When not forced to compete with primetime broadcast football (NBC's "Sunday Night Football"), ABC's "The Path to 9-11" bested the competition on Monday, the second day of the two-part series. Reports Drudge:
Path to 9/11
By Greg Sheffield | September 12, 2006 | 12:12 PM EDT
Reports NY Daily News:
Former President Bill Clinton said yesterday that his administration had thwarted a number of large-scale terror attacks but acknowledged its efforts were "not enough" to prevent the horror of 9/11.
Clinton would not comment directly on the ABC miniseries that began airing Sunday that suggests he was soft on Al Qaeda, but he said yesterday that his administration stopped other attacks similar to 9/11.
By P.J. Gladnick | September 11, 2006 | 11:26 AM EDT
As expected, the airing of the ABC movie, The Path To 9/11, has infuriated the left-wing blogosphere. Their comments range from dark threats against ABC for broadcasting this movie to a self-pitying sense of despair over their inability to keep it from airing. Here is a sampling of enraged comments from the Democratic Underground, the Daily Kos, and the Huffington Post:
By Noel Sheppard | September 11, 2006 | 10:12 AM EDT
On this solemn occasion, our hearts go out to all who lost friends, colleagues, and family members five years ago, as well as to those who worked tirelessly and selflessly to save them. God Bless America.
For those that watched “The Path to 9/11” last evening, and were interested in which scenes were targeted by the Clinton administration for editing, you should see Dan Riehl’s post on the subject here.
Those that are interested in what apparently was altered in the final edition should see Al Brown's post here, as well as Editor & Publisher’s article on the subject.
With that as pretext, I wanted to offer my impressions of Part I.
By Al Brown | September 10, 2006 | 11:43 PM EDT
ABC's entertainment division refused to knuckle under to intense pressure from supporters of former President Bill Clinton, including the Democratic National Committee and MoveOn.org, and aired the first part of their miniseries, "The Path to 9/11", with some additional edits:
By Robin Boyd | September 10, 2006 | 1:24 PM EDT
The opposition to the ABC docu-drama has been using Harvey Keitel’s CNN Interview statements as one of their talking points against "The Path to 911". But were Keitel’s comments taken out of context and misrepresented? Are certain comments made by Keitel during the interview completely ignored by those vehemently protesting the airing of the movie?Here is what Bill Clinton’s lawyer wrote in his latest letter to ABC:
By Noel Sheppard | September 10, 2006 | 12:33 PM EDT
The Chairman of the 9/11 Commission, Thomas Kean, as well as Commissioner John Lehman, were George Stephanopoulos’s guests on ABC’s “This Week” Sunday, and they both spoke out strongly in favor of the upcoming miniseries “The Path to 9/11” (video link to follow).
At the beginning of this discussion, Stephanopoulos presented concerns expressed by Clinton administration officials about the docudrama, and asked Kean if the program should be aired. Kean responded:
Oh, of course, it should be aired. I mean, I'm not for censorship or not allowing people to see things. In my experience with these people who’ve been working in the film they've been responsive to criticism, mine and other people’s, and have made changes that were necessary. I haven't seen the final cut. It's a miniseries. It's not a documentary. It's not done by ABC news. It's done by ABC news entertainment, but as I've seen it, I think it'll make a contribution.
Stephanopoulos then reiterated concerns of the Clinton administration, in particular about a couple of scenes in the film, and asked, “Did you ask the filmmakers to change those scenes and did they change them?” Kean responded:
By Al Brown | September 10, 2006 | 11:48 AM EDT
Sometimes, in spite of itself, ABC's "This Week With George Stephanopoulos" shines a light on liberal thinking that liberal political strategists would prefer remain dark. Today Katrina Vanden Heuvel, the Left's answer to Michael Savage, revealed that her thinking remains firmly stuck in pre-9/11 mode.
By Noel Sheppard | September 9, 2006 | 9:56 PM EDT
With all the ballyhoo and discussion surrounding ABC’s “The Path to 9/11,” very few people have actually seen any of the controversial docudrama about to air (hopefully) beginning Sunday.
By Noel Sheppard | September 9, 2006 | 7:55 PM EDT
In the middle of all the controversy surrounding ABC’s upcoming docudrama “The Path to 9/11,” something very important has been lost: Regardless of the protestations of the left, there were indeed some missed opportunities to capture or kill Osama bin Laden before our nation was attacked.
By Noel Sheppard | September 9, 2006 | 3:19 PM EDT
I guess we all should have expected that mere changes to the story weren’t going to placate Team Clinton, for another letter was sent to ABC President and CEO Robert Iger on Friday, this one asking for “The Path to 9/11” be cancelled. For those that are interested, and can tolerate yet another example of extraordinary political hypocrisy, here it is: