March 10, 2004

23 Questions. The 9/11 Family Steering Committee for an Independent Commission has prepared twenty-three questions it hopes the 9/11 Commission will ask George W. Bush. Commission member Jamie Gorelick called the list "a road map" for the government's investigation. Let's hope the Commission takes the trip. Here are four of the questions:

5. US Navy Captain Deborah Loewer, the Director of the White House Situation Room, informed you of the first airliner hitting Tower One of the World Trade Center before you entered the Emma E. Booker Elementary School in Sarasota, Florida. Please explain the reason why you decided to continue with the scheduled classroom visit, fifteen minutes after learning the first hijacked airliner had hit the World Trade Center.

7. What plan of action caused you to remain seated after Andrew Card informed you that a second airliner had hit the second tower of the World Trade Center and America was clearly under attack? Approximately how long did you remain in the classroom after Card's message?

12. What defensive measures did you take in response to pre-9/11 warnings from eleven nations about a terrorist attack, many of which cited an attack in the continental United States? Did you prepare any directives in response to these actions? If so, with what results?

19. Who approved the flight of the bin Laden family out of the United States when all commercial flights were grounded, when there was time for only minimal questioning by the FBI, and especially, when two of those same individuals had links to WAMY, a charity suspected of funding terrorism? Why were bin Laden family members granted that special privilege, a privilege not available to American families whose loved ones were killed on 9/11?

Also worth reading: The New Pentagon Papers: A high-ranking military officer reveals how Defense Department extremists suppressed information and twisted the truth to drive the country to war. By Karen Kwiatkowski

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