Posted on 07/13/2003 9:10:40 PM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
By coincidence, ex-Time editor Henry Grunwald passed away on Feb. 26. The reports say he has a daughter named Mandy.
I also see that Cooper is a part-time comedian - stand-up.
Here's an excerpt of an E & P piece from today about Clarke's new editorial writing gig. It was done by telephone:
...But in his upcoming column, Clarke will take back the nice things he said about airport security, alleging that people with phony driver's licenses have been able to easily escape detection. You can get a license off the internet for $48, he told E&P.Curious, and I wouldn't consider the reporter's interpretation of Clarke's comment as authoritative.Does Clarke have a view on whether the White House is using special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald to punish Judith Miller of The New York Times in the Valerie Plame leak case? I don't know about that, he says slowly, then sounding as if he were talking about himself, adds, but as a general statement they do hold grudges. They do go after people.
The Times put itself in a sticky position by hiring Clarke as columnist.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ep/20050228/en_bpiep/richardaclarketalksaboutwritingregularcolumnforthenytimes
The New York Times has hired Richard Clarke to write for their magazine?!
Yes--I looked up the link and it's true!
Does Clarke have a view on whether the White House is using special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald to punish Judith Miller of The New York Times in the Valerie Plame leak case? I don't know about that, he says slowly, then sounding as if he were talking about himself, adds, but as a general statement they do hold grudges. They do go after people.
New spin is the the WH is USING Fitzgerald to punish these reporters.
The deviousness of the thinking on the left never ceases to amaze me.
And look at Clarke "reluctantly" conceding that why yes, this WH just goes after people (like WHO, Dick?).
Laurie Mylroie, "The United States and the Iraqi National Congress"
In April 1993, an INC delegation visited Washington to meet the newly-elected administration. They met with the new Secretary of State, Warren Christopher, and the new National Security Council Advisor, Anthony Lake. And in what seemed to be token of the Clinton administration's greater commitment to democracy and human rights, the INC also met with the Vice-President.
Subsequently, the INC began to establish a headquarters and offices in Salah al-Din, where it engaged in a variety of media activities. They included publishing a newspaper and managing a radio station and television station, both of which broadcast into Iraq. The INC also ran a political office. But most importantly, the INC developed a network of contacts with individuals occupying significant positions in the rest of the country.
By the end of 1993, the INC had developed a plan of action called the "Three Cities Plan." In the north, the two Kurdish militias, along with an INC force, would attack the two northern cities of Mosul and Kirkuk. By prior understanding, friendly military commanders would go over to the opposition. In the south, the INC and the Shi'ite militia, led by Baqir al-Hakim, would attack Basra, where the same thing was to happen.
The INC briefed US officials on this plan, but they were not enthusiastic. It was the first clear indication that the Clinton administration was not serious about Saddam. Above all, the administration did not want the opposition to do any fighting. In fact, although the US was funding the INC, the Clinton administration prohibited any US funds from being used for the purchase of weapons. US officials flippantly maintained that there were already enough weapons in Iraq. It was not long before the White House began to actively undermine the INC. George Tenet, now CIA Director, was then NSC adviser on intelligence matters. Tenet believed that he could orchestrate a coup in Iraq and he acted in co-ordination with Lake. Lake did not want to get into a confrontation with Baghdad and his hesitancy extended to matters far beyond the INC. They included the issue of UN weapons inspections. Early on, Lake advised Rolf Ekeus, UNSCOM chairman, "Don't give us sweaty palms."8 That is, don't create crises. Somehow, Lake believed that he could deal with the several challenges posed by Iraq quietly. It was a remarkable assumption, because these issues constituted the unfinished business of the Gulf War, a deadly serious affair.
In the spring of 1994, a new chief of the CIA's Near Eastern Division, Steve Richter, was appointed. Richter had been head of the CIA station in Amman, where he had recruited Mohammad Abdullah al-Shawani, an Iraqi Turcoman living in Jordan who was a former commander in the army Special Forces. Tenet and Lake worked together with Richter, the three of them bypassing the head of the CIA, James Woolsey.
At Tenet's prompting, in June 1994, Richter called a meeting with figures from the Iraqi National Accord and several other former Iraqi officers. The CIA once again began to push for a coup and it would again promote the coup option at the expense of the popular insurgency represented by the INC.
"The New York Times has hired Richard Clarke to write for their magazine?!"
Hush money? ;-)
I wonder how he reacted when he heard "Plame."
He's one to talk about retribution. How about his comment he could tell Rice never heard of Al Qaeda by looking into her face?
So. . .what's their motive for putting themselves in this sticky position? What benefit do they gain from hiring Clarke that outweighs the potential risk of further damage to their already-damaged credibility?
"The INC briefed US officials on this plan, but they were not enthusiastic. It was the first clear indication that the Clinton administration was not serious about Saddam."
Well, they could have had well-founded fears given the outcome of the revolt immediately after Gulf War I.
That would seem to be a possible answer to the question I posed in #67. . .
That's what I've been thinking! This has irritated me. We'll have to keep an eye on his column, that's for sure.
All I can say is $%^#! It's Lent, you know.
Looking at that Cockburn book now. It discusses this a bit in Chapter 7. Still absorbing it and it looks like a few factors were involved, but one thing mentioned on 166-167 is that, "Any Iraqi unit that defected en masse would certainly evoke a violent response from Saddam. . .Resisting the counterattack, therefore, would require help from the Pentagon in the form of air support. But the U.S. military was very dubious about involving itself in fighting in Iraq. 'I would go to the JCS. . .and say, 'If I can identify a military unit that is ready to mutiny, will you adopt it?'' recalls one CIA official involved in the Iraq operation. 'The answer was never yes. It was always 'We'll get back to you.'" Beyond that there is discussion of some stuff related to what's mentioned in the previous post. BTW, later in the chapter it looks like there's some interesting stuff on Bob Baer.
Wouldn't it be ironic if Miller has to go to jail in order to protect another Times employee?
Two days later, Clarke was on the Times Web site attacking Bush's anti-terrorism policies.
After 9/11 we did a good job as a nation in improving air passenger security, but few other vulnerabilities have been fixed: trains, chemical plants, cyber networks, Clarke wrote. We are still vulnerable to some types of biological and radiological attacks.
This guy is all defense, no offense. No vision.
All hat, no cattle.
"Wouldn't it be ironic if Miller has to go to jail in order to protect another Times employee?"
Maybe there's some rule or custom about that...
...Robert Novak: I’m going to tell you the same thing that I wrote in my column and that I said in a previous interview on CNN, and that was that I thought it was very strange that the missions in Niger should be done by a diplomat with no experience in counterproliferation, who was regarded as a critic of the war and, really, had no experience at the agency. So in interviewing a senior administration official on a number of other subjects, I asked him if he could explain why, and he said, “Well, his wife works in the counterproliferation section at the CIA and that she suggested his mission.” And it was given to me as an offhand manner and by a person who is, as I wrote in the column, not a partisan gunslinger by any means. The one thing I regret I wrote, I used the word “operative,” and I think Mr. Broder will agree that I use the word too much. I use it about hat politicians. I use it about people on the Hill. And if somebody did a Nexus search of my columns, they’d find an overuse of “operative.” I did not mean it. I don’t know what she did. But the indication given to me by this senior official and another senior official I checked with was not that she was deep undercover.Novak stuck to his story. I doubt if it was false he would keep making a record of it. So, who would be "a senior administration official" whom Novak would talk "on a number of other subjects". I'm thinking "recently retired" is no bar to the definition and it might be Clarke. Powell? Tenet? Some less known fellow?
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