HOME /  Hot Document :  Primary sources exposed and explained.

Osama Bin Who?

Entry 1:

By |Posted Thursday, June 1, 2006, at 5:35 PM ET

On April 1, 2005, the National Security Archive, a nonprofit group in Washington that procures and publishes on its Web site  documents about United States foreign policy, queried the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The letter, written by Barbara Elias, the Archive's Freedom of Information coordinator, asked for documents pertaining to al-Qaida and its relationship to various charitable organizations.

Scroll down below to see how, on Jan. 12, 2006, the FBI answered Elias' letter. To read the footnote, roll your mouse over the portion highlighted in yellow.

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Since this is a little hard to read, here's the text: "No records responsive to your FOIA request regarding AL QAEDA or in connections [sic.] to any other organizations were located by a search of the automated and manual indices." Not, "No, you can't have them" but rather, "No we ain't got 'em." Isn't that confidence inspiring?

  

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Timothy Noah is a former Slate staffer. His  book about income inequality, "The Great Divergence," will be published by Bloomsbury in 2012.