Follow the Money, Find a Bush

An important story today, and like most important stories, it's easy to miss (and thanks to "seems" at Democratic Underground for ensuring I didn't):

9/11 Relatives Sue Bank in Terror Attacks

WASHINGTON -- Lawyers for Sept. 11 families suing the Saudis have filed a related class-action legal action accusing a major bank here of aiding financial backers of the al-Qaida terrorist group through negligence.

The bank, Riggs National Bank, was fined $25 million in May for failing to properly monitor millions of dollars in Saudi financial transactions, including withdrawals now being investigated for possible connections to terrorism.

...

Riggs has been under investigation since regulators reportedly traced the "charitable contributions" to the hijackers two years ago. Since then investigators have discovered tens of millions of dollars in questionable transactions at Riggs by Saudi diplomats.

Funny, the things left unstated here.

Nowhere in the article is reported the fact that Riggs is the bank of Jonathan Bush - uncle of the president, brother of the former president and fellow Bonesman to both - who became CEO on May 31, 2000. Also unspoken is the fact that representing the Saudi defendants in the families' trillion dollar lawsuit is Bush consiglieri James Baker's giant Texas oil-friendly firm, Baker Botts.

So, this is the story: 9/11 families are squaring off against Bush attorney James Baker and his Saudi clients, and have now filed a class action suit against the Bush-run Riggs Bank, accusing it of being a conduit of terrorist financing. ("Through negligence," naturally, because it's inconceivable to most decent people that it could be anything else.)

Riggs has been making the most interesting kinds of headlines lately. It's been slapped with a record setting $25 million fine for money laundering on behalf of clients Saudi Arabia and Equatorial Guinea; found to be trying to shelter the assets of Chilean Cenobite Augusto Pinochet; and is the cause for "suspicious activity reports" on Bob Dole and the Carlyle Group's Frank Carlucci, who may have violated federal laws against money laundering. ("As often as once a week, Mr. Dole's assistant walks around the corner from his Pennsylvania Avenue office in Washington to a branch of Riggs Bank, where she withdraws as much as $8,000 in cash. For walking-around money, Mr. Dole keeps a wad of $100 bills in the breast pocket of his shirt.")

Following the money may seem pretty boring compared to speculating about pods, missiles and remote control, but unravelling a money trail is a far surer way to crack the 9/11 nut. To the Riggs story, we ought to add such leads as Mohammed Atta's money man, commander of Pakistani Intelligence Mahmood Ahmed; the billions of dollars in insider trading; the carefully chosen words of Sibel Edmonds; and the dogged research of Daniel Hopsicker. It's like I said in an earlier post: "these are not puzzles; these are crimes. And crimes are never, in the end, How done its. They are Who done its." And uncovering who paid for 9/11, and who profited by it, tells us virtually all we need to know to answer that question with confidence.