President Bush and Dick Cheney, far busier with the Bush-Cheney Legacy Tour than with their final days exercising executive (or whatever branch Cheney's in) power--we can hope, are offering one overarching defense of the administration's performance: there was no further attack on "the homeland"--i.e., the US of A--since 9/11.
Setting aside the matter of the post-9/11 white powder episodes, this argument has a certain appeal that has attracted conservative pundits and bloggers. Sure, there have been terrorist attacks since 9/11 on London, Madrid, and Australians in Bali, as well as all sorts of folks in Mumbai, but--homeland safe.
So, if Bush & Cheney et al are entitled to brag about keeping America safe for seven years, logic dictates that Bill Clinton and co. can similarly boast about no attacks on the homeland after the first World Trade Center assault in 1993. Sure, there were attacks on the USS Cole and the embassies in Kenya and Tanzania--but nothing on the "homeland."
So, a question for conservatives: did the Clinton administration, like the Bush administration, do a fine job of protecting the country once it had undergone one al-Qaeda attack? Or did both administrations fail to prevent the initial attack in the first place?
Or does al-Qaeda just have a longer time-frame for its attention span than American administrations?
(EDITED TO CORRECT SPELLING AND INCLUDE TANZANIAN EMBASSY ATTACK)
While Bush was busy trying to keep us safe from "evil doers," no one was keeping us safe from Bush.
By the way, Harry, didn't you just love Bush's little press conference tirade against the folks who claimed he didn't do enough for NO in the wake of Katrina? 30 thousand people pulled from roofs? By helicopter "drivers"?
While my hat's off the the (I believe they'd prefer to be called pilots) air rescue folks, me thinks the president doth exagerate.
My main recollection of rescue work on the ground, was Sean Penn in a rowboat, and Anderson Cooper in a tizzy!
If there was, these guys would do everything to blow their own horn, including T-shirts.
My response to your article should be "pinned" somewhere at this blog for all to read. Regarding "terrorism", no President, past or present has kept us safe. Ask yourself "safe from what?". White powder? Bio-bombs? The obvious vulnerabilities mean little when you consider the following:
1. How many miles of unguarded natural gas and oil pipelines criss-cross this country?
2. How easy is it to export contaminated foods into the U.S.?
3. How many bridges spanning the Mississippi River are vulnerable to explosives?
4. How many small private planes have 24/7 free access to our nation's airspace?
5. How many power plants across the country are secure?
6. How many main water lines in major cities are vulnerable to explosives?
7. How safe is our satellite communications system?
8. How safe are our computerized security and infrastructure systems?
Finally, Al-Qaeda strikes when ready, regardless of who is President.
That's all I read. Your post may be brilliant, I do not know, but I staunchly believe the old saying that anyone who claims to be wise is not.
Be well.
Now, without Bush to do his work for him, Bin Laden will have to come again on his own. We will see how well Bush protected us.
Bush? Off the table.
Kind of ironical.
Bush did worse than Clinton.
Clinton, as it were, got by with some WTC basement damage.
Bush lost the entire WTC, AND took a hit to the Pentagon, even given foreknowledge of the 1993 attack, as well as the pointed PDB, etc.
Then there's the economics of war: No $3 Trillion hit to the economy on Clinton's watch.
And then there's all the servicemen and women lost.
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=protecting-new-orleans
"Yet scientists, engineers and Louisiana state politicians had warned for years that a Category 4 or 5 storm crossing the Gulf of Mexico from a certain direction would drown the region." In fact, Katrina was a weak Cat 2 or strong Cat 1 by the time it reached New Orleans. It didn't "drown the region", it battered the Mississippi Gulf Coast with typical hurricane-force wind damage, and the design and construction flaws of the "hurricane protection system" in New Orleans led to the catastrophic breaching of that system at surge levels lower than the system was advertised to withstand.