Rating: 
Summary: A sad indictment of our bureacratic culture
Review: While I was never a big fan of President Clinton, I always felt all of the hoopla surrounding the Lewinsky scandal was overblown nonsense. After reading this (and Losing bin Laden by R. Miniter) this week, I realized now that I was wrong. Of course, all of the clues are easy to see in hindsight, but, regardless, it seems ludicrous that Clinton declined many opportunities to stop bin Laden. The evidence was there, and I am sure he knew a lot more as President than the author or any of us will ever know. However, all of the distractions Clinton faced did not allow a clear vision of how to deal with the problems wrought by al-Qeida. Additionally, the strong Clinton desire (and Carter-esque failure) to be the one to bring peace between Israel and Palestine clouded his judgment even more. The saddest parts, in my view, was the attitude of the Administration was that dealing with these terrorists was a criminal justice matter. Time and time again, Clinton and Janet Reno felt "there wasn't enough evidence" (Sound familiar? There is never "enough evidence" in the liberal mindset) What got me most upset were the bureaucratic rules and institutional turf battles that denied our country the protection we deserve. September 11th showed those rules to be a disaster, yet the ACLU and every Democrat is castigating John Ashcroft for removing them. Read this book honestly, and with an open mind, and you will see what Bush and Ashcroft were, and are, up against. The accounts of how the terrorists used (and mocked) our Democratic systems against us should make everyone reasses the reality of what needs to be done, and stop this feel-good non-judgementalism.To be honest, I planned to pass this book over. I did not like Posner's book Case Closed. While it made perfect sense in a lot of ways, all of the logic in the world cannot explain away the Zapruder film. I did not care to read any of his future work because of it. However, I saw Posner on the O'Reilly Factor, and I was compelled to read this. It was well worth it.
Rating: 
Summary: A Red Herring!?
Review: The confoundingly selective content of this book leads me to believe it was written as a disinformation tool to help shift the blame for 911 away from the Bush administration. On the other hand, if you believe that Lee Harvey Oswald killed JFK with that famous single Magic Bullet (the case for which was made by Mr. Posner in his earlier work, 'Case Closed'), you'll LOVE this book. I give it two stars despite the content because the actual writing is engaging. I give it no more than two stars, however, because it is, in my view, essentially an unconvincing snow job.
Rating:
Summary: Surprisingly Good And Balanced
Review: As an aside, I read Stephen Jones book on the OKC bombing and it didn't convince me of a larger conspiracy, however Posner in this one mentioned Jayna Davis ,and her investigation into the OKC Bombing showing middle eastern involvement, endorsed by a former head of the CIA, and some other noteworthy folks. Her book The Third Terrorist has just been published,I picked it up and it's defnitely most shocking & convincing.Seems the limosine liberals who act as if.. gee conspiracies don't happen in America, when they happen all the time, & each case must be examined rigorously to pass any judgement on it,, when if these knuckleheads got off their butts and investigated maybe we would have a more united history that is understood. Because, the way the media are such lapdogs with no attention span, nor ability to go after a story afer a Govt. Agency makes a pronouncement, we don't know what happened. 911 we will probably never understand, since the media don't understand very powerful conspiracies using multiple groups, exhanging personnel, recruitment from different countries, and large sums of money changing hands etc.. It took me a long time to read this book as Posner's Case Closed was just sheer garbage, to put it mildly,if you can tell me with a straight face Oswald acted alone, you could probably also tell me LBJ & Nixon were honest men, so I wasn't in any big hurry, but he redeemed himself here with a solid work that shows faults across the board, and doesn't come across as another partisan with an agenda.
Rating:
Summary: Great take on the failure to stop 9/11
Review: Posner has written a great book on why America failed to stop 9/11 and has uncovered new information along the way. Posner details the rise of militant Islam in the US, the rise of Bin Laden, terrorism funding, blown chances to stop 9/11, and shocking new info on countries that may have known about 9/11. The missed oppurtunities by the CIA and the FBI to stop 9/11 have been widely reported and there really isn't much new info. The parts I enjoyed were the chapters "Jihad in America", "The Interrogation", and the chapter on terrorism financing. Militant Islam has been around for a long time. Posner discusses its rise during the 90s and how people were preaching hatred towards America for a long time. Guess where most of the money comes from for terrorism? From US charities. Many of them are fronts for terrorists. The last chapter is probably the best in the book. I would say about half the chapters of the book are new information. Posner rereports some open facts for about half the book, but the other half is definitely worth the read.
Rating:
Summary: Not that great, and GROSS overuse of footnotes
Review: The story I found ho-hum, nothing really that amazing. I thought the official 9/11 report much more interesting.
I was particularly distracted by Posner's overuse of footnotes -- not to be confused with endnotes, where an author documents his sources and are good, Posner likes to have footnotes sprinkled about on most pages. This style is annoying b/c apparently (or as near as I can figure), there is no threshold in Posner's mind as to what qualifies as a footnote versus a regular paragraph. A skilled author could easily have incorporated the relevant content of the footnotes into the main text.
Overall, ho hum. Wish I didn't pay so much for the hard-cover version.
Rating: 
Summary: This Book Might Make Your Blood Boil
Review: Scores upon scores of books have been written about the horror and tragedy of 9/11, but this book is the first one to provide a fully detailed account of the failures of the Clinton administration and of a guy too busy playing with bimbos and snookering the nation with his charm if not his incompetence to fully grasp the menace of Bin Laden.
The chapter on the woeful experience of James Woolsey, one of the finest men to serve our country through four administrations (not a Richard Clarke) is worth the purchase of the book alone. Clinton, desperately seeking a Conservative voice on his Carterite National Security team, chose Woolsey to head the CIA, barely knowing the man, and then ignored him. Gathering intelligence on the increasing threat of Al Qaeda, Woolsey time and time and time again urgently sought one-on-one meetings with Clinton, only to be rebuffed. In one astonishing conversation, Woolsey asked his National Security counterparts if they had access to the President - and even liberals like Tony Lake and Warren Christopher responded that they had not. Woolsey, in disgust, resigned. As did a Les Aspin, scapegoated for Clinton's failures to deal with Al Qaeda terrorism in Somalia.
This was Bill Clinton - a guy who was supposed to be on the ball and secure our people. And Liberals still talk about President Reagan nodding off.
What is even more remarkable about this fully detailed, factual account of how the ball was dropped is that the Posners were liberals too. Gerald Posner was best known for writing critical accounts of the Kennedy Assasination and of the Warren Commission. Here he points out how our combined National Security agencies could have brought the war home to Al Qaeda after the first World Trade Center bombing before they could strike us again, and instead how the Clinton team chose to pinprick empty camps and pharamecutical factories.
Perhaps the best of the finger pointing books published since 9/11, and certainly one of the most-researched.
(...)
Rating:
Summary: Very probable
Review: The Justice Department conveyed a grand jury with the purpose of establishing grounds for an indictment and extradition. Osama was not prosecuted because a conviction case could not be established despite the overwhelming evidence possessed by the intelligence community. Intelligence Agencies do not like to share information and evidence gathered by the FBI came under the protection of strict Grand Jury Law.
The U.S began increasing pressure on Sudan to expel Bin Laden exposing him to potential capture. American Ambassador, Tim Carney suggested to Sudan a list of steps for Sudan proving they are not a terrorist state. Sudan responses with news that they might be willing to turn Bin Laden over and is rejected because the FBI does not believe it has enough evidence to indict Bin Laden. Congressman Lee Hamilton, House Foreign Affairs Committee invite the FBI to Khartoum to investigate Sudanese files and were halted with a "no go" from Madeline Albright, State Department and Sandy Berger, National Security Council. The FBI was behind on the investigation, the CIA had 40 thick folders of intelligence, most no processed nor analyzed. The State Department was calling Bin Laden the "greatest financier of terrorist projects". The NSC feared reprisals if Bin Laden was not convicted, it was just too many risks. Sudan asks Bin Laden to leave. The Counter Terrorism Committee wants permission to nab Bin Laden during his departure to Pakistan. President Clinton tells the CTC to let Bin Laden go. May 18, 1996 Bin Laden leaves Khartoum with 150 top aides and his wives and children on a C-130 and refuels in Qatar. In Pakistan, Bin Laden unites with Islamic students using his money and networks to create the Taliban. It is supposed that funding is received from Saudi largely to keep Bin Laden's network out of the Kingdom.
Rating: 
Summary: 9/11 ... THE SEARCH FOR SCAPEGOATS
Review: If you REALLY want to understand 9/11, DON'T buy this book.
It's a pot-boiler, pushed out in the heat of the post-9/11 climate, designed to cash-in on our confusion. The "research" is rudimentary, the "story" confusing.
The "story," such as it is, has two components: First, Posner tries to reconstruct the tortured course of the long-running CIA vs FBI inter-agency feud. [For those of you under thirty: The CIA deals with "foreign" foes, the FBI with "domestic" threats. The CIA likes to break the law; the FBI, generally, does not]. Since they don't play by the same rules, they constantly trip each other up. The results can be fatal in a "war" agains terror. That's the bare bones of the "story." This was well known long before Posner learned to walk. So: nothing new here.
The second strand in the tale has to do with the "recent" emergence of Islamic fundamentalist terror. Posner's story begins in ... Brooklyn! It moves outward from there in confused ripples to locations as disparate as Jersey City and Jalalabad; and backward in time to ... well, oddly enough, historical time disappears in this story. Because he starts in the wrong place, and all but ignores historical time, Posner ends up confusing rather than informing us. [There's no way anyone can understand the current crisis without grounding it firmly in the Middle East, and in History. Only then will we begin to understand what the Arabs already know: that it is Western influence in the region, not mindless Muslim madness, that has caused the problem].
Because Posner himself is confused, he cannot help but confuse his readers. He already had his answers before he wrote this book; so, his "research" was based on his ideological position rather than on any genuine curiosity about the causes of 9/11. As a result, we emerge from the book without any real clarity; and yet, we are curiously convinced that ... it's Clinton's fault! Clinton, them mindless Arabs, and (perhaps) the CIA vs FBI thing. That's Posner's "analysis". And, as an afterthought, there's a chapter or two about some foreign "allies" that maybe we should be more circumspect with.
Bottom line?
Posner's pot-bolier WON'T help you to understand 9/11 or "why America slept".
It WILL give you the erroneous impression that 9/11 was the result of "intelligence failures" in the CIA and/or FBI; rather than an "intelligence failure" in the White House.
It relies excessively on what Posner describes as "critical information still classified in the files of several governments." (217) ... Which begs the question of how Mr Posner got his hands on it ... But that's not really important. What IS important is that we've no way of verifying the reliability or accuracy of the claims he makes based on such sources. Nor do we have any reason to believe those sources are themselves accurate or reliable. I mean, being "classified" doesn't make them right ... right?
Posner wants us to believe that "official" documents, if only we could get our hands on them, would reveal everything. Unfortunately, it's not that simple. "Classified" documents may some day reveal to us who knew what and when. But, they will NOT explain 9/11. Nor will "official" accounts, now or in the future.
ALL the "official" explanations of 9/11 to date have been, without exception, lies.
For some of us, this is the crux of the issue. We're sick of the lies. What we want is the truth. Nothing less is acceptable. Posner can't or won't help us in that quest. He's too busy providing what (according to the blurb at the back of the book) will "soon to be a Showtime MiniSeries."
Is that all 9/11 is, Mr Posner? A chance to Cash In?
Rating:
Summary: 9/11 ... The MiniSeries
Review:
If what you want is a STORY about 9/11, as opposed to the truth, then you'll enjoy Posner's work. It's chock full of Bad People plotting to do all sorts of evil and nasty things to us as we sleep. Unfortunately for us, they are opposed by a phalanx of Good (But Stupid) People who don't really know how to protect us.
The Good (But Stupid) People, it turns out, are all in the CIA. Or, worse stll, in the FBI. But, they are not stupid individually. Only collectively. Individually, they can sound intelligent. In fact, Posner relies an awful lot on the (uncorroborated) word of ex-CIA chief James Woolsey in order to blame Clinton for 9/11. That done, he returns to the the tired, old yarn of the "intelligence wars". You know the story: the FBI won't work with the CIA; the CIA won't work with the FBI; and the NSA plays favorites depending on the political winds. YAWN! In short: there's nothing here to surprise anyone familiar with the last thirty years of American history. But, even worse, despite what Posner says, there's NOTHING here to prove that an intelligence failure CAUSED (or, "explains") 9/11. To buy the "intelligence failure" argument is to ignore the oceans of evidence that prove it was a lack of POLITICAL INTELLIGENCE that caused the disaster. So, despite the breathless blurb and the positive reviews, those of us who know our recent politics know there's really nothing here to hang our hats on. The "intelligence" that was lacking was not lacking because of the FBI or the CIA. They provided enough information for ANY administration to come to the obvious and "intelligent" conclusion. But ... "intelligence" and Dubya just don't go together.
So: What about The Bad People?
The Bad People, of course, are all Muslims. (Son-of-a-Bear! Who'd a thunk it?) And Posner names them all ... all two hundred million of them ... Before you've gone very far into the book you'll be so exhausted by the endless litany of what he calls "Afghan Arabs" (mostly from Saudi Arabia and/or Palestine ... go figure!) that you'll be unable to follow the "story" ... such as it is. So, if you are not familiar with these names already (and most of us are not, because our real lives take up so much of our time) this book won't help. By the time you've reached the half-way mark the names will have blurred into a vast, foggy, Islamic fundamentalist conspiracy. (This incidentally strikes me as a deliberate ploy by Posner: His aim is as much confusion as explanation).
These Bad People are everywhere. And I mean Everywhere! They are in Brooklyn! (Omigod!) ... Jersey City! (No!) ... Detroit! (Say It Ain't So!) ... They were in Oklahoma City with McVeigh! (I just KNEW it!) No. They were there (gasp) ... BEFORE McVeigh!! ... It's all just a little too breathless if you've got a fully functioning brain. I mean: why WOULDN'T there be Muslims in major American cities? And why WOULDN'T they be upset with U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East? To connect those two dots and come up with a Vast Islamic Fundamentalist Plot To Take Over OUR World is hardly credible. Although, I'm sure Fox "News" will buy it.
In short: there's no balance here. The Arabs are always mindlessly Fundamentalist; and, hence, of course, always (fundamentally) Wrong. And, oddly enough, the Israeli's are always right! In fact, Posner uses every possible chance to link US and Israeli policies; no doubt to get us to see the "rightness" of the Israeli "approach" to the "problem" of Muslim terrorists. The implied message from Posner, of course, is: If only we'd listen to the Israelis, we'd know what we're dealing with. And we'd respond accordingly. If you think I'm overstating this consider Chapter Four ("The First Shot") in which Posner deliberately implies ... I kid you not ... that the assassination of Meir Kahane marked the opening of the American Jihad! I mean ... Meir Kahane!! Can anyone reasonably pass off Kahane as a "victin" of anything other than his own obsessive hatred of Arabs?
So: to conclude ...
Posner's work is UNHELPFUL at best, and downright CONFUSING at worst.
It's long on HINDSIGHT but short on INSIGHT.
It WON'T help you to understand 9/11 or "why America slept".
It WILL give you the erroneous impression that 9/11 was the result of "intelligence failures" in the CIA and/or FBI; rather than an "intelligence failure" in the White House.
It relies excessively on what Posner describes as "critical information still classified in the files of several governments." (217) ... Which begs the question of how Mr Posner got his hands on it. But that's not really important. What IS important is that we've no way of verifying the reliability or accuracy of the claims he makes based on such sources. Nor do we have any reason to believe those sources are themselves accurate or reliable. I mean, being "classified" doesn't make them right ... right?
So: Where does all this leave us?
In the dark?
Only if, like Posner, we fall prey to the illusion that "official" documents contain definitive answers. Or, indeed, ANY answers worth considering! "Classified" documents may some day reveal to us who knew what and when. But, they will NOT explain 9/11. Nor will "official" accounts, now or in the future. ALL the "official" explanations of 9/11 to date have been, without exception, lies.
For some of us, this is the crux of the issue. We're sick of the lies. What we want is the truth. Nothing less is acceptable. Posner can't or won't help us in that quest. He's too busy providing what (according to the blurb at the back of the book) will "soon to be a Showtime MiniSeries."
Is that all 9/11 is, Mr Posner? A chance to Cash In?
Rating:
Summary: A MUST READ for All Americans
Review: This book is a real SHOCKER!! It'll both anger and scare the hell out of you. The hard to pronounce Middle Eastern Names are the only downer. The rest of the book is bluntly informative. It SPELLS it out.
We have been in Danger for decades and didn't know it and we still are. Yes we've made progress , but we have a long journey ahead of us.
This book tells all about the FBI CIA INS CTC and every other agencies blunders and oversights from the past 25 years that make a chain of events leading to 9-11.
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