maxrandb asked - why is Dem Party not defending Clinton against 911 lies?

[papau]

I think it is a damn good question.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4313567

DEM's Better Be Spitting Fire, to Repudiate "It's Clinton's Fault" Mantra
If we have learned anything from the 2004 campaign and, most especially, the Paul Hackett campaign, it should be this:

First: Waiting too long to respond to scurrilous attacks is NEVER a good idea.
Second: Fighting back and hitting these "bastards" HARD! does not hurt our electoral chances. On the contrary, we are rewarded at the ballot box when we fight back. And I mean fight back as nasty as the repukes do. Our slogan should be the Sean Connery line from "The Untouchables". "If he sends one of your's to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue".

In other words. "Coming out swinging with a 2x4 to the forehead to these "effers" IS A GOOD THING.

I caught Rush's little 2 minute update on the radio today. Stand by for 3 hours today of blaming Clinton for 9/11. It's all they have left. By the time Rush and Fox are done, they'll be saying it was Clinton himself putting "yellow stickies" on Atta's face.

Dems better get out in force to knock some sense into these people. As near as I can tell, President Clinton was not the President on 9/11/2001. As near as I can tell, President Clinton was not still on the "distribution list" for Presidential Daily Briefings on 6 August 2001. As near as I can tell, it was VP Cheney who dis-banded Clinton's task force on terrorism because the Bush admin wanted to go in a "new direction".

Here are some facts that we can, and should use(bolding is mine):
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According to the public record, the Administration made counter-terrorism such a "top priority" that it never once convened its task force on counter terrorism before 9/11, attempted to downgrade counter terrorism at the Justice Department, and held only two out of more than one hundred national security meetings on the issue of terrorism. Meanwhile, the White House was cutting key counter terrorism programs -- Bush himself admitted that he "didn't feel the sense of urgency" about terrorism before 9/11. According to the Washington Post, President Bush and Vice President Cheney never once convened the counter terrorism task force that was established in May 2000(Clinton was still president in May 2000) -- despite repeated warnings that Al Qaida could be planning to hijack airplanes and use them as missiles. This negligence came at roughly the same time that the Vice President held at least 10 meetings of his Energy Task Force and attended at least six meetings with Enron executives.
Similarly, Newsweek reported that internal government documents show that, before 9/11, the Bush Administration moved to "de-emphasize" counter terrorism. When the "FBI officials sought to add hundreds more counterintelligence agents" to deal with the problem, "they got shot down" by the White House.
Additionally, the Associated Press reported in 2002 that "President Bush's national security leadership met formally nearly 100 times in the months prior to the Sept 11 attacks yet terrorism was the topic during only two of those sessions." This is consistent with evidence Clarke has presented showing that his January 2001 "urgent" memo asking for a meeting of top officials on the imminent Al Qaida threat was rejected for almost eight months. At the time, the White House said that they simply "did not need to have a formal meeting to discuss the threat". Finally, the White House threatened to veto efforts putting more money into counter terrorism, tried to cut funding for counter terrorism grants, delayed arming the unmanned airplanes that had spotted bin Laden in Afghanistan, and terminated "a highly classified program to monitor Al Qaida suspects in the United States.

Here are the sources for the above:

1. Process Used to Develop the National Energy Policy, US General Accounting Office.
2. "Cheney: We Met With Enron Execs", ABC News, 01/09/2002.
3. Freedom of Information Center, 05/27/2002.
4. "Clarke's Take On Terror", CBS News, 03/21/2004.
5. "White House Rebuttal to Clarke Interview", Washington Post, 03/22/2004.
6. Freedom of Information Center, 05/27/2002.
7. "FBI Budget Squeezed After 9/11", Washington Post, 03/22/2004.
8. "Officials: U.S. missed chance to kill bin Laden", Helena Independent Record, 06/25/2003.
9. "In the Months Before 9/11, Justice Department Curtailed Highly Classified Program to Monitor Al Qaeda Suspects in the U.S.", PR Newswire, 03/21/2004.

Additionally, here is the redacted August 6 PDB. Again (bold is mine)

The following is a redacted text of the presidential daily briefing from August 6, 2001: Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.
Clandestine, foreign government, and media reports indicate Bin Laden since 1997 has wanted to conduct terrorist attacks in the U.S. Bin Laden implied in U.S. television interviews in 1997 and 1998 that his followers would follow the example of World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef and "bring the fighting to America."

After U.S. missile strikes on his base in Afghanistan in 1998(I interrupt this post to point our that in 1998 THE PRESIDENT WAS BILL CLINTON), Bin Laden told followers he wanted to retaliate in Washington, according to a service.
An Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ) operative told service at the same time that Bin Laden was planning to exploit the operative's access to the U.S. to mount a terrorist strike.
The millennium plotting in Canada in 1999 may have been part of Bin Laden's first serious attempt to implement a terrorist strike in the U.S. Convicted plotter Ahmed Ressam has told the FBI that he conceived the idea to attack Los Angeles International Airport himself, but that Bin Laden lieutenant Abu Zubaydah encouraged him and helped facilitate the operation. Ressam also said that in 1998 Abu Zubaydah was planning his own U.S. attack.

Ressam says Bin Laden was aware of the Los Angeles operation.
Although Bin Laden has not succeeded, his attacks against the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 demonstrate that he prepares operations years in advance and is not deterred by setbacks. Bin Laden associates surveilled our Embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam as early as 1993, and some members of the Nairobi cell planning the bombings were arrested and deported in 1997.
AI Qaeda members -- including same who are U.S. citizens -- have resided in and traveled to the U.S. for years, and the group apparently maintains a support structure that could aid attacks.

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Hit these people hard and often that blaming the guy who had been out of office for 9 months WILL NOT FOOL THE AMERICAN PEOPLE.

[Merlot]

1. Quick response was how Clinton won the WH

Remember how he when ever they hit, he hit right back and harder? So he knows this. But the rest of the dems haven't learned it (swiftboat anyone?).

I think defending Clinton and getting dragged into that argument is not a good idea for two reasons. First is that it throws us back to the past and away from the present issues - something the repubs will love right now. Secondly, we should not be defending Clinton because we shouldn't be on the defensive. We should be pointing out (as your post does) how THIS administration, the "accountability" administration, has been less than accountable on 9/11.

If rush spends three hours blaming Clinton for 9/11, you can just chalk it up to another distraction from the Cindy Sheehan debacle.

[second edition]

2. Good Question!

It amasses me how this current administration never accepts responsibility for what goes wrong during their watch. They always look to lay blame elsewhere. Clinton kept his eye on Bin Laden and was aware of his movements. It is my understanding that Clinton informed Bush on Inauguration day, 2001 about the Bin Laden situation in very serious terms. Bush and his team of incompetents ignored the situation. Why? My thought is they were even then, focused on Iraq.

[xchrom]

3. don't defend clinton, attack bush.

it was bush who left the warnings sitting on his desk uninvestigated.
it was bushco that let the warnings from the fbi agent in minnesota go by.
it was bushco that let sibel edmunds investigations go.
it was bushco that let al gore's papers and warning go.

the left has the upper hand in this -- we need to be louder and more aggressive in our attacks of bushco.

[blm]

4. Clinton gets more airtime than any other Dem. He's the best communicator

in the Dem party. Who can defend themself better than Clinton?

He had 2 promotional book tours to set the record straight.

The GOP can't get away with defining Clinton. The American people know him better than any other politician. Why would they believe the GOP's version?

[phiddle]

5. Paul Hackett:

"But the fact of the matter is, they can attack me, but I punch back just as hard as I get. " (When calling Rush Limbaugh a fat-ass drug addict.)
The best defense is a GOOD offense!

[papau]

6. I agree :-)

:-)