War criminal to probe mass murder Ex-Senator Bob Kerrey appointed to 9/11 panel

War criminal to probe mass murder Ex-Senator Bob Kerrey appointed to 9/11 panel: Last month, Cleland denounced the agreement reached between the White House and the commission’s leadership to severely limit access to documents that are key to determining what the administration knew about the threat of terrorist attacks before September 11.

The deal, accepted by the panel’s chairman, former New Jersey Republican Governor Thomas Keane, and Democratic Vice-Chairman Lee Hamilton, a former congressman from Indiana, governs access to Presidential Daily Briefs. These are daily summaries of US intelligence reports provided to the president.

According to press reports, one of these briefs, issued on August 6, 2001—a month before some 3,000 people were killed at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon—warned the White House of plans by Al Qaeda to mount terrorist attacks using hijacked airplanes.

Rather than issuing subpoenas demanding the full panel’s unrestricted access to these crucial documents, the leadership of the panel agreed to a rigged procedure in which only one commissioner and one staff member will be allowed to review selected portions of the briefs and write summaries of them, with the White House then vetting the final material, removing whatever it sees fit.

“If this decision stands, I, as a member of the commission, cannot look any American in the eye, especially family members of victims, and say the commission had full access,” Cleland said following the announcement of the deal. “This investigation is now compromised.... This is ‘The Gong Show;’ this isn’t protection of national security.”