Posted on 05/21/2006 7:50:06 AM PDT by yoe
Judith Miller, The New York Times reporter at the center of the I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby case, reveals that she received advance word about a terrorist plot that turned out to be 9/11 - but the Times spiked the story.
Miller spent 85 days in jail before finally disclosing that Libby was the source who confirmed to her that Valerie Plame was a CIA operative.
Miller - who's no longer with the Times - never wrote a story about Plame. But she's more troubled by another story that didn't run - the one about 9/11.
Miller began investigating al-Qaida after the terrorist group's October 2000 suicide bombing of the USS Cole in the harbor of Aden, Yemen.
Over the weekend before July 4, 2001, there were strong indications that terrorists were planning to attack the U.S. or a major American target elsewhere, Miller said in an interview with Scott Malone and Rory O'Connor that appeared on the Web site NavySEALS.com.
The attack never materialized. But that weekend "I did manage to have a conversation with a source," she told the interviewers.
"The person told me that there was some concern about an intercept that had been picked up. The incident that had gotten everyone's attention was a conversation between two members of al-Qaida. And they had been talking to one another, supposedly expressing disappointment that the United States had not chosen to retaliate more seriously against what had happened to the Cole.
"One al-Qaida operative was overheard saying to the other, "Don't worry; we're planning something so big now that the U.S. will have to respond.'
"I was obviously floored by that information. I thought it was a very good story - the source was impeccable, the information was specific, tying al-Qaida operatives to, at least, knowledge of the attack on the Cole, and they were warning that something big was coming, to which the United States would have to respond. This struck me as a major Page 1-potential story."
However, when Miller met with her editor Stephen Engelberg, he was critical, noting that Miller didn't know who the operatives were, where they were overheard or what attack they were planning.
"At that point I realized I didn't have the whole story," Miller said. She continued to probe, but couldn't turn up enough information to satisfy Engelberg.
The story never ran. And two months later came al-Qaida's Sept. 11 attacks.
Engelberg, now managing editor of The Oregonian in Portland, told the Columbia Journalism Review: "More than once I've wondered what would have happened if we'd run the piece. A case can be made that it would have been alarmist and I just couldn't justify it, but you can't help but think maybe I made the wrong call."
Said Miller: "Sometimes in journalism you regret the stories you do; but most of the time you regret the ones that you didn't do."
So it's Miller's fault, and not Bush's fault?
Very interesting.
And we are not finished responding yet either!
Uh...when hasn't there been an elevated risk of a terrorist attack prior to a national holiday? Especially the nations birthday on July 4th?
Seems she's just trying to sell books.
Many people knew something was cooking and that airliners were going to be used. The Phoenix memos prove that. They just didn't take the simple precautions that would have prevented those acts of terror.
That would make it all Pinchy's fault (and his editorial board)
NYTimes fault...so much for "All The News That's Fit To Print".
We had no color codes before 9-11.
This seems to say that if Clinton had responded to the USS Cole, then Al-Qaeda might not have brought down the World Trade Center towers.
If this media whore Mrs. Miller said the sun rises in the east I'd check it first.
If she said the sky is blus and the sun yellow, I'd be skeptical.
Gosh I love reporters who use unnamed sources for news reports with potentially huge ramifications. Especially with her track record of political favoritism.
It is nothing more than another of the 10,000 or so attempts of liberals to blame 9-11 on Bush.
The libs will probably run with this, Jon Stewart will make jokes about it, and yet another non-story will swell the heads of the Air America blame America first crowd.
WHY DIDNT YOU GO TO THE COPS WOMAN
shoot, take the " out of that previous link.
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/defense/1227842.html
Did she predict the Burst of the Bubble as well?????
This chick has about 0 crediblity.
It wouldn't have done any good. The people preparing for Sept. 11th were already here. Clinton should have attacked Al-Qaeda in the mid 1990's before they had the strength and organization to carry out a massive attack on U.S. soil.
She should have connected the dots!
/sarc
A 'buy-my book'... exclusive! I wonder if she sent a copy to Jamie GORElick?
What did the New York Times know and when did they know it?
Since the 1st WTC bombing in 1993, this country has higher alert status on both the mainland AND foreign embassies and military bases at certain times.
Surely one of those times is prior to a birthdate of the nation.
We know she didn't write the story, but did she at least contact someone like the FBI about it?
"they had been talking to one another, supposedly expressing disappointment that the United States had not chosen to retaliate more seriously against what had happened to the Cole."
Sounds to me like a thinly veiled attempt to legitimize Clinton's total lack of response to the Cole attack. "See? They WANTED us to attack them. Bill sure understood those terrorists."
Sorry, I was being sarcastic. :)
Oh, it goes back much further than that. We should have turned Iran into a burnt crisp when they took the hostages, but Jimmah preferred to treat those early terrorists as if they were actually legitimate.
Well, thank God we've learned from our mistakes and we now strip search granny at the airport while allowing anyone to stroll across the southern border. /s
If I had known something like that, you couldn't have kept my mouth shut with a staples. It wouldn't have done much good coming from a nobody like me but Miller is "respected". I guess her big money salary was more important than thousands of lies.
Or, she's lying. Which is it Judith?
Now, her story is so "impeccable" she's running to her publisher.
Run, Spot, run!
Leni
She still should have gone to the cops.
Well then you're too good at it on a SUnday morning.
LOL, I was tipped of too! OBL had been threatening us publicly for years.
And even if you did believe her, you have to ask why she didn't take this information to the proper authorities.
So they couldn't connect the dots.
Our government had just come off the Clinton Rock Star train where all security departments were in an state of the noncompliant Gorlick/Clinton/Reno/Albright WALL - no one would take the fall - certainly not Sandy Berger. Gore's refusal to give up and admit defeat left the country in limbo for far too long. The Bush administration was not up and running and when it did take over, too many Clinton people were left in key positions and continued to obstruct to save their sorry rears. America took last place as Al Gore would have them do anyway had he won.
thousands of lies should be lives.
freudian slip?
Interesting. After all, it wasn't the attack that did major damage to the United States -- it has been the response.
Islamic nutjobs are planning? or have planned? or will plan? "something big" against America?
Well hell- I'm shocked!
(I'm not shocked...)
It seems to imply that if we had only responded to the Cole, we might not have had 9/11.
They wanted to be attacked?
Miller is seeking another five minutes of attention. IMO
Oy vey. Alarmist. Wouldn't want to look anything other than cynically detached now would we.?
what a loopy video... just because they don't find any remains at the Pa crash site ... a plane crashes nose first into the ground at several hundred mph, you're NOT going to find remains... so where are the passengers from flight 93 anyway since they landed in cleveland ... good grief! there's always some pud out there who is going to be irresponsible and lead grieving people to false hope
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