Gee Tom,

You are so SURE that the Bush administration just couldn't be guilty of anything...why those boys are all lilly white!
You declare this without even an investigation....

However, there are other theories out there, and this one isn't so far-fetched.
The time lines are all there.
Is it because the Bush boys and their Texas oil buddies (Cheney, et al, etc....) could have been lined up with Enron to get the Afganistan oil pipeline contract that was in the works?
However ......Sept 11th changed all that.
THAT's when their bubble burst and the dominoes started to fall.
So why was Anderson ordered to shred the papers?
To prevent this scandal from coming to light perhaps?
No culpability at all could rest upon American interests dealing with the Taliban.
None.

Consider this:

From William Pitt

A book recently published in France titled 'Osama bin Laden: The Hidden Truth' by Jean-Charles Brisard and Guillaume Dasique has put some serious questions on the table for consideration. In 1998, American oil company Unocal's attempt to build a pipeline from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to Pakistan, in order to exploit the vast Turkmenistan natural gas fields, was foiled by Osama bin Laden's attack on American embassies in Africa. The Clinton administration forbade any company from dealing with the Taliban, protectors of bin Laden, who were in control of Afghanistan at the time.

Upon his arrival in Washington D.C. in 2000, Bush revived negotiations with the Taliban to see this pipeline through. High-level talks between Washington and Kabul continued through August of 2001 to this very purpose. The Bush administration was trying to get the Taliban on board with the pipeline idea, and believed they could depend upon the regime to be stable enough to see it built. The rationale for these actions is simplicity itself: Bush's campaign was funded by the energy industry, and negotiations like this were their payoff. The business of America is business.

Problems arise when one considers the fact that the chief bin Laden hunter in America, former Deputy Director John O'Neill, quit his post in protest some two weeks before the September 11th attacks. O'Neill had been the lead investigator in several previous bin Laden-controlled attacks, and was considered to be the most knowledgeable man in America about the terrorist mastermind's activities and capabilities. He quit in frustration, stating that his efforts at capturing bin Laden had been thwarted by oil interests in America, and by a desire by powerful people to protect America's relationship with Saudi Arabia. After leaving the FBI, O'Neill took a job at head of security at the World Trade Center, and died in the September 11th attack. The irony of this is agonizing.

O'Neill knew that bin Laden called Afghanistan home. Was he kept from pursuing the terrorist there by an administration that wanted to protect its relationship with the Taliban in order to see the pipeline through? Did his departure create a security gap in America that allowed the attacks to take place? Conversely, did America's dalliance with the Taliban incite bin Laden to attack? It is well documented that his terrorist career began with the arrival of American troops onto Saudi soil, a land he considered sacred. Was he motivated to attack again when his new home seemed ready to allow the Crusaders in?

Finally, does this pipeline deal shine a light onto the emailed optimism of Kenneth Lay? There is no question that Enron was Bush's favorite company. If the pipeline was to happen, it is easy to imagine that Enron would get the contract. Lay would have known this. His last email was sent on August 27th, about the same time as the last U.S./Taliban meeting. If a deal was near at hand, and if he knew that his company was about to get a plum government contract, he had every reason to be optimistic about the future.

Is this why Arthur Andersen was ordered to shred documents? Did those documents detail the preparations for the pipeline, thus demonstrating beyond doubt that Bush was dealing with the Taliban? Were the consequences of releasing these documents more damaging than the consequences of destroying them because of this?

It will be a long hot season before we know the half of it. One thing, however, is certain. Not long from today, we will stand in observance. Before we know it, one year will have passed since the attacks of September 11th, 2001. We will light candles, unfurl wind-tattered flags, sing patriotic songs, and remember the dead. In that year we will have mourned for those lost, and mourned the passing of an age of innocence in America. The oceans that separate us, the armies that guard us, the weapons that make others fear us, protected us not at all on September 11th. The security we felt before that day is gone forever.

We deserve to know why.