Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist says that Richard Clarke lied under oath and is demanding that his classified testimony from two years ago be released.
I'll look forward to seeing that declassified material. Of course, we already know that Clarke has directly contradicted himself and as a result has crippled his own credibility--apparently making himself a wealthy man in the process. But it'll be interesting to see what's in that now-classified testimony.
Clarke needs to be speaking to a grand jury, methinks. Perjury's still a felony, last I heard.
If Democrats had any sense they'd be stepping way back from this guy. That they are instead gleefully high-fiving the guy--and each other--speaks volumes.
* Update * My lovely wife, the Queen of All Evil, informs me that John Kerry has been distancing himself from Clarke, and that Kerry has already said that Clarke should be indicted for perjury if he lied to Congress under oath.If Rosemary is correct--and she doesn't have a link but she has a good memory so I tend to believe her--then Kerry needs to be praised. I hope this is true, I really do. I'm so mad at Democrats right now, anything that makes them look less like assholes would make me happy.
Actually, John Kerry has been treading very careful on this one. He said yesterday that if Clarke lied under oath to Congress, then he should be prosecuted for perjury.
Here's your link, via Drudge.
Do ya think that we could get Ken Starr to look into this, do ya, do ya? Hey Mr Ashcroft, Sir. If you could peel yourself away from reading my e-mail, and that fine job you're doing prosecuting Ken Lay, could ya spare a couple prosecutors for this ClarkE thing, could ya?
Could someone find out what party this guy belongs to? Also, what was he like under Reagan and Bush Sr.?
Kerry looks like he is doing what he can on this issue, given his position right now. What he says sounds reasonable enough.
Whether or not the charges are proven, one question remains, who in the administration is responsible for some of these people being there? After all, Clarke is far from the first to write this type of book on the current administration. How many like this are still there?
Off the top of my head, the list of has-beens includes DiIulio, Clarke, O'Neill, Beers, and (hanging by a thread) David Kay & Colin Powell.
Is it them, or is it something about the Bush Kool-Aid that they find themselves allergic to, once they drink it?
Ara,
Geesh, you never quit, do ya? Powell isn't "hanging by a thread", and I don't think that Kay currently has any official position within the United States government...though there is a move afoot to get him the CIA directors job next year.
Clarke also wasn't a Bush appointee; he was a career civil servant working in the Executive Branch - started out at Defense in the early 1970's and then worked his way up the ladder. Beers is a huge ditto on that.
As for Clarke, himself - what a huge flameout this turned out to be. The coincidences (ie, working with Kerry's national security advisor Beers, getting an incestuous interview on 60 Minutes) shows that this wasn't just a guy writing a book - this was an orchestrated attempt to take away the War on Terrorism issue from President Bush...I'm mindful, now, of that leaked Democratic memo last year wherein they discuss that they have one chance to use the investigation route to hurt President Bush's re-election chances. Well, they've used it and it seems now that the likely course of events will turn out to be an investigation of Clarke's obvious lies.
This, dear people, is what you get when you try to fight something with nothing - the Democrats, had they rallied behind Gephardt or Lieberman (or perhaps even Edwards) could have done this right; tried to "out war" the President (meaning claim Iraq as their own, and then slam the President for not fighting hard enough to kill every terrorist in the world) and then towards the end of the campaign (their pro-war bona fides firmly established) to fight it out on domestic issues. I still think that President Bush would have won against such a thing, but it wouldn't be the overwhelming blow-out its going to end up being.
Mark, this guy advised four presidents, meaning he started in the capacity he had under Reagan. Now you say he started in the Defense Department in the early '70s. That's Nixon. Strange how in both cases we are talking about Republican adminstrations. I have no doubt as to the Democratic motives in this; however, I am now more than ever mystified as to Clarke's.
Geesh, you never quit, do ya?
Never give up. Never never never give up.
:^)
Besides, you didn't answer my question: "Is it them, or is it something about the Bush Kool-Aid that they find themselves allergic to, once they drink it?" BTW, that includes Powell and Kay.
I get the feeling that he was hired not appointed. He was a career civil servant not a political appointee. He worked his way up the food chain and, under Clinton, was given a access normally reserved for appointees. His promotions did not seem to require congressional approval like most appointed deputies.
Given that what appears to have happened is that the Bush administration moved him off to the side. What they did is consistent with how you have to handle the in place employees of the executive branch. They couldn't fire him, government employee unions have rules you know, so they found a position for him and had a swell to do when they moved him there.
With the Shays memo, his ten year record of minor achievements, and the need to get someone they bevlieved in and trusted in the position, they moved him off as gentlely as they could. He is acting like a disguntled employee suing his employer.
As a special advisor to the president, he served at the pleasure of POTUS. Lemme see if I can find that dang tin foil hat and see if it fits any of you guys.
Frist on Friday:"Until you have him under oath both times, you don't know."
Frist on the Senate floor (protected from libel):
"Third, Mr. Clarke has told two entirely different stories under oath."
Frist to reporters afterwards: 'He said he personally didn’t know whether there were any discrepancies between Clarke’s two appearances.'
But the Republicans aren't playing hardball character assasination are they Dean? They're sticking to the facts and merely pointing out the inconsistancies in Clark's charges and the nasty, negative Democrats just can't deal with it! Its like, political jujitsu or something!
My advice:
Read the transcript, peruse some left-leaning blogs before shooting off (all this info was available) in future Dean. Friendly advice is all.
I see Mark is back to normal. :-P
I must have missed something. Who is POTUS?
Libertarian- President of the United States = POTUS. SCOTUS= Supreme Court of the United States. I have never seen COTUS used before, I think it's too close to "coitus" to be said with a straight face ;-)
This quote from Kerry seems more like a taunt than a true request to get to the bottom of the problem. Or, maybe that is my own paranoia showing.
I was going to comment how fast Frist backed off the "Clarke perjured himself" charge, but Max beat me to it.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4601195/
And technically, Clarke didn't "contradict himself". Hadley contradicted him.
There was no evidence, there was absolutely no evidence that Iraq was helping al-Qaeda. Clarke's characterization of Hadley's "Please update and resubmit" looks entirely accurate to me.
If Clarke was a perjurer, then why is Bush not letting Condi Rice testify before the 9/11 panel? Could it be that he is hiding something and is afraid of her making a slip?