Crispy Rice Treats - Part IX
From the Kerrey Segment of the Rice Testimony:Let me ask a question that _ well, actually, let me say _ I can't pass this up. I know it'll take into my 10-minute time. But as somebody who supported the war in Iraq, I'm not going to get the national security adviser 30 feet away from me very often over the next 90 days, and I've got to tell you, I believe a number of things.Two things to take from this: 1) While Kerrey appears to be a supporter of the war in Iraq, his true motivations aren't quite clear in this clip. Afterall, he's playing to the crowd and then admonishes them for applauding (which should have been done MUCH earlier in the proceedings; so I give him credit for that, at least). And 2) Kerrey is a political hack, why bring up Iraq at a Commission hearing about 9/11; it has been established that 9/11 and Iraq are not directly related. Iraq is a part of the larger War on Terror, but this is the Commission on the War on Terror; this commission must remain focused on the task on hand. Mr. Kerrey wasted valuable time.
I believe, first of all, that we underestimate that this war on terrorism is really a war against radical Islam. Terrorism is a tactic. It's not a war itself.
Secondly, let me say that I don't think we understand how the Muslim world views us, and I'm terribly worried that the military tactics in Iraq are going to do a number of things, and they're all bad. One is...
(APPLAUSE)
No, please don't _ please do not do that. Do not applaud.
KERREY: Since he was an expert on terrorism, did you ask Philip Zelikow any questions about terrorism during transition, since he was the second person carded in the national security office and had considerable expertise?Well, what did you think they'd talk about Bob? Of course they talked about terrorism.
RICE: Philip and I had numerous conversations about the issues that we were facing. Philip, as you know, had worked in the campaign and helped with the transition plans, so yes.
KERREY: Yes, you did talk to him about terrorism?
RICE: We talked _ Philip and I over a period of _ you know, we had worked closely together as academics...
KERREY: During the transition, did you instruct him to do anything on terrorism?
RICE: Oh, to do anything on terrorism?
KERREY: Yes.
RICE: To help us think about the structure of the terrorism _ Dick Clarke's operations, yes.
Maybe you should badger the witness some:
KERREY: You've used the phrase a number of times, and I'm hoping with my question to disabuse you of using it in the future.And hey, while we're at it, let's all praise Bill Cinton too:
You said the president was tired of swatting flies.
KERREY: Can you tell me one example where the president swatted a fly when it came to Al Qaida prior to 9/11?
RICE: I think what the president was speaking to was...
KERREY: No, no. What fly had he swatted?
RICE: Well, the disruptions abroad was what he was really focusing on...
KERREY: No, no...
RICE: ... when the CIA would go after Abu Zubaydah...
KERREY: He hadn't swatted...
RICE: ... or go after this guy...
KERREY: Dr. Rice, we didn't...
RICE: That was what was meant.
KERREY: We only swatted a fly once on the 20th of August 1998. We didn't swat any flies afterwards. How the hell could he be tired?For the record, Mr. Kerrey, the Cole Incident happened on CLINTON'S watch. If the Bush administration had acted on that, Congress would have impeached him; the editorial board of the New York Times would have staged a hunger strike to demand it.
RICE: We swatted at _ I think he felt that what the agency was doing was going after individual terrorists here and there, and that's what he meant by swatting flies. It was simply a figure of speech.
KERREY: Well, I think it's an unfortunate figure of speech because I think, especially after the attack on the Cole on the 12th of October, 2000, it would not have been swatting a fly. It would not have been _ we did not need to wait to get a strategic plan.
Dick Clarke had in his memo on the 20th of January overt military operations. He turned that memo around in 24 hours, Dr. Clarke. There were a lot of plans in place in the Clinton administration _ military plans in the Clinton administration.
In fact, since we're in the mood to declassify stuff, there was _ he included in his January 25th memo two appendices _ Appendix A:
Strategy for the elimination of the jihadist threat of Al Qaida, Appendix B: Political military plan for Al Qaida.
So I just _ why didn't we respond to the Cole?
RICE: Well, we...
KERREY: Why didn't we swat that fly?
Maybe Kerrey should expose himself as being an idiot:
KERREY: Why didn't we swat that fly?What a political hack. And an arrogant one at that.
RICE: I believe that there's a question of whether or not you respond in a tactical sense or whether you respond in a strategic sense; whether or not you decide that you're going to respond to every attack with minimal use of military force and go after every _ on a kind of tit-for-tat basis.
By the way, in that memo, Dick Clarke talks about not doing this tit-for-tat, doing this on the time of our choosing.
RICE: I'm aware, Mr. Kerrey, of a speech that you gave at that time that said that perhaps the best thing that we could do to respond to the Cole and to the memories was to do something about the threat of Saddam Hussein.
That's a strategic view...
(APPLAUSE)
And we took a strategic view. We didn't take a tactical view. I mean, it was really _ quite frankly, I was blown away when I read the speech, because it's a brilliant speech. It talks about really...
(LAUGHTER)
... an asymmetric...
KERREY: I presume you read it in the last few days?
RICE: Oh no, I read it quite a bit before that. It's an asymmetric approach.
Now, you can decide that every time Al Qaida...
KERREY: So you're saying that you didn't have a military response against the Cole because of my speech?
RICE: I'm saying, I'm saying...
(LAUGHTER)
RICE: No.
KERREY: That had I not given that speech you would have attacked them?
RICE: No, I'm just saying that I think it was a brilliant way to think about it.
Let's try badgering the witness again:
RICE: We simply believed that the best approach was to put in place a plan that was going to eliminate this threat, not respond to an attack.Nope. That didn't work either. Man, this Dr. Rice chick is GOOD! Maybe we should try calling her a LIAR, that always plays well:
KERREY: Let me say, I think you would have come in there if you said, We screwed up. We made a lot of mistakes. You obviously don't want to use the M-word in here. And I would say fine, it's game, set, match. I understand that.
But this strategic and tactical, I mean, I just _ it sounds like something from a seminar. It doesn't...
RICE: I do not believe to this day that it would have been a good thing to respond to the Cole, given the kinds of options that we were going to have.
And with all due respect to Dick Clarke, if you're speaking about the Delenda plan, my understanding is that it was, A, never adopted, and that Dick Clarke himself has said that the military portion of this was not taken up by the Clinton administration.
KERREY: Let me move into another area.
KERREY: Let me move into another area.Does this guy even know what he's talking about? It sure doesn't look like it. Rice is making him look foolish now. Maybe that playing to the crowd thing will work now:
RICE: So we were not presented _ I just want to be very clear on this, because it's been a source of controversy _ we were not presented with a plan.
KERREY: Well, that's not true. It is not...
RICE: We were not presented. We were presented with...
KERREY: I've heard you say that, Dr. Clarke, that 25 January, 2001, memo was declassified, I don't believe...
RICE: That January 25 memo has a series of actionable items having to do with Afghanistan, the Northern Alliance.
KERREY: Let me move to another area.
KERREY: Let me move to another area.Well, the anti-Bush crowd liked it. Too bad it didn't help the situation...
RICE: May I finish answering your question, though, because this is an important...
KERREY: I know it's important. Everything that's going on here is important. But I get 10 minutes.
RICE: But since we have a point of disagreement, I'd like to have a chance to address it.
KERREY: Well, no, no, actually, we have many points of disagreement, Dr. Clarke, but we'll have a chance to do in closed session. Please don't filibuster me. It's not fair. It is not fair. I have been polite. I have been courteous. It is not fair to me.
(APPLAUSE)
I understand that we have a disagreement.
RICE: Commissioner, I am here to answer questions. And you've asked me a question, and I'd like to have an opportunity to answer it.
RICE: Commissioner, I am here to answer questions. And you've asked me a question, and I'd like to have an opportunity to answer it.Oh, the agony... I feel for this guy at this point. (Not really.)
The fact is that what we were presented on January the 25th was a set of ideas and a paper, most of which was about what the Clinton administration had done and something called the Delenda plan which had been considered in 1998 and never adopted. We decided to take a different track.
RICE: We decided to put together a strategic approach to this that would get the regional powers _ the problem wasn't that you didn't have a good counterterrorism person.
The problem was you didn't have an approach against Al Qaida because you didn't have an approach against Afghanistan. And you didn't have an approach against Afghanistan because you didn't have an approach against Pakistan. And until we could get that right, we didn't have a policy.
KERREY: Thank you for answering my question.
RICE: You're welcome.
Well, let's rehash some old stuff and see if that works; maybe throwing in a direct plea to the crowd again:
KERREY: Let me ask you another question. Here's the problem that I have as I _ again, it's hindsight. I appreciate that. But here's the problem that a lot of people are having with this July 5th meeting.No one thing, no matter who thinks so, would have prevented 9/11. That is a fact.
You and Andy Card meet with Dick Clarke in the morning. You say you have a meeting, he meets in the afternoon. It's July 5th.
Kristen Breitweiser, who's a part of the families group, testified at the Joint Committee. She brings very painful testimony, I must say.
But here's what Agent Kenneth Williams said five days later. He said that the FBI should investigate whether Al Qaida operatives are training at U.S. flight schools. He posited that Osama bin Laden followers might be trying to infiltrate the civil aviation system as pilots, security guards and other personnel. He recommended a national program to track suspicious flight schools.
Now, one of the first things that I learned when I came into this town was the FBI and the CIA don't talk. I mean, I don't need a catastrophic event to know that the CIA and the FBI don't do a very good job of communicating.
And the problem we've got with this and the Moussaoui facts, which were revealed on the 15th of August, all it had to do was to be put on Intelink. All it had to do is go out on Intelink, and the game's over. It ends. This conspiracy would have been rolled up.
KERREY: And so I...
RICE: Commissioner, with all due respect, I don't agree that we know that we had somehow a silver bullet here that was going to work.
Rice is warmed up pretty good by this point. Let's have some more:
KERREY: Dr. Rice, everybody who does national security in this town knows the FBI and the CIA don't talk. So if you have a meeting on the 5th of July, where you're trying to make certain that your domestic agencies are preparing a defense against a possible attack, you knew Al Qaida cells were in the United States, you've got to follow up.Dr. Rice, did you consult with the Great Carsini? Surely, you brought at least one psychic. A swami, perhaps? Ugh.
KERRY: And the question is, what was your follow-up? What's the paper trail that shows that you and Andy Card followed up from this meeting, and...
RICE: I followed...
KERREY: ... made certain that the FBI and the CIA were talking?
RICE: I followed up with Dick Clarke, who had in his group, and with him, the key counterterrorism person for the FBI. You have to remember that Louis Freeh was, by this time, gone. And so, the chief counterterrorism person was the second _ Louis Freeh had left in late June. And so the chief counterterrorism person for the FBI was working these issues, was working with Dick Clarke. I talked to Dick Clarke about this all the time.
RICE: But let's be very clear, the threat information that we were dealing with _ and when you have something that says, something very big may happen, you have no time, you have no place, you have no how, the ability to somehow respond to that threat is just not there.
Maybe calling her by the wrong name will get her off her game:
KERREY: Dr. Clarke, in the spirit of further declassification...DOH! This woman is GOOD! Let's wrap this painful episode up:
RICE: Sir, with all...
KERREY: The spirit...
RICE: I don't think I look like Dick Clarke, but...
(LAUGHTER)
KERREY: Dr. Rice, excuse me.
RICE: Thank you.
In the spirit of further declassification, this is what the August 6th memo said to the president: that the FBI indicates patterns of suspicious activity in the United States consistent with preparations for hijacking.And there you have it, folks; a confirmed kill.
That's the language of the memo that was briefed to the president on the 6th of August.
RICE: And that was checked out and steps were taken through FAA circulars to warn of hijackings.
But when you cannot tell people where a hijacking might occur, under what circumstances _ I can tell you that I think the best antidote to what happened in that regard would have been many years before to think about what you could do for instance to harden cockpits.
That would have made a difference. We weren't going to harden cockpits in the three months that we had a threat spike.
Mark's Remarks
First of all, why are we talking about Iraq so much, Mr. Kerrey? What in blue blazes does that have to do with your present job? I mean, could you be playing to the crowd, or maybe even auditioning for the Vice Presidential nominiation? This guy is a gasbag, and he is only out there to make people not forget that there is another Kerrey who is also a Vietnam vet and who claims to be tough on defense. This guy ranks about with bin Vineste. Both hacks and both unconscionable.
Secondly, if you are going to engage in a gasbag diatribe that wastes about 3 minutes or so of your time, do not gripe and try to harass the witness merely because you are running out of time for your attempted smear. Terrible, simply terrible.
Mr. Kerrey's treatment of Dr. Rice should outrage many. Here he is, and instead of engaging in factfinding, he is nitpicking, merely to attempt to paint this administration in a negative light. How shameful, how treacherous to the trust that the American people gave to him and the rest of the commission!
The Cole: 1) it was Clinton's watch. 2) HE did nothing about it. 3) it was months before Bush came to office. 4) If you cannot figure out in that hamster brain that Bush was talking about the US swatting flies, that he was tired of that, then you quite frankly sir do not have the intelligence to be on this commission. But, of course, I know better. You are merely trying to spin. Shameful, sir, shameful.
Dr. Rice then turns the tables on him by discussing a speech Mr. Kerrey made on the floor of the Senate that would support how the Cole was handled. And what does Kerrey do? He first seems to implicate that Rice is trying to bait him and didn't read the speech until a day or two ago(insulting her intelligence, where is the outrage from the African American community and feminists?), and then he tries to duck his own conflict of statements then and now. What a terrible hack, and I hope more people realize this guy, along with basically the leadership of the Democratic party, are using this terrible tragedy, and playing on the emotional hurts of some 9/11 families, to twist and influence the nation to turn against Bush. These 9/11 families are being used by the likes of Kerrey and bin Vineste, by playing to their emotional need for blame, by seeking to blame Bush. Shameful, and not what the duty of this commission is supposed to do. And quite shameful that they are playing on the emotional hurts of the victimized. The Victims are being assaulted again...this time through manipulation by the likes of hacks like Mr. Kerrey.
And, as we go on, as Mr. Kerrey is revealed to be nothing more than a spewer of bull; he forgets who he is talking to and sounds rather intelligible. Notice also how he did not stop the applauding and such now! How utterably hypocritical...this guy is nothing more than a drama king out for cheap pops from the crowd and to keep his sorry name in the paper a while longer.
Bob Kerrey further proved my points that 1) he is an arse, and that 2) this commission has become a fruitless exercise of blame gaming, rather than what it was charged to do; and 3) Condi Rice defender herself well and made this morons look like what they really are: hacks who don't care about the public trust or their chartered misssion.
