Free Republic

People manage to survive in Washington, DC while adding nothing to the commonweal, and sometimes doing substantial damage. They have the dirt on their rivals, they know who’s butt to kiss or they just have a canny instinct that enables them to artfully duck at the right moment. I’m not sure which describes Jamie Gorelick, but like Arnold Schwarzenegger at the end of a Terminator Movie, it seems you can predict that she’ll be back. This time, perhaps, as President Barack Obama’s new Attorney General. In revolutionary France, Minister Talleyrand had a similar career to Jamie Gorelick. He worked for...

"...One Jamie Gorelick is this American. And without pretending that she caused the loss of countless thousands of lives and countless billions of dollars of wealth by herself, she certainly did push some of the early domino's in catastrophic chain events that are a major factors in life in America today...Gorelick, an appointee of Bill Clinton, is the one who constructed the wall of separation that kept the CIA and the FBI from comparing notes and therefore invading the privacy of nice young men like, say, Muhammed Atta and Zacarius Moussaoui. While countless problems were uncovered in our intelligence operations...

In his interview with CBS News, Obama says: Logan: Because you do have a situation seven years on into this war where Osama bin Laden and all his lieutenants and all the leaders of the Taliban, they’re still there. And they’re inside Pakistan. Obama: Right. It’s a huge problem. And first of all, if we hadn’t taken our eye off the ball, we might have caught them before they got into Pakistan and were able to reconstitute themselves. Several times in recent interviews, Obama has referred to "taken our eye off the ball" in terms of the invasion of Iraq,...

Janet Reno's No. 2 possible AG for ObamaJamie Gorelick accused of treating terror suspects as mere criminals Posted: June 13, 2008 10:45 pm Eastern By Jerome R. Corsi © 2008 WorldNetDaily NEW YORK – A panel of Democratic Party legal heavyweights speculated Jamie Gorelick, former deputy attorney general in the Clinton administration, could be appointed attorney general if Barack Obama were elected president. In a panel chaired by Elena Kagan, dean and professor of law at Harvard Law School, Gorelick charged on the opening plenary panel of the American Constitution's Society two-day meeting in Washington that the Bush administration had...

WINSTON-SALEM -- U.S. District Court Judge James Beaty Jr. on Tuesday denied a motion for sanctions filed by Duke University and the City of Durham and ruled that the legal team for 38 members of the 2005-06 Duke lacrosse team had violated ethical rules by using a Web site, news conference and news release to publicize the filing of their case. The players have filed a civil rights lawsuit against Duke and the city, demanding reparations arising from the since dismissed Duke lacrosse sexual offense case. Beaty also ruled, however, that the content published on that Web site -- www.dukelawsuit.com...

Not What They Supposed The terror connection missed by the Clintonistas. by Stephen F. Hayes Four months after the start of the Iraq war, two former senior Clinton administration national security officials took to the pages of the New York Times to demand accountability for the Bush administration's claims about Iraq and terrorism. Or, as they put it in their opening sentence, "Iraq's supposed links to terrorists." Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon wrote that the Bush administration's assertions about Iraqi support for terrorism were "suspect" and demanded scrutiny. One sure way to know the truth about Iraq and terrorism, they...

Since murdering nearly 3,000 Americans on a single day six-and-a-half years ago, al-Qaeda has not ceased plotting new mass-murder attacks against the United States. The terror network’s rigorous training regimen puts a premium on schooling its operatives in counter-interrogation tactics. Defeating those tactics requires keeping jihadists in the dark about the treatment to which they may be subjected if captured. Al-Qaeda’s operational ignorance of our techniques makes our interrogations more effective, leading to intelligence that prevents new atrocities. These uncontroversial facts make it difficult to understand why congressional Democrats want to hand our enemies the playbook — literally, an actual...

House Inaction Left America Open To Attack By SENATOR MITCH McCONNELL Posted Monday, February 25, 2008 4:30 PM PT In the wake of 9/11, Americans were stunned to learn that our own intelligence officials had information on some of the hijackers even before the attacks. Three years later, Congress created the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to prevent similar gaps in intelligence gathering. Its nonpartisan director oversees 16 agencies and advises the president and Congress on how best to detect terrorist plots. But now, when it comes to intercepting the communications of terrorists overseas, the Democrats' leadership in...

In the wake of 9/11, Americans were stunned to learn that our own intelligence officials had information on some of the hijackers even before the attacks. Three years later, Congress created the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to prevent similar gaps in intelligence gathering. Its nonpartisan director oversees 16 agencies and advises the president and Congress on how best to detect terrorist plots. But now, when it comes to intercepting the communications of terrorists overseas, the Democrats' leadership in the House of Representatives has decided that his advice is optional. The consequences of inaction are real: Last Saturday,...

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed planned and helped execute the 9/11 attacks that killed 3,000 Americans. He also planned the 1993 World Trade Center Attack, the attacks in Bali and Kenya that killed hundreds more, and attacks that never had the chance to take place thanks to his capture and interrogation by American intelligence agents. We know this because KSM himself openly brags about his atrocities as a point of pride. Now some have decided to help him commit his final atrocity -- by painting himself as a victim: On Monday, some six years after 9/11, military prosecutors filed charges against Khalid...

See link for video -- John Boehner leads Republicans out of the House, protesting the Democrats not addressing FISA extension.

The House will allow the current FISA legislation to lapse rather than address the differences between the their version of the extension and the one passed by the Senate on Tuesday. Democrats wanted yet another three-week extension to kick the can down the road again, and petulantly dropped consideration when both opponents and advocates of the Senate plan refused to agree. Now they're saying the lapse in the FISA legislation will have no effect -- as long as no new terrorist groups arise: Democrats insisted that a lapse would have no real effect. The expiration of the powers “doesn’t mean...

AND NOW . . . amidst billowing clouds of fragrant, aromatic first- and second-hand premium cigar smoke. . . it is time for . . . that harmless, lovable little fuzz ball, the highly-trained broadcast specialist, having more fun than a human being should be allowed to have, from behind the golden EIB microphone, firmly ensconced in the prestigious Attila-the-Hun chair at the Limbaugh Institute of Advanced Conservative Studies, with talent on loan from G-d, at the cutting-edge of societal evolution, with half his brain tied behind his back — just to make it fair, the all-knowing, all-caring, all-sensing, all-feeling,...

Federal authorities say a high-level Muslim Pentagon aide, who led a campaign to silence a Pentagon intelligence analyst for taking a hard line against Islam, is running an "influence operation" on behalf of U.S. Muslim groups fronting for the radical Muslim Brotherhood. Hesham H. Islam (left), Muslim aide to the deputy secretary of defense, with Muslim military chaplain Abuhena M. Saifulislam (right) Hesham H. Islam, a special assistant to deputy Defense secretary Gordon England, recently criticized Maj. Stephen Coughlin, one of the military's leading authorities on Islamic war doctrine, for making the connection between the religion of Islam and terrorism....

NOTE: Although Hillary Clinton touts her foreign policy experience, being right there with her husband, the New York Times' Patrick Healy reports that she did not have a security clearance and did not sit in on NSC briefings. Now recall this from the late David Hackworth. Monica Lewinsky did have TOP SECRET clearance. Perhaps she should be the one in the Dem primaries touting her experience. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ DEFENDING AMERICA David H. Hackworth 17 March 98 LOOSE LIPS, SINK SHIPS.. While at the Pentagon, Monica Lewinsky traveled with Defense Secretary William Cohen, sat in on briefings where the highest secrets...

WASHINGTON – It's no longer just a charge of copyright violation in the case of Michael Savage v. Council on American-Islamic Relations. Now the radio talk star is going for the legal jugular in his battle with the group that bills itself as a Muslim civil rights organization. The San Francisco-based talker has amended his lawsuit against CAIR for misusing audio clips of his show as part of a boycott campaign against his three-hour daily program to include charges the group "has consistently sought to silence opponents of violent terror through economic blackmail, frivolous but costly lawsuits, threats of lawsuits...

Seven days prior to events which would set the world on-edge, newly-hired Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria "Torie" Clarke offered an equally startling admission to Agency France Presse wire service, but which received scant attention within U.S. media. On September 5, Ms. Clarke--lured back into government service by pal Mary Matalin on Vice President Dick Cheney's staff, from a high-paying post as Manhattan office director for the venerable public relations firm of Hill & Knowlton--the former PR chief to Senator John McCain and one-time George Bush (the elder) staffer would divulge to foreign media that the United States, via the Pentagon and...

View the photo essay at the link - http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2007/11/questions-for-clintons-vin-gupta-and.html

It may seem odd to call a 24-year veteran of the House of Representatives an outsider. But Rep. Duncan Hunter, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, has made a career out of bucking Washington's insiders. And his latest stand is a tribute to the way representative democracy is supposed to work. You see, Hunter did not rush with the Washington crowd to "reform" the nation's intelligence system. In fact, he is being cast as a villain for blocking a bill that all the insiders were pushing. Hunter correctly saw that the bill would have gutted the ability of our...

Huma Abedin & Hillary Clinton May 6, 2000     Syed Zainul Abedin VARIATIONS: Syed, Sayed, Zainul, Zainal, Zaiunul, Abedin, Abedīn, etc Huma Abedin's father, Syed Zainul Abedin, was born in India, in 1928 [prior to the partition]. It is possible that he was named for the fourth Imam, Ali Ibn el Hussain, Zainul Abedeen, also known as Zayn al-Abidin. Syed Zainul Abedin's undergraduate education was at Aligarh Muslim University, and his graduate education was at the University of Pennsylvania, where he received his PhD, in American Civilization, in 1974: Franklin Library, University of Pennsylvania: Syed Zainul Abedin He seems...

Finally, Hillary Clinton is getting some moderately tough questions. People are finally noticing that in answering questions, she follows the advice of Yogi Berra: "If you come to a fork in the road, take it." At Tuesday's Democratic debate, when asked whether she supports Spitzer's plan to license illegals.....Clinton's response can be summarized as: Yes, no, maybe, sorta, kinda. Before the press corps relapses into its coma and Clinton's competitors go back to hiding from her shadow, let's see if she can answer a few more questions:

Bill Clinton addressed a crowd in Minneapolis, Minnesota at a fundraiser for his wife's campaign on Tuesday. Clinton's 50-minute speech, which started about an hour behind schedule, was derailed briefly by several hecklers in the audience who shouted that the 2001 terrorist attacks were a fraud. Rather than ignoring them, Clinton seemed to relish a direct confrontation. "A fraud? No, it wasn't a fraud," Clinton said, as the crowd cheered him on. "I'll be glad to talk to you if you shut up and let me talk." When another heckler shouted that the attacks were an "inside job," Clinton took...

RICHMOND -- Two Republican state legislators are accusing Gov. Timothy M. Kaine and other Democrats of embracing radical Islamic organizations that support terrorism, an allegation that has outraged the governor and Muslim leaders, who say the GOP is resorting to fear-mongering to win votes. As Republicans work to retain their majorities in the General Assembly, the two delegates from the Shenandoah Valley say they are conducting an investigation into Democrats' ties to the Muslim American Society and Dar Al Hijrah Islamic Center, both in Falls Church.

2008 candidate Giuliani’s speech just one of a slew of issues causing anger NEW YORK - Once again, the city will pause for four moments of silence to mark the attacks that killed more than 2,700 people. Family members will lay flowers where the twin towers fell, and the names of victims will be read. But much will be different on the sixth anniversary of Sept. 11, after tense arguments about where to hold the ceremony, whether a presidential candidate should be allowed to speak and if it's still fitting to put on such a large-scale commemoration. Firefighters, first responders...

A little over three years after Pan Am Flight 103 blew up over Lockerbie, Scotland, Fred D. Thompson provided advice to a colleague about one of his law firm’s new clients: The man representing the two Libyan intelligence officials charged in the terrorist bombing. The colleague, John Culver, a partner at the Washington firm of Arent Fox Kintner Plotkin & Kahn began advising the two suspects’ Libyan lawyer in February 1992. Mr. Thompson, according to a memorandum from that era written by his secretary, held “discussions with Culver re: Libya” that same month. At the time, Libya was facing international...

WASHINGTON - It took an act of Congress to force the CIA to lift the veil on its watchdog's internal investigation that lays out the agency's many failures in the months and years before Sept. 11, 2001. Three CIA directors disparaged the document. Multiple requests under the Freedom of Information Act collected dust. Finally, on Tuesday, with the clock ticking on Congress' 30-day deadline to release the report, CIA Director Michael Hayden reluctantly caved in. Completed in June 2005, the report lays out in greater detail what has long been known: The CIA's top leaders failed to use their available...

The CIA's top leaders failed to use their available powers, never developed a comprehensive plan to stop al-Qaida and missed crucial opportunities to thwart two hijackers in the run-up to Sept. 11, the agency's own watchdog concluded in a bruising report released Tuesday. Completed in June 2005 and kept classified until now, the 19-page executive summary finds extensive fault with the actions of senior CIA leaders and others beneath them. "The agency and its officers did not discharge their responsibilities in a satisfactory manner," the CIA inspector general found. "They did not always work effectively and cooperatively," *snip* Yet the...

WASHINGTON - The CIA's top leaders failed to use their available powers, never developed a comprehensive plan to stop al-Qaida and missed crucial opportunities to thwart two hijackers in the run-up to Sept. 11, the agency's own watchdog concluded in a bruising report released Tuesday. Completed in June 2005 and kept classified until now, the 19-page executive summary finds extensive fault with the actions of senior CIA leaders and others beneath them. "The agency and its officers did not discharge their responsibilities in a satisfactory manner," the CIA inspector general found. "They did not always work effectively and cooperatively," the...

WASHINGTON (AP) - Congress sent President Bush legislation Friday to intensify anti-terror efforts in the U.S., shifting money to high-risk states and cities and expanding screening of air and sea cargo to stave off future Sept. 11-style attacks. The measure carries out major recommendations of the independent 9/11 Commission. The bill, passed by the House on a 371-40 vote, ranks among the top accomplishments of the six-month-old Democratic Congress. The Senate approved the measure late Thursday by 85-8, and the White House said the president would sign the bill. Six years after the Sept. 11 attacks and three years after...

Investigation into pilfered documents reveals former president signed letter President Bill Clinton signed a letter authorizing former National Security Adviser Sandy Berger's access to classified documents that later came up missing, according to a newly released investigation report by the National Archives and Records Administration. The sensitive drafts of the National Security Council's "Millennium After Action Review" on the Clinton administration's handling of the al-Qaida terror threats in December 1999 suspiciously disappeared after Berger said he intended to "determine if Executive Privilege needed to be exerted prior to documents being provided to the 9/11 Commission." Then-Attorney General John Ashcroft testified...

Nearly 11 years after a fuel tank exploded on TWA Flight 800, killing 230 people off the South Shore of Long Island, a congressional committee voted yesterday to force the Federal Aviation Administration to act to prevent similar explosions. The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee added language to the Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization Act that would require the federal government to make so-called inerting systems standard equipment on commercial airlines. If passed by the full Congress, the FAA would have to require the installation of the safety equipment on the nation's commercial fleet to begin by the end of the...

Shades of the Old Rudy! America's Mayor provided the most electrifying moment of Tuesday night's GOP presidential debate when he ripped into Rep. Ron Paul for suggesting that U.S. foreign policy invited the 9/11 attacks. "That's an extraordinary statement," said a clearly indignant Rudy Giuliani, as he demanded that Paul retract the assertion. "I don't think I've ever heard that before, and I've heard some pretty absurd explanations for Sept. 11." Good for him. Most of Rudy's rivals doubtless thought it best just to ignore the Texas oddball's isolationist rant. But Giuliani decided otherwise - and he was right to...

Most terrorists seem like bumbling losers if they're caught before the act: That's certainly true of the Fort Dix jihadists who took their terrorist training DVD to the local audio store to be copied. It was also true of the Islamists arrested in Toronto last year for plotting to behead the prime minister, one of whose cell members had a bride who wanted him to sign a prenup committing him to jihad. The Heathrow plotters arrested while planning to blow up U.S.-bound airliners included a Muslim convert who'd started out as the son of a British Conservative Party official with...

"After a thorough reading of the report it would not be unreasonable to conclude as I have that there was a cover-up at high levels of our government and, it appears to have been substantial and coordinated...The question is why? And that question regrettably will go unanswered. Unlike some other cover-ups, this one succeeded.” – Independent Counsel David M. Barrett on the censoring of The Barrett Report. If you have been experiencing a sneaking suspicion that there is a lot of one-sided interest where investigations into political malfeasance are concerned at the US Justice Department, you’re not alone. From the...

The recent disbarment of Lynne Stewart is one of the latest examples of what is wrong with using the law-enforcement approach to dealing with terrorism. Not only is there the fact that all too often, treating terrorism as a criminal matter to be dealt with by law enforcement agencies, leads to terrorists going back onto the street, but there are problems with the lawyers. Stewart was convicted for providing material support to terrorists while she was representing Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman during his terrorism trial. One of the things she did was pass messages to Rahman's supporters – including exhortations...

I visited Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse in Florida, one of the tallest in the nation. I climbed to the top of the 175 foot tower. Though totally protected by a fence, a mild case of vertigo kept my back pressed against the hall while I enjoyed the spectacular view. Then it hit me. On 9/11 thousands of my fellow Americans, who simply showed up for work, were faced with the unimaginable horrifying choice of whether to be consumed by fire or jump from the towers. Innocent moms, dads, sisters, brothers, sons and daughters clueless of the danger were tortured...

If anyone watched the Fox News report titled, "Socks, Papers, Scissors" hosted by David Asman, the conclusion was that the Justice Department was aware that Berger stole and destroyed some of the most sensitive documents in the National Archives - and yet failed to notify the 911 Commission priof to Berger testifying. Berger was sworn in under oath - and gave his testimony to the commission who was unaware of what he did? It wasn't until much later that they were told - after the report was printed and distributed. A commission member said he was shocked to hear that...

The first face-to-face confrontation of the 2008 presidential race is looming over a US Senate inquiry into health problems suffered by workers at New York’s ground zero after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. As the chairwoman of a Senate subcommittee investigating complaints that workers were misled about air quality after the collapse of the twin towers, Senator Hillary Clinton, the Democrat front-runner for the presidential nomination, confirmed last week that she is considering calling Rudolph Giuliani, the former mayor of New York and the leading Republican contender, to testify at a public hearing. The health committee’s inquiry has...

The bell has just rung on the 2008 presidential sweepstakes and already more entries have crowded into the gates than the American grandstand can count, much less account for. That's all to the good, as the only winners over the past two decades have been named either Bush or Clinton. Still, since nothing less than the fate of the nation seems to be at stake, it is imperative that all candidates be measured... --snip--     Deeply frustrated by nine seasons of blockading by Clinton lawyers and Democratic congressmen, Mr. Barrett issued a statement saying, "An accurate title for the report would...

(AP) WASHINGTON -- A lengthy Senate investigation has debunked charges by a Republican congressman that military analysts identified Mohamad Atta and other Sept. 11 hijackers before the attacks, according to a committee aide familiar with the report. In a letter to members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sens. Pat Roberts and John D. Rockefeller dismissed suggestions by Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa., that defense analysts ignored analysis that could have prevented the attacks. Roberts, R-Kan., is outgoing chairman and Rockefeller, of West Virginia, is the senior Democrat who will assume the chairmanship next month. They concluded "there was no evidence Mohamad...

WASHINGTON (AP) - The FBI failed to fully investigate information suggesting other suspects may have helped Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols with the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, allowing questions to linger more than a decade after the deadly attack, a congressional inquiry concludes. The House International Relations investigative subcommittee will release the findings of its two-year-review as early as Wednesday, declaring there is no conclusive evidence of a foreign connection to the attack but that far too many unanswered questions remain. The subcommittee's report will conclude there is no doubt McVeigh and Nichols were the main perpetrators, and it discloses...

Deconstructing Clinton is a lot easier than parsing sentences. Language has its own structure and rules, what we call grammar and syntax. It is these things that allow us to communicate efficiently with each other, even when we are not schooled in the rules of language. But in Clinton’s post-modernist world there are no rules because there is no reality. Existence is a matter of opinion and reality is what I think it ought to be. In such a world facts are fiction and fiction is reality with each reality being as good as any other. Hence whatever I say...

The federal judge who ordered a halt to the Bush administration's program of domestic wiretapping on Thursday allowed the surveillance to continue for a week to allow an appeals court to weigh in on an issue expected to end up with the U.S. Supreme Court. U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor in Detroit denied the Justice Department's request for a lengthy stay pending an appeal of her August ruling that the National Security Agency's surveillance program violates the civil rights of Americans. Instead, Taylor gave the government a seven-day window to get a stay from the federal appeals court in...

HILLARY'S FECKLESS 'DEFENSE' OF BILL WILL DAMAGE BOTH CLINTONSTHE CHRIS WALLACE INTERVIEW BLOWBACK by Mia T, 9.27.06 I think my husband did a great job in demonstrating that Democrats are not going to take these attacks. All you have to do is read the 9/11 Commission [Report] to know what he and his administration did to protect Americans and prevent terrorist attacks against our country. hillary clinton, 9.26.06 hat was it exactly that impelled missus clinton to rush to her husband's 'defense' within hours of the broadcast of his now infamous interview by Chris Wallace? 1 Was it the...

new blockbuster book by WASHINGTON TIMES reporter Bill Gertz exposes how China recruited at least three CIA officers as spies, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned. Gertz writes in 'ENEMIES: HOW AMERICA'S FOES STEAL OUR SECRETS, AND HOW WE LET IT HAPPEN,' that details about the spies were first discovered in 1999 by counterspies who were able to trace some of the money paid by Beijing. Chinese intelligence paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to the spies, and one CIA officer alone got some $600,000 in Chinese money. Gertz discloses for the first time how spies were recruited by members of...

I didn't know if there was a west coast version of this thread. It didn't make sense to post on thread for the show that was almost over on the East Coast.

Of all the 9/11 anniversary coverage this morning, FNC was absolutely the best, letting the unadulterated tape tell the story of that savage September day.Of course, there were others, and as you might have guessed in advance, CNN's was easily the worst. Most notably, not once was Flight 175's actual impact into the South Tower ever shown. But one particularly ugly moment immediately floated to the top of the CNN bowl. Former Dem Congressman (he didn't last long) and former 'd-list' DLC hack Tim Roemer was given 5 minutes by CNN to make a free, but utterly tasteless & depraved...

The report of the September 11 Commission, once a best seller and hailed by the news media as the definitive word on the subject, must now be moved to the fiction shelves. The commission concluded...the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon couldn't have been prevented. Able Danger has changed all of that. The problem was...Jamie Gorelick. What may be a bigger scandal is that the staff of the September 11 Commission knew of Able Danger and what it had found, but made no mention of it in its report. This is as if the commission that investigated...

This may be useful at various 9/11 events. Poster has a 9/11/2001 image of New York City and New York Harbor. I've added some information about Able Danger and appropriate quotes for this solemn, sad day. Never Forget. Never Again. Download instructions to download/save PDF version to desktop. : Scroll down to the Click on the Download for free with... Basic Scroll to the Click here to begin your download link. Left click to download/save. Double click to open, then and print the 9-sheet color artwork (trim 1-2 edges, then glue stick or tape into the large poster) Takes only...