Snapshot #5

I just found this New York Times report from Thursday leading to an interesting connection.

In the months before the Sept. 11 attacks, federal aviation officials reviewed dozens of intelligence reports that warned about Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, some of which specifically discussed airline hijackings and suicide operations, according to a previously undisclosed report from the 9/11 commission. ...

The report discloses that the Federal Aviation Administration, despite being focused on risks of hijackings overseas, warned airports in the spring of 2001 that if "the intent of the hijacker is not to exchange hostages for prisoners, but to commit suicide in a spectacular explosion, a domestic hijacking would probably be preferable."

It just so happens that the Washington Post for March 21, 2004, carried an op-ed by none other than our new Secretary of State, CantBe Right. In the course of defending the Shrub gang against charges it royally screwed up in the months leading up to 9/11, she wrote that

[d]espite what some have suggested, we received no intelligence that terrorists were preparing to attack the homeland using airplanes as missiles, though some analysts speculated that terrorists might hijack airplanes to try to free U.S.-held terrorists. The FAA even issued a warning to airlines and aviation security personnel that "the potential for a terrorist operation, such as an airline hijacking to free terrorists incarcerated in the United States, remains a concern."

It's the same report. Rice quoted the part about a hijacking to force the release of prisoners, but left out the part about "commit[ting] suicide in a spectacular explosion" while continuing to insist no one had any idea this could happen.

We knew she was a serial liar, but here's another log for what I could only wish was her political funeral pyre.