Ignoring your list of "actions" that you want me to defend (or whatever you want me to do with it), my idea of a rational response:

"Condi, what are we doing about this? I see FBI investigations listed in the briefing. Are they enough? Are they effective? Is that all we are doing? Who is heading the effort to thwart this OBL guy? Do we need to assign someone? Recommendations? Report on my desk by next week, please."

Oh, okay. Generate another report. That'll help. And what do you think that report would have said?

Maybe Bush should do what Democratic leaders do. Pretend to care. Pretend to fix the problem. Make people think you're accomplishing something. Walk around with a serious frown on your face. Hold more meetings. Make more promises. A few speeches about how you "will spare no effort to make sure something is done." Your constituents will never ask the question, "How?" Perception is all to this kind of mind. If you don't look like you're busy or concerned, you aren't.

The fact that I can't drag you (or others) into specifics with an anchor chain shows that you don't want to deal with specifics. Warn the airlines? To do what? To watch for what? Or who? Based on this memo, what response would have been accepted?

Now, an observation:

Not only is the Left hitting a dead end with the "Bush Didn't Do Enough" line of attack, but many mainstream Democrats are heading for the Looney Zone of "Bush Knew," where the radical websites have been living for some time. Like the famous "Ashcroft Commercial Airlines" lie, star of wacko websites around the world.

Maybe you missed Ashcroft shooting Ben Veniste down in flames on this issue?

BEN-VENISTE: ...Let me ask you, as my time is expiring, one question, which has been frequently put to members of this commission; probably all of us have heard this one way or another.

And we are mindful that part of the problem with the Warren commission's work on the Kennedy assassination was the failure to address certain theories that were extant and questions and much of the work was done behind closed doors. So I would like to provide you with the opportunity to answer one question that has come up repeatedly.

At some point in the spring or summer of 2001, around the time of this heightened threat alert, you apparently began to use a private chartered jet plane, changing from your use of commercial aircraft on grounds, our staff is informed, of an FBI threat assessment. And, indeed, as you told us, on September 11th itself you were on a chartered jet at the time of the attack.

Can you supply the details, sir, regarding the threat which caused you to change from commercial to private leased jet?

ASHCROFT: I am very please pleased to address this issue.

BEN-VENISTE: Thank you.

ASHCROFT: Let me indicate to you that I never ceased to use commercial aircraft for my personal travel.

ASHCROFT: My wife traveled to Germany and back in August. My wife and I traveled to Washington, D.C., on the 3rd of September before the 17th -- before the 11th attack on commercial aircraft.

I have exclusively traveled on commercial aircraft for my personal travel; continued through the year 2000, through the entirety of the threat period to the nation.

The assessment made by the security team and the Department of Justice was made early in the year. It was not related to a terrorism threat as a threat to the nation. It was related to an assessment of the security for the attorney general, given his responsibilities and the job that he undertakes. And it related to the maintenance of arms and other things by individuals who travel with the attorney general. And it was their assessment that we would be best served to use government aircraft.

These were not private chartered jet aircraft. These were aircraft of the United States government. And it was on such an aircraft that I was on my way to an event in Milwaukee on the morning of September the 11th.

BEN-VENISTE: I'm pleased to have been able to give you the opportunity to clarify that issue for all who have written to this commission and communicated in other ways about their questions about that, sir.

How about the Gorelick Memo? Or Reno flattening Clarke on the Great Millenium Plot victory?

ROEMER: The Clinton administration has a great deal of success during this time period deflecting or foiling millennium plots. A great deal of this, in my humble opinion, my theory is because of this small group that is meeting at the top levels of government and pushing decisions down into the bureaucracy to get things done.

I want to know your recollection of this time period. How often were you meeting with the principals? How often were you meeting with the president? How involved were you in this? How involved were you with the FBI and the CIA?

RENO: I spent a lot of time at the SIOC.

ROEMER: The SIOC, if you'd explain?

RENO: Somebody help me.

(LAUGHTER)

(UNKNOWN): Secure...

RENO: Strategic Information...

(UNKNOWN): Operations...

RENO: ... Operations Center.

ROEMER: ... Operations Center.

RENO: I would meet with them at the SIOC.

Let me stress -- and I think it's important, because people have dismissed what happened during that time by saying it was because of an alert customs officer. I want to pay special commendation to the alert customs officer; she was sharp and right on target. And it was an extremely -- it wasn't a lucky break, it was a great break by a good officer.

But it is so important to be able to capitalize on this, to follow through; you have a window, you have an opening to see what's happening. And it was extraordinary to sit in that command center and to see the results come in and to follow it. And then during the height of the crisis, I literally sat at the Office of Intelligence Policy Review until the early hours of the morning to be prepared to sign it at the soonest time possible, to sign the FISA application.

RENO: And to see the whole network in operation is an extraordinary experience and something -- people told me when I came to Washington that there would be one area that would seem mysterious and would be new, and that was the intelligence function of the department.

You can't go to the university to really learn it, at least I haven't found the course that really teaches it. You've got to come in, you've got to be as prepared as you can to learn, to find the good people that can make the difference, find the people that make the link.

And sometimes you've got to sit together so I can say, "But, George" -- referring to Tenet...

ROEMER: And George was George Tenet, the director of the CIA.

RENO: ... "what about this and what about that," and to...

ROEMER: Was Mr. Freeh in the room with you as well?

RENO: Director Freeh would oftentimes be there. And the bureau did a wonderful job. But you can't -- I think it's important for the principals to be involved because they can cut through to the hard issues, they can cut through the red tape. It is very important.

ROEMER: My time has just about run out.

Just to clarify one point then. You think the decision made by the guard on the border to get Ressam coming into our country to bomb the Los Angeles International Airport then was somehow related to the frenetic...

RENO: No.

ROEMER: ... active activity of the principals meeting?

RENO: No. I think she did that -- I mean, I think that was just good police work, and it was a lucky break for us.

RENO: But you've got to capitalize on lucky breaks and understand better what you can learn from them.

ROEMER: Now, the fact that these principals are meeting does have an impact on bringing the CIA director, the FBI director and you and the president together to make decisions on a regular basis.

Thank you very much.

I would cut Reno some slack on the acronym bobble. Working in the space field, believe me, I have dealt with acronyms that nobody in the room had any idea what they stood for.