Mickey Kaus on Black Hawk Down

It seems the Corner Kids over at National Review have little substantive to say in regards the information that President Clinton provided to Faux News hack Chris Wallace so they turn their microphone over to Mickey Kaus:

My impression – from Mark Bowden’s book, Black Hawk Down – is that al Qaeda operatives had taught Somali warlord Aideed’s men how to bring down U.S. helicopters with RPGs. (See, e.g., here) Did Clinton misspeak, or does he really not know of this Al Qaeda connection? Or does he have information that Bowden’s claim really is “bull”?

But what did President Clinton say to Chris Wallace?

OK, now let’s look at all the criticisms: Black Hawk down, Somalia. There is not a living soul in the world who thought that Osama bin Laden had anything to do with Black Hawk down or was paying any attention to it or even knew Al Qaida was a growing concern in October of ‘93.

Black Hawk Down was published in 1999. Yes, we learned years later about the role Al Qaeda played, but Clinton was referring to what we knew in late 1993. Now did Mickey Kaus publish something back in 1993 telling us that Al Qaeda was involved? Why does Slate give this hack the right to publish under its name?

Update: Roland Patrick (our Patrick R. Sullivan) displays the same traits of “is it stupidity of mendacity” as Mickey Kaus. Gee – Clinton knew it was Al Qaeda in 1998, but the Q&A had to do with what we knew in late 1993. Are these rightwingers really these stupid – or are they assuming the average America is not incredibly dumb?