The Weekly Koolaid Magazine: Cheney Speaks

On Clinton's pardons, 9/11 as seen from the White House bunker, mistakes made in Iraq, and more.

From Weekly Standard magazine:


Here is an excerpt of detail of Cheney's reaction to WTC attack:



In the Old Executive Office Building, Scooter Libby's young assistant Jennifer Mayfield was also monitoring the developments in New York on her television. Libby had just begun a meeting with John Hannah, a top national security adviser to Cheney. President Bush had decided to support the creation of a Palestinian state, a major change in U.S. policy. The vexing details of the coming announcement had been in discussion for weeks without resolution. Libby wanted desperately to come up with a policy guidance for the vice president by the end of the day. Before the meeting started, he had given Mayfield strict orders: Do not interrupt this meeting.


As soon as she saw that a plane had hit the World Trade Center, Mayfield charged into her boss's office. Libby and Hannah listened to her report. "Unless it's terrorism," Libby responded, "don't interrupt me again."


Back at the White House, Cheney watched the screen as thick, gray smoke poured from the hole in the north tower. He, too, noticed that it was a clear day in New York. "How in the hell," he asked himself, "could a plane hit the World Trade Center?"


Seconds later, he had his answer. Cheney and McConnell watched as a second plane appeared on the right hand side of the screen, banked slightly to the left, and plunged into the south tower.



"Did you see that?" Cheney asked his speechwriter.


In the ABC News picture, the north tower largely blocked their view of the plane hitting the south tower. Still, they were able to see a massive blast of smoke behind the north tower and debris from the explosion falling to the ground below.


"We knew then it was terrorism," Cheney recalls.
Jenny Mayfield raced back into Libby's office and told him: "It's terrorism." Within seconds, Libby received a call from Cheney asking him to return to the White House.
Moments after the second plane hit, Cheney "popped out of his chair," says McConnell, and walked across the hallway to the office he had occupied as chief of staff in the Ford administration. The current occupant, Andy Card, was traveling with President Bush in Florida. Cheney told Card's secretary that he wanted to speak with Card when he called back to the White House and returned to his office.



And here is an excerpt of Cheney's reaction of the attack and the lives lost in the bunker:



Cheney stopped briefly. He was obviously moved.


We know of these and so many similar acts of courage and kindness on that terrible morning. Other stories, we will never know. Surely men and women here, and aboard Flight 77, were in their last moments holding and comforting one another. And when we think of them, it will always be with a special feeling of empathy and sorrow.


As Cheney spoke these words, he looked out at the families of the ones who were lost. Many of them, holding and comforting one another, looked back at him, their faces streaked with tears. A burly Army Ranger stood alone next to the holding area for the press, crying silently as he listened.


We will always understand the pain of their families. And our nation will forever look with reverence upon their place--this place where there lives ended.


And then Cheney paused, his words and his emotions tangled in his throat. He started to speak and then, choking back tears, stopped again. Reporters exchanged quick glances as if to confirm that they were seeing what they thought they were seeing.


For the man who had repeatedly evaded questions about how those attacks affected him personally, this was his answer.


*cough* *cough* (Biloxi blows his nose). I find it amazing that Libby, the public servant, a "good man," and the lovefest of the koolaid drinkers did not want to be interrupted in his meeting despite his assistant told him of the first plane that hit the WTC. I guess the meeting was more important to Libby than National Security. When Libby said that "unless it is terrorism, don't interrupt him?" Then, first plane hitting the WTC was not an act of terrorism??? And the audiacity of Cheney to wait until the second plane hit the WTC and then respond, "it's terrorism?" Ya think it was terrorism when the first plane hit, Dick? This magazine certainly exposed the hypocrisy of the Administration and Dick.