9/11 Commission Chairs: We Weren't Thorough Enough

The report was thorough, but it comes as a surprise to no one that much was hidden...

AP: Book: Sept. 11 panel doubted officials

The Sept. 11 commission was so frustrated with repeated misstatements by the Pentagon and FAA about their response to the 2001 terror attacks that it considered an investigation into possible deception, the panel's chairmen say in a new book.

Republican Thomas Kean and Democrat Lee Hamilton also say in "Without Precedent" that their panel was too soft in questioning former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani — and that the 20-month investigation may have suffered for it.

The book, a behind-the-scenes look at the investigation, recounts obstacles the authors say were thrown up by the Bush administration, internal disputes over President Bush's use of the attacks as a reason for invading Iraq, and the way the final report avoided questioning whether U.S. policy in the Middle East may have contributed to the attacks...

I'm with Americablog on this one... why do all these government officials fuck up while on the job, and then write tell-all books after the fact passing the buck and assuring us how they really knew what to do all along, but were stymied by outside factors? In this case, Kean Hamilton admit they were too soft on interviewing certainly politicians who were popular with the media (ie. Guiliani for one) and also admit they didn't dig enough on certain issues. Is this a case of hindsight being 20/20 or did they realize it at the time? If it's the latter, then there's no excuse why they didn't just do their jobs and not worry about what the editorials might say. In short... government officials should do better jobs, so that the rest of us have less mea-culpa books to sit through later on.

And, of course, this news will be further fuel for the conspiracy theorists. The AP report on the Commission does further cement my belief that it is the White House itself which is most responsible for allowing these theories to grow. The secrecy with which they approached every aspect of their post-9/11 work implies they have something to hide. Me personally, I believe that they're simply hiding their own failures and agenda of an unfettered executive, but I suppose it's understandable why some might see a more sinister coverup.

(Sidenote for the conspiracy theorists... Even if you believe Bush, et al, were really that evil, let's face it, not a one of them were smart or competent enough to pull it off. Sorry. Just accept that they were asleep at the wheel and let's move on.)