So Many Republican Hypocrites, So Little Time

February 1, 2008 | SEND TO A FRIEND | GET EARLY NOTICE OF THE HOTW

Philip Zelikow

Welcome back to the BuzzFlash GOP Hypocrite of the Week.

The 9/11 Commission has long been suspected of being a bipartisan whitewash of the Bush Administration failures in preventing 9/11 and its botched immediate follow-up after the event.

But, according to Think Progress, it turns out that Philip Zelikow, who was chosen to be the executive director of the 9/11 Commission, was actually one of the key people who set up the flawed national security apparatus under Condoleezza Rice, you know the one that blew off a CIA warning in the summer of 2001 of imminent Al-Qaeda hijackings in the U.S.

Do you get the picture? This was like Bush appointing himself to investigate the Katrina disaster and the Valerie Plame outing. In short, Zelikow -- as with Bush -- was in a position to monitor and mold information so as to save his own neck, along with the necks of Rice, Bush, and Dick Cheney.

According to ABC News, when "9/11 Commission co-chairs Tom Kean and Lee Hamilton hired former Condoleezza Rice aide Philip Zelikow to be executive director, Zelikow failed to tell them about his role helping Rice set up President George W. Bush's National Security Council in early 2001 -- and that he was 'instrumental' in demoting Richard Clarke, the one-time White House counterterrorism czar who was fixated on the threat from Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda."

It is also now being alleged that Zelikow, contrary to explicit Commission guidelines, discussed the "investigation" with Karl Rove. (It should be noted, that Zelikow admits talking to Rove at the time on a number of occasions but says that it was not about Commission work. No doubt, they were discussing the prospects for the Washington Redskins.)

Of course, we'll never get to the bottom of it -- and perhaps unravel the untold story of 9/11 -- because the Democrats in Congress aren't going to use their subpoena powers to undercut a bipartisan commission, even if its executive director appears to have good reason to cover up a lot of the truth.

Much of this information is coming from a new book, "The Commission: The Uncensored History of the 9/11 Investigation," to be published in February by New York Times reporter Philip Shenon.

Zelikow, who went on to work for Rice again after his stint with the 9/11 Commission, may continue to deny some of the claims, but the case for an ipso facto conflict of interest is evident.

One can speculate Zelikow was more interested in censoring much of the true 9/11 story than revealing it, because it was his actions -- along with his buddies in the Bush Administration -- that were on the line.

That's some hypocrisy to whitewash 9/11. That's the granddaddy of them all this decade, along with the lying that led us into the Iraq War.

For that dubious honor, Philip Zelikow is presented with the BuzzFlash GOP Hypocrite of the Week Award.

Remember our motto: So many Republican hypocrites, so little time.

Catch up with you soon.