Bush Speech: Little New Ground

In his 17 minute address to the nation on the fifth anniversary of 9-11, President Bush told us that we are in "the decisive ideological struggle of the 21st century, and the calling of our generation." There was little new ground in the speech, although he did explicitly concede that "Saddam Hussein was not responsible for the 9/11 attacks." Maybe all those Americans who still think there is a link will finally discard that belief.

Because the speech is long on claims and short on evidence, it's truly listener or reader beware. Take, for example, his message to Osama bin Laden: "No matter how long it takes, America will find you, and we will bring you to justice."

That's an old tune, one that he sang right after 9-11 ... and then promptly forgot.

"The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden. It is our number one priority and we will not rest until we find him." - 13 September 2001

"So I don't know where he is. You know, I just don't spend that much time on him, Kelly, to be honest with you."
- 13 March 2002

"I — I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him. I know he is on the run."
- 13 March 2002

The Washington Post notes that in a speech earlier this month, Bush mentioned bin Laden "17 times in the 44-minute speech, a tactic that seemed intended to emphasize the Republican argument that the nation can trust the president and his party more than Democrats to protect it from attacks."

Prior practice has been to avoid mentioning him -- after all, he's still at large, five years later.

India, Pakistan, Iran ... All Get A Warning
Although Iraq had no active WMD program -- conventional or nuclear -- Bush again played the (strike fear into the hearts of boomers) nuclear card:

If we do not defeat these enemies now, we will leave our children to face a Middle East overrun by terrorist states and radical dictators armed with nuclear weapons.

So who does have nuclear weapons in the Middle East? Let's count: India and Pakistan, maybe Israel. Who wants them? Iran. Who has the largest unsecured stash? The former Soviet Union. And who has expanded -- or initiated -- a controversial nuclear weapons development program? The US.

Justifying Iraq, Yet Again
Given the Senate Intelligence Committee report from Friday, I can't understand how the speechwriters got away with this one:

I'm often asked why we're in Iraq when Saddam Hussein was not responsible for the 9/11 attacks. The answer is that the regime of Saddam Hussein was a clear threat.

The threat was not clear -- the intelligence community was divided. Time after time, especially in regards to nuclear weapons and the bogus yellowcake purchase attempt, the intelligence coming out of the State Department was spot on. It was the CIA that was wrong. See for yourself.

Saddam Hussein "did not have a relationship, harbor, or turn a blind eye toward [Abu Musab al Zarqawi] and his associates.'' Instead, he "attempted, unsuccessfully, to locate and capture al Zarqawi."

"Information obtained after the war supports the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research's (INR) assessment in the NIE that the Intelligence Community lacked persuasive evidence that Baghdad had launched a coherent effort to reconstitute its nuclear weapons program."

It goes on and on like this.

If it had been a baseball game, the CIA would have been defeated, not quite in a shut-out.

Are We Safer Today?
President Bush thinks so: "The world is safer because Saddam Hussein is no longer in power. "

Much of the rest of the world doesn't. They think that the world is less safe because of the US invasion of Iraq ... and they think the US is the largest threat to world peace.

A Concession?
The President seems to be conceding that mistakes have been made in Iraq -- a first: "Whatever mistakes have been made in Iraq, the worst mistake would be to think that if we pulled out, the terrorists would leave us alone."

The "terrorists" in Iraq would leave us alone if we left ... but I'm afraid that we'd soon have the world's second largest oil reserve in worse shape than it is now because civil war would be a certainty.

Estimated oil production, pre-invasion: 2.5m barrels a day. In 2005, it was 1.7m barrels a day. In March 2006, it was 1.1m barrels. The country is paying almost a billion dollars to import oil this year.

Iraq As China Shop
If it's true that "[t]he safety of America depends on the outcome of the battle in the streets of Baghdad," then it's because we made it so. We are fighting a discretionary war in Iraq, one that is costing us more than 10 billion dollars a month.

We're like the bull in the china shop that is Iraq ... and we've gotta pay the price, pick up the broken bits, so that those coming along behind us don't get hurt.

On that, and that alone, I'll agree with the President.

See full text of the speech, 9.11: Five Years Later, Global Goodwill Squandered

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