Originally posted by: jpeyton
Originally posted by: MisterCornell
Originally posted by: jpeyton
Originally posted by: MisterCornell
Whether you like Bush or not, you have to admit his administration has done a good job preventing any more terrorist attacks in the U.S.
Despite all the liberals whining about Ashcroft and the Patriot Act, those two are what kept Muslims from inflicting further terrorist attacks on the U.S.
Actually you would be a fool to admit that.
It has been less than four years since the attack. Now if we don't have any attacks for the next 6 years, I might admit Bush has protected the country. But most experts (including those far more qualified than anybody on this forum) agree that the question of al-Qaeda attacking the US again is not a question of if, but when.
Not too hard when your figurehead is still on the loose almost four years later.
If it's not a question of if but when, then it seems like keeping the U.S. safe for 4 years since 9/11 is a pretty massive accomplishment. Where you pull this "another 6 years" figure out of your ass is meaningless. A lot of political commentators, as well as those from the John Kerry campaign, agreed after the election that keeping the U.S. safe from further Al Qaeda assaults was Bush's ace in the hole that probably moreso than anything else helped him win the election.
al-Qaeda, according to the experts who spend a good portion of their careers studying the group, does not attack in a guerrilla-like fashion. The simple fact is that our country is huge, and there are no fool-proof ways of securing it. We know this, and al-Qaeda knows this.
If we screen the international passengers too closely, they will fly to Canada or Mexico and cross the border.
If we stop their cargo plane shipments of contraband, they will send it on a container ship (or smuggle it across the border).
If we start profiling a certain type of person, they will recruit a different type of person.
Their methods are not quick and rapid. They are slow and methodical. They have literally a million different ways they can wreak havoc on our country besides slamming planes into buildings, and we're not significantly more protected now than we were then. If anything, the Patriot Act and all our new security is just an added nuisance for them, and not a deal killer.
GWB protected us for four years? More like al-Qaeda has been taking their typical amount of time before striking again.