Clark blames President Bush for Sept. 11 intelligence failures

Clark argued that Bush has manipulated facts, stifled dissent, retaliated against detractors, shown disdain for allies and started a war without just cause. He said Bush put Americans at risk by pursuing war in Iraq instead of hunting for Osama bin Laden and other terrorists, pulling a "bait-and-switch" by going after Iraqi President Saddam Hussein instead of al Qaida terrorists

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2003/10/28/national1500EST0687.DTL&type=printable


Finally some direct talk

and Slimy Shrub should quit putting the blame everywhere but on himself. "Fish rots from the head down"

Finally someone who can say it. Will other Democrats jump on board?

Last night on Charlie Rose. Said when a ship goes aground it doesn't matter who made the mistake, it's always the Captain's responsibililty. Called for Rumsfeld, Tenet, and Wolfowitz to resign; and put the full responsibility for the failures of this Administration right on the head of George Bush. He's been saying it since his regime change comment months and months ago. I don't know why people are so afraid to acknowledge anything he does. Him and Kucinich. Anti-war people know Kucinich really speaks to their heart, yet reject him. Traditional Democrats know Kerry speaks to their heart, yet reject him. None of it makes any sense.

I like Wes Clark just fine and I'm glad he's speaking to this. The more the merrier. I'd be completely content if he got the nomination and could campaign for him whole-heartedly. Just to clarify.

You are right. I forgot about that.

...I doubt it, but Clark is right. Regarding 9/11, the buck stops on George W. Bush's desk. Why has it taken 2 years for someone "offical" to publically state the obvious?

Will Clark go one step further and demand that the Aug 6th, 2001 PDB be released to the Independent Comission? A LOT of ANSWERS could come out of that 11-page document. (In fact, I suspect that document would be more useful than the "2 million pages" the WH has tried to inundate the Comission with. Now that would really be something if Clark stated that openness and transparency was needed with regard to the Presidential Daily Briefings and the 9/11 Commission!

MSRNC ran some of these comments on their ticker DURING the chimp's faux press conference today. I'm sure the timing wasn't intentional, since they'd do absolutely nothing to make little boy blue look bad, but it speaks well that they *would* run some of the comments.

Nice Job , Wesly!

Clark said he knew of the plot against Iraq, Syria, and other Middle Eastern countries before Bush invaded Iraq. With all the big brouhaha before invading Iraq, why didn't Clark speak up then? He could've provided a hugely legitimate voice to deterring the Bushies from invading Iraq.

Senator Byrd could have used some back-up. He was pretty lonely on the Senate floor. The time to expose and discuss the PNAC was before the war, when it could have changed history. Now, all we can do is play the rotten hand Bush has dealt us

Why? He was on CNN. He had the chance. If he had spoken up then, he could have made a real difference and been a true hero. It almost makes me want to cry that he didn't. And now, as it is, he's just another Johnny-Come-Lately to the Bash Bush bandwagon that Dean and Kucinich led. Why didn't he help us try to stop it from happening? Why?

He was definately raising some warning flags before the invasion. Clark's concerns about post war Iraq have come true.

I would still have liked to hear folks "in the know" like Clark talk about things like the PNAC and plans to invade Iraq and other Mideastern countries before Bush got the boulder rolling down the hill.

search Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo for "wesley clark interview".

But the interview also implies he heard about these plans soon after 9/11. I just would have liked to hear Clark (and a lot of others like Kerry, Biden, Daschle) discuss PNAC before the invasion of Iraq.

It wasn't a secret. It was just being ignored by the media (and still is, for that matter). Alarm bells about the PNAC were ringing all over the internet. They have a website spelling things out. The Bush admin is a rat nest of PNAC plotters.

I am just frustrated that in Iraq, our options are now only bad and worse. That wasn't the case before the invasion.

Don't get me wrong. I am glad Clark is in the race and speaking boldly on Bush's plans to invade other countries in the Mideast now.

But he didn't talk about the PNAC or the other 5-6 nations on the list, or that W was determined to invade no matter what, or why. The stuff that he's saying now he knew all along.

Because no one would have listened.

They do now, and we have yet to invade Syria
or Iran. So Clark has spoke up in time.

Iraq was a forgone conclusion.

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Clark was in a position to know many things. In fact I would venture to guess he knows much more than Bush* on just about everything.

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Is the most charitable explanation many of us would give for the attacks of September 11th. We are not alone.

Also, please define "partisanship". I've been hearing it a lot lately from people who don't seem to know what it means--but they know it's bad!

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... the Dems are and always will be pikers compared to the Repukes.

The PNAC crowd has been around for some time...they argued with the "real" politic advisors of bush the elder. Before that they inhabited the caves at the Rand Corp with a their mentor, Wohlstetter. Their collective heads rose over the horizon during the Clinton years, but the Big Dawg wasn't buying.

Clark not only knows where these creeps live, he knows their allies and their enemies.

http://www.pbs.org/thinktank/transcript1017.html

the ambiguity, and apparent contradictions, of some of his earlier statements on the war.

He failed to answer the challenge well in the debate when his praise of the war on CNN was pointed out. He should have said, "I praised the valor of our troops, not the policy that put them there" or something to that effect.

In my opinion, Clark and Dean (on Medicare) have made the same mistake. When confronted with previous statements that seem in conflict with present positions, one can either clarify and explain the old remarks, or simply say "I have changed my mind on that."

Flatly denying you ever said things that you are on the public record as saying is the worst thing a candidate can do. It will always come back to bite them.

I am still actively considering both men, though. But you can bet Karl Rove already has commercials ready to air, showing the flat denials followed by clips of them saying what they claim never to have said.

During the debate he answered with a great line that recieved both laughter AND applause



CAMERON: General, there is a long litany of comments from you, both in your time as a former television
analyst and then over the course of the last several months. Are we to understand that what you’re saying
now is that those things you have said that were positive about the war was not what you meant?

CLARK: No, I always—I’m a fair person, Carl. And when this administration's done something right, well, if
they were Russians doing something right, Chinese doing something right, French doing something right or
even Republicans doing something right—

(LAUGHTER)

I’m going to praise them.

Now, this country was attacked on 9/11, and it was right that this administration went into Afghanistan.
And I supported that war; so did 90 percent of the American people. That Taliban government should have
been taken out.

But the failure of this administration was not to put the troops in to finish the job against Osama bin Laden.
And you know why they didn’t do it? They didn’t do it because, all along, their plan was to save those
troops to go after Saddam Hussein.

So I support them for what they did right, and I condemn them for what they did wrong.

IFILL: Thank you, General.

(APPLAUSE)

I thought Graham would have the courage to do it, but I am sure as hell glad Clark is doing it now. This is the hot button that Kerry can't risk pressing because it's sure to lose votes amongst some people... but it helps to shine the flashlight on W's incompetence on this hugest of all fuck-ups.
Let it shine!

Bush should face an inquiry over Iraq war, says general
By David Rennie in Washington
(Filed: 04/10/2003)

General Wesley Clark, the front-runner in the Democratic race for the White House, launched a high-risk attack on American foreign policy yesterday when he said the Bush administration should face an investigation into possible "criminal" conduct in its drive to war.

Gen Clark, who as Nato supreme commander led the war in Kosovo, accused the Bush administration of entering office already determined to attack Iraq, then seizing on the September 11 attacks as justification.

He called for an independent review of what he called the "possible manipulation of intelligence" to convince the American people that war with Iraq was necessary.

"Nothing could be a more serious violation of public trust than consciously to make a case for war based on false claims," he was due to say in a speech last night. "We need to know if we were intentionally deceived."

more
Telegraph - 04 OCT 03

You'd think calling for a criminal investigation of the administration would make more news. If Clark could have only figured out how to tie it in with Kobe or Laci!

:shrug:

You mean a top ranking former military general who led the UN forces in Europe and attained nearly the top level office in the military accuses the president of the United States of lying, obstructing justice, starting a war for no reason, and basically treason and other high crimes and misdemeanors, and the San Francisco Gate is the main source to carry it?

Today I heard the radio's top of the hour news reports several times, and they were full of Bush quotes, even though every one was a tired platitude and most had been debunked. I heard Kobe Bryant's attack on Shaquille O'Neal. But I didn't hear that a former commander of the UN troops had all but accused the president of treason.

Damned liberal media!

Clark raises hell, the media ignores it. Dean raises hell, the media ignores it. All they're interested in playing are Bush's mangled platitudes. Its infuriating that substance is ignored while insipidcy is promoted. Once again, consider who owns the networks and the newspapers. They report what they want you to hear. Accuracy or fairness has nothing to do with it.

He is an excellent fellow, who well deserves it.

"LET'S GO GET THOSE BUSH BASTARDS!"

so grows the shameful stain on those protected by the first amendment. What shoud be a bulwark of democracy is becoming the handmaiden of the powerful.

The founding fathers did not solemnize their protection from the power of rulers to insure their sinecure at the feet of that power, nicknames or not.

:grr:

...when Bush's cock was half way down his throat last year. If he had so many problems with Bush in 2002, after 9/11, why was he slobbering all over his knob in front of Republican audiences?

This is pure political opportunism from Clark, I'm sorry to say. Sounds like when he became a Democrat last week, he forgot to leave his Republican tendencies at the door.

...IMHO, who gives a rat's butt about what Clark thought LAST year or any other time in the past?

Based on a number of your posts recently, some could accuse you of "Republican tendencies".

if the best they can do is repeat the mid-schoolish trash in in the "post" above yours. We worked that to death in September.

on the Clark accusations

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uslatest/story/0,1282,-3320852,00.html

today.

Check it out.

Than any other available Democratic candidate.

It cannot be denied that he knows how intelligence is gathered and used, and how those bureaucracies work.