In April 2004, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice testified before an independent Congressional commission investigating the alleged mismanagement of national security before the 9/11 attacks. Rice was asked about a potentially damning presidential memo which had come to the attention of the commission (but had not been made public). "It did not warn of attacks inside the United States," Rice declared of the document. "It was historical information based on old reporting."

Some time later, Rice was asked by Democratic commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste (a former Watergate prosecutor who had seen the memo) whether she recalled the memo's title. "I believe," Rice replied, "the title was 'Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the United States.'"

(Several family members of 9/11 victims were seen shaking their heads in the hearing room as they heard Rice's words.)

[It did not warn of attacks inside the United States? According to the memo, "clandestine, foreign government, and media reports indicate bin Laden since 1997 has wanted to conduct terrorist attacks in the US... [the FBI has observed] patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks." The document also reported that the CIA and FBI were investigating a call to the U.S. embassy in the United Arab Emirates in May "saying that a group of (Osama) bin Laden supporters was in the U.S. planning attacks with explosives."]

[The speech which Condoleezza Rice was preparing on national security threats on September 10th, 2001, did not mention al-Qaeda... Bush created the Department of Homeland Security to streamline intelligence gathering? By mid-2004, the DHS had to report to no fewer than 88 different Congressional committees.]