Clinton Rendition Flights: Why Didn't The MSM Find This?
Everyone knows about the bias the MSM has. This is why Marcie, Sabrina, and I post right here. No, we're not up there updating like the rest of the elites in the blogosphere all day long, but we try to keep up. With the day being as busy as it was (Sabrina left late this morning for her return to Chicago. We'll miss her around here. But, as they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder, especially when it comes to good friends.)
Anyway, back to the MSM. As if we needed another example of this bias, this wonderful story was on Breitbart today. (By now, I'm sure this has reached quite a few people. We're still running with it, though.)
HT: Captain's Quarters http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/006045.php
(And PLEASE pray for the First Mate. She's sick, and needs all the prayers she can get.)
http://www.breitbart.com/news/na/051228161155.nt4rpl2e.html
The CIA's controversial "rendition" program to have terror suspects captured and questioned on foreign soil was launched under US president Bill Clinton, a former US counterterrorism agent told a German newspaper. Michael Scheuer, a 22-year veteran of the CIA who resigned from the agency in 2004, told Thursday's issue of the newsweekly Die Zeit that the US administration had been looking in the mid-1990s for a way to combat the terrorist threat and circumvent the cumbersome US legal system.
"President Clinton, his national security advisor Sandy Berger and his terrorism advisor Richard Clark ordered the CIA in the autumn of 1995 to destroy Al-Qaeda," Scheuer said, in comments published in German.
"We asked the president what we should do with the people we capture. Clinton said 'That's up to you'."
Scheuer, who headed the CIA unit that tracked Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden from 1996 to 1999, said that he developed and led the "renditions" program, which he said included moving prisoners without due legal process to countries without strict human rights protections.
Stop! If these people were not US citizens, there is no "due process" involved. They receive none as they have no protections enumerated under the Constitution. The protections listed within the Constitution apply to US citizens, born here or naturalized.
"In Cairo, people are not treated like they are in Milwaukee. The Clinton administration asked us if we believed that the prisoners were being treated in accordance with local law. And we answered, yes, we're fairly sure."
At the time, he said, the CIA did not arrest or imprison anyone itself.
"That was done by the local police or secret services," he said, adding that the prisoners were never taken to US soil. "President Clinton did not want that."
He said the program changed under Clinton's successor, President George W. Bush, after the attacks of September 11, 2001.
"We started putting people in our own institutions -- in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo. The Bush administration wanted to capture people itself but made the same mistake as the Clinton administration by not treating these people as prisoners of war."
Stop, again. These people we have captured aren't prisoners-of-war. They have a different legal classification being labled as "unlawful combatants." This definition has been addressed and upheld by the US Supreme Court. In Hamdi, the court recognized the authority of Congress to define the detainees as "unlawful comabtants." It was also not the same mistake in regard to how these detainees are treated under the law, as opposed to a prisoner-of-war.
He accused Europeans of being hypocritical in criticizing the US administration for its anti-terror tactics while benefiting from them.
"All the information we received from interrogations and documents, everything that had to do with Spain, Italy, Germany, France, England was passed on," he said.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice defended renditions on a trip to Europe this month as a "vital tool" for fighting international terrorism but insisted that Washington does not condone torture.
So, back to my original question: Why didn't the MSM locate this? When the debate was raging over the WaPo's story regarding these flights, how was it that A) The WaPo missed it? and B) The rest of the MSM missed this? We should also take into account that the MSM missed another fact regarding these secret programs leaked to the press. Remember the NSA leak? Yeah, Clinton did that, too. This proves two things to me. There is an obvious, arrogantly-flaunted bias in the media. And that they really aren't paying attention to America over this.
There is no other way to lay it out. No one can deny that the MSM was absolutely in love with Clinton. He was charismatic, he was popular, and he gave the press unprecedented access to the White House. They were near-orgasmic when they broke "big" stories about Hillary or Bill. The only reason they'd cover for these two, and refuse to address it is because they think that it might hurt those two, or they don't want to implicate their favorite president in something that they've been screaming "ILLEGAL" for over a week now.
The hurt part is what I don't get, which proves the MSM isn't listening to america. In the recent Rasmussen Poll, 64% of Americans support the NSA program. And 51% of Democrats polled had absolutely no problem with it. If the MSM were truly listening, then they would've been the first ones out there to disapprove "right-wing spin." We took a look back after 11 Sept. to see what steps were taken to tackle terrorism under Clinton. We saw little, if any, serious attempt to address it.
Dick Morris, in interview after interview, claims that he was pushing paying attention to terrorism after the first World Trade Center attack. Instead of a response, he received a police action; feeble attempts to deal with these people, and the only route willing to be undertaken was through our courts. That's great, but if they keep sending their people into our country, and we don't take notice until AFTER the attack, what good does that do us? Innoncent civilians are dying in their attacks. An after-the-fact response was not what we needed. We had over 1 dozen serious terrorist attacks against the US in the 1990s.
If this were true (I say "if" because I find it interesting the link to the interview with the German newspaper is no longer working) then it would blow that whole outlook by Morris, and a fair majority of bloggers and members of the alternative media, out of the water. And it would give Clinton the benefit of building onto that tattered legacy he has. (Yes, I do blame him for the failures and shenanigans leading up to 11 Sept. There's his legacy in my eyes.) The MSM should've trumpted this to the highest heavens, and they didn't. They tried to play cover-up with this. I'm sure this will hit their news shows at some point, on some page, but this should have been priority number one today, and it wasn't.
Pity.
Of course, I suppose the next question to be answered would be if they did know about it, why didn't they report it? Is there something embarrassing about Clinton's establishment ofthe renditions program? That's a question that requires a bit more digging. Unless the MSM would like to pipe up about it, if they have the answers. It's only going to look worse for them if they don't sound off soon. Again, that is if they knew.
Publius II
EVERYONE have a Happy New Year. We'll see y'all in 2006!
Everyone knows about the bias the MSM has. This is why Marcie, Sabrina, and I post right here. No, we're not up there updating like the rest of the elites in the blogosphere all day long, but we try to keep up. With the day being as busy as it was (Sabrina left late this morning for her return to Chicago. We'll miss her around here. But, as they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder, especially when it comes to good friends.)
Anyway, back to the MSM. As if we needed another example of this bias, this wonderful story was on Breitbart today. (By now, I'm sure this has reached quite a few people. We're still running with it, though.)
HT: Captain's Quarters http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/006045.php
(And PLEASE pray for the First Mate. She's sick, and needs all the prayers she can get.)
http://www.breitbart.com/news/na/051228161155.nt4rpl2e.html
The CIA's controversial "rendition" program to have terror suspects captured and questioned on foreign soil was launched under US president Bill Clinton, a former US counterterrorism agent told a German newspaper. Michael Scheuer, a 22-year veteran of the CIA who resigned from the agency in 2004, told Thursday's issue of the newsweekly Die Zeit that the US administration had been looking in the mid-1990s for a way to combat the terrorist threat and circumvent the cumbersome US legal system.
"President Clinton, his national security advisor Sandy Berger and his terrorism advisor Richard Clark ordered the CIA in the autumn of 1995 to destroy Al-Qaeda," Scheuer said, in comments published in German.
"We asked the president what we should do with the people we capture. Clinton said 'That's up to you'."
Scheuer, who headed the CIA unit that tracked Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden from 1996 to 1999, said that he developed and led the "renditions" program, which he said included moving prisoners without due legal process to countries without strict human rights protections.
Stop! If these people were not US citizens, there is no "due process" involved. They receive none as they have no protections enumerated under the Constitution. The protections listed within the Constitution apply to US citizens, born here or naturalized.
"In Cairo, people are not treated like they are in Milwaukee. The Clinton administration asked us if we believed that the prisoners were being treated in accordance with local law. And we answered, yes, we're fairly sure."
At the time, he said, the CIA did not arrest or imprison anyone itself.
"That was done by the local police or secret services," he said, adding that the prisoners were never taken to US soil. "President Clinton did not want that."
He said the program changed under Clinton's successor, President George W. Bush, after the attacks of September 11, 2001.
"We started putting people in our own institutions -- in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo. The Bush administration wanted to capture people itself but made the same mistake as the Clinton administration by not treating these people as prisoners of war."
Stop, again. These people we have captured aren't prisoners-of-war. They have a different legal classification being labled as "unlawful combatants." This definition has been addressed and upheld by the US Supreme Court. In Hamdi, the court recognized the authority of Congress to define the detainees as "unlawful comabtants." It was also not the same mistake in regard to how these detainees are treated under the law, as opposed to a prisoner-of-war.
He accused Europeans of being hypocritical in criticizing the US administration for its anti-terror tactics while benefiting from them.
"All the information we received from interrogations and documents, everything that had to do with Spain, Italy, Germany, France, England was passed on," he said.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice defended renditions on a trip to Europe this month as a "vital tool" for fighting international terrorism but insisted that Washington does not condone torture.
So, back to my original question: Why didn't the MSM locate this? When the debate was raging over the WaPo's story regarding these flights, how was it that A) The WaPo missed it? and B) The rest of the MSM missed this? We should also take into account that the MSM missed another fact regarding these secret programs leaked to the press. Remember the NSA leak? Yeah, Clinton did that, too. This proves two things to me. There is an obvious, arrogantly-flaunted bias in the media. And that they really aren't paying attention to America over this.
There is no other way to lay it out. No one can deny that the MSM was absolutely in love with Clinton. He was charismatic, he was popular, and he gave the press unprecedented access to the White House. They were near-orgasmic when they broke "big" stories about Hillary or Bill. The only reason they'd cover for these two, and refuse to address it is because they think that it might hurt those two, or they don't want to implicate their favorite president in something that they've been screaming "ILLEGAL" for over a week now.
The hurt part is what I don't get, which proves the MSM isn't listening to america. In the recent Rasmussen Poll, 64% of Americans support the NSA program. And 51% of Democrats polled had absolutely no problem with it. If the MSM were truly listening, then they would've been the first ones out there to disapprove "right-wing spin." We took a look back after 11 Sept. to see what steps were taken to tackle terrorism under Clinton. We saw little, if any, serious attempt to address it.
Dick Morris, in interview after interview, claims that he was pushing paying attention to terrorism after the first World Trade Center attack. Instead of a response, he received a police action; feeble attempts to deal with these people, and the only route willing to be undertaken was through our courts. That's great, but if they keep sending their people into our country, and we don't take notice until AFTER the attack, what good does that do us? Innoncent civilians are dying in their attacks. An after-the-fact response was not what we needed. We had over 1 dozen serious terrorist attacks against the US in the 1990s.
If this were true (I say "if" because I find it interesting the link to the interview with the German newspaper is no longer working) then it would blow that whole outlook by Morris, and a fair majority of bloggers and members of the alternative media, out of the water. And it would give Clinton the benefit of building onto that tattered legacy he has. (Yes, I do blame him for the failures and shenanigans leading up to 11 Sept. There's his legacy in my eyes.) The MSM should've trumpted this to the highest heavens, and they didn't. They tried to play cover-up with this. I'm sure this will hit their news shows at some point, on some page, but this should have been priority number one today, and it wasn't.
Pity.
Of course, I suppose the next question to be answered would be if they did know about it, why didn't they report it? Is there something embarrassing about Clinton's establishment ofthe renditions program? That's a question that requires a bit more digging. Unless the MSM would like to pipe up about it, if they have the answers. It's only going to look worse for them if they don't sound off soon. Again, that is if they knew.
Publius II
EVERYONE have a Happy New Year. We'll see y'all in 2006!
posted by Syd And Vaughn | 7:19 PM
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