Redefining cooperation

 
February 8:

President Bush:  We have given extraordinary cooperation with Chairmen Kean and Hamilton.  As you know, we made an agreement on what's called "Presidential Daily Briefs," so they could see the information the CIA provided me that is unique, by the way, to have provided what's called the PDB, because - 

Russert:  Presidential Daily Brief?

President Bush:  Right. And see, the danger of allowing for information that I get briefed on out in the public arena is that it could mean that the product that I receive or future presidents receive is somewhat guarded for fear of - for fear of it being revealed, and for fear of people saying, "Well, you know, we're going to second-guess that which you told the President."

I need good, honest information, but we have shared this information with both those gentlemen, gentlemen I trust, so they could get a better picture of what took place prior to September the 11th.

And again, we want - I want the truth to be known.  I want there to be a full analysis done so that we can better prepare the homeland, for example, against what might occur.

Meet the Press

February 9:

Members of the independent commission investigating the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks warned the White House on Monday that it could face a politically damaging subpoena this week if it refused to turn over information from the highly classified Oval Office intelligence reports given to President Bush before 9/11.

The panel's chairman, Thomas H. Kean, a Republican and the former governor of New Jersey, said through a spokesman that he was hopeful an agreement would be worked out before the commission's next meeting, on Tuesday. Commission officials said that negotiations continued throughout the day on Monday and into the evening with the office of Alberto R. Gonzales, the White House counsel.

But other members of the commission said that without an immediate resolution, they would call for a vote on Tuesday on issuing a subpoena to the White House for access to information in the documents. The papers are known as the President's Daily Brief, the intelligence summary prepared each morning for Mr. Bush by the Central Intelligence Agency.

Responding to earlier threats of a subpoena, the White House agreed last year to allow three members of the 10-member commission and the panel's Republican staff director to review portions of the daily briefings from before the Sept. 11 attacks that referred to intelligence warnings about Al Qaeda and its plans for terrorist attacks.

The commission has described the briefings as vital since they would show whether the White House had warnings of a catastrophic terrorist attack. The White House has acknowledged that one briefing Mr. Bush saw in August 2001 referred to the possibility of a Qaeda strike with commercial airplanes.

In recent weeks, however, the White House has refused to give permission for the four members of the delegation to share their handwritten and computerized notes - which have been retained by the White House under the agreement - with the full commission. That has outraged Democrats and Republicans on the panel and prompted the renewed threat of a subpoena.

NY Times

With apologies to the memory of Douglas Adams, this must be some new meaning of "extraordinary cooperation" which I was previously unfamiliar with.