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September 26, 2006
9:03 pm

"Rice Boils Over At Bubba

"RICE BOILS OVER AT BUBBA

"RIPS 'FLATLY FALSE' CLAIM ON BUSH'S BID
TO GET BIN LADEN
By IAN BISHOP Post Correspondent
Source New York Post
(excerpt)
"September 25, 2006 -- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday accused Bill Clinton of making "flatly false" claims that the Bush administration didn't lift a finger to stop terrorism before the 9/11 attacks.
Rice hammered Clinton, who leveled his charges in a contentious weekend interview with Chris Wallace of Fox News Channel, for his claims that the Bush administration "did not try" to kill Osama bin Laden in the eight months they controlled the White House before the Sept. 11 attacks.

"The notion somehow for eight months the Bush administration sat there and didn't do that is just flatly false - and I think the 9/11 commission understood that," Rice said during a wide-ranging meeting with Post editors and reporters.

"What we did in the eight months was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton administration did in the preceding years," Rice added.

The secretary of state also sharply disputed Clinton's claim that he "left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy" for the incoming Bush team during the presidential transition in 2001.

"We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al Qaeda," Rice responded during the hourlong session.

Her strong rebuttal was the Bush administration's first response to Clinton's headline-grabbing interview on Fox on Sunday in which he launched into an over-the-top defense of his handling of terrorism - wagging his finger in the air, leaning forward in his chair and getting red-faced, and even attacking Wallace for improper questioning.".......

....."In her pointed rebuttal of Clinton's inflammatory claims about the war on terror, Rice maintained the Bush White House did the best it could to defend against an attack - and expanded on the tools and intelligence it inherited.
"I would just suggest that you go back and read the 9/11 commission report on the efforts of the Bush administration in the eight months - things like working to get an armed Predator [drone] that actually turned out to be extraordinarily important," Rice added.

She also said Clinton's claims that Richard Clarke - the White House anti-terror guru hyped by Clinton as the country's "best guy" - had been demoted by Bush were bogus.

"Richard Clarke was the counterterrorism czar when 9/11 happened. And he left when he did not become deputy director of homeland security, some several months later," she said."......

........."Rice cited the final 9/11 commission report to substantiate her claims, while Clinton relied on Clarke's book as the basis for many of his rehashing the events leading up to the Sept. 11 attacks."....

........"Transitioning to the global war on terror, an animated Rice questioned, "When are we going to stop blaming ourselves for the rise of terrorism?" .....

Asked about recently leaked internal U.S. intelligence estimates that claimed the Iraq war was fueling terrorist recruiting, Rice said: "Now that we're fighting back, of course they are fighting back, too." .......

........"These are people who want to fight against us, and they're going to find a reason. And yes, they will recruit, but it doesn't mean you stop pursuing strategies that are ultimately going to stop them," Rice said.

She insisted U.S. forces must finish the job in Iraq and the wider Middle East to wipe out the "root cause" of violent extremism - not just the terror thugs who carry out the attacks.

"It's a longer-term strategy, and it may even have some short-term down side, but if you don't look at the longer term, you're just leaving the problem to somebody else," she said. ".......

....."In Latin America, home to outrageous Venezuelan bomb thrower Hugo Chavez, Rice said the U.S. approach is to "spend as little time possible in talking about Chavez and more time talking about our positive agenda in Latin America," including several trade agreements."

http://www.nypost.com/seven/09252006/news/nationalnews/rice_boils_over_at_bubba_nationalnews_.htm

Comments

Entry #586

September 25, 2006
11:30 am

How one reporter gave Clinton heartburn over Chinagate

Rather long but well detailed article which shows Clinton goes ballistic when confronted with facts about something he's made every effort to conceal.

Clinton echoes the same mantra as terrorists, blaming everyone, everything other than himself for being caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

Archived timeline of China-gate here http://alamo-girl.com/treason.htm

My picnic with Bill
How one reporter gave Clinton heartburn over Chinagate

Posted: September 24, 2000
1:00 a.m. Eastern

Editor's note: In the fall of 1999, President Bill Clinton endured something to which he was not accustomed -- a member of the news media challenging him with tough questions about issues of concern to the American people. WorldNetDaily Washington bureau chief Paul Sperry, then a reporter with Investor's Business Daily, went toe-to-toe with the president during a picnic on the White House south lawn. The widely publicized confrontation caused Clinton so much consternation that Sperry was subsequently banished from the White House.

The following was originally published as the cover story for WorldNet Magazine in February 2000.

By Paul Sperry
Source WorldNetDaily.com

WASHINGTON -- There's probably no finer place to throw a party than the South Lawn of the White House, and no better time to do it than on a mild and breezy day in early fall. And there's probably no guest more grateful for such a free fete than the Washington press corps.

My colleagues will climb over each other to get to a table full of rubbery hoagies, soggy chips and stale Budweiser. Doesn't matter what it is, really, so long as it's free.

But this. This was hog's heaven for the cheap scribes who filed onto the White House grounds that Friday night in September for a Cajun party in their honor. What a spread. On red-checkered picnic tables spanning the length of the plush green lawn, beckoned trays of jambalaya, boudin and boiled shrimp.

And the bars, under colorful tents, were stocked full of liquor. No kegs here. Black-tie-clad help poured your favorite libation from bottles. Forget Budweiser; they had Guinness Stout and other imported brews. Fine reds and whites, too, and highballs. All free.

Zydeco tunes skipped across the crowd of giddy guests. As the sunny day faded to dusk, the soft lights of the White House portico glowed behind us. Intoxicating. What a night.

But, for me, there was still something wrong with this party -- namely, the host.

President Clinton, the function's main attraction, was due to make a cameo appearance at any moment. Despite having to wade through 40-plus scandals over the previous seven years, my cohorts in the press were all atwitter at the prospect of pumping Clinton's arm and snapping shots of him with their spouses and kids.

Just 48 hours earlier, four FBI agents had testified before the Senate that Justice Department lawyers had stopped them from pursuing leads back to Clinton in the ongoing campaign-finance investigation.

Not only that, agents swore that lawyers for months had blocked their request to ask a judge for a warrant to search the Little Rock, Ark., office of Clinton fund-raiser Yah Lin "Charlie" Trie. Agents sifting through his trash found that key records subpoenaed by the Senate had been shredded.

Among the torn-up documents: checks from Asian donors to Clinton's legal defense fund, Democratic National Committee donor lists, travel records for Chinese money men and statements from Chinese bank accounts. There was also a FedEx slip showing the White House had sent two pounds of documents to Trie just two months before a 1997 Senate probe of Chinagate kicked off.

What's more, one agent said 27 pages of notes detailing her struggles with Justice over the Trie case were ripped out of spiral notebooks after she turned them over to her superiors.

The explosive testimony was ignored by most of the media. But I couldn't shake it from my mind, no matter the occasion. Was Clinton's attorney general covering for him in one of the gravest probes in U.S. history, one with national security implications? Did Clinton have any knowledge of it?

Sometime after 6 p.m., the president emerged from the Oval Office. Dressed in a suit, he strolled down the walkway, only to disappear through a doorway. His aide Sidney Blumenthal strolled on and joined the crowd. At his side was Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass. (I ran into Markey later in the evening inside the White House. He was giving his wife and father a tour. Markey's now all over the TV talk shows flacking for Vice President Al Gore's campaign.)

The suspense built as the guests closed in around a loose rope line that stretched from the edges of the Oval Office area to the stage where the band played. Then, at last, Clinton came out of the White House wearing what can only be described as a get-up -- tight black pullover shirt, tight black pants with a big silver-buckle black belt and black cowboy boots.

Strutting past me, he looked like a bad imitation of Johnny Cash. Or was it an over-the-hill Elvis? Tom Jones? Whatever, the silver-haired devil made a beeline for the stage, climbed up on it and drawled on about how great it was for all of us to be there with him on such a wonderful night listening to such great music. At that, a guest tried to hand a tenor saxophone up to him. Several painted-up women pushed their way to the stage. By the way, Clinton remarked, "Hillary wanted to be here with y'all, but she's up in New York tonight." Wink-wink.

Little did he know that in just a few minutes, a rude guest would give him a Maalox moment to remember and probably spoil any entertainment plans he had for the evening.

As Clinton worked the rope line on his way back toward the White House, it was hard not to be taken up in the electricity of the moment. Everyone was having such a good time. And a buoyant Clinton was working the crowd, yucking it up like no one can. At one point, he was even wearing baubles around his neck. Husbands were offering up their wives and children for grip-and-grin shots. Photojournalists were camped out like paparazzi. Why not? A notorious celebrity was in their midst. Even one of my reporters was snapping shots with his instamatic -- for his wife.

I stood there slack-jawed, watching one powerful journalist after another clamor like so many fawning teen rock-idol fans to grasp the hand of the most corrupt president in U.S. history.

So many scandals, so many unanswered questions -- so many unasked questions. National security at stake. That little boy there, that little girl over there ... your sons, your daughters. Don't you care what this president has or hasn't done with our military secrets?

Maybe I just cared too much. Relax. Yes, have a good time; it is a party after all. Don't be so serious. Loosen up.

But just as I was about to give in to the perverse euphoria, suspending disbelief about the harmlessness of old Slick like everyone else around me, I recalled a Proverb I'd read that morning -- "Do not envy wicked men, do not desire their company" -- and I closed my eyes for strength.

It was my turn to meet the celebrity president. As he approached me, I politely, if coolly, asked him when he would hold his next formal press conference. It had been several months since his last and he's had fewer than any recent president. I admit I was trying to agitate the proper forum for questions about the FBI agents' charges. But, to me, this was still a rather innocuous question, even within the supposedly neutral zone of a party. A relevant question, too, given the gathering. Other hard-nosed reporters surely were wondering when they'd get another crack at Clinton.

Or so I thought. My simple question was rewarded with boos and hisses from the adoring Clinton groupies around me. So much for the adversarial press.

But that was nothing compared with Clinton's reaction to my inquiry about his next press confab. In an instant, his 100-watt charm shut off, replaced by a taunting belligerence. "Why?" he barked.

"Because the American people have a lot of unanswered questions," I replied, struggling to hold my bladder. At that point, he moved back down the rope, pulling up square in front of me, and demanded, "Like what?"

"Well, like illegal money from China and the campaign-finance scandal ..."

What happened over the next 10 minutes was nothing short of a "scene." The party-goers collapsed in around us. I watched the blood rush to Clinton's gargantuan face as he launched into a tirade against ex-Republican National Committee Chairman Haley Barbour, the FBI, Bob Dole and Republicans in general. All the while, he tried to belittle me by making faces (to get a rise out of his fans) and intimidate me by getting in my face.

And now I can see how he can do that to people. Clinton's not just intellectually intimidating, he's physically imposing. He's tall (6-2) and big-boned.

Luckily, I'm the same height and was able to stand toe-to-toe and eye-to-eye with him. I'll never forget the maniacal look in his bloodshot eyes. There was a moment, fleeting, where I sensed he wanted to try to take a swipe at me. I was getting full frontal Clinton. His volcanic temper, hidden so well from the public by his handlers, erupted less than 12 inches from my eyes.

Clinton always is game for a debate. That I asked him hard questions at a party wasn't what ticked him off. It's what I asked him about. He clearly doesn't want to talk about the mother of all scandals -- Chinagate.

He also may have been thrown by my grasp of the facts. I'd been tracking the Beijing-tied Lippo Group's influence in the Clinton White House since 1996 and have been suspicious of the probity of Attorney General Janet Reno's special task force since she let John Keeney Sr. set it up -- a month after the election -- to look into Lippo's influence.

Keeney's son is none other than a defense attorney for John Huang, the former Lippo executive and convicted Clinton-Gore fund-raiser. Junior, who's also a long-time Democratic National Committee lawyer, cut Huang a deal with daddy's old task force that got him no jail time and immunity from prosecution for espionage.

Clinton also was unprepared for my tenacity. Other reporters may back down after he singes their eyebrows with a verbal fusillade. Dummy me, I hung in there for more abuse, challenging his answers, following up with more questions. Which only made him madder.

Take, for instance, the exchange we had after I asked him what he thought of the FBI agents' charges two days earlier that they'd been blocked from following trails back to the White House in the Chinagate probe. (When I first mentioned the agents, he acted dumb: "What FBI agents?")

"The Eff-Bee-Ahh," Clinton said, his tone dripping with contempt and suspicion. "What do you think of the FBI?"

I don't have an opinion, sir. My question is to you.

"Yeah, the FBI wants you to write about that rather than write about Waco," a reference to lingering questions about the agency's role in the 1993 fire that killed Branch Davidian separatists in Waco, Texas.

It was an extraordinary remark. The president was questioning the motives and veracity of his own agency.

I piped up that these were career FBI agents. One had been with the agency 25 years. And they made these charges under oath.

"Are you suggesting they're not telling the truth, Mr. President?" I asked.

Clinton's face turned a darker hue of red, almost the purplish color of raw hamburger meat that's been left out on the counter. Changing the subject, he attacked Republicans for their own fund-raising woes.

After Clinton had had enough of me, he tried to move on. But, I pressed, reminding him that he still hadn't answered my original question: When will you have another formal news conference?

"You just had one," he snapped.

With that, I turned around and knifed my way through the crowd that had gathered. Two women -- one from AP, then another from CNN -- rushed up to me. Both asked what got Clinton so angry.

"Why'd he turn so red?" asked one. Good question, I said, then replayed the exchange for them. Both asked for my card, though neither of their news agencies filed a story.

Before grabbing a plate of Cajun food and a much-needed cold one, I scribbled down what Clinton had told me on some White House napkins and left the grounds soon after. As I made my way to the Metro station, I realized my knees were a bit wobbly.

Still dazed by the time I got home, I trudged in the front door and only half-jokingly told my wife to prepare for an IRS audit. As I did radio shows around the country over the next few weeks, I found I wasn't the only one with that thought. Except callers weren't fooling.

Some warned me to get my tax forms in order and "not to take any plane trips." They were concerned I'd pay a heavy price for "standing up to the scary occupant of the White House," as one put it.

Another radio caller reckoned "there is a lot of info from FBI files being used to leverage reporters." (That's actually not so far-fetched. White House correspondents have to submit to background checks.)

One wise guy actually posted a phony Washington Post obituary on the Internet.

"Paul Sperry, the Washington bureau chief of Investor's Business Daily, was found in the swimming pool of his Richmond, Va., home early this morning," the prankster wrote. "He had apparently shot himself in the head in his living room before throwing himself fully clothed into the pool. A .45-caliber bullet was found in his skull and he was holding the suicide weapon, a 9 mm automatic with the serial numbers filed off.

"His notes and home computer were found burning in a trash can," he added. "Police were alerted to the body by an anonymous tip. No foul play is suspected."

I'm of the mind that the president and first lady, both of whom have strangely gone out of their way to remind the public that they've "even been accused of murder," like that people think that. It breeds fear, and fear makes those who might otherwise confront the Clintons with the facts think twice about doing so.

Still, after taking calls into the wee morning hours, such thoughts didn't exactly help me sleep over the next several days as the story grew legs.

Saturday night, Sept. 25: As I was typing up my story, James Grimaldi, a reporter for the Seattle Times, called me at home. He had been covering the Microsoft trial in Washington but he was working on another story -- mine -- and had a few questions for me.

Turns out Grimaldi was standing right next to me during the exchange with Clinton. He heard the whole thing and we compared notes. He said he was filing a story for the Times' Sunday edition. At first, I was frosted seeing that Grimaldi would beat my story. My paper at the time, Investor's Business Daily, only publishes Monday through Friday and Monday's paper is put to bed on Friday. So my story wouldn't run till Tuesday.

Even so, I was thankful that another major paper would corroborate the interview.

"The blood was rushing in and out of his face," Grimaldi observed over the phone. "He actually blew up. His initial blow-up was unexpected and unanticipated."

He counted at least 10 exchanges, "back and forth." Not one question I asked, he said, was "rude" or "disrespectful," although the entire impromptu interview could be construed as such. He also said Clinton "was baiting you" into asking more questions.

At one point, Grimaldi said the official White House photographer standing behind Clinton shouted: "This is so inappropriate! This is so inappropriate!" I never heard him. Clinton's own shouting must have drowned him out.

Tuesday night, Sept. 28: The Drudge Report posted a story at the top of its website: "Fight Club: Furious Clinton Orders Reporter Banned After Grilling!"

Wednesday, Sept. 29, at 3:12 p.m. EDT: In the White House briefing room, a Washington Times reporter asked Clinton spokesman Joe Lockhart about Clinton's FBI remark. But Lockhart brushed him off. Then the reporter asked about the Drudge Report.

Before answering, Lockhart lectured reporters on the "virtues or lack thereof" of using citizen cyberjournalist Matt Drudge as a news source. He nonetheless confirmed Drudge's report.

"I was asked for comment from the reporter about the incident and I made the comment that the only regret I have is inviting him to the party -- and I wouldn't make that mistake again," he explained. "So to the extent that we judge coverage of this building by the parties, he's banned."

Lockhart left the impression that he personally told me I was banned. And that's the way the press reported it.

In fact, Lockhart never called me. He had his girl give me the news. And even she passed it along sheepishly.

On Monday, Sept. 27, I had called Lockhart's deputy Jake Siewart to see if the president wanted to clarify any of the remarks he made to me. Siewart replied, bluntly, that Clinton "doesn't regret making" them.

Not 10 minutes after I hung up, a woman called from the White House identifying herself as Lockhart's assistant. She had a message for me.

What is it? I asked.

"I didn't say it. It's not coming from me," she assured me, speaking under her breath. "It's specifically from Joe Lockhart."

All right, what?

"The only regret we have is inviting you to the party," she said, quoting her boss, "and we won't make that mistake again."

Is he serious? I asked.

"Uh-huh."

How juvenile, I thought, but how predictable for this White House.

I left that part out of my story at the request of my editor, who asked me to divorce myself from the story as much as I could.

But the next day, Drudge called from Hollywood and asked about the story which, by then, was bouncing around the Internet. I mentioned being kicked off the invite list. He wasted no time in posting the news later that night on his website.

Where Drudge got the "Class A s--thead" slur, I don't know. No one from Lockhart's office uttered it to me. (Could it be that Drudge has a mole in the White House?) If Lockhart indeed used the childish epithet, he clearly was accusing me of being a relative.

Wednesday, Sept. 29: Washington Post reporter Beth Berselli called my editor Wes Mann in Los Angeles for comment on the Drudge Report. Her first question: "So what disciplinary action do you plan to take against your reporter?"

The presumption of guilt came through loud and clear in the next day's "Reliable Source" column she helped pen. Reporting with the certainty of an eyewitness, Berselli said I "ambushed" Clinton.

Only, she wasn't there. She relied on the account of Lockhart, who told her I was "badgering" the president. Only, Lockhart wasn't there either. Berselli never talked to me.

I never planned to buttonhole the president, but I'm glad I did. His heated reaction to simple questions was revealing. And I pried away some remarkable quotes, particularly about the FBI.

Though admittedly a far cry from the backbiting seen during Watergate, there hasn't been this much tension between a president and his chief law enforcement agency since President Nixon.

It was news. Big news. Yet the Washington press corps, by and large, passed on the meat of the story and focused instead on the theater of a reporter mixing it up with the president at a picnic.

"National Papers Miss Flare-Up Highlighting Clinton-FBI Rift," said a report in Media Critic, an online newsletter of the nonpartisan Center for Media & Public Affairs in Washington.

"Beltway Blinders: Smaller Papers' Scoops Get Little Notice," said White House correspondent Josh Gerstein in his ABCNEWS.com column. Gerstein was the only reporter who picked up my line of questioning with Clinton. On Oct. 1, as Clinton was dashing off to California, he pressed Clinton to open up more about his problems with the FBI, though without much luck.

Sure, the New York Times and the Washington Post eventually used my revealing quotes, while holding their noses and calling me "rude" and "impertinent" for extracting them at a social event -- as if I were the first to do that. According to former press secretaries, both Sam Donaldson and Helen Thomas worked over President Reagan and President Bush at press parties and state dinners.

A social aide for Reagan told me the two veteran correspondents were hectoring the president to such a degree during one dinner that she and other aides had to literally put their bodies between them and the president to spare the guests from more obnoxious shouting at closer range.

Funny how the press corps suddenly stands on ceremony when a Democrat is in the White House.

The old bar flies at the National Press Club roundly booed me when they saw me talking about the dust-up on one of the Fox News shows. And they weren't just booing my TV performance.

Though I clearly exposed a nerve on Chinagate, the White House press corps has failed to tap into it. At Clinton's Feb. 16 press conference, no reporter plied him with questions on the still-mushrooming conspiracy and now-fully active cover-up -- even though 10 days earlier the Los Angeles Times had reported that a foreign donor with ties to the People's Liberation Army laundered money through convicted Clinton fund-raiser Trie (who, it turns out, drove around Beijing in a PLA-issue car).

Citing FBI interviews, the story also revealed Trie sought "fund-raising help" from the Chinese consulate in Houston right after Clinton told him he was running for president early last decade.

Did Clinton in fact meet with Trie back then? What did they talk about? Did he have any idea that his Arkansas friend was so tight with the communists in Beijing? No one bothered to ask.

If I get banned for asking tough questions about a deadly serious scandal (unlike the Lewinsky affair), what does that say about all those among the White House press corps who haven't been banned? Are they tossing up softballs?

"I've been all around this country, and you are the first person to ask me about (Chinagate)," Clinton claimed. "Not one person has brought that up."

Maybe no one among the media elite. But average Americans have. Surely, Clinton's heard or seen the placard-waving citizens who for months have been protesting his blind appeasement of China at the north entrance to the White House. Many of them are tied to FreeRepublic.com, (http://alamo-girl.com/treason.htm ) ( http://alamo-girl.com/ ) which has built a compelling chronology of the Chinagate scandal.

Investor's Business Daily got more than 1,100 e-mails and letters and hundreds of phone calls from readers. All but one were supportive (the lone dissenting voice wished I'd asked about the homeless). And most demanded more answers about Chinagate. Here is a sample:

"When President Clinton said Mr. Sperry was the first person to ask about the Chinese campaign finance scandal, he showed just how badly the American people are being under-served by the media," said T. Downs of Neptune Beach, Fla. "We Americans really would like to know what went on in the Chinese funny-money scandal."
Wrote Wendy Jacques of Farmington Hills, Mich.: "I read what happened to you when the president did not wish to answer your factually-based question regarding the apparent cover-up by the Justice Department of the president's acceptance of illegal campaign donations and apparent compromise of our country's national security in exchange for those donations. I admire you for asking an important question."
"Keep going after this China thing," said Jerry Hatch of Idaho Falls, Idaho.
Christopher Sivley of Decatur, Ala., said: "If the president took illegal money from the Chinese in exchange for U.S. technology, then he is guilty of treason. It's about time the press started ... asking real questions."
"Thank you for your courage in asking the president to explain to the people of the United States why he sold our secrets and weapons technology to the Chinese for campaign money," wrote Esther Nobrega, Nashua, N.H.
Patrick Giagnocavo e-mailed: "Please know that I, too, would like to see many more answers from the White House concerning the very serious, very detailed charges of what can only be called treason."
"I send my appreciation to Mr. Sperry for asking President Clinton about China and campaign finance," wrote Connie Ward of Pensacola, Fla. "I am disgusted by the president's response."
"Despite what Mr. Clinton says, the American people do want to know," said Michael McTaggart.
R. North responded: "About time somebody rattled his cage about a very important matter."
"Please thank Mr. Sperry for his courage in confronting the president with questions about the Chinese contributions to the DNC," Bill Bynum e-mailed. "The president hasn't heard those questions asked in his travels around the U.S. because he is shielded. But I guarantee there are people like me who want answers to them."
Michael Audette insisted: "I, for one, am very interested in his connections with the People's Republic of China."
"It's about time the news media stopped giving Clinton a pass," wrote R.H. Langill of Plainfield, N.H. "The selling of policy for Chinese money in 1996 and probably earlier should be completely aired."
"Paul Sperry is to be congratulated for his efforts. He is asking what many Americans want to know," said J.A. Brady of Mashpee, Mass. "I hope that other reporters will also ask President Clinton for more details about his involvement. Clinton has never been held accountable for his part in those fund-raising activities due to the stonewalling of Attorney General Janet Reno. Please continue to press for answers."
Bo Mosley of Honolulu wrote: "The China fund-raising scandal has burned me to the core, and I am pleased to see that some inside the Beltway are just as concerned as I am."
"Someone has to have the guts to ask some of these questions," said Steve Tronnes of Edgerton, Wis. "If there wasn't anything to any of these allegations, then the president would not have gone ballistic."

Excellent point, but one apparently lost on my normally hard-boiled colleagues. They seem more interested in currying favor with this White House and maintaining their good standing in the Washington tail class than ferreting out the truth for the American people and holding the president accountable for sending our national security to China in a handbasket.

The press corps should be ashamed that a single reporter was able to fire off as many, if not more, specific and tough questions at the president about Chinagate in 10 minutes than they've managed to do in the three years since this scandal broke. Did I pay a price in becoming the persona non grata of the Clinton White House? Yes, but I wear it as a badge of honor. I did my job. Now it's your turn.

Paul Sperry is a Washington, D.C.-based journalist, WND contributor and author of "Infiltration: How Muslim Spies and Subversives have Penetrated Washington."

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=20765

"New photos of Clinton
blowing a gasket
Pics record notorious dust-up between then-prez and WND's Sperry

Posted: September 24, 2003
1:00 a.m. Eastern

Source WorldNetDaily.com

"Just in time for the fourth anniversary of WND Washington bureau chief Paul Sperry's celebrated confrontation with then-President Bill Clinton on the White House south lawn, WND has obtained new photos of the verbal brawl revealing a visibly upset chief executive getting in the face of the one reporter who dared to ask the tough questions.

Sperry, who at the time was Washington bureau chief for Investor's Business Daily, five months after the incident accepted an offer for the same position at WorldNetDaily. In one of his first WND stories, he documented his fiery impromptu debate with Clinton in a widely read account titled "My picnic with Bill."

Clinton uses index finger in direction of Paul Sperry, right, to make a point. Janet Fallon is at left.

It was Sept. 24, 1999, when Sperry attended a White House south lawn party for Washington reporters. The event would turn out to be his last White House visit, since the Clinton administration banned him from the grounds after he dared confront the president on his own turf.

Sperry set the stage in "My picnic with Bill":

This was hog's heaven for the cheap scribes who filed onto the White House grounds that Friday night in September for a Cajun party in their honor. What a spread. On red-checkered picnic tables spanning the length of the plush green lawn, beckoned trays of jambalaya, boudin and boiled shrimp.
And the bars, under colorful tents, were stocked full of liquor. No kegs here. Black-tie-clad help poured your favorite libation from bottles. Forget Budweiser; they had Guinness Stout and other imported brews. Fine reds and whites, too, and highballs. All free.
Zydeco tunes skipped across the crowd of giddy guests. As the sunny day faded to dusk, the soft lights of the White House portico glowed behind us. Intoxicating. What a night.
But, for me, there was still something wrong with this party – namely, the host.

Clinton asks for and takes Sperry's business card.

Around 6 p.m., Clinton emerged from the White House to greet his guests. The president was dressed in an all black casual outfit, as Sperry described, "like a bad imitation of Johnny Cash."

As Clinton began working the crowd of reporters, Sperry asked the president a simple question – one that set off a 10-minute confrontation the reporter recalls as "nothing short of a 'scene.'" The question: When would he hold his next formal press conference?

Clinton barked back, "Why?" and the bout began:

"Because the American people have a lot of unanswered questions," I replied, struggling to hold my bladder. At that point, he moved back down the rope, pulling up square in front of me, and demanded, "Like what?"
"Well, like illegal money from China and the campaign-finance scandal ..."
The party-goers collapsed in around us. I watched the blood rush to Clinton's gargantuan face as he launched into a tirade against ex-Republican National Committee Chairman Haley Barbour, the FBI, Bob Dole and Republicans in general. All the while, he tried to belittle me by making faces (to get a rise out of his fans) and intimidate me by getting in my face.
And now I can see how he can do that to people. Clinton's not just intellectually intimidating, he's physically imposing. He's tall (6-2) and big-boned.
Luckily, I'm the same height and was able to stand toe-to-toe and eye-to-eye with him. I'll never forget the maniacal look in his bloodshot eyes. There was a moment, fleeting, where I sensed he wanted to try to take a swipe at me. I was getting full frontal Clinton. His volcanic temper, hidden so well from the public by his handlers, erupted less than 12 inches from my eyes.

One of the event's attendees was Janet Fallon, a public-relations specialist who, ironically enough, had worked for Pat Buchanan's 1992 presidential campaign. Fallon stood just to the right of Clinton – a front-row seat for the dust-up. "..........

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=34747

8 Comments

Entry #585

September 25, 2006
11:18 am

More on Clinton's purple faced rage

I've seen Powerline dissect inaccuracies printed by the New York Times and other media outlets. One thing you can say for them is they don't give up until all the facts come out.

Looks like Bill Clinton is getting the same attention. Remember these guys are attorneys so have built in antennae for BS snow jobs, concealing truth. First mistake was attempt at censorship which sent up a red flag. Second mistake was "purple faced rage" in the interview with Chris Wallace.

That purple faced rage will be seen as a reaction to someone calling him on something he's concealing as shown in the next article after this one I'm posting with verifiable time-lines of events, people, etc.

"Play it as it lies

The most striking feature of Bill Clinton's bloviations on FOX News Sunday with Chris Wallace yesterday was the incredibly low ratio of facts to whoppers. If Chris Wallace could prompt that red-faced response with such an innocuous question, I wonder if a few minutes with Richard Miniter (author of Losing bin Laden, interviewed by NRO here), might not send him to intensive care. I would love to hear Miniter ask Clinton a few questions about Clinton's treatment of the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center -- an attack that Clinton shrugged off in a few paragraphs of his subsequent Saturday morning radio talk, never to return to the subject. (Miniter quotes the relevant paragraphs of the radio address at pages 28-30 of his book.)

Our friends at RealClearPolitics have posted a tough column by Ronald Cass begins to address Clinton's rewriting of the record."....................

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/015366.php

Comments

Entry #584

September 24, 2006
10:57 pm

Clinton's temper tantrums in 1990

Had to chase this down but knew I'd read it. It's correctly quoted and linked for reference.

"Setting the Record Straight
An open letter to Hillary Clinton.

By Dick Morris

Dear Hillary,

In your new book, Living History, you correctly note that when you asked me to help you and Bill avert defeat in the congressional election of 1994 I was reluctant to do so. But then you assert, incorrectly, that my reluctance stemmed from difficulties in working with your staff. You even misquote me as telling you: "I don't like the way I was treated, Hillary. People were so mean to me."

As you know, I never said anything of the sort. I had, in fact, no experience in dealing with either your staff or the President's at that point, and had not yet met Leon Panetta or George Stephanopoulos. My prior dealing with Harold Ickes had been twenty five years earlier.

The real reason I was reluctant was that Bill Clinton had tried to beat me up in May of 1990 as he, you, Gloria Cabe, and I were together in the Arkansas governor's mansion. At the time, Bill was worried that he was falling behind his democratic primary opponent and verbally assaulted me for not giving his campaign the time he felt it deserved. Offended by his harsh tone, I turned and stalked out of the room.

Bill ran after me, tackled me, threw me to the floor of the kitchen in the mansion and ed his fist back to punch me. You grabbed his arm and, yelling at him to stop and get control of himself, pulled him off me. Then you walked me around the grounds of the mansion in the minutes after, with your arm around me, saying, "He only does that to people he loves."

I continued to work for Bill since I felt a responsibility to do so until Election Day in 1990. But our relationship was never close and never the same. After the 1990 campaign we parted ways as a direct result of the altercation.

When the story threatened to surface during the 1992 campaign, you told me to "say it never happened."

That, and not the invented conversation in your memoir, was the reason that I was reluctant to work for Bill again.

Yours,
Dick Morris

- Dick Morris, an adviser to Bill Clinton for 20 years, is author, most recently, of Off with Their Heads : Traitors, Crooks & Obstructionists in American Politics, Media & Business.

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-morris061203.asp

7 Comments

Entry #583

September 24, 2006
7:21 pm

"Bill Clinton's Excuses

"Bill Clinton’s Excuses
No matter what he says, the record shows he failed to act against terrorism.

By Byron York

National Review Online

....."But Clarke’s book does not, in fact, support Clinton’s claim. Judging by Clarke’s sympathetic account — as well as by the sympathetic accounts of other former Clinton aides like Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon — it’s not quite accurate to say that Clinton tried to kill bin Laden. Rather, he tried to convince — as opposed to, say, order — U.S. military and intelligence agencies to kill bin Laden. And when, on a number of occasions, those agencies refused to act, Clinton, the commander-in-chief, gave up."......

......"But the bottom line is that Bill Clinton, the commander-in-chief, could not find the will to order the military into action against al Qaeda, and Bill Clinton, the head of the executive branch, could not find the will to order the CIA and FBI to act. No matter what the former president says on Fox, or anywhere else, that is his legacy in the war on terror."

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MDM4N2E1MzU5ZjQ0YTA3YmJiYzEyYjQ2ZDBiNWJlYjE=

Comments

Entry #582

September 23, 2006
7:56 am

"Child slavery suit charges 30,000 held in camel-racing camps

Like I've said before slavery is STILL thrives in the Middle East. Saw this on another site a few days ago and found the follow up this morning.

"Child slavery suit charges 30,000 held in camel-racing camps

SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Monday, September 18, 2006

WASHINGTON - U.S. relations with the United Arab Emirates could face another challenge amid a suit that charged the Gulf state's vice president with enslaving tens of thousands of children.
UAE Vice President Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum has been accused of enslaving about 30,000 children, some of them as young as two, since 1975.

The suit filed in U.S. district court in Miami charged that Al Maktoum, crown prince of Dubai, and his brother, Hamdan, ordered the stealing of the children to raise them as camel jockeys, Middle East Newsline reported.

"Boys as young as two years old have been stolen from their families, trafficked across international borders, and kept in brutal camel-racing camps throughout the United Arab Emirates, forced to train camels and perform as jockeys," the suit said.

The 56-page suit, filed on Sept. 13, could test the U.S. commitment to end human trafficking. The UAE, a leading defense client of the United States, has been cited as a major violator of human trafficking.
The Al Maktoums have property in Florida, including a horse ranch. The Dubai crown prince has not responded to the suit.

The six plaintiffs in the case have not been identified, but were said to be parents of children stolen by the UAE leaders. The suit said agents for Al Maktoum took young boys from such countries as Bangladesh and Sudan and transferred them to Dubai where they were forced to train camels and perform as jockeys.

The suit does not ask for specific compensation for the victims. Instead, the plaintiffs called for a jury to determine the damages.

"We hope to punish the perpetrators of these vile crimes and compensate the victims for their pain and suffering," Ron Motley, an attorney with the South Carolina-based law firm Motley Rice LLC, said. "

http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/06/front2453996.452777778.html

"Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum and Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid al Maktoum
"A lawsuit has been filed and is seeking class action status against several rulers of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for allegedly enslaving tens of thousands of boys over the past three decades. The boys were allegedly forced to work as jockeys in the popular sport of camel racing. The lawsuit alleges Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum, the crown prince of Dubai, and Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid al Maktoum, the deputy ruler, were the most active perpetrators. The lawsuit claimed the boys were taken largely from Bangladesh and Pakistan, were held at desert camps in the UAE and other Persian Gulf nations, and forced to work. It also claimed some boys were sexually abused, given limited food and sleep and injected with hormones to prevent their growth.

Register your Camel Racing Complaint
If you or a loved one has suffered damages in this case, you may qualify for damages or remedies that may be awarded in a possible class action or lawsuit. Please click the link below to submit your complaint to a lawyer for a free evaluation, or call 1-866-886-5529 toll free."
http://www.lawyersandsettlements.com/case/camel_racing_slave.html?ref=newsletter_bca_camel_racing_slave

5 Comments

Entry #581

September 22, 2006
10:01 pm

"Tinpot Tyrants and Madmen

Via Powerling The Anchoress blog's assessment of Chavez. He and Ahmadinejad have taken their clue and followed suit by repeating what Dem leaders their watering holes and MSM have encouraged for 6 years.

Since it just bit them on the behind but good, perhaps they can muster some shame for having wallowed in street trash coarseness.

"More on Chavez, the Dems and the Press

Blog of the Week The Anchoress has excellent thoughts on the provenance of Hugo Chavez's over-the-top attack on President Bush at the United Nations. A sample: (highlight below)

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/015347.php

"Chavez clearly listened to Dems and Air America

........."

But maybe some on the left finally understand that while they’ve been having fun and laughing while calling President Bush every manner of ugly name and insult, dangerous people have been watching. And they have made a calculation: We can disrespect Bush and America will laugh with us. Bush is weak. America is once again the appeasing “weak horse” it was throughout the 1990’s and even before…when we could attack anything and be accountable to no one.

I’m sure Hugo, once he left the guffawing chamber of hyenas at the UN, was shocked to discover that most Americans were not laughing, that even some Democrats were not.

And I’m sure some Democrats were shocked to see just how ugly their words sounded, when coming out of the mouth of someone else, someone with “no right,” to spew hate for political expediency.

There are some on the left who are suggesting that Hugo Chavez’s remarks are simply an indicator that the world “disrespects” President Bush…well…I wonder who gave them the idea that they could? Was it John Kerry calling him a “***king liar,” and not having to answer for that rudeness to anyone while the press shrugged it off? Good heavens, Bush calls terrorism “evil” and he was mocked and criticized for using that word, but the press never had a problem with “***king liar, ***king crooks and thieves” or with adolescent musings about the president’s name and female genitalia. It was alllllll soooooo funnnnneeeeeee, newsreaders could hardly deliver the spite without grinning, themselves.

Let me tell you, I didn’t see “disrespect” at the UN while President Bush was speaking…while he was speaking he was accorded that dubious body’s full and complete attention, and like it or not, nothing he said was disregarded, because the world knows he means what he says. They may not like him, but they respect him. And if they don’t respect him, they fear him just enough to pretend. Which frankly I prefer to a president they all “love” but don’t respect or fear, one who plays games.

But if Bush is being disrespected, then the Democrats need to look to themselves and their actions and understand how complicit they have been in encouraging it. Dems like Charlie Rangel, who called President Bush “Bull Connor,” knowing full well how wrong, inaccurate, unfair and inflammatory that was, or like the idiots who called Bush “a genocidal racist” after Hurricane Katrina, or like the party (and the press) who spent years telling America about Saddam’s Weapons of Mass Destruction only to later pretend they never said such things, and to pretend further that somehow Bush’s believing the same things they believed…made him a liar.

The Democrats alleged something that disingenuous - that what they believed was true was suddenly not only false but one man’s lie - and the press let them do it.

The press repeated it, ad nauseam, and the press and the Dems promoted films with that message, and books, until that damnable, transparent and nonsensical lie was repeated enough…because everyone knows that if you tell a big lie enough, it becomes “the truth.”

If tinpot tyrants and madmen now come to the United Nations and believe they can say anything they wish about The American President, it is because - as some of us have been warning, for some time - while all manner or irresponsible nonsense and hate has been directed at this president…the world has been watching.

And now, these tyrants and madmen sound eerily like the Democrats and the press and the left. One ideology, the world over, had completely lost its bearings, its self-control and its manners concerning one man who has never - not once -repaid them back in kind. Not in speeches. Not to the press. Not to “friendly audiences.” He came to town talking about “changing the tone,” and that’s what happened, in a perverse way. One side’s tone went rabid, the other side went nearly-silent, but this one man…kept his tone."...............

http://theanchoressonline.com/2006/09/21/chavez-clearly-listened-to-dems-and-air-america/

3 Comments

Entry #580

September 21, 2006
1:53 pm

"Chavez Wants to Reboot UN

Found a pic of Chavez in his new car.

"Venezuela was the fourth-largest crude oil supplier to the U.S. last June, ." .... ... and we owe a debt of gratitude to the "greens" for hamstringing domestic drilling, refinery expansion thereby subjecting us to the whims of this tiny little despot seated above.

Just maybe the UN will move to Venezeula and a more meaningful, effective world organization can be formed.

"Chavez Wants to Reboot UN
By Patrick Goodenough
CNSNews.com International Editor
September 21, 2006

(CNSNews.com) - Hugo Chavez has spelled out his plan for creating the type of United Nations he could work with - including moving the U.N. headquarters from New York City to a country of "the South," like Venezuela.

The left-wing populist's suggestion that the U.N. leave U.S. shores may be the one point in his controversial speech to the General Assembly that American conservatives support.

In a 15-minute address laden with personal attacks against President Bush, whom he called the devil, Chavez outlined why he thought the U.N. was "worthless."

That the U.N. had "collapsed," he said, was evident from Washington's use of its "immoral veto" to block Security Council efforts to stop Israel's war in Lebanon over the summer.

Complaining that the General Assembly had been "turned into a merely deliberative organ," Chavez laid out his four-step formula for re-establishing the U.N.

The Security Council had to be expanded, with new permanent seats going to developing and less-developed countries. There must be "immediate suppression" of the veto power currently wielded by the big five -- the U.S., Britain, France, Russia and China.

Decisions at the U.N. to resolve the world's conflicts must be "transparent," he said.

And finally, the role and powers of the secretary-general must be strengthened.

In contrast to his criticism of the U.N., Chavez remarked positively on the Non-Aligned Movement, a grouping of 118 nations -- more than 60 percent of the General Assembly -- which held a summit last week in Havana, and is chaired by Cuba for the next three years.

The resolutions adopted by the NAM, he said, followed "open debate in a transparent matter."

He urged his audience to "lend your goodwill to lend momentum to the Non-Aligned Movement for the birth of a new era -- to prevent hegemony and prevent further advances of imperialism."

"A new, strong movement has been born, a movement of the South. We are men and women of the South."

'Voice of the world's people'

Chavez also attacked the U.S. for opposing Venezuela's bid for a rotating Security Council seat. A seat earmarked for Latin America becomes vacant at year's end, and Venezuela has been lobbying hard to fill it.

Washington, however, is supporting Guatemala as an alternative candidate. The General Assembly will vote on the matter in a secret ballot on October 16, and the winner will need the backing of two-thirds of members, or 128 countries.

China and Russia have declared their support for Venezuela's candidacy, and Chavez said in his U.N. speech that he also received the endorsement of major Latin American countries, the entire (22-member) Arab League, and "almost all of Africa."

"Venezuela, with a seat on the Security Council, will be expressing not only Venezuela's thoughts, but it will also be the voice of all the peoples of the world, and we will defend dignity and truth."

A key concern for the U.S. and its allies is that Venezuela -- even as a non-permanent member -- will play an additional spoiler role in the already divided council at a time it faces challenges posed by the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea. Chavez has allied himself closely with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and is also sympathetic to Pyongyang.

Responding to Wednesday's speech, State Department spokesman Tom Casey said: "The U.N. is an important world stage and an important forum, and leaders come there representing their people and their country. And I'll leave it to the Venezuelan people to determine whether President Chavez represented them and presented them in a way they would have liked to have seen.'

Rep. Connie Mack (R-Florida) said Chavez had shown the world his true colors.

"Quite simply, Chavez's anti-freedom tirade at the United Nations only bolstered the fact that he is little more than a champion of despair and despotism and a sworn enemy of hope and opportunity," Mack said in a statement.

"Chavez's growing alliance with proven enemies of freedom including Iran, Syria, Cuba and North Korea, coupled by his rapid militarization, pursuit of nuclear technologies and relentless broadside attacks on freedom in Venezuela, pose a real threat to the stability of the Western Hemisphere and indeed the world."

Venezuela is the world's fifth largest oil producer. According to the Department of Energy's Energy Information Administration, Venezuela was the fourth-largest crude oil supplier to the U.S. last June, after Canada, Mexico and Saudi Arabia."
http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewForeignBureaus.asp?Page=/ForeignBureaus/archive/200609/INT20060921a.html

Comments

Entry #579

September 21, 2006
1:29 pm

Rangel: An attack on Bush is an attack on all Americans

Wow what posturing from the party who invited the world to foist insults onto a seated president during wartime, never miss an opportunity to grandstand when it suits their agenda.

Way too little ..... way too late .... totally unbelievable dog and pony show.

RANGEL: AN ATTACK ON BUSH IS AN ATTACK ON ALL AMERICANS... 'You do not come into my country, my congressional district, and you do not condemn my president. If there is any criticism of President Bush, it should be restricted to Americans, whether they voted for him or not. I just want to make it abundantly clear to Hugo Chavez or any other president, but do not come to the United States and think because we have problems with our president that any foreigner can come to our country and not think that Americans do not feel offended when you offend our Chief of State'...

http://www.drudgereport.com/

PELOSI: YOU THUG

3 Comments

Entry #578

September 20, 2006
1:23 pm

Pope and Kissinger Warn the World

A clash of old against new, the old accustomed to ruling in darkness because it's been able to do so for 1500 years or more.

However, considering the amount of spiritual light or enlightenment that has poured onto the planet since the Harmonic Convergence in 1987, no wonder dark elements are fighting for their very lives. It's evident even here in the US.

They'll lose, light always prevails over darkness especially now that the balance is changed.

"The Pope and Kissinger Warn the World

September 20, 2006
By Tony Blankley
Washington Times

There is an historically fairly predictable pattern to the unfolding strategies and views of great wars. They often start with a morally ambiguous view of the enemy, a more limited conception of the war's magnitude and a restrained application of violent tactics.

Eventually, moral clarity is obtained, war objectives expand - often to grandiosity, and tactics become ferocious. For example at the start of our Civil War in 1861 at the Battle of First Manassas, spectators came out by carriage with picnic lunches to observe the event. By 1865, Gen. Sherman executed a campaign of civilian terror and material obliteration in his march to the sea. Likewise, the war started with the purpose of saving the union, but morally expanded to end slavery - north and south.

World War II started out in Europe first with the phony war and mutual thoughts of a negotiated peace, then with careful bombing (Hitler initially ordered that London not be bombed) and ended with the firebombing of Dresden and Tokyo and the atomic obliteration of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Even during his war on the Jews, as late as 1940, Hitler was thinking of deporting German Jews to Madagascar, and ended in rounding up Jews throughout Europe and perpetrating genocide in industrially designed death camps (although some historians believe the Madagascar plan may always have been a subterfuge for the Final Solution.)

Today, the West's struggle to resist radical Islamic aggression (both cultural and terroristic) is still in that early phase of moral confusion and limited tactics. Thus we continue to debate the ethical merits of minor intrusions into American civil liberties (such as NSA surveillance of some phone calls from foreign suspects), and even serious and patriotic men such as Sen. John McCain and Gen. Colin Powell challenge the need to permit psychologically rough - but nonviolent - interrogation of captured terrorists.

But there are some signs that the early stage of moral confusion is beginning to give way to greater clarity. Last week, two towering intellects - Pope Benedict XVI and Henry Kissinger - began to offer clarity. On Tuesday the pope gave his now famous, but still misunderstood, lecture at the University of Regensburg, and on WednesdayMr. Kissinger published in The Washington Post a half page seminal article on the risk of civilizational war.

Any fair and careful reading of the pope's lecture must conclude that it was not an inadvertent insult to Islam. Rather it was a firm assertion that the Judeo-Christian God acts in accordance with reason (In the beginning was the logos - word and reason.), and thus Christians and Jews can undertake a rational debate about the morality of violence. He quotes, now famously, Emperor Manuel II's assertion in 1391 that Islam spreads its faith through violence - which, he says, is unreasonable and incompatible with the nature of God. He then cites an 11th-century Arab Muslim theologian, Ibn Hazn, who argued that Allah is transcendent of reason.

After criticizing secular Christians for not giving reason its proper place in understanding faith and God, he concludes his lecture by again quoting the Byzantine Emperor Manuel II on his same criticism of Islam. Then the pope finishes his lecture with the following words: "It is to this great logos, to this breadth of reason, that we invite our partners in the dialogue of cultures. To rediscover it constantly is the great task of the university."

In other words, he is inviting Islam to explain whether its God is like ours - inherently understandable by reason (and thus, is their God opposed to violence, as ours is?)

He was also, I strongly suspect, speaking to his own flock, both to return to proper Christianity and to consider the nature of Islam. And, I suspect, the pope did not inadvertently quote the now inflammatory passage. If he had not included that quote, the world would not now be debating his lecture. While the pope surely did not want to see violence, he just as surely wanted to engage the world in this vital search for clarity.

While not the pope, Mr. Kissinger is the world's premier practitioner and scholar of real politic. So, it is consequential that in his article last week he warned the world that "we are witnessing a carefully conceived assault, not isolated terrorist attacks, on the international system of respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity. The creation of organizations such as Hezbollah and al-Qaeda symbolizes the fact that transnational loyalties are replacing national ones. The driving force behind this challenge is the jihadist conviction that it is the existing order that is illegitimate."

He went on to warn that "The debate sparked by the Iraq war over American rashness vs. European escapism is dwarfed by what the world now faces...the common danger of a wider war merging into a war of civilizations against the backdrop of a nuclear-armed Middle East...We now know that we face the imperative of building a new world order or potential global catastrophe."

These are shocking words coming from the verbally impeccably careful diplomatist.

So, within 24 hours the pope raises the question whether Islam is inherently violent and unreasonable, while Henry Kissinger warns of a possibly emerging nuclear clash of civilizations.

Moral clarity, anyone?

http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/20060919-091310-2934r.htm
http://www.stevequayle.com/News.alert/06_Global/060920.Pope.Kissinger.html?id=16966

4 Comments

Entry #577

September 20, 2006
10:25 am

"The Associated (with terrorists) Press

What the MSM siding with terrorists ...................... Whoda thunkit?????

"The Associated (with terrorists) Press

By Michelle Malkin

Source TownHall.com

"The Associated Press proudly calls itself the "essential global news network" and a "bastion of the people's right to know around the world." But when it comes to the "people's right to know" whether Associated Press employees are cooperating with terrorists overseas, the "essential global news network's" motto is: Bug off.

On April 12, I learned from military sources that an Associated Press photographer in Iraq, Fallujah native Bilal Hussein, had been captured in Ramadi in an apartment with insurgents and a cache of weapons. This was news. I asked the AP for confirmation. Corporate spokesman Jack Stokes informed me that company officials were "looking into reports that Mr. Hussein was detained by the U.S. military in Iraq but have no further details at this time." After reporting the alleged detention on my blog (michellemalkin.com/archives/005941.htm), I followed up several more times with AP over the past five months for status updates on Hussein. No reply.

On Sept. 17, the Associated Press finally acknowledged that Hussein was being detained. The AP's overdue revelation was likely part of an attempt to drum up sympathy for Hussein, who has made critical public statements against our troops in Fallujah, and undermine Bush administration interrogation efforts involving military detainees. The AP article not only confirmed Hussein's capture, it also revealed (buried deep in the story) that it knew of Hussein's capture from at least May 7 -- when it received an e-mail from U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Jack Gardner revealing bombshell details:

"The military said Hussein was captured with two insurgents, including Hamid Hamad Motib, an alleged leader of al-Qaida in Iraq. 'He has close relationships with persons known to be responsible for kidnappings, smuggling, improvised explosive device (IED) attacks and other attacks on coalition forces,' according to a May 7 e-mail from U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Jack Gardner, who oversees all coalition detainees in Iraq."

In fact, the Pentagon said on Monday, after three separate independent reviews, the military had deemed Hussein a security threat with "strong ties to known insurgents . . . involved in activities that were well outside the scope of what you would expect a journalist to be doing in that country." Hussein "tested positive for traces of explosives."

Let me repeat that: An Associated (with terrorists) Press journalist gets caught with an alleged al Qaeda leader and tests positive for bomb-making materials. That. Is. News. How does a news organization explain away its decision to sit on it for five months? Like this: "The AP has worked quietly until now, believing that would be the best approach."

The best approach to journalism? No. The best approach to suppressing a damning connection to terrorists.

The mainstream media enjoys mocking bloggers as journalistic wannabes who don't do any "real" reporting and have no concern for the "public interest." But as in the case of the Reuters photo-faking debacle this summer, it is bloggers in their little home offices -- not the professionals on the ground thousands of miles away -- who smoked out a war story with profound national security implications. Well before I reported on Hussein's capture, military bloggers and media watchdog bloggers had raised persistent questions over the past two years about Hussein's relationship with terrorists in Iraq and whether his photos were staged in collusion with our enemies. (For a thorough overview, see http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/cat_bilal_hussein.php. ) ".................

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/MichelleMalkin/2006/09/20/the_associated_with_terrorists_press

2 Comments

Entry #576

September 19, 2006
10:16 am

video link "Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West

Posted this a few weeks ago ...... link was bad after a few days. Back up, running and worth time investment to watch. For anyone who ever thought Muslim extremists could ever be reasoned with this may shed some light as to their mindset.

They blame everyone and everthing but themselves.

Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West [full-length] 1 hr 17min 31 sec

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1211228663574416724&q=obsession

2 Comments

Entry #575

September 18, 2006
4:21 pm

Illegals crossing border carrying "KI Tablets"

Nuclear Threats : Law Enforcement Sources Confirm: Illegals crossing border carrying "KI Tablets"

*18 September 2006: In an article provided exclusively to the Northeast Intelligence Network and Canada Free Press by Dr. Paul Williams and Mr. David Dastych on Saturday, “final preparations have been made for the next major attack on the US” identified as “American Hiroshima,” suggesting the attack will be nuclear in nature. Since we published that report, confidential sources in law enforcement positions have privately confirmed to the Northeast Intelligence Network that a "disturbing trend" is being reported on both of our borders – a pattern that is consistent with a potential nuclear attack scenario against the US. According to these sources, a "significant and alarming number" of illegal aliens attempting entry into the US, caught by border patrol agents, have been found to be carrying Potassium Iodide tablets, which are used to protect against exposure to radiation in emergency situations.*

According to our sources, the illegal aliens who have been caught have been described as OTMs (other-than Mexicans), and consist primarily of Chinese and Iranian nationals on our southern border, and Asians and others from a variety of Middle Eastern countries at the US-Canadian border. Law enforcement sources providing this information to the Northeast Intelligence Network agreed that this is “a very recent phenomena,” but one that has increased to “alarming levels” and is of particular concern to government officials.

Additional and more specific information will be contained in the upcoming issue of the HQ INTEL-ALERT Private Intelligence Report.

*NOTE: An astute and well-educated reader accurately points out that Potassium Iodate, also referred to as KI, protects only one organ in the body (the thyroid) from ONE form of radiation (I-131). And it does so only if a person takes the tablet BEFORE (or just after) being exposed to I-131, as the KI fills up the thyroid gland with "good" salt instead of the radioactive version.

Too many people nationwide already falsely believe that KI is a so-called "anti-radiation" pill that will protect them from all forms of radiation. If a person takes the tablet and fails to leave/evacuate a radioactive area, they will still be exposed to radiation and will likely become ill or even die from radiation sickness. Further, Gamma radiation, (the type of radiation that killed so many people in Nagasaki and Hiroshima, Japan, after the atomic blasts in 1945) is deadly; Potassium Iodate offers no protection on this type of nuclear radiation.

For further and more specific information, you may download the KI Fact Sheet compiled using information from the National Institutes of Health, Food & Drug Administration, and Nuclear Regulatory Commission (PDF File).

http://www.homelandsecurityus.com/site/modules/news/article.php?storyid=592

Comments

Entry #574

September 18, 2006
11:08 am

photos "The Pulitzer Prize for Felony Murder, Part II

No wonder the press reports pro-terrorist ... whoda thunk it?????? Permalink to discussion at the bottom.

"The Pulitzer Prize for Felony Murder, Part II

........."Now, the Associated Press wants us to believe that the man who took these photographs showed "extraordinary courage" because they were "taken at great personal risk" to the photographer. But I don't buy it. It appears obvious that the person who took these photos knew that the terrorists wanted the pictures taken. If the terrorists hadn't wanted the pictures taken, they would have shot the photographer. And what was the photographer doing within a few yards of the terrorists in the first place? Are we supposed to believe that he just stumbled across them while they were in the act of committing murder or firing a mortar? Of course not. The photographer was present at the invitation of the terrorists, who wanted the pictures taken for propaganda purposes.".............

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/015301.php

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Entry #573

September 17, 2006
10:12 am

"Al-Qaida warning: Muslims leave U.S.

My last post has established that al Qaida and the like are descended from Hitler's Nazis, also one article I posted said bin Laden was intent on "ethnic cleansing" so I'm not sure what it's going to take to convince some how serious their threat is.

These two articles are likely the intelligence President Bush was referring to in his latest speech because he was stressing the point that YES they do want to kill us, and YES they're planning another attack.

BTW, I use World Net Daily quite frequently for intelligence articles because Joseph Farah who owns WND also has an intelligence bulletin, G-2 which has been pretty accurate.

Live links.

"Al-Qaida warning: Muslims leave U.S.
Afghan terror commander hints at big attack on N.Y., Washington

Posted: September 17, 2006
1:00 a.m. Eastern

Source WorldNetDaily.com

"The new al-Qaida field commander in Afghanistan is calling for Muslims to leave the U.S. – particularly Washington and New York – in anticipation of a major terror attack to rival Sept. 11, according to an interview by a Pakistani journalist.

Abu Dawood told Hamid Mir, a reporter who has covered al-Qaida and met with Osama bin Laden, the attack is being coordinated by Adnan el-Shukrijumah and suggests it may involve some form of weapon of mass destruction smuggled across the Mexican border.

"Our brothers are ready to attack inside America. We will breach their security again," he is quoted as saying. "There is no timeframe for our attack inside America; we can do it any time."

As WND has previously reported, el-Shukrijumah is a trained nuclear technician and accomplished pilot who has been singled out by bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri to serve as the field commander for the next terrorist attack on U.S. soil.

The terrorist was last seen in Mexico, where, on Nov. 1, 2004, he allegedly hijacked a Piper PA Pawnee cropduster from Ejido Queretaro near Mexicali to transport a nuclear weapon and nuclear equipment into the U.S., according to Paul Williams, a former FBI consultant and author of "The Dunces of Doomsday."

"He is an American and a friend of Muhammad Atta, who led 9/11 attacks five years ago," said Dawood. "We call him 'Jaffer al Tayyar' (Jafer the Pilot); he is very brave and intelligent. (President) Bush is aware that brother Adnan has smuggled deadly materials inside America from the Mexican border. Bush is silent about him, because he doesn’t want to panic his people. Sheikh Osama bin Laden has completed his cycle of warnings. You know, he is man of his words, he is not a politician; he always does what he says. If he said it many times that Americans will see new attacks, they will definitely see new attacks. He is a real mujahid. Americans will not win this war, which they have started against Muslims. Americans are the biggest supporters of the biggest terrorist in the world, which is Israel."

Dawood said he was currently conducting operations in Afghanistan under the leadership of the Taliban. He warned of a series of upcoming suicide bombings there directed against government and coalition forces during Ramadan.

He is also quoted as saying the next attack in America will not be conducted by people like Atta.

"We have a different plan for the next attack," he told Mir. "You will see. Americans will hardly find out any Muslim names, after the next attack. Most of our brothers are living in Western countries, with Jewish and Christian names, with passports of Western countries. This time, someone with the name of Mohamed Atta will not attack inside America, it would be some David, Richard or Peter."

He said there will be another audio message from bin Laden aired within the next two weeks.

Mir reportedly interviewed Dawood Sept. 12 at the tomb of Sultan Mehmud Ghaznawi on the outskirts of Kabul. Dawood and the al-Qaida leaders who accompanied him were clean-shaven and dressed as Western reporters. The al-Qaida commander had contacted Mir by cell phone to arrange the meeting.

"You have witnessed the brutality of the Israelis in the recent 34-day war against Lebanese civilians," said Dawood. "9/11 was a revenge of Palestinian children, killed by the U.S.-made weapons, supplied to Israel. The next attack on America would be a revenge of Lebanese children killed by U.S.-made cluster bombs. Bush and (British Prime Minister Tony) Blair are the Crusaders, and Muslim leaders, like (Pakistani President Pervez) Musharraf and (Afghani President Hamid) Karzai are their collaborators. We will teach a lesson to all of them."

El-Shukrijumah was born in Guyana Aug. 4, 1975 – the firstborn of Gulshair el-Shukrijumah, a 44-year-old radical Muslim cleric, and his 16-year-old wife. In 1985, Gulshair migrated to the United States, where he assumed duties as the imam of the Farouq Mosque in Brooklyn.

The mosque, located at 554 Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn, has served as a hive for terrorist activities. It has raised millions for the jihad and has served as a recruiting station for al-Qaida. Many of the planners of the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, including blind Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, were prominent members of this notorious "house of worship."

In 1995, the Shukrijumah family relocated to Miramar, Fla., where Gulshair became the spiritual leader of the radical Masjid al-Hijah Mosque, and where Adnan became friends with Jose Padilla, who planned to detonate a radiological bomb in midtown Manhattan; Mandhai Jokhan, who was convicted of attempting to blow up nuclear power plants in southern Florida; and a group of other home-grown terrorists.

Adnan Shukrijumah attended flight schools in Florida and Norman, Oklahoma, along with Mohammad Atta and the other 9/11 operatives, and he became a highly skilled commercial jet pilot, although he, like Atta and the other terrorists, never applied for a license with the Federal Aviation Commission.

In April 2001, Shukrijumah spent 10 days in Panama, where he reportedly met with al-Qaida officials to assist in the planning of 9/11. He also traveled to Trinidad and Guyana, where virulent al-Qaida cells have been established. The following month, he obtained an associate's degree in computer engineering from Broward Community College.

During this time, he managed to get passports from Guyana, Trinidad, Saudi Arabia, Canada and the United States, according to Williams. He also began to adopt a number of aliases, including Abu Arifi, Jafar al-Tayyar, Jaafar At Yayyar, Ja'far al-Tayar, and Mohammed Sher Mohammed Khan (the name that appeared on his official FBI file). He traveled to Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, where he met with Ramzi Binalshibh, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and other members of the al-Qaida high command. He also spent considerable time within al-Qaida camps in Afghanistan, where he received training in explosives and special operations.

Following 9/11, el-Shukrijumah was reportedly singled out by bin Laden and al-Zawahiri to spearhead the next great attack on America. One plan was for a nuclear attack that would take place simultaneously in seven U.S. cities, leaving millions dead and the richest and most powerful nation on earth in ashes.

"Muslims should leave America," said Dawood. "We cannot stop our attack just because of the American Muslims; they must realize that American forces are killing innocent Muslims in Afghanistan and Iraq; we have the right to respond back, in the same manner, in the enemy's homeland. The American Muslims are like a human shield for our enemy; they must leave New York and Washington."

Mir, the journalist, has reported previously that al-Qaida has smuggled nuclear weapons and uranium into the U.S.

"I am saying that Muslims must leave America, but we can attack America anytime," he said. "Our cycle of warnings has been completed, now we have fresh edicts from some prominent Muslim scholars to destroy our enemy, this is our defending of Jihad; the enemy has entered in our homes and we have the right to enter in their homes, they are killing us, we will kill them."

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=52018

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Osama's biographer says nukes in U.S.
Border used to smuggle WMDs inside America, says source

Posted: May 24, 2006
1:00 a.m. Eastern

Source WorldNetDaily.com

"Al-Qaida has smuggled tactical nuclear weapons and uranium into the U.S. across the Mexican border and is planning to launch a major terrorist attack using a combination of nukes and dirty nukes, according to an interview with Osama bin Laden's biographer, Hamid Mir, in WorldThreats.com.

The information confirms reports previously published in Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin and in a new book by Paul L. Williams, "Dunces of Doomsday."

"I came up with this conclusion after eight years of investigation and research in the remote mountain areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan. I traveled to Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Syria, Uzbekistan and Russia and met dozens of people," Mir said. "I interviewed not only al-Qaida operatives but met scientists and top U.S. officials also. I will have the details in my coming book. At least two al-Qaida operatives claimed that the organization smuggled suitcase nukes inside America. But I have no details on who did it. But I do have details about who smuggled uranium inside America and how."

Mir claims his information is based not only on what al-Qaida operatives, including bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, told him, but also upon his own independent research as a journalist. Mir says his upcoming book, a biography of bin Laden, will disclose al-Qaida's nuclear attack plans.

"As far as I know, they smuggled three suitcase nukes from Russia to Europe," Mir says about al-Qaida. "They smuggled many kilos of enriched uranium inside America for their dirty bomb projects. They said in 1999 that they must have material for more than six dirty bombs in America. They tested at least one dirty bomb in the Kunar province of Afghanistan in 2000. They have planned an attack bigger than 9-11, even before 9-11 happened. Osama bin Laden trained 42 fighters to destroy the American economy and military might. Nineteen were used on 9-11, 23 are still 'sleeping' inside America waiting for a wake-up call from bin Laden."

Mir said al-Qaida operatives told him that tactical nuclear weapons were smuggled over the Mexican border before Sept. 11, 2001.

Mir said again he believes al-Qaida may use its nuclear arsenal after the U.S. attacks Iran in an effort to stop its nuclear weapons program.

"This is my opinion," he says. "No al-Qaida leader has ever admitted that they are working with Iran. I also think that, maybe, the Iranians will organize some attacks inside America and you will accuse al-Qaida."

Asked why al-Qaida hasn't used nuclear weapons it already possesses, Mir said: "They are waiting for the proper time. They want the U.S. to be involved in a mass killing of Muslims, so that they will have some justification. That is what I was told by a top al-Qaida leader in the Kunar Mountains of Afghanistan."

Hamid Mir's credibility skyrocketed when he accurately predicted in G2 Bulletin last month the imminent release of a new recorded communiqué from bin Laden through al-Jazeera, the Arabic TV network. Two days later, bin Laden's tape was the focus of international news coverage.

"If you think that my information and analysis about bin Laden's location is correct," said Mir, "then please don't underestimate my analysis about his nuclear threat also."

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=50341

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Entry #572