#78 November/December 2005
The Washington Free Press Washington's Independent Journal of News, Ideas & Culture
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TOP STORIES

Genetically Engineered Designer Politicians
When it comes to politicians, intelligent design trumps evolution
by Todd Huffman, MD

Judge: Grant County's Public Defense System Deficient
from the ACLU of Washington

The Day My Leaf Blower Became Silent
story & photos by Kristianna Baird

FREE THOUGHTS

READER MAIL
More Trust Goes to Doctors; A Plague Upon You; Can We Clean Up the Hanford Clean-up?; American Politicians: A Threat to the World; On Hunger Strike in WA Prison

Writing in an Age of Terror
by David Swanson

Somebody Up There Likes Us!
Utne Reader nominates us for best local/regional coverage
from the editor

NORTHWEST & BEYOND compiled by Sharlynn Cobaugh
Small-Town Victory in North Central Cascades; Seattleites Rally Against Military Recruitment; US Wants Extradition of Canada's Prince of Pot; Old Growth Forests Endangered by Healthy Forest Initiative; CAFTA: A knife in the back of health freedom-fighters; Dirty Kilowatts; Chavez Prepares for US Intervention

HEALTH

Dentist Gone Native: The prophetic nutritional research of Dr. Weston Price, DDS
Part 2 (conclusion): The effects of modern diet on native peoples
by Dr. Stephen Byrnes

LABOR

Work For Bush
cartoon by David Logan

What About the Rank and File?
Labor leaders are still ignoring Labor's biggest asset: volunteer members
part 2 (conclusion)
opinion by Brian King

Federal Charges Filed Against Cascadian Building Maintenance
from SEIU Local 6

Temp World
part 1
by Margie M. Mitchell

POLITICS

Able Danger: 'Something Bigger Here'
New evidence regarding prior government knowledge of 9/11 terrorists
by Rodger Herbst

Socialist Candidate Scores Well in Seattle Vote
from Advocates for Averill

ENVIRONMENT

Ford Redoubles Green-washing Efforts
Activists double over laughing
from Global Exchange and Rainforest Action Network

TRASH TALK by Dave and Lillian Brummet
The Valuable Individual; Reduce Waste this Christmas

WAR

MEDIA BEAT by Norman Solomon
'The War on Terror'--in Translation

Did you know that...
from David Swanson and O'Kelly McCluskey

Iraq: Toward an Honorable Exit
by Phil Heft

CONTACTS/ACTIVISM

NORTHWEST NEIGHBORS
contact list of subscribers who like to talk with you

DO SOMETHING! CALENDAR
Northwest activist events

MEDIA

Bird Flu!
cartoon by Andrew Wahl

Washington Prisons Pay Record Censorship Penalty
from Prison Legal News

Cable-Access TV Faces Local and National Threats
from SCAN

LAW

Too Much Seatime
by John Merriam, attorney-at-law

CULTURE

Teacher; Dead Artists; Untitled
Three poems by Robert Pavlik

If God...
by Styx Mundstock

The Wanderings and Thoughts of Kip Kellogg
by Vincent Spada

PUMPKIN EDDIE'S LIGHTNING POEMS
Moody; Crazy
by Vincent Spada

EDUCATION

Weapons of Mass Instruction
by Paul Rathgeb

Able Danger: 'Something Bigger Here'

by Rodger Herbst

Four years after the 9/11 attacks, evidence has surfaced of intelligence data on al-Qaeda operatives which was obtained prior to the attacks and destroyed by the Pentagon. Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer and Mr. James Smith (a defense contractor at the time with Orion Scientific Systems) along with several others have come forward to state that they remember seeing Mohammed Atta's picture and/or his name in the data that was collected by a secret Pentagon intelligence unit known as "Able Danger" prior to September 11, 2001.

Shaffer noted that at the request of the Able Danger project leader Navy Captain Scott Phillpott, he and Smith repeatedly tried to arrange meetings with the FBI to provide information on al-Qaeda, but each time Pentagon lawyers cancelled the meeting at the last minute. (John Crewdson and Andrew Zajac "Atta known to Pentagon before 9/11" Chicago Tribune, 9/28/05)

For his efforts, Shaffer became a Pentagon smear target. In an interview, Shaffer described how the government spent almost $400,000 to discredit him. In the end, his security clearance was revoked by the Department of Defense (DOD), effectively ending his career. He and Smith are now under the council of Mark Zaid, whose specialty is defending whistleblowers in national security disputes. (www.alternet.org/story/26095)

On June 27 2005, Representative Curt Weldon, R-Penn., Vice Chair of the Armed Services and Homeland Security Committees, delivered a 45-minute speech on the House floor outlining the nature of Able Danger and the data it had developed on al-Qaeda prior to 9/11. A Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, chaired by Senator Arlen Specter, was convened on Sept 21 2005. Five key Pentagon witnesses, including Shaffer and Smith, volunteered to testify, but were gagged by order of the Pentagon.

Committee Chair Specter suggested the Pentagon could be engaging in obstruction. Representative Weldon testified that the former Able Danger team members were prevented from testifying, according to the Pentagon, due to concern regarding classified information, in spite of the claims of the Pentagon to the Armed Services Committee that the bulk of the data was open source, i.e. freely available to the public. DOD lawyers relatedly claimed that no certificate was needed to destroy the massive amount of data.

From a transcript of the hearing, Weldon's words evoke the sentiment of the most ardent 9/11 truth advocate: "My goal now Mr. Chairman is the same as it was then: the full and complete truth about the run up to 9-11.... I promised Michael's wife & kids, and Ray's wife & kids & grandkids, that we would not stop until the day that we learned all the facts about 9-11. Unfortunately Mr. Chairman, that day has not arrived."

Eric Kleinsmith testified that he was ordered to destroy Able Danger's 2.25 terabytes of information, the equivalent of About one-third the contents of the Library of Congress. The data was deleted in May-June 2000.

Representative Weldon testified that he attempted on four separate occasions to brief 9/11 Commission members on a number of issues, including Able Danger. One commissioner who was finally briefed stated the 9/11 commissioners were never briefed by staff on Able Danger, and that the facts had to be brought out. Shaffer and Smith also tried to provide information to the 9/11 Commission, but, according to Shaffer, this information never made it to the panel members. (www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/08/17/sept.11.hijackers)

In a news release, 9/11 Commission co-chairs Kean and Hamilton said the panel became aware of Able Danger on October 21, 2003, when Philip Zelikow, White House insider and executive director of the 9/11 Commission met with three DOD intelligence officers at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. Kean and Hamilton said the official memorandum from that meeting did not mention that any hijackers' names were brought up during the conversation.

According to Rory O' Connor of Alternet, Shaffer noted in a recent interview : "I'm honestly, you know, flabbergasted that there's such resistance on this ... And I don't know exactly which ant hill... we kicked over. We've all kind of talked amongst ourselves on this and there seems to be something else, something bigger here, that maybe we're just so close to that we can't see." (www.alternet.org/story/26095)

Something bigger to be sure, but why can't they see it?


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