The Young Turks

In January of 2000, as George Bush was preparing to shamelessly take office despite the fact that he did not win the election, he received an explicit warning from the outgoing Clinton administration: the number one threat to American national security was Osama Bin Laden. This was not wild-eyed speculation or the kind of fear-mongering that Bush has majored in during his tenure. This was hot on the heels of the USS Cole bombing and the foiled 'millenium' plot. Richard Clarke, the NSC's chief counter-terrorism authority was kept on through the transition to ensure the issue received proper attention. But Clarke and others inside the new Bush administration were frustrated by the President's lack of enthusiasm for fighting terrorism, an attitude that was embraced by Condi Rice, the new National security Advisor. On August 6th, 2001, Bush responded to a PDB entitled "Bin Laden Determined To Strike In US" by allegedly telling his CIA briefer "Alright... you've covered your ass now." His highness then went back to clearing brush, whatever that means. The point of repeating all this is to draw the contrast between Reformed Bush, who thrives on fear and terrorism and must hear every word we utter over the phone and internet, and Brush-clearing Bush, who had no particular fervor when it came to figuring out what the Evil-Doers may be plotting and lacked the simple curiosity to follow any number of explicit leads that he was made aware of. We would all be better off today if Fuckface had taken the reasonable advice of his mortal enemy, Bill Clinton, to heart and filled part of the dead space between his ears with rational fear and a sense of duty to protect and serve his country. Instead, that gaping hole now finds itself home to a mortal fear that has controlled this president and, as a result, this electorate like a master puppeteer. Condi? For her part, the warnings were all historical. Then they turned hysterical, and we have been indiscriminately pissing our rights away ever since. Nowhere has this been done more egregiously that in the case of the current FISA debate and the telecomm immunity. Because, you see, if only NumbNuts had used the adequate measures in place in 2001 to do what he was supposed to be doing--- his job--- we would more than likely never have hit the national panic button because there is every reason to believe that 9/11 didn't have to happen. That is the brutal truth that we just can't seem to accept as a nation--- our government failed us miserably. We picked an idiot as a president. And we'll go to any length to avoid letting that into the mainstream debate. We'll waterboard brown people, build a wall across the Texas border, give up our carry-on shampoo, let our phones and computer activity become the fodder for Big Dumb Brother, anything to avoid saying the truth: it didn't have to happen. Yes, there have been no attacks on US soil by Al Qaeda since 2001 because their job was done here as soon as AssWipe peed his pants. Sadly, though, there has been no shortage of attacks on Americans by the Bush administration. Let's make an agreement... let's not forget to point out on whose watch the worst attack on American soil was allowed to happen.