Predator drones firing Hellfires are controlled by a few of those 9000 troop. They have already in a short time killed more terrorists than blowjob bubba

I was wrong about the sub. There were two subs:

Despite the occasional abortive raid, they never seemed to get close to bin Laden. That meant that the Clinton team had to fall back on a second strategy: taking out bin Laden by cruise missile, which had been tried after the embassy bombings in 1998. For all of 2000, sources tell Time, Clinton ordered two U.S. Navy submarines to stay on station in the northern Arabian Sea, ready to attack if bin Laden’s coordinates could be determined.

By the way, the fact that taking out bin Laden by cruise missile was tried after the embassy bombings belies the repeated argument that the Clinton administration did “nothing” to retaliate for that. That whole linked article is a good read, and it dates back to August of 2002, so none of this is exactly breaking news.

Anotherthing2:
But time and again he knew the location but by the time he reached a concensus with his cabinet or could be bothered with the information he was gone.

Don’t suppose you can back up those assertions with anything resembling a mainstream news report, can you? And even if you can demonstrate that Clinton’s actions were woefully inadequate, as you seem to be implying, what does it say about Bush that he did even less until the terrorists attacked in our back yard?

Drake:
Predator drones firing Hellfires are controlled by a few of those 9000 troop. They have already in a short time killed more terrorists than blowjob bubba.

Yeah, and they’ve obviously hamstrung al-Qaeda in the process. This is why al-Qaeda hasn’t been able to pull off major attacks in Bali or Instanbul or Spain. Oh, wait a minute…

Do you think Al-Queda would prefer to hit targets here or nail hotels and the like? Maybe, just maybe they can’t hit us right now because they are reeling from real military action, not token half measures.

Methinks you miss the point. Al-Qaeda has a history of taking its time. The last attack on US soil before 9/11 was seven years earlier. The embassy bombings in Africa were fully four years after the first WTC bombing attempt, and another two years between that and the Cole bombing.

It’s been just two and a half years since 9/11, and we’ve already seen several attacks across the globe, most seriously the Spanish rail bombings. So take your pick, from:

Take your pick. But frankly, based on the increased frequency of attacks (even if not against what Drake would personally call “important US interests”), I’d find it hard to describe al-Qaeda as “reeling.”

But as the neo-cons love to point out, “9/11 changed everything.” Since we’re talking about the 9/11 commission here, what’s relevant is what the two presidents did before 9/11. And before 9/11, Bush did exactly two things to combat terror: Jack and Shit.

In fact, the Bush administration even funded the Taliban as late as August of 2001, as part of the lovely war on drugs that’s been such a smashing success. But you’re right, it’s all Clinton’s fault.

I’m just basking in the warm glow of your two sentences, and the obvious Bush-hatred they contain.

Pre-9/11 is relevant, because that’s what the commission is discussing. And it’s indisputable that Clinton did far more about terror pre-9/11 than Bush did. Since you have no answer for that, you instead decide to paint me as a “Bush hater?” (Which I am, but that doesn’t take away from my points…)

Post 9/11, the most important issue is whether the Iraq war is an important part of the war on terror, or a distraction from it. More and more officials (most recently Clarke), are coming out saying they believe it’s a distraction. And these aren’t anti-Bush Democrats, either. These are Republicans questioning Bush’s tactics.

Ah, now I get it. When you completely divorce my quote from its context… That’s the part I was missing. I was being an idiot and looking at my quote in context. Silly me!

Now that I have the frame of reference correct, I can address these more appropriately. First, understand that I was responding to people who seemed to be of the opinion that Clinton did nothing (or, at least, nothing worthwhile) about terror, whereas Bush is doing a brilliant job fighting terror. It was these two assumptions that I was attacking.

Parking two subs in the Indian Ocean was not the only thing the Clinton Administration did vis-a-vis terror. You may not agree with everything they did and didn’t do, but the fact remains that when the Bush Administration took control, they did far less until after we were attacked on US soil.

As for Bush in Afghanistan, his initial actions were indeed correct, but then he largely bailed out to wage his sideshow in Iraq. Our 9,000 troops in Afghanistan, where Bush is “doing something” about terror, are exceeded by our troops in Japan (43,000), South Korea (37,000), Western Europe (116,000), and of course, Iraq (146,000).

So you’ll forgive me if I don’t think 9,000 troops in Afghanistan is a significant deployment, when compared to our deployments in “peaceful” regions.

In sum: Prior to 9/11, Clinton took terrorism far more seriously than Bush did. Post-9/11, Bush used 9/11 as an excuse to go after an unrelated enemy (Iraq) instead of finishing the job that needed to be done (going after al-Qaeda, bin Laden, Mullah Omar; and stabilizing Afghanistan).

No, I’ll wager you don’t know.

No, I’ll wager you don’t know.

You’re right. I don’t know. But I do know that every major intelligence agency in the world says al-Qaeda wasn’t in Iraq prior to our invasion there. You may not call that a distraction, but I do.

Also, the reason we (purportedly) went into Afghanistan was to take away al-Qaeda’s safe haven. Do you really think 9,000 troops is enough to secure the entirety of Afghanistan such that al-Qaeda can find no safe haven there?

Maybe you’re right and I’m wrong. Maybe 9,000 US troops is more than enough to secure Afghanistan. Maybe finishing the job in Afghanistan has been a priority for this administration, and they’re just not talking about it. Maybe every major intelligence agency in the world is wrong about Iraq and al-Qaeda. Just seems unlikely to me.