutes ago (it will be back later) but now they have brought out the big guns.

"Report: White House knew about levees"

Since this was the one successful hit that actually affected Bush's poll numbers, the next full frontal assault is on.... Someone decided to combine NSA/Libby/Katrina. Because the MSM handled Katrina with lies, most people can't get beyond those trapped people's faces.

[richard mcenroe]

"How many people were dropped from that Kerry campaign...Let's see -Berger-sticky fingers,socks and pockets-Wilson- King of Niger who almost got a speaking gig at a Kerry fundraiser, His appointed religious person -after no one would give him communion- Am I missing anyone?"

Maryrose — Don't forget the noble Reverend Alston, the gallant brutha from the Band of Brothers who sank from sight like an unhitched Swift Boat anchor after it turned out he testified to seeing Kerry perform his manly acts of martial valor... at a time when the Reverend was flat on his back in a military hospital miles away with a head wound.

[Larry]

Hillary's smart? How smart do you have to be to share the stage with Bill and choose or agree to speak AFTER arguably the best public speaker of our time? Unfortunately for her, it was one of Bill's best ever, too. If it was the gong show, she'd have gotten the hook. Really weird that she had the keynote spot when the sitting Pres and three formers all spoke. My hat's off to the two of them, though. The only Dems who didn't bash GW (at the funeral).

[Larry]

BTW, Igor sent Hillary the first MOAM (Mother Of All Megaphones) prototype. Harry, Nancy, Barb and JFK getting preproduction models, too. The better to hear their braying, bleating and blathering. ALGORE? Heck, he don't need no steenking megaphone. His 150 db screech can be heard up to 1,000 miles radius. Don't think they'll let him stay out long anyway unless he gets back on his meds.

[kim]

He was takin' it to 'em!
========================

[kim]

You might say that 'Man of God' was with him spiritually if not physically.
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[clarice]

OT but interesting:

The Telegraph reports we are planning an attack on Iran

Quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Strategists at the Pentagon are drawing up plans for devastating bombing raids backed by submarine-launched ballistic missile attacks against Iran's nuclear sites as a "last resort" to block Teheran's efforts to develop an atomic bomb.

Central Command and Strategic Command planners are identifying targets, assessing weapon-loads and working on logistics for an operation, the Sunday Telegraph has learnt.

They are reporting to the office of Donald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, as America updates plans for action if the diplomatic offensive fails to thwart the Islamic republic's nuclear bomb ambitions. Teheran claims that it is developing only a civilian energy programme.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/02/12/wiran12.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/02/12/ixnewstop.html

Great graph at site.

[clarice]

Iran

[kim]

Shivering submarines.
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[clarice]

I figure they play with cartoons and we let this "leak" out. Are we hiding a royal flush or is it a pair of low cards? LOL

[Rick Ballard]

Correct link to Telegraph Iran article

Gee, what a not surprise.

[clarice]

Thanks, Rick--

Here's a second Telegraph article:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/02/12/wiran112.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/02/12/ixnewstop.html

Let's put a map up and play war games..

The last time we looked at this, I believe we thought there were 11 key sites. Now we're down to 8.

Wonder if we aren't whittling the number down even further. (Watch to see when Iran kicks out the IAEA which it has now banned from using most of its equipment.

[kim]

I am dubious of Philip Sherwell's claim that in two years Iran will be close to having the knowledge to develop a weapon. I'll bet they have that now. The missing link is a quantity of enriched uranium.

Also, I consider it a sign of real progress that we find a need to convert Tridents to conventional weapons.
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[clarice]

I consider it a sign of real progress that we find a need to convert Tridents to conventional weapons Why?

[Larry]

Man bites dog: DOD has no contingency plan for attacking Iran. Ho hum: DOD doing its job, contingency-planning attack on Iran.

[kim]

Moving assets from strategic deterrance to tactical potential is a plus in my admittedly thin book, C, because it is being done not just to address a need in the straits of Hormuz, but because there seems less need of the deterrance. I am pretty sure that wouldn't be done if Rice hadn't looked into Putin's soul and found hope.
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