Fact-checking asses on the web has become such a widespread participatory sport that it’s almost a cliche. The Center for American Progress has published two truly masterful—and painstakingly sourced—examples of the exercise in top form:
- “Claim vs. fact: Condoleezza Rice’s opening statement”
- “Claim vs. fact: Rice’s Q&A testimony before the 9/11 Commission”
Here’s one excerpt:
CLAIM: “I do not remember any reports to us, a kind of strategic warning, that planes might be used as weapons.” [responding to Kean]
FACT: Condoleezza Rice was the top National Security official with President Bush at the July 2001 G-8 summit in Genoa. There, “U.S. officials were warned that Islamic terrorists might attempt to crash an airliner” into the summit, prompting officials to “close the airspace over Genoa and station antiaircraft guns at the city’s airport.” [Sources: Los Angeles Times, 9/27/01; White House release, 7/22/01]
CLAIM: “I was certainly not aware of [intelligence reports about planes as missiles] at the time that I spoke” in 2002. [responding to Kean]
FACT: While Rice may not have been aware of the 12 separate and explicit warnings about terrorists using planes as weapons when she made her denial in 2002, she did know about them when she wrote her March 22, 2004 Washington Post op-ed. In that piece, she once again repeated the claim there was no indication “that terrorists were preparing to attack the homeland using airplanes as missiles.” [Source: Washington Post, 3/22/04]
OK, one more:
CLAIM: There was “nothing about the threat of attack in the U.S.” in the Presidential Daily Briefing the President received on August 6th. [responding to Ben Veniste]
FACT: Rice herself confirmed that “the title [of the PDB] was, ‘Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the United States.’” [Source: Condoleezza Rice, 4/8/04]
The whole “Rice testimony before 9/11 Commisson” section is the best coverage of today’s events I’ve seen.
Highly recommended. You won’t find analysis like this in the corporate media because of a vested interest in maintaining the status quo.
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