Why is this NOT receiving coverage from the American Media? The United States is trying to silence and prevent the public from knowing of a possible gigantic clusterfuck in American intelligence just prior to 9/11. The question is not just why they are trying to do this, but why we have to rely on a newspaper from faux Middle Earth to tell us. Bush administration bids to silence intelligence failure witness The Bush administration will today seek to prevent a former FBI translator providing evidence about September 11 intelligence failures to a group of relatives and survivors who have accused international banks and officials of aiding al Qaeda. Sibel Edmonds was subpoenaed by a law firm representing more than 500 family members and survivors of the attacks in New York and Washington to testify that she had seen information that proved there was considerable evidence prior to September 2001 that al Qaeda was planning to strike the US with aircraft. The lawyers made their demand after reading the comments Mrs Edmonds had made to The Independent. But the US Justice Department is seeking to stop Mrs Edmonds from testifying, citing the rarely used "state secrets privilege". Today in afederal court in Washington, senior government lawyers will try and gag Mrs Edmonds, claiming that disclosure of her evidence "would cause serious damage to the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States". Mrs Edmonds, 33, a Turkish-American who had top secret security clearance while working for the FBI, claimed earlier this month that information she had seen while working in the bureau's headquarters in Washington proves senior officials knew of al Qaeda's plans to attack the US with aircraft months before the strikes happened. She said the claim by the National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, that there was no such information was "an outrageous lie". Mrs Edmonds has declined to publicly reveal the specific information shes ays she has but she has provided sworn testimony to the independent panel appointed by President Bush to investigate the circumstances surrounding 9-11. She was subpoenaed by the law firm Motley-Rice, which is representing hundreds of families who are taking civil action against a number of banks and two members of the Saudi royal family for allegedly aiding al Qaeda. Mrs Edmonds would be in contempt of court if she refused to respond to the subpoena. Last night her lawyer, Mark Zaid, said: "The FBI wants to shut her up completely. They don't want her to say anything. "He said it was ridiculous to claim that everything Mrs Edmonds knew had national security implications. Rather, he said, the FBI was seeking to silence his client to save its embarrassment. "There is no doubt that what she knows is hugely embarrassing to the bureau," he said. God forbid what the Ashcroft Justice Department would try to do if Ms. Edmonds owned a calico cat.