Wingnuts Are More Partisan Than Patriotic On 9-11

Pasco Conservative has the amazing ability to blockquote huge amounts of text and not fact-check. He cites a blog post by Cliff Kincaid that leans against Bill Clinton's military action to stop the genocide in Kosovo. Kincaid lays several accusations, but cites and links to no sources. He accuses the Clinton administration of having a pro-Kosovo Liberation Army agenda that helped Osama bin Laden. Wesley Clark testified at the International Criminal Tribunal against Slobodan Milošević.

"And I want to make that very clear for the record. NATO had no relationship with the KLA, period," Clark said. The Clinton administration even listed KLA as a terrorist organization.

Kincaid takes what anti-semite Michael Scheuer has too say too seriously. Classic Scheur quote.

SCHEUER: Well, the clandestine aspect is that, clearly, the ability to influence the Congress — that’s a clandestine activity, a covert activity. You know to some extent, the idea that the Holocaust Museum here in our country is another great ability to somehow make people feel guilty about being the people who did the most to try to end the Holocaust. I find — I just find the whole debate in the United States unbearably restricted with the inability to factually discuss what goes on between our two countries."

Isn't that Holocaust museum such a drag? Much like Pasco Conservative and Kincaid wondering why Clinton made such a big deal about the Kosovo genocide.

Republicans who were gung ho for Iraq were against Kosovo. I'm talking to you Tom Delay and Trent Lott. Governor George W. Bush even got into the act.

Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the president to explain to us what the exit strategy is.

Perhaps George W. Bush would like to explain what that exit strategy is to those cut and runners.

The 9-11 Commission Report details how Republicans put politics over Osama bin Laden.

The air strikes marked the climax of an intense 48-hour period in which Berger notified congressional leaders, the principals called their foreign counterparts,
and President Clinton flew back from his vacation on Martha’s Vine-yard to address the nation from the Oval Office. The President spoke to the congressional leadership from Air Force One,and he called British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak from the White House.47 House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott initially supported the President.The next month, Gingrich’s office dismissed the cruise missile attacks as “pinpricks.”

At the time, President Clinton was embroiled in the Lewinsky scandal,which continued to consume public attention for the rest of that year and the first months of 1999. As it happened, a popular 1997 movie, Wag the Dog, features a president who fakes a war to distract public attention from a domestic scandal. Some Republicans in Congress raised questions about the timing of the strikes. Berger was particularly rankled by an editorial in the Economist that said that only the future would tell whether the U.S. missile strikes had “created 10,000 new fanatics where there would have been none.”

The point is anyone can write silly posts detailing the faults of the other side on 9-11. I think both presidents could have done more. I'm willing to admit that. If conservatives actually think Bush did a good job, before or after 9-11, on national security matters, then they should ask themselves why are his approval ratings tanking. It's not because of some liberal media conspiracy. People find Bush dishonest (no mission accomplished) and wondering what the point of the Iraq war is now. The average citizen realizes Saddam Hussein is gone and there are no weapons of mass destruction. Americans are wondering why we are still there. Bush refuses to give an honest answer to that question. At least Clinton can admit he didn't do enough to stop Osama bin Laden. A good measure of a man is if he can admit his failures.