He’s obviously a very sharp guy. One would hope that
the people in our intelligence community and defense
people are equally sharp.

I’m not willing to judge the intelligence or defense
people based on what Lance said before reading his
book.

However, anyone who has ever had to juggle elements
of uncertain meanings in the analysis phase
or guessing at end-points from
inferred strategic intents . . . I’d guess that they’d
know there’s a huge difference between hind-sight
and ability to delegate action based on fuzzy evidence.

From what I gather from what Lance said tonight: there
was nothing fuzzy about it.

Well, maybe Lance should drop his dalliance with journalism
and get to work in the intelligence community.

I guess I’ll find out after reading the book.

I wanted to start out here, though, by writing
‘ha ha ha ha, I don’t know what’s funnier: that a blogger
is being sucked up into this hysteria about a couple
twice removed involved in libel and slander, or that
the book is being trashed by people who haven’t read it
yet.’

So to enfold whoever reads this even deeper into the
comedy of that, I wrote what I wrote before I wrote what
I didn’t write at the beginning, but instead, at the
end.

Now you laugh.

There is no conspiracy amoung ex-feds. Heck, Bob’s never even met Fitzgerald or Mcarthy and probably could not pick McCarthy out of line up if his life depended on it. It’s probably been 10 or 15 years since I last saw or spoke to McCarthy. That’s some great conspiracy there, yessereee.

You really never hesitiate to jump to wild conclusions do you? [chuckling]

Really, zombies. You ought to add Zombies. Lots of Zombies. If zombies could bring so much renewed interest to a great classic like Pride and Prejudice, think of what they could do to improve that thing you wrote.

How about instead of some crazy conspiracy amoung ex-feds, my opinion of your publication might have to do with my affinity for verifiable facts over paranoid fantasy?

Like the fact that the letters to Harper Collins were not written on US Attorney’s stationary. A fact that could be verified by looking at the letters themselves. See how that works?

On another note:

I see that some responsible person has corrected the original post to reflect that the letters were not, in fact, sent on US Attorney’s stationary. Well done.

If you didn’t buy it either, you have a real source for answers in an investigative reporter as meticulous as Peter Lance. Never relenting, Lance has pursued the historical chain of people and events, the flashing signals visible at the time but ignored, neglected or outright repressed, until with this his third book on 9/11, TRIPLE CROSS, he brings out of the shadows a major player who is still somewhere in an American prison. It is cause for wonder that this man, whom Patrick Fitzgerald said “should not be allowed out on the streets,” is never mentioned by him as one among the gallery of those who brought such terror to America.

But then Fitzgerald has been trying to suppress Lance’s work that brought Ali Mohamed to light. All of a sudden, it’s the First Amendment be damned. The district attorney, who prosecuted the “”Scooter” Libby case, trying to find out who exposed CIA agent Valerie Plaime as punishment for her husband, Amb. Joseph Wilson’s exercise of his free speech rights, is squirming because of the case Lance has made re his role regarding Ali Mohamed.

TRIPLE CROSS cannot be consigned to books dealing in hindsight or conspiracy. It is the result of starting from the beginning, based on interviews with FBI agents, police, firemen, military officers, news reports, FBI documents, all buttressed by extensive travel and correspondence, and developing a timeline that begins, not in 1996 or 1998, but 1989.

On first blush Ms. Kouril’s comments attacking my book might appear to have some credibility.

But one needs to consider the source. She’s a former Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Southern District, the very Federal prosecutor’s office were Patrick Fitzgerald was head of the Organized Crime and Terrorism Unit.

The SDNY is the focus much of my criticism in TRIPLE CROSS. This is one of the two “bin laden offices of origin” which dropped the ball so many times on the road to 9/11.

Fitzgerald also directed Squad I-49 in the FBI New York Office (NYO) and, as I report, along with other SDNY and FBI officials was repeatedly outflanked by FBI master spy Ali Mohamed. To download the 32 page illustrated timeline from the hardcover edition of TRIPLE CROSS go to: http://www.peterlance.com and click on the TIMELINE in the upper right hand corner of the home page.

Cynthia Kouril blogs for firedoglake.com. Not only is she a Southern District alumna but so is her law partner (in private practice) Robert L. Folks.

Here’s a link to her bio page: http://firedoglake.com/author/13793/
The text follows:

“Cynthia Kouril is a former Special Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York under several different U.S. Attorneys…”

The Feds — current and former — are notorious for sticking together to defend themselves and they tend to be extremely thin skinned when it comes to the kind criticism documented in TRIPLE CROSS.

Case in point: Andrew C. McCarthy: Fitzgerald’s co-prosecutor in the 1995 “Day of Terror” trial vs. The blind Sheikh. On the night that TRIPLE CROSS first appeared in hardcover November 21st, 2006 McCarthy issued a statement attacking the book and me when I was a guest on “The O’Reilly Factor.”

Here’s a video link to broadcast which you should find amusing.

http://www.peterlance.com/oreilly-2006-11-21.wmv

The guest host that night was an ex-conservative congressman from Ohio named John Kasich. Even though the 604 page book, meticulously researched with 1,450+ end notes and 32 pages of documentary appendices had only been in bookstores a few hours McCarthy issued the following attack which Kasich and Fox News illustrated in large full screen graphics:

“This (the book) is scurrilously presented. Everything he (Lance) said we were hiding about Ali Mohamed was presented in open court. It is presented in a widely disingenuous way, relying on convicted terrorists and convicted murderers as sources.”

Cynthia Kouril is another SDNY crony from this same “shoot from the hip” school calling TRIPLE CROSS “so over the top that I thought maybe it was meant to be a satire of some kind.”

So with respect to her criticism above, I ask you to take it from the source. Clearly Fitzgerald’s friends are starting to circle the wagons.

For more on TRIPLE CROSS please visit my website.

You can download a pdf of all four of Fitzgerald’s threat letters and HarperCollins initial response, rejecting his libel claim at:

http://www.peterlance.com/Fitzgerald_Libel_Claim_Letters_HCP_Response.pdf

As to Ms. Kouril’s clear threats to both Ann Sparanese and Rory Litwin who maintains this marvelous blog, I ask you to consider whether or not, if my findings in TRIPLE CROSS are, as she alleges “beyond serious consideration as to border on hilarity” why would she go to the lengths she did to effectively threaten each of them with defamation?

As the Bard wrote, “Me thinks the lady doth protest too much.”

I am stunned by the fact that it was cross-posted to Free Republic and surprised to be confronted with legal language. I was not expecting this type of a response. I don’t personally have an opinion about the situation, and I believe that Ann could be swayed by further information as well.

I think it is clear from the format that Ann is not affiliated with the blog. You just didn’t examine the blog closely before making that assumption.

I’m sorry, and I’m not trying to be argumentative, but what about the format would alert me that the author was not affilaited with this blogsite? there is no legen that says “cross posted from X” or “orginally posted on X” or anactual disclaimer saying that she was unaffliated.

I genuinely don’t know what would have tipped me off that the author was unaffiliated