Freeh decries Clinton’s ‘moral compass’
Clinton spokesman: Book ‘a total work of fiction’
Friday, October 7, 2005; Posted: 5:48 a.m. EDT (09:48 GMT)
In his upcoming book, “My FBI,” Freeh says Clinton failed to pressure Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah to let the FBI question suspects the kingdom had in custody.
“Bill Clinton raised the subject only to tell the crown prince that he understood the Saudis’ reluctance to cooperate and then he hit Abdullah up for a contribution to the Clinton library,” Freeh writes.
. . .
Jay Carson, Clinton’s spokesman, said Freeh “wasn’t even present for the meetings he describes. President Clinton repeatedly pressed the Saudis for cooperation on the Khobar Towers investigation and his pressure led to the eventual indictments.”
Clinton aides challenge claim by ex-FBI chief
By Howard Kurtz
The Washington Post
Under strong pressure from former President Clinton’s advisers, CBS’ “60 Minutes” has agreed to read a statement denying a charge being made on tonight’s program by former FBI Director Louis Freeh.
In the statement, Sandy Berger, Clinton’s national-security adviser, challenges Freeh’s assertion, also made in his new book, that Clinton failed to press Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah to cooperate with an investigation of the 1996 bombing of Khobar Towers in that country, and used the occasion to ask for a contribution to his presidential library.
It’s a little strange how every mainstream news story about Freeh’s book and upcoming 60 Minutes appearance include, or are even dominated by, a pro-Clinton counter-point. The above articles are among the current top matches. Search Google or Yahoo and see for yourself.
It’s as if they wouldn’t report the story until they had some opposing points to print with it. Wouldn’t it be great if they did this every time? Unlike say how Richard Clarke, Paul O’Neill, and Dan Rather (speaking for Bill Burkett) got to sucker punch Bush on prime time TV during the 2004 presidential campaign.
The following article provides some counter-counter-point in support of Freeh.
How the Left Undermined America’s Security Before 9/11
By David Horowitz
FrontPageMagazine.com | September 9, 2005
Underlying the Clinton security failure was the fact that the administration was made up of people who for 25 years had discounted or minimized the totalitarian threat, opposed America’s armed presence abroad, and consistently resisted the deployment of America’s military forces to halt Communist expansion. National Security Advisor Sandy Berger was himself a veteran of the Sixties “antiwar” movement, which abetted the Communist victories in Vietnam and Cambodia, and created the “Vietnam War syndrome” that made it so difficult afterwards for American presidents to deploy the nation’s military forces.
Berger had also been a member of “Peace Now,” the leftist movement seeking to pressure the Israeli government to make concessions to Yasser Arafat’s PLO terrorists. Clinton’s first National Security Advisor, Anthony Lake was a protégé of Berger, who had introduced him to Clinton. All three had met as activists in the 1972 McGovern presidential campaign, whose primary issue was opposition to the Vietnam War based on the view that the “arrogance of American power” was responsible for the conflict, rather than Communist aggression.
So I guess we can conclude Bill Clinton was too busy dogging babes in the back seat to pay attention to the road and George Bush was too drunk on power (or something else) when he got his chance.
What concerns me, as well, is the “Able Danger”-esque reports and references to Clinton that always point to his administration as ignoring or even obstructing terror investigations prior to 9/11. No one bothers to ask these “fact witnesses” why they didnt run to the White House with this evidence as soon as Bush took office.
Then of course we have Sandy Berger trying to steal evidence from the National Archives (flippity) and what some have called the greatest espionage story (and under-reported) since the Rosenbergs with Leandro Aragoncillo using his VP Cheney/Gore staff security clearance to steal classified info for the filipino-government “opposition” parties. (floppity)
What will be really interesting on this espionage story is the timing of the activity (cheney years?) and whether this was foreign espionage or US-backed. Regardless of the outcome, some how I think this story will be lost.
You need to look beyond the first few hits from the left-wing google-search…
Counter-Counter-Counter-point from the “vile” mediamatters.org (“vile” is a Bill Oreilly description)
http://mediamatters.org/items/200510110002
MSNBC wrote :
More than the scandals, however, Freeh says President Clinton failed to follow through on his promise to pursue the killers behind the 1996 Khobar towers bombing in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 Americans.
Freeh says, “That’s the order that I got, [but he] then did nothing to assist and facilitate that investigation, in fact [he] undermined it.”
Freeh charges that, rather than pressure Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah for access to the bombing suspects, Mr. Clinton asked the kingdom for a contribution to his presidential library.
The conservativevoice reports:
http://www.theconservativevoice.com/articles/article.html?id=8815
Rich Lowry says:
http://www.nationalreview.com/lowry/lowry200311030753.asp
“…the Clinton administration deliberately looked the other way after the Khobar bombing and made a near-apology to the perpetrator of the attack.”
Dont let the 9/11 commission off the hook…
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/10/9/103449.shtml
Freeh under the microscope: (note the date)
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/law/jan-june01/freeh_6-22.html
There is numerous right-wing conspiracy stories linking Khobar Towers to Al Quaeda. Clinton let the Saudi’s have their way, the Saudi’s executed the only link, Freeh made a stink, Bush steps in, Saudi’s make nice and “share” intel and what do we get after all that?
9/11
What’s your moral? If we stick our heads in the sand 9/11s won’t happen?
Maybe there are only “conspiracy stories” about Khobar because we never got to the root of it.
The “left-wing” doesn’t have any concerns about Khobar because they were not (and still aren’t) taking the Jihad seriously. E.g. what does it matter whether the Jihadis carry al Qaeda business cards or not?