May 26, 2006
It Gets Even More Bizarre: Judith Miller (Yeah, That One) Knew 9/11 Might Happen, But Bush Didn't! And She Was Told by a "Senior White House Official"! Through the Looking Glass Time!
A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS
Those of you who read BuzzFlash regularly know that our position on
9/11 has been that the Bush Administration, at a minimum, was guilty
of malfeasance in not taking measures to prevent the attack. As evidence,
we have often pointed out (as have others) that Bush and Rice were warned,
in an official briefing paper, that Al-Qaeda planned hijackings in the
United States.
This briefing, you will recall, occurred in the summer of 2001. In response,
Bush did nothing, absolutely nothing, to prevent hijackings. In fact,
he went on a month long photo-op vacation to the Hollywood-set Crawford,
Texas, ranch.
Rice and Bush claimed that they would have done something if they had
been warned that Al-Qaeda planned to hijack planes and fly them into
buildings. We, in many editorials over the years, have pointed out what
a second grader would know: if you take successful steps to prevent hijackings,
then terrorists won't be able to fly planes into buildings.
But that connection was obviously too intellectually challenging for
Bush and Rice to make, so they took no measures to stop hijackings, which
might have prevented 9/11 had they done so.
Okay, now we are up to date (at least in summary form). Now comes a story
by Rory O'Connor -- president and co-founder of the international
media firm Globalvision, Inc, and MediaChannel.org -- that the infamous
Judith Miller was tipped off by a "senior White House official" (where
have we heard that expression before?) in the summer of 2001 that U.S. "intelligence
indicated that Al Qaeda was planning a major attack on the United States."
Excuse us, Judith Miller knew, but George W. Bush claims that he didn't
know? Uh, isn't this a front-page story? The implications of this information
are potentially mind-boggling in terms of Bush Administration negligence
-- or worse, a decision to do nothing to stop the attack -- but no mainstream
media outlet, including the New York Times (which passed on a story covering
the original tip to Miller), is covering O'Connor's bombshell.
As Lily Tomlin said: "No matter how cynical I get, I just can't keep
up."
No, try as we do, even BuzzFlash just can't keep up.
A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS