Storm on Capitol Hill

It was also a difficult day for Rice, who when she wasn't contradicting Fleischer by detailing domestic terrorism threats, was providing confusing justification for why the public was not warned about those threats.

"You would have risked shutting down the American civil aviation system with such generalized information," Rice said. "You would have to think five, six, seven times about that, very, very hard."

Of course, after the Sept. 11 attacks, all civilian air traffic was shut down for two days, and the full air-traffic schedule did not resume for weeks.

In her afternoon briefing, Rice gave reporters a detailed breakdown of the kinds of intelligence information President Bush received during his first eight months in office. By April 2001, Rice said, there was "clear concern that something was up" involving al-Qaida, but she repeated Fleischer's assertion that most of those concerns focused on potential attacks in Europe, the Middle East and the Arabian Peninsula.

But on June 26, Rice said, there was another "threat spike," prompting the FAA to issue a warning to airlines of an increased risk of hijacking. On July 5, President Bush asked Rice to "see what was being done about all the chatter." At that time, according to Rice, intelligence forces were focused on possible attacks in Paris, Turkey and Rome.

In mid-July, Rice said, there was a threat surrounding the G8 summit in Genoa, Italy, that was "specific to the president." On July 18, the FAA issued another memo to airlines urging them to use "the highest level of caution."

On Aug. 6, Rice said, the president received an "analytic report" that mentioned Osama bin Laden and hijacking. But, Rice insisted, it was "hijacking in the traditional sense," adding that there was no indication terrorists planned to fly airplanes into buildings. This was a reiteration of Fleischer's earlier spin: The White House may have received a greater number of warnings about hijackings but no indication that planes could be used to fly into buildings.

"Before and after 9/11, 'hijacking' means two very different things," Rice said, delivering a line that was clearly straight off the White House "talking points of the day" memo.

On Capitol Hill, claims by Bush officials that they knew nothing about potential hijacking plots sparked new questions about the so-called Phoenix memo, sent by FBI counter-terrorism agents in Arizona to FBI headquarters. The memo outlined concerns about some Middle Eastern students enrolled at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Ariz.

"Phoenix believes that the FBI should accumulate a listing of civil aviation universities/colleges around the country," the memo said. "FBIHQ should discuss this matter with other elements of the U.S. intelligence community and task the community for any information that supports Phoenix's suspicions."

Rice said Thursday that, to the best of her recollection, the briefings Bush received "did not include Moussaoui and the Phoenix memo." But she did not deny the possibility that Bush knew about either threat outright; she said her office was looking into whether that information may have come across her desk, or the president's, at any other point.

On Capitol Hill, steady -- if cautious -- criticism increased throughout the day. Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., renewed his criticism of the administration and intelligence agencies, arguing that the government should have been able to predict something like Sept. 11 with the information they had. "A pattern of terrorists supporting Osama bin Laden, and the use of aviation training, had been established," prior to Sept. 11, Durbin said.

The 9/11 story hit Washington just as key legislators began preparing for joint House-Senate intelligence committee hearings on the terror attacks. In addition, speaking on the Senate floor Thursday, Sen. Joe Lieberman said the new information underscored the need for an independent commission to investigate the events leading up to Sept. 11, and what if anything could have been done to prevent it. Lieberman said he is looking to introduce such a proposal on the Senate floor in the next week or so.

Some Republicans agreed with Lieberman. "This just reconfirms the need for an outside commission," said Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., referring to the bipartisan proposal sponsored by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Lieberman and others.

In a Thursday afternoon press conference, Graham noted that the American public should "avoid overreacting to partial information." But by then, both House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, D-Mo., and Daschle had publicly raised concerns about the latest revelations.

Daschle said he was "gravely concerned about the information provided us just yesterday that the president received a warning in August about the threat of hijackers by Osama bin Laden and his organization. Why did it take eight months for us to receive this information?"

Meanwhile, on the east side of the Senate chambers, Rice provided a closed-door briefing to Senate Democrats, while behind another closed door just a couple hundred feet away, the president kept his previously scheduled meeting with Republican senators. A swarm of more than 50 reporters was flanked in triple stakeout formation, with one cluster posted outside each room, and another outside the Senate's north doors, where Daschle, Durbin and Graham eventually came to talk to reporters.

CNN reported that President Bush told congressional Republicans today that he sensed "the sniff of politics in the air," as Democrats press the White House on this issue. Hagel noted that the dust-up comes just "six months away from an important election." When asked if he thought the Democrats were trying to exploit the revelations about the pre-9/11 warnings, Hagel said, "I wouldn't impugn anybody's motives, but we are on a high state of political alert here."

But Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., countered the president's efforts to downplay the controversy. "Sniff of politics? We want a sniff of truth. Why didn't we [Congress] know about this a lot sooner?"

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