Need help with freeper.

[Bushknew]

Freeper says that the Sudanese offered Osama to Clinton, and Clinton refused.?

What is the best counter argument to this?

Freeper posted:

"The first public glimpse of this negligence appeared last January when Britain's best, and best-selling, newspaper, The Sunday Times, ran a three-part series and al Qaida that concluded: "President Bill Clinton turned down at least three offers involving foreign governments to help to seize Osama Bin Laden after he was identified as a terrorist who was threatening America, according to sources in Washington and the Middle East."

In the summer of 1996, intelligence officials from the Sudan suggested their handing over to us Osama bin Laden -- then living in Sudan -- just as they had handed over Carlos "The Jackal" to French authorities two years earlier.

Yet unlike the tough-minded French, the flabby Clinton crowd let pass Sudan's offer. Sure enough, a month later Osama bin Laden struck when a 5,000 pound truck bomb ripped the Khobar Towers, an American military installation in Saudi Arabia, and killed 19 innocent U.S. soldiers.

The Clinton White House received two more offers in the summer of 2000, neither receiving any serious response. Then, of course, Osama bin Laden struck big-time by slaughtering more than 3,000 Americans in the World Trade Centers and Pentagon on September 11th.

We all shared the horror. For a fleeting instance, even Bill Clinton felt the cost of his frivolous behavior. In that Sunday Times series was the report that Clinton "admitted how things went wrong in Sudan at a private dinner at a Manhattan restaurant shortly after September 11th last year. According to a witness, Clinton told a dinner companion that the decision to let bin Laden go was probably 'the biggest mistake of my presidency.'"

http://www.techcentralstation.com/080702C.html

[jpgray]

1. The Saudis refused to take him, and we had no legal case

Sudan's Offer to Arrest Militant Fell Through After Saudis Said No

By Barton Gellman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, October 3, 2001; Page A01

The government of Sudan, employing a back channel direct from its president to the Central Intelligence Agency, offered in the early spring of 1996 to arrest Osama bin Laden and place him in Saudi custody, according to officials and former officials in all three countries.

The Clinton administration struggled to find a way to accept the offer in secret contacts that stretched from a meeting at a Rosslyn hotel on March 3, 1996, to a fax that closed the door on the effort 10 weeks later. Unable to persuade the Saudis to accept bin Laden, and lacking a case to indict him in U.S. courts at the time, the Clinton administration finally gave up on the capture.

Sudan expelled bin Laden on May 18, 1996, to Afghanistan. From there, he is thought to have planned and financed the twin embassy bombings of 1998, the near-destruction of the USS Cole a year ago and last month's devastation in New York and Washington.

http://www.library.cornell.edu/colldev/mideast/ladnsudx.htm

Plus, who knows what kind of quid pro quo the Sudanese wanted? They are some shady folks themselves.

[jpgray]

2. Plus, point out how Bush closed down the effort to hunt Bin Laden

And note that in 1996, his list of crimes was not anywhere near as extensive as it was in 2000.

[boneygrey]

3. Osama

Can't help you. My best friend from college is in Navy Intelligence and agrees this is all true. We need to change the discussion to something more positive for the Democrats.

[KC21304]

6. Your best friend from Navy Intelligence is either a liar

or not very intelligent. This story has been disproven many times over.

[boneygrey]

7. Liar?

Maybe? I don't no. I know he is a very liberal democrat, so I don't know why he would lie.

[KC21304]

13. I can't imagine any "very liberal democrat " would believe

this bs. Even those looney freepers know it's hogwash.

[BOSSHOG]

14. Because lies support an agenda?

I was in the Navy too. Your friend is a liar. And lies begat lies, and eventually one does not know what the truth is. That is the current state of the republican party and conservatives in America. They know not what the truth is but they care not because their base is unconcerned about the truth. Conservatives win with lapel pins and false feelings of patriotism. Poor Citizens in America who believe they are patriotic and think Clinton betrayed them are ignorant dupes who are being led by a leash by evil people. I repeat, your friend is a liar.

[boneygrey]

23. Navy

What did you do in the Navy and what was your rank.Were you in Intel?

[oasis]

27. It would help if your friend would do some research.

[Rose Siding]

4. Snopes handles it

http://www.snopes.com/rumors/clinton.htm

[boneygrey]

10. snopes

How reliable is snopes? They won't address Bush being AWOL!

[rumguy]

15. Snopes is non-partisan and makes a living debunking all types of myths

including many urban legand type myths. It is always backed up with research and provides cites and links so you can check it out for yourself. I suggest you go over there and read it, instead using freeper-type logic to back up something you know nothing about.

[boneygrey]

22. Snopes

Until they can properly address the Bush AWOL story, I have no use for them.

[Name removed]

25. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[DODI]

5. Al Franken covers it n p. 113 of Lies and the lying . . .

[Bushknew]

24. I'll check it out DoDI, thanks

[onecitizen]

8. Last wekend on book TV..........

Madeline Albright was on and a caller asked her this very question. She said it simply is not true. A Contributor to Fox news is the one that has spread this lie around. Seems he has a personal bone to pick with the Clinton Administration. I can't think of his name right now but I have seen him on several of the talk shows saying the same thing. This question is asked here frequently so I suspect someone will provide you with links if they haven't already.

[Scairp]

12. Mansoor Ijaz

Or something like that. He's of Pakistani descent, though I do not know his actual nationality.

[onecitizen]

16. Yep! that's him!!!

Monsoor Ijaz!!

[BOSSHOG]

9. A freeper will also tell you

that bill clinton was responsible for the sinking of the titanic, and by god he can prove it because he watches faux and listens to hate radio. We expend a great deal of time expounding facts to deaf ears while the limbaughs and roves of the right sit in the corner and chortle. NEVER GIVE UP THE FIGHT TEAMMATES! The truth is to a freeper what sunlight is to a vampire.

[Wonk]

11. I don't see an actual link to the article (which is a good reason TO link)

but I did find this with a little googling.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,31-116658,00.html

September 24, 2001

The hunt
Clinton sent hit squad for bin Laden

US SPECIAL forces launched a secret mission to capture Osama bin Laden two years ago after President Clinton authorised his assassination.

In 1999 dozens of American commandos trained in northern Pakistan at a remote military base near Peshawar in a joint Pakistan-US attempt to seize the fugitive.

Yesterday Mr Clinton confirmed that a year earlier his Administration had given the CIA approval to kill bin Laden. ÒAt the time we did everything we can do,Ó Mr Clinton said in New York.

ÒI authorised the arrest and, if necessary, the killing of Osama bin Laden and we actually made contact with a group in Afghanistan to do it. We also trained commandos for a possible ground action, but we did not have the necessary intelligence to do it in the way we would have had to do it.Ó

more...

[Bushknew]

20. Thanks Wonk and all

Is there a major newspaper like the New York Times or the BBC debunking this?

IÕm off to do battle, if anyone has more info it will be appreciated.

[onecitizen]

17. Here ya go...........

this is good:


http://www.disinfopedia.org/wiki.phtml?title=Mansoor_Ijaz



I haven't checked the link myself yet. Hope it works!

[Wonk]

18. Well, supposedly the original article was written on 01/06/2002

and the results of this google search are pretty revealing.

http://www.google.com/search?q=%22Sunday+Times%22+Clinton+Osama+%2201%2F06%2F2002%22

If wingnuts repeat a lie often enough does it become true?

The Freeper page that comes up in that search does have a link, but it doesn't link to the article it claims to. Another page links to drudge, for what that's worth, but there's nothing there either.

I'd say the burden of proof in this case lies with the freepers making the claim that the article was actually published (never mind for the moment whether what they claim was published is true or not), and none of the pages about this that I found met that burden.

All in all I'd have to say BULLSHIT unless someone presents better evidence (and posting "I have a friend in intelligence who swears this is true" doesn't cut it as proof, either). The burden of proof is on the freepers to prove it to be true, not on us to prove something loosely attributed to drudge is false.

[KC21304]

19. Freepers are beyond help .

Nothing penetrates their skull. Give up. Why waste your time ?

[the_real_38]

21. This rumor was repeated in ....

.... the book "Crude Politics" by Paul Sperry. Supposedly, they offered to turn over Bin Laden, but only if he would be tried by a council of 3 people, two of whom would have to be muslim clerics. By the way, this book is pretty objective, and it's about as anti-bush as it gets, but it does point out the fact that the oil companies have been forcing our foreign policy in some sleazy directions. For example, at one point a diplomat named (I hope this is right) Khalilzad actually brought the Taliban leaders to America in '98, thinking that we could deal with them. Mullah Omar was actually walking around a mall in Texas - UNOCAL sponsored the trip - they were hoping to build some pipelines through Afghanistan. Of course, when the pitch came down, and the Clinton administration informed them they were going to have to lighten up on the woman abuse, they balked. After that, Khalilzad changed stripes, and started agitating to remove the Taliban from power. And get this - today he is one of George Bush's security advisors, specializing in Caspian Sea policy.

[never cry wolf]

26. For a general overview of Clinton's stance on terrorism

Please review this that Will posted in a thread the yesterday.

http://truthout.org/docs_03/101303A.shtml

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=793236#793294