Salon.com Wire Story: "Sept. 11 ringleader Mohammed Atta and three other hijackers were identified by defense intelligence officials more than a year before the attacks but information about their possible connections to al-Qaida never were forwarded to law enforcement, Rep. Curt Weldon said Tuesday.

Weldon, a Pennsylvania Republican and vice chairman of the House Armed Services and Homeland Security committees, said the hijackers were identified in September of 2000 by a classified military intelligence unit known as 'Able Danger,' which determined they could be members of an al-Qaida cell.

At the time, Weldon said, the unit recommended that its information on the hijackers be given to the FBI 'so they could bring that cell in and take out the terrorists,' Weldon said in an interview.

However, Weldon said Pentagon lawyers rejected the recommendation because they said Atta and the others were in the country legally."

Yeah, clearly we needed the Patriot Act. It's not a cover for incompetence at all...

(Via Salon.)