The speech Condi Rice was going to deliver on Sept. 11, 2001, was, the White House said, “confidential” and therefore off-limits to the 9/11 Commission.
The White House has refused to provide the independent commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks with a speech that national security adviser Condoleezza Rice was to have delivered on the night of the attacks touting missile defense as a priority rather than al-Qaida, sources close to the commission said Tuesday.
With Rice scheduled to publicly testify Thursday before the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, the commission submitted a last-minute request for Rice’s aborted Sept. 11 address, the sources told Reuters on condition of anonymity. But the White House has so far refused on the grounds that draft documents are confidential, the sources said.
Though the negative reaction in the media was fairly tepid, the White House caved quickly anyway.
[9/11 Commission member Bob] Kerrey said the panel was provided yesterday with a copy of a draft speech that Rice was scheduled to give on the day of the Sept. 11 attacks. It focused on missile defense and made little mention of terrorism. Some commissioners had complained that the document had not been turned over to the panel, and the presidential campaign of Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) accused the White House yesterday of trying to “stonewall” the commission.
Is it me or has the White House been reversing itself very quickly every time a controversy pops up with the Commission? First the White House fought the very existence of the Commission, then Bush said he was for it. Later, Bush insisted he would only speak to the panel for an hour, then it became “as long as they needed.” Bush said he’d only talk to Kean and Hamilton, then it was the full panel. Rice couldn’t possibly be allowed to testify, then she could. The White House withheld thousands of Clinton-era docs, then it gave up 90% of them. Rice’s speech was “confidential,” but it was in the panel’s hands 24 hours later.
I wonder, if pushed hard enough, whether Bush would give in and agree to speak to the Commission by himself, without Cheney there to hold his hand.