The Empty Sky
Posted by
Kevin
Osama Bin Laden is still free.
That, five years after the fall of the towers, is as good a symbol for the failures of the Bush Administration as any. As I mentioned earlier today, not only is Bid Laden till free, but the US government has lost all trace of him after bungling the operation to catch him at Tora Bora because it shifted focus to Iraq. Even worse, there is no one single person responsible for finding him; the various bureaucracies have been left to fight it out among themselves. Bin Laden’s freedom is hardly the only failure of the last five years. You all know the list: leaving Afghanistan to quietly collapse back into the hands of the Taliban; the invasion of a nation that had nothing to 9/11 and was no threat to the US; the botching of the occupation; the abandonment of the Israeli/Palestinian peace process; the horribly botched Dept. of Homeland Security; the authoritarian assault on American ideals and Constitutional government. Bin Laden isn’t the only failing of the past five years, not by a long shot.
But the biggest failing isn’t a failure elf commission, but rather a failure of omission. There was an opportunity after 9/11 for something better. It was right there, the lowest of fruit, a better world just waiting for someone to come along and pick it. Surely, it was clear and obvious. After 9/11 the United States had a unique mix of goodwill and a world ready to believe it would take whatever action necessary to punish the perpetrators and their allies. It could have used that leverage to pressure Saudi Arabia to reign in the Whabist missionaries, to help Pakistan challenge the madrasses and Taliban sympathizers in its intelligence services, to help Israel and the Palestinians overcome the extremists’ veto. At home, he had a public willing, almost begging, for something to do, someway to help. Converting that desire into action on better CAFE standards, for alternate energy programs, for paying for common sense measures to protect ports, chemical depots, and power plants would have been useful an easy. Surely, all this was clear and obvious.
But when George W. Bush stopped running around the country that day, he turned the department of Homeland Security into a political ploy and a patronage shop, turned his back on Afghanistan, rushed headlong and recklessly into Iraq, and asked us to go shopping.
Apparently, the opportunity for something better was not as obvious as I thought.
“But when George W. Bush stopped running around the country that day, he turned the department of Homeland Security into a political ploy and a patronage shop”
You give Bush too much credit. The Department of Homeland Security wasn’t even in existence on 9/11. Turning the department into a “political ploy and a patronage shop” on that day when it didn’t even exist would be considered impossible by normal people. It’s amazing how illogical hate makes liberals.
Comment 9/11/2006