April 17, 2004 by lonbud

Bill Clinton’s Fault

Asked to explain the events of September 11, 2001, Attorney General John Ashcroft stepped up to the microphones before the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States this week to recite the Republican Party’s favorite mantra: “It was Bill Clinton’s fault.”

Because Bill Clinton didn’t buy new computers for the FBI on his way out of the White House, no one important enough to take the heat can be shown to have sat on the information we had about the identities, the whereabouts, and the activities of some of the 9/11 hijackers -well before they managed to pull off their dark deeds.

Because Bill Clinton’s policy toward Osama bin Laden was that he had to be captured instead of that the U.S. Military was authorized to drop a nuclear device on him, now there are gaping holes in the southern tip of Manhattan Island, in the lives of the survivors of over 3,000 killed on 9/11, and in the credibility of the United States as a responsible member of the global community of nations.

Yet, all manner of former Bush administration insiders have lately come forward describing the vast indifference the President and his cabal showed for information or action on the problem of Radical Islam when they came riding into Washington, D.C. in the Winter of 2000. Stalwart Republicans like David Kay, Paul O’Neill, Richard Clarke, and Joseph Wilson have amply documented the pre-occupation with Saddam Hussein, and the strategy of imposing western-style democracy on the Middle East through the forced overthrow of his horrible regime. Army General Eric Shinseki warned congress before the war on Iraq began -the junta’s gross underestimations of the manpower required to “pacify” Iraq would lead to exactly the kinds of casualties we are beginning to see now.

“Mission Accomplished” has got to be the all-time premature ejaculation in the history of global affairs. And George W. Bush is running as a “war president.”

As if the gathering calamities in Iraq were not enough to vex a man, the creeping specter of inflation has recently been seen poking around consumer prices here at home. Murmurs of a rise in interest rates now threatens to throttle the gasping start of an economic “recovery.” News from abroad hints our chief supplier of goods, China, is looking to pass on raw materials price increases as well.

George W. Bush is at the crossroads. He needs several things to start going right, right away.

Unfortunately for him, chances are they won’t. With the first videos of American POWs beginning to roll in and no particular person or entity to whom the Keys to Sovereignty may be handed in Iraq, that adventure is turning out to be a little more like Outward Bound than Cheney, Rummy, and the Rovemeister figured it would be. Long, hard slog, indeed.

Questions about 9/11 aren’t going to go away, either.

The Commission looks set to give a very stern, yet respectful rebuke to the Bush Administration for failing a proper appraisal of the risks of Radical Islam. But the basic question of why our standard civil defense system did not so much as react or respond to the actual events as they happened on that day has yet to be asked in any serious manner.

Forget about weasels like Ashcroft annd Rice. I believe we need to hear from the folks in the air traffic control towers that morning. Why exactly, did they not follow standard operating procedures and inform the FAA of a commercial aircraft off-course and unresponsive to radio contact within moments of it being the case?

Oh. They did?

Then, we need to hear from the folks at the FAA, who need to explain why they didn’t follow standard operating procedure and inform the U.S. Military of a commercial aircraft off-course and unresponsive to radio contact within moments of their having confirmed with air-traffic control it was the case.

Oh. They did?

Then, we need the General, Colonel, Major, Captain, Leiutenant, Sergeant, Corporal, or Private who was resposible for following standard operating procedure to explain why they did not order immediate scrambling of military fighter jets to intercept the off-course and unresponsive commercial aircraft moments after having confirmed with the FAA it was the case.

Oh. They did?

Then, we need to hear from the folks with the Right Stuff at McGuire Air Force Base in Wrightstown, NJ. They need to explain why they didn’t follow standard operating procedure and have their jets airborne within three minutes of getting the order, flying the 80 miles to New York at over 600 miles an hour to investigate the off-course and unresponsive commercial aircraft nearly 20 minutes before that aircraft crashed into the World Trade Tower.

Oh. They did?

Well, why then, did they not follow standard operating procedure and blow that commercial aircraft out of the sky within moments of determining that it was, indeed, off-course and unresponsive?

My guess is it had nothing to do with Bill Clinton.