Sen. Boxer/Condy Rice

[dmadman43]

Actually, some historic did occur today. A record number of no votes were cast against Condi. See http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,11069-1457729,00.html History was made this week.

Yawn! You're kidding, right? Is this how you want to spin this? What would have been historic is if Kerry had voted what he believes...that she was qualified for the job, which he was on record as saying.

 

[dmadman43]

The truth is never moot dmadman. Condi is a liar and this is going to affect her ability to do her job. Do you really think that any foriegn leader is going to take anything that Condi says seriously given the fact that it has now been well documented that Condi is liar.

I found this piece on the John Kerry website that documents that Condi is a liar. See http://www.johnkerry.com/pressroom/releases/pr_2004_1010.html This thread has been fun. You, Bet and others challeged us to show that Condi is a liar. After it has been demonstrated that Condi lied, you want to change the subject. Remember the truth is never moot and the fact that Condi has been documented as a liar will bear on her ability to serve as Sec. of State.

85 senators, some of them your fellow Democrats, would disagree with you. You have opinions, not proof. I would think even a law school dropout would understand the distinction.

 

[WWTBAMFAN]

Here are the comments of Senator Kennedy in the Rice debate with regard to Condi's lies. See http://rawstory.com/news/2005/index.php?p=5

In general, I believe the President should be able to choose his Cabinet officials. But this nomination is different, because of the war in Iraq. Dr. Rice was a key member of the national security team that developed and justified the rationale for war, and it’s been a catastrophic failure, a continuing quagmire. In these circumstances, she should not be promoted to Secretary of State....

Dr. Rice was the first in the Administration to invoke the terrifying image of a nuclear holocaust to justify the need to go to war in Iraq. On September 9, 2002, as Congress was first considering the resolution to authorize the war, Dr. Rice said: “ We don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.”

In fact, as we now know, there was significant disagreement in the intelligence community about Iraq’s nuclear weapons program. But Dr. Rice spoke instead about a consensus in the intelligence community that the infamous aluminum tubes were for the development of nuclear weapons.

On September 8, 2002, she said the aluminum tubes “are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs.” On July 30, 2003, she said “the consensus view of the American intelligence agency” is that the tubes “were most likely” for use in nuclear weapons.

Dr. Rice continually spoke of the “contacts between Al Qaeda and Iraq” and the “connection” between Al Qaeda and Saddam. In fact, as we now know, there was no operational link between Iraq and Al Qaeda  as the 9/11 Commission has confirmed.

Normally the person who is nominated for the Sec. of State slot has an easy time of confirmation because the president should be allowed to pick his candiate. The fact that Condi set a record for the number of no votes for a Sec. of State is noteworthy. Given that the reasong being given for such no votes are the lies set forth herein, Condi is going to have a hard time getting foriegn leaders to believe anything she says.

 

[rubyslipperlover]

so although Bush got who he wanted in the job, he won't be able to get our allies to go along with things he wants to do.


too bad, with Iran and North Korea....

 

[dmadman43]

so although Bush got who he wanted in the job, he won't be able to get our allies to go along with things he wants to do.


too bad, with Iran and North Korea....

Neither would the Democratic candidate for President have been able to, what's your point?

 

[dmadman43]

Here are the comments of Senator Kennedy in the Rice debate with regard to Condi's lies. See http://rawstory.com/news/2005/index.php?p=5 Normally the person who is nominated for the Sec. of State slot has an easy time of confirmation because the president should be allowed to pick his candiate. The fact that Condi set a record for the number of no votes for a Sec. of State is noteworthy. Given that the reasong being given for such no votes are the lies set forth herein, Condi is going to have a hard time getting foriegn leaders to believe anything she says.

Was she confirmed? Yes or no? I rather doubt foreign leaders care much about who voted against her. I'm sure they already had their minds made up. The vote was not going to change that.

 

[Lebjwb]

Condoleeza Rice's lie about the attacks of September 11, 2001:

"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." (This lie was told by Condoleeza Rice to the American people on May 16, 2002.)

The truth about Condoleeza Rice's lie:

George W. Bush himself was given a one-and-a-half page briefing on August 6, 2001. That briefing informed him that Osama Bin Laden's organization was capable of using a hijacked American airplane to conduct a major strike against targets within the United States. Furthermore, a month earlier, the Bush Administration was informed that terrorists had concocted plans to use airplanes as missiles. The truth is that experts did predict that terrorists would use hijacked airplanes as missiles, and those experts told George W. Bush about the threat. George W. Bush sat around and did nothing about it.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Condoleeza Rice's lie used to cover for her earlier lie about the attacks of September 11, 2001:

When the Bush Administration was confronted with evidence that Condoleeza Rice had lied, and that George W. Bush had received a briefing warning of terrorist plans to use hijacked airplanes as missiles against American targets, Condoleeza Rice said that Bush got the briefing because he had been so concerned about the elevated terrorist threat levels during the summer of 2001. (This lie was told by Condoleeza Rice to the American people on March 25, 2004.)

The truth about Condoleeza Rice's lie about her lie:

The Central Intelligence Agency has revealed that the terrorist briefing was in no way solicited by George W. Bush. Instead, the Central Intelligence Agency created the brief without any expression of interest from Bush because they thought that the matter was so critical that the President needed to be aware of the terrorist plans without further delay. The truth is that, in spite of the elevated terrorist threat levels just before September 11, George W. Bush did not bother to ask the CIA to be briefed about the methods Osama Bin Laden could use to kill Americans. Bush was on vacation on his dude ranch that month.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Another lie from Condoleeza Rice about Bush's preparations for terrorist attacks:

Embarrassed by reports of Bush's lack of preparation for attacks by Osama Bin Laden, Condoleeza Rice said, "In June and July when the threat spikes were so high we were at battle stations." (This lie was told to the American people by Condoleeza Rice on March 22, 2004)

The truth about this lie from Condoleeza Rice:

When the Clinton Administration got information about high threat levels for terrorist attacks, Bill Clinton ordered his officials to go to battle stations. Bush's anti-terrorism chief Richard Clarke has revealed that George W. Bush never ordered anyone to go to battle stations, even though the reported threat in the weeks before September 11, 2001 was much higher than anything ever reported during the Clinton Administration. Furthermore, George W. Bush ordered that a program to monitor Al Quaida suspects within the United States be discontinued. The truth is that Bush not only failed to order anti-terrorism officials to battle stations, he lowered America's protections against terrorism just as the terrorist threat was reaching record levels.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Still another lie from Condoleeza Rice about September 11:

"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." (Condoleeza Rice told the American people this lie on March 22, 2004)

The truth about this other lie from Condoleeza Rice:

The commission studying the context of the September 11 attacks found that the NSPD plan referred to by Condoleeza Rice in fact had no military component. Commission member Gorelick has stated, "There is nothing in the NSPD that came out that we could find that had an invasion plan, a military plan." George W. Bush's own Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage, admitted to the commission that Condoleeza Rice's claim was completely inaccurate. When Armitage was asked, "Is it true, as Dr. Rice said, 'Our plan called for military options to attack Al Qaida and Taliban leadership'?", Armitage replied "No." The truth is that Condoleeza Rice knew that what she was saying was false. She just made up a claim in order to cover up the failure of George W. Bush to take adequate steps to protect America before September 11, 2001.

 

[Lebjwb]

Neither would the Democratic candidate for President have been able to, what's your point?

Back that with anything?

 

[WWTBAMFAN]

Was she confirmed? Yes or no? I rather doubt foreign leaders care much about who voted against her. I'm sure they already had their minds made up. The vote was not going to change that.

Part of the job of Sec. of State is to negotiate and represent the interest of the US with other governments. It is difficult to negotiate with someone when you do not trust that person. In this case, Condi has been proven to be a liar in these debates and any leader who deals with her will be aware of this fact. Leaders will know that they can not trust any thing that Condi says becuase she has no personal integrity and will say anything that Bush tells her to say. That is going to make her job much harder.

No one expected to defeat Condi as Sec. of State. The mission for these debates was accomplished when it was established that Condi is a liar. Even on this thread, the conservatives have had to back down and in effect admit that Condi lied about the stupid tubes. It has been several pages now since the last conservative challenge to prove that Condi was a liar. That demonstrates that the Democrats have done a great job of getting the truth out about Condi and her lies

Thank you Barbara Boxer for leading this charge. Job well done. .

 

[bsnyder]

Part of the job of Sec. of State is to negotiate and represent the interest of the US with other governments. It is difficult to negotiate with someone when you do not trust that person. In this case, Condi has been proven to be a liar in these debates and any leader who deals with her will be aware of this fact. Leaders will know that they can not trust any thing that Condi says becuase she has no personal integrity and will say anything that Bush tells her to say. That is going to make her job much harder.

No one expected to defeat Condi as Sec. of State. The mission for these debates was accomplished when it was established that Condi is a liar. Even on this thread, the conservatives have had to back down and in effect admit that Condi lied about the stupid tubes. It has been several pages now since the last conservative challenge to prove that Condi was a liar. That demonstrates that the Democrats have done a great job of getting the truth out about Condi and her lies

Thank you Barbara Boxer for leading this charge. Job well done. .

It's been several pages because we like watching you make a fool of yourself.

 

[Lebjwb]

It's been several pages because we like watching you make a fool of yourself.

Well that was a real contribution.

 

[Lebjwb]

Media now mum on Rice's apparent falsehoods

Since President George W. Bush nominated national security adviser Condoleezza Rice to succeed Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, major news outlets have produced numerous reviews and assessments of Rice's record during Bush's first term. But these reports have generally omitted mention of Rice's numerous apparently false statements, even when the reviews were conducted by outlets that originally broke the news of the statements in question.

Iraq's aluminum tubes were "only really suited for nuclear weapons"

In The New York Times' large-scale investigation of the intelligence regarding Iraq's purchase of aluminum tubes, the paper reported on October 3, 2004, that Rice had misrepresented the state of intelligence on the tubes. Prior to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, the White House and parts of the intelligence community had promoted the purchase as crucial evidence that then-Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had restarted his nuclear weapons program.

The tubes were "only really suited for nuclear weapons programs," Condoleezza Rice, the president's national security adviser, explained on CNN on Sept. 8, 2002. "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud."

But almost a year before, Ms. Rice's staff had been told that the government's foremost nuclear experts seriously doubted that the tubes were for nuclear weapons, according to four officials at the Central Intelligence Agency and two senior administration officials, all of whom spoke on condition of anonymity. The experts, at the Energy Department, believed the tubes were likely intended for small artillery rockets.

The Times did not mention this incident when reporting on Rice's recent nomination; nor did the paper note other instances in which Rice's truthfulness has been challenged. A separate analysis of Bush's new Cabinet appointments did mention that Rice would likely face questioning in confirmation hearings about "what appeared to be her failures either to warn Mr. Bush about flawed prewar intelligence regarding Iraq's weapons programs or, as Secretary of State Colin L. Powell did, to make dogged efforts of her own to ascertain its accuracy."

Cox News Service also predicted that Rice would face questions about her statements on the tubes. A USA Today article on Rice's nomination recalled her statements on the tubes, as did a Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service editorial originally published in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. The Journal Sentinel editorial board opined: "If outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell will be remembered for his 'you break it, you own it' advice to the president, Rice regrettably will be remembered for her assertion, which she should have known to be false, that those infamous aluminum tubes 'are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge programs' in Iraq."

Despite the Journal's prediction, few media outlets have "remembered" Rice's assertion or reported it in the context of her nomination for higher office.

"This August 6th PDB was in response to the president's questions"

On March 25, 2004, The Washington Post debunked Rice's longstanding claim that the famous August 6, 2001, presidential daily brief (PDB) entitled "Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in U.S." came in response to a specific request for a summary of potential Al Qaeda plans to attack the United States following a summer of elevated threat reports.

The CIA now says that a controversial August 2001 briefing summarizing potential attacks on the United States by al Qaeda was not requested by President Bush, as Rice and others had long claimed. ... After the highly classified document's existence was first revealed in news reports in May 2002, Rice held a news conference in which she suggested that Bush had requested the briefing because of his keen concern about elevated terrorist threat levels that summer.

Beyond the news conference that the Post mentions (where Rice's statements about Bush's requests were ambiguous), Rice repeated the claim about Bush's supposed request in her April 8 testimony before the 9-11 Commission: "The fact is that this August 6th PDB was in response to the president's questions about whether or not something might happen or something might be planned by Al Qaeda inside the United States."

Neither The Washington Post nor any other U.S. news outlet mentioned this apparent falsehood in its recent coverage of Rice, according to an MMFA search.

"Our plan called for military options to attack Al Qaeda"

In a March 22, 2004, op-ed in The Washington Post, Rice suggested that the Bush administration was developing plans to invade Afghanistan even before September 11, 2001. But Chapter 6 of the 9-11 Commission report notes that far from an invasion, the pre-9-11 plan "called for a multiyear effort involving diplomacy, covert action, economic measures, law enforcement, public diplomacy, and if necessary military efforts." Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage revealed in testimony before the 9-11 Commission that the immediate military component was in fact added to the administration's plan only after the September 11 attacks.

From Rice's March 22 op-ed:

Through the spring and summer of 2001, the national security team developed a strategy to eliminate al Qaeda -- which was expected to take years. ... Our 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.

From Armitage's March 24 testimony before the 9-11 Commission; Armitage is responding to a question from commissioner Jamie Gorelick:

GORELICK: So I would ask you whether it is true that -- whether it is true, as Dr. Rice said in The Washington Post, "Our 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." Was that part of the plan as -- prior to 9-11?

ARMITAGE: No, I think that was amended after the horror of 9-11.

No U.S. news outlet mentioned this apparent falsehood in its recent coverage of Rice, according to an MMFA search.

"Richard Clarke had plenty of opportunities"

On March 22, 2004, Rice tried to answer former National Security Council counterterrorism coordinator Richard Clarke's claim that the Bush administration did not treat terrorism as a serious threat before the September 11, 2002, attacks. She told CNN: "Richard Clarke had plenty of opportunities to tell us in the administration that he thought the war on terrorism was moving in the wrong direction and he chose not to." In fact, Clarke sent Rice a memo on January 25, 2001, in which he wrote: "We urgently need . . . a Principals level review on the al Qida [sic] network." According to the 9-11 Commission report:

The national security advisor did not respond directly to Clarke's memorandum. No Principals Committee meeting on al Qaeda was held until September 4, 2001 (although the Principals Committee met frequently on other subjects, such as the Middle East peace process, Russia, and the Persian Gulf).

(See below for news coverage of Clarke's revelations about Rice.)

"No al Qaeda plan was turned over to the new administration"

Rice also wrote in her March 22 Post op-ed that "No al Qaeda plan was turned over [by the Clinton administration] to the new administration." But according to the 9-11 Commission report, when Clarke sent Rice his aforementioned 2001 memo, he also sent her the so-called "Delenda Plan" -- which he had developed in 1998 -- along with an updated "strategy paper" entitled "Strategy for Eliminating the Threat from the Jihadist Networks of al Qida [sic]: Status and Prospects."

Ahead of Bush's official nomination of Rice as secretary of state, The Washington Post assessed her tenure at the National Security Council. The article devoted significant space to recalling Clarke's and the 9-11 Commission's criticisms of Rice but did not highlight Rice's pattern of factually dubious statements regarding Clarke. Other news outlets (including The Boston Globe; the Baltimore Sun; and Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service) noted Clarke's allegations that Rice failed to heed his warnings about terrorism, but none specifically mentioned her apparently false statements.

 

[WWTBAMFAN]

It's been several pages because we like watching you make a fool of yourself.

Bet, the funny thing is that I have been enjoying your and dmadman amusing attempts to debate this issue. Did you see this outstanding piece of logic on dmadman's part last night.

Isn't Sen Dayton the same one that closed his office in Washington due to a supposed terror threat? Did he lie to the people about the substance of the threat? Did he lie to his fellow members of Congress on why he shut his office? LIAR!!

What is is they say? If you don't have the law on your side, attack the facts. If you don't have the facts on your side, attack the person. .

dmadman, do you realize that your weak response to the excellant points raised by Senator Dayton was by attacking him instead of dealing with the substance of his comments. You are guilty of the crime that you are accusing the democrats of committing. Thank you for the joke. It is one of the funniest things that I have seen in a while.

This is one of the funniest things that I have seen in a long time. Dmadman really out did himself here.

Bet, have you read the NYT article that you were demanding last night. The article confirms that Condi is a liar. The fact that you do not want to discuss this article after repeatedly demanding it, means that you agree that the article establishes the Condi is liar.

Again, thanks for the amusement.

 

[peachgirl]

85 senators, some of them your fellow Democrats, would disagree with you.

Actually, that's not true either. Quite a few Democrats made it clear that their yes vote only meant that they believed that bush was entitled to have the cabinet of his choosing....no matter how lousy the choice. Their vote did not have anything to do with their opinion of Rice's abilities or lack thereof.

I guess they figure if he wants a liar advising him, so be it.

 

[WWTBAMFAN]

Here is an account from a foriegn paper of the debate in the Senate. See http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12063631%5E2703,00.html

Rice branded a liar

DEMOCRATS have labelled Condoleezza Rice as unfit to be the US's top diplomat over her booster role for the Iraq War, with one senator claiming she had "repeatedly, flagrantly, intentionally" lied about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein....

But in debate yesterday, Democrat senator Mark Dayton called the outgoing National Security Adviser a liar. He accused Dr Rice and other Bush administration officials of "lying to Congress, lying to our committees, lying to the American people".

"I don't like impugning anyone's integrity, but I really don't like being lied to," he said. "Repeatedly, flagrantly, intentionally."

Liberal senator Edward Kennedy also accused Dr Rice of giving Congress "false" reasons for the war. The main justifications were weapons of mass destruction and close ties to al-Qa'ida, neither of which have been proved.

"Dr Rice was a key member of the national security team that developed and justified the rationale for war – and it's been a catastrophic failure, a continuing quagmire," he said. Veteran senator Robert Byrd was another critic. "Dr Rice is responsible for some of the most overblown rhetoric that the administration used to scare the American people into believing that there was an imminent threat from Iraq," he said.

The heated language came as Mr Bush spoke briefly to Prime Minister Iyad Allawi of Iraq ahead of Sunday's election and as the White House acknowledged it needed a new infusion of cash for the war.

The foriegn press has not missed what happend in this debate. Everyone now knows that Condi is a liar and this will affect her job performance.

Bet, you haven not presented your analysis of the New York Times article that you demanded that I provide you the link to. You stated last night that you wanted to review the article because this article was the source of many of the attacks by the Democrats against Condi. What is the status of your review?

 

[superbird]

Reading these last few posts truly amaze me. We are suppossed to beleive anything and everything Kerry and Boxer say. After making a fool out of herself showing no diplomatic skills in trying to embarass Condi (which she did not) Boxer sends out a fund raising letter saying how she stood up to them. Does she have any principles?? If she truly cared about what she was saying she would not be out sending fund raising letters, selling herself (we won't go into name calling here). That is the problem with the dems is always the ulterior motives involved. The bottom line is they are trying to put down Condi so she won't make a run in 2008 against Hillary. Dems/libs should try to actually believe in their message and they will start to win again. But when they move all over the spectrum trying to get votes instead of spreading their message and making the point!! Kerry and Boxer both came out and said Saddam was a threat. Kerry was on the panel in the Senate that saw the same intelligence as Condi and the president and understood it to be the same. Bottom line is we need to overhaul the entire intelligence community because the UN and the rest of Europe actually thought the same as the USA.

 

[Sirius]

 

[dmadman43]

Bet, the funny thing is that I have been enjoying your and dmadman amusing attempts to debate this issue. Did you see this outstanding piece of logic on dmadman's part last night. This is one of the funniest things that I have seen in a long time. Dmadman really out did himself here.

Bet, have you read the NYT article that you were demanding last night. The article confirms that Condi is a liar. The fact that you do not want to discuss this article after repeatedly demanding it, means that you agree that the article establishes the Condi is liar.

Again, thanks for the amusement.

You're so busy trying to find people to think for you, you can't even keep track of who you are responding to. Now that is amusing. I never demanded any NYT article. Why would I demand to read anything from the fish-wrapping?

 

[dmadman43]

 

[dmadman43]

Media now mum on Rice's apparent falsehoods

Since President George W. Bush nominated national security adviser Condoleezza Rice to succeed Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, major news outlets have produced numerous reviews and assessments of Rice's record during Bush's first term. But these reports have generally omitted mention of Rice's numerous apparently false statements, even when the reviews were conducted by outlets that originally broke the news of the statements in question.

Iraq's aluminum tubes were "only really suited for nuclear weapons"

In The New York Times' large-scale investigation of the intelligence regarding Iraq's purchase of aluminum tubes, the paper reported on October 3, 2004, that Rice had misrepresented the state of intelligence on the tubes. Prior to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, the White House and parts of the intelligence community had promoted the purchase as crucial evidence that then-Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had restarted his nuclear weapons program.

The tubes were "only really suited for nuclear weapons programs," Condoleezza Rice, the president's national security adviser, explained on CNN on Sept. 8, 2002. "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud."

But almost a year before, Ms. Rice's staff had been told that the government's foremost nuclear experts seriously doubted that the tubes were for nuclear weapons, according to four officials at the Central Intelligence Agency and two senior administration officials, all of whom spoke on condition of anonymity. The experts, at the Energy Department, believed the tubes were likely intended for small artillery rockets.

The Times did not mention this incident when reporting on Rice's recent nomination; nor did the paper note other instances in which Rice's truthfulness has been challenged. A separate analysis of Bush's new Cabinet appointments did mention that Rice would likely face questioning in confirmation hearings about "what appeared to be her failures either to warn Mr. Bush about flawed prewar intelligence regarding Iraq's weapons programs or, as Secretary of State Colin L. Powell did, to make dogged efforts of her own to ascertain its accuracy."

Cox News Service also predicted that Rice would face questions about her statements on the tubes. A USA Today article on Rice's nomination recalled her statements on the tubes, as did a Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service editorial originally published in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. The Journal Sentinel editorial board opined: "If outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell will be remembered for his 'you break it, you own it' advice to the president, Rice regrettably will be remembered for her assertion, which she should have known to be false, that those infamous aluminum tubes 'are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge programs' in Iraq."

Despite the Journal's prediction, few media outlets have "remembered" Rice's assertion or reported it in the context of her nomination for higher office.

"This August 6th PDB was in response to the president's questions"

On March 25, 2004, The Washington Post debunked Rice's longstanding claim that the famous August 6, 2001, presidential daily brief (PDB) entitled "Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in U.S." came in response to a specific request for a summary of potential Al Qaeda plans to attack the United States following a summer of elevated threat reports.

The CIA now says that a controversial August 2001 briefing summarizing potential attacks on the United States by al Qaeda was not requested by President Bush, as Rice and others had long claimed. ... After the highly classified document's existence was first revealed in news reports in May 2002, Rice held a news conference in which she suggested that Bush had requested the briefing because of his keen concern about elevated terrorist threat levels that summer.

Beyond the news conference that the Post mentions (where Rice's statements about Bush's requests were ambiguous), Rice repeated the claim about Bush's supposed request in her April 8 testimony before the 9-11 Commission: "The fact is that this August 6th PDB was in response to the president's questions about whether or not something might happen or something might be planned by Al Qaeda inside the United States."

Neither The Washington Post nor any other U.S. news outlet mentioned this apparent falsehood in its recent coverage of Rice, according to an MMFA search.

"Our plan called for military options to attack Al Qaeda"

In a March 22, 2004, op-ed in The Washington Post, Rice suggested that the Bush administration was developing plans to invade Afghanistan even before September 11, 2001. But Chapter 6 of the 9-11 Commission report notes that far from an invasion, the pre-9-11 plan "called for a multiyear effort involving diplomacy, covert action, economic measures, law enforcement, public diplomacy, and if necessary military efforts." Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage revealed in testimony before the 9-11 Commission that the immediate military component was in fact added to the administration's plan only after the September 11 attacks.

From Rice's March 22 op-ed:

Through the spring and summer of 2001, the national security team developed a strategy to eliminate al Qaeda -- which was expected to take years. ... Our 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.

From Armitage's March 24 testimony before the 9-11 Commission; Armitage is responding to a question from commissioner Jamie Gorelick:

GORELICK: So I would ask you whether it is true that -- whether it is true, as Dr. Rice said in The Washington Post, "Our 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." Was that part of the plan as -- prior to 9-11?

ARMITAGE: No, I think that was amended after the horror of 9-11.

No U.S. news outlet mentioned this apparent falsehood in its recent coverage of Rice, according to an MMFA search.

"Richard Clarke had plenty of opportunities"

On March 22, 2004, Rice tried to answer former National Security Council counterterrorism coordinator Richard Clarke's claim that the Bush administration did not treat terrorism as a serious threat before the September 11, 2002, attacks. She told CNN: "Richard Clarke had plenty of opportunities to tell us in the administration that he thought the war on terrorism was moving in the wrong direction and he chose not to." In fact, Clarke sent Rice a memo on January 25, 2001, in which he wrote: "We urgently need . . . a Principals level review on the al Qida [sic] network." According to the 9-11 Commission report:

The national security advisor did not respond directly to Clarke's memorandum. No Principals Committee meeting on al Qaeda was held until September 4, 2001 (although the Principals Committee met frequently on other subjects, such as the Middle East peace process, Russia, and the Persian Gulf).

(See below for news coverage of Clarke's revelations about Rice.)

"No al Qaeda plan was turned over to the new administration"

Rice also wrote in her March 22 Post op-ed that "No al Qaeda plan was turned over [by the Clinton administration] to the new administration." But according to the 9-11 Commission report, when Clarke sent Rice his aforementioned 2001 memo, he also sent her the so-called "Delenda Plan" -- which he had developed in 1998 -- along with an updated "strategy paper" entitled "Strategy for Eliminating the Threat from the Jihadist Networks of al Qida [sic]: Status and Prospects."

Ahead of Bush's official nomination of Rice as secretary of state, The Washington Post assessed her tenure at the National Security Council. The article devoted significant space to recalling Clarke's and the 9-11 Commission's criticisms of Rice but did not highlight Rice's pattern of factually dubious statements regarding Clarke. Other news outlets (including The Boston Globe; the Baltimore Sun; and Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service) noted Clarke's allegations that Rice failed to heed his warnings about terrorism, but none specifically mentioned her apparently false statements.

Well, that was a real contribution.