Three Card Condi and the Ghost of Payne Stewart.

[RBHam]

Directly after the tragic events of 9-11, National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice informed us all that nobody could have predicted hijackers would have slammed planes into buildings. This statement was in response to questions about the absence of the Air Force.
That was the context. How come jets weren't scrambled in time? Especially since Strandard Operating Procedures have been followed over and over again when planes go off course and their transponders immediately alert NORAD. Routinely. Remember Payne Stewart's Lear Jet?

Today, Thursday April 8, Ms. Rice finally testified before the 9-11 commission after months of refusal. Rice was thought to be in trouble
because a Presdiential Daily Briefing on August 6th apparently discussed terorist hijacking warnings. I was hoping that this would have come up in the context of why the nation's defences had failed that day.

Good luck. Even the Democrats on the panel seemed uninterested in the complete lack of response from the Air Force on 9-11. In fact, the complete farce that the 9-11 commission is revealed itself as such today. Nobody asked Dr. Rice why she, along with President Bush and his cabinet, took an anthrax vaccine just days before 9-11.
Now, her response to THAT question would have been interesting.

Bob Kerrey and Richard Benvniste led the Democrats in a partisan attack on the Bush Administration from the incompetence angle. That was the extent of their aggresive questioning surrounding the events of the attacks.

It was apparent that Rice managed to talk alot without saying anything throughout the hearing, especially when panel members brought up the August 6th PDB. With a fixed smile, she deflected any pointed questions by dissembling them and constantly falling back on
her position that nothing could have been done about preventing 9-11 without hindsight.

If nothing else, Rice showed that she can play the political shell game with the best of them. Her ability to prevaricate so skillfully will hold her in good stead with Bush's political base.

Yet, the ghost of Payne Stewart still haunts the corridors of the nation's conscience. And there are still too many unanswered questions surrounding 9-11.

Mark me well. If there is no resolution to these unanswered questions, if the truth behind 9-11 continues to be repressed, then there will be a reckoning.

Karma.

[Wapsie B]

1. The Payne Stewart incident

shows me that there's something fishy about 9/11. We can intercept a business jet in the middle of nowhere, but we can't intercept an airliner due to crash into the Pentagon?

[tigereye]

2. one of the questioners

asked a very good series of simple questions.... were you aware of...
the Saidi govt responses, and other comments about potential risks. She had to say "no" to most of that. I thought that that was the most effective way to deal with her spiel.

[RBHam]

3. karma kick

nt

[chookie]

4. There was great moment though

I agree, RB -- all Condi had to do was speak platitudes for 3 hours, and accomplish only not to embarass her boss, who could be impeached if she slipped, and not to commit perjury, which could come back to haunt her in the form of a prison sentence.

We all know the Sept 11 Commission is a bit of a joke, that all it is "trying" to do is find some excuses or scapegoats, and that it is not to be taken seriously, but her testimony today contained a great moment, that it would not have been out of place in a Jon Stewart parody.

When pressed by a panel member as to the title of the August 6 PDB, she said something like, "Uh, I *think* it was titled something like 'Bin Laden is Going to Strike the USA On It's Own Soil Any Day Now with Something Very Very Very Big.'"

Imagine saying that in front of the families who lost people that day.

You and I couldn't do it.

But Condi did it, just fine. With a ladylike smile. Now that's a hell of a poker player!

If I owned a network, *that* would be the clip you would see over and over and over and over and over again.