Re: Looks like the USS Cole bombing in 2000 was just another October surprise by the Republicans, a'la Ronald Reagan's October surprise of 1980. Hmmmmmm!!!!

[i_hate...@yahoo.com]

On Feb 5, 11:57 pm, i_hate_gwb...@yahoo.com wrote:
> boy those Republicans will do ANYTHING to win an election, won't
> they?  including selling out their own country, breaking the Geneva
> convention, torture, waterboarding, etc.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_J._Crawford
>
> ties to Ronald Reagan, GHW Bush, AND GWBush
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abd_al-Rahim_al-Nashiri
>
> suspect that had been held by GWBush's CIA had been waterboarded
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Cole_bombing
>
> info about the USS Cole bombing, on 10/12/2000..... so very close to
> the 2000 elections, huh?  al-Qaeda takes responsibility - in 06/2001.
> Turns out on this link that al-Queda wanted Clinton to attack, before
> he left office in 01/2001, and GWBush after that.  And, before any of
> you neocons try to blame Clinton, saying he should have attacked in
> retribution, this cite indicates that the Bush administration was of
> the mind that it was inconclusive as to who was responsible for it.
>
> "
> Evidence of al-Qaeda's involvement was inconclusive for months after
> the attack. The staff of the 9-11 Commission found that al-Qaeda's
> direction of the bombing was under investigation but "increasingly
> clear" on 11 November 2000. It was an "unproven assumption" in late
> November. By 21 December the CIA had made a "preliminary judgment"
> that "al Qaeda appeared to have supported the attack," with no
> "definitive conclusion."[22]
>
> Accounts thereafter are varied and somewhat contradictory.
>
> Then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice told the Commission
> that when the administration took office on 20 January 2001, "We knew
> that there was speculation that the 2000 Cole attack was al Qaeda...
> We received, I think, on 25 January the same assessment [of al-Qaeda
> responsibility]. It was preliminary. It was not clear."
>
> Newsweek reported that on the following day, "six days after Bush took
> office," the FBI "believed they had clear evidence tying the bombers
> to Al Qaeda."[23] The Washington Post reported that, on 9 February,
> Vice President Dick Cheney was briefed on bin Laden's responsibility
> "without hedge."[24]
>
> These conclusions are contrasted by testimony of key figures before
> the 9/11 Commission, summarized in the 9/11 Commission Report. Former
> CIA Director George Tenet testified (page 196) that he "believed he
> laid out what was knowable early in the investigation, and that this
> evidence never really changed until after 9/11."[25] The report
> suggests (pages 201 - 202) that the official assessment was similarly
> vague until at least March 2001:
>
> On 25 January, Tenet briefed the President on the Cole investigation.
> The written briefing repeated for top officials of the new
> administration what the CIA had told the Clinton White House in
> November. This included the "preliminary judgment" that al Qaeda was
> responsible, with the caveat that no evidence had yet been found that
> Bin Ladin himself ordered the attack... in March 2001, the CIA's
> briefing slides for Rice were still describing the CIA's "preliminary
> judgment" that a "strong circumstantial case" could be made against al
> Qaeda but noting that the CIA continued to lack "conclusive
> information on external command and control" of the attack.[25]
>
> According to Dr. Rice, the decision not to respond militarily to the
> Cole bombing was President Bush's. She said he "made clear to us that
> he did not want to respond to al Qaeda one attack at a time. He told
> me he was 'tired of swatting flies.'" The administration instead began
> work on a new strategy to eliminate al-Qaeda.[26]
> "
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_G._Doumar
>
> federal judge appointed by Ronald Raygun rules that the Sudanese
> government allowed al-Queda to pull off the bombing.

yeah, gotta watch those repuglicons like a hawk barney fife!