Dr. Rice has Live Interview at 4 pm EST

[pechuna]

Call in with your questions:

http://www.hannity.com/

[suelee000]

Can't be bothered to testify under oath to the 9/11 commission, but has time to slander and smear Mr. Clarke on every news show that's been broadcast this week.

[tncorgi]

Fri Mar 26,10:24 PM ET Add White House - AP Cabinet & State to My Yahoo!


By TERENCE HUNT, AP White House Correspondent

WASHINGTON - Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites) says the Bush administration has a good story to tell about fighting terrorism and she's pouring it out in television appearances, interviews and newspaper articles. The one place she won't talk is in public, under oath, before the independent commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

That is blossoming into a public relations nightmare.


The White House finds itself in the awkward position of trying to explain why Rice, the national security adviser to President Bush (news - web sites), can talk at length to reporters but not at the commission's televised hearings because of the constitutional principle of separation of powers.


"This is mostly about politics, not about the legalities," said Michael Gerhardt, a constitutional law professor at the College of William and Mary who specializes in separation of powers. "There's not much they can point to as settled law to prevent this. This is a matter of political judgment, not legal judgment. ... It hasn't kept her from talking to the press."


Instead of testifying publicly, Rice is requesting a private meeting with the commission — her second such session — to discuss what the White House says are mischaracterizations of her statements.


"I don't know necessarily what the difference is" between a private interview and public testimony, presidential spokesman Scott McClellan said. "She's going to tell it exactly how it happened," he said.


Rice's selective silence denied the administration a chance to answer charges at the hearing by former White House counterterrorism chief Richard A. Clarke, who accuses Bush of squandering opportunities to undermine the terrorist group al-Qaida and politicizing the fight against terrorism.


Clarke's charges strike at the heart of Bush's re-election campaign, raising questions about credibility, trust and Bush's strongest issue in the polls, the war against terrorism.


"In many ways, having a guy like Clarke do this now is the White House's worst nightmare," said Norm Ornstein, political analyst at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. Clarke's charges stole the momentum from the Bush campaign's effort to put Democratic rival John Kerry (news - web sites) on the defensive with ads suggesting he was weak on national security and the economy.


Respected on national security issues, Clarke held posts at the Pentagon (news - web sites), the State Department and the White House in the administrations of Ronald Reagan (news - web sites), George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton (news - web sites) and George W. Bush.


Trying to damage Clarke's credibility "is risky, first of all, because I think he's tough to pull down," Ornstein said.


Rice will try to gain ground in the public relations struggle Sunday by appearing on CBS' "60 Minutes," the same program Clarke used a week earlier to level his charges and promote his new book, "Against All Enemies." Bush's allies in Congress also sought to declassify two-year-old testimony by Clarke, suggesting he may have lied this week when he faulted Bush's handling of the war on terror.


Legal scholars say the White House has a difficult case on its hands as it tries to defend Rice's silence.


"When courts see them coming they lock their doors and run for cover, admonishing the political branches to work out their own difficulties," said Douglas Kmiec, a Pepperdine University law professor who served as a constitutional specialist in the Reagan and first Bush administrations. "It really is a political question the judicial branch feels totally at a loss to resolve."


Princeton University politics professor Keith Whittington said administrations run the risk of looking bad when they invoke executive privilege.


"It's hard to explain this kind of concern to the public, given that there's a strong need for accountability for those in office ... some transparency about what's happening in the White House," said Whittington, a specialist in constitutional issues.


Some Republicans lamented the White House's refusal to put Rice under oath.


"Personally I think her voice is so good, so powerful ... it would be to the administration's benefit" if she testified publicly, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said.

Former New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean, a Republican named by Bush to lead the commission, said, "I think this administration shot itself in the foot by not letting her testify in public."

But White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales said that in order for presidents to receive the most candid advice from their staffs, "it is important that these advisers not be compelled to testify publicly before congressional bodies such as the commission."

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040327/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/rice_hot_seat&cid=542&ncid=716

___

[iggy1I]

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/03/21/terror/main607659.shtml

Retracted White House statements do little to boost public trust. CBS News Correspondent Jim Stewart reports, until today, the Bush administration denied a meeting had taken place between the president and Clarke, during which Bush allegedly instructed Clarke to investigate Saddam Hussein and Iraq after Sept. 11.

The White House today reversed that comment, and staff members now tell reporters, "We are not denying such a meeting took place. It probably did."

Reversed that comment LOL!

[carogonza]

Boy they are sure flip-flopping on the issue! LOL I am just disgusted that Rice goes on every single talk show to talk bad about Clarke and yet can't go in front of the committee. Plus, when she talks to the committee in private, she does not do it under oath. It's shameful. :mad:

[iggy1I]

Boy they are sure flip-flopping on the issue! LOL I am just disgusted that Rice goes on every single talk show to talk bad about Clarke and yet can't go in front of the committee. Plus, when she talks to the committee in private, she does not do it under oath. It's shameful. :mad:
No, no, no--not flip-flopped, reversed! :wink2:

[iggy1I]

New word for today~~Retreated

“Mr. Clarke has told two entirely different stories under oath,” Frist said in a speech from the Senate floor, alleging that Clarke said in 2002 that the Bush administration actively sought to address the threat posed by al-Qaida before the attacks

but then:

Frist later retreated from directly accusing Clarke of perjury, telling reporters that he personally had no knowledge that there were any discrepancies between Clarke’s two appearances. But he said, “Until you have him under oath both times, you don’t know.” Huh, what?

[pattyepye]

The Center for American Progress has compiled an excellent list of
Rice's contradicted claims. Here are some excerpts:

* RICE CLAIM: "I don't think anybody could have predicted that they
would try to use an airplane as a missile, a hijacked airplane as a
missile." National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 5/16/02
* FACT: On August 6, 2001, the President personally "received a
one-and-a-half page briefing advising him that Osama bin Laden was capable of
a major strike against the US, and that the plot could include the
hijacking of an American airplane." In July 2001, the Administration was
also told that terrorists had explored using airplanes as missiles.
[Source: NBC, 9/10/02; LA Times, 9/27/01]

* RICE CLAIM: In May 2002, Rice held a press conference to defend the
Administration from new revelations that the President had been
explicitly warned about an al Qaeda threat to airlines in August 2001. She
"suggested that Bush had requested the briefing because of his keen concern
about elevated terrorist threat levels that summer." [Source:
Washington Post, 3/25/04]
* FACT: According to the CIA, the briefing "was not requested by
President Bush." As commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste disclosed, "the CIA
informed the panel that the author of the briefing does not recall such a
request from Bush and that the idea to compile the briefing came from
within the CIA." [Source: Washington Post, 3/25/04]

* RICE CLAIM: "In June and July when the threat spikes were so high…we
were at battle stations." National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice,
3/22/04
* FACT: "Documents indicate that before Sept. 11, Ashcroft did not give
terrorism top billing in his strategic plans for the Justice
Department, which includes the FBI. A draft of Ashcroft's 'Strategic Plan' from
Aug. 9, 2001, does not put fighting terrorism as one of the department's
seven goals, ranking it as a sub-goal beneath gun violence and drugs.
By contrast, in April 2000, Ashcroft's predecessor, Janet Reno, called
terrorism 'the most challenging threat in the criminal justice area.'"
Meanwhile, the Bush Administration decided to terminate "a highly
classified program to monitor Al Qaeda suspects in the United States."
[Source: Washington Post, 3/22/04; Newsweek, 3/21/04]

* RICE CLAIM: "The fact of the matter is [that] the administration
focused on this before 9/11." National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice,
3/22/04
* FACT: President Bush and Vice President Cheney's counterterrorism
task force, which was created in May, never convened one single meeting.
The President himself admitted that "I didn't feel the sense of urgency"
about terrorism before 9/11. [Source: Washington Post, 1/20/02; Bob
Woodward's "Bush at War"]

* RICE CLAIM: "Our [pre-9/11 NSPD] plan called for military options to
attack al Qaeda and Taliban leadership, ground forces and other targets
-- taking the fight to the enemy where he lived." National Security
Adviser Condoleezza Rice, 3/22/04
* FACT: 9/11 Commissioner Gorelick: "There is nothing in the NSPD that
came out that we could find that had an invasion plan, a military
plan." Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage: "Right." Gorelick: "Is it
true, as Dr. Rice said, 'Our plan called for military options to attack
Al Qaida and Taliban leadership'?" Armitage: "No, I think that was
amended after the horror of 9/11." [Source: 9/11 Commission testimony,
3/24/04]