Now John Gibson is asking questions about the OKC/Iraq connection. They're not the right questions--he's assuming that the feds wanted McVeigh out of the way quickly to provide "closure for the families."

No, John, they wanted him out of the way quickly because they wanted to minimize the chances that he would change his mind and talk, and convert Clinton's campaign against evil right wingers into a much less desirable (to him) war with Iraq.

Did Janet Reno execute anyone else as quickly as Tim McVeigh? Did she, in fact, in the eight years of her tenure, execute anyone else, period?

The answer is no. Of course, not one else had, either. He was the first federal prisoner executed since 1963.

[Update, a few minutes later]

And here's a related AP story.

Not that I'm in a big hurry to give Reno & Clinton a free pass here -- but if you're going to tar them with this speculative brush, Ashcroft & Dubya have some 'splainin' to do, too.

After all, you'd think the Bush administration would be THRILLED with the prospect of proving gross negligence and dereliction of duty by its predecessors.

So why didn't Ashcroft -- who had the authority to delay McVeigh's execution by 30 days -- take the opportunity to postone it indefinitely, in the HOPE that McVeigh might yet reveal inconvenient truths about John Doe #2?

Obviously, there were political motivations at work here. McVeigh was subhuman scum, and the political price for blocking his swift entry to Hell would have been too great for any administration to bear.

But to suggest that, in seeking his swift execution, the Justice Dept. -- spanning both administrations! -- was motivated by fear of what McVeigh might eventually say to 60 Minutes? That's just crazy-talk!

(If they were REALLY that fearful, surely they would have "arranged" to have McVeigh meet an untimely end at the hands of a "psychotic cellmate," long before he ever went to trial.)

I agree with you that Bush and Ashcroft are, at this point, as complicit. There seems to be a real reluctance at the Justice Department to dig into what really happened to the American criminal justice system during the Clinton Administration.

I have no explanation for this, but it seems of a piece with their reluctance to recognize who our enemies are in the Middle East.

As for "blocking his entry to hell," there would be plenty of ways to do this that wouldn't necessarily be obvious, or bring down the wrath of the voters. If McVeigh became the devil incarnate, it's because the Clinton administration was more interested in that outcome than in finding the truth. And, sadly, I see no evidence that the current administration is any different...

Well, I agree there's a possibility your thesis is correct. But on the question of McVeigh's execution, do remember that he dropped his appeals and made other legal maneuvers to speed his own path to execution.

Whoops, link didn't go through (one never remembers which comments systems allow them or not)

http://www.cnn.com/2000/LAW/12/28/mcveigh.hearing.02/

"a real reluctance at the Justice Department to dig...I have no explanation for this"

- this is pure wild speculation... could the FBI files ransacked early in the Clinton Administration perhaps be having some effects to this day?

Yes, Dan, I do remember that. I think that McVeigh and the Administration had, shall we say, a convergence of interests...

McVeigh wanted the glory for himself. He wouldn't want to admit that he couldn't have pulled it off without a bunch of ragheads. He had delusions of grandeur and revolution. He didn't want to share any of the responsibility.

Speeding his execution would not be inconsistent with this mindset--his purpose in life was fulfilled, and he was in a rush to become a martyr to whatever perverted cause he believed in. If his story was going to be sullied by Muslims, he'd be happy to go before it happened, and he'd have to be confronted with his own lies.

Again, speculation, but it fits the facts.

I too wish that Bush and Ashcroft had looked into this more deeply, but remember, Bush was elected on a razor-thin margin on the heels of every person who dared question Clinton's actions being ridden out of town on a rail (Newt, Livingston, Bob Barr, Henry Hyde, etc.) If they so much as looked crosseyed in that direction, everyone would have screamed that they were using the DOJ for personal gain (never mind that they kept silent when Clinton and Reno actually did). The people demanded bi-partisanship, he gave them what they demanded. At least Ashcroft delayed the execution until all the documents the Reno DOJ didn't turn over to the McVeigh defense were reviewed (another Reno civil liberties atrocity Ashcrofts critics ignore)

There's no need to construct a Clinton/Reno/Bush/Ashcroft conspiracy just yet. This could be a case of the FBI's traditional mindset in action: once they identify a "perp," they completely ignore any evidence contrary to their hypothesis. Remember Richard Jewell, the supposed bomber at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics? Or how about the FBI's current fixation on a domestic "mad scientist" for last October's anthrax attacks, despite compelling evidence the 9/11 hijackers were exposed to anthrax? And don't forget the FBI's insistence, despite several eyewitness accounts, that "John Doe #2" doesn't exist. These are just a few examples of how the FBI is determined to stick to its original conclusion no matter what other evidence is presented.

McVeigh and friends may not have known the extent of any Iraqi/Iranian involvement. It now seems that most of the 9/11 hijackers didn't know they were on a suicide mission; McVeigh may have been another "useful idiot" unaware of who was really sponsoring his mission.

If John Doe #2 exists (and as I've said before, FBI denial of his existence doesn't constitute very compelling evidence to me of his nonexistence) then McVeigh certainly knew about him. McVeigh knew much more than he was ever willing to say, and I always had the sense that that was just fine with the investigators.

I still believe that there's a good possibility that this was a government sting operation gone very sour, and after it happened, the Administration decided to make lemonade by shifting the blame to the evil "right wingers."

The question I'd like an answer to is, has Nichols and his wife been threatened to keep quiet, either by the terrorists, or by some elements of the FBI themselves...

ACTually, the Jewell case could also be read as more of the Reno movement to tar all "right wingers" as radical killers, since investigation of the Olympic bombing consisted entirely of grabbing the first right-winger they could find (i.e. Jewell) How Ironic that the same people who wring their hands about profiling Arabs now and were loudly condemning profiling even then were actively profiling conservatives.

What needs to happen, tho it won't unless media takes this very seriously, is for Justice to wipe the slate clean with Nichols, confront and interrogate him aggressively on his activities in the Phillipines prior to OKC, and to provide protection to his family in exchange for information on the accomplices, including John Doe #2. See JunkYardBlog, WhoisJohnDoe2, Insight magazine interview with widow of Angeles, the Phillipine double/triple agent, on her deathbed. Links on above blogs. Compelling stuff.

Ironically, in fingering Jewell, FBI initially missed the real "right wing" whacko still at large in the woods, growing pot and blowing up abortion clinics.

The question is not whether McVeigh knew about whoever was John Doe #2. The question -- assuming for the sake of argument that there was such a person and that it was Padilla -- is whether McVeigh would neceessarily have known that this Puerto Rican guy was a Muslim with ties to Osama bin Laden.

Some of the Sept. 11 hijackers didn't even know at first that theirs was what the jihadists euphemistically call a "martyrdom" operation.

It seems unlikely to me that he wouldn't know. Padilla/Hujahir doesn't seem like the type to hide his interests...