Three Big Stories You Won't Read In Your Newspaper

I.

U.S. Representative Curt Weldon (D-PA) created a stir this past week when he claimed that a secret U.S. Military Intelligence outfit code-named "Able Danger" uncovered the existence of an Al Qaeda terrorist cell in New Jersey headed by Mohammed Atta, more than six months before Atta (who was the chief coordinator for the 9/11 attacks) flew his hijacked plane into the World Trade Center. (see Captain Ed here, here, here & here and follow the links, too)

According to Weldon, the report was turned over to the Pentagon and the CIA who refused a recommendation to turn the information over to the FBI. The refusal was allegedly based on the "wall of separation" that, as Executive Branch policy, severely limited the cross-over of intelligence information from the military/CIA into the Justice Department/FBI.

Also related to this story is the allegation that the "Able Danger" report had been shared with the Congressional 9/11 Commission that, earlier this year, released the final, definitive report on the intelligence failures, etc. surrounding the terrorist attack on the United States. The final Commission report, however, makes no mention of "Able Danger's" alleged pre-9/11 identification of Atta (and also, perhpas, the names of three other men who later participated in the attacks).

Why wasn't this information, which if true is extremely important, not included in the Commission's report? Was their a cover-up? If so, why?

At first the Commission leaders said absolutely that they had never heard of that allegation or heard of "Able Danger" during their investigation. Then, a few days later, they said that they had heard the information but had rejected it as inconsistant with other reports they had received. Still later, they issued a detailed account of the meetings (which they had previously said had never occurred) claiming that the alleged information had never been presented to them at all!

Weldon, unfortunately, has thus far produced no physical evidence (in the form of documentation or a real Able Danger person) to back his allegations up. Although breaking stories suggest that one Able Danger member may have stepped forward to speak to a reporter and confirm what Weldon has claimed, the matter now sits as a stalemate with the age-old "he said-she said" leaving the rest of us wondering where the truth of the matter lies.

Hav you read much of this in your newspaper or heard it on the evening news? I didn't think so.

II.

Although the news media has followed the comedy of errors between Europe and Iran diplomatically "negotiating" the issue of Iran's nuclear power program (including the alleged manufacturing of enriched uranium...suitable for making nuclear weapons) there has been very little analysis over what is really at stake.

It appears that it takes a European to put the pieces together and lay out the dilemma that the United States (and Israel) are facing. Niall Ferguson lays it all on the line in an op-ed piece in the Telegraph today entitled, "Iran's revolution is in its infancy--But it may have just found its Stalin." (ht: Hugh Hewitt)

Iran, which has already been accused of supporting terrorists in Iraq and even providing support for the 9/11 terrorists then and Osama bin Laden today, represents a major reservoir of untapped international terrorism. Should the United States (or Israel) allow the nuclear weapons program to run its course, the world's greatest supporter of radical Islamic terrorism would have a nuclear bomb. Most of the Arab/Irani Muslim world would rather see Israel as a nuclear wasteland than to see it remain as a Jewish State. Such a weapon would have a very good chance of being used...whether provoked or not....either in Isreal or the United States.

Such a weapon could be used to hold nations hostage as well, forcing the Ayatollah's will on those they might threaten.

On the other hand, should the United States of Israel conduct a "preemptive" strike against Iran's nuclear facilities, that untapped reservoir of radical Islamic terror would most assuredly be set loose througout the Middle East, Europe, South Asia and North America.

Either of these scenarios are clearly unacceptable to the West, including Israel. But what to do about it?

Has this reality been discussed on TV or in the printed news lately? I didn't think so.

III.

For nineteen months a New York investigative team has been looking into what has now risen to nearly $900,000 in "loans" made to one of the founders of the liberal national talk radio program, "Air America." The loans were made by the "Gloria Wise Boys & Girls Club," a charitable agency in New York that specializes in providing programs for children, troubled teens and the elderly, including sufferers of Alzheimer's Disease. Much of their funding comes from federal tax money.

The concern here is self-evident: Were federal tax monies, designated for charitable programs for children, the poor, the sick and the elderly, transferred to help financially prop up the launching of a politically liberal talk show program?

And, by the way....what was the money spent on? And where is it now? And how was it to have been repayed?

And........why hasn't the national media been interested in this story? If it had involved Rush Limbaugh or Bill O'Reilly the press would have been all over this investigation. Is there a bias here because the business involved is a liberal one? Even the home-town newspaper, the New York Times, has failed to print a single news story on the matter although the internet has been sharing information concerning the investigation for over two weeks.

If it hadn't been for the New York Sun and the blogosphere, the story might not have gotten out at all!

You've heard of this story, too, of course? You haven't? Wonder of wonders!