TERRORISM -- SPINNING THE NUMBERS

americanprogressaction.org

TERRORISM -- SPINNING THE NUMBERS: Newsweek reports, "Without any
public explanation, President George W. Bush last week increased the
estimate of al Qaeda leaders who have been killed or captured." Bush claimed
for the first time that "more than three quarters of al Qaeda's key
members and associates have been detained or killed." In his previous
statements, Bush said the number was "nearly two-thirds." According to
Newsweek, "White House and U.S. intelligence officials declined to provide
any back-up data for how they developed the new number
(http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5945061/site/newsweek/) ?or even to explain
the methodology that was used." An official from the recently disbanded
9/11 Commission said, "It was meaningless when they said two-thirds and
it's meaningless when they said three-fourths. This sounds like it was
pulled out of somebody's orifice." The vast majority of the FBI's most
wanted terrorists
(http://www.fbi.gov/mostwant/terrorists/fugitives.htm) are still at large.