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Politics : Bill Clinton Scandal - SANITY CHECK -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ish who wrote (12438)	11/2/1998 10:02:00 PM
From: Zoltan!	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 67261

The PBS site, pbs.org, has a Frontline report on Waco in which they reveal that the reports that lead to Reno's order to storm the compound were bogus. The local PBS station here had an excerpt from the series which detailed that the reports of child abuse were fabricated and the documentation for that was later found secreted in the basement of a law firm. PETER J. BOYER: The ATF defeat was complete. Now Waco was the FBI's crisis. Lord knows we all think we know a lot about what happened at Waco. But five months ago, in the basement of a Texas law firm, we discovered the Waco files_ 7,000 government photographs, wiretaps and hundreds of hours of telephone negotiation tapes that had never been revealed to the public. Together they provide an extraordinary inside view of the FBI's 51-day stand-off at Waco and the fiery conclusion that killed 75 Branch Davidians. These files unlock the real story of the Waco stand-off, what was going on inside the minds of the men whose day-by-day decisions added up to disaster. .... PETER J. BOYER: The HRT are ready with a plan. It's simple, aggressive and quick. Under the cover of darkness they would take the compound with Bradley tanks and gas. The Davidians, overwhelmed, would come out. They are ready to act, but first the plan must be approved by Washington. The record shows that using tanks and gas on a compound still holding 25 children was a tough sell to this attorney general. As a local prosecutor, Janet Reno had built a reputation as a zealous child advocate. And on Monday, April, 12th, she said no to the gas plan. The FBI didn't relent. They came back at the attorney general. "The plan's too aggressive,'' she said. Then they'll water it down. She worried the Davidians might use the children as shields. If they did, the FBI promised to back off. Most of all, she worried that the gas would permanently damage the children. A military expert assured her the gas was safe. For five days the FBI tried to eliminate her objections. After the Waco fire, Reno would say again and again that she authorized the gas plan because children were being abused. JANET RENO: [ABC News "Nightline''] We had had reports that they had been sexually abused, that babies had actually been beaten. I asked when I first heard that for them to verify it and, again, that was the report that was brought back. PETER J. BOYER: When she said, "I was told that babies were being beaten and I said, 'What do you mean? Babies are being picked up and beaten?' 'Yes,' I was told, 'babies were being beaten' ''_ WILLIAM SESSIONS: Then she will have to say who told her that. Certainly, I did not. PETER J. BOYER: She says she doesn't remember. WILLIAM SESSIONS: Well, if it was impressive_ something that impressed her tremendously, then she's responsible for what she heard. PETER J. BOYER: But FBI documents uncovered by FRONTLINE confirm that as the Bureau was pressuring Reno to approve the gas plan, someone in the FBI told her that children were being abused at Waco. But the FBI knew that children were not being beaten during the stand-off. [interviewing] At the time, what she said was, "I was told that babies were being beaten.'' She told me that she was told that. Web Hubbel told me that he heard her being told that. Did you tell her that? WILLIAM SESSIONS: No. PETER J. BOYER: It is still not known who had told Reno about the child abuse, but on Friday, April 16th, she changed her mind and approved the gas plan. The FBI is ready, but will the Davidians play the role the FBI has scripted for them? When the gas goes in, will they come out?... pbs.org

To: Ish who wrote (12438)	11/2/1998 11:31:00 PM
From: Daniel Schuh	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 67261

Very good word twisting, Ish, or should I say Bill? I wrote, precisely: Bunch of cowboy FBI agents left over from Reagan-Bush killed those kids. Reno hardly had a handle on the Justice department at that point, much less Clinton. You think that operation was directed from the White House? To elaborate, I think the FBI came up with the assault plan, because their previous plan of playing bad music and rabbit screams wasn't working. It worked with Manuel Noriega, but it wasn't working with Vernon. So they came up with another bad idea, and it went up the chain of command and got approved by people who didn't know any better. Suddenly, in your ever logical mind, this gets turned into: Slick was the president, Reno was the Atty. Gen. Lloyd Bentsen was the head of the ATF. Bush ordered the attack? You are a sick puppy. Next you'll be saying that Reagan shot Randy weaver's wife when she was nursing her baby. I didn't write Bush ordered the attack did I? Where did I write that? In your addled mind? The operation was early in the Clinton administration, and Clinton was very slow at getting control of the government in general and DoJ in particular. I would guess that most of the people involved in planning the Waco assault had no particular association with the Clinton administration, except that he was President. Reno probably knew more about it than Clinton, but she also probably was too new to just tell the FBI guys they were nuts. Then, of course, you throw in the ever tasteful Didn't know Vernon Jordan, Clinton's friend, was in to pedophile. So steamed up that grammar goes out the window along with taste, eh Bill? Vernon Howell was very much into young girls. More or less every one that was available to him in his little cult. It's unfortunate that nobody looked into the situation earlier. The whole thing was tragic. Nobody deserved to die, and I wish nobody had. There was a lot of stupidity on both sides. But to make it into another thing to preach Clinton hatred with is, well, typical. Yes, Bush was out of office. What did the FBI chain of command look like? How many people at the FBI had been appointed by Clinton, the root of all evil? Again, I never said that Bush ordered the attack, you invented that one. Clinton probably signed off on it, and he should have known better, but he didn't come up with the plan.