I Spit on the Way the Democrats Handled 9/11 During the Election.

[IdaBriggs]

THREE THOUSAND DEAD AMERICANS AND THEY DIDN'T THINK IT WAS A CAMPAIGN ISSUE?

:wtf:

If you ask a Republican, they will explain to you that it was CLINTON'S FAULT. Prior to Michael Moore doing his movie, the only thing the Democrats would say was "Bad Bin Ladin!" Most of the so-called leadership wouldn't even comment on the "Pet Goat" book reading, and to my knowledge that devastating video was NEVER played on network television.

Personally, I am EXTREMELY CLEAR on whose fault it was --

GEORGE W. BUSH AND HIS CABAL OF CRETINS!!!

Prior to 9/11 George W. Bush (1) dismantled our existing anti-terrorism systems, (2) ignored warnings of impending terrorist attacks, and (3) tried to cut the FBI counter-terrorism budget by $65 Million (12%). To add insult to injury, NO ONE WAS FIRED and Bin Ladin is * STILL * running around loose.

I want to know why the Democrats aren't running around screaming bloody murder about this, while the Republicans spent EIGHT YEARS polluting the airwaves with talk of CLINTON'S SEX LIFE.

Oh, yeah. I forgot -- the Democrats don't want to POLITICIZE 9/11 because apparently they don't get THAT KEEPING AMERICA SAFE IS WHY WE HIRED THEM.

:wtf:

Links to Top 3 Claims --

(1) Dismantled our Existing Anti-Terrorism Systems

April 19, 2001 CRS Report for Congress on "Terrorism and the Military's Role in Domestic Crisis Management" page 6: http://www.fas.org/irp/crs/RL30938.pdf:

President George W. Bush recently signed National Security Presidential Directive-1 (NSPD-1) establishing the organization of the National Security Council under his Administration. Among other things, the document abolishes the previous system of interagency working groups and replaces them with policy coordination committees (PCC).

(2) Ignored warnings of impending terrorist attacks

August 6, 2001 Presidential Daily Brief (PDB), Bin Ladin Determined to Strike Inside US: http://www.cnn.com/2004/images/04/10/whitehouse.pdf

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 East Africa were US citizens, and a senior EIJ member lived in California 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.

May 16, 2002, National Security Advisor Holds Press Briefing, http://www.fas.org/irp/news/2002/05/wh051602.html

Now, on August 6th, the President received a presidential daily briefing which was not a warning briefing, but an analytic report. This analytic report, which did not have warning information in it of the kind that said, they are talking about an attack against so forth or so on, it was an analytic report that talked about UBL's methods of operation, talked about what he had done historically, in 1997, in 1998. It mentioned hijacking, but hijacking in the traditional sense, and in a sense, said that the most important and most likely thing was that they would take over an airliner, holding passengers and demand the release of one of their operatives. And the blind sheikh was mentioned by name as -- even though he's not an operative of al Qaeda, but as somebody who might be bargained in this way.

I want to reiterate, it was not a warning. There was no specific time, place or method mentioned...(snip)

September 20, 2004, National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (aka 9/11 Commission), Threats and Responses in 2001, Staff Statement No. 8, “National Policy Coordination,” pp 9-10; http://www.9-11commission.gov/hearings/hearing8/staff_statement_8.pdf

Clarke asked on several occasions for early Principals Committee meetings on these issues and was frustrated that no early meeting was scheduled. He wanted principals to accept that al Qaeda was a ‘first order threat’ and not a routine problem being exaggerated by ‘chicken little’ alarmists. No Principals Committee meetings on al Qaeda were held until September 4, 2001.

(3) Tried to cut the FBI counter-terrorism budget by $65 Million (12%)

September 10, 2001 Annual Budget Request for the Department of Justice by Attorney General John Ashcroft, page 25 (page 31 of the PDF document): http://www.americanprogress.org/atf/cf/%7BE9245FE4-9A2B-43C7-A521-5D6FF2E06E03%7D/FY03ASHCROFT.PDF

The budget also proposes to reduce funding for counterterrorism equipments grants by $65,000,000, leaving $4,400,000 in 2003. As of June 2001, this program was operating with an unobligated balance of $180,000,000, which represents two years of appropriated funding. OJP has been unable to obligate this money because Congress has required that states submit comprehensive state-wide preparedness plans as a condition of receiving funding. Only one state plan has been received; the other plans are expected in 2002.

[Old and In the Way]

1. Lets not forget-

* Taking subs out of the Persian Gulf and Predators out of service as soon as he gets into office....tasked with locating/destroying terrorists.
*shitcanning the Bipartisan Hart-Rudmin recommendations on security against terrorist attacks
* Ignoring multiple warnings of impending attacks my other intel services throughout the world.

Almost like they wanted to make us exposed.

The Dems have been cowered by 2 pronged assault of the Republican Party and their control over the media. The media has distorted their message when they bother to give them political oxygen. The calculus of 9/11 was based on bad assumptions about the depths of this administration's complicity....I truely think that they've woken up to this, but they misunderestimated Republican control on the election process.

I think that this is beginning to change....more and more people are leaving the Republican Party, the media is regaining it's ability to report and expose the corruption. The incompetence, war profiteering, and corruptness is reaching a level that can no longer be deflected or unreported.

Payback, and justice for the 3000 Americans who died on 9/11 will happen.....and it's going to be a bitch for those that allowed it to happen.

[IdaBriggs]

2. I hope you are right. I *pray* you are right.

Sometimes I get so discouraged -- how can all of this information be so readily available, and people STILL not know about it? (Sorry, that is a rhetorical question -- there is SHOPPING to do, don't you know!)

:eyes:

[G_j]

3. Richard Clarke, Sibel Edmonds

they might have backed up these people. :shrug:

[IdaBriggs]

5. I agree. Instead, it appeared as if they were standing on their own.

Lives subjected to ridicule, and their careers destroyed for telling the truth -- what is WRONG with the folks in power? (Although I think Senior Citizen in post #4 has a better grip on it than I wish were true!

Sigh.

[Senior citizen]

4. Democrats have no power in Congress.

Most of them are beholden to the DLC and big corporations for the money they need for their campaigns.

They are people. They have families, mortgages, and a lifestyle they want to maintain. Sometimes they have to be "political" meaning they have to go along to get along, and in this corporatocracy that means doing what big money tells them to do.

But if you look at the Congressional signatures on Conyers' petition, you'll find that there are are lot of Democrats who aren't fascists. They didn't get elected by raising more money than their opponents or through election skullduggery--they did it the old-fashioned way by living their lives so that they became well known in their districts for the way they spoke truth to power and fought for the little guy.

But those are in the House of Representatives. The Senate is another story. I think we now have an African-American senator. One. We didn't have one in 2000. Not a single one. None. It was a totally segregated society. In the year 2000. Moreover, there wasn't a single Senator in the year 2000 who was willing to defend our voting rights. So I guess none of them got where they are through free and fair elections, or else they'd be willing to fight for free and fair elections. If they got where they are through dirty tricks and they want to stay there, free and fair elections are the last thing they want, even if they're Democrats.

I can tell you one thing, Ida: There isn't a single Democrat in Congress who hasn't watched the Zapruder film many times, and there isn't a single one who doesn't know about the anthrax attacks on Congressional Democrats when the pukes were trying to achieve a majority in Congress by any means necessary. The Central and South American drug cartels are said to get elected officials to do their bidding by offering them a choice between "plomo y plata" lead or silver, meaning bullets or payoffs. The ones who choose lead are no longer alive. The ones who choose silver are doing very well, thank you, so long as they keep their mouths shut. They are usually given permission to do a certain amount of campaigning, so long as they don't pose any real threat to the corporatocracy, for the purpose of maintaining the illusion that we have a democratic republic instead of a fascist corporatocracy.

So I don't spit on them. I think they're as frightened as I am--more frightened, as they're in the spotlight and I'm not. People who would arrange to have 3,000 Americans killed in order to advance their fascist agenda, really wouldn't hesistate to kill a few more for the same reason.

But I also believe that progress is being made. I heard about the Voting Systems and Procedures Panel hearing in Sacramento, California, where they gave lots of time to those who favored unverifiable election systems, but tried to cut off those who spoke in favor of open source code and verifiable voting. It seems that the audience objected, and the voice of the people was heard. That doesn't guarantee that California won't recertify Diebold and ES&S, but it makes me hope that when the crooked vote-rigging companies finish training election officials to "manage" conflict and crises in voter registration and elections, there might actually be some conflict and crises for them to manage.

If we ever manage to get free and fair elections, maybe we can get a form of government that is more democratic and less likely to lead to dictatorship. I stood outside the Post Office with a clipboard today and asked people to sign letters to the VSPP. Then I addressed the envelopes, paid for the postage out of my SSI check, and mailed them off. I'm going to be at a supermarket doing the same thing this week--I had to apply for permission to be there before I could do it. And Saturday is the Defending Democracy forum at the Unitarian Universalist Church in Hillcrest, San Diego, which will have workshops on voting accountability and other urgent issues. I'm a coward too, Ida, so I can empathize with the cowards in Congress. Courageous leaders like Conyers, Maxine Waters, and the rest, have my total respect, but I'm not spitting on the cowards because I'm one too.

[IdaBriggs]

6. But the Democrats *DID* have power during 9/11.

Thanks to the extremely bold leadership of ONE MAN who defected from the Republicans and declared himself an Independent, the Democrats were in control of the Senate. I get the first week -- I rallied around my fellow Americans, too.

And then the second week happened, and they were *STILL* singing kumbya on the steps of the White House.

I pay them to do a job, and I get that it is scary -- that is why it pays extremely well, and has a great deal of respect attached. The members of my local police department have families, too, as do the folks in my fire department -- yet I expect them to rush into danger, risk their lives, AND DO THE JOB I PAY THEM FOR regardless of the risk to themselves. "The bad guys have guns, so I'm not going in there" or "but that building is on fire!" are NOT acceptable responses from my public servants; if you can't handle the dangers and still do the job, find another one. At $200K+ a year, plus some mighty fine benefits, I think I can get a decent line up of BRAVE, HONEST people who are willing to take down the traitors who think "plomo y plata" is an acceptable form of behavior.

Its almost as if the Mafia really has taken over our government, only in this case, its a bunch of disgusting greedy scum balls.

Sigh. :cry:

[Senior citizen]

7. You are absolutely right, Ida.

If you look at my sig line, one of the books I recommend is by Walter Karp. It isn't a new book. It came out many years ago. It explains the "2-party" system very well. If we ever get free and fair elections in this country, maybe we can start electing valiant people as individuals instead of being forced to vote for party candidates. I want to vomit every time a Democratic Senator I voted for betrays me, while some brave Republican break ranks and votes his conscience. I personally don't believe that people with (small-d) democratic ideals have had any political power in this country since the bloody coup of 1963.

When Big Dog was first running for President, I knew an aide to Maxine Waters who told me that he'd tried to gut welfare in Arkansas and had to be sued by welfare-rights people, but that I should vote for him because he was the best we could get at the time. And sure enough, he gutted welfare for the entire country. Everything he did that a Republican would have done, like NAFTA, sailed through Congress, but any time he tried to do something decent, it stalled.

I like your analogy with firefighters and cops. But a lot of people in minority communities would beg to differ, and I've read stories leading me to believe that the firefighters who died in the WTC on 9/11 may have been set up.

Many years ago I'd read some stories about a fascist dictator named Stroessner in Paraguay who was sheltering a community of WWII Nazi war criminals. While deeply concerned about this, I happened to be in a bank one day and picked up a booklet about foreign investments and I learned that the U.S. and Israel were two of the 3 biggest investors in Paraguay at the time. That was the moment I learned that I was living in a fascist country. Prior to that, as an American-born Jew, I had always believed what I'd been taught: that the U.S. and Israel were anti-fascist. I'd been so naive that it came as a real shock to me.

We do not have a government that is accountable to the people. We do not have free and fair elections. I admire you and I appreciate all the hard work you've done. If not for you and others like you, I wouldn't even be able to go gather more signatures on letters to the VSPP today. But I'm still a coward and if I could afford to leave and if there was anyplace that would take me, I'd have been gone long ago.