What’s Bush Hiding From 9/11 Commission?
by Joe Conason
In an election year, a Republican President seeking his second term
can be expected to propose more tax cuts and, in this era of
right-wing profligacy, considerably more spending as well. Informed
critics calculate the costs of George W. Bush’s latest proposals in
the trillions of dollars—a vague yet substantial sum that will come
due sometime during what budgetary jargon denotes as "the out years,"
meaning long after Mr. Bush has departed the White House.
Excessive spending and tax breaks always elicit more applause than
controversies over the global "Axis of Evil," Niger’s phantom
yellowcake and Iraq’s weapons of mass disappearance. So do such
perennially popular topics as improved health care, the protection of
heterosexual marriage and, in the immortal words of the President’s
father, jobs, jobs, jobs. Estimates of future deficits depend on
whether the President actually tries to send astronauts to live on
Mars and the moon, or abandons that vision in deference to
disapproving poll numbers. In short, bread and maybe circuses.
What Mr. Bush understandably chose not to highlight, however, is his
administration’s continuing determination to undermine, restrict and
censor the investigation of the most significant event of his
Presidency: the attacks on New York and Washington of Sept. 11, 2001.
The President is fortunate that until now, the bipartisan National
Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States has received
far less attention than controversies over the design for a World
Trade Center memorial. At every step, from his opposition to its
creation, to his abortive appointment of Henry Kissinger as its chair,
to his refusal to provide it with adequate funding and cooperation,
Mr. Bush has treated the commission and its essential work with
contempt.
In the latest development, the President’s aides refused additional
time for the 9/11 commission to complete its report. Although the
original deadline in the enabling legislation is May 27, the
commissioners recently asked for a few more months to ensure that
their product will be "thorough and credible."
Earlier this month, Thomas Kean—the former New Jersey governor who has
chaired the commission since Mr. Kissinger recused himself—explained
why the commission needs more time. As the genial Republican told The
New York Times, he is only permitted to read the most important
classified documents concerning 9/11 in a little closet known as a
"sensitive compartmented information facility" (or SCIF). He cannot
photocopy the documents, and if he takes notes about them, he must
leave the notes in the SCIF when he leaves.
Other recent statements by Mr. Kean, which he subsequently modified,
suggest that the White House has ample reason to worry about what the
commission’s report will say. In December, he told CBS News that he
believes the 9/11 attacks could have been prevented—and that
incompetent officials were at fault for the failure to uncover and
frustrate the plot.
Following the creation and staffing of the commission, many months
passed before the administration agreed to let Mr. Kean look at any of
those crucial documents. The commission still has hundreds of
interviews to conduct, and millions of pages to examine, before its
members begin to draft their conclusions.
But the President’s political advisers, concerned about the political
impact of the commission’s report, are unsympathetic to its requests
for additional time—and House Speaker Dennis Hastert, who would have
to approve an extension, is perfectly obedient to his masters in the
White House. According to Newsweek, the administration offered Mr.
Kean a choice: Either keep to the May deadline, or postpone release of
the report until December, when its findings cannot affect the
election.
Mr. Bush doesn’t want his re-election subject to any informed judgment
about the disaster that reshaped the nation and his Presidency. But
why should such crucial facts be withheld from the voters? What does
the President fear?
Perhaps inadvertently, Mr. Kean provided a clue to the answers in his
Times interview. Asked whether he thinks the disaster "did not have to
happen," he replied, "Yes, there is a good chance that 9/11 could have
been prevented by any number of people along the way. Everybody pretty
well agrees our intelligence agencies were not set up to deal with
domestic terrorism …. They were not ready for an internal attack."
Then, asked whether "anyone in the Bush administration [had] any idea
that an attack was being planned," he replied: "That is why we are
looking at the internal papers. I can’t talk about what’s classified.
[The] President’s daily briefings are classified. If I told you what
was in them, I would go to jail."
But the commission’s final report may well indicate what the President
was told in his daily briefing of Aug. 6, 2001, when he was sunning
himself in Crawford, Tex.—as well as the many warnings he and his
associates were given by the previous administration. That kind of
information could send him back to Crawford for a permanent vacation.
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| User: "Saint Isidore of Laytonville" |
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| Title: Re: What's Bush hiding from 9/11 Commission? |
25 Jan 2004 12:55:52 PM |
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Everything he can!
The Psychedelick Pope
Saint Isidore of Laytonville
^Ö^ Patron Saint of the Internet ^Ö^
°°^Ö^ °°
http://apple2.org.za/gswv/me
AOXOMOXOA and ENESSA QUA ONNICA
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