Tid Bits

I don’t want to get into the Able Danger mess because, as I wrote earlier, my gut tells me it’s nonsense. However, I can’t resist sharing two new pieces of information:

From Steve Soto I learned that the whole “roll-out” of the story was pre-approved by Dennis Hastert, Pete Hoekstra and most amazingly, Steven Cambone at the Pentagon. I’m sure they were all just showing their deep respect for whistleblowers. (Too bad Bunatine Greenhouse didn’t get pre-approved.)

The other tid-bit, via Laura Rozen, is that another member of the team came forward to say that Atta had been named in 2000. Unfortunately, he couldn’t produce any evidence because:

The former contractor, James D. Smith, said that Mr. Atta’s name and photograph were obtained through a private researcher in California who was paid to gather the information from contacts in the Middle East. Mr. Smith said that he had retained a copy of the chart for some time and that it had been posted on his office wall at Andrews Air Force Base. He said it had become stuck to the wall and was impossible to remove when he switched jobs.

It would be interesting to know if he switched jobs before or after 9/11.

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