LGF - Bob Kerrey: A Disgrace
By the way...
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I’ve never seen anything like the spectacle that played out today at the 9/11 hearings. Bob Kerrey was just awful, grilling Condolleeza Rice in a sneering, disrespectful manner, talking over her responses and then accusing her of filibustering, and launching into an extended rant about Iraq that had nothing to do with the subject at hand.
And the spectators were applauding.
He made one good point: that we’re in a war with radical Islam, not “terror.” Then he proceeded to show that his understanding of the issue was about one micron deep, by whining about “enraging the Arab street” like a classic dhimmi.
It was sad and infuriating; political grandstanding at its very worst, over the bodies of the Americans murdered on that bright September morning.
Kerrey is a war hero. But he disgraced his medals today, in my opinion.<font size=3>
NEW YORK TIMES
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Despite Panel Leader's Appeal, Partisanship Seeps Through<font size=3>
By TERENCE NEILAN
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It was hardly the nonpartisan hearing that the 9/11 commission leaders had planned for, and considerable parts of the questioning seemed to center on the same issue: a memo from President Bush's daily briefing on Aug. 6, 2001, and its related subject, Al Qaeda.
"Swatting flies" was also a phrase that punctuated the hearing.
Quite notably, too, the spectators broke into frequent applause, and, on seven occasions, even laughter.
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And if some of the questioning was pointed, even visibly impatient at times, Condoleezza Rice and the panel managed to maintain a largely courteous atmosphere.
Time and again, Ms. Rice referred to the "structural" problems that existed in Washington, with a failure to share domestic and foreign intelligence that could provide "a product" for policymakers that they could rely on.
Fly-swatting came up when Ms. Rice said a number of times that Mr. Bush had made it clear to his officials that he did not want to respond to Al Qaeda one attack at a time. "He was tired of swatting flies," she said. The phrase was later picked up a Democratic member of the panel, Bob Kerrey, who wondered why more swatting of flies had not been carried out.
Fred Fielding, a Republican member of the panel, who said there was no other way to describe what happened on Sept. 11 other than "an intelligence failure."
"I don't think anyone will kid ourselves that we didn't suffer one," he said.
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Two Democrats were the most avid in their pursuit of information, while stating their own points of views at the same time.
Richard Ben-Veniste, a former Watergate prosecutor, led the charge, followed closely by Mr. Kerrey<font size=3>, who stood out by also lauding Ms. Rice for her "extraordinary" accomplishments and saying he was quite moved by the story of her life.
Together they, and other panel members, cited the Aug. 6 briefing and the memo that came out of it, close to 20 times. The memo covered ground that included the knowledge that Al Qaeda cells existed in the United States and warnings that planes could be hijacked, but not, Ms. Rice insisted, that they could be used as "missiles."
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Mr. Ben-Veniste and Ms. Rice clashed almost immediately, the two interrupting each other a total of four times as soon as Mr. Ben-Veniste had completed his initial question
A similar number of interruptions were to follow as the former prosecutor pressed Ms. Rice on what she had, and had not, told Mr. Bush about intelligence findings.
Later Ms. Rice returned Mr. Kerrey's compliments about her achievements by referring in an admiring way to a speech he had given that mentioned the attack on the destroyer Cole and recommended the way to deal with it was to deal with Saddam Hussein.<font size=3>
The following at times lighthearted exchange took place:
Mr. Kerrey: "I presume you read it in the last few days?"
Ms. Rice: "Oh, no, I read it quite a bit before that. It's an asymmetric approach. Now, you can decide that every time al Qaeda—— "
Mr. Kerrey: "So you're saying that you didn't have a military response against the Cole because of my speech?"
Ms. Rice: "I'm saying — I'm saying — no."
Mr. Kerrey: "That had I not given that speech, you would have attacked them?"
Ms. Rice: "No. I'm just saying that I think it was a brilliant way to think about it. It was a way of thinking about it strategically, not tactically."
Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company |
