Rewriting History; Eight Months vs Eight Years

The 9/11 Commission Report: Final Report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (Authorized Edition)

Former President Bill Clinton will be seen on Sunday in an interview with Chris Wallace of Fox News. Some snippets of the interview have been aired as a promo for the show and in them Clinton contradicts earlier assertions and he demonstrates anger at the attack on his legacy. This is obviously the Bill Clinton “Rewriting History and Damage Control Tour” in response to ABC’s movie The Path to 9/11. With all the protesting taking place one would have to wonder why so much attention is being payed to this if it is not true. I seem to remember then President Clinton being as angry and adamant about not having sex with that woman. Turns out he was covering up a lie at that time.

In one of the clips for the interview Clinton asserts that he tried and he came the closest to getting bin Laden which, he states, is more than anyone has done since. I have to agree that, in part, he is right. Clinton did come closer than anyone to getting bin Laden because Sudan offered him to the administration. Sandy Berger said that the offer was never made (maybe it was on those papers he stole from the National Archives) and Media Matters has taken Sean Hannity to task for repeating these allegations. The truth is, however, that several administration officials reported they did not take Sudan up on the offer because they did not believe it to be a serious one. As Richard Miniter, the author of Losing bin Laden stated, even an offer that is not serious, is an offer. Clinton himself admitted that he was offered bin Laden in a speech when he says they did not take him because they did not think they had anything to hold him on.

They released him. At the time, 1996, he had committed no crime against America so I did not bring him here because we had no basis on which to hold him, though we knew he wanted to commit crimes against America. News Max transcript

Unfortunately, the words here do match the words in the 9/11 Report. In that report it is said that the Clinton officials believed that killing an individual that was an imminent threat to the US would be viewed as self defense not an assassination:

Senior legal advisers in the Clinton administration agreed that, under the law of armed conflict, killing a person who posed an imminent threat to the United States was an act of self-defense, not an assassination. As former National Security Adviser Berger explained, if we wanted to kill Bin Ladin with cruise missiles, why would we not want to kill him with covert action? Clarke’s recollection is the same.

Dereliction of Duty: The Eyewitness Account of How Bill Clinton Endangered America\'s Long-Term National Security

If bin Laden was an imminent threat worthy of killing, why could we not hold him? He must have done something to be an imminent threat. Bin Laden was also picked up on video by a predator drone. The drone was armed and could have taken him out and yet the order to kill him was not given despite the assertions in the 9/11 Report cited above. This video shows that the administration was seeking bin Laden but the fact that he is alive shows they did not do anything once they found him. This was one of the questions the 9/11 Commission had to tackle, and that is, if we found him why did we not get him? Clinton was closer then, than anyone has been and still he did not pull the trigger. Bill Clinton might have come closer to having the chance of getting bin Laden than anyone else since but he did not take anywhere near the actions that those who followed him have taken to get the top terrorist.

I also saw another part of the interview where Clinton is defending his actions with regard to Somalia. He indicates that people say he allowed this to happen because of Somalia. Then he says, no one knew al-Qaeda existed then (Somalia incident 1993). The BBC News, however, reports that:

“Al-Qaeda, meaning “the base”, was created in 1989 as Soviet forces withdrew from Afghanistan and Osama Bin Laden and his colleagues began looking for new jihads. BBC News

Losing Bin Laden: How Bill Clinton\'s Failures Unleashed Global Terror

The terror group was known and bin Laden was affiliated with it since 1989. In addition, the Somalia incident happened in October of 1993 and the first attack on the WTC was in February of 1993. The government knew that al-Qaeda was involved in the WTC bombing which means people had in fact knew about them when Somalia occurred. How could Clinton assert that no one knew of them when Somalia occurred? Is this another quick lie that he can say was misunderstood? Whatever the case, one thing is certain; this statement does not show a man who tried and tried to get bin Laden, not if he was unaware of the terror group with which OBL was associated. It is more likely that Clinton knew who they were, as did most of the country. It is also likely that Clinton popped out a quick lie to deflect attention. Many people who support him will watch and say “see, we did not even know who they were so Bill is not at fault and will hold it to be true regardless of the facts involved. This is the case today with Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11, a film which, interestingly enough, does not have disclaimers and cautions like The Path had. People from the left continue to hold the movie as Gospel truth despite the fact that it has been debunked. A lefty website discussing The Path to 9/11 has a commenter who rehashes the false story that Saudis were allowed to leave this country after 9/11 when no one else was allowed to fly. This has been shown to be a lie but still people hold on to it. Say it enough and show it enough and people will begin to believe it. With regard to the administration’s terror stance, Richard Clarke, in his rebuke of ABC for the movie, wrote this:

The exact opposite is true. From the President, to all of his White House team, and NSC Principals (Lake, Berger, Albright, Tenet, Reno) there was a common fixation with terrorism, al qaeda, and bin Ladin. TPM Cafe

How could there be a common fixation if Clinton did not know who they were and if bin Laden “had committed no crime against America”? Was not the WTC attack in 1993 a crime?

The interview also has Clinton deflecting blame and pointing at Bush. He points fingers and tries to say that the Bush Administration did nothing to get bin Laden even though they had eight months to do it in.

“At least I tried. That’s the difference between me and some, including all the right wingers. They ridicule me for trying. They had eight months to try, they did not try. I tried. SO I tried and failed…”

I find it rather amusing that Clinton had all those chances in eight YEARS to take out OBL and could not do the deed but then has the audacity to say no one in the Bush administration tried as if we are supposed to excuse eight years of impotence by acting like it should have been done in eight months. Clinton actually expects people to believe that Bush should have done in eight months what he (Clinton) could not do in eight years. This is from transcripts of a briefing with Richard Clarke (the guy who is upset with the items in The Path to 9/11):

Actually, I’ve got about seven points, let me just go through them quickly. Um, the first point, I think the overall point is, there was no plan on Al Qaeda that was passed from the Clinton administration to the Bush administration.

Second point is that the Clinton administration had a strategy in place, effectively dating from 1998. And there were a number of issues on the table since 1998. And they remained on the table when that administration went out of office — issues like aiding the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, changing our Pakistan policy — uh, changing our policy toward Uzbekistan. And in January 2001, the incoming Bush administration was briefed on the existing strategy. They were also briefed on these series of issues that had not been decided on in a couple of years.

And the third point is the Bush administration decided then, you know, in late January, to do two things. One, vigorously pursue the existing policy, including all of the lethal covert action findings, which we’ve now made public to some extent. Fox News

9/11 - The Filmmakers\' Commemorative Edition

According to Clarke, no plan was passed from Clinton to Bush. That might have been helpful, Bill. Secondly, contrary to Clinton’s claim that no one tried in eight months, the transcript clearly indicates that the Bush plan was to vigorously pursue the existing policy, including all lethal covert action findings. So, one has to ask, if Bush continued with what Clinton was doing, how is it that Bush did not try but Clinton did? If the Democrats assert that Bush was doing nothing on the war on terror, does that not indicate Clinton did nothing as well? The truth of the matter is, the movie showed incompetence throughout the government in both administrations. Most of it was at the appointee level. Regular government employees were trying to do their jobs and were making suggestions but, particularly in the case of Clinton, politics got in the way of leadership. Bush, though not blameless, shares a smaller portion of the blame. I know for certain that if any of the opportunities to get OBL that were presented to Clinton had been given to Bush, OBL would be a pile of ashes in the desert.

The Path to 9/11 says, in the disclaimer, that the movie is based on the 9/11 Commission Report. The Democrats have gone nuts over this and have indicated that this is a lie. The fact is, the disclaimer also says it was based on other sources such as interviews. Some of the incidents in the movie are based on the 9/11 Report and others are based on interviews and other material. Couple this with the fact that some of the Clintonistas sat on the Commission and Sandy Berger was busy stealing information and the stage is set for a rewrite of history by Clinton and his den of thieves. The fact that he is squawking so loudly about this is more evidence that a raw nerve has been touched. I believe the quote goes “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

Additional Source:
My Way News

UPDATE: Ms. Underestimated has the transcript up at her site!

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8 Responses to “Rewriting History; Eight Months vs Eight Years”

  1. Camilio Verdugo says:

    You doing the lord’s work!
    It is clear that if the U.S tacitly approved of Israel’s policy of targeted removals (Engineer Ayash-portable blows his head off) or the hit job on the leader of Islamic Jihad (Malta-Rabin days), it could also do certain things, like when President Reagan allowed for the surptitious apprhension of a TWA terrorist, lured to a U.S operated yacht off shore Cyprus, now convicted in U.S custody (Lifer?).
    Therefore, the excuses made by a draft dodger are shameful and demeanining, because every American and the entire world community is paying th eprice for his failures, as the phenomenon of Bin Ladenism have not peaked yet.
    Coninue with the good work!

    C.V

  2. Webloggin says:

    Rewriting History; Eight Months vs Eight Years…

    Excellent post. I hope you get thousands of hits!!!!

    ……

  3. Jo says:

    Best post I’ve read on this so far! (thumbs up)

  4. Bill Clinton Unleashed (VIDEO)…

    All I can say is “wow.” I didn’t have this earlier like everybody else did because Fox News Sunday only airs in the evening in my area. So, my apologies for not getting it to you sooner.
    This was quite an eye-opening experience, and …

  5. Right Truth says:

    Bill Clinton wags his digit again…

    Former President William Jefferson Clinton is all over the television and internet today because of his spontaneous premeditated outburst while being interviewed by Chris Wallace. What struck me was how cool Chris Wallace was while Clinton jabbed that …

  6. Biloxi says:

    Great synopsis of the situation. Our sociopathic former President tends to get into high gear when defending his carefully crafted but partially fictional “legacy”.

  7. Carlos Amezaga says:

    In the 8 years vs 8 months arguement, it is never brought up that Bush was also stemied due to the elections debacle created by Gore when he contested the election. The normal orderly transition of power did not occur as it normally does in every presidential transition. Bush missed out on a lot of information he would have normally gotten had the election not been contested by Gore. This would have likely hampered Bush’s policy buildy prior to taking office.

    Carlos

  8. paul hermann says:

    What about Richard Clarke’s assertion that Bush Cheney and Rumsfeld told Clarke that he “gave Bin Laden to much credeit. He is only a guy hiding in a cave. That was the mentality in the Bush circle. It was all about getting Saddam see Treasury Sect Snows book. Bottom line 9/11 happened when Bush was President case closed.