[N8 v2.0]

Melt down:

Purple faced rage:

Clinton, Fox Anchor Battle in Interview
Sep 25, 6:35 AM (ET)
By KAREN MATTHEWS

NEW YORK (AP) - In a combative interview on "Fox News Sunday," former President Clinton defended his handling of the threat posed by Osama bin Laden, saying he tried to have bin Laden killed and was attacked for his efforts by the same people who now criticize him for not doing enough.

"That's the difference in me and some, including all of the right-wingers who are attacking me now," Clinton said in the interview. "They ridiculed me for trying. They had eight months to try, they did not try."

Clinton accused host Chris Wallace of a "conservative hit job" and asked: "I want to know how many people in the Bush administration you asked, 'Why didn't you do anything about the Cole?' I want to know how many people you asked, 'Why did you fire Dick Clarke?'"

He was referring to the USS Cole, attacked by terrorists in Yemen in 2000, and former White House anti-terrorism chief Richard A. Clarke.

Wallace said Sunday he was surprised by Clinton's "conspiratorial view" of "a very non-confrontational question, 'Did you do enough to connect the dots and go after Al Qaida?'"

"All I did was ask him a question, and I think it was a legitimate news question. I was surprised that he would conjure up that this was a hit job," Wallace said in a telephone interview.

Clinton said he "worked hard" to try to kill bin Laden.

"We contracted with people to kill him. I got closer to killing him than anybody's gotten since," he said.

He told Wallace, "And you got that little smirk on your face and you think you're so clever, but I had responsibility for trying to protect this country. I tried and I failed to get bin Laden. I regret it, but I did try and I did everything I thought I responsibly could."

The interview was taped Friday during Clinton's three-day Global Initiative conference.

On NBC's "Meet the Press," also taped Friday and aired Sunday, Clinton told interviewer Tim Russert that the biggest problem confronting the world today is "the illusion that our differences matter more than our common humanity."

"That's what's driving the terrorism," he said. "It's not just that there's an unresolved Arab-Israeli conflict. Osama Bin Laden and Dr. al-Zawahiri can convince young Sunni Arab men, who have - and some women - who have despairing conditions in their lives, that they get a one-way ticket to heaven in a hurry if they kill a lot of innocent people who don't share their reality."

 

[Transcend]

It's about time someone called out fox news on being of no use expect to give Republicans lip service. What was amazing, is he did it while on their own network. Awesome.

The fact that Wallace thought he could dance with one of the most eloquent statesmen of the 20th century is hilarious. Wallace has the intellect of my left shoe.

 

[MMike]

YOu're right shoe is a moron

 

[Transcend]

YOu're right shoe is a moron

Ya, I tell it off daily. At least it can spell "Your" however.

 

[H8R]

Everything I say to my shoe gets like, no response.

Stupid fvcking shoe.

 

[Echo]

I find it quite funny that Fox and Wallace got straight up pwn3d by Clinton, but they are still trying to spin it like they were all being fair and balanced

Of course Bill should have known better than to go on that show, just like he should have known better than to let that fat chick wax his dolphin.

 

[MMike]

Ya, I tell it off daily. At least it can spell "Your" however.

I was being sophisticated....I was making the OPPOSITE mistake that everyone else makes...

 

[Transcend]

Of course Bill should have known better than to go on that show, just like he should have known better than to let that fat chick wax his dolphin.

Ya but c'mon, it was totally worth it. Maybe he went in knowing he'd get to call them out? Apparently it is really boosting poll numbers for Hillary?? too bad she is straight up nuts.

Oh well, screw the 22nd ammendment, get Slick Willy back in the whitehouse!

 

[MMike]

He was on the Daily Show the other day. Jon's "Seat of Heat" question was:

Assuming Hilary runs for president, if there is one thing that could assure her defeat, what would it be?

 

[MMike]

And actually, BIll O'Reily was on....was it Barbra walters? O'Reily referred to Clinton a "brilliant" and that he had a successful presidency.

 

[reflux]

Ya but c'mon, it was totally worth it. Maybe he went in knowing he'd get to call them out? Apparently it is really boosting poll numbers for Hillary?? too bad she is straight up nuts.

Oh well, screw the 22nd ammendment, get Slick Willy back in the whitehouse!

I'm reminded of Jon Stewart on Crossfire.

 

[Transcend]

I'm reminded of Jon Stewart on Crossfire.

Best 20 mins of CNN ever.

 

[$tinkle]

what a difference a week makes:

Look what President [Hugo] Chavez just said about President Bush. You know, we--and we try to teach our children to get over it. I mean, you've got kids. You know, one of the most important things you can teach a child is that not everything that happens to you will be nice. But you are in control of how you respond to everything that happens to you. You do not have to respond with violence or anger or hatred or bitterness or demeaning conduct, and you cannot be diminished by what someone else says about you.

Wm Jefferson Clinton interviewed on larry king live, september 20th, 2006

at least it can be truthfully said he's not acting childish


** crickets **

 

[$tinkle]

He was on the Daily Show the other day. Jon's "Seat of Heat" question was:

Assuming Hilary runs for president, if there is one thing that could assure her defeat, what would it be?

i saw that, too.
i like what he's doing now with other influential people (clinton foundation, i think). seems very altruistic.


liberal chics dig that, & you know he knows it.

:hogpoke:

 

[Inclag]

I find it quite funny that Fox and Wallace got straight up pwn3d by Clinton, but they are still trying to spin it like they were all being fair and balanced

Of course Bill should have known better than to go on that show, just like he should have known better than to let that fat chick wax his dolphin.

So true.

Clinton is going around trying to conjure up support for his Global Initiative, which is why he is appearing on all this major media outlets, and what does FOX News do? Well, instead of trying to get information out to help with what may end up being one of the most important private party initiatives to help with serious global issues, they use it as an opportunity to push their "fair and balanced" agenda.

 

[Transcend]

So true.

Clinton is going around trying to conjure up support for his Global Initiative, which is why he is appearing on all this major media outlets, and what does FOX News do? Well, instead of trying to get information out to help with what may end up being one of the most important private party initiatives to help with serious global issues, they use it as an opportunity to push their "fair and balanced" agenda.

Fair and balanced. As long as you are only interested in our twisted, conservative, war mongering side of the story.

 

[H8R]

:hogpoke:

OMFG

I vote that RM gets a :hogpoke: smilie NOW.

 

[BurlyShirley]

Did Clinton sleep with the host?

 

[Transcend]

Did Clinton sleep with the host?

Naw, wallace wouldn't swallow and din't want any stains on his dress.

 

[Inclag]

Naw, wallace wouldn't swallow and din't want any stains on his dress.

Well being christian right, anything besides missionary is a sin.

 

[Transcend]

Well being christian right, anything besides missionary is a sin.

C'mon now, as all good Christian school girls know, BJs don't count as sex.

 

[Changleen]

Thanks N8, I enjoyed watching that dick from Fvx get pwn3d.

 

[Old Man G Funk]

C'mon now, as all good Christian school girls know, BJs don't count as sex.

Nor does anal.

 

[N8 v2.0]

Condi setting Bubba straight...





RICE BOILS OVER AT BUBBA
By IAN BISHOP Post Correspondent

September 25, 2006 -- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday accused Bill Clinton of making "flatly false" claims that the Bush administration didn't lift a finger to stop terrorism before the 9/11 attacks.

Rice hammered Clinton, who leveled his charges in a contentious weekend interview with Chris Wallace of Fox News Channel, for his claims that the Bush administration "did not try" to kill Osama bin Laden in the eight months they controlled the White House before the Sept. 11 attacks.

"The notion somehow for eight months the Bush administration sat there and didn't do that is just flatly false - and I think the 9/11 commission understood that," Rice said during a wide-ranging meeting with Post editors and reporters.

"What we did in the eight months was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton administration did in the preceding years," Rice added.

The secretary of state also sharply disputed Clinton's claim that he "left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy" for the incoming Bush team during the presidential transition in 2001.

"We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al Qaeda," Rice responded during the hourlong session.

Her strong rebuttal was the Bush administration's first response to Clinton's headline-grabbing interview on Fox on Sunday in which he launched into an over-the-top defense of his handling of terrorism - wagging his finger in the air, leaning forward in his chair and getting red-faced, and even attacking Wallace for improper questioning.

The "Fox News Sunday" show had its best ratings since the capture of Saddam Hussein in December 2003, according to Nielsen Media Research. Two versions of the interview were the two most-watched clips on YouTube yesterday, totaling more than 800,000 views.

After Clinton got angry during the questioning, Wallace said Clinton aide Jay Carson tried to get his producer to stop the interview. Carson said he was concerned that time was running out and that little of the philanthropy efforts of the former president had been addressed.

At The Post, Rice also touched on hot spots around the globe:

• On Iran: "There isn't a particularly good, direct way to neutralize the Iranian threat."
• On Iraq: "You're never going to have a just Sunni-Shia reconciliation if you don't have a political system in which the interests of all can be represented - and that's what Iraq represents."
• On Pakistan: "The future of Pakistan, as [President Pervez] Musharraf and his people fully understand, is to de-radicalize elements of the population."
• On the Middle East conflict: "It would help to have a moderate force in the Palestinian territories and to have the beginnings of rapprochement with Israel and the rest of its neighbors."
• On the Far East: "I would like to see an improvement in Japanese-China relations."

In her pointed rebuttal of Clinton's inflammatory claims about the war on terror, Rice maintained the Bush White House did the best it could to defend against an attack - and expanded on the tools and intelligence it inherited.

"I would just suggest that you go back and read the 9/11 commission report on the efforts of the Bush administration in the eight months - things like working to get an armed Predator [drone] that actually turned out to be extraordinarily important," Rice added.

She also said Clinton's claims that Richard Clarke - the White House anti-terror guru hyped by Clinton as the country's "best guy" - had been demoted by Bush were bogus.

"Richard Clarke was the counterterrorism czar when 9/11 happened. And he left when he did not become deputy director of homeland security, some several months later," she said.

Rice noted that the world changed after 9/11.

"I would make the divide Sept. 11, 2001, when the attack on this country mobilized us to fight the war on terror in a very different way," Rice said.

Rice cited the final 9/11 commission report to substantiate her claims, while Clinton relied on Clarke's book as the basis for many of his rehashing the events leading up to the Sept. 11 attacks.

"I think this is not a very fruitful discussion. We've been through it. The 9/11 commission has turned over every rock and we know exactly what they said," she added.

Transitioning to the global war on terror, an animated Rice questioned, "When are we going to stop blaming ourselves for the rise of terrorism?"

Asked about recently leaked internal U.S. intelligence estimates that claimed the Iraq war was fueling terrorist recruiting, Rice said: "Now that we're fighting back, of course they are fighting back, too."

"I find it just extraordinary that the argument is, all right, so they're using the fact they're being challenged in the Middle East and challenged in Iraq to recruit, therefore you've made the war on terrorism worse.

"It's as if we were in a good place on Sept. 11. Clearly, we weren't," she added.

"These are people who want to fight against us, and they're going to find a reason. And yes, they will recruit, but it doesn't mean you stop pursuing strategies that are ultimately going to stop them," Rice said.

She insisted U.S. forces must finish the job in Iraq and the wider Middle East to wipe out the "root cause" of violent extremism - not just the terror thugs who carry out the attacks.

"It's a longer-term strategy, and it may even have some short-term down side, but if you don't look at the longer term, you're just leaving the problem to somebody else," she said.

She also said Middle East countries like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan have a "major educational reform" effort under way to root out propaganda literature and extremist brainwashing.

In Latin America, home to outrageous Venezuelan bomb thrower Hugo Chavez, Rice said the U.S. approach is to "spend as little time possible in talking about Chavez and more time talking about our positive agenda in Latin America," including several trade agreements.

 

[syadasti]

Condi setting Bubba straight...

The only person who was set straight was Rice. Did you forget her blabbering testimony in front of the 9-11 Commission where she was unable to answer what was asked

 

[N8 v2.0]

The only person who was set straight was Rice. Did you forget her blabbering testimony in front of the 9-11 Commission where she was unable to answer what was asked

riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight....


I think you have the testimony of Condi and Mz Clinton confused....

 

[Westy]

September 25, 2006 -- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday accused Bill Clinton of making "flatly false" claims that the Bush administration didn't lift a finger to stop terrorism before the 9/11 attacks.
[snip]
"What we did in the eight months was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton administration did in the preceding years," Rice added. [snip]
"We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al Qaeda," Rice responded during the hourlong session.

So Condi basically is saying they did just as good of a job as Clinton did, and Clinton did a Chitty job? Finally some honesty in government, although I would have preferred she just admitted "Dem or Repugnican, we are stupid politians and couldn't lead a chicken across a road."

 

[syadasti]

riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight....


I think you have the testimony of Condi and Mz Clinton confused....

Rice Testimony at 40:55

 

[N8 v2.0]

Remember the Clintons?

Cuz they sure don't remember anything:

I don't remember
I don't know
I'm not sure
I have no idea
I don't believe so
I don't recall
I don't think so
I don't have any specific recollection
I have no recollection
Not to my knowledge
I just don't remember
I don't believe
I have no specific recollection
I might have
I don't have any recollection of that
I don't have a specific memory
I don't have any memory of that
I just can't say
I have no direct knowledge of that
I don't have any idea
Not that I recall
I don't believe I did
I can't remember
I can't say
I do not remember doing so
Not that I remember
I'm not aware
I honestly don't know
I don't believe that I did
I'm fairly sure
I have no other recollection
I'm not positive
I certainly don't think so
I don't really remember
I would have no way of remembering that
That's what I believe happened
To my knowledge, no
To the best of my knowledge
To the best of my memory
I honestly don't recall
I honestly don't remember
That's all I know
I don't have an independent recollection of that
I don't actually have an independent memory of that
As far as I know
I don't believe I ever did that
That's all I know about that
I'm just not sure
Nothing that I remember
I simply don't know
I would have no idea
I don't know anything about that
I don't have any direct knowledge of that
I just don't know
I really don't know
I can't deny that, I just -- I have no memory of that at all

 

[psychobiker]

we want clinton back and not the one with the scowl

 

[Old Man G Funk]

riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight....


I think you have the testimony of Condi and Mz Clinton confused....

Did Hillary testify to the 9-11 commission?

 

[N8 v2.0]

Did Hillary testify to the 9-11 commission?

I don't recall.

 

[N8 v2.0]

From one who knows him best...


The real Clinton emerges
Dick Morris

From behind the benign façade and the tranquilizing smile, the real Bill Clinton emerged Sunday during Chris Wallace’s interview on Fox News Channel. There he was on live television, the man those who have worked for him have come to know – the angry, sarcastic, snarling, self-righteous, bombastic bully, roused to a fever pitch. The truer the accusation, the greater the feigned indignation. Clinton jabbed his finger in Wallace’s face, poking his knee, and invading the commentator’s space.

But beyond noting the ex-president’s non-presidential style, it is important to answer his distortions and misrepresentations. His self-justifications constitute a mangling of the truth which only someone who once quibbled about what the “definition of ‘is’ is” could perform.

Clinton told Wallace, “There is not a living soul in the world who thought that Osama bin Laden had anything to do with Black Hawk Down.” Nobody said there was. The point of citing Somalia in the run up to 9-11 is that bin Laden told Fortune Magazine in a 1999 interview that the precipitous American pullout after Black Hawk Down convinced him that Americans would not stand up to armed resistance.

Clinton said conservatives “were all trying to get me to withdraw from Somalia in 1993 the next day” after the attack which killed American soldiers. But the real question was whether Clinton would honor the military’s request to be allowed to stay and avenge the attack, a request he denied. The debate was not between immediate withdrawal and a six-month delay. (Then-first lady, now-Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) favored the first option, by the way). The fight was over whether to attack or pull out eventually without any major offensive operations.

The president told Wallace, “I authorized the CIA to get groups together to try to kill bin Laden.” But actually, the 9-11 Commission was clear that the plan to kidnap Osama was derailed by Sandy Berger and George Tenet because Clinton had not yet made a finding authorizing his assassination. They were fearful that Osama would die in the kidnapping and the U.S. would be blamed for using assassination as an instrument of policy.

Clinton claims “the CIA and the FBI refused to certify that bin Laden was responsible [for the Cole bombing] while I was there.” But he could replace or direct his employees as he felt. His helplessness was, as usual, self-imposed.

Why didn’t the CIA and FBI realize the extent of bin Laden’s involvement in terrorism? Because Clinton never took the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center sufficiently seriously. He never visited the site and his only public comment was to caution against “over-reaction.” In his pre-9/11 memoirs, George Stephanopoulos confirms that he and others on the staff saw it as a “failed bombing” and noted that it was far from topic A at the White House. Rather than the full-court press that the first terror attack on American soil deserved, Clinton let the investigation be handled by the FBI on location in New York without making it the national emergency it actually was.

In my frequent phone and personal conversations with both Clintons in 1993, there was never a mention, not one, of the World Trade Center attack. It was never a subject of presidential focus.

Failure to grasp the import of the 1993 attack led to a delay in fingering bin Laden and understanding his danger. This, in turn, led to our failure to seize him when Sudan evicted him and also to our failure to carry through with the plot to kidnap him. And, it was responsible for the failure to “certify” him as the culprit until very late in the Clinton administration.

The former president says, “I worked hard to try to kill him.” If so, why did he notify Pakistan of our cruise-missile strike in time for them to warn Osama and allow him to escape? Why did he refuse to allow us to fire cruise missiles to kill bin Laden when we had the best chance, by far, in 1999? The answer to the first question — incompetence; to the second — he was paralyzed by fear of civilian casualties and by accusations that he was wagging the dog. The 9/11 Commission report also attributes the 1999 failure to the fear that we would be labeled trigger-happy having just bombed the Chinese embassy in Belgrade by mistake.

President Clinton assumes that criticism of his failure to kill bin Laden is a “nice little conservative hit job on me.” But he has it backwards. It is not because people are right-wingers that they criticize him over the failure to prevent 9/11. It was his failure to catch bin Laden that drove them to the right wing.

The ex-president is fully justified in laying eight months of the blame for the failure to kill or catch bin Laden at the doorstep of George W. Bush. But he should candidly acknowledge that eight years of blame fall on him.

One also has to wonder when the volcanic rage beneath the surface of this would-be statesman will cool. When will the chip on his shoulder finally disappear? When will he feel sufficiently secure in his own legacy and his own skin not to boil over repeatedly in private and occasionally even in public?

 

[narlus]

Remember the Clintons?

Cuz they sure don't remember anything:

reagan was the master of the spotty memory.

 

[N8 v2.0]

reagan was the master of the spotty memory.

Not that I remember

 

[narlus]

if osama's still such a big deal re: the war on terrorism (which will be about as sucessful, as say, the war on the color orange), then what's the Bush admin done in the last 2 years?

it's all classified, right?

 

[$tinkle]

oh yeah, n8...i got keith frikkkin olbermensche:

this is getting kind of fun watching these self-important sychophants bloviate.

not as fun as watching some here lap up this hot porridge like the holy words of the kkkoran, but it'll do.

 

[$tinkle]

reagan was the master of the spotty memory.

you talkin' to me?

 

[Transcend]

if osama's still such a big deal re: the war on terrorism (which will be about as sucessful, as say, the war on the color orange), then what's the Bush admin done in the last 2 years?

it's all classified, right?

Naw it's not classified, everyone knows he invaded the wrong country.

 

[MMike]

Naw it's not classified, everyone knows he invaded the wrong country.

HE should have taken that left turn at Albequerque