60 Minutes: Bush Admin LIED to 9/11 First Responders About Air Quality

[kpete]

60 Minutes: Bush White House lied to 9/11 first responders about air quality
by John in DC - 9/19/2006 04:40:00 PM


The White House edited EPA press releases about air quality to make them sound more reassuring, and Christine Todd Whitman put out releases saying the air quality was fine when all the tests weren't even in yet. And guess what, the air wasn't fine at all. And now, 25% of the NYC fire department has respiratory problems because the White House lied to New York policemen and firemen and others who ran to Ground Zero to help on that horrible day.

Rudy Giuliani refused to talk to 60 Minutes about the story.

So, basically, George Bush and the Republicans intentionally and negligently put our 9/11 heroes at risk of their lives. Then again, they did the same to 150,000 members of our military, so why not another couple of tens of thousands in New York as well? Republicans are so arrogant that they think you can't handle the truth. They are the only ones qualified to decide about your health, your bedroom, and whether you live or die.

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/09/60-minutes-bush-white-house-lied-to.html

[spanone]

1. Yes, they surely did.

Christine Whitman lied under orders from the WH. Has Congress asked anyone about this? Naw.

[peacebird]

2. Has everyone called their congresscritters to ask about this?

just askin'

Let's make this another issue that rings their phones off the hooks. Along with the calls rejecting torture, and demanding paper ballots.

Let's make certain that congress KNOWS we are AWAKE and we are watching.

[kellenburger]

3. pffffffffffft !

Why would congress care about this?
Why should the American people care about this?
Why would the media cover this?

No one got a BJ so.......NO HARM ! :sarcasm:

[tom_paine]

4. The funny thing is how long all this information has been out there

I find it anachronistic for it to even have aired. Imperial Amerika is so funny, playing sometimes at being a free nation.

If Der Fuhrer lied to the 9-11 responders and now they are dying, well then he MUST have had a good reason for doing that.

:sarcasm:

[Auntie Bush]

8. "he MUST have had a good reason for doing that." It was God's will!

:sarcasm:

[Captain Hilts]

5. Check out NYDN's Juan Gonzales' columns about air and "Twisty" Whitman.

[Gman]

6. I remember sitting here and saying...

"No fucking way! They're lying their asses off!" when I heard the report that the EPA said the air quality was fine.

[Divernan]

7. Chief liar was James Connaughton, head of WH Council on Env. Quality

He's a lawyer who represented major asbestos and toxic polluters prior to being named Bush's point man on environmental matters. REMEMBER THAT NAME - it will live in infamy.
HE'S the one who changed the EPA reports.
HE'S the one who used Bush's authority to tell Christine Whitman what to say.
HE'S the one who sent brave men and women back into that toxic mixture so that they will die slow and painful deaths over the next ten years.

I know his parents, lovely,kind people - but haven't talked to them in years. His father is a psychiatrist who was on the faculty at Johns Hopkins - now retired. He was sooooo proud of "Jimmy" when he took the White House job. As far as I'm concerned, the family should change their names and little Jimmy should be tried for crimes against humanity, and specifically named in the class action suits of all the first responders, and all others who were exposed to this lethal mix of deadly toxins in the air after 9/11. This monster could have stood up to Bush. He could have protected Americans. His deletions and changes to the EPA reports are responsible for killing many thousands more Americans than the terrorists who crashed into the Twin Towers.

For example, one statement from the initial draft revealed that asbestos levels in some areas were three times higher than national standards. This was changed to say "slightly above the 1 percent trigger for defining asbestos material." In another case, despite warnings by EPA scientists, a sentence was added to a Sept. 16 news release concluding "Our tests show that it is safe for New Yorkers to go back to work in New York's financial district." And a statement which raised concerns about "sensitive populations" such as asthma patients, the elderly and people with underlying respiratory diseases was deleted.

www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=03/08/26/145232

In today's Daily News Juan Gonzalez reveals that the man in charge of the Council on Environmental Quality is James Connaughton. Before his appointment by President Bush Connaughton was an industry lawyer who represented major asbestos and toxic polluters.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk more about what you found after you read this, well, more than 160 page report and specifically start with James Connaughton.
JUAN GONZALEZ: Yeah, well Connaughton before he was appointed in June in 2001 by President Bush worked as a lawyer representing firms like SARCO, which has more than 1,000 asbestos liability suits against it and represented other companies, General Electric and others who in the past have had major problems with pollution. So it's astounding that this man who has made a living representing polluters, especially asbestos polluting companies now suddenly was a guy who told the E.P.A. directly to change language about--in relation to asbestos particularly.

For instance, there was the original draft of a September 13th E.P.A. press release, which was one of the first press releases the E.P.A. put out-- said, quote, “Even at low levels E.P.A. considers asbestos hazardous in this situation.” That was changed by the White House to say, quote, “Short term, low level exposure to asbestos of the type that might have been produced by the collapse of the World Trade Center buildings is unlikely to cause significant health effects.” It's basically turning the statement upside down. So it's particularly chilling to find out that the guy who was in charge at the White House of environmental quality policy was ordering the scientists in the health officials to change material in these releases.

AMY GOODMAN: Juan Gonzales, what about this evidence that it goes right to the White House and how high up it goes?
JUAN GONZALEZ: I think that one of the interesting things about this, I think for this you can definitely blame the president, is that Connaughton and the people from the Council on Environmental Equality refused requests by the E.P.A. Inspector General to be interviewed on their role or on who gave them the order to do what they did.

[fed-up]

9. don't forget Agent Orange-Vietnam and 250K on disability GWI n/t

[Golden Raisin]

10. They lie about everything else.

Why is anyone surprised they also lied about the NYC air quality post-9/11? I live in New York and predict that there will be many pulmonary illnesses, cancers and early deaths in the general public, not just the brave first responders. When the winds changed on 9/12 the toxic clouds blew uptown, right up the Hudson River, and all over Manhattan. You could see the cloud. You could smell the cloud. Beyond the smell of burnt human flesh, it smelled like a goddamn chemical factory. I will never forget that smell.

[razors edge]

11. call me when they tell the truth. n/t