For the record, I'm not laying this at Bush's feet. However, it does appear that something was up, for even under his watch department heads were called in and warned that it appeared something was going to take place.
Now, do you find it unreasonable for us to question why even our capital was left exposed to these suicide flights? I don't.
You miss my point, but in doing so, you inadvertently make my point. And my point attempts to answer your not-at-all-unreasonable question. What I was trying to say, and pardon tinge of sarcasm used, was... what could our leaders (Bush, Ashcroft, Ridge, etc.) have done to protect our capital from suicide flights? Yes, it was reported that there were theorized "suicide attacks" in CIA reports as early as 1995, perhaps even earlier. So? We already had metal detectors and security staff in place at every airport. We also had decades of cumulative PC interference sabotaging our intelligence agency's effectiveness, from the Church Hearings in the 70's to Clinton and Toricelli in the 90's. What practical measures should we have instituted to protect our capital from suicide flights? Shut down the private air travel system indefinately? Or, profile the passengers, selecting out the "terrorist" types? "Racial profiling?" Haven't we just had years of endless, pointless, debate and PC demogoguery belaboring just that issue? Is this begining to hit home? Just what would you have done?
The evil "genius" of Bin Laden's plan in the 9/11 attacks was just how he used our free society against us. Our sophisticated and instantaneous communication systems, the ease of travel, the freedom of movement, the lack of a police state-checking papers at every point of movement, the size, speed, range, fuel capacity, and power of the aircraft we use at such affordable ticket prices, even the professional and non-judgemental courtesy of flight attendants, were all taken advantage of and subsequently turned on us... and they became a deadly and terrifying weapon of mass destruction, that has shook this country to it's very foundation. Your comments are an indication of the depth of that terror... to the point where we are becoming irrational, demanding that our leaders do the impossible; protect us from future terrors unknown, but don't inconvenience us or in any way appear racially insensitive, or change anything that might upset us in the process. Unless you have access to a time machine, or a special pair of "hindsight" binoculars, I don't know of a way to protect us from the effects of an event that has yet to happen, perpetrated by a fiend that so thoroughly used our very national nature, culture, and fruits of our economy against us, without us shutting down that very culture altogether.
Now, do you find it unreasonable for me to question why you don't understand that regardless of what anyone could have realistically done, with the information they had, and our laws and society as it is, against a determined, well planned, suicide attack, even our capital was left exposed? I don't.