a good overview on Able Danger

From the Left Coaster:

Why Did Rummy Shut Down Senate's Inquiry Into Able Danger Today?
We’ve commented on Curt Weldon’s pursuit of the Able Danger story previously. For those of you who may not remember, GOP representative Curt Weldon has made claims in the past about the gathering threat from Iran, and has taken the usual “Blame Clinton” approach when making his points about Bin Laden, Al Qaeda, and Iran. Recently, Weldon claimed that a secret Pentagon unit, Able Danger, was tracking Mohammad Atta and the other three members of his domestic Al Qaeda cell here for at least a year before 9/11, but those findings for some reason weren’t reported by the Pentagon to the 9/11 Commission. The Pentagon said that they would investigate why Able Danger’s work wasn’t provided to the 9/11 Commission, but like all other Bush Administration claims of cooperation, nothing came of this.

The Senate decided it wanted answers from the administration on what the Pentagon has found out, after 9/11 Commission chair Tom Kean said he wanted to know also why the commissioners weren’t told about Able Danger. Initially, it was thought that Weldon and the Pentagon would try and spin this as another “Blame Clinton” story, by trying to show that Able Danger’s work was not acted upon at the end of the Clinton Administration. Yet it has been discovered since that for some reason Southern Command never forwarded Able Danger’s findings up the chain into the national security hierarchy. Southern Command was the home to one Tommy Franks. And it has also been determined that Richard Clarke was never told about Able Danger.

Recently, the Able Danger staff revealed that it was the Bush Administration that actually pulled the plug on Able Danger in February 2001, right around the time that Sandy Berger tried to brief one Condi Rice about the dangers posed by Al Qaeda, and right about the time that the new Bush Administration pulled the FBI off of pursuing the Bin Laden family for their role in supporting terrorism.

So imagine my surprise this morning in finding out that the Pentagon prevented all Department of Defense staff from participating in the Senate hearing today, pissing off Arlen Specter among other GOP senators. Now that it appears that Able Danger will actually become a black eye for the Bush Administration, and not the Clinton Administration, what is Rummy hiding?

Kudos to the fine work of Kos diarists topdog04 and Sherlock Google.

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Once again, trying to blame Clinton for the repugs' own failings. No wonder they are trying to squash it yet again!