The turmoil from this TV show is a good thing. We need to have this discussion once and for all on a national stage. To what extent is the Clinton administration responsible for 9/11?
The Path To 9/11″ is astonishing.
It is an amazing achievement on many levels. It is flat-out one of the best made-for-televison movies seen in decades. The only thing that would keep this movie from theatrical distribution is its nearly 5-hour running time (split over two days in this instance). Forget CNN’s “replay” broadcast from 9/11 – Trust me and mark your calendars to watch ABC these nights.
Of course, Clinton himself doesn’t think so:
A furious Bill Clinton is warning ABC that its mini-series “The Path to 9/11” grossly misrepresents his pursuit of Osama bin Laden – and he is demanding the network “pull the drama” if changes aren’t made.
Clinton pointedly refuted several fictionalized scenes that he claims insinuate he was too distracted by the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal to care about bin Laden and that a top adviser pulled the plug on CIA operatives who were just moments away from bagging the terror master, according to a letter to ABC boss Bob Iger obtained by The Post.
As a result of this and other pressure, the show has been changed:
ABC’s upcoming five-hour docudrama “The Path to 9/11” is quickly becoming a political cause célèbre.
The network has in recent days made changes to the film, set to air Sunday and Monday, after leading political figures, many of them Democrats, complained about bias and alleged inaccuracies. Meanwhile, a left-wing organization has launched a letter-writing campaign urging the network to “correct” or dump the miniseries, while conservative blogs have launched a vigorous defense.
Do you think Clinton is responsible for what happened?
I’m Republican, but I have to say Clinton is not responsible. Murderous thugs who have their hearts bent on killing innocent people are responsible.
The only way to protect ourselves completely is the unthinkable — a police state. Who wants that?
#26
The Clinton spin machine is hard at work dodging responsibility for it’s 8 years of mismanaged foreign policy. While riding high on the dot com bubble of the 90’s they let foreign policy slide.
Clinton years
2/26/93 # of dead not stated
6/25/96 19 dead
8/7/98 200 dead, 12 American
10/12/00 17 dead
Bush years
9/11/01 3000+
today 2500+ Americans. Others. Way too many and counting
You do the math
Shame Shame Shame
It wasn’t just the Lewinsky sex scandal which was distracting Bill. It was the sleazy and corrupt cabal from Arkansas in general. And despite what Hillary Rodham thought, it wasn’t the “Vast Right Wing Conspiracy” that did her husband in the whole Lewinsky mess was self inflicted.
RECORDS SET
– The only president ever impeached on grounds of personal malfeasance
– First president sued for sexual harassment.
– First president accused of rape.
– First first lady to come under criminal investigation
– Largest criminal plea agreement in an illegal campaign contribution case
– First president to establish a legal defense fund.
– First president to be held in contempt of court
– Greatest amount of illegal campaign contributions
– Greatest amount of illegal campaign contributions from abroad
– First president disbarred from the US Supreme Court and a state court
The dumb thing is that if Bill Clinton had gotten up in front of the press and admitted he had screwed up, lied and basically tried to cover his butt, I’m sure that the public knowing what kind of a guy he was/is, they’d have probably forgiven him and moved on. However, as Scooter Libby (Dick Cheney’s ex-Chief of Staff recently found out) it’s the lying that proves to be more damaging then the initial charges.
Which reminds me that many who ranted on this site owe Karl Rove an apology for accusing him of outing Amb WIlson’s wife as a CIA agent. Now that the truth is out there, the fact is that Rove didn’t try to orchestrate a political vendetta against Wilson, and that in fact Amb. Wilson either lied or was very misinformed when he claimed that there was NO PROOF that Saddam tried to procure Uranium from Niger, As the Washington Post said last week, it would have been better all around if Wilson hadn’t been taken so seriously.
There are numerous books and articles tracing the development of the terrorist threat and they have mostly told the same story about the role of President Clinton: his administration did a good job of recognizing the threat but was largely ineffective in dealing with it.
This ineffectiveness was due to many factors including those cited in the other comments. Also, it was extraordinarily difficult to do anything about Bin Ladin in those days. We would have had to go to full-out war in Afghanistan and how on earth could the President explained that to the people, especially with eveyone so fixated on Lewinsky? So, he tried to deal with it using cruise missiles–a strategy which was not effective.
I’m not trying to absolve Clinton or demonize Bush. But it’s important that we understand these things. And a docudrama from ABC is not likely to help.
Curmudgen: Your blaming BUSH for 9/11 !? What about laying the blame on Bin Laden & Co who planned the attack and maybe the Clinton’s who shirked the public trust in defending the country from the terrorist threats during the 90’s? Using that kind of Logic, you’d have blamed FDR for Pearl Harbor and the allies for prosecuting WWII!
Some say that FDR allowed Pearl Harbor to happen.
Donovan: You’re partially right. I wouldn’t give the Clinton Administration credit for recognizing the Terror threat. They were warned. They were made aware of it by the actions of the Terrorists and by the analysts in the US intelligence bureacracy. They CHOSE not to do anything that would be politically damaging to the Administration. I would have had more respect if they had taken their lumps and pushing forward with the politically unpopular decision and making the unpalatable choices in defending the country (ie military engagement) But, after being REPEATEDLY attacked by terrorist elements during the 90’s, the Clinton administration did very little to combat terrorism. Now if the WTC had collapsed in 1993, then history would have been undoubtably been changed and maybe we’d had gone through all this a decade earlier. But the Clinton administration got very lucky and the WTC didn’t fall back then. Regrettably, a lot of people had to die before the USA collectively recognized that after the Cold War we were entering into a dangerous new phase with an enemy that has a tribal/religious mindset on killing everything Western and who are armed with modern 21st Century weapons.
Smartalix, I’ve heard that before. I’m going to be charitable and refuse to believe that. I don’t think Bush had prior knowledge to 9/11 or that FDR knew about Pearl Harbor. For if that is true, then the American public really has no other choice then to overthrow the government that was sworn to protect them.
Out of z mind Can you read? I didn’t blame anyone for any thing.
Just a score card!!
Using that kind of Logic, you’d have blamed FDR for Pearl Harbor
Some still do.
and the allies for prosecuting WWII!
Wnat does that mean??
History repeats itself. We are seeing a repeat of the 1930’s and I predict we are going to make the same mistakes we made then. While rushing off to war isn’t a good idea, hopeless appeasement isn’t a good idea either.
Also hindsight is 20/20. Yes, Clinton should have been tougher and not wimped out of the terrorist attacks #26 points out. (#35’s comment is just silly, Bin Lauden wanted the towers down in 1993 and tried then, just because he failed doesn’t absolve the President – Clinton – from taking action.) Bill is fighting the movie because he wants his wife to be in the white house soon.
Part of the larger problem was that the different intelligent and judicial services were NOT allowed to share information. The CIA and the FBI were not allowed to coordinate their efforts. This policy predates Clinton, but Clinton was asked to push for changing the law and he didn’t. (It is now legal for those agencies and others to coordinate their efforts.)
There is no single person who is responsible for not reading the events correctly and predicting 9/11. (Guys the August memo that you claim Bush ignored didn’t have any details, rather difficult to act effectively on something without any details and that isn’t 100% sure.) It is very easy to look back and see the path, it is much harder to look forward and know what road to take.
As much as I WANT to blame Clinton (I hate what that man did for this country) – it’s not his fault directly.
It’s more the fault of 100 years of continual movement to a non-responsive, non-elected bureaucracy being in charge of everything.
Sadly, neither party wants to fix the real problem, and that is entrenched, unfireable people with no accountability. Until the elected people get control of the unelected, we’ll never have the country we should have.
Here’s an interview with Harvey Keitel, one of the stars of the docudrama.
#42
Silly of me to think that you could also read not just write. Pick a thought and stay with it.
If you can’t beat ’em with brilliance, baffle ’em with Bullshit!!
To blame? No. That lies witht he terrorists themselves. Did the Clinton Admin make it easier? Yes. Did they enable? Yes.
I’m setting the over/under at 95 on this hack thread’s post count.
If the USA would keep its nose CLEAN, and out of others battles, and fights and squabbles…..Wars they have been going on for over 2000 years.
It makes for Good population control.
Let them wipe themselves out….PLEASE…
Then we can go into the area and clean up and TAKe the land for the USA.
Until those other countries PAY us to be a peace keeper, STAY OUT of the mess.
This string of comments makes me long for the “good ole days” of Nikita Krushchev, when we knew who to hate and had some idea of why.
Curmudgen: Well I apologize if you feel I’ve misread or taken your comments out of context:
“You do the math
Shame Shame Shame ”
However I don’t exactly get what you mean by that. Shame on who? Bin Laden? Bush? Clinton? Me?
My biggest beef is that most people in this day and age of video and movies is that what they see portrayed on the screen is often taken as fact. Most people don’t take time to read books or news articles and will often opt to watch the video instead. What I find ironic is that when CBS did their lil’ program “The Reagans” the Democrats were “apalled” and “disappointed” that CBS pulled their mini-series when conservatives roasted them over the show’s attempt to fill in parts with drama – sure it’s not accurate, but it makes a great story right? Now they’re singing a different tune as ABC gets ready to air their program. ABC must be happy, they’re getting HUGE publicity over their show. Even CNN has devoted time on this tempest in a teaport story. Ratings should be pretty good. As my dad would say, “They’ve had their fun, now it’s our turn to sit back and watch who’s ox gets gored next”
P.S. – if you want to read some hilarious stuff, go to the DailyKOS website and read the user comments over there 😀
What I find ironic is that when CBS did their lil’ program “The Reagans” the Democrats were “apalled” and “disappointed” that CBS pulled their mini-series when conservatives roasted them over the show’s attempt to fill in parts with drama – sure it’s not accurate, but it makes a great story right?
Wrong. The Republicans were upset because their hero, Ronald Reagan was not being totally portrayed in the best light. They complained because the movie dared to show some negative elements of Reagan, not that anything was untrue. In fact, I remember an interview with one of the screen writers saying how much they rewrote to remove so many negative, but true, facts.
Gee, Republicans sure like to rewrite their history. I’m still waiting for one of the neo-con trolls to suggest that 9/11 even happened while Clinton was in charge of the White House.
…if Bill Clinton had gotten up in front of the press and admitted he had screwed up, lied and basically tried to cover his butt, I’m sure that the public knowing what kind of a guy he was/is, they’d have probably forgiven him and moved on.
The public didn’t care. His approval ratings remained high throughout the whole farce. If permitted, he could have easily won a third term. I thought more people were upset over the whole Kenneth Starr inquisition then anything Clinton did.
Then we had Newt Gingrich screwing his secretary and divorcing his second wife. We had Henry Hyde, the speaker who replaced Gingrich, fathering a child out of wedlock, while married. We had Rich Santorum spitting indignation about morals while charging Pennsylvania to home school his kids in Virginia. We had Tom Delay blacklisting lobbyists with any former Democratic politicians on their staff. Our moral examples.
CBS killed “The Reagans” because there was a good amount of widespread public criticism on the negative portrayals on a popular president who was dying from Alzheimers.
The fun part now is watching Democrats scramble and see if enough pressure will be brought to bear on ABC to kill the show. As far as ABC goes they’re under a lot of pressure right now but you can’t deny that it’s one story that everyone is talking about.
With regards towards revisionist history go read Bill Clinton’s book”My Life” There are too many key events that are glossed over or ignored completely to go in here.
Don’t get me wrong. Having Bill Clinton as president was a watershed moment in this country’s history. Back in 1994 with his sadly botched attempt to ramrod healthcare reform (and I sincerely wish it had been enacted) through congress, Bill and Hillary did more to breaking the Democratic stranglehold on Congress then any other politician including Newt Gingrich. The interesting thing is whether or not 2006 will prove to be a moment for the Democrats to take back control after 12 years of GOP rule. As long as the Democratic leadership uses their stewardship to advance policies to help people I’m all for it. However, from a realpolitiks perspective, there will be many a people with an axe to grind to settle some old scores. If the Democrats do take over the Congress (I figure they have better then even money on doing this), the public expectation is that there will be political gridlock till the next presidential election.
But for now, enjoy the spectacle! I know I am. 😉
you’re perplexed why Disney would back the GOP,
Yeah, the Chairman of their Board is George Mitchell.
George Bush has been in business with Osama Bin Laden and his brother since shortly after he got out of college and you think Clinton helped orchestrate the 9/11 attacks? Wake up and smell the coffee. The SOB who rigged the election and buried the constitution is at the root of all this terror bullshit and you know it. It is the perfect excuse to take away the last of our civil rights and he has done that too.
#56
The President is a misguided baffoon. He’s been granted every gift nepotism could afford, which is why a lackluster student, former cokehead turned Bible thumper, with a deer in the headlamps stare could somehow overcome all the odds and become President.
But he isn’t Dr Evil. He isn’t a Bond Villian. He’s just a typical rich boy prick way out of his depth and blissfully unaware of it. He didn’t help orchestrate 9/11 anymore than you or I did.
I mean, he traded Sammy Soza to the Cubs! What makes anyone think he could be a secret kingpin masterminding a global reign of terror with nefarious designs on civil liberties?
#57, OFTLO, scary thought, isn’t it. In 25 years we will be answering our children and grandchildren why this happened. That is provided sanity has returned, the gulags closed, and the Constitution restored.
#58 – Those are big “ifs” – remember that the Democrats were so imcompetent that they couldn’t even dethrone him the second time around. I have little hope for anything good happening in the political arena in my lifetime.
Turns out they edited out a part about Clinton being distracted by Monica to act. Good thing. Thde history shows that those were the times he acted. What we needed was more scandals so that he could distract us with attacks. The only scandal that should have been thrown outr was the draft dodging because those attack scared him away from acting, just like Black Hawk Down.
Your program that aired on 9/10 and 9/11 was excellent. It held your interest, made you angry, sad and left you wanting to help somehow – in the war against terrorism, especially. If the part was true about the Afghani who opposed Bin Laden (the one murdered by the terrorist/journalist) it was a terrible, unforgivable sin on our part . No more excuses – I don’t agree with President Bush on much but he can wiretap, profile, etc. all he wants if that’s what it takes.