Enact the 9/11 Commission Findings?

A few stories that intersect in an interesting way.

Democrats Reject Key 9/11 Panel Suggestion
By Jonathan Weisman
Washington Post
November 30, 2006; Page A07

It was a solemn pledge, repeated by Democratic leaders and candidates over and over: If elected to the majority in Congress, Democrats would implement all of the recommendations of the bipartisan commission that examined the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

But with control of Congress now secured, Democratic leaders have decided for now against implementing the one measure that would affect them most directly: a wholesale reorganization of Congress to improve oversight and funding of the nation's intelligence agencies. Instead, Democratic leaders may create a panel to look at the issue and produce recommendations, according to congressional aides and lawmakers.

Readers may recall that when the GOP became the majority party in the House in 1994 the first item in the Contract with Americawas to "require all laws that apply to the rest of the country also apply equally to the Congress."

Democrats have been more than eager to impose the 9/11 Commission findings on the Executive Branch and the public. Seems when it comes to Congress, they are reverting to the typical liberal policy of exempting themselves.

With the impending release of the Iraq Study Group Report (link here) It seems the 9/11 Commission findings also give rise to some other contradictions:

Syria's Bloody Fingerprint
New York Sun Editorial
November 24, 2006

One irony of the negotiate-with- Iran-and- Syria axis in America has been that so many of its members also campaigned on a platform of fully implementing the 9/11 Commission's recommendations for averting future terror attacks on American soil. Legitimizing Mr. Al Assad's regime by making him a negotiating partner would mark an obvious violation of at least one of those recommendations.

The commission, after noting that America needs to spread a vision of the future that stresses "life over death" and "widespread political participation and contempt for indiscriminate violence," as well as "respect for the rule of lawÂ? and tolerance for opposing points of view," recommended that "Where Muslim governments, even those who are friends, do not respect these principles, the United States must stand for a better future."

"One of the lessons of the long Cold War," the commission recommendation continues, "was that short-term gains in cooperating with the most repressive and brutal governments were too often outweighed by long-term setbacks for America's stature and interests." That pronouncement would appear to be exactly on point.

This is who we're going to negotiate with?

We shall have to wait until the Iraq Study report is released on December 6 to see how those who suggest negotiation with Iran and Syriafinessee the issue. We'll be especially interested in the comments of Lee Hamilton, who was Vice Chairman of the 9/11 Commission and currently serves as Co-Chairman of the Iraq Study Group.

I would just add to the New York Sun editorial that it isn't just Lebanese Christians who are being murdered by Syrian/Iranian agents. Long before the US invaded Iraq Hezbollah, the Syrian/Iranian proxy in Lebanon murdered at least 289 Americans.

And once again, we're reminded that Iran has been killing Americans in Iraq and stoking the violence that has killed so many innocent Iraqis:

Iranian Weapons Arm Iraqi Militia
Hezbollah Training Also Linked to Iraq Violence
By JONATHAN KARL AND MARTIN CLANCY
ABC News
Nov. 30, 2006

U.S. officials say they have found smoking-gun evidence of Iranian support for terrorists in Iraq: brand-new weapons fresh from Iranian factories. According to a senior defense official, coalition forces have recently seized Iranian-made weapons and munitions that bear manufacturing dates in 2006.

This suggests, say the sources, that the material is going directly from Iranian factories to Shia militias, rather than taking a roundabout path through the black market. "There is no way this could be done without (Iranian) government approval," says a senior official.

Iranian-made munitions found in Iraq include advanced IEDs designed to pierce armor and anti-tank weapons. U.S. intelligence believes the weapons have been supplied to Iraq's growing Shia militias from Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, which is also believed to be training Iraqi militia fighters in Iran.