4/01: focus on Bib Laden "A MISTAKE"!
A previously forgotten report from April 2001 (four months before 9/11)
shows that the Bush Administration officially declared it "a mistake" to
focus "so much energy on Osama bin Laden." The report directly contradicts
the White House's continued assertion that fighting terrorism was its "top
priority" before the 9/11 attacks.
Specifically, on April 30, 2001, CNN reported that the Bush Administration's
release of the government's annual terrorism report contained a serious
change: "there was no extensive mention of alleged terrorist mastermind
Osama bin Laden" as there had been in previous years. When asked why the
Administration had reduced the focus, "a senior Bush State Department
official told CNN the U.S. government made a mistake in focusing so much
energy on bin Laden.".
The move to downgrade the fight against Al Qaeda before 9/11 was not the
only instance where the Administration ignored repeated warnings that an Al
Qaeda attack was imminent). Specifically, the Associated Press reported
in 2002 that "President Bush's national security leadership met formally
nearly 100 times in the months prior to the Sept. 11 attacks yet terrorism
was the topic during only two of those sessions". Meanwhile, Newsweek
has reported that internal government documents show that the Bush
Administration moved to "de-emphasize" counterterrorism prior to 9/11.
When "FBI officials sought to add hundreds more counterintelligence agents"
to deal with the problem, "they got shot down" by the White House...more [MisLeader.org]
Bush gets slaped down by Clarke, and what does the White House do? They focus on character assasination. The funny thing is that Clarke voted for Bush. I love the images of Condi Rice looking like she was sucking on a lime -- of course she has time to go on 60 minutes, but not to testify under oath...mj
9:03:28 PM 
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