Chameleon Clarke

Fox News reports an background briefing by Richard Clarke, taped by by Jim Angle in early August 2002. Excerpts:

there was no plan on Al Qaeda that was passed from the Clinton administration to the Bush administration.

. . . [T]he Clinton administration had a strategy in place, effectively dating from 1998. And there were a number of issues on the table since 1998. And they remained on the table when that administration went out of office . . . And in January 2001, the incoming Bush administration was briefed on the existing strategy. They were also briefed on these series of issues that had not been decided on in a couple of years.

. . . [T]he Bush administration decided then, you know, in late January, to do two things. One, vigorously pursue the existing policy . . .. The second thing the administration decided to do is to initiate a process to look at those issues which had been on the table for a couple of years and get them decided.

. . . [T]hat process which was initiated in the first week in February . . . decided in principle . . . in the spring to add to the existing Clinton strategy and to increase CIA resources . . . for covert action, five-fold, to go after Al Qaeda.

They report. I decide. I think his credibility is shot full of holes.


Of course, today Clarke's got a book he and the Democrats on the 9/11 Commission are flogging and those statements were made before he didn't get the job he wanted in the Homeland Security Department. But he says, "I will not accept any position in the Kerry administration should there be one." I don't think he needs to worry about that. Nobody but an idiot would appoint a guy who has switched sides twice. On second thought, he might make a good lobbyist.

Update: William Saletan is trumpeting Clarke's revelations without a hint of skepticism or question. It's his smoking gun to show that Bush did nothing and lied, yadda, yadda, yadda.