Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: epicure who wrote (137472)	6/22/2004 1:33:16 PM
From: Andrew N. Cothran	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

From NewsMax.com:CBS Airs New Footage of Clinton Denying Bin Laden Offer In an effort to counter the growing perception that President Clinton forfeited America's best chance to arrest Osama bin Laden before the 9/11 attacks, "CBS Evening News" anchorman Dan Rather aired new footage Monday night of Clinton strenuously denying that the government of Sudan ever offered to extradite the al Qaida mastermind. In a segment initially edited out of Sunday night's "60 Minutes" broadcast, Clinton tells Rather, "To the best of my knowledge it is not true that we were ever offered [bin Laden] by the Sudanese, even though they later claimed it. I think it's total bull." [More below...] In his remarks deleted from the original broadcast, the ex-president claimed: "Mr. Absurabi, the head of the Sudanese government, was a buddy of bin Laden's. They were business partners together. There was no way in the wide world this guy who was in business with bin Laden in Sudan was going to give him up to us." During Sunday night's telecast, the portion of Clinton's comments on the Sudanese offer aired by CBS was far more abbreviated. "I don't believe that is true," he said. "There was a story, which is factually inaccurate, that the Sudanese offered bin Laden to us. As far as I know, there is not a shred of evidence of that." The Clinton-CBS publicity machine racheted up denials about the Sudanese offer after talk radio stations from coast-to-coast aired audiotape on Monday of a Feb. 2002 speech where Mr. Clinton admitted that Sudan had indeed offered him bin Laden, but that he turned the offer down. "At the time, 1996, he had committed no crime against America so I did not bring him here because we had no basis on which to hold him, though we knew he wanted to commit crimes against America," the ex-president explained, in comments recorded exclusively by NewsMax.com. Clinton's characterization of the Sudanese story as "bull" was first reported Thursday by the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz, based on his interview with Mr. Rather. But "60 Minutes" spokesman Kevin Tedesco insisted to NewsMax later in the day that Clinton never uttered the word "bull," explaining instead that the Mr. Rather had attributed the word to Mr. Clinton erroneously. "Clinton never used the word 'bull.' That was Dan Rather's word. Clinton never said that," Tedesco said. "60 Minutes" declined NewsMax.com's offer to share its recording of Clinton admitting he had turned down the Sudanese offer, and instead let Clinton's denial stand unchallenged. In a March staff report issued by the Sept. 11 Commission, commission investigators said that every Sudanese official interviewed about the bin Laden offer confirmed the story, while every Clinton official they spoke to denied it. In his own April 9 interview with the Commission, Mr. Clinton said he'd been "misquoted" in reports claiming that he had confirmed the bin Laden offer. 9/11 Commissioner Bob Kerrey said two days later that at the time of Clinton's interrogation, he was unaware that staffers had obtained a videotape of Clinton's 2002 speech where he detailed the Sudanese offer. Mr. Clinton's expanded denials were posted to the CBS News Web site after the Monday's "CBS Evening News" broadcast.