No Evidence — That We’re Going to Tell You About, Anyway . . .
The L.A. Times story on Able Danger yesterday, titled No Evidence Atta Was Identified, consisted of two entire paragraphs:
The Pentagon has been unable to validate claims that a secret intelligence unit identified Sept. 11 hijacker Mohamed Atta as a terrorist more than a year before the attacks, a Defense Department spokesman said.
Larry Di Rita said research into the matter continued, but that there had been no evidence that the intelligence unit, called Able Danger, came up with information as specific as an Army Reserve officer associated with the program had asserted.
That’s two instances of the phrase “no evidence” — one in the headline, and one in the body of this puny little story. But one leetle name is noticeably missing from the story: Navy Capt. Scott Phillpott. Independent Sources explains.
P.S. This is the last story the paper ran on Able Danger. Nice job, guys.
Striving to inform their readers, are they?
See they just want to boil the story down to its essentials – there is no need to complicate matters with a few additional witnesses contradicting the Pentagon’s statement.
MaxedOutMama (c7678c) — 8/25/2005 @ 9:10 amThe Gorelick Wall & Sandy Berger, Update XIII
Although this is just a theory, the fact that Atta never again set foot in Germany after the arrests of the Iraqi agents is very telling.
Flopping Aces (59ce3a) — 8/25/2005 @ 11:32 amdid they also have a paragraph about how the able danger posters didn’t include atta’s picture back in the day, but now Weldon says they did.
actus (a5f574) — 8/25/2005 @ 4:35 pmSpecter To Hold Hearings on Able Danger
Meanwhile, Patterico is holding the LA Times’ feet to the fire on Able Danger. They’ve tried to spin the "no evidence Able Danger identified Mohammed Atta" line, but curiously left out the testimony of Navy Capt. Scott Phillpott. Patteric…
DOUBLE TOOTHPICKS (b55965) — 8/25/2005 @ 5:37 pm