Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Originally posted by: getbush
I think that is honest and healthy skepticism of the Clinton admin. on your part. What boggles me then is where do you throw that out the window with the current administration? These are some of the most deceitful, arrogant, holier than thou, butt-out we can do no wrong, hypocritical, scheming and politicking crooks of our time.
I'm not convinced Bush was doing much at all about the terror threat before 9/11, to be clear. Clinton understood the damage a fvck 'em all I'm the president of the US the best country in the world attitude would do. Bush has had a total majority his whole presidency, and there is not much that can be done to stop this juggernaut of stupidity until that changes.
Well thank you for the positive comment. So much nicer when we get away from personal attacks.
What did Bush do before 9-11?? Nothing that amounted to anything, was working on a "plan" that as Richard Clarke says would change "the strategy from one of rollback with Al Qaeda over the course of five years, which it had been, to a new strategy that called for the rapid elimination of Al Qaeda." What was the plan? I don't know, don't have details and it is 2:22am and I am not going to Google for half an hour to find them.
🙂 Based on what Bush HAS done I think it is safe to say that he would have been more agressive in going after al Qaeda for sure.
After 9-11, what he did in Afghanistan was masterful, no one can deny that. Overthrew the Taliban without placing hardly any US troops on the ground.
Sad to say we never caught Osama and are still looking for him. (We could start a thread on why we can't find him, but essentially we are looking for 1 man who is hiding in an area the size of California and most likely has the help of dozens if not hundreds of people. Plus everyone seems to say he is no longer in command, so getting him now is more PR than anything else. Don't forget Bush is a politician, if you told him that 15,000 troops in Afghanistan for 6 months would bring Osama in a body bag he would do it. Instead we have 20,000 NATO troops there and no one has even SEEN him for over 2 years.)
Also the Taliban is trying to make a comeback, but they seem to get thier asses kicked every time they actually face NATO in battle. They spent 10 years fighting Russia, so we better be prepared for the fact that they could be fighting us for that long as well.
Now onto Iraq, what a mess that has turned into. The original idea was a good one. Take Saddam out of power and create a allied Democratic state. In essence change the whole dynamic of the middle east in one daring move.* The reality didn't turn out quite as well. Saddam is gone and a Democratic government is in place, progress there, but everything else seems to be a mess. Wish the left would offer some solutions that might actually work.
BTW: Bush and company have admitted that things have gone wrong in Iraq, they just have not admitted that the idea behind the policy is wrong. (Did Clinton ever admit that any of his policies were mistakes? How about Somalia? Sadly in our political system admitting mistakes is tantamount to suicide. Maybe after this election cycle when Bush truly becomes a lame duck he will be more open to admitting past errors.)
As far as Europe and what they think... They have bitched about everything we have done since WAY before Bush was in office and they will bitch when he is gone. They feel that they (all of Europe) should have equal status to the US on the world stage, based on population and economy they should, however they are not willing to spend the money militarily.
Go read this if you want a good analysis as to why there is a difference between US policy and European ideas.
Power and Weakness
Europe is turning away from power, or to put it a little differently, it is moving beyond power into a self-contained world of laws and rules and transnational negotiation and cooperation. It is entering a post-historical paradise of peace and relative prosperity, the realization of Kant?s ?Perpetual Peace.? The United States, meanwhile, remains mired in history, exercising power in the anarchic Hobbesian world where international laws and rules are unreliable and where true security and the defense and promotion of a liberal order still depend on the possession and use of military might. That is why on major strategic and international questions today, Americans are from Mars and Europeans are from Venus: They agree on little and understand one another less and less.
* The dynamic of the middle east could actually be changing based on events in Lebanon and the backlash against Hezbollah, but we will have to wait and see how that plays out.
