« Student Loans: How to avoid defaulting. | Main | David Brooks on Mitt Romney: Thurston Howell Romney. »

In a NY Times Op-Ed two days ago, Kurt Eichenwald, former reporter for the New York Times, writes:

On Aug. 6, 2001, President George W. Bush received a classified review of the threats posed by Osama bin Laden and his terrorist network, Al Qaeda. That morning's 'presidential daily brief" -- the top-secret document prepared by America's intelligence agencies -- featured the now-infamous heading: 'Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." A few weeks later, on 9/11, Al Qaeda accomplished that goal.

On April 10, 2004, the Bush White House declassified that daily brief -- and only that daily brief -- in response to pressure from the 9/11 Commission, which was investigating the events leading to the attack. Administration officials dismissed the document’s significance, saying that, despite the jaw-dropping headline, it was only an assessment of Al Qaeda's history, not a warning of the impending attack. While some critics considered that claim absurd, a close reading of the brief showed that the argument had some validity.

That is, unless it was read in conjunction with the daily briefs preceding Aug. 6, the ones the Bush administration would not release. While those documents are still not public, I have read excerpts from many of them, along with other recently declassified records, and come to an inescapable conclusion: the administration's reaction to what Mr. Bush was told in the weeks before that infamous briefing reflected significantly more negligence than has been disclosed. In other words, the Aug. 6 document, for all of the controversy it provoked, is not nearly as shocking as the briefs that came before it.

It's a stunning claim and should have been front page news yesterday, the 11th anniversary of that terrible day.

Read the rest if you haven't been sufficiently shocked.

I agree with your analysis. Stunning is an understatement. Another example of bush's incompetence.

I agree with your analysis. Stunning is an understatement. Another example of Bush's incompetence.

Name (required)
Email
Website
Remember personal info? Yes   No
Comments

home | music | democracy | earth | money | projects | about | contact

Site design by Matthew Fries | © 2003-23 Consilience Productions. All Rights Reserved.
Consilience Productions, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.
All contributions are fully tax deductible.