JOE McCain Abuses 911

This call came into Alexandria's 911 system on October 21 -

Operator: 911 state your emergency

Caller: It's not an emergency, but do you know why on one side at the damn drawbridge of 95 traffic is stopped for 15 minutes and yet traffic's coming the other way?

Operator: Sir, are you calling 911 to complain about traffic? (pause)

Caller: "(Expletive) you." (caller hangs up)

The complaint call about traffic on the Wilson Bridge forced the 911 dispatcher to call back. The voice mail on the other end, appears to belong to Joe McCain, brother of presidential candidate, John McCain.

"Hi this is Joe McCain. I can't take this message now because I'm involved in a very (inaudible) important political project. I hope on November 4th we have elected John."

"I think it's horrible. I can't believe somebody would tie up valuable resources to complain about traffic," said District resident Nancy Case.

"It seems stupid, my name can be tagged to this, why would I hose my brother, why would I do it," asked District resident Rob Case.

But that wasn't all. McCain apparently called 911 again to complain about the message the operator just left him, warning him such use of 911 is criminal.

Caller: Somebody gave me this riot act about the violation of police.

Operator: Did you just call 911 in reference to this?

Caller: Yeah.

Operator: 911 is to be used for emergencies only not just because you're sitting in traffic.

Bin Laden Been Dead?

Osama Bin Laden is dead since December 26, 2001. - Translation of Funeral Article in Egyptian Paper al-Wafd

The original article:

Translation of Funeral Article in Egyptian Paper:

al-Wafd, Wednesday, December 26, 2001 Vol 15 No 4633
News of Bin Laden’s Death and Funeral 10 days ago

Islamabad -
A prominent official in the Afghan Taleban movement announced yesterday the death of Osama bin Laden, the chief of al-Qa’da organization, stating that binLaden suffered serious complications in the lungs and died a natural and quiet death.

The official, who asked to remain anonymous, stated to The Observer of Pakistan that he had himself attended the funeral of bin Laden and saw his face prior to burial in Tora Bora 10 days ago. He mentioned that 30 of al-Qa’da fighters attended the burial as well as members of his family and some friends from the Taleban.

In the farewell ceremony to his final rest guns were fired in the air. The official stated that it is difficult to pinpoint the burial location of bin Laden because according to the Wahhabi tradition no mark is left by the grave. He stressed that it is unlikely that the American forces would ever uncover any traces of bin Laden.

http://www.welfarestate.com/binladen/funeral

Rotten Rudy - "I'm One of Them"

Rudy Giuliani:

"This is not a mayor or a governor or a president who's sitting in an ivory tower," he said. "I was at ground zero as often, if not more, than most of the workers. I was there working with them. I was there guiding things. I was there bringing people there. But I was exposed to exactly the same things they were exposed to. So in that sense, I'm one of them."



Fire Captain and Giuliani foe James Riches, whose firefighter son died on 9/11,: "That's insulting and disgraceful. He's a liar. I was down there on my hands and knees looking for my son."

And Battalion Chief John McDonnell, head of the Uniformed Fire Officers Association in New York,: "I have a real problem with that statement. I think he's really grasping and trying to justify his previous attempts to portray himself as the hero of 9/11."

More searing criticism of Rudy, directly from the rescue workers themselves, is right here.

George Tenet: We were warned about the WTC attacks in June of 2001

I was unable to grab video for this so far - I'm sure it will be out there soon, at least it had better be! Visit Meet The Press on MSNBC.com if you wish to view it - "Warnings on 9/11". This video should be playing on every TV in America right now. . .here is the transcript

MR. RUSSERT: And we are back.

I want to go back, leading up to September 11.

MR. TENET: All right.

MR. RUSSERT: In March, you went in to see Stephen Hadley, who was then Condoleezza Rice's deputy of the National Security Council, and said, "I want to expand my authorities."

MR. TENET: Well, we were asked to send them those authorities.

MR. RUSSERT: And you brought them in?

MR. TENET: Right.

MR. RUSSERT: The next day, you got a call saying, "Can you take these back because we want--or roll back the clock, we don't want to have to be set to this timetable."

MR. TENET: Tim, in fairness, I also said, "You've got to get your policies in order. You've got to consider covert action thoughtfully in a policy context." They weren't quite ready to get those policy deliberations done. we're not ready to receive those authorities yet.

MR. RUSSERT: So you took them back?

MR. TENET: Yes, sir.

MR. RUSSERT: You regret taking them back?

MR. TENET: No. It's, you know, authorities is--the policy process determines when covert action is going to be used. They did send them back, and, and they deliberated.

MR. RUSSERT: Then in June, a briefer of the CIA named Rich B gave a conclusion saying, based on all the reporting we've seen, that "bin Laden is going to launch a significant terrorist attack against U.S." Israeli "interest in the coming weeks." July 10 you got another briefing so alarming that you picked up the phone, said to Condoleezza Rice, "I want to come see you now," jumped in the car with some of your key advisers, went to see her. Rich B, he gave her a briefing package. Opening line, "There will be a significant terrorist attack in the coming weeks or months!" And then you--and later July, Rich B sitting at the CIA, said, "They're coming here." When he told you that, what did you think?

MR. TENET: It was a moment I'll never forget. We, we were sitting there trying to rack our brains, trying to figure out what we were up against at that moment. And you know, Rich, Rich said that, it hung over the room. We had no texture. We took it seriously, you know, but we had no texture at that moment. Of course, this is a, this is a human being who's been following this for many years, and he's giving us an instinctual call.

MR. RUSSERT: This is late July. The evidence coming in the intelligence: big event, spectacular, King, King Abdullah of Jordan calling, saying, "We have to go to Afghanistan. We have to do something." A presidential daily brief was prepared for the president on August 6 entitled "Bin Laden Determined To Strike in the U.S."

Late August, you went to Crawford, Texas, first time ever, met with the president, rode with him in his pickup truck. Did you say to him at that time, "Mr. President, Rich B told me at the CIA they are coming. You got to do something now"?

MR. TENET: Tim, by, by August, remember, this threat reporting starts way back in the spring--May, June, July, August. I held nothing back from the president. He understood our concerns about threats. He understood what we were doing around the world at the time. The interesting thing is is by the end of July, everything goes silent on us.

MR. RUSSERT: But did you say to him, "I brought in recommendations in March that they sent back. I need those now."

MR. TENET: At that, at that time, the policymakers were deliberating on those things, Tim. I believe that you've got to let them come to their conclusions. You know, I, I have every confidence that everybody in our government understood what I believed to be a very, very serious time period. At the end of the day, the authorities we were seeking were to get on the ground and work covertly with, with Ahmed Shah Massoud and the northern alliance. We wanted to get more proactive on the ground. The hijackers were already here.

So what, what did you learn from all this? You know, you warn, you provide strategic warning. You work around the world. We stopped many, many attacks in that summer overseas, saved thousands of lives. You go back and look at this, people always will focus either on the intelligence community, on the law enforcement. Everybody looks at individual vignettes, this mistake, that--here's the truth: An entire government, over two administrations, we, we all have to say everybody could've done more. And this was a period of time that there's a, there's a strategic and important point. We had no system of
domestic protection in place in this country. We didn't think about the United States as a target. People focus on watch listing. Yes, we didn't watch list people in a timely way. Even when we watch listed them, they weren't put on a no-fly list.

You know, in, in, in, in the millennium period, we told the president of the United States five to 50 attacks against the United States. None occurred. We caught a guy trying to cross the border from Canada. And the message was, "You know, they're starting to think about us here." So lots of things could've been done better. We think we provided strategic warning. We think we were acting aggressively overseas. But you have to have offense and defense playing together, Tim.

MR. RUSSERT: Do you think the president should've come off vacation back to Washington and pulled all the principals together and said, "This intelligence is alarming. We got to do something"?

MR. TENET: I think, Tim, that in, in the August time period, I didn't, we didn't, we weren't giving the president more. I think principal--I think, you know, Condi Rice was running the NSC, Dick Clarke was taking actions. We--you can go back and think about this. The hindsight may be perfect. But that's what happened.