Both the Wall Street Journal and National Review wrote pieces on September 8th about ABC’s two-part, $40M production, “The Path to 9/11,” which aired once and only once 20 years ago on September 10/11, 2006, then all but disappeared.
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Why did it air only once?
Democrats went all Tony Soprano on ABC, intimidating them with the fury and force of the federal government. (Cute little network you got there. Shame if something happened to it….) And why did they do it? It made Bill Clinton look bad. It made members of the Clinton Administration look bad. Those portrayed negatively objected. Bill Clinton himself objected. Some Democrats on the Hill wrote letters to then-president of ABC Bob Iger to stop it from airing at all.
Team Clinton even bullied the actors themselves.
[T]he ‘Clinton spin machine’ contacted several ‘Path to 9/11’ actors and pressured them to speak against the project.
ABC aired it anyway, but just that once, then they never licensed it out for distribution in any way, shape, or form. The only way to see it now is via private citizens who recorded it and uploaded it to the internet.
I found one. I was surprised at how little effort it took. I’m frankly shocked it’s still there, as the copy I found has been up for a year. (So I’d watch it quickly before it’s taken down.) It was the best copy of about a half dozen I could find. They all look to have been recorded via VCR, so the screen quality is, to our 2026 eyes, notably lacking, but the copy below is acceptable.
Part One:
Part Two:
What was it specifically that Democrats found so objectionable? Via National Review:
The Path to 9/11 makes one thing abundantly clear: Hard-working law-enforcement officials had multiple opportunities to stop the terrorists before they wreaked their havoc, but inept leadership, mainly by political appointees of the Clinton administration, got in the way. Secretary of state Madeleine Albright comes off as a shrill obstructionist, [and] CIA director George Tenet appears wimpy….
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[snip]
[National Security Advisor Sandy Berger] … is the closest thing in the film to a villain who isn’t an actual terrorist. In one scene, a group of military operatives surrounds bin Laden in his remote Afghan compound. ‘Do we have clearance to load the package?’ asks an American who is leading them. Berger refuses to give it — he simply flicks off his video-conferencing camera — and a remarkable opportunity to snatch or kill bin Laden slips away.
That Sandy Berger scene never fully aired. The original unedited part where Berger refuses to give clearance to take out Bin Laden was left on the cutting room floor. It has never been seen publicly and likely never will be.
The irony is thick here.
We have never and will never see that full 9/11 scene featuring Sandy Berger in the same way we have never and will never see the full 9/11 documents Sandy Berger stole.
What did he steal?
Documents of his relating to 9/11, which had his in the margins.
It was reported recently that Mrs. Clinton was working on Bill Clinton’s funeral plans. Of course, a president’s send-off is pre-planned upon assumption of Office, and Mr. Clinton’s should be no different, having been set decades ago. So who knows what the headlines regarding that were really about? Perhaps Bill Clinton’s health. Perhaps Hillary was adding to or striking out certain participants. Perhaps Fake News was jonesing for some extra fake-news-ing that day. Who knows? But it seems safe to predict that the full truth of what happened in the years preceding 9/11 won’t be fully known until all of the participants are, indeed, dead and buried.
M. Walter blogs at www.mwalterwriter.com where you can find The Lunatic Left Series, a (near) daily snapshot of Democrat words and deeds so you can see what they’re up to without having to go hip-deep in their toxic brew. You’re welcome 😉
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