Patterico's Pontifications

8/23/2007

Captain Ed skewers Bill Clinton

Filed under: General — DRJ @ 9:15 am



[Guest post by DRJ]

From Captain Ed: Did Clinton Lie About Targeting Bin Laden?

Quote:

“It appears that Bill Clinton may have exaggerated his record when it came to strategizing against Osama bin Laden. Newsweek’s Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball take a look at the Inspector General’s report of the pre-9/11 intelligence failures at the CIA and find an interesting nugget. Despite Clinton’s angry assertion to Chris Wallace in last year’s controversial Fox interview, he never gave the CIA an assassination order regarding bin Laden (h/t: CQ reader Mark):”

“The report also criticized intelligence problems when Bill Clinton was president, detailing political and legal “constraints” agency officials felt in the late 1990s. In September 2006, during a famous encounter with Fox News anchor Wallace, Clinton erupted in anger and waived his finger when asked about whether his administration had done enough to get bin Laden. “What did I do? What did I do?” Clinton said at one point. “I worked hard to try to kill him. I authorized a finding for the CIA to kill him. We contracted with people to kill him. I got closer to killing him than anybody has gotten since.”

Clinton appeared to have been referring to a December 1999 Memorandum of Notification (MON) he signed that authorized the CIA to use lethal force to capture, not kill, bin Laden. But the inspector general’s report made it clear that the agency never viewed the order as a license to “kill” bin Laden—one reason it never mounted more effective operations against him.”

Captain Ed concludes:

“One has to sympathize with CIA officials who had read the classified report in 2005, but were unable to respond to his exaggeration in 2006. He once gave the same kind of finger-waggling tirade to the nation, which turned out as false as his Wallace interview. It’s a sad reflection on a man who somehow cannot bring himself to tell the truth, even when his nation needs it.”

I agree with Ed.

24 Responses to “Captain Ed skewers Bill Clinton”

  1. this is pretty funny considering the number of lies we’ve heard from bush, and bush’s studied disinterest in going after bin laden. i’d trade bush to get bill clinton back right now.

    assistant devil's advocate (2c9cdc) — 8/23/2007 @ 9:27 am

  2. Lies, on top of lies, on top of lies. Anyone surprised?

    JD (815fda) — 8/23/2007 @ 9:43 am

  3. 90% of Americans know Bill’s a liar. The MSM marvels at how well he does it yet 45% really believe he feels their pain. For sure, when he wags the finger you know it’s a whopper. Bill concluded his harangue at Chris Wallace with, “That’s not an opinion that’s an assertion.” Leave it to Bill to find a distinction.

    i b squidly (94e4c9) — 8/23/2007 @ 10:25 am

  4. Talk about missing the forest.

    As many as 60 people at the CIA knew that two known bin Laden operatives, who would later become 9/11 hijackers, had traveled to the United States 18 months before the attacks. And the FBI was not told about them until the end of August 2001.

    Captain Ed, two days ago:

    “Is it fair to paint this report as evidence that the fault for our unpreparedness belongs to the Clinton administration? I’d say that it’s not healthy to think along these lines. It’s better to leave the partisan sniping aside and have everyone learn the lessons than it is to turn this to partisan advantage. Tenet ran the CIA, and he’s responsible for its performance. Bill Clinton appointed him, and George Bush kept him on the job.”

    http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/011819.php

    steve (2bbfdc) — 8/23/2007 @ 11:14 am

  5. Maybe this should be included in his presidential LIEbrary

    krazy kagu (e08c0e) — 8/23/2007 @ 11:35 am

  6. As with all politians, they are all lie to a great extend. I suspect the major difference between Clinton and Bush is that one lies to cover up how lax he was on national security while the other lies to protect national security. Which liar would be in your best interest?

    joe kosanda (4defde) — 8/23/2007 @ 12:15 pm

  7. Kind of makes you wonder what was in the documents pilfered from the National Archives by Sandy Burger, doesn’t it? Must have really been damning, even by Clintonian standards.

    driver (faae10) — 8/23/2007 @ 1:37 pm

  8. Hey Steve,

    How come you didn’t include the next paragraph?

    I would say that it’s fair to point out that passages such as “No comprehensive report focusing on bin Laden was written after 1993,” and “no comprehensive report laying out the threats of 2001 was assembled” put lie to the assertions by Clinton-era national-security officials that they handed the Bush administration a turn-key strategy to deal with al-Qaeda. The IG’s report clearly shows that no such strategy existed — which is why Bush insisted on developing one.

    Paul (f54101) — 8/23/2007 @ 1:57 pm

  9. Amen, Driver, but did you mean Sandy Burglar?

    DRJ (bfe07e) — 8/23/2007 @ 2:59 pm

  10. The President then refused to give the TRODPINT and JAWBREAKER teams the authority they neededto take out Bin Laden; at Tarnak farms, the falconry camp with the emirati prince, et al. Previously, “Rich” the liason to the UZbeks at the CTC where he directed those two efforts wasblamed for missing Al Midhar and Al Hazmi; the truth turned out differently. The efforts indicated in the IG report bely these comments; much more than the statements by the administration. The code word classified summary of the aftermath of the Ressam plot would also prove enlightening if Sandy Berger had not stolen & destroyed them. It would also put into perspective what was done in regards to the Dec. 1998 PDB which mentioned key AQ figures like Mustafa Atef and Seif Al Adel not the edited gruel
    provided on Aug 6, 3 1/2 years later.

    narciso (d671ab) — 8/23/2007 @ 5:39 pm

  11. ADA…do us a favor and justify that comment…it will be interesting reading….

    reff (f3109d) — 8/23/2007 @ 9:42 pm

  12. ADA….didn’t think you would….thanks for playing…

    reff (bff229) — 8/24/2007 @ 9:36 am

  13. ADA, whatever one might think of Bush, your comment is just silly given the actual facts.

    Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 8/24/2007 @ 11:33 am

  14. “”We haven’t heard much from him. And I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s at the center of any command structure. And, again, I don’t know where he is,” Bush said during the 2002 news conference. “I’ll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him.”

    – George W. Bush, March 13, 2002

    Seems fairly disinterested to me…

    Leviticus (3c2c59) — 8/24/2007 @ 12:08 pm

  15. Only if you want to convince yourself Leviticus. To the rest of us, that you are just misrepresenting what he said is clear.

    Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 8/24/2007 @ 12:47 pm

  16. Levi #14,

    Re: Your Bush quote, was Bush referring to Osama bin Laden? If so, do you really believe the American government had no interest in bin Laden after 9/11? Government officials might very well have feigned indifference to avoid compromising ongoing actions or surveillance, but I’m sure they were all concerned about bin Laden.

    As for Clinton, he said he tried to kill Osama bin Laden and, when he said that, he knew the CIA couldn’t respond to verify or deny his claim. Now the IG’s report has been released so we know the CIA didn’t believe it had orders to kill Osama bin Laden. Thus, either Clinton never directed the CIA to kill bin Laden or he wrote the directive in such a vague manner that the CIA was unable to act on it. I don’t know which is correct but, at a minimum, it’s been reported that Clinton’s approach to terrorism was characterized by letting top aides “spend weeks or months arguing over the fine points in action memorandums.” That sounds like Clinton responded to terrorism with legalese, an approach that is consistent with his legal background. It does not sound like an approach that would result in a clear directive to take out bin Laden.

    My point is not to criticize or praise Clinton or Bush for what they did to combat terrorism. My point is that it’s wrong for Clinton to dissemble about what he actually did to burnish his own image and legacy.

    DRJ (bfe07e) — 8/24/2007 @ 1:08 pm

  17. Q Mr. President, in your speeches now you rarely talk or mention Osama bin Laden. Why is that? Also, can you tell the American people if you have any more information, if you know if he is dead or alive? Final part — deep in your heart, don’t you truly believe that until you find out if he is dead or alive, you won’t really eliminate the threat of —

    THE PRESIDENT: Deep in my heart I know the man is on the run, if he’s alive at all. Who knows if he’s hiding in some cave or not; we haven’t heard from him in a long time. And the idea of focusing on one person is — really indicates to me people don’t understand the scope of the mission.

    Terror is bigger than one person. And he’s just — he’s a person who’s now been marginalized. His network, his host government has been destroyed. He’s the ultimate parasite who found weakness, exploited it, and met his match. He is — as I mentioned in my speech, I do mention the fact that this is a fellow who is willing to commit youngsters to their death and he, himself, tries to hide — if, in fact, he’s hiding at all.

    So I don’t know where he is. You know, I just don’t spend that much time on him, Kelly, to be honest with you. I’m more worried about making sure that our soldiers are well-supplied; that the strategy is clear; that the coalition is strong; that when we find enemy bunched up like we did in Shahikot Mountains, that the military has all the support it needs to go in and do the job, which they did.

    And there will be other battles in Afghanistan. There’s going to be other struggles like Shahikot, and I’m just as confident about the outcome of those future battles as I was about Shahikot, where our soldiers are performing brilliantly. We’re tough, we’re strong, they’re well-equipped. We have a good strategy. We are showing the world we know how to fight a guerrilla war with conventional means.

    Q But don’t you believe that the threat that bin Laden posed won’t truly be eliminated until he is found either dead or alive?

    THE PRESIDENT: Well, as I say, we haven’t heard much from him. And I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s at the center of any command structure. And, again, I don’t know where he is. I — I’ll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him. I know he is on the run. I was concerned about him, when he had taken over a country. I was concerned about the fact that he was basically running Afghanistan and calling the shots for the Taliban.

    But once we set out the policy and started executing the plan, he became — we shoved him out more and more on the margins. He has no place to train his al Qaeda killers anymore. And if we — excuse me for a minute — and if we find a training camp, we’ll take care of it. Either we will or our friends will. That’s one of the things — part of the new phase that’s becoming apparent to the American people is that we’re working closely with other governments to deny sanctuary, or training, or a place to hide, or a place to raise money.

    And we’ve got more work to do. See, that’s the thing the American people have got to understand, that we’ve only been at this six months. This is going to be a long struggle. I keep saying that; I don’t know whether you all believe me or not. But time will show you that it’s going to take a long time to achieve this objective. And I can assure you, I am not going to blink. And I’m not going to get tired. Because I know what is at stake. And history has called us to action, and I am going to seize this moment for the good of the world, for peace in the world and for freedom.

    bonhomme (d737be) — 8/24/2007 @ 1:14 pm

  18. Nicely done, bonhomme. The context shows just how much Leviticus misrepresents the comment.

    Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 8/24/2007 @ 1:23 pm

  19. How do you capture someone after using lethal force against them?

    Seriously, the evidence that Bill Clinton lied about authorizing the CIA to kill Bin Laden is a memorandum signed by Bill Clinton authorizing the CIA to kill Bin Laden. Do you people even try to make sense anymore?

    Bob Smith (1b6f54) — 8/24/2007 @ 9:40 pm

  20. That’s not what the article says about the memorandum Bob. The article says that the memorandum authorized lethal force for the objective of capturing Bin Laden himself. That would not mean that they were authorized to mount an operation to kill bin Laden himself, just to employ lethal force during a mission to capture.

    Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 8/24/2007 @ 9:53 pm

  21. By the way, Bob, its Isikoff who you claim is not making sense. The passage is from the Newsweek article.

    Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 8/24/2007 @ 9:57 pm

  22. And we knew that BILL CLINTON lied everytime his mouth was open

    krazy kagu (5e1710) — 8/25/2007 @ 10:58 am

  23. Uh Robin, I was referring to the characterization of Clinton as a liar. Isikoff’s article doesn’t make that claim, the Captain and DRJ did.

    Bob Smith (1b6f54) — 8/25/2007 @ 9:38 pm

  24. Bob,

    Clinton said he authorized a finding to kill Osama bin Laden. The IG’s report says he didn’t – that instead he authorized the CIA to use lethal force to capture bin Laden. I assume that means the CIA was authorized to kill other people in trying to capture bin Laden. But Clinton didn’t say he worked hard to capture bin Laden, he said he worked hard to kill bin Laden … and he said it again and again.

    Clinton lied about Monica and I think it’s plausible he lied about bin Laden. The IG’s report and circumstantial evidence suggests he did but feel free to believe he didn’t.

    DRJ (bfe07e) — 8/25/2007 @ 10:31 pm


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