St.Pete Times gets Letter from Gonzalaz....

[bluedog]

They printed this in the Ed sec..The times has been bashing bush as of late as the letter writers in our city...people are getting outraged at bush and have made their opinions known...and lo and behold here comes a letter from the WH...LOL

http://www.sptimes.com/2003/11/12/news_pf/Opinion/White_House_is_cooper.shtml

Re: Secrets and security, editorial, Nov. 5.

Contrary to the impression conveyed by your editorial, the president has clearly stated a policy of strong support for the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, and the executive branch has dedicated tremendous resources to assisting the commission.

Because of the extraordinarily unique nature of the Sept. 11 tragedy, the executive branch has provided truly unprecedented and extraordinary access to the commission, including more than 2-million pages of documents, nearly 100 briefings and more than 300 interviews. The commission has had access to many highly classified and extremely sensitive documents that have seldom, if ever, been made available outside the executive branch, particularly on this scale.

snip

. We have discussed special access arrangements for only a small fraction of the most sensitive information and have consistently proposed new ways to facilitate prompt review of information.

We look forward to continued cooperation with the commission as it completes its work.


-- Alberto R. Gonzalez, counsel to the president, the White House, Washington, D.C.

[realFedUp]

1. Doing his own PR work now eh...

The White House spin office too busy on other
matters?

[soup]

2. Well, how weird is that?

Don't believe I've ever seen anything like it.

Wonder if the St Pete Times is the only paper that received this letter? or did they 'astroturf it' on other op/ed pages across the country?

How very odd. *jr's lead counsel has nothing better to do than to respond to editorials in the St Pete Times... :crazy:

[bluedog]

3. did anyone else

get this letter in their local paper or was it in ours just because of Jebby? I thought it strange when I started reading the eds.and then thought.shit..they are trying to stifle our newspaper right here in the US....

[seafan]

4. Here is that wonderful editorial that unglued the WH counsel!

From the "Secrets and Security" editorial in the St. Pete Times on November 5, 2003:


<snip>

.......From the start, the administration has been less than friendly toward any effort to investigate the executive branch's activities related to the 9/11 attacks. President Bush initially opposed the creation of an independent commission. And, since getting under way, the leaders of the commission have complained about difficulties in gaining access to key documents and witnesses.

If Rice believes the Clinton administration and even the prior Bush and Reagan administrations responded inadequately to the growing terrorist threat, isn't it vital we now have a full accounting? Our estimated $30-billion intelligence apparatus can't be reformed until we know precisely what went wrong and why. Unless the White House offers its full cooperation, the commission chairman, former New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean, will have no choice but to subpoena the documents, setting the stage for a possible court battle.

The Bush administration has been one of the most secretive in modern history, jealously guarding the president's public image. But politics and ego should take a back seat to national security in this case. Before Rice points any more fingers, the White House has some disclosing to do.

http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/sptimes/index.html?ts=1068655870


:)