BUSH PARDONS OSAMA BIN LADEN??
Posted By: Dee on 2009-01-23
In Reply to:
**** I am so glad this man is no longer the president. He is retarded!!! May want to credit him with "keeping us safe" after 9-1-1. No credit due him, Remember, we were never attacked before 9-1-1 and he knew about the attack and ignored it. PLUS -- He is friends of Osama Bin Laden's family. BYE RETARD!!
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ARTICLE-BUSH PARDONS OSAMA BIN LADEN
Forgot to post the link for all you "naysayers" ...... MAN - Before you get on your high-horse, READ, READ, READ -- It's all over the internet. I meant to say, that Bush is friends with members of Osama Bin Laden's "family."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-rees/breaking-bush-pardons-osa_b_159272.html
ARTICLE BELOW:
WASHINGTON, DC: In a stunning late-hour development, President George W. Bush has granted Osama bin Laden a pardon for the murder of more than 2,700 Americans in the fall of 2001.
"This kinda came out of nowhere," said a White House aide who requested anonymity. "I wouldn't have put bin Laden on the short list myself. On the other hand, maybe this is the president's way of finding closure. Because ... y'know ... he wasn't actually able to kill bin Laden, or capture him, or even keep him from making all those (expletive) videos. I mean, jeez, let's face it: Osama bin Laden is basically a one-man Netflix of cave movies."
The aide paused, then went on to say, "Can you believe this dude (Bush) was actually president for eight (expletive) years? What were we thinking? Seriously, what the (expletive) were we thinking?"
The aide began weeping quietly. "May God have mercy on me for my role in the unfathomable travesty that was the Bush administration."
Conservative columnist William Kristol insisted the pardon made sense.
"George W. Bush is a brilliant strategist. I'm sure he has a good reason for this pardon. I'll figure it out."
Kristol sucked his thumb for a few minutes, lost in thought. He was then distracted by a brightly colored piece of string.
A passerby, told of the bin Laden pardon, offered a possible explanation:
"Maybe Bush is trying to smoke him out. Wasn't that the plan?"
ARTICLE-BUSH PARDONS OSAMA BIN LADEN
Forgot to post the link for all you "naysayers" ...... MAN - Before you get on your high-horse, READ, READ, READ -- It's all over the internet. I meant to say, that Bush is friends with members of Osama Bin Laden's "family."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-rees/breaking-bush-pardons-osa_b_159272.html
ARTICLE BELOW:
WASHINGTON, DC: In a stunning late-hour development, President George W. Bush has granted Osama bin Laden a pardon for the murder of more than 2,700 Americans in the fall of 2001.
"This kinda came out of nowhere," said a White House aide who requested anonymity. "I wouldn't have put bin Laden on the short list myself. On the other hand, maybe this is the president's way of finding closure. Because ... y'know ... he wasn't actually able to kill bin Laden, or capture him, or even keep him from making all those (expletive) videos. I mean, jeez, let's face it: Osama bin Laden is basically a one-man Netflix of cave movies."
The aide paused, then went on to say, "Can you believe this dude (Bush) was actually president for eight (expletive) years? What were we thinking? Seriously, what the (expletive) were we thinking?"
The aide began weeping quietly. "May God have mercy on me for my role in the unfathomable travesty that was the Bush administration."
Conservative columnist William Kristol insisted the pardon made sense.
"George W. Bush is a brilliant strategist. I'm sure he has a good reason for this pardon. I'll figure it out."
Kristol sucked his thumb for a few minutes, lost in thought. He was then distracted by a brightly colored piece of string.
A passerby, told of the bin Laden pardon, offered a possible explanation:
"Maybe Bush is trying to smoke him out. Wasn't that the plan?"
Yes. Bush most definitely Osama Bin Laden's
NM
Osama Bin Laden
Perhaps I am missing something here but what strikes me about the above is the fact that this man has not been found (can't find someone if your'e not REALLY looking). They sure FOUND Saddam Hussein. The other thing was that when 9/111 took place, when perhaps you or a loved one was trying to get home from college, business trip, etc - all air transportation was shut down but the relatives of Bin Laden were ALLOWED to be flown OUT OF the U.S...maybe it's just me thinking about it this way...hmmm
Obama/Biden - looks like Osama Bin Laden, and
nm
obama osama biden bin laden.....
x
doesnt' obama biden sound too much like osama bin laden?
I would think that they are going to be losing a few votes just because of this.
Possible Bush Pardons
By Dafna Linzer, ProPublicaPosted Thursday, Nov. 20, 2008, at 7:00 AM ET
Attention, convicts: Time is running out to get applications to the pardon attorney at the Justice Department if you're hoping President Bush will be your decider. Few of you should get your hopes up—Bush has rejected a record number of requests for pardons and commutations. In the last eight years, he has pardoned 157 people—a miserly sum compared with his predecessors. But you don't have to give up entirely: More are expected in the coming months, most notably for Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.
Before President Clinton went on a pardon spree for wealthy friends and campaign contributors at the end of his presidency, pardons and commutations were traditionally bestowed on average citizens who had successfully reformed their lives and given back to their communities after completing lengthy sentences. Pardon experts believe that of the Bush prospects, the 1980s junk-bond king Michael Milken best fits the rich-and-famous description.
Most of the other top prospects for pardon listed below have, like Milken, been convicted and served prison time. But not all. People who are merely charged could be eligible for pardons, as Bush's father demonstrated when he pardoned former Defense Secretary Casper Weinberger. And Washington is abuzz with the prospect that Bush might issue pre-emptive pardons for government employees who could face trouble in the future stemming from their roles in his "war on terror."
We've rated potential pardonees' chances from zero to four "Get of Jail Free" cards.
SPORTS
Marion Jones: unlikely. This disgraced Olympic gold medalist returned five awards after she was sentenced to six months in jail in January for lying to federal agents about using steroids. She was released on Sept. 5. Jones' offense is considered mild, and her sentence was brief, but the president may not want to reward someone who cost the United States Olympic gold.
Michael Vick: no chance. The Atlanta Falcons' suspended quarterback is serving a 23-month sentence in Leavenworth, Kan., for criminal conspiracy relating to dog fighting. Yuck. There just isn't much of a pro-dog fighting lobby to pull for Vick.
Barry Bonds: unlikely. The former San Francisco Giants superstar who holds the MLB all-time record for home runs was indicted in November 2007 for lying about his involvement in a steroids scandal. Bonds became a free agent last year but has been unable to find a team willing to sign him while under indictment. As a former baseball team owner, Bush may be sympathetic to Bonds. But let's be honest—who in baseball likes Barry?
TEXAS
Florita Bell Griffin: possible. As governor, Bush appointed Griffin to the oversight board of the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs. In 2000, she was convicted of bribery, theft, and money laundering. In 2003, a federal appeals court overturned a separate conviction for mail fraud. Griffin has two things going for her: Bush and Texas. Bush has pardoned more of his fellow Texans than residents of any other state.
Texas Border Patrol guards: good chance. Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean are serving sentences of 11 and 12 years, respectively, for the nonfatal shooting in the back of an unarmed Mexican drug runner in February 2005. A jury found that the two border patrolmen then tried to cover up the shooting. Their requests for pardons have won support from numerous Republican congressmen, including Rep. Duncan Hunter of California, who introduced the Congressional Pardon for Border Patrol Agents Ramos and Compean Act. Bush left open the possibility of pardons for both men during an interview with a Texas TV station.
TEAM BUSH
Scooter Libby: You betcha! Cheney's former chief of staff, who also served as assistant to the president, was convicted of perjury and of obstructing the FBI's investigation of the leak of former CIA officer Valerie Plame's identity. In June 2007, he was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison and ordered to pay a hefty fine. Bush commuted the prison time, but only a pardon will allow Libby to practice law again.
James Tobin: good chance. Tobin was Bush's 2004 New England campaign chairman and raised more than $200,000 for the president's re-election bid. He was indicted in October for making false statements to the FBI in connection with the bureau's investigation of the plot to jam Democratic Party phones in New Hampshire in 2002. Tobin was convicted in 2005 for his actual role in that scheme, but that conviction was overturned on appeal in 2007. His fundraising prowess and the overturning of his earlier conviction—in connection with the same case—make him a good pardon candidate.
Tom Noe: unlikely. Noe was a prominent Ohio Republican fundraiser for Bush-Cheney ཀ. He was sentenced to 27 months in a federal prison for illegally funneling money to the campaign. Two months later, he was also found guilty of theft, money laundering, forgery, and corrupt activity related to Ohio's rare-coin investment scandal. Noe might have a shot if his only offense were connected to campaign funding. But his Ohio crime was one of a number of nasty Republican scandals that badly damaged the party's standing in the 2006 midterm election.
CONGRESS
Sen. Ted Stevens: possible. Now that the 85-year-old Alaska Republican, who was found guilty last month of corruption, has lost re-election, members of his party might push for a pardon for him—after all, he spent the last 40* years in the Senate. Stevens seemed to dismiss the need for a pardon while the votes were being counted; late Tuesday, he was tight-lipped about the whether he would ask Bush for clemency.
Bob Ney: no chance. The former Republican congressman from Ohio was sentenced to two and a half years in prison after he acknowledged taking bribes from convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Ney was on the Abramoff-sponsored golfing trip to Scotland at the heart of the case against David Safavian, the former White House procurement officer who was also caught up in the scandal. A pardon of Ney could refocus public attention on cushy relationships between Republicans and lobbyists over the last eight years—relationships that a humbled GOP would rather forget.
Randy Cunningham: no chance. The former Republican congressman from California pleaded guilty in 2005 to federal conspiracy charges to commit bribery, mail fraud, wire fraud, and tax evasion. He was sentenced to eight years and four months in prison and ordered to pay $1.8 million in restitution for all the fancy gifts he racked up from lobbyists. "The Duke" has a pardon attorney, and a number of people have written to the Justice Department in support of clemency. But Cunningham's naked abuse of power tainted Republican rule and contributed to steep party losses in 2006.
Brent Wilkes: possible. Wilkes, a defense contractor, was sentenced to 12 years in prison in February for furnishing Cunningham with yachts, vacations, and other luxury items in exchange for lucrative contracts. Wilkes cooperated with federal investigators in the Cunningham case, and that could help him win a pardon.
Kyle "Dusty" Foggo: possible. Foggo was Wilkes' childhood friend before he rose to become executive director of the CIA, the No. 3 position in the U.S. spy agency. He was indicted in 2007 on several counts of fraud, conspiracy, and money laundering in connection with Wilkes and admitted to steering a lucrative CIA contract to his pal. Foggo remains under investigation by the CIA and other federal agencies. But his cooperation with investigators and years of service in the clandestine agency once run by Bush's father could make him a good candidate for clemency.
TEAM ABRAMOFF
Jack Abramoff: no chance. The former Hollywood producer-turned-Republican lobbyist was at the center of the largest lobbying scandal in Washington, which erupted in 2005. Abramoff was convicted of fraud, tax evasion, and conspiracy to bribe public officials. The sentence was reduced in September to four years in recognition of Abramoff's cooperation with investigators. That's all the break he'll get. Abramoff was such a disaster for Bush and the GOP that the White House refused to release any photos in which the president and Abramoff appeared in the same room at the same time.
J. Steven Griles: possible. Griles served as deputy secretary of the Interior during Bush's first term. In March 2007, he pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice charges in connection with his 2005 Senate testimony regarding the Abramoff scandal. Griles was sentenced to 10 months in prison and fined $30,000. He was released this year. Griles' time served, combined with his senior position in the administration, make him a good candidate for a pardon.
David Safavian: unlikely. The senior White House procurement officer in the Office of Management and Budget was convicted in 2006 for concealment, making false statements, and obstructing justice in the Abramoff investigation. He was sentenced to 18 months in prison, but the conviction was overturned in June. A retrial is set for December.
WHITE COLLAR
Michael Milken: excellent chance. The junk-bond king became the symbol of the ྌs greed on Wall Street that led to insider-trading scandals and a stock-market crash. Milken was sentenced to eight years for conspiracy and fraud charges and ordered to pay $200 million in fines. But he was released in January 1993, after less than two years in prison. Milken, who was diagnosed with prostate cancer that year, has since devoted significant resources to philanthropy and has created several foundations to support cancer research. Milken, who is believed to be worth more than $1 billion, tried unsuccessfully to secure a pardon from President Clinton. He is currently represented by Washington powerhouse attorney Ted Olson,* Bush's longtime friend and first-term solicitor general. Olson also represented Armand Hammer, who received a pardon from former President George H.W. Bush.
The Smartest Guys in the Room: possible. Former Enron executives Jeffrey Skilling and Andrew Fastow were convicted of multiple federal felonies in 2006 in connection with Enron's downfall. Skilling, who was Enron's CEO, is serving a 24-year prison sentence at a federal penitentiary in Minnesota. Fastow, the corporate CFO, is nearing the end of his six-year sentence. Bush was friends with the now-deceased chairman, Kenneth Lay of Enron, which, of course, was based in Texas. But the president managed to distance himself from the company's extraordinary collapse. A point against pardons for these guys: Considering the current financial crisis, rewarding Enron's failed leadership might not be smart.
Martha Stewart: Why not? Millions of glue-gun aficionados would love to see a pardon for the domestic doyenne who was convicted in 2004 of lying to investigators about a stock sale and who served five months in a women's correctional facility. Thousands of people have even signed a petition seeking a pardon for Martha. It's hard to see what would be in it for Bush. But Martha's spectacular book sales and daytime-TV ratings are testament to millions of other Americans' ability to forgive. Why not the president, too? (The question, of course, that all pardon applicants ask.)
Bush's pardons
Did anyone happen to notice that his pardon list didn't include Ramos and Campion? Now there was a miscarriage of justice for ya and it just happened to come out of the Great State of Texas or maybe Bushexas. There is sure something fishy going on there!!!!
Bush and Bin Laden were (are) friends!
Knew of this way back when 9/11 happened. He also had Saudi Arabians escorted out of the U.S. safely that night or the next night. Good grief! Keep up with the news!
Bush is no friend of bin Laden and isn't it ironic
that the same person who spouts the first amendment is also the one who runs to the monitor when people say something she doesn't like? Hummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Bush sr having lunch with Obama Bin Laden?
freudian slip? LOL. Before you have a canniption...joke. lol.
Bush, military leaders let bin Laden escape
CIA operative says Bush, military leaders let bin Laden escape
Capitol Hill Blue | January 2 2006
The top CIA counterterrorism officer who tracked Osama bin Laden through the mountains of Afghanistan says the United States could have captured the terrorist leader if President George W. Bush and the American military had devoted the necessary resources to the hunt and capture.
In addition, says Gary Bernsten, a decorated espionage officer, the post-Cold War downturn in recruitment and attention to espionage has left a crippled spy agency that will need a decade or more to build up its clandestine service for the U.S. war on terrorism.
Berntsen led a paramilitary unit code-named Jawbreaker in the war that toppled the Taliban after the September 11 attacks.
He says his Jawbreaker team tracked bin Laden to Afghanistan's Tora Bora region late in 2001 and could have killed or captured the al Qaeda leader there if military officials had agreed to his request for an additional force of about 800 U.S. troops. But the administration was already gearing up for war with Iraq and troops were never sent, allowing bin Laden was able to escape.
His account contradicts public statements by Bush and former Gen. Tommy Franks, who maintained that U.S. officials were never sure bin Laden was at Tora Bora.
Berntsen says CIA Director Porter Goss faces an uphill battle to fill the agency's senior ranks with aggressive, seasoned operatives.
He's probably more aggressive than most of the senior officers in the clandestine service. So I think he's having to pull them along a bit, Berntsen said in an interview.
(Goss) is trying to improve the situation. But it's going to be tough. The rebuilding is going to take years. A decade, at least, he told Reuters late last week.
The CIA, widely criticized for lapses involving prewar Iraq and the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington, has seen its clandestine staff dwindle to less than 5,000 employees from a peak of over 7,000, intelligence sources say.
Experts blame a post-Cold War downturn in recruitment for a current lack of seasoned clandestine operatives that has been exacerbated by a rush to lucrative private sector jobs in recent years.
We have a smaller number of really, really aggressive, creative members of our leadership in the senior service, said Berntsen, who recently published a book about his exploits in the war on terrorism, titled Jawbreaker (Crown Publishing).
Former CIA Director George Tenet told the September 11 commission in April 2004 the CIA would need five years to produce a clandestine service fully capable of tackling the terrorism threat.
Goss later said at his September 2004 Senate confirmation hearings that rebuilding the clandestine operation would be a long build-out, a long haul.
President George W. Bush issued an order last year that called for a 50 percent increase in CIA clandestine officers and analysts to be completed as soon as feasible.
The CIA is moving aggressively to rebuild and enhance its capabilities across the board, CIA spokesman Paul Gimigliano said.
But intelligence sources say the rebuilding process has been complicated by disaffection for Goss' leadership within the clandestine service.
Years of double-digit growth in federal spending on intelligence that followed the September 11 attacks may also be about to end.
John Negroponte, the new U.S. director of national intelligence, has endorsed an intelligence budget for fiscal year 2007 that is relatively flat, with current spending levels believed to total about $44 billion for the 15-agency intelligence community. Fiscal 2007 begins in October.
Berntsen, 48, who also led the CIA Counterterrorism Center's response to the 1998 al Qaeda bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa, sued the CIA in July, accusing the spy agency of trying to stop him from publishing his book.
Gimigliano said the CIA reviewed Bernsten's book before publication only to ensure that it contained no classified information.
In the book, Berntsen says his Jawbreaker team tracked bin Laden to Afghanistan's Tora Bora region late in 2001 and could have killed or captured the al Qaeda leader there if military officials had agreed to his request for an additional force of about 800 U.S. troops.
But the troops were never sent and bin Laden was able to escape, he said.
His account contradicts public statements by Bush and former Gen. Tommy Franks, who maintained that U.S. officials were never sure bin Laden was at Tora Bora.
Bin laden's family are NOT bin laden. They disowned him years ago. Please. nm
/
Pardons....sm
*Well....he was convicted of perjury and if he in fact did lie under oath to the grand jury, he should go to jail. That being said...why not pardon him? Clinton was cited for exactly the same things...lying under oath (perjury) before a grand jury and obstruction of justice. He is free as a bird, finished his term as President, making money hand over fist....yes, for that reason alone I think Libby should be pardoned to level the playing field again. If liberals were happy that Clinton walked, they should not scream bloody murder if Bush does pardon Libby. Because it is the very same thing and would expose the hypocrisy BIG time. But, that has never stopped them before, has it? *
If they do pardon him, will you be able to let this sleeping dog lie? Libby is (was) not on level playing field as Clinton...he was never President of the US on trial for a LOVE AFFAIR of all things. Yet I digress, Clinton should have been punished for perjury. You've drilled that point home a gazillion times already. Should that be everyone's excuse from here until the end of time. *Pardon me because you let Clinton slide.* Of course not. Clinton did make some questionable pardons at the end of his term. I don't think anyone should be pardoned unless the president can provide proof that they were innocent of the crimes committed.
Pardons....admission of guilt...
According to this that I found, they are saying that if you *accept* a pardon, that is an implicit admission of guilt. A person does not have to say formally *yes, I am guilty.*
In the United States, the pardon power for Federal crimes is granted to the President by the United States Constitution, Article II, Section 2, which states that the President:
shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.
All federal pardon petitions are addressed to the President who grants or denies the request. Typically, applications for pardons are referred for review and non-binding recommendation by the Office of the Pardon Attorney, an official of the Department of Justice. Since 1977, presidents have received about 600 pardon or clemency petitions a year and have granted around ten percent of these, although the percentage of pardons and reprieves granted varies from administration to administration (fewer pardons have been granted since World War II than historically had been the case).
The presidential power of pardons and commutations was controversial from the outset; many Anti-Federalists remembered examples of royal abuses of the pardon power in Europe, and warned that the same would happen in the new republic. However, Alexander Hamilton makes a strong defense of the pardon power in The Federalist Papers, particularly in Federalist 74. It is worthy of note that Hamilton called for something like an elective monarch at the Constitutional Convention. President George Washington granted the first high-profile Federal pardon to leaders of the Whiskey Rebellion.
Many pardons have been controversial; critics argue that pardons have been used more often for the sake of political expediency than to correct judicial error. One of the more famous, recent pardons was granted by President Gerald Ford to former President Richard Nixon on September 8, 1974, for official misconduct which gave rise to the Watergate scandal. Polls showed a majority of Americans disapproved of the pardon and Ford's public-approval ratings tumbled afterward. He was then narrowly defeated in the presidential campaign, two years later. Other controversial uses of the pardon power include Andrew Johnson's sweeping pardons of thousands of former Confederate officials and military personnel after the American Civil War, Jimmy Carter's grant of amnesty to Vietnam-era draft evaders, George H. W. Bush's pardons of 75 people, including six Reagan administration officials accused and/or convicted in connection with the Iran-Contra affair, and Bill Clinton's pardons of convicted FALN terrorists and 140 people on his last day in office - including billionaire fugitive Marc Rich.
A presidential pardon may be granted at any time after commission of the offense; the pardoned person need not have been convicted or even formally charged with a crime. Clemency may also be granted without the filing of a formal request and even if the intended recipient has no desire to be pardoned. In the overwhelming majority of cases, however, the Pardon Attorney will consider only petitions from persons who have completed their sentences and, in addition, have demonstrated their ability to lead a responsible and productive life for a significant period after conviction or release from confinement.[1]
It appears that a pardon can be rejected, and must be affirmatively accepted to be officialy recognized by the courts. Acceptance also carries with it an admission of guilt. Burdick v. United States, 236 U.S. 79 (1915). However, the federal courts have yet to make it clear how this logic applies to persons who are deceased (such as Henry Flipper - who was pardoned by Bill Clinton), those who are relieved from penalties as a result of general amnesties and those whose punishments are relieved via a commutation of sentence (which cannot be rejected in any sense of the language - See Chapman v. Scott (C. C. A.) 10 F.(2d) 690).
The pardon power of the President extends only to offenses cognizable under U.S. Federal law. However, the governors of most states have the power to grant pardons or reprieves for offenses under state criminal law. In other states, that power is committed to an appointed agency or board, or to a board and the governor in some hybrid arrangement.
My pardons to you, then. It was evidently picked up by
Fox and of course had the 'ole Fox spin put on it, riling up once again the unstable.
Around here we call him Osama bin Biden
nm
I meant pulling on Osama's beard
and not Obama's beard. How easy it is to confuse Osama with Obama though. Just one letter difference.
I'd appreciate you keeping the personal insults out. Like you have never made a typo when typing. I'm sorry I am not as perfect as you are.
i'm sure osama has a perfectly good reason for this
nm
. . .so where is Bin Laden?
He protected nothing. He made the rest of the democratic world hate the US, throwing his weight around like a ridiculous cowboy, talking like a redneck. All he did was allow AL Queda to regroup, and they're stronger than ever.
According to the bin Laden family sm
They disowned Osama a long long time ago. In fact, the bin Laden family owns probably the largest construction company in the Middle East. They built the new U.S. military installation in Saudi Arabia. I am thinking they were allowed to leave for fear of retribution by Americans. That was always my thought and I never really questioned it because I knew of the alienation between Osama and his family.
Bin Laden got what he aimed for.....
economic ruin...........GW played right into his hands...........4 more years, 4 more years, yeah!!!! RUIN!!!!!! McSame even has a cheerleader to inspire the masses.....
Are you talking about bin Laden?
Or are you talking about an old washed up hippie terrorist who probably couldn't swat a fly?
You Republicans come back and defend the fact that bin Laden has not paid for 9/11. Don't tell me that our military could not have taken him out in 7 years!!! I suspect Cullen Powell knows more than he has ever said and that it is no accident that he is supporting Obama and not because he happens to be black either.
What happened to Bin Laden? sm
Watch this Clinton interview by Mike Wallace. Clinton lets him have it with both barrels and defends why he did not get Bin Laden.
http://crooksandliars.com/2006/09/24/fox-clinton-interview-part-1-osama-bin-laden/
So, show me bin Laden! I'm sure you
that he is alive and well somewhere.
Even bin Laden is Saudi..........nm
x
It appears that Bin Laden
has threatened Americans again in a new audio tape, saying President Barack Obama inflamed hatred toward the U.S. by ordering Pakistan to crack down on militants in Swat Valley and block Islamic law in the area.
You just can't win with terrorists. No matter how nice we try to be to Muslims.....the extremists are still going to hate us and want to kill us.
A mission accomplished for bin Laden.
In a 1998 interview, Osama bin Laden — the terrorist organizer of 9/11 who still roams free — listed as one of his many grievances against the U.S. that Americans “have stolen $36 trillion from Muslims” by purchasing oil from Persian Gulf countries at low prices. The real price of a barrel of oil should be $144, bin Laden demanded.
Ten years ago today, the price of a barrel of oil was just $11. Heading into this holiday weekend, the price of a barrel of oil rested at $144 — a thirteen-fold increase.
One month after 9/11, the New York Times wrote of possible “nightmare” scenarios that would deliver bin Laden’s goal. Neela Banerjee warned that among the “misguided decisions” that would put oil supplies at risk would be “that the United States attacks Iraq.” The Times included this quote in its story:
“If bin Laden takes over and becomes king of Saudi Arabia, he’d turn off the tap,” said Roger Diwan, a managing director of the Petroleum Finance Company, a consulting firm in Washington. “He said at one point that he wants oil to be $144 a barrel” — about six times what it sells for now.
Bin Laden didn’t have to become king of Saudi Arabia to achieve his goal; in fact, Bush’s policies delivered it for him. The Bush administration’s catastrophic decision to invade Iraq, sink the nation into debt to pay for that war, and consequently, weaken the dollar have all caused oil prices to soar astronomically.
Testifying before the House Foreign Affairs Committee last May, Anne Korin, the co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, reminded Congress about bin Laden’s goal:
[A]bout ten years ago, Osama bin Laden stated that his target price for oil is $144 a barrel and that the American people, who allegedly robbed the Muslim people of their oil, owe each Muslim man, woman, and child $30,000 in back payments. At the time, $144 a barrel seemed farfetched to most. […]
I would like to impress upon this Committee that $144 a barrel oil will be perceived as a victory for the Jihadist movement and a reaffirmation that the economic warfare component of its campaign against the West is a resounding success. There is no need to elaborate on the implications of such a victory in terms of loss of U.S. prestige and our ability to prevail in the Long War of the 21st century.
Only if you want to say Obama Biden Laden
Which I don't know where the Laden comes in. I don't see the similarity unless you want to see it. You need to get Osama Bin Laden out of your minds and grasp reality. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are two great men in politics. Osama? He's been out of my mind ever since Benazir Bhutto said she knew who had killed Bin Laden (then she was assissinated).
Bin Laden wanted to bankrupt the US. sm
Supporters of the Bush administration like to say that there have been no terrorist attacks on US soil since the tragedy of September 11, 2001, suggesting that President Bush has kept the country safe from terrorism. What they forget is that Osama Bin Laden clearly outlined his strategy for battling America, not by flying more planes into new buildings, but by driving the US into bankruptcy.
Show me bin Laden and maybe I'll be
a little bit.
We've Found Bin Laden
Osama bin Laden may be hiding out in one of three walled compounds near the Pakistani border, according to scientists who've used satellites and geographic analysis in an attempt to pinpoint the fugitive terrorist's location.
University of California-Los Angeles researchers used nighttime satellite images and population-detection methods to target what they believe to be the 9/11 mastermind's hiding place - Parachinar, a town mere miles from the southern Pakistani border, according to USA Today.
The researchers took into consideration where bin Laden has been spotted and where he would likely frequent since he went underground in 2001, mapping out potential nearby lairs where the AL Qaeda leader could set up house.
The amount of available electricity and the population density of the areas bin Laden was likely to travel through were also a factor in the study's conclusions.
Geographer Thomas Gillespie, who led the UCLA research team, previously used similar techniques to locate endangered species and criminals. The bin Laden study was born out of a seminar Gillespie was teaching to undergraduates on how to use mapping techniques to solve real-life problems, USA Today reported.
Government officials told USA Today that Gillespie's conclusions could potentially hold weight once they are fleshed out and published in journal form.
"The combination of physical terrain, socio-cultural gravitational factors and the physical characteristic of structures are all important factors in developing an area limitation for terror suspects," John Goolgasian of the federal National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency told USA Today.
President Barack Obama has said on the campaign trail and in office that one of his main priorities in the White House will be to locate the terrorist leader.
"My preference obviously would be to capture or kill him," Obama told Katie Couric in a January interview.
Last week, Obama said that he would begin actions to disable al Qaeda activities in Afghanistan, though he did not have a precise timetable mapped out for action in the region.
"What I know is that I'm not going to allow al Qaeda and bin Laden to operate with impunity attacking the U.S.," Obama said on Feb. 9.
Bin Laden as anti-fur demonstrator and vegan?
New Files Show FBI Watched Domestic Activist Groups
By ERIC LICHTBLAU, The New York Times
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Getty Images
One of the groups targeted by the FBI was People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
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WASHINGTON (Dec. 20) - Counterterrorism agents at the Federal Bureau of Investigation have conducted numerous surveillance and intelligence-gathering operations that involved, at least indirectly, groups active in causes as diverse as the environment, animal cruelty and poverty relief, newly disclosed agency records show.
F.B.I. officials said Monday that their investigators had no interest in monitoring political or social activities and that any investigations that touched on advocacy groups were driven by evidence of criminal or violent activity at public protests and in other settings.
After the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, John Ashcroft, who was then attorney general, loosened restrictions on the F.B.I.'s investigative powers, giving the bureau greater ability to visit and monitor Web sites, mosques and other public entities in developing terrorism leads. The bureau has used that authority to investigate not only groups with suspected ties to foreign terrorists, but also protest groups suspected of having links to violent or disruptive activities.
But the documents, coming after the Bush administration's confirmation that President Bush had authorized some spying without warrants in fighting terrorism, prompted charges from civil rights advocates that the government had improperly blurred the line between terrorism and acts of civil disobedience and lawful protest.
One F.B.I. document indicates that agents in Indianapolis planned to conduct surveillance as part of a Vegan Community Project. Another document talks of the Catholic Workers group's semi-communistic ideology. A third indicates the bureau's interest in determining the location of a protest over llama fur planned by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
The documents, provided to The New York Times over the past week, came as part of a series of Freedom of Information Act lawsuits brought by the American Civil Liberties Union. For more than a year, the A.C.L.U. has been seeking access to information in F.B.I. files on about 150 protest and social groups that it says may have been improperly monitored.
One FBI document indicates that agents in Indianapolis planned to conduct surveillance as part of a Vegan Community Project. Another document talks of the Catholic Workers group's semi-communistic ideology.
The F.B.I. had previously turned over a small number of documents on antiwar groups, showing the agency's interest in investigating possible anarchist or violent links in connection with antiwar protests and demonstrations in advance of the 2004 political conventions. And earlier this month, the A.C.L.U.'s Colorado chapter released similar documents involving, among other things, people protesting logging practices at a lumber industry gathering in 2002.
The latest batch of documents, parts of which the A.C.L.U. plans to release publicly on Tuesday, totals more than 2,300 pages and centers on references in internal files to a handful of groups, including PETA, the environmental group Greenpeace and the Catholic Workers group, which promotes antipoverty efforts and social causes.
Many of the investigative documents turned over by the bureau are heavily edited, making it difficult or impossible to determine the full context of the references and why the F.B.I. may have been discussing events like a PETA protest. F.B.I. officials say many of the references may be much more benign than they seem to civil rights advocates, adding that the documents offer an incomplete and sometimes misleading snapshot of the bureau's activities.
Just being referenced in an F.B.I. file is not tantamount to being the subject of an investigation, said John Miller, a spokesman for the bureau.
The F.B.I. does not target individuals or organizations for investigation based on their political beliefs, Mr. Miller said. Everything we do is carefully promulgated by federal law, Justice Department guidelines and the F.B.I.'s own rules.
A.C.L.U officials said the latest batch of documents released by the F.B.I. indicated the agency's interest in a broader array of activist and protest groups than they had previously thought. In light of other recent disclosures about domestic surveillance activities by the National Security Agency and military intelligence units, the A.C.L.U. said the documents reflected a pattern of overreaching by the Bush administration.
It's clear that this administration has engaged every possible agency, from the Pentagon to N.S.A. to the F.B.I., to engage in spying on Americans, said Ann Beeson, associate legal director for the A.C.L.U.
You look at these documents, Ms. Beeson said, and you think, wow, we have really returned to the days of J. Edgar Hoover, when you see in F.B.I. files that they're talking about a group like the Catholic Workers league as having a communist ideology.
The documents indicate that in some cases, the F.B.I. has used employees, interns and other confidential informants within groups like PETA and Greenpeace to develop leads on potential criminal activity and has downloaded material from the groups' Web sites, in addition to monitoring their protests.
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In the case of Greenpeace, which is known for highly publicized acts of civil disobedience like the boarding of cargo ships to unfurl protest banners, the files indicate that the F.B.I. investigated possible financial ties between its members and militant groups like the Earth Liberation Front and the Animal Liberation Front.
These networks, which have no declared leaders and are only loosely organized, have been described by the F.B.I. in Congressional testimony as extremist special interest groups whose cells engage in violent or other illegal acts, making them a serious domestic terrorist threat.
In testimony last year, John E. Lewis, deputy assistant director of the counterterrorism division, said the F.B.I. estimated that in the past 10 years such groups had engaged in more than 1,000 criminal acts causing more than $100 million in damage.
When the F.B.I. investigates evidence of possible violence or criminal disruptions at protests and other events, those investigations are routinely handled by agents within the bureau's counterterrorism division.
But the groups mentioned in the newly disclosed F.B.I. files questioned both the propriety of characterizing such investigations as related to terrorism and the necessity of diverting counterterrorism personnel from more pressing investigations.
The fact that we're even mentioned in the F.B.I. files in connection with terrorism is really troubling, said Tom Wetterer, general counsel for Greenpeace. There's no property damage or physical injury caused in our activities, and under any definition of terrorism, we'd take issue with that.
Jeff Kerr, general counsel for PETA, rejected the suggestion in some F.B.I. files that the animal rights group had financial ties to militant groups, and said he, too, was troubled by his group's inclusion in the files.
It's shocking and it's outrageous, Mr. Kerr said. And to me, it's an abuse of power by the F.B.I. when groups like Greenpeace and PETA are basically being punished for their social activism.
Yeah, they're definately in on it with Bin Laden.
New 'Bin Laden message' released...sm
I guess he's still alive and sending videos.
-------------
From BBC: New 'Bin Laden message' released
Osama Bin Laden
This would be Bin Laden's fourth message this year
A new recording purportedly from al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden has been posted on an Islamic website.
He praised Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the al-Qaeda leader killed in Iraq three weeks ago, as the lion of holy war.
The video, lasting 19 minutes, shows a still picture of Bin Laden, and moving pictures of al-Zarqawi.
The recording's authenticity has not been verified, but if it is confirmed, it would be the fourth audio message Bin Laden has released this year.
However, no new video images of the al-Qaeda leader have appeared since October 2004.
Last week a video was broadcast purportedly showing the deputy leader of al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahri in which he paid tribute to Zarqawi and said his death would be avenged.
Universal fight
In the latest recording, Bin Laden addresses US President George W Bush, warning him not to be too happy about Zarqawi's death, for the banner [of al-Qaeda in Iraq] hasn't dropped but has passed from one lion of Islam to another lion.
Bin Laden says al-Qaeda will go on with operations against the US and its allies.
We will continue, God willing, to fight you and your allies everywhere, he said, in Iraq and Afghanistan and in Somalia and Sudan until we waste all your money and kill your men.
In an apparent reference to a campaign against Iraq's Shias by Zarqawi, Bin Laden addressed those who accuse Abu Musab of killing certain sectors of the Iraqi people.
Abu Musab had clear instructions to focus his fight on the occupiers, he went on, particularly the Americans and to leave aside anyone who remains neutral.
He called on President Bush to return Zarqawi's body to his family, and used rhyming couplets to eulogise the dead al-Qaeda leader.
oh please. Clinton. The Sudan offered him bin Laden...
long before 9-11 and he did not take him. Now YOU tell ME who failed to protect the American people. Good grief.
Posters on THIS board condone what Zarqawi and Bin Laden did?
Why? Because they don't all agree with your highness?
Point out one post on this board that condones what they did.
You're pathetic.
Why didn't Clinton kill bin Laden when he had the chance?
Totally agree about bin Laden - but Ayers doesn't need to be able to swat (sm)
a fly. All he needs to be able to do is dial a phone and call someone else to swat it for him. He has plenty of people supporting him. You can call him a washed up old hippie if you want. I know tons of washed up old hippies who did drugs, lived in vans and protested wars. However they never tried to KILL anyone. They never tried to violently overthrow the US government. They protested but they were peaceful. Ayers group was not a group of typical peace-seeking hippies. They were almost a Manson-like cult, only much better educated and calculated in their plans and attacks. We are not talking about Ayers swatting flies. We are talking about a long-term plan by an evil man with lots of high level friends and supporters. Yes bin Laden is terribly evil, much more so than Ayers. However, the person we are talking about has been actively involved in promoting Obama's political career and is STILL NOT SORRY why don't you understand that part? for what he did and feels they should have done more. And he said this right after our attack on 09/11 happened. Do you need it spelled out for you?
Bill Clinton gets part of the blame == refused to take out bin Laden...sm
when he had the chance.
Bush aides challenge Biden's boasts of Bush slapdowns.
Aides to former President George W. Bush are challenging the veracity of Vice President Joe Biden's claim this week of having privately castigated Bush, who does not remember the incident or an earlier episode in which Biden claims to have similarly rebuked Bush.
Biden spokesman Jay Carney declined to specify the dates of his boss's purported Oval Office scoldings of Bush. Nor would he provide witnesses or notes to corroborate the episodes.
"The vice president stands by his remarks," Carney told FOX News without elaboration.
Those remarks include a shot that Biden took at Bush on Tuesday.
"I remember President Bush saying to me one time in the Oval Office," Biden told CNN, "'Well, Joe,' he said, 'I'm a leader.' And I said: 'Mr. President, turn and around look behind you. No one is following.'"
That exchange never took place, according to numerous Bush aides who also dispute a similar assertion by Biden in 2004, when the former senator from Delaware told scores of Democratic colleagues that he had challenged Bush's moral certitude about the Iraq war during a private meeting in the Oval Office. Two years later, Biden repeated his story about dressing down the president.
"When I speak to the president - and I have had plenty of opportunity to be with the president, at least prior to the last election, a lot of hours alone with him. I mean, meaning me and his staff," Biden said on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" in April 2006. "And the president will say things to me, and I'll literally turn to the president, say: 'Mr. President, how can you say that, knowing you don't know the facts?' And he'll look at me and he'll say - my word - he'll look at me and he'll say: 'My instincts.' He said: 'I have good instincts.' I said: 'Mr. President, your instincts aren't good enough.'"
Bush aides now dispute the veracity of both assertions by Biden.
"I never recall Biden saying any of that," former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said after reviewing detailed notes of Bush's White House meetings with Biden, which include numerous direct quotes from Biden. "I find it odd that he said he met with him alone all the time. I don't think that's true."
Fleischer said that whenever Bush met with Sen. Biden, the meeting also included a congressional counterpart so as to not "antagonize" the House.
Karl Rove, former White House political adviser, also was skeptical of Biden's claim to have spent "a lot of hours alone" with Bush.
"I remember checking on such a Biden exaggeration while at the White House and no one witnessed the meeting and his comments in remotely the same way," Rove said.
Candida P. Wolff, Bush's White House liaison to Capitol Hill, said the only meetings she remembered between Bush and Biden also included other lawmakers. She said such meetings were held in the Cabinet Room or the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, not the Oval Office, and certainly did not last for "hours."
"The president would never sit through two hours of Joe Biden," Wolff said. "I don't ever remember Biden being in the Oval. He was such a blowhard on all that stuff - there wasn't a reason to bring him in."
Andy Card, former White House chief of staff, reviewed the two Biden claims and said: "This does not ring true to me. I doubt that it happened."
A spokesman for Bush declined comment, although a person close to the former president said Bush does not remember either episode.
This is not the first time the veracity of Biden's assertions has been challenged. In 1988, he dropped out of the presidential race after being accused of plagiarizing British Labor Party leader Neil Kinnock. The Washington Post also cited "the senator's boastful exaggerations of his academic record."
Last year, liberal Slate magazine recalled that "Biden's misdeeds encompassed numerous self-aggrandizing thefts, misstatements, and exaggerations that seemed to point to a serious character defect."
Also last year, Biden came under fire for telling a questionable story about being "shot at" in Iraq.
"Let's start telling the truth," Biden said during a presidential primary debate sponsored by YouTube in July. "Number one, you take all the troops out -- you better have helicopters ready to take those 3,000 civilians inside the Green Zone, where I have been seven times and shot at. You better make sure you have protection for them, or let them die."
But when questioned about the episode afterward by the Hill newspaper, Biden backpedaled from his claim of being "shot at" and instead allowed: "I was near where a shot landed."
Biden went on to say that some sort of projectile "landed" outside a building in the Green Zone where he and another senator had spent the night during a visit in December 2005. The lawmakers were shaving in the morning when they felt the building shake, Biden said.
"No one got up and ran from the room-it wasn't that kind of thing," he told the Hill. "It's not like I had someone holding a gun to my head."
Seven weeks after claiming to have been "shot at" in Iraq, Biden again raised eyebrows with another story about his exploits in war zones -- this time on "the superhighway of terror between Pakistan and Afghanistan, where my helicopter was forced down."
"If you want to know where AL Qaeda lives, you want to know where bin Laden is, come back to Afghanistan with me," Biden bragged to the National Guard Association. "Come back to the area where my helicopter was forced down, with a three-star general and three senators at 10,500 feet in the middle of those mountains. I can tell you where they are."
But it turns out that inclement weather, not terrorists, prompted the chopper to land in an open field during Biden's visit to Afghanistan in February 2008. Fighter jets kept watch overhead while a convoy of security vehicles was dispatched to retrieve Biden and fellow Sens. Chuck Hagel and John Kerry.
"We were going to send Biden out to fight the Taliban with snowballs, but we didn't have to," joked Kerry, a Democrat, to the AP. "Other than getting a little cold, it was fine."
Bush aides challenge Biden's boasts of Bush slapdowns.
Aides to former President George W. Bush are challenging the veracity of Vice President Joe Biden's claim this week of having privately castigated Bush, who does not remember the incident or an earlier episode in which Biden claims to have similarly rebuked Bush.
Biden spokesman Jay Carney declined to specify the dates of his boss's purported Oval Office scoldings of Bush. Nor would he provide witnesses or notes to corroborate the episodes.
"The vice president stands by his remarks," Carney told FOX News without elaboration.
Those remarks include a shot that Biden took at Bush on Tuesday.
"I remember President Bush saying to me one time in the Oval Office," Biden told CNN, "'Well, Joe,' he said, 'I'm a leader.' And I said: 'Mr. President, turn and around look behind you. No one is following.'"
That exchange never took place, according to numerous Bush aides who also dispute a similar assertion by Biden in 2004, when the former senator from Delaware told scores of Democratic colleagues that he had challenged Bush's moral certitude about the Iraq war during a private meeting in the Oval Office. Two years later, Biden repeated his story about dressing down the president.
"When I speak to the president - and I have had plenty of opportunity to be with the president, at least prior to the last election, a lot of hours alone with him. I mean, meaning me and his staff," Biden said on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" in April 2006. "And the president will say things to me, and I'll literally turn to the president, say: 'Mr. President, how can you say that, knowing you don't know the facts?' And he'll look at me and he'll say - my word - he'll look at me and he'll say: 'My instincts.' He said: 'I have good instincts.' I said: 'Mr. President, your instincts aren't good enough.'"
Bush aides now dispute the veracity of both assertions by Biden.
"I never recall Biden saying any of that," former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said after reviewing detailed notes of Bush's White House meetings with Biden, which include numerous direct quotes from Biden. "I find it odd that he said he met with him alone all the time. I don't think that's true."
Fleischer said that whenever Bush met with Sen. Biden, the meeting also included a congressional counterpart so as to not "antagonize" the House.
Karl Rove, former White House political adviser, also was skeptical of Biden's claim to have spent "a lot of hours alone" with Bush.
"I remember checking on such a Biden exaggeration while at the White House and no one witnessed the meeting and his comments in remotely the same way," Rove said.
Candida P. Wolff, Bush's White House liaison to Capitol Hill, said the only meetings she remembered between Bush and Biden also included other lawmakers. She said such meetings were held in the Cabinet Room or the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, not the Oval Office, and certainly did not last for "hours."
"The president would never sit through two hours of Joe Biden," Wolff said. "I don't ever remember Biden being in the Oval. He was such a blowhard on all that stuff - there wasn't a reason to bring him in."
Andy Card, former White House chief of staff, reviewed the two Biden claims and said: "This does not ring true to me. I doubt that it happened."
A spokesman for Bush declined comment, although a person close to the former president said Bush does not remember either episode.
This is not the first time the veracity of Biden's assertions has been challenged. In 1988, he dropped out of the presidential race after being accused of plagiarizing British Labor Party leader Neil Kinnock. The Washington Post also cited "the senator's boastful exaggerations of his academic record."
Last year, liberal Slate magazine recalled that "Biden's misdeeds encompassed numerous self-aggrandizing thefts, misstatements, and exaggerations that seemed to point to a serious character defect."
Also last year, Biden came under fire for telling a questionable story about being "shot at" in Iraq.
"Let's start telling the truth," Biden said during a presidential primary debate sponsored by YouTube in July. "Number one, you take all the troops out -- you better have helicopters ready to take those 3,000 civilians inside the Green Zone, where I have been seven times and shot at. You better make sure you have protection for them, or let them die."
But when questioned about the episode afterward by the Hill newspaper, Biden backpedaled from his claim of being "shot at" and instead allowed: "I was near where a shot landed."
Biden went on to say that some sort of projectile "landed" outside a building in the Green Zone where he and another senator had spent the night during a visit in December 2005. The lawmakers were shaving in the morning when they felt the building shake, Biden said.
"No one got up and ran from the room-it wasn't that kind of thing," he told the Hill. "It's not like I had someone holding a gun to my head."
Seven weeks after claiming to have been "shot at" in Iraq, Biden again raised eyebrows with another story about his exploits in war zones -- this time on "the superhighway of terror between Pakistan and Afghanistan, where my helicopter was forced down."
"If you want to know where AL Qaeda lives, you want to know where bin Laden is, come back to Afghanistan with me," Biden bragged to the National Guard Association. "Come back to the area where my helicopter was forced down, with a three-star general and three senators at 10,500 feet in the middle of those mountains. I can tell you where they are."
But it turns out that inclement weather, not terrorists, prompted the chopper to land in an open field during Biden's visit to Afghanistan in February 2008. Fighter jets kept watch overhead while a convoy of security vehicles was dispatched to retrieve Biden and fellow Sens. Chuck Hagel and John Kerry.
"We were going to send Biden out to fight the Taliban with snowballs, but we didn't have to," joked Kerry, a Democrat, to the AP. "Other than getting a little cold, it was fine."
Bush aides challenge Biden's boasts of Bush slapdowns.
Aides to former President George W. Bush are challenging the veracity of Vice President Joe Biden's claim this week of having privately castigated Bush, who does not remember the incident or an earlier episode in which Biden claims to have similarly rebuked Bush.
Biden spokesman Jay Carney declined to specify the dates of his boss's purported Oval Office scoldings of Bush. Nor would he provide witnesses or notes to corroborate the episodes.
"The vice president stands by his remarks," Carney told FOX News without elaboration.
Those remarks include a shot that Biden took at Bush on Tuesday.
"I remember President Bush saying to me one time in the Oval Office," Biden told CNN, "'Well, Joe,' he said, 'I'm a leader.' And I said: 'Mr. President, turn and around look behind you. No one is following.'"
That exchange never took place, according to numerous Bush aides who also dispute a similar assertion by Biden in 2004, when the former senator from Delaware told scores of Democratic colleagues that he had challenged Bush's moral certitude about the Iraq war during a private meeting in the Oval Office. Two years later, Biden repeated his story about dressing down the president.
"When I speak to the president - and I have had plenty of opportunity to be with the president, at least prior to the last election, a lot of hours alone with him. I mean, meaning me and his staff," Biden said on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" in April 2006. "And the president will say things to me, and I'll literally turn to the president, say: 'Mr. President, how can you say that, knowing you don't know the facts?' And he'll look at me and he'll say - my word - he'll look at me and he'll say: 'My instincts.' He said: 'I have good instincts.' I said: 'Mr. President, your instincts aren't good enough.'"
Bush aides now dispute the veracity of both assertions by Biden.
"I never recall Biden saying any of that," former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said after reviewing detailed notes of Bush's White House meetings with Biden, which include numerous direct quotes from Biden. "I find it odd that he said he met with him alone all the time. I don't think that's true."
Fleischer said that whenever Bush met with Sen. Biden, the meeting also included a congressional counterpart so as to not "antagonize" the House.
Karl Rove, former White House political adviser, also was skeptical of Biden's claim to have spent "a lot of hours alone" with Bush.
"I remember checking on such a Biden exaggeration while at the White House and no one witnessed the meeting and his comments in remotely the same way," Rove said.
Candida P. Wolff, Bush's White House liaison to Capitol Hill, said the only meetings she remembered between Bush and Biden also included other lawmakers. She said such meetings were held in the Cabinet Room or the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, not the Oval Office, and certainly did not last for "hours."
"The president would never sit through two hours of Joe Biden," Wolff said. "I don't ever remember Biden being in the Oval. He was such a blowhard on all that stuff - there wasn't a reason to bring him in."
Andy Card, former White House chief of staff, reviewed the two Biden claims and said: "This does not ring true to me. I doubt that it happened."
A spokesman for Bush declined comment, although a person close to the former president said Bush does not remember either episode.
This is not the first time the veracity of Biden's assertions has been challenged. In 1988, he dropped out of the presidential race after being accused of plagiarizing British Labor Party leader Neil Kinnock. The Washington Post also cited "the senator's boastful exaggerations of his academic record."
Last year, liberal Slate magazine recalled that "Biden's misdeeds encompassed numerous self-aggrandizing thefts, misstatements, and exaggerations that seemed to point to a serious character defect."
Also last year, Biden came under fire for telling a questionable story about being "shot at" in Iraq.
"Let's start telling the truth," Biden said during a presidential primary debate sponsored by YouTube in July. "Number one, you take all the troops out -- you better have helicopters ready to take those 3,000 civilians inside the Green Zone, where I have been seven times and shot at. You better make sure you have protection for them, or let them die."
But when questioned about the episode afterward by the Hill newspaper, Biden backpedaled from his claim of being "shot at" and instead allowed: "I was near where a shot landed."
Biden went on to say that some sort of projectile "landed" outside a building in the Green Zone where he and another senator had spent the night during a visit in December 2005. The lawmakers were shaving in the morning when they felt the building shake, Biden said.
"No one got up and ran from the room-it wasn't that kind of thing," he told the Hill. "It's not like I had someone holding a gun to my head."
Seven weeks after claiming to have been "shot at" in Iraq, Biden again raised eyebrows with another story about his exploits in war zones -- this time on "the superhighway of terror between Pakistan and Afghanistan, where my helicopter was forced down."
"If you want to know where AL Qaeda lives, you want to know where bin Laden is, come back to Afghanistan with me," Biden bragged to the National Guard Association. "Come back to the area where my helicopter was forced down, with a three-star general and three senators at 10,500 feet in the middle of those mountains. I can tell you where they are."
But it turns out that inclement weather, not terrorists, prompted the chopper to land in an open field during Biden's visit to Afghanistan in February 2008. Fighter jets kept watch overhead while a convoy of security vehicles was dispatched to retrieve Biden and fellow Sens. Chuck Hagel and John Kerry.
"We were going to send Biden out to fight the Taliban with snowballs, but we didn't have to," joked Kerry, a Democrat, to the AP. "Other than getting a little cold, it was fine."
Bush aides challenge Biden's boasts of Bush slapdowns.
Aides to former President George W. Bush are challenging the veracity of Vice President Joe Biden's claim this week of having privately castigated Bush, who does not remember the incident or an earlier episode in which Biden claims to have similarly rebuked Bush.
Biden spokesman Jay Carney declined to specify the dates of his boss's purported Oval Office scoldings of Bush. Nor would he provide witnesses or notes to corroborate the episodes.
"The vice president stands by his remarks," Carney told FOX News without elaboration.
Those remarks include a shot that Biden took at Bush on Tuesday.
"I remember President Bush saying to me one time in the Oval Office," Biden told CNN, "'Well, Joe,' he said, 'I'm a leader.' And I said: 'Mr. President, turn and around look behind you. No one is following.'"
That exchange never took place, according to numerous Bush aides who also dispute a similar assertion by Biden in 2004, when the former senator from Delaware told scores of Democratic colleagues that he had challenged Bush's moral certitude about the Iraq war during a private meeting in the Oval Office. Two years later, Biden repeated his story about dressing down the president.
"When I speak to the president - and I have had plenty of opportunity to be with the president, at least prior to the last election, a lot of hours alone with him. I mean, meaning me and his staff," Biden said on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" in April 2006. "And the president will say things to me, and I'll literally turn to the president, say: 'Mr. President, how can you say that, knowing you don't know the facts?' And he'll look at me and he'll say - my word - he'll look at me and he'll say: 'My instincts.' He said: 'I have good instincts.' I said: 'Mr. President, your instincts aren't good enough.'"
Bush aides now dispute the veracity of both assertions by Biden.
"I never recall Biden saying any of that," former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said after reviewing detailed notes of Bush's White House meetings with Biden, which include numerous direct quotes from Biden. "I find it odd that he said he met with him alone all the time. I don't think that's true."
Fleischer said that whenever Bush met with Sen. Biden, the meeting also included a congressional counterpart so as to not "antagonize" the House.
Karl Rove, former White House political adviser, also was skeptical of Biden's claim to have spent "a lot of hours alone" with Bush.
"I remember checking on such a Biden exaggeration while at the White House and no one witnessed the meeting and his comments in remotely the same way," Rove said.
Candida P. Wolff, Bush's White House liaison to Capitol Hill, said the only meetings she remembered between Bush and Biden also included other lawmakers. She said such meetings were held in the Cabinet Room or the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, not the Oval Office, and certainly did not last for "hours."
"The president would never sit through two hours of Joe Biden," Wolff said. "I don't ever remember Biden being in the Oval. He was such a blowhard on all that stuff - there wasn't a reason to bring him in."
Andy Card, former White House chief of staff, reviewed the two Biden claims and said: "This does not ring true to me. I doubt that it happened."
A spokesman for Bush declined comment, although a person close to the former president said Bush does not remember either episode.
This is not the first time the veracity of Biden's assertions has been challenged. In 1988, he dropped out of the presidential race after being accused of plagiarizing British Labor Party leader Neil Kinnock. The Washington Post also cited "the senator's boastful exaggerations of his academic record."
Last year, liberal Slate magazine recalled that "Biden's misdeeds encompassed numerous self-aggrandizing thefts, misstatements, and exaggerations that seemed to point to a serious character defect."
Also last year, Biden came under fire for telling a questionable story about being "shot at" in Iraq.
"Let's start telling the truth," Biden said during a presidential primary debate sponsored by YouTube in July. "Number one, you take all the troops out -- you better have helicopters ready to take those 3,000 civilians inside the Green Zone, where I have been seven times and shot at. You better make sure you have protection for them, or let them die."
But when questioned about the episode afterward by the Hill newspaper, Biden backpedaled from his claim of being "shot at" and instead allowed: "I was near where a shot landed."
Biden went on to say that some sort of projectile "landed" outside a building in the Green Zone where he and another senator had spent the night during a visit in December 2005. The lawmakers were shaving in the morning when they felt the building shake, Biden said.
"No one got up and ran from the room-it wasn't that kind of thing," he told the Hill. "It's not like I had someone holding a gun to my head."
Seven weeks after claiming to have been "shot at" in Iraq, Biden again raised eyebrows with another story about his exploits in war zones -- this time on "the superhighway of terror between Pakistan and Afghanistan, where my helicopter was forced down."
"If you want to know where AL Qaeda lives, you want to know where bin Laden is, come back to Afghanistan with me," Biden bragged to the National Guard Association. "Come back to the area where my helicopter was forced down, with a three-star general and three senators at 10,500 feet in the middle of those mountains. I can tell you where they are."
But it turns out that inclement weather, not terrorists, prompted the chopper to land in an open field during Biden's visit to Afghanistan in February 2008. Fighter jets kept watch overhead while a convoy of security vehicles was dispatched to retrieve Biden and fellow Sens. Chuck Hagel and John Kerry.
"We were going to send Biden out to fight the Taliban with snowballs, but we didn't have to," joked Kerry, a Democrat, to the AP. "Other than getting a little cold, it was fine."
Yeah right. Served under Reagan, Bush I and Bush II
x
Stop bringing up Bush - this post was not about Bush
I even said we have had some good presidents and some bad ones, but this post was not about Bush. It was about Obama. Yes Bush was one of the worst presidents I'm not arguing with you on that one, but everytime anyone brings up something about our current president they are shot back with Bush this or Bush that and on things that have nothing to do with what the current topic is about. Again, this was not about Bush. It was about Obama.
Oh, more "blame Bush" - except Bush didn't send these out, now did he?
Here's a news flash for you since you apparently haven't heard: BUSH IS NOT IN OFFICE and just today Gallup did a poll showing that THE MAJORITY OF AMERICANS THINK OBAMA SHOULD START TAKING RESPONSIBILITY FOR WHAT HAPPENS ON HIS WATCH.
G E T A C L U E.
Bush is gone, YEA!!! and yeah, it could darn well be Bush! LOL.
Chimp boy!! But, the cartoon is NOT about Bush, now is it? Give me a break.
George Bush HIMSELF makes it so easy to make fun of George Bush!!!! oh where would I start, so litt
nm
Yes, Bush and Bush alone did this whole mess all my himself
Your speaking as though nobody else had a hand in this, just Bush nobody else. Last I knew we had a democratic congress and they are the ones who got us into this mess. Time to put fault where it belongs - congress. Bush is only a talking head.
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