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Politics : John Kerry for President Free speach thread NON-CENSORED -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: American Spirit who wrote (236)	10/28/2004 5:54:42 PM
From: StockDung	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1449

Explosive news Debra J. Saunders Thursday, October 28, 2004 AS THE New York Times put it Wednesday, "The New York Times, working with the CBS News program '60 Minutes', reported that the (380 tons of powerful) explosives at al Qaqaa, mainly HMX and RDX, had disappeared since the invasion." There's one little problem: The Times doesn't know that the high-power explosives "disappeared" after the invasion. And it doesn't speak well for the Gray Lady that if fails to recognize, three days into this story, that it is reporting as fact assertions its reporters haven't nailed down. "I've never seen such a flagrant intervention from the media," Rep. Peter King, R-New York, told me over the phone Wednesday. "60 Minutes" already has a bad story in its basket -- the phony National Guard smear on President Bush. The New York Times attributed the missing weapons to looting before interviewing anyone from the Army's 101st Airborne Division, King noted. Worse, the source of the story is International Atomic Energy Agency Director-General Mohamed El-Baradei, whose reappointment has been opposed by the Bush administration. There is no proof that Saddam Hussein or his Baathist lieutenants didn't raid the stock before the invasion. Yet days into the story, the New York Times is sticking with its first impression. Oh, and here's a little item you have to go to the New York Sun to read: U.S. weapons inspector Charles Duelfer had asked the IAEA to remove the al Qaqaa bombs in 1995 -- but the IAEA refused. As Duelfer told the Sun, "The policy was if acquired for the WMD program and used for it, it should be subject to destruction. The HMX was just that. Nevertheless, the IAEA decided to let Iraq keep the stuff, like, they needed more explosives." So the source of the NYT story about Bush letting the bad bombs get away was the agency that was supposed to destroy the weapons but chose instead to let Hussein keep them. Sen. John Kerry doesn't care. Camp Kerry jumped on the issue and started running TV spots bashing Bush for losing the explosives as "misjudgments" that could cost American lives. Bush is right that Kerry was wrong to embrace this story "60 Minutes"- style before it has been verified. But the real issue is that Kerry has blamed Bush for everything. Why is Osama bin Laden still alive? It's because of Bush. (Forget that Kerry voiced no qualms about diverting troops from the hunt for bin Laden to a hunt for Hussein when he voted authority for the war.) Kerry has spent the war -- well, the war since support for it softened in the polls -- speaking as if the war would be going so much better if only he were in charge. Kerry promised the United States would have real allies -- unhindered by the fact that his rhetoric undermines allies who already have shed blood in Iraq. Kerry promises more troops -- while bashing Bush for the war's price tag. Kerry spinner Joe Lockhart explained that Bush is responsible for the missing bombs because of his decision not to listen to Army Chief of Staff Erik Shinseki, who told Bush to send more troops to Iraq, when Lockhart knows Bush listened to another general, Tommy Franks, who insisted it wasn't necessary. This criticism is over the top. Is it unpatriotic to criticize Bush on Iraq? Certainly there are patriots who always opposed the war, and can't be expected to stop criticizing Bush now. Kerry, however, voted for the war, so he shouldn't be talking in a way that undermines victory by essentially elevating every setback and ignoring every victory. Things are better in Iraq, King noted, than anyone would guess from the media coverage. (King just got back from his latest trip to Iraq last week.) He remembers visiting last year and being surprised to see an amusement park in Mosul so jammed its parking lots overflowed. On this trip, he saw a Baghdad with schools and a hospital reopened. Because Americans don't see that Baghdad on their TVs, he noted, they are "much less supportive than they would be if they saw everything that was happening over there." To listen to Kerry, there is only failure in Iraq. What happens if Kerry is elected, I asked Sen. Joe Biden, D-Dela., on a conference call, and high-profile ordnance is looted, there are more problems in military prisons and bin Laden is thought to be located but then not captured? Will all that be on Kerry's doorstep? "Sure," Biden answered. "We're going to inherit a God-awful mess." Which I take to mean that anything that goes wrong in a Kerry White House will still be Bush's fault. E-mail Debra J. Saunders at dsaunders@sfchronicle.com. Page B - 9

To: American Spirit who wrote (236)	10/28/2004 6:10:39 PM
From: StockDung	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1449

Alleged American Al Qaeda Warns of U.S. Attacks Azzam the American: 'Streets of America Will Run Red With Blood' A man identified only as "Azzam the American" appears on a tape saying America faces a new wave of terror attacks. (ABC News)http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=206661 By BRIAN ROSS NEW YORK, Oct. 28, 2004 — A man describing himself as an American member of al Qaeda says a new wave of terror attacks against the United States could come "at any moment," according to a videotape obtained by ABC News. From the ABCNEWS Investigative Unit: Daily Investigative Report Alleged American Al Qaeda Warns of U.S. Attacks Poll Watchers to Crowd Voting Venues Person of the Week: Complete Coverage Watch Brian Ross' full report on ABC's "World News Tonight with Peter Jennings" at 6:30 p.m. ET. The tape was acquired by ABC News last Friday from a source known to have Taliban and al Qaeda contacts in the tribal region of Pakistan. ABC paid the source $500 in transportation fees. While CIA officials say they have not been able to authenticate the 75-minute tape, an agency spokesman says it "appears to have been produced by al Qaeda's media organization, al Sahab productions." The tape is marked with the same logo and graphics seen on previous videos released by al Qaeda. The man on the tape is identified only as "Azzam the American." U.S. officials say they had not previously known of the nom de guerre. His face is never fully visible and he makes no reference to where in the United States he might have lived. "No, my fellow countrymen you are guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty. You are as guilty as Bush and Cheney. You're as guilty as Rumsfeld and Ashcroft and Powell," he says in what he calls his message to America. "After decades of American tyranny and oppression, now it's our turn to die. Allah willing, the streets of America will run red with blood matching drop for drop the blood of America's victims." "A member of al Qaeda who professes to be a U.S. citizen was always coveted and looked for by the al Qaeda," said Jack Cloonan, a former FBI agent who interviewed a number of captured al Qaeda members and is now an ABC News consultant. Cloonan said he believed the tape to be authentic. Law enforcement officials and linguistic expert Gerald Lampe, deputy director of the National Foreign Language Center at the University of Maryland, believe English was not Azzam's first language. They speculate he may have learned English as a child in a household of non-native speakers. U.S. officials believe there are several Americans working with al Qaeda, including Adam Gadahn, a former Southern California student who is wanted for questioning by the FBI. U.S. intelligence officials say the voice on the tape does not match Gadahn's or that of any Americans suspected of being part of al Qaeda. Azzam makes references to several American officials, including 9/ll Commission Chairman Tom Kean, and even refers to the controversial remarks made by comedian Bill Maher about the cowardice of the U.S. launching cruise missiles compared with terrorist suicide attacks. And he warned that Sept. 11 was only the beginning. "People of America, I remind you of the weighty words of our leaders, Osama bin Laden and Dr. Ayman al-Zawahri, that what took place on Sept. l1 was but the opening salvo of the global war on America," said Azzam. "And that Allah willing, the magnitude and ferocity of what is coming your way will make you forget all about Sept. 11."