The Wall of Separation

[patsfan13]

In NEM's thread about the Dems taking control of congress and what he thinks will happen there was an exchange between All Around Brown and I.

He suggested the topic deserved it's own thread, so in the spirit of bi partisanship here it is.

From the previous thread:

Quote:
OK...perhaps you could provide some proof of that wild assertion? The wall of separation was an institutional one going back decades. You are embarrasing yourself trying to pin that on the liberal Dem on the panel. But nice smear job anyhow.




Here is a link from a goverment document (a PDF from MS Gorelick to Louie Freeh and Mary Jo White)

http://www.usdoj.gov/ag/testimony/20...0separation%22


an excerpt from a Wash Times editorial on the subject:


Quote:
Jamie Gorelick's wall



The disclosure that Jamie Gorelick, a member of the September 11 commission, was personally responsible for instituting a key obstacle to cooperation between law enforcement and intelligence operations before the terrorist attacks raises disturbing questions about the integrity of the commission itself. Ms. Gorelick should not be cross-examining witnesses; instead, she should be required to testify about her own behavior under oath. Specifically, commission members need to ask her about a 1995 directive she wrote that made it more difficult for the FBI to locate two of the September 11 hijackers who had already entered the country by the summer of 2001.
On Tuesday, Attorney General John Ashcroft declassified a four-page directive sent by Ms. Gorelick (the No. 2 official in the Clinton Justice Department) on March 4, 1995, to FBI Director Louis Freeh and Mary Jo White, the New York-based U.S. attorney investigating the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. In the memo, Ms. Gorelick ordered Mr. Freeh and Ms. White to follow information-sharing procedures that "go beyond what is legally required," in order to avoid "any risk of creating an unwarranted appearance" that the Justice Department was using Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants, instead of ordinary criminal investigative procedures, in an effort to undermine the civil liberties of terrorism suspects.

At issue was the oft-noted wall of separation that prevented counterterrorism agents and federal prosecutors from communicating with one another prior to September 11. Information collected under special FISA warrants, which do not require a probable cause, was generally not to be shared with personnel responsible for enforcing federal criminal laws — where probable cause must be demonstrated for a warrant to be issued. As lawyers David Rivkin and Lee Casey noted on our Op-Ed page yesterday, the practical effect of the wall was that counterintelligence information was generally kept away from law enforcement personnel who were investigating al Qaeda activities. But Ms. Gorelick's memo clearly indicated that the Clinton administration had decided as a matter of policy to go even beyond the law's already stringent requirements in order to further choke off information sharing.

I also ran across this article today about a documentary on ABC this Sept 10-11 called: The Road to 9-11. here is an excerpt from a review:

I recently attended an advance screening of ABC’s outstanding, epic miniseries "The Path to 9/11" (airing this September 10-11), and I came away enormously impressed. Writer/producer Cyrus Nowrasteh ("Into the West"), director David Cunningham ("To End All Wars"), and the whole production team have done a magnificent job in presenting the complex events leading up to 9/11 with accuracy, fairness, and artistry.
....



This is the first Hollywood production I’ve seen that honestly depicts how the Clinton administration repeatedly bungled the capture of Osama Bin Laden. One astonishing sequence in "The Path to 9/11" shows the CIA and the Northern Alliance surrounding Bin Laden’s house in Afghanistan. They're on the verge of capturing Bin Laden, but they need final approval from the Clinton administration in order to go ahead. They phone Clinton, but he and his senior staff refuse to give authorization for the capture of Bin Laden, for fear of political fall-out if the mission should go wrong and civilians are harmed. National Security Adviser Sandy Berger in essence tells the team in Afghanistan that if they want to capture Bin Laden, they'll have to go ahead and do it on their own without any official authorization. That way, their necks will be on the line - and not his. The astonished CIA agent on the ground in Afghanistan repeatedly asks Berger if this is really what the administration wants. Berger refuses to answer, and then finally just hangs up on the agent. The CIA team and the Northern Alliance, just a few feet from capturing Bin Laden, have to abandon the entire mission. Bin Laden and Al Qaeda shortly thereafter bomb the U.S. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya, killing over 225 men, women, and children, and wounding over 4000. The episode is a perfect example of Clinton-era irresponsibility and incompetence.

The miniseries also has a scene in which the CIA has crucial information identifying some of the 9/11 hijackers in advance of 9/11, but refuses to share the information with the FBI because of the “wall” put up by certain Democrat officials to prevent information sharing between government agencies. The CIA is depicted as sitting in a meeting with the FBI (with John O’Neil present), and showing the FBI surveillance photos of terrorism suspects - some of whom will later turn out to be the 9/11 hijackers. The CIA asks the FBI for help in identifying the men in the photos, but refuses to give the FBI any of the information they have on who the men are. John O’Neil protests that it’s impossible for the FBI to help the CIA identify the men if they won’t provide any information whatsoever on them. When O’Neil tells the FBI to keep the photos so they can at least work on them, the CIA becomes hostile to O’Neil and takes the photos back. Tragically, John O’Neil himself will later die in the 9/11 attacks, in part because agencies like the CIA refused to share crucial information like this. Scenes like these really challenge the prevailing liberal media and Hollywood mindset by showing that the Patriot Act's information-sharing and surveillance provisions are crucial to the safety of this country, and that political correctness and bureaucratic inefficiency are Islamic terrorism’s greatest friend.

link to the complete review:http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=16621

[Blue Collar]

Originally Posted by patsfan13

In NEM's thread about the Dems taking control of congress and what he thinks will happen there was an exchange between All Around Brown and I.

He suggested the topic deserved it's own thread, so in the spirit of bi partisanship here it is.

From the previous thread:



I also ran across this article today about a documentary on ABC this Sept 10-11 called: The Road to 9-11. here is an excerpt from a review:



link to the complete review:http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=16621

Here is the video of Condoleeza Rice at the 911 commision explaining what Bush knew about al qeada's plans and what he did to prevent any tragedy that may occur in america due to the new info detailed in the DPB and past history of bin laden and al qaeda..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYbWa...arch=condoleez

Also tonight on CNN is a documentary of bin laden and how he escaped capture after the 911 terrorist attack he planned.

[patsfan13]

Originally Posted by Blue Collar

Here is the video of Condoleeza Rice at the 911 commision explaining what Bush knew about al qeada's plans and what he did to prevent any tragedy that may occur in america due to the new info detailed in the DPB and past history of bin laden and al qaeda..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYbWa...arch=condoleez

Also tonight on CNN is a documentary of bin laden and how he escaped capture after the 911 terrorist attack he planned.

So the President had concerns about Terrorist good. The information in the Aug 6th memo did say there were concerns about Al Queda atacking inside the US.

Unfortunatly, there was no specific threat identified that the President could act on.

This speaks to the Wall of separation referenced in post 1 of this thread. If that had not existed perhaps the information the President had received woudl have been more specific and helped prevent the attacks. Thanks for the ,ink BC it does illustrate the issue I am addressing in this thread.

BTW Ben Vineste is a real political hack isn't he, badgering Rice to give a caned political answer rather than providing complete answers to the commission.

[All_Around_Brown]

I thought we were discussing Gorelick and her allegedly constructing the wall of separation?

What does a Hollywood fiction have to do with that? Should we start providing Syriana as evidence of the Bush master plan in the ME?

Please come back to reality.

[patsfan13]

Originally Posted by All_Around_Brown

I thought we were discussing Gorelick and her allegedly constructing the wall of separation?

What does a Hollywood fiction have to do with that? Should we start providing Syriana as evidence of the Bush master plan in the ME?

Please come back to reality.

Here is the connection. The film isn't a fiction it is based on the 9-11 commission report (unless you consider it fiction, whihc some conservatives might afree with.) The film address the wall of seperation and the role it played in the success of the 9-11 attack.

I also felt it was interesting for this information to get out on the 5th anniversary of 9-11 during themidst of a congressional election where the 2 parties are presenting very different views on the nature of the threat presented by Islamofascist and how it should be addressed. The facts shown in the documentary draws into sharp focus the differences in the approach taken to dealing with threats to this country by the 2 parties.

[All_Around_Brown]

If its endorsed by conservatives as a version of the events, theres a good chance its fiction.

[patsfan13]

So the actions of the previous administration had no role in preventing connecting the dots?

The presence of Gorelick on the commission gvien her clear conflict of interest in this matter isn't a problem?

The bit about Sandy Berger hanging the CIA guy out to dry when we could have had Bin Laden was news to me, and made more interesting given his subsequent arrect and guilty plea in stealing and destroying secret documents in connection with the 9-11 commission hearings. Perhaps the docs he was destroying were the ones showing how he let Bin Laden get away?

[Patters]

patsfan13 gets his information from MSM mini-series. LOL. C'mon patsfan, if you want to discuss things, you'll have to do better than that. Maybe the miniseries has been well researched or maybe it'sinterpretation of events is dramatic license. At any rate, while Bush's many predecessors certainly made mistakes, he was the only one who had opportunity to stop 9/11, and he failed. Just as Clinton failed to stop the Cole attack, Bush failed to stop the biggest attack on American soil in history and has answered that attack by donating 2500 American lives to the graveyard.

[All_Around_Brown]

Originally Posted by patsfan13

So the actions of the previous administration had no role in preventing connecting the dots?

Not at all what Im saying. The responsibility for 911 dates back at least three presidencies. Weve all been over this before. Not going there again.

Originally Posted by patsfan13

The presence of Gorelick on the commission gvien her clear conflict of interest in this matter isn't a problem?

You have yet to demonstrate that IMO. Her colleagues elected to keep her on and that was a bipartisan panel...so I don't know why you are still swinging away and missing so badly on that pitch.

Originally Posted by patsfan13

The bit about Sandy Berger hanging the CIA guy out to dry when we could have had Bin Laden was news to me, and made more interesting given his subsequent arrect and guilty plea in stealing and destroying secret documents in connection with the 9-11 commission hearings. Perhaps the docs he was destroying were the ones showing how he let Bin Laden get away?

OK, so now we're not discussing the original premise of yours.... that Gorelick was personally responsible for the creation of a wall of separation between agencies (absurd as it is)... but you are shifting to Berger and his alleged role in some conspiracy??

Are you now just throwing a bunch of crap on the wall to see what sticks or what?

[Turd Furguson]

Originally Posted by Patters

At any rate, while Bush's many predecessors certainly made mistakes, he was the only one who had opportunity to stop 9/11, and he failed.

I call bullchit on this.