So. 7/10/01, Rice/Tenet meeting. Same month, Asscroft stops flying....

[Bluebear]

And still Rice denies the meeting took place. Or, "can't recall". And the dots connect to make a line...

====

(CBS) WASHINGTON, July 26, 2001, Fishing rod in hand, Attorney General John Ashcroft left on a weekend trip to Missouri Thursday afternoon aboard a chartered government jet, reports CBS News Correspondent Jim Stewart.

In response to inquiries from CBS News over why Ashcroft was traveling exclusively by leased jet aircraft instead of commercial airlines, the Justice Department cited what it called a "threat assessment" by the FBI, and said Ashcroft has been advised to travel only by private jet for the remainder of his term.

"There was a threat assessment and there are guidelines. He is acting under the guidelines," an FBI spokesman said. Neither the FBI nor the Justice Department, however, would identify what the threat was, when it was detected or who made it....

Asked if he knew anything about the threat or who might have made it, the attorney general replied, "Frankly, I don't. That's the answer."

Earlier this week, the Justice Department leased a NASA-owned G-3 Gulfstream for a 6-day trip to Western states. Such aircraft cost the government more than $1,600 an hour to fly. When asked whether Ashcroft was paying for any portion of the trips devoted to personal business, a Justice Department spokeswoman declined to respond.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2001/07/26/national/main303601.shtml

[joemurphy]

1. The Hits Just Keep A-Coming, Don't They. n/t

[No DUplicitous DUpe]

44. Boy, that's an understatement.

[FloridaPat]

2. Has to be a coincidence. Wasn't there a story about Rice warning

SFO mayor? More coincidences. If fact, 9-11 is just one big coincidence.

[wakeme2008]

3. Thanks Bluebear and a Nom

TWO WEEKS after Tenet meeting with Rice Ashcroft is not flying Commercial any more..... There is more than a little something strange about this.

[Bluebear]

5. This story always stuck with me, as I was flying at that time.

Of course, nobody warned FLIGHT CREWS in the summer of 2001 that something may be up. Nobody warned us that there was "chatter" and to keep our eyes and ears peeled. But after the meeting that "never happened", Asscroft certainly gets warned.

[merh]

4. Oh stop it, that is just a coincidence

it had nothing to do with terrorists, just the movies showed on the airplanes that exposed boobies. :silly:

:tinfoilhat:

[Bluebear]

8. ...

:hug:

[merh]

13. (((( hugs )))))

:hug:

Okay, I couldn't pull it off, no one believes it's a coincidence. :rofl:

:loveya:

[WCGreen]

17. Boobies.......

On A Plane....

The next Samuel Jackson Movie...

[Clark2008]

19. Well, if Asscroft, Shrub, Darth Cheney and Rummy are on the

plane, the working title should be "BOOBS on a Plane."

[Herman Munster]

6. wow

i never read this before. excellent find!!!

[Zenlitened]

7. And it gets deeper. The State Department now ADMITS...

... that Rice was briefed by Tenet. But claims she kicked the matter over to Ashcroft. And Ashcroft says, "Who, me? I dunno nothin'."

Seriously, the whole goddamned bunch of them should be clapped in irons and thrown in jail RIGHT NOW.

They could have prevented 9-11. That much is becoming more clear by the day. They could have prevented 9-11.

:mad: :mad: :mad:

October 2, 2006 (8 pm E

Records Show Tenet Briefed Rice on Al Qaeda Threat

By PHILIP SHENON and MARK MAZZETTI

JIDDA, Saudi Arabia, Oct. 2 — A review of White House records has determined that George J. Tenet, then the director of central intelligence, did brief Condoleezza Rice and other top officials on July 10, 2001, about the looming threat from Al Qaeda, a State Department spokesman said Monday.

...

Officials now agree that on July 10, 2001, Mr. Tenet and his counterterrorism deputy, J. Cofer Black, were so alarmed about an impending Al Qaeda attack that they demanded an emergency meeting at the White House with Ms. Rice and her National Security Council staff.

According to two former intelligence officials, Mr. Tenet told those assembled at the White House about the growing body of intelligence the Central Intelligence Agency had collected pointing to an impending Al Qaeda attack. But both current and former officials took issue with Mr. Woodward’s account that Mr. Tenet and his aides left the meeting in frustration, feeling as if Ms. Rice had ignored them.

...

Mr. McCormack said the records showed that, far from ignoring Mr. Tenet’s warnings, Ms. Rice acted on the intelligence and requested that Mr. Tenet make the same presentation to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Atttorney General John Ashcroft.

But Mr. Ashcroft said by telephone on Monday evening that he never received a briefing that summer from Mr. Tenet.

“Frankly, I’m disappointed that I didn’t get that kind of briefing,” he said. “I’m surprised he didn’t think it was important enough to come by and tell me.”

Full story:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/02/washington/03ricecnd.html?hp&ex=1159848000&en=5de194832d554019&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[jimshoes]

12. Meanwhile the potato that resides at the White House

also known as POTUS, who being at the top of this pyramid of ineptitude and deceit, just got near dictatorial powers. That is kind of frightening. What's even more frightening is if number two suddenly becomes number one with all that power.

[Bluebear]

20. ' the potato'

:)

[Bluebear]

47. :)

[leftchick]

49. be very frightened

number two is most certainly number one. :scared:

[eviltwin2525]

50. They're all "number-two" to me!

pewwwww!

[Supersedeas]

58. the National Security advise thought the DoJ should handle Al-Queda???

[robertpaulsen]

9. Very nice catch! K & R!

:kick:

[Cocoa]

10. the perks of being a Bush appointee

he gets warned. We're kept in the dark, but we get to pay for special protection for the AG. :toast:

[indepat]

11. Wonder why Condi had advised (reportedly) Mayor Brown (SF) on 9-10 not

to fly on 9-11? Wonder why the names of those who sold airline stocks short big time before 9-11 could not or would not be identified? Has justice been obstructed or did no one even bother to find out for seemingly obvious reasons? Inquiring minds really want to know.

[Tin Man]

14. WOW WOW WOW - awesome find Bluebear - K&R !!!

:toast:

[Imagevision]

15. Rice called Mayor Willie Brown (San Francisco) to stay off planes

(this is ancient history I know)

[Bluebear]

16. Ancient history but VERY interesting in light of her July meeting!

The one she "can't recall" happening.

[IChing]

25. Since she called him and doesn't remember why she said that

or remember what was said at the other meeting..........they knew..........

[cosmicdot]

37. that look on Babs face

she looks like someone who hit the trifecta ... almost like, we're almost there ... we'll be getting our revenge for Prescott ...


But after "everything changed" on 9/11, he reportedly gloated to his budget director, Mitch Daniels, "Lucky me--I hit the trifecta!" At the time, this comment (a variation of which is being recycled for laughs at current GOP fundraisers) seemed merely offensive. But in light of revelations that Bush's August 6 briefing memo was titled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike U.S.," Bush's "luck" and weird prescience are worth more than passing scrutiny.

from "How Bush Hit the 'Trifecta' on 9/11--and the Public Lost Big-Time"

http://baltimorechronicle.com/trifecta_jun02.shtml

[glitch]

55. That;s the way I see it too. Both she and poppy can barely contain their

glee. Junior just looks nervous.
:puke:

[greyl]

39. That's not true.

September, 2006:

Brown's warning: In the five years since 9/11, the question of how then-San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown got a warning about flying that day continues to live on in the blogosphere -- and conspiracy theories abound.

"The latest version is that Condoleezza Rice alerted me personally,'' Brown said this week. "It's all part of the ongoing myth."

The "myth" has its origins in the night before the attacks, when Brown called "my security people at the airport'' to check on his flight to New York the next morning.

What the mayor got from his source was a warning that Americans should be concerned about traveling.

Willie being Willie, he paid no attention -- and was actually waiting for his ride to the airport when he turned on the TV and, like millions of other Americans, watched as the World Trade Center crumbled.

Exactly how the warning popped up remains a mystery to this day.

It might have had something to do with a little-noticed State Department memo issued a week before that went out in a routine press briefing -- and that former Secretary of State George Shultz himself received -- warning that Americans may be the target of an attack from extremist groups "with links to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda organization."

The warning, however, dealt primarily with U.S. military bases in Japan and South Korea -- clearly the wrong targets.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/09/13/BAGG9L4KI81.DTL

[BlueEyedSon]

18. 9/11 timeline is a great resource

http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline.jsp?timeline=complete_911_timeline&startpos=800#a072601ashcroft

[Bluebear]

21. "The FBI obviously knew something was in the wind..."

"the rest of us just had to take our chances"

[savemefromdumbya]

23. Did FBI/O'Neill?

[BuyingThyme]

22. kcik

[savemefromdumbya]

24. guess it's time to fold up the tinfoil caps and put them neatly in the dra

[Bluebear]

30. Amen to THAT!

At last the dots connect enough not to 'sound like a nut' discussing it.

[satya]

26. And $1600/hr of our tax dollars spent to keep HIM safe.

Imagine if they'd invested their efforts in trying to keep ALL of us safe and not just their own ... but that's just those good ol' authoritarian conservative values in action.

[Bluebear]

27. ASHCROFT RECEIVED SAME WARNING OF ATTACK AS RICE>>>>>>>

WASHINGTON Mon, Oct. 02, 2006 - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and former Attorney General John Ashcroft received the same CIA briefing about an imminent al-Qaida strike on an American target that was given to the White House two months before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/politics/15663391.htm

[file83]

43. It's starting to look a lot like LIHOP...

...at the very least. It seems as though our government Let It(9/11) Happen On Purpose.

[michael_1166]

48. I guess it's more like LIHOPWABOT

Let It Happen On Purpose With A Bit Of Tailwind ...

[truthisfreedom]

28. Asscroft received the same warning that sleezy received:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2541635

[Tin Man]

29. new information from today's WaPo

Tenet Recalled Warning Rice
Former CIA Chief Told 9/11 Commission of Disputed Meeting

<snip>

"The briefing was a summary of the threat reporting from the previous weeks," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters traveling with Rice in Jiddah, Saudi Arabia. "There was nothing new."

Despite this, McCormack said, Rice asked that Tenet provide the same briefing to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and then-U.S. Attorney General John D. Ashcroft. The two men received it by July 17, he said. McCormack was unable to explain why Rice felt the briefing should be repeated if it did not include new material.

</snip>

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/02/AR2006100200187.html

So on July 17, Ashcroft received the same briefing that Rice heard on July 10. And then Ashcroft stopped flying commercial. hmmmmmmmmmm......

[young_at_heart]

31. The poor family members/victims of 9/11, when they read this

It would seem someone worked hard to keep this covered up....no wonder they fought so hard to not have any investigation. Cheers to the widows and family members who pushed for the investigation!

[Bluebear]

32. Yes, those "millionaire bitches" as Ann Coulter called them nt

[savemefromdumbya]

33. "the widows" won't give up

[Marie26]

34. And then he cut FBI counterterrorism funding!

We now know that Tenet gave the same urgent terror briefing to Ashcroft on July 17, 2001. Ashcroft stopped flying planes in July 2001, so he obviously knew there was a credible & specific terrorism threat to the US. Then, a month later, he turns down an FBI request for more anti-terrorism funding. So, this threat was serious enough for him to stop flying, but not serious enough for him to give the FBI the resources it needed to prevent a terrorist attack?

"Summer 2001: FBI Lacks Resources But Ashcroft Denies More Funding

The New York Times will later report that, according to senior government officials, “A top secret report warned top officials of the FBI in the months before Sept. 11 that the bureau faced significant terrorist threats from Middle Eastern groups like al-Qaeda but lacked enough resources to meet the threat...” The internal assessment finds that virtually every major FBI field office is undermanned when evaluating and dealing with the threat from groups like al-Qaeda. The report gives detailed recommendations and spending increases to address the problem. However, in August 2001, acting FBI Director Tom Pickard meets Attorney General John Ashcroft to ask for supplemental funding for counterterrorism, but his request is turned down. On September 10, 2001, Ashcroft rejects a proposed $58 million increase in FBI counterterrorism funding for the next year’s budget. (New York Times, 6/1/2002)"

http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/entity.jsp?id=1521846767-2800

[Dem2theMax]

35. Did anyone send this to Olbermann?

He just LOVES 'connect the dots' stories. :evilgrin:

[Bluebear]

36. I just did

Thanks for the suggestion!

[greyl]

38. Michael Moore slightly disagrees.

(at least the fact checking team for Fahrenheit 911 does)

As proof of its scrupulousness, the Moore team cites adjustments it made to the film's portrayal of Attorney General John Ashcroft. The film is brutal to Mr. Ashcroft, depicting him as a glassy-eyed architect of efforts to shred the Constitution, who became Attorney General only after he proved himself so unpopular in his home state of Missouri that he lost a Senate race to a former Democratic governor who died in a plane crash a month before election day. "Voters preferred the dead guy," Mr. Moore deadpans in the film, a line that drew belly laughs at recent preview screenings. (In reality, voters knew they were in effect casting ballots for the governor's widow).

An earlier version of the film, however, included a reference to a widely circulated charge, broadcast by CBS News in July 2001, that Mr. Ashcroft had received warning of threats and stopped flying on commercial airlines. Tia Lessin, supervising producer of "Fahrenheit 9/11," said the reference to the CBS report was cut after Mr. Moore's fact-checking team found evidence that Mr. Ashcroft had flown commercially at least twice that summer.
nytimes

Does this mean he wasn't aware of the warnings? No. It only means that it's not true that he stopped flying on commercial flights.

[Bluebear]

40. Maybe a puddle jumper from Branson to St. Louis.

Who knows? In any case, the original story stands.

[greyl]

41. Maybe a flight to Germany?

The original story does not still stand in its entirety. What's wrong with solidifying our argument and ensuring its integrity?

[Bluebear]

42. Easy enough.

Subpoena his travel records, summer of 2001. :)

[greyl]

59. Maybe Moore's team did that.

Or maybe they found proof that he flew commercial flights without having to rely on subpoenas.

[ThoughtCriminal]

45. Did Anybody Else Stop Flying Commercial?

who normally would have and switch to charters? Specifically, any body who had knowledge of the briefing.

It now seems extremely probable that Ashcroft was LYING in July, 2001 when he claimed not to know what the threat was. Someday, I hope he gets to explain that again under oath.

[sandnsea]

46. Worldwide Caution - July 5 - Sept 22

http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2001/3978.htm

Dept of State press briefing on July 5

Q: Speaking of the 4th of July, there's a Worldwide Caution out, but a major holiday has passed apparently without incident, I think. Is there any new appraisal of the security situation worldwide you can share with us? I know the Caution is supposed to be in effect until September, I believe.

MR. BOUCHER: The Caution is in effect until September 22nd. It wasn't particularly tied to the 4th of July.

Q: There's extra concern. Usually a major holiday is a time to --

MR. BOUCHER: No, it wasn't -- the 4th of July was not cited in the Caution. We do continue to believe there is an increased risk of terrorist action from extremist groups and recommend that people exercise a high level of vigilance, take appropriate steps to increase their security. So no, nothing has changed in that. If it should change, we will revise the Caution.

[GeorgeGist]

51. How inquisitive...

of the chief federal law enforcement official.

"Asked if he knew anything about the threat or who might have made it, the attorney general replied, "Frankly, I don't. That's the answer."

[wicket]

52. Bluebear, you always find the greatest stuff to post

:yourock:

[Bluebear]

56. :)

WE rock, darlin'. I love this place!

[wicket]

57. I don't know what I'd do without DU

And all you lovely people keeping me up to date with stuff the MSM ignores :D

[rateyes]

53. 7-10-01 is also the date on The Phoenix Memo

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2859757&mesg_id=2859757

[Supersedeas]

54. Security (physical and political) for those who are in the loop

[Kurovski]

60. Prison, prison, prison, prison.

PRISON.

[Bluebear]

61. PRISON.

[brettdale]

62. kick

kick