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Four years ago, Osama bin Laden chronicler and CNN and New America Foundation terrorism expert PETER BERGEN, The Torture Papers: The Road to Abu Ghraib author and NYU Center on Law and Security Director KAREN GREENBERG, and I organized a day long mega-meeting of the world's best and brightest al Qaeda watchers. "Al Qaeda 2.0" (edited volume from conference here) assembled Western and Non-Western journalists including Yosri Fouda, Hamid Mir, Rohan Gunaratna and others who had interviewed the chiefs of al Qaeda or those who had masterminded the 9/11 terrorist attacks -- and those trying to catch them like Richard Clarke and Michael Scheuer.

I am really pleased to say that populist writer and opinion leader Abdel Bari Atwan will be with us in this conference this year. Four years ago, the U.S. government would not allow him a visa because he was considered too hot given his political views about the so-called "war on terror." The State Department did arrange this time for him to have a visa -- and we think some progress has been made over there in Foggy Bottom.

We are back with an update -- AL QAEDA 3.0 -- which the New America Foundation and NYU Center on Law and Security are co-sponsoring.

This meeting takes place today and will STREAM LIVE over the blog and run live from 9 am until 5:15 pm on C-Span 2 today.

I will be moderating the meeting along with Greenberg and Bergen. Both an audio file and video file of the entire event will later be posted on my blog.

Special thanks to Senator Chuck Hagel and his staff, as well as the staff of the U.S. Senate Rules Committee for accommodating our rather large request of having this meeting all day in one of the most dramatic and historic rooms in the U.S. Senate -- the Russell Senate Office Building Caucus Room. It is where the Titanic hearings, the Watergate hearings, and even the Harry Truman-led 1940 war profiteering hearings took place.

Here is the general schedule of today's event:

The New America Foundation/American Strategy Program and the New York University Center on Law and Security cordially invite you to...

AL Qaeda 3.0: The So-Called "War on Terror" After the Bush Administration

Friday, 10 October 2008
8:45 a.m. - 5:30 p.m.

Caucus Room, 325 Russell Senate Office Building
United States Senate, Washington, D.C.

RSVP directly to Steve Clemons at clemons@newamerica.net

8:45 am REGISTRATION AND COFFEE

9:00 am WELCOMING REMARKS

Steve Clemons
Director, American Strategy Program, New America Foundation
Publisher, The Washington Note

Karen Greenberg
Director, Center on Law and Security, New York University

9:15 am PANEL I: THE FUTURE OF AL QAEDA

Frances Fragos Townsend
Homeland Security and Counter-Terrorism Advisor to President Bush 2004-2008

Bruce Hoffman
Georgetown University

Steve Coll
New America Foundation and The New Yorker

Peter Bergen
New America Foundation & CNN

10:45 am PANEL II: THE WAR OF IDEAS

Lawrence Wright
NYU Center on Law and Security and The New Yorker

Daniel Kimmage
Author, "Iraqi Insurgent Media: The War of Images and Ideas

Eliza Griswold
New America Foundation

12:00 pm PANEL III: THE TALIBAN AND AL QAEDA IN AFGHANISTAN AND PAKISTAN

Seth Jones
RAND Corporation

Christine Fair
RAND Corporation

Nir Rosen
New America Foundation/American Strategy Program and NYU Center on Law and Security

1:15 pm PANEL IV: AL QAEDA IN THE ARAB WORLD AND EUROPE

Abdel Bari Atwan
Al Quds Al Arabi

Brian Fishman
Combating Terrorism Center, West Point

Mohammed Hafez
Naval Postgraduate School

Thomas Hegghammer
Harvard University & Norwegian Defence Research Establishment (FFI)

2:30 pm PANEL V: COUNTER-RADICALIZATION: WHAT WORKS?

Christopher Boucek
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Zachary Abuza
Simmons College

Kenneth Ballen
Terror Free Tomorrow

3:45 PANEL VI: COUNTERTERRORISM AND AMERICAN SECURITY

Philip Mudd
National Security Branch, FBI

Marc Sageman
New York Police Department

Mitchell Silber
Intelligence Division's Analytic and Cyber Units, New York Police

Michael Sheehan
NYU Center on Law and Security and former NYC Deputy Police Commissioner

Joseph Zogby
Chief Counsel to Senator Richard Durbin
Staff Director, Subcommittee on Human Rights and the Law, Senate Judiciary Committee
Former Special Counsel on Post-9/11 Discrimination, U.S. Department of Justice.

5:15 ADJOURNMENT

RSVP to clemons@newamerica.net