Able Danger & Watergate

Last week Congressman Curt Weldon (R-PA) drew this cliched parallel:

Representative Curt Weldon, R-PA, compared the Pentagon’s alleged cover-up of Operation Able Danger to the Watergate scandal, during the first open Congressional hearings on the matter Wednesday.

Weldon has alleged that Able Danger identified the hijackers involved in the 9/11 attacks months before September 11, but were unable to notify the proper law enforcement authorities because of a legal wall forbidding shared intelligence.

Weldon says he received his information from whistle-blowers within the Pentagon.

According to The Hill, Weldon issued his comparison in response to the denials of Stephen Cambone, undersecretary of defense for intelligence. Cambone denied Weldon’s claims that Pentagon whistle-blowers were intimated by their superiors against speaking publicly.

"How can we trivialize what these people have said?” Weldon asked. "I do not understand,” he continued. "It is frustrating to me. I am not going to stop here. President Nixon had to resign over a third-rate burglary,” but thousands died in the September 11 attacks.

That's one difference between the two scandals. Another is that Able Danger is a Democrat scandal since it took place on Bill Clinton's watch, and the Extreme Media has zero interest in doing anything to further tarnish Mr. Bill's "legacy." And a third is that unlike any Dem administration with the chance to run wild scandalmongering a GOP predecessor, the Bush White House not only evinces no interest in exposing Clinton's national security derilictions, but is actively carrying out their coverup.

Guess it goes to show that not everything that is "bipartisan" is necessarily a good thing. Or that bitching in a vacuum (The Hill reported that only a handful of lawmakers attended Weldon's hearing, and then only as specators) is ever anything other than bitching in a vacuum.

What's that old saying? "Lonely are the brave..."