Linking to editorials isn’t usually the best idea, but Slate’s Fred Kaplan dissects the newest spin on the War on Terror, Iraq, and the Bush’s state of mind in a way I think everyone should read. On Bush’s claim that the War in Iraq is crucial to the safety of the world:

Here’s the question: Does anybody believe this? If you do, then you must ask the president why he hasn’t reactivated the draft, printed war bonds, doubled the military budget, and strenuously rallied allies to the cause.

On that we need peace over stability:

“Years of pursuing stability to promote peace had left us with neither,” Bush said this morning. That’s a matter of debate. In any event, the new danger is that Bush’s neglect of stability to promote freedom will leave us with neither of those things—to the still-deeper detriment of peace: a trifecta of world misery.

A history teacher of mine in high school used to emphasize this to us, I’ll be paraphrasing: “World peace is a pipe dream. The world will never hold hands and get along. If you can get world security, then you’ve succeeded.” Bush refuses stability, thinking he can enforce peace. We can see how well that’s going.

[tags]bush, iraq, war, middle east[/tags]

I was watching Fox earlier today (don’t ask why), and lo and behold I see a “BREAKING ALERT” describing a new tape from Al Qaeda. The tape was by the #2 man Zawahiri, with the twist of an American helper.

The 41-minute video, posted on an Islamic militant Web site nine days before the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, had footage of al-Zawahri and a man the video identified as Adam Yehiye Gadahn, an American who the FBI believes attended Al Qaeda training camps in Pakistan and served as an Al Qaeda translator.

I’ll tell you, what perfect timing yet again. But the same question remains. If Al Qaeda is still the name that strikes fear, why aren’t we putting a massive offensive against them? More than that, why do people still call their leader’s capture unimportant?

To an outside observer, it would seem that the redcoats are more interested in Al Qaeda the monster in the closet than they are in Al Qaeda the enemy that must be taken out.

[tags]al qaeda, terrorism[/tags]

So I recognized the speech Bush delivered without having heard it before. No big deal, he has a pretty standard “Mad Lib” style of speech-giving, we’ve heard a lot of the same bits and pieces. But there’s another part of it. Namely, he used the exact same speech before. At the same place.

President Bush on Thursday repeated - sometimes word for word - a good portion of the message he delivered a year ago in Salt Lake City: that the fight against terrorism is a noble battle on par with 20th-century struggles against fascism, Nazism and communism.

Now, the article describes the subtle differences this go-round. Namely that Bush “acknowledges” that the war is “draining our psyche” and all of that. Of course, that just means two things. It means Bush is trying to sound more muted because he’s hoping to rope back some of his quickly-dwindling base.

It also highlights that Bush won’t acknowledge problems in the war, only that we as the American people are whiny. That’s the base thesis. The war is fine, the war is good and must be done. The problem is that YOU people are tired of it and need some damn patience. Whatta guy. So humble and down to earth.

[tags]bush, war, iraq, terrorism, usa[/tags]