Posted on 08/08/2002 9:01:21 AM PDT by Jean S
The funniest knee-slapper in days comes right from the pages of the latest Time magazine. Time, joining the ranks of increasingly hysterical leftwingers nationwide, appears to be searching for anything, anything, to excuse or defuse the ever-more-obvious glaring defense defects of the 1990s. This latest attempt in revisionist comedy, ominously titled, “They Had A Plan”, portrays the inept Clinton Administration as actually having a gung-ho strategy for getting Al-Qaeda - until, of course, their plan was squashed by that sinister chad-stealer himself, George W.
The article is allegedly written by Pravda-esque author Michael Elliott, but it’s got Bill Clinton’s fingerprints all over it. It follows, exactly, the highly perfected Clinton M.O. First, tell the Big Lie. Tell it so outrageously, with a straight face, that incredulous people will think they’ve fallen down the rabbit hole. Next, get the lapdog media to repeat the Big Lie, endlessly and also with apparent seriousness. Trot it out on reliably partisan cable shows. Get a couple of insider newspaper editors worked up enough to write indignant columns about it. Rational people wind up with their heads spinning in the Kafkaesque surrealism, unsure of what exactly to think. And, for years it worked like a charm, keeping Clinton in office after impeachment and generally flummoxing any effective opposition.
Will the media-hyped “Clinton Charm” continue to work in the new world after 9/11? A recent Pew Research Center poll suggests a resounding “No!”. A mere 12 percent of the polled populace believes “most” of what Bill Clinton has to say, while a resounding 48 percent believe “nothing” of what comes out of the former President’s mouth. Go tell it to Bill, who still seems to harbor a serene belief in the truth of the fantastic reality he weaves in order to shield himself from his failures.
President Bush appears to put a lot of stock in his vaunted “New Tone” in Washington, and tries to at least refrain from openly criticizing his predecessor. Clinton, as usual bereft of tack and good taste, feels no such restraint. Out of office, as in, he feels inclined to immediately satisfy whatever urge entices him at that moment - the perpetual adolescent, preening for the crowd and laughing over having pulled another one over on the clueless adults.
Yet, one should never forget that Clinton and his cronies possess a ruthless cunning, and a willingness to emasculate the opposition in ways that would make Tony Soprano proud. Just ask Kathleen Willey and her cat. Clinton would currently be making the rounds of the Norwegian blondes, if overweening ambition didn’t stand in his way. Or, in hers, as in the junior Senator from New York.
Clinton’s buck passing has more to it than just rehabilitating the tattered shards of his “legacy”. The truth of the matter is that the blame for September 11th can be laid squarely at his door. Clinton was in charge when Al-Qaeda launched their intafada against America, in the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993. His Defense Secretary, Les Aspin, was the one who made the decision denying 18 Army Rangers armored support in Mogadishu - a decision which led to their deaths at the hands of militant Islamic warlords. Bill Clinton was at the helm in 1996, when the Khobar Towers were bombed in Saudi Arabia. He was still President in 1998 when our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were destroyed and 258 people were killed; and he was still there on October 12th, 2000 when the USS Cole was hit and 17 United States sailors lost their lives.
Bill Clinton’s responses to these increasingly stepped up terrorist attacks, many of which were committed by Al-Qaeda or their offshoots, was either cowardly - in Mogadishu he ran away without letting the U.S. military avenge their men’s lives - or nonexistent. Oh yeah, there was that aspirin factory he hit to get Monica out of the headlines, but that was it.
The reasons given for Clinton’s inaction are many, but the underlying reasons are simpler. True leftists like the Clintons scorn America and American ideals, and see no real reason to protect her interests or even her citizenry. Harry Truman and JFK were the last Democrats who understood national security issues and were willing to act upon them. Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, paralyzed by white Leftist liberal guilt, both vacillated and showed weakness when adversaries struck at us and the adversaries were, of course, emboldened to strike again.
Clinton’s failure to act on the terrorist threat during his eight years in office has shown that American lives and American interests abroad are too important to be trusted to a Leftist liberal Democrat - ever again. That’s what he - and Time - are trying to hide with their farcical revamping of his "legacy". ***
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