The Democrats' internal polling numbers must be truly awful for them pull this kind of stunt so far in advance of the election. I would have expected them to wait until mid-October.
The president's critics finally have an issue, or so they think.
This is the real issue. Democrats have seen every attempt to attack and diminish or politically harm the president come to utter failure. They know that President Bush acted correctly and showed excellent leadership on September 11th and ever since. His September 20th speech was masterful, cementing his place in Presidential history and our military actions in Afghanistan put deeds to words. Americans approved and felt confident that they had a real leader. A good man, friendly and near-average in many respects but able to take charge, use his excellent serior staff and accomplish the necessary goals in fighting terrorism, minus the tawdry scandals and endless posing and spinning of the Clinton years
Now, the Democrats, having willingly lowered themselves collectively to Clinton's level and seeming to like the neighborhood down there, are attempting to 'Nixon-ize' George W. Bush. This attempt will also utterly fail and possibly backfire. Americans like Bush and can see that he is no Clinton; blaming others for every mistake and passing the buck whenever confronted with something unpleasant. Bush is a leader, not a poser.
On August 6, 2001, President Bush received a vague and general warning about terrorists possibly planning to hijack a plane. The president put the proper agencies on warning. No knowledge of using the hijacked plane(s) as missiles was ever mentioned or probably thought of at the time, as the article notes. No probable dates, no specifics were given. It's all 20/20 hindsight and with no basis for the screaming headlines and finger pointing going on.
Americans are not as stupid as the media assumes. The evidence is clear. This is political grandstanding and a media feeding frenzy but without any meat to feed on. It gets old fast with no evidence, no substance to the story. Even the Democrats are backing off, fearing the voter backlash from being seen as attempting to smear a popular president with lies and contrived accusations baased on speculation and Monday-morning quarterbacking.
The liberal media is shooting itself in the foot by trumpting this non-story endlessly. Bush acted properly. What he knew a month before September 11th was of little use in preventing the September 11th attacks and it's obvious to eveyone but liberal Bush-haters and the media.
Let them howl. This will simply help to further open the eyes of the public to the strong, leftist-driven media bias against Bush and Republicans and the Democrat's desperation and shallowness.
1) We can not explain the failure of the previous administration to act when they were directly advised on possible attacks. Or when OBL was directly offered for capture by the Sudan government. (provide further details)
2) We can not explain why individuals appointed during the previous administration did not pass on critical information that would have been useful in decision making to the President when he took office. We will investigate this selective and apparently politically motivated, lapes in judgement.
3) The breifing received by the President was so vague as to only indicate possibilities. An advisement that some organization is planning at some time to attack a US interest somewhere in the world or hijack a US plane is of little practical use.
4) The Congress was given the same level of information as was received by the President. Apparently, these highly classified reports which contain sensitive intelligence is being leaked to the press and might jeprodize the lives of intelligence officers. Such leaks violate the National Security Act and will be investigated as well. This should have the Dems backtraking in a couple of days.
Off topic (a bit). I have had to explain several times to persons with PhDs that one cannot replace testing of engineering systems by simulation.
The dream, you see, is simulating failures. Simulation is much cheaper and faster than testing, goes the 'reasoning'.
This is impossible.
Failures you foresee are designed against. The failure that bites is always one you did not foresee.
Such failures can only be revealed by test.
Were we angels, our devices would always be perfect. No "safety factors" would be needed. A safety factor is the result of human fallibility.
Amazing that this has to be recited to so many learned men, full of dreams of simulation.
--Boris