Sept. 11 Panel Addresses Lewinsky Scandal
By DEB RIECHMANN

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Sept. 11 commission's final report says there's no evidence suggesting President Bill Clinton ordered airstrikes on Osama bin Laden targets to distract attention from his affair with Monica Lewinsky.

But the report says the affair, coupled with other issues, likely affected later discussions about using force against the terrorist leader.

Following U.S. embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, the Clinton administration planned and launched cruise missile strikes on alleged terrorist assets of bin Laden in Sudan and Afghanistan. The report said reaction to the Aug. 20, 1998, strikes included ``scalding criticism'' that the action was ``too aggressive.''

``At the time, President Clinton was embroiled in the Lewinsky scandal, which continued to consume public attention for the rest of that year and the first months of 1999,'' the report said. ``As it happened, a popular 1997 movie, 'Wag the Dog,' features a president who fakes a war to distract public attention from a domestic scandal. Some Republicans in Congress raised questions about the timing of the strikes.''


In testimony, Clinton aides told the commissioners that their advice to Clinton about the airstrikes was based solely on national security considerations. ``We have found no reason to question their statements,'' the commissioners said.


The commission's final report treads lightly on Clinton's affair with the one-time White House intern, which led to his impeachment and later acquittal by the Senate. Although only tiny sections of the report refer to the affair, the commissioners spent a lot of time discussing how and whether to discuss it in the report, deciding, in the end, that it was important to do so.


``The language was carefully chosen,'' Philip Zelikow, the commission's executive director, said Friday. ``We wanted to flag it and note its significance.''


In a chapter cataloguing initial U.S. responses to al-Qaida assaults, the report said that by the early morning hours of Aug. 20, 1998, Clinton and all his principal advisers were agreed to strike the bin Laden camps in Afghanistan near Khowst, as well as al Shifa, a pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum, Sudan.


Intelligence reports said the plant was ``manufacturing a precursor ingredient for nerve gas with bin Laden's financial support,'' although the commission said no independent evidence has emerged to corroborate this assessment.


``The air strikes marked the climax of an intense 48-hour period in which (former national security adviser Sandy) Berger notified congressional leaders, the principals called their foreign counterparts, and President Clinton flew back from his vacation on Martha's Vineyard to address the nation from the Oval Office,'' the report said.


The report said everyone involved in the decision to strike were aware of Clinton's problems.


``He told them to ignore them,'' the report said. Berger recalled the president saying to him ``that they were going to get crap either way, so they should do the right thing.''


While the commission said it found no reason to doubt the motivation of Clinton and his advisers, their report stated: ``The failure of the strikes, the 'wag the dog' slur, the intense partisanship of the period and the nature of the al Shifa evidence likely had a cumulative effect on future decisions about the use of force against bin Laden. Berger told us that he did not feel any sense of constraint.''

http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/story.jsp...219.htm&sc=1110

so basically what this means is, as ive said all along: the Republican's idiotic, partisan obsession with bringing Clinton down any way they could (including snooping into his personal life) jeopardized national security.


instead of being able to devote all his time and concentration to security issues, he had to worry about fighting off the sick Republicans sniffing at his crotch and accusing him of attempting to divert attention away from the scandal every time he took military action.


interesting....


maybe if Republicans werent so idiotically partisan back in the late 90's criticizing everything Clinton did, he would have had his hands free to do more in the war on terror.. and we would be in better shape right now.


9/11 <--- a result of Republican's stupid obsession with where Clinton stashed his cigars.

-smh-

OOOORRRR the President of the United States could have used a little more discretion and not had an affair with a White House Intern, in the Oval Office, and got himself caught.

You can say the "Republicans" pursuit of Clinton because of where he put his cigar caused him to not take adequate actions against terrorism, and they are to blame for the resulting strength of Al-Qaeda and their ilk.....


OOORRRR you could say the Republicans would have had nothing to pursue if Bill had shown a little personal responsibility and control

How disgraceful. To think oral sex may have contributed to 9/11

what does the responsibility and control of Bill Clinton's personal life have to do with running the country?

that was none of their business to investigate in the first place.


this is America. the private relationship between a man and his wife, including any infidelity that may occur, is a personal issue that doesnt concern anyone else as long as no laws are broken.


what if people at YOUR job tried to get u fired by snooping around in your personal life and your relationships?
what if ALL of America worked that way?

do u think anything would get done?

NO. and the beauty of America is that its NOT invasive like that.


u cant blame Clinton for an unnecessary investigation into his personal life that was conducted SIMPLY to smear and politically injure him, when he had broken no laws.

well the Republicans succeeded.. Clinton WAS politically injured, and therefore didnt have the ability to persue terrorism the way he wanted to.


this is in the 9/11 Report.. u arent disagreeing with me, you're disagreeing with the bipartisan 9/11 panel that wrote this

but i suppose u know more than they do, right?

Clinton could have handled this quite differently.

The fact that he didn't get anything done has more to do with how his administration only did things based on public opinion.
They never would have done what Cheney did and say "he deserved to be cussed out".
Clinton should have simply said that the only impeacheable offense would have been not unzipping his pants for Monica.

But since Clinton's team had no true policy on anything other than going with the flow. The Lewinsky deal hampered them significantly only because they had turned the white house into a waffle house.

Huey says...."What if people at YOUR job tried to get u fired by snooping around in your personal life and your relationships?
what if all of America worked that way.".......

Huey, I hate to bust your bubble, but All of America does work that way. Let me pose a couple of theoretical questions at you.

What if your local doctor is caught in an operating room with his pants down and a Candy Striper on her knees giving him a little relief?

What if your local high school principal is also caught receiving oral sex from the local librarian in his office?

Can you honestly sit there with a straight face and tell me all four of the participants in these theoretical events would not be summarily dismissed and sent on their way?

You will now rant and rave and come up with some off the wall explanation about why these people would not be fired but we all know they would be terminated....and so will you if you give it some logical thought.

Chuck, the problem with Huey, like with far too many Lefties today is a common little phrase: Moral Relativism. Don't judge my chanpion with immoral acts. After all, he is just human, and was doing what everyone else would do if given the chance. But your chanpion is a lier, criminal, baby killer, and general all-around louse. Get it?