Hmmm - will anything come of this - the fact that the Bush Administration knew or should have known that Al Qaeda would use planes to attack the US - ideally domestic flights - and did nothing about it?

In The News : TNA Online Last Updated: Feb 25th, 2005 - 08:19:10
http://www.thenewamerican.com/artman/publi...ticle_703.shtml

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9/11: Release of FAA Report Confirms Whistleblower Charges
by William F. Jasper
February 25, 2005


A previously undisclosed report of the 9/11 Commission shows that in the months prior to September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, Federal Aviation Administration officials reviewed dozens of intelligence reports concerning Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda, some of which specifically discussed airline hijackings and suicide operations.


http://www.whistleblower.org/article.php?did=123&scid=97

Bogdan Dzakovic

Bogdan Dzakovic was a special agent and team leader for the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA). Security Division who blew the whistle on gross mismanagement of FAA Security. He has worked in FAA's Security's "Red Team" (ACS-50) whose job it is to conduct unannounced testing of aviation security on domestic as well as international basis. As bad as ACS-50 office files indicated how poorly secured US airports are, what was most disturbing to Dzakovic was that FAA management had been fully briefed on the deplorable state of security and there was not one single instance that Dzakovic knew of where action was taken to close these security loopholes. During his time with Red Team, Dzakovic saw the Red Team succeeded in gettung 50 out of 50 simulated bombs through security at Frankfurt airport, passing simulated bomb's through Heathrow airport even though Heathrow has the latest bomb detection equipment, breaching National Airport's multi-million dollar computer controlled access system about 85% of the time, and determining that the success rate for domestic airports in detecting test objects in screening ranged only from 3-10%.

In 1998, Dzakovic sent a 13 page memo through the chain of command to FAA Administrator Jane Garvey to report the culture of management abuse of employees, highly inefficient hiring practuces, and major security vulnerabilities coupled with an ever growing threat of terrorism. Garvey took no steps to investigate Dzakovic's allegations and refused to acknowledge receipt of the memo. The only reaction Dzakovic received from the FAA was thaty Associate Administrator for Security, Carol Flynn, personally threatened to fire Dzakovic on false charges of his being potentially violent in the office. Dzakovic filed an EEO complaint in order to protect himself, but wthdrew the complaint in 2001 when Michael Canavan assumed the post of Associate Administrator for Security as a token of support for Canavan's anti-cult, anti- good old boy club, mission oriented approach to his job.

FAA received many warnings on Qaeda before 9/11 attacks, federal panel says
By Associated Press | February 10, 2005

NEW YORK -- Federal aviation officials received dozens of warnings before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks about Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, including some that mentioned airline hijackings or suicide attacks, The New York Times reported today.

A previously undisclosed report by the commission that investigated the suicide airliner attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon detailed 52 warnings given to leaders of the Federal Aviation Administration from April to Sept. 10, 2001, about the radical Islamic terrorist group and its leader.

The commission report, released in August, said the warnings came from the FAA's security branch. The paper said five security warnings mentioned Al Qaeda's training for hijackings and two reports concerned suicide operations not connected to aviation.

The Times said a classified version and a partially declassified version of the 120-page report were given to the National Archives two weeks ago. The Times story cited the declassified version of the document.

The Times said the commission reported that aviation officials were ''lulled into a false sense of security." The commission also reported ''intelligence that indicated a real and growing threat leading up to 9/11 did not stimulate significant increases in security procedures."

It takes the FAA to task for not expanding the use of in-flight air marshals or tightening airport screening for weapons. It said FAA officials were more concerned with reducing airline congestion and lessening delays.

Now we know why the government paid off the victims - because they knew they died because of government negligence...

Families outraged over FAA 9/11 warnings

BY CURTIS L. TAYLOR
STAFF WRITER

February 10, 2005, 10:05 PM EST
Newsday

Expressing outrage Thursday, family members of 9/11 victims called on the federal government to probe why it didn't act on intelligence warning of terrorist hijackings in the months before the World Trade Center was destroyed.

"The fact of the matter is these warnings were out there and nobody did anything about it," said Bill Doyle of Staten Island, who lost his son Joseph Doyle at the trade center. "My biggest concern is how high up did this get into the administration.

"There were people who testified at the 9/11 hearings that there were no warnings, but now we know there were. We need another investigation into the failures of 9/11. Obviously, someone at the FAA should be held accountable." Doyle said he received 253 e-mails yesterday from victim's families expressing anger over the declassified report.

Elaine Moccia, who lost her husband, Frank V. Moccia Sr., said releasing the information reopened old wounds.

"I am mad and upset that they keep bringing it up," Moccia said. "If they knew about it, why couldn't they have prevented it?"

Attorney Sanford Rubenstein, who represents families in a 9/11-related federal lawsuit against Saudi Arabia, said the families were hoping something good could come from the declassified information.

"It is clear that what the victims hope is what comes out of this information will prevent another 9/11," Rubinstein said. City Councilman Peter Vallone Jr.(D-Astoria), said, "It was outrageous that no action was taken by the FAA." "How much more specific than the word hijack before the FAA increases security?" said Vallone.

City Council minority leader Jim Oddo (R-Staten Island) said the early warnings the FAA received show that "we can stop these things."

"It underscores that we have to be vigilant and use all our resources to prevent something like this from happening again. We have to keep our fingers on the pulse."

Seems clear that a major error was made by the Bush Administration who provided the intelligence to the FAA.

February 10, 2005
9/11 Report Cites Many Warnings About Hijackings
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
New York Times

WASHINGTON, Feb. 9 - In the months before the Sept. 11 attacks, federal aviation officials reviewed dozens of intelligence reports that warned about Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, some of which specifically discussed airline hijackings and suicide operations, according to a previously undisclosed report from the 9/11 commission.

But aviation officials were "lulled into a false sense of security," and "intelligence that indicated a real and growing threat leading up to 9/11 did not stimulate significant increases in security procedures," the commission report concluded.

The report discloses that the Federal Aviation Administration, despite being focused on risks of hijackings overseas, warned airports in the spring of 2001 that if "the intent of the hijacker is not to exchange hostages for prisoners, but to commit suicide in a spectacular explosion, a domestic hijacking would probably be preferable."

The report takes the F.A.A. to task for failing to pursue domestic security measures that could conceivably have altered the events of Sept. 11, 2001, like toughening airport screening procedures for weapons or expanding the use of on-flight air marshals. The report, completed last August, said officials appeared more concerned with reducing airline congestion, lessening delays, and easing airlines' financial woes than deterring a terrorist attack.

The Bush administration has blocked the public release of the full, classified version of the report for more than five months, officials said, much to the frustration of former commission members who say it provides a critical understanding of the failures of the civil aviation system. The administration provided both the classified report and a declassified, 120-page version to the National Archives two weeks ago and, even with heavy redactions in some areas, the declassified version provides the firmest evidence to date about the warnings that aviation officials received concerning the threat of an attack on airliners and the failure to take steps to deter it.

Among other things, the report says that leaders of the F.A.A. received 52 intelligence reports from their security branch that mentioned Mr. bin Laden or Al Qaeda from April to Sept. 10, 2001. That represented half of all the intelligence summaries in that time.

Five of the intelligence reports specifically mentioned Al Qaeda's training or capability to conduct hijackings, the report said. Two mentioned suicide operations, although not connected to aviation, the report said.

A spokeswoman for the F.A.A., the agency that bears the brunt of the commission's criticism, said Wednesday that the agency was well aware of the threat posed by terrorists before Sept. 11 and took substantive steps to counter it, including the expanded use of explosives detection units.

"We had a lot of information about threats," said the spokeswoman, Laura J. Brown. "But we didn't have specific information about means or methods that would have enabled us to tailor any countermeasures."

She added: "After 9/11, the F.A..A. and the entire aviation community took bold steps to improve aviation security, such as fortifying cockpit doors on 6,000 airplanes, and those steps took hundreds of millions of dollars to implement."

The report, like previous commission documents, finds no evidence that the government had specific warning of a domestic attack and says that the aviation industry considered the hijacking threat to be more worrisome overseas.

"The fact that the civil aviation system seems to have been lulled into a false sense of security is striking not only because of what happened on 9/11 but also in light of the intelligence assessments, including those conducted by the F.A.A.'s own security branch, that raised alarms about the growing terrorist threat to civil aviation throughout the 1990's and into the new century," the report said.

In its previous findings, including a final report last July that became a best-selling book, the 9/11 commission detailed the harrowing events aboard the four hijacked flights that crashed on Sept. 11 and the communications problems between civil aviation and military officials that hampered the response. But the new report goes further in revealing the scope and depth of intelligence collected by federal aviation officials about the threat of a terrorist attack.

The F.A.A. "had indeed considered the possibility that terrorists would hijack a plane and use it as a weapon," and in 2001 it distributed a CD-ROM presentation to airlines and airports that cited the possibility of a suicide hijacking, the report said. Previous commission documents have quoted the CD's reassurance that "fortunately, we have no indication that any group is currently thinking in that direction."

Aviation officials amassed so much information about the growing threat posed by terrorists that they conducted classified briefings in mid-2001 for security officials at 19 of the nation's busiest airports to warn of the threat posed in particular by Mr. bin Laden, the report said.

Still, the 9/11 commission concluded that aviation officials did not direct adequate resources or attention to the problem.

"Throughout 2001, the senior leadership of the F.A.A. was focused on congestion and delays within the system and the ever-present issue of safety, but they were not as focused on security," the report said.

The F.A.A. did not see a need to increase the air marshal ranks because hijackings were seen as an overseas threat, and one aviation official told the commission said that airlines did not want to give up revenues by providing free seats to marshals.

The F.A.A. also made no concerted effort to expand their list of terror suspects, which included a dozen names on Sept. 11, the report said. The former head of the F.A.A.'s civil aviation security branch said he was not aware of the government's main watch list, called Tipoff, which included the names of two hijackers who were living in the San Diego area, the report said.

Nor was there evidence that a senior F.A.A. working group on security had ever met in 2001 to discuss "the high threat period that summer," the report said.

Jane F. Garvey, the F.A.A. administrator at the time, told the commission "that she was aware of the heightened threat during the summer of 2001," the report said. But several other senior agency officials "were basically unaware of the threat," as were senior airline operations officials and veteran pilots, the report said.

The classified version of the commission report quotes extensively from circulars prepared by the F.A.A. about the threat of terrorism, but many of those references have been blacked out in the declassified version, officials said.

Several former commissioners and staff members said they were upset and disappointed by the administration's refusal to release the full report publicly.

"Our intention was to make as much information available to the public as soon as possible," said Richard Ben-Veniste, a former Sept. 11 commission member.

[/quote]

Thanks for all this information. I wish there was some way to get this information out more.

And isn't it curious... that the new report which Bush had covered up - which could have been released prior to the election - which could have shown that Bush and Rice are incompetent that the FAA had countless warnings about the 9/11 attacks and failed to properly heed them is revealing.

The FAA says that they did everything they could because they had no specific warnings...

Excuse me? You knew it was likely to be terrorists - using domestic flights - to commit these acts - do you think it might have been advisable to increase your screening procedures making them a little more rigorous?

Do you think Condoleezza Rice should have been a little more involved addressing this threat and following up on it...

In my mind, these blatant lies are impeachable - traitorous offenses.

Of course they only come out now because it is after the election and after Condi has been confirmed...the selective truth by W.

All The President's Arguments

April 14, 2004

An old political aphorism holds that if you're explaining, you're losing. So, in keeping with that, Bush's allies have shifted from defense to offense.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/04/14/...ain611782.shtml

(The New Republic) This column from The New Republic was written by Jonathan Chait.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From a moral standpoint, the question of whether the Bush administration should have done more to prevent the September 11 attacks is of the utmost gravity. But if you put aside moral considerations for a moment, the administration's defense against charges of negligence can be appreciated on the level of sheer comic virtuosity. After first launching a flurry of scattershot, mutually exclusive, and largely-unsuccessful charges against their main antagonist, former terrorism czar Richard Clarke, the Bushies have settled onto two main lines of argument -- one that involves playing defense, and another that seems designed to seize the initiative in the debate. Both were on display at the president's press conference last night.

The general thrust of the defensive arguments has been to question the quality of intelligence available to Bush before September 11. When it came out that Bush had received a detailed memorandum on August 6, 2001, the administration dismissed the memo as "historical" -- you know, probably some musty old professor ruminating on the development of Wahhabism. Then, after the 9/11 Commission revealed the memo's decidedly non-backward looking title -- "BIN LADEN DETERMINED TO ATTACK INSIDE THE UNITED STATES" -- Bush had to retrench yet again. The new defense had several elements. At his Sunday press conference in Waco, Bush defined the memo as merely reporting that "Osama bin Laden had designs on America. Well, I knew that." Later in the same conference, Bush stretched the point slightly further: "Of course we knew that America was hated by Osama bin Laden. That was obvious." In fact, the memo didn't merely say bin Laden "had designs on" or "hated" America, but that he was planning an imminent attack, one that might involve hijacking airplanes or targeting federal buildings in New York.

Second, Bush pointed out that the memo did not predict the "hijacking of an airplane to fly into a building." But what difference would that have made? Even if we had known that al Qaeda planned to crash the hijacked planes, we wouldn't have let the hijackers take control of the planes and then tried to fortify the World Trade Center against a crash; we would have put the government on high alert against hijackers.

Third, Bush insisted that the memo did not specify a "time and place" for the attack. Was our domestic law enforcement so incompetent and understaffed that it could only act against a terrorist attack if we knew the precise time and place? (On September 11, send a squad car over to Logan airport and arrest any Arab men found with box cutters!) Presumably the government had more resources at its disposal than a couple guys in a squad car, and could have, I don't know, put the federal government on alert against all hijackings. Since then, the government has received intelligence about terror attacks that doesn't reveal the precise time and place or come attached with a signed confession from bin Laden. Presumably the response is not simply to throw up our hands and decry its uselessness.

Finally, Bush has sought to change the question from his competence to his intent. "Had I had any inkling whatsoever that the people were going to fly airplanes into buildings," he said at his press conference last night, "we would have moved heaven and earth to save the country." But of course no serious person is saying Bush deliberately ignored the threat. It's as if former Boston Red Sox manager Grady Little responded to questions about his baffling failure to relieve Pedro Martinez in Game 7 against the Yankees by insisting that of course he wanted to win the game.

An old political aphorism holds that if you're explaining, you're losing. So, in keeping with that, Bush's allies have shifted from defense to offense. The developing line is that those who criticize Bush for doing too little to thwart the al Qaeda attacks are hypocrites, because the very same people accuse him of doing too much on Iraq.

Perhaps the most fascinating thing about this peculiar line of reasoning is to observe the way it has developed and mutated into an official talking point. It first burbled up on The Wall Street Journal editorial page last month:

"There is a profound contradiction at the heart of this 20-20 hindsight. On the one hand, the critics want to blame the Bush Administration for failing to prevent 9/11, but on the other they assail it for acting "pre-emptively" on a needless war in Iraq. Well, which do they really believe?"

The Journal editors apparently thought so highly of this point that they used it as the beginning of a subsequent editorial:

"Give President Bush's critics credit for versatility. Having spent months assailing him for doing too much after 9/11 -- Iraq, the Patriot Act, the 'pre-emption' doctrine -- they have now turned on a dime to allege that he did too little before it."

One obvious problem with this line of attack is that it assumes that all of Bush's critics opposed the Iraq war. Well, I supported the Iraq war, and I still think Bush should have reacted to the warnings he received about al Qaeda in 2001. What do you have to say to me?

A more glaring flaw with this critique -- so glaring, in fact, that it's almost demeaning to have to point it out -- is that it completely elides the objection to the Iraq war. Most critics of the Iraq war argued it would deplete our military, intelligence, and diplomatic resources, weakening us in the fight against al Qaeda. Nobody argued that Iraq was a central part of the war on terror but it wasn't worth fighting. What's so funny is that the Journal seems to recognize this -- it accurately accuses critics of calling the war "needless" -- yet fails to grasp the implication: There's nothing hypocritical about opposing actions you think aren't necessary and supporting actions you think are. Suppose that after the World Trade Center fell, Bush decided to ignore Afghanistan and instead invade Canada. By the Journal's logic, anybody who criticized both policies would be a hypocrite. Is Bush invading too many countries, or too few? Make up your minds!

By Tuesday the Journal's line had been taken up by administration spokeswoman Mary Matalin, who told Don Imus, "You cannot on the one hand say [Bush] did too little before 9/11 and say he did too much after." The same day, a slightly more sophisticated version of this spin appeared in David Brooks's New York Times column:

"The critics savage the Clinton and Bush administrations for not moving aggressively enough against terror. Al Qaeda facilities should have been dismantled before 9/11, the critics say.

Then you look at the debate over Iraq and suddenly you see the same second-guessers posing as Weinbergerians [which Brooks defines as cautious about responding to uncertain risks]. The U.S. should have been more cautious. We should have had concrete evidence about W.M.D.'s before invading Iraq.

Step back and you see millions of people who will pick up any stick they can to beat the administration."

Here Brooks ignores all the details that set apart the threat from al Qaeda and the threat from Iraq. For one thing, there's the question of the cost of action. Responding to al Qaeda threats in the summer of 2001 could have entailed as little as convening some high-level meetings, dispatching more FBI agents, alerting airport security, and so on. Responding to the Iraq threat required starting a major theater war. So, even if the two threats were equivalent, there'd be nothing hypocritical about supporting the easy response and opposing the hard response.

But, more importantly, the two threats were not equivalent. The intelligence Bush had on al Qaeda in 2001 warned of an imminent attack within the United States. Intelligence on Iraq suggested no such thing. The only credible intelligence anybody had produced connecting Saddam Hussein to terrorism concerned Ansar al-Islam, which was based in Iraqi Kurdistan, outside of Saddam's control. The best argument that Saddam represented a threat was the prospect that he could obtain a nuclear weapon within the next few years. But even that threat -- as it was understood at the time -- was nowhere near as imminent as the al Qaeda threat.

Perhaps Bush was supposed to repeat this argument in his press conference last night. But he failed to bring it up, and had to be prompted by a friendly reporter, who asked him, "You have been accused of letting the 9/11 threat mature too far, but not letting the Iraq threat mature far enough. First, could you respond to that general criticism?" (Of course, what Bush was being asked to respond to was the opposite of "criticism.") The President replied, "Yes. I guess there have been some that said, Well, we should've taken preemptive action in Afghanistan, and then turned around and said we shouldn't have taken preemptive action in Iraq."

Bush's version was more refined still than previous iterations but remains wholly ignorant. Yes, some critics objected to the "preemptive" quality of the Iraq war, but most Democrats, rightly or wrongly, would have supported a preemptive attack if the U.N. Security Council had given its blessing. Anyway, the key point is that taking action against al Qaeda, even before September 11, would not have been preemptive. Al Qaeda attacked the United States in 2000, 1998, and 1993.

I've always been inclined to believe that the Bush administration could not have done anything different that would have prevented the September 11 terrorist attacks. But it's kind of suspicious that, when they defend themselves on this point, Bush and his allies are spectacularly unpersuasive. Perhaps their habit of dissembling has become so ingrained that they do it even when they're right. On the other hand, maybe they do it because the president has something to hide.

Jonathan Chait is a senior editor at TNR.

[/quote]

I think the better question is this. Why didn't the people on the plane do something about it? Adults take care of themselves. Only children expect someone else to take care of them.

This is the best - the only paper with the guts to call it like it is - the NYT published the story but wimped out on blaming the Bush Administration.

I know its an old story - but the whistleblower aspect is new.

Friday, February 11, 2005

Truth held hostage

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER EDITORIAL BOARD

It's difficult to decide which is more outrageous -- federal aviation officials' failure to follow through on intelligence reports before Sept. 11, 2001, that warned of al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden using airliner hijackings and suicide operations, or the Bush administration's refusal to let the American public know about it before the November election.

The administration has for five months blocked public release of the full version of the 9/11 commission report, even though former commission members insist that it provides what The New York Times calls a critical understanding of the failures of the civil aviation system that contributed to the atrocities.

This revelation perhaps would not have changed the outcome of the presidential election. But that could not have been clear to the administration in the months between the report's completion and the resolution at the polls of what was widely presumed to be a very tight race with Sen. John Kerry.

In April last year, President Bush said, "Had I any inkling whatsoever that the people were going to fly airplanes into buildings, we would have moved heaven and earth to save the country. ..." The 9/11 commission report apparently found that there were indeed such inklings, which should have "raised alarms about the growing terrorist threat to civil aviation throughout the 1990s and into the new century."

We're left with a pretty good inkling as to why the president moved heaven and earth to keep it quiet before the election.

Ah - you are so right - we invest billions of dollars in defense and national security and intelligence operations - and you know what...

9/11 was the fault of the passengers - those bastards - if they had showed a little bit of courage we could have avoided this whole mess.

Boy, would never think to blame the people whose job it was to actually secure the nation against threats of attack - the people who are charged with defending our nation like the commander in chief.... or the people who actually got the warnings

What have you been smoking?

Actually - the courage of the people on Flight 93 did result in the capture of the sneaker bomb terrorist when the passengers reacted - but I think it is offensive that you would seek to blame the victims.

This is as insane as Bush blaming the terrorists - well yeah - the attack occurred because of the terrorists - but ordinarily we have something in place known as national security which safeguards against these attacks... and we have people responsible for that where if they screw up they're removed...

You can not be serious and can not believe the persons at fault are the passengers.

It seems almost inane that you would go to such links to protect Bush from any responsibility...no I must correct myself - it is inane. You must be joking.

Hey, hate to burst your bubble. But the police and the military can't be everywhere. Your life is still YOUR responsibility and no one else's. Be an adult, take responsibility for you life and encourage everyone else to do the same. And that includes defending it! Otheriwse, your promoting the teaching of civilization through cowardice... and that's exactly what the terrorists want.

So you are serious about this. I still can't tell if you're being tongue and cheek...

You are not bursting my bubble. I accept responsibility for my life as good or bad as it is.

However, my taxes and your taxes pay people to protect the nation - they failed - we still do not know to what extent because they redacted most of the information from that report - and rather than place responsibility where it belongs you would rather blame the victims?

Does the Bush Administration bear any responsibility for safeguarding the nation in your opinion? What if it comes out that they had even more blatant warnings and did nothing - though it is hard to imagine what would constitute more blatant than the warning that their preferred method of attack was by domestic arirliner?

Actually - there is - Sibel Edmunds - an FBI translator hired on 9/12/01 retransalted some communiques which warned of using planes to bomb the world trade center.

If that information existed would you find Bush any more culpable.

You response is a sad commentary on level to which Americans are unwilling to hold government accountable.

However, I truly doubt that there are many Americans who would share your point of view in this regard - but I have been wrong before.

Another concern I have is about truth...

Do you care about the truth?

Does it bother you the obfuscation and evasion that has been going on by the Bush Administration on this central issue?

A lot of good men and women in the FBI and CIA and FAA have been taken for not doing their jobs.

However, it seems that it may be the case that they did their jobs, but the people in charge did not do their jobs.

Do you have a problem with that at all?

Don't we select a president and his staff to protect and defend our nation from attacks domestic or foreign?

Did your support the impeachment of Richard Nixon?

At what point would you ever challenged the Bush Administration's credibility or demand accountability from them?

Deadly serious. I'll say more as I respond to your post.



I'm glad you accept responsibility for you life. Like I said, it's your life and no one is responsible for it but yourself.

People are murdered all the time. Do you blame the police for not being there right that second?

Don't get me wrong. You are right that they failed. But guess what? That doesn't detract from the fact that everybody is STILL responsible for thier own lives. It is not the governments responsibility to remove burdens from you. They are there to alleviate the burden and share the load somewhat. But, the bottom line, is that your life could still be in danger at ANY moment. And if you aren't willing to fight for your life? Well, second place is often a body bag.

I'm reminded of a gang tag I saw in L.A. that paints the picture pretty clear. "There are no victims, only volunteers." This is the way of thinking that people like terrorists have. So, if you aren't even remotely prepared for the possibility of such violent people, well, you have no one to blame but yourself.



No more responsibility than the rest of us. Tell me. How many people do you know that learn martial arts? Carry a concealed weapon? Learn first aid? How many do you know that are willing to fight for their lives and the lives of their fellow man? Given our society today, I think you'll find that such souls are getting fewer and fewer. More and more people have the belief that they can unburden themselves of the responsibility of thier own lives. And such people then turn around and complain when they become victimized. What they fail to realize is... they volunteered.



No more responsible than the FBI or the adminstration or anyone else. See, I don't blame one person, because our government isn't one person. And this is an issue that started with the older Bush adminstration and ran all the way through the Clinton adminstration. People kept saying how we were at peace and we didn't need the CIA. All the while, Muslim extremists kept wailing war against us. So our very own Americans cut our own wrists when they knee-capped the CIA. The are no victims...



I hold the government no more responsible than the people themselves. No government is perfect, and even most 10 year olds know that. So, if the government isn't perfect, why subscribe so much trust to them?

There are many Americans who probably wouldn't share my viewpoint, but that's because they want to unburden themselves of their responsibility of their own lives.

Ianna, you need serious therapy.
Think about what you said!
______________________________________________________________________________


"There are many Americans who probably wouldn't share my viewpoint, but that's because they want to unburden themselves of their responsibility of their own lives."

I need serious therapy because I think people need to take more responsibility for their own lives instead of less?

Care to explain that?

What else is new?
Like I said a long time ago. The administration knew ahead of time. Twenty four hours ahead of the attack, bases overseas had recall and closed. Why, probable attack is what the troops were told.

Also, where were the controllers when the planes went haywire? Normally they would be yelling bloody murder. Where were all those missles we have all over the place?

It's hard to say. A lot of things went wrong. There were failures in the process all up and down the board. Probably too much complacency and thinking that it's just another hijacking and we will wait and see where they demand to go and land. I'm sure no one was thinking that the planes would be used as a bomb. It's the same kind of pre-9/11 thinking that we would never be attacked on our own soil. People failed to realize... wishful thinking is not a survical trait.

It is really stupid to say the passingers are responsible for defending themselves. Prior to 9/11 passingers were trained to cooperate with hijackers who would make demands and then let them go. Flight 93 learned the truth and tried to defend themselves. In any event the whole event was preventable if the Bush people were not so incompetent. Thhat starts with moron Bush himself.

No it's not stupid to say. Don't remove people's responsibility for taking care of their own lives. Don't displace the burden that is supposed to be thiers. And Bush is no more at fault than anyone else in the chain... including the passengers.

And if you don't trust the government now, why would you trust them before when they tell you to give in to terrorists demands?

QUOTE(kindergarten teacher @ Feb 25 2005, 09:16 PM)
Ianna, you need serious therapy.
Think about what you said!
______________________________________________________________________________
"There are many Americans who probably wouldn't share my viewpoint, but that's because they  want to unburden themselves of their responsibility of their own lives."

I need serious therapy because I think people need to take more responsibility for their own lives instead of less?
Care to explain that?
______________________________________________________________________________

Inanna,
When you were playing the devil's advocate on the Flight 93 topic you told me to "Google-Fu" your name. I asked you if your site was X-rated. I Googled Inanna and I found a Goddess and a Belly dancer. You said your are male. Are you a male Goddess or male Bellydancer Inanna?

_____________________________________________________________________________

Is this who you identify with???????


The myth about Innana and her descent "deals with the time of year when food supplies are at their most critical point, which is late winter when the stores in the storehouse dwindle and finally come to an end....Her actual death, the final inability of the storehouse to function as food supply, the myth dramatically symbolizes by the cut of tainted meat into which she is turned in the netherworld"
"Thus, at its simplest, we would see the death of Inanna in the emptying of the storehouse, her revival and the resultant death of Dumuzi in the replenishing of the storehouse with fresh meat when the flocks return from the desert and its withering pasturage in late spring and early summer."
     - Thorkild Jacobsen, The Treasures of Darkness

"In art, Innana is usually represented as a warrior-goddess, often winged, armed to the hilt, or else surrounded by a nimbus of stars. Even in this aspect she may betray - by her posture and state of dress - her role as goddess of sex and prostitutes. In Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian art, a female, shown full frontal and nude, or nude from the waist down, who has wings and wears the horned cap of divinity, probably depicts Ishtar more specifically in her sexual aspect.
"Ishtar's beast was a lion. Her usual symbol was the star or star disc. She may also have been symbolized for a time by the rosette."
     - Black and Green, Gods, Demons and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia

First off, I chose my Goddess's name just as representation. She is the Summerian goddess. Primarily known as the Goddess of both love and war, but also fertility. It also depends on her incarnation during Sumer or Babylon or Greece or the Romans.

Belly dancer? That's a new one.

By the way, you didn't answer my question.

Reasons why Bush is responsible for 9/11 : He and the people under him received numerious warnings fron holdovers from the Clinton team. They were disregarded because the warnings were seen as comming from the Clinton administration. Security was not allowed to interfer with airline operations because that would be government intrusion in business. Bush did not wish to be seen to profile muslems because they voted for him in the 2000 election. Hence muslems training to fly were not acted on and muslems comming from overseas not bothered. Bush himself received the PDB from the CIA beating him over the head with a warning. He went back to sleep in Texas being the lazy party boy he is. The people of the US were ill served by this government. Bush was responsible and he failed. Like I said, it is STUPID to blame 9/11 on the people who were only going about thir business when Bush failed them.

Not only that, the man arrested for the first bombing of the WTC, while being flown to his court date, was flown right by the WTC. At the time he was told, "See look, there it is still standing." At that point the man looked over and said "Yes but not for long."


This was the man responsible for the first attack being flown directly by the WTC by our Government. Now I wonder where the idea to fly into the WTC came from??????

Something we can agree on...



Let's see - where to start. Hmmm?

If the police had adequate warnings and opportunities to stop the person who murdered me from doing it - I would have a problem with it and I believe with sufficient evidence a prima facie case could be made for damages for their negligence. If the police after they had been previously asked if there had been any hint of this person murdering me in the way he or she had - and they said no - and then later evidence came out that they did - I think you and I would both have a lot of problems with it. This is my point - they had a responsibility - they failed.



Yes, everybody is responsible for their lives and we agree on that. However, when you volunarily seek the office of the president of the united states - and you assume the responsibilities of that office taking an oath of office to protect and defend the constitution and the nation you - the commander in chief have a responsibility. If you or your staff fail in the execution of those responsibilities then you should be punished. Your solution seems to be - whoever had the last chance to avert the terror attack is responsibile - but when we board planes as passengers this is not our responsibility. Now - someone may act as a good samaritan in an effort to save their life and the others - and you do not know whether they did or not. You don't know how many people may have been shot dead or strangled or otherwise incapacitated - you just make a foolish statement when I call upon those in our government who are accountable to be held accountable.

It just boggles my sensibilities that you could make such callous remarks regarding the victims in those airplanes. What of those that were hit by the planes in the world trade center - should they have been on the roof with weapons shooting down the planes instead of at their desks working?

I do not know where you are from, but I saw a lot of the emotional carnage first hand interviewing victims and trying to address their legal concerns in the wake of the attack. It was devestating and for you to make such offhand remarks suggesting that it was the victims' fault is not only insensitive - its inhumane. I truly would like to see how you'd respond in a similar tragedy to see if you have the courage you pretend to have - but then I couldn't wish such pain and suffering on anyone.



The gangs volunteer to do what they do - passengers on an airplane do not and like I said you have know personal knowledge of their struggles. None.

And please, don't give me that Bush-Clinton crap please. This post demonstrates that Bush was hiding a lot of information regarding 9/11 and he still is hiding more. I blame people for not acting if they have the knowledge to do something and they don't - this was the Bush Administration - they had the knowledge to defend the country. They had the resources and they had the responsibility. And they should pay.

Clinton had a terror czar - he saw the problem. More and more information is coming out regarding how the Bush Administration - not the Clinton Administration. 52 FAA warnings were not issued under Clinton - 44 PDBs were not addressed to al Qaeda under Clinton.

They knew about the problem and they failed and in my mind its an impeachable offense.

You conveniently seem to forget a number of factors.

The Bush Administration had information - more information than the passengers - the Bush Administration did not use that information to alert people - but it did alert the airlines through the FAA - but they failed to follow through with their alerts.

Perhaps the best way to explain it is through the law of negligence.

Negligence exists when there is a duty (the duty to protect the country) - the duty is breached (the failure to protect the country) and that breach is the proximate cause of the injuries to the people involved (the deaths to the passengers).

Now in many states there is contributory or comparative negligence where you can discount the damages by the amount of fault assigned to the injured/dead people.

You are suggesting that there is just as much fault with the passengers on an airliner as there is with the government.

When judging whether negligence occurs - the law looks to foreseeability.

Based on the warning to the president and the FAA - was it foreseeable on September 11th that a plane might be hijacked and flown into a building?

Given the latest news it was. Thus the government had a foreseeable duty to protect the people which they did not do. The failure

Was it foreseeable to a passenger boarding a plane on September 11th that their plane would be hijacked?

Well - it may have been slightly foreseeable - but it was no more foreseeable than if the plane was going to spontaneously combust...so their contributory negligence in not fighting - which you actually do not know whether or not they did...is much a less of a factor than the government - which had 52 warnings of Al Qaeda and 5 that planes would be used as weapons...



Now if the government had given the people the warnings that hid had given the FAA - then the government would have executed its minimum duty in at least providing a warning and allowing the people to assume their own risk of flying - but they didn't...

As a result - the government - and Bush Administration is the most at fault and deserves the bulk of the responsibility and as a result deserves to be taken to task and punished in whatever way possible.

I'm not defending the FAA here, I'm just hoping to add to the overall picture of things. Many of the faults that allowed the attacks to happen lie with the dual nature of the FAA since its inception: aircraft safety as well as promoting air travel.

This has been a problem as long as the agency has been in existance. How do you tell people that its not safe to fly if you are thereby decreasing the likelihood that they will travel by air?

The problem with the FAA is its ties to the airline industry.

As I have posted earlier in this thread - there is an effort underway to restore the decentralized pre-9/11 security system where each airport controls their own security.

The article I posted from the New York Times states that in 1990 and 1997 a commission recommended security improvements to the airline industry. Well, the industry lobbied against those - if instituted they might have prevented 9/11.

Now they are lobbying against the current security measures in place and the money to pay for it.

Seeing the article on polls done regarding airport security and the fact that people do not mind being inconvenienced - did that help to address your concerns that people did not want to take the time to go through extra security measures.

The polls says not only don't they mind the inconvenience - they also do not mind paying additional money...

But still the airlines want to cut back on security...

this is exactly what the government knew prior to 9/11

K.T.,
I think you should be nominated for the Google-Fu Master of the CGCS forum! I'm going to write FlameWarriors and ask them to add "Google-Fu" Master to their list of warriors in your honor! You ROCK, KT!

Carry on folks, I'm watching. Interesting that a moderator would comment too. I raised some interesting questions I guess.

KT

I didn't notice that before, KT. Yes, you have raised some interesting questions.

I will explain in on KT's behalf - not that KT needs any assistance...

You need serious therapy because you place responsibility on the passengers for defending themselves - as much responsibility it seems - as on the government which had knowledge of the potential hijackings - the resources to prevent them - a responsibility to prevent them - and a lack of action to prevent them...

When the passenger themselves you are assuming did not act to defend themselves...

You don't know that - they may have tried and failed - you do not know that - but despite this - you are blaming the passengers as much for their demise as the person charged with protecting this country who had more than enough warnings to know that something needed to be done and did nothing.

To blame the victims is a little crazy.

I guess that's why the Governement stepped up to the plate and created the victim's fund, not only was it the right thing to do but it was Bush's guilt of not paying mind to Clinton's outgoing administration ... Why do you think Bill said it was Osama Bin Laden as soon as he saw what happened.
Clinton - He knew what the reports said. SAD that Bushco is so opposed to Democrates that he didn't smell the smoke. But read about the Goat He Did.

Very SAD and PREVENTABLE - History WILL HANG THIS AROUND BUSH'S NECK LIKE A STONE WEIGHT. (When it all comes out - I think that's why he's making peace with Europe or at least one of the reasons - The other reasons are more Economic)

I'd rather get cought screwing around on my wife and lying about it (i'ts immoral but not illegal ... than screwing up about missed intel and covering it up. Illegal and Impeachable Offenses.

BUSHCO should not be in office PERIOD! FACISTS!

It would appear the majority of the public think infidelitiy is far more important than one's country's security? Bush and Cheney should 'hang' for this!

I agree.

I am outraged over this because it so clearly points to the White House, but really only a couple of newspaper reporters/editorial boards have gotten this issue - and pointed the blame where it belongs. (In fact, the New York Times editorial on this - which I waited three days for - didn't blame the White House at all - it focused on the future).

Condi Rice might have been confirmed as SOS if this had come out before - but it would have been a lot harder.

I do have questions about whether Bush would have been elected though.

In the summer of 2004 I suggested that the Democrats should run as the party of intelligence reform and take the president whose views were vacillating on almost a dily basis - talk about flip-flopping - first regarding the need for a unified intelligence system - then on the need for the director and then what authority the director would have...

If the Dems had run with this - they couold have scored major points with the public.

I just want those responsible for the screw up held accountable - and I want the CIA and FBI exonerated as much as they should be - as much as the evidence shows that they were doing their jobs - because I think they have been unfairly blamed for this debacle.

Did Bill say it was Osama bin Laden right after he heard? And Richard Clarke told Rice that bin Laden was going to be the most important threat the new administration needed to pay attention to. And George Tenent, didn't he say it was bin Laden?

I remember having no idea that day what was happening. I knew we were being attacked but didn't know by whom. I figure the general public didn't know.

BTW: Screwing around on your wife is a betrayal, but it's one that's frankly to be expected. It happens. All the time.

Screwing up intelligence reports and getting thousands of innocent Americans killed is not even in the same ballpark. It's not even in the same food category. This isn't oranges and apples we're comparing here.

History should hang this around Bush's neck.

G -

Correct on all points.

I just cannot understand Inanna's point of view where he blames the victims as much as he does the Bush Administration for the attacks...

Here's the full article which started the post...

9/11: Release of FAA Report Confirms Whistleblower Charges
by William F. Jasper
February 25, 2005

A previously undisclosed report of the 9/11 Commission shows that in the months prior to September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, Federal Aviation Administration officials reviewed dozens of intelligence reports concerning Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda, some of which specifically discussed airline hijackings and suicide operations.

Release of the report had been blocked for five months by the Bush administration, angering some of the commission members, who had urged that the information be made public. The declassified report that was released on February 9 has many references blacked out, and commission members are urging that the administration release the full report.

Among other things, the report says that leaders of the FAA received 52 intelligence reports from their security branch that mentioned Mr. Bin Laden or al-Qaeda from April to Sept. 10, 2001. That represented half of all the intelligence summaries in that time. Five of the intelligence reports specifically mentioned al-Qaeda’s training or capability to conduct hijackings, the report said.

The declassified report reinforces the claims of FAA whistleblower Bogdan Dzakovic, who testified before the 9/11 Commission concerning the FAA’s stubborn refusal to implement security reforms, even in the face of repeated warnings. (Mr. Dzakovic was the principal subject of our October 18, 2004 article, “Unfriendly Skies.”) At the time of the 9/11 attacks, Dzakovic was a 14-year veteran of the Security Division of the FAA. Since 1995, he had served as a Team Leader of the FAA’s elite Red Team, which conducted undercover tests on airport security through simulated terrorist attacks.

“We were extraordinarily successful in destroying U.S. Flag commercial aircraft and killing large numbers of innocent people in these simulated attacks,” Dzakovic told the 9/11 Commission on May 22, 2003. “This occurred with such regularity and ease,” he noted, “as to present a frightening picture of the sorry state of aviation security on a worldwide basis, including our domestic airports.” It was Special Agent Dzakovic’s job to think like a terrorist and to expose security weaknesses so that they could be corrected. He was very good at his job. The problem was (and is, even after 9/11) that despite all the hi-octane talk from officialdom about stepping up aviation security, very little effort was made to fix the outrageous failures that were an open invitation to terrorists and a virtual guarantee of future catastrophe.

“Although we breached security with ridiculous ease up to 90% of the time, “ Dzakovic told the commission, “the FAA suppressed these warnings. Instead we were ordered not to write up our findings [in some cases] and not to retest airports where we found particularly egregious vulnerabilities to see if the problems had been fixed. Finally, the agency started providing advance notification of when we would be conducting our ‘undercover’ tests and what we would be checking.”

What is most distressing is that the Transportation Security Administration, the branch of the new Department of Homeland Security that has absorbed the FAA’s security functions, has promoted many of the same officials responsible for the neglect that permitted the 9/11 hijackings.

I guess Inanna has decided to give up arguing with the facts...

Here's another related article to chew on...and illustrate more Bush responsibility...

Posted on Tue, Mar. 01, 2005

Security shouldn't be a game of hide and seek

BY RHONDA CHRISS LOKEMAN

Knight Ridder Newspapers

(KRT) - It was announced that unidentified victims of the 2001 terror strikes on the World Trade Center would remain so. All current DNA technology had been exhausted. Medical examinations would resume when new technology makes possible an accurate identification.

For many families of Sept. 11 victims, this was not the closure they had sought. But, when one chapter of this saga closes, another somehow opens.

According to a New York Times account of a declassified staff report by the Sept. 11 commission, some in the federal government likely knew more than they've said about events leading up to the attacks.

The newspaper was first to report on a previously undisclosed commission staff report on the Federal Aviation Administration. The staff report said the FAA "had indeed considered the possibility that terrorists would hijack a plane and use it as a weapon." Also, reportedly, in 2001 the FAA even provided the airlines with a CD-ROM about hijackings and suicide attacks.

Why are we just learning about this now? The Bush administration blocked the report, that's why.

The commission staff report found that between April and Sept. 10, 2001, the FAA had received 52 intelligence reports mentioning Osama bin Laden or al-Qaeda. Five mentioned al-Qaida training or aerial hijackings. Two mentioned suicide attacks.

U.S. Reps. Henry Waxman and Carolyn Maloney openly questioned whether the Bush administration misled Congress by withholding information provided in the Sept. 11 commission report. They also suggest Condoleezza Rice wasn't forthcoming in her testimony.

"Although the 9/11 Commission staff completed its report on August 26, 2004, the Bush administration refused to declassify the findings until Jan. 28, 2005, less than 48 hours after Rice was confirmed as secretary of state," the lawmakers wrote Tom Davis, chairman of the House Committee on Government Reform.

Their February letter asked for committee hearings to investigate possible abuse of the declassification process by the Bush administration and whether Rice lied in her testimony on April 8, 2004.

"One possibility raised by these facts is that Ms. Rice was unaware of the FAA warnings when she appeared before the press and testified before the 9/11 Commission. This would raise serious questions about her preparation and competency," they wrote. "Another possibility is that Ms. Rice knew about the FAA warnings but provided misleading information to the public and the commission ... the committee should investigate what Ms. Rice knew, when she knew it, and why she testified as she did."

Then there's the matter of how much safer we've become since the attacks. A recent inspector general's audit of the Department of Homeland Security raises suspicions about government accountability and accounting. Flawed distribution of port grants compromises our national security.

According to the audit, $517 million in grants for port security was distributed between June 2002 and December 2003. However, "the program has not yet achieved its intended results in the form of actual improvement in port security."

Taxpayers' dollars continue to be dumped into the bottomless pit that the Bush administration has marked "national security." The audit found $10,000 allocated to a port for encrypted radios that were deemed incompatible with those used by federal and state authorities.

An additional $25,000 anti-terrorism grant went for installation of surveillance equipment that appeared "to support the normal course of business" of the nearby luxury resort. A $935,000 grant went to a port with a new industrial park under construction, according to The Times . The audit questions how this economic development could pass for terror prevention.

Questions about port security aren't new, but their re-emergence in a government audit has been a long time coming. Democratic challengers to President Bush's 2004 re-election raised the issue. So did Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California who said in 2003 that "there is almost a one-in-two chance" of a dirty bomb hitching a ride aboard a container passing through California.

The nation has about 360 ports. Eighty percent of trade moves through 10 of them, several in California. Yet a congressional report found that Vice President Dick Cheney's home state of Wyoming was allocated four times more in anti-terrorism funds per capita than New York.

In her party's rebuttal to the State of the Union address, Rep. Nancy Pelosi spoke of vulnerabilities. The best response the Bush Republicans have for their critics is that nothing has happened, so they must be doing something right. (See Sept. 11, 2001.)

---

ABOUT THE WRITER

Rhonda Chriss Lokeman is a columnist for the Kansas City Star. Readers may write to her at: The Star, 1729 Grand Boulevard, Kansas City, Mo. 64108-1413, or e-mail her at lokeman@kcstar.com.

---

The Kansas City Star.

Taz,

My guess would be that people blame the victim to restore a feeling of safety, invincibility, power to themselves. When we are privy to the victimization of another we automatically have thoughts about our own vulneratilby. If another woman is raped, I might start saying to myself, "If she could be raped, then I could, too." I would start to experience fear, a sort of vicarious traumatization. So, in order to protect myself while I go about my daily business of walking alone on the streets to and from parking buildings, etc. I tell myself that my friend was raped because she's not as careful, conservative in her dress, observant, vigilant as I am. I falsely reassure myself that I will wear a nun's habbit (ah, but nuns are raped, too), only go in certain neighborhoods during certain times of day or with an escort, etc. Thus I've rationalized away my fear of the truth - that bad things happen to good people and could happen to me at any moment.

The same thing with the hijacked airplanes. Seems the argument is that if I were on the airplane I wouldn't behave like the other victim sheep - like those "victims" on the airplane behaved. I would fight my way free. And thus I would survive and not be a victim. My superior strength, willpower, courage, knowledge, moral values, etc. would protect me. Again this is an example of another illusion that is used by a person who needs to protect him/herself from what they dread the most - identification with the victim.

Also, for those who have actually raped the woman or hijacked a plane, they blame the victim to relieve their own guilt. "It's her fault. She made me do it because she did A, B, or C." Same with hijackers. "It's their fault because they have bases on Saudi Arabia, are morally reprehensible, are stealing America's wealth by their dependence on New Deal government handouts, etc."

In light of this report I wonder if the judges rulings in the Sibel Edmonds' case can be revisited?

G - my sentiments exactly.

With all this information coming out the only interest that the continued gag order on Edmunds serves is to protect the Bush Administration from further losses in their credibility.

I also wonder what the redacted portions of the 9/11 report include as well.

I bet there is more info there indicting the Bush Administration than is of any national security import...

Another good point - I know I raise a lot of insecurities with my posts...

But the other crazy thing is how do you know the people didn't fith their hearts out to stop the terrorists...

They might have killed the terrorists - but the pilots were locked in the cockpit and they couldn't get to that terrorist.

Hey - my concern is always - we need to know the truth - the whole truth - and punish those who could have prevented the event from occurring - so that we never have to face this again.

Putting your head in the sand never helped... I don't think?

I think people like you show real courage, Taz. And don't worry about people who want to place the blame on the victim. I know it's painful to hear how callous this is - to blame the Americans who died that day. I mean if you follow the logic you'll soon reach it's absurd conclusions. That the people in Windows on the world and the other floors above where the planes hit were to blame for being there. I wonder what crime of courage, patriotism, valor, morality, etc. those who blame the airplane victims will accuse those whose only "sin" was being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Getting people to think, even if it makes them uncomfortable, is a good thing. Thinking is our only defense against fear. And for every person like you who is willing to get on this forum and question the official take on intelligence failures, etc. I assure you there are 10's to 100's of people out there thinking the exact same thing. You're not asking people to consider anything that they shouldn't already be well on their way to considering themselves.

These are important questions we raise. Our own personal psychological defense mechanisms don't cut it. They simply don't make the grade where national security is concerned. I don't expect people to be perfect. But I do expect them to rise to the occasion. I don't care if they're Republicans or Democrats or from Mars. How we were attacked on 9/11 is my buisness. And it's your buisness. And it's everyone's business on this forum. Secrecy. Lies. They don't cut it. A cowering, paid off, tabloid media doesn't cut it either. That's what our media has become - a tabloid media. When we're talking the life and death of hundreds of thousands with the possibility of devastating the world economy from a major terrorist strike with a suitcase nuke in NY or other major metropolitan area - we are talking about something that is ALL of our business.

People seem to think that national security is George Bush's job now. Bull$hit! It's all of our jobs. It's our job to find out what the hell is going on! It's our JOB not to stick our heads in the sand. If our soldiers can fight in the terror zone called Iraq year in and year out certainly the people who happen into these threads can muster up the courage to ask themselves what really happened on 9/11? Everything starts there. All the killing, all the money, all the death, all the hundreds of billions of dollars spent - IT ALL STARTS THERE! On that beautiful September morning.

People need to ask themselves "What do I know about what George Bush did to protect this country prior to 9/11?" "What would a reasonable person do to protect this country with the knowledge he had?" "How much have I looked into it?" "Do I expect America's sons and daughters to die for my ignorance?" Because that's really what it is. They're not dying for America's freedom - they're dying to protect America's ignorance.

Taz - Thank you for posting all of this material. Its interesting - This information was either not addressed or ignored by the 9-11 Commission. Also, ignored were the facts that senior government officials including Ashcroft decided not to fly airplanes for a period of time before 9-11; many European dignitaries removed their representatives from the US during that summer etc. Sibel Edmunds was pilloried. The CIA is the agency that is getting trashed for the failures of 9-11. Wrong agency - should be the FBI, FAA, and the State Department.