Schreibe got somewhat close with "we blame Bush because he's the President" - certainly a convenient and cheap excuse.

If all of you stop your nonsensic BS and actually look at what happened - it shouldn't be so hard (even with your level of intelligence) to see what took place and what is taking place.

The war on terror should've been started by Clinton, after numerous attacks abroad and an attack in NY in 1993. He didn't, but he should have. We may have had bases and troops in some of the Middle Eastern countries, but we certainly weren't attacking or fighting anyone there, until they kept repeatedly attacking us. You want to blame Clinton for doing nothing on the subject - that would...

Schreibe got somewhat close with "we blame Bush because he's the President" - certainly a convenient and cheap excuse.

If all of you stop your nonsensic BS and actually look at what happened - it shouldn't be so hard (even with your level of intelligence) to see what took place and what is taking place.

The war on terror should've been started by Clinton, after numerous attacks abroad and an attack in NY in 1993. He didn't, but he should have. We may have had bases and troops in some of the Middle Eastern countries, but we certainly weren't attacking or fighting anyone there, until they kept repeatedly attacking us. You want to blame Clinton for doing nothing on the subject - that would be more plausible than blaming Bush for actually trying to do something.

The Iraq war - let's see, we have more than a dozen UN resolutions telling saddam to stop his deeds - the man doesn't comply. He doesn't let UN inspectors stay etc. - this isn't some undocumented news - everyone should be well aware. So, US goes over there (after still letting the guy flee the scene and avoid the whole war thing and him not taking the offer) and takes the guy down. Done. The big problem in Iraq is sectarian BS, with muslims killing muslims with ease and conviction of normal people breathing air. You want to blame Bush for that? The sectarian crap that's been going on longer than US has been in existence and you want to blame Bush for that? Obviously you 'can' and you 'do', but certainly without any logic or reason. And the argument of US 'enabling' the Iraqis, where saddam didn't and kept them in check, certainly speaks very low of the Iraqi people, if that's how they view their liberation from the Butcher of Iraq.

The Clinton critics like to dismiss his administration's efforts to stop bin Laden as a couple of missiles fired at an empty tent. Yet there was no lack of zeal in Clinton's hunt for the Saudi terrorist. In 1998 Clinton signed a secret National Security Decision Directive that authorized an intensive, ongoing campaign to destroy al-Qaida and seize or assassinate bin Laden. Several attempts were made on bin Laden's life, aside from the famous cruise missile launches that summer, which conservatives falsely denounced as an attempt to deflect attention from the Lewinsky scandal.

In 1999, the CIA organized a Pakistani commando unit to enter Afghanistan on a mission to captu...

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The Clinton critics like to dismiss his administration's efforts to stop bin Laden as a couple of missiles fired at an empty tent. Yet there was no lack of zeal in Clinton's hunt for the Saudi terrorist. In 1998 Clinton signed a secret National Security Decision Directive that authorized an intensive, ongoing campaign to destroy al-Qaida and seize or assassinate bin Laden. Several attempts were made on bin Laden's life, aside from the famous cruise missile launches that summer, which conservatives falsely denounced as an attempt to deflect attention from the Lewinsky scandal.

In 1999, the CIA organized a Pakistani commando unit to enter Afghanistan on a mission to capture or kill bin Laden. That operation was aborted when General Pervez Musharraf seized the Pakistani government from Nawaz Sharif, the more cooperative civilian Prime Minister. A year later, bin Laden was reportedly almost killed in a rocket-grenade attack on his convoy. Unfortunately, the missiles hit the wrong truck.

Simultaneously, the White House tried to persuade or coerce the Taliban regime into expelling bin Laden from Afghanistan. Clinton signed an executive order freezing $254 million in Taliban assets in the United States, while the State Department kept the Taliban internationally isolated. But there was nothing the United States could have done, short of full-scale military action, to separate al-Qaida from the Taliban. And there was also no guarantee that such action would lead to the apprehension of bin Laden, as the Bush administration discovered when American forces helped to overthrow the Taliban after September 11.

On Clinton's watch, the CIA and the National Security Council instituted a special al-Qaida unit that thwarted several deadly conspiracies, including a scheme to blow up Los Angeles International Airport on Millennium Eve, and plots to bomb the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels in New York City as well as the United Nations building. Timely American intelligence also prevented a deadly assault on the Israeli embassy in Washington. Meanwhile, the State Department and the CIA neutralized dozens of terrorist cells overseas through quiet prosecutions, extraditions, and executions undertaken by allies from Albania to the Philippines.

A month before Clinton left office -- and nine ...

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On Clinton's watch, the CIA and the National Security Council instituted a special al-Qaida unit that thwarted several deadly conspiracies, including a scheme to blow up Los Angeles International Airport on Millennium Eve, and plots to bomb the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels in New York City as well as the United Nations building. Timely American intelligence also prevented a deadly assault on the Israeli embassy in Washington. Meanwhile, the State Department and the CIA neutralized dozens of terrorist cells overseas through quiet prosecutions, extraditions, and executions undertaken by allies from Albania to the Philippines.

A month before Clinton left office -- and nine months before the planes hit the World Trade Center and the Pentagon -- the nation's most experienced diplomats in counterterrorism praised those efforts. "Overall, I give them very high marks," said Robert Oakley, former Ambassador for Counterterrorism in the Reagan State Department. "The only major criticism I have is the obsession with Osama, which has made him stronger." Paul Bremer, who had served in the same post under Reagan and later was chosen by congressional leaders to chair the National Commission on Terrorism, disagreed slightly with his colleague. Bremer told the Washington Post he believed that the Clinton administration had "correctly focused on bin Laden." (He has since been chosen to lead the Bush administration team in Iraq.)

Same old line of crap out of the rightwing nutjobs. I could recite this line in my sleep. Bush unfortunately was in office on 9/11 and it happened on his watch.

The indictment of Clinton by Sean Hannity, Sullivan and other conservatives relies heavily on a fable about attempts by the government of Sudan to "hand over bin Laden to the United States" in 1996. That story, attested by an American businessman who represents Sudanese interests, is designed to expunge the Khartoum regime's many atrocities against its own people as well as its close relationship with Islamist terror organizations. Authoritative reporting in the Washington Post and in "The Age of Sacred Terror" by Daniel ...

Same old line of crap out of the rightwing nutjobs. I could recite this line in my sleep. Bush unfortunately was in office on 9/11 and it happened on his watch.

The indictment of Clinton by Sean Hannity, Sullivan and other conservatives relies heavily on a fable about attempts by the government of Sudan to "hand over bin Laden to the United States" in 1996. That story, attested by an American businessman who represents Sudanese interests, is designed to expunge the Khartoum regime's many atrocities against its own people as well as its close relationship with Islamist terror organizations. Authoritative reporting in the Washington Post and in "The Age of Sacred Terror" by Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon shows that the Sudanese offered only to "arrest Osama bin Laden and place him in Saudi custody."

Post reporter Barton Gellman detailed the efforts by the Clinton White House and the State Department to induce the Saudis to accept custody of bin Laden, a request that the authorities in Riyadh adamantly refused. There was no offer to hand bin Laden over to the United States before the Sudanese deported him back to Kabul.

The Sudanese have always had their own agenda, by the way, which Clinton's antagonists never mention. They promised to cooperate against terrorism only if the United States ended economic sanctions imposed to punish their genocidal campaign of bombing and enslavement against black Christians. Frequently during those years, Sudanese officials would promise copious intelligence about the Islamist terror network. But after many meetings, neither the FBI nor the CIA believed that Khartoum was providing anything valuable on bin Laden or al-Qaida. In their eagerness to indict Clinton and their inexperience in dealing with matters of foreign intelligence, propagandists like Hannity have served as useful idiots in a disinformation gambit by the Sudanese intelligence service.

@theCatWhisperer - what you say about Iraq/Iran formula is certainly plausible, I've heard it before and it does make sense logically to a degree. I still don't agree that I'm wrong... The reason is simple - we didn't fight this war the way wars are fought. That certainly was our mistake. If we did - Iran would've been where it needs to be. Your notion about US not being able to fight is not totally accurate. We certainly have the firepower to fight a lot more than just Iraq/Iran/N.Korea etc. The big question is do we have the will and that's what's been missing so far, which is why we have what we have with Iran. The Iraq deal is different - people are dying because they're killing e...

@theCatWhisperer - what you say about Iraq/Iran formula is certainly plausible, I've heard it before and it does make sense logically to a degree. I still don't agree that I'm wrong... The reason is simple - we didn't fight this war the way wars are fought. That certainly was our mistake. If we did - Iran would've been where it needs to be. Your notion about US not being able to fight is not totally accurate. We certainly have the firepower to fight a lot more than just Iraq/Iran/N.Korea etc. The big question is do we have the will and that's what's been missing so far, which is why we have what we have with Iran. The Iraq deal is different - people are dying because they're killing each other, not for any other reason. I realize your boys want to hang Bush for that, but it has nothing to do with Bush. It has to do with their idiotic hate for each other.