It's funny that the MSM seems to accept the commission's discounting of a single Navy officer's statement, but accepts Joe Wilson's statements as the final say on the Iraq-Niger deal.

I hate the phrase "historically significant." It's a fact. A fact that shd have been included and considered.

Another thing - Steyn's story about Johnelle (sp?) Bryant was criticized because it put Atta in the US before June 2000. The Navy officer also puts him in the US before June 2000. Perhaps the derision directed at Steyn should have targetted the commission instead.

I expect Dan Rather will be all over this like white on rice.

From the interview with Bryant:

BRIAN ROSS: And, when did you first meet someone who you say is Mohamed Atta? What happened?

JOHNELLE BRYANT: I met him somewhere between the end of April, around the third week of April to the third week of May of 2000.

BRIAN ROSS: Somewhere in that...

JOHNELLE BRYANT: Somewhere in that general area. I can't pinpoint it down any more than that.

That timeframe, prior to the visa entry date of 3 June 2000, undermined the rest of her story. But now we have the Navy Officer :

"According to the commission, the officer said he briefly saw the name and photo of Atta on an "analyst notebook chart." The material identified Atta as part of a Brooklyn al Qaeda cell and was dated from February through April 2000, the officer said."

The 9/11 Commission discounted this story because it also put Atta in the US before his visa date of entry. But now the two stories corroborate (to an extent) one another.

This could be reasonably big news.

Sometimes I just get so frustrated with America. Are we really so petty and self-absorbed?

Properly defending ourselves and confronting islamofascism is a matter of life and death. We have no time to waste on squabbling and finger-pointing. I cannot believe that the 9/11 Commission was turned into a partisan points-scoring circus. So now maybe the right will get some points in retaliation. Great. Fine and dandy.

But as a US citizen I'm becoming increasingly angry at the fact that much of my government simply isn't taking these matters seriously. They're playing political games while people are dying.

I don't know what my point is. I'm just angry and disgusted. Mostly at the left, but a little at the right, too.

The 9/11 Commission was never anything but a nifty stage, a convenient excuse for politicians to get the attention they crave.
Remember the fun they had with Condi Rice?

Its all a dumb show.

...though that makes it funny, that they managed to f*** themselves anyway.

You had to be a Big Shot, didn't ya?

I lean to "both" myself. After all, part of the job of staff is to decide what is important enough to pass up the line vs what to just pass up. And I can see "Hey, this guy says he may have seen info that Atta was here in 2000: any confirmation?" being responded to with "Nope, and the FBI says he couldn't have been here that early."

This is a problem anywhere an officer, of business or government, has staff. Bother the boss with it, send it to a lower level to be investigated/handled, or discard?

Contrast these two bits of information:

1. A report by an intelligence agent who supplies a specific name. Not "historically significant."

2. A presidential daily briefing that supplies no names, no dates, no methods, no sources. "Historically significant."

Which one does the MSM spend more time discussing? Why, the one that makes Bush look bad, of course.

Weasles is as weasles does - Forest Gump

The 9-11 comission screwed up and are now in the full speed ahead CYA mode. With the help of the left wing media they will suceed in burying the latest information. No one on the left including the media types wants to know what Socks Berger stuffed in his shorts. I do, because if it comes out it will burn Slick Willie and the Weasel again. What did they know, and when did they know it. The death of 3,000 people on 9-11 now rest on their heads.

So are we now using data mining to catch Terrorists now? Or just doing PC tactics only.

SJKevin, I've perceived a lack of seriousness about destroying our enemies all along. It's so important for the decent people like President Bush to be given a free hand and all possible encouragement to secure us. The alternative to the Bush Administration, who are such nice people, isn't the Democrats, who are even nicer. If the nice people show they're not up to the job of securing us, then those of us who are without decency, who want to wage war without restraint, are waiting for our turn. Such nations as Israel, Japan, and the European nations have had the U.S. guaranteeing their security, but also standing over them and keeping them placid. But there's no one either to guarantee the U.S.'s security or to keep the U.S. placid. If the U.S.'s electorate put real hawks in office sometime in the next few years, there won't be anyone to stand over the U.S. and say "no."

Arafel

Anthony, I believe the project was canceled in 02' due to "privacy concerns".

Which of course is complete BS. The last thing the govt wants to waste database capacity on is maintaining records of non-criminal, non-terrorist mundane tripe about grocery purchases, inexplicable collections of old Shaun Cassidy records, subscriptions to Hot Lesbian Dawrfs, etc.

If some "solid citizen" looked to be developing a rather extensive ammonium nitrate collection and they happened to live in an urban condo rather than a 500 acre farm, then maybe that should cause a few discrete inquries to be made.

Anthony, I believe the project was canceled in 02' due to "privacy concerns".

Nah, they just changed their name to HARVEY Danger and put a record out.

You know... "I'm not sick, but I'm not well... Blah blah blah blah... To live in he-ell..."

"Paranoia, paranoia, etc."

You know, with this sort of political garbage going on in DC to undo all the work we try to do out there in the great wide open, I somedays wonder why the hell I bother.