Deceit Deluxe
It is quite upsetting -- not that I didn't know that our government practiced a great deal of misinformation and deceit -- but this administration has made a practice of lying -- just flat out LIES -- that upsets me
The Center for American Progress has compiled an excellent list of Rice's
contradicted claims.� Here are some excerpts:
* RICE CLAIM: "I don't think anybody could have predicted that they would try to
use an airplane as a missile, a hijacked airplane as a missile." National
Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 5/16/020
* FACT: On August 6, 2001, the President personally "received a one-and-a-half
page briefing advising him that Osama bin Laden was capable of a major strike
against the US, and that the plot could include the hijacking of an American
airplane." In July 2001, the Administration was also told that terrorists had
explored using airplanes as missiles. [Source: NBC, 9/10/02; LA Times, 9/27/01]
* RICE CLAIM: In May 2002, Rice held a press conference to defend the
Administration from new revelations that the President had been explicitly
warned about an al Qaeda threat to airlines in August 2001. She "suggested that
Bush had requested the briefing because of his keen concern about elevated
terrorist threat levels that summer." [Source: Washington Post, 3/25/04]
* FACT: According to the CIA, the briefing "was not requested by President
Bush." As commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste disclosed, "the CIA informed the
panel that the author of the briefing does not recall such a request from Bush
and that the idea to compile the briefing came from within the CIA." [Source:
Washington Post, 3/25/04]
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* RICE CLAIM: "In June and July when the threat spikes were so high�we were at battle stations."� National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04
* FACT: "Documents indicate that before Sept. 11, Ashcroft did not give
terrorism top billing in his strategic plans for the Justice Department, which
includes the FBI. A draft of Ashcroft's 'Strategic Plan' from Aug. 9, 2001, does
not put fighting terrorism as one of the department's seven goals, ranking it as
a sub-goal beneath gun violence and drugs. By contrast, in April 2000,
Ashcroft's predecessor, Janet Reno, called terrorism 'the most challenging
threat in the criminal justice area.'" Meanwhile, the Bush Administration
decided to terminate "a highly classified program to monitor Al Qaeda suspects
in the United States." [Source: Washington Post, 3/22/04; Newsweek, 3/21/04]
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* RICE CLAIM: "The fact of the matter is [that] the administration focused on
this before 9/11." National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04
* FACT: President Bush and Vice President Cheney's counterterrorism task force,
which was created in May, never convened one single meeting. The President
himself admitted that "I didn't feel the sense of urgency" about terrorism
before 9/11. [Source: Washington Post, 1/20/02; Bob Woodward's "Bush at War"]
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* RICE CLAIM: "Our [pre-9/11 NSPD] plan called for military options to attack al
Qaeda and Taliban leadership, ground forces and other targets -- taking the
fight to the enemy where he lived."� National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice,
3/22/04
* FACT:� 9/11 Commissioner Gorelick: "There is nothing in the NSPD that came out that we could find that had an invasion plan, a military plan." Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage: "Right." Gorelick: "Is it true, as Dr. Rice said, 'Our plan called for military options to attack Al Qaida and Taliban
leadership'?" Armitage: "No, I think that was amended after the horror of 9/11."
[Source: 9/11 Commission testimony, 3/24/04]