Cheney's false choice

[noise]

Cheney would have the public choose between a Constitutional Republic and a unitary executive police state. His view is that the former structure cannot prevent terrorist attacks. It's very odd the way his binary construct has taken hold--police state tactics or bust. If he had any credibility his argument might be worth considering.

Why were there no domestic terrorist attacks after 9/11 (not including the unsolved anthrax attacks)? It's a good question. Incredibly there may be a better answer to this question than the one put forth by Cheney. Anyone who properly researches 9/11 will find it difficult to avoid the obvious conclusion--government failure to prevent the 9/11 attacks wasn't attributable to the lack of police state powers. For example, the CIA knew two al Qaeda operatives were in the US but failed to tell the FBI for 20 months, even though FBI agent Ali Soufan repeatedly asked for information while investigating the attack on the USS Cole. Another example comes from author James Bamford (The Shadow Factory) who wasn't able to find out why NSA Director Hayden failed to use FISA to track al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar. So we return to the initial question--why no more attacks? This is a very difficult question to answer because so much government conduct is secret. However, one can come up with better answers than those Cheney has put forth. For example, less bureaucratic red tape, increased threat awareness, more intel sharing, more CT funding, the FBI has changed their approach to terrorism (less focus on building criminal cases and more focus on intel gathering).

[The Magistrate]

1. The Reason There Has Been No Attack By Al Queda On U.S. Soil Since September '01, Sir, Is Simple

The attacks achieved their objective. Therefore there is no need to repeat the exercise. People engaged in war, which the leadership of Al Queda certainly conceives itself to be, do not engage in violence simply for its own sake. Violence in war is employed to achieve a desired effect on the enemy's actions.

The intent of the attacks in September '01 was to madden the government and people of the United States, so that the country would be drawn into an extended military engagement in the Moslem world, that would become for the United States the same running economic and political sore, and military quagmire, that Afghanistan was for the Soviet Union. While the initial engagement in Afghanistan did not fulfill these hopes, the Bush administration was kind enough to oblige Al Queda by hurrying to invade and occupy Iraq rather than consolidating the initial success in Afghanistan, and this handily fulfilled the hopes of Al Queda's leadership. Now, owing to the poor decision made in '02, Afghanistan, and more importantly Pakistan, seem to be queuing up to play the same role as some disengagement is undertaken in Iraq.

No purported 'protective measures' of the Bush administration, and surely not the torture of prisoners in custody, had the slightest thing to do with the fact that Al Queda needed to make no further attack, having achieved its objective with the first. Indeed, the program of torture had little to do with securing information on impending attacks on the U.S., and everything to do with wringing false confessions of Al Queda complicity with Saddam Hussein, for domestic political use.

Though people will not like to hear this, the most likely occasion for an attack on the United States itself by Al Queda in future will be actual withdrawl of U.S. combat forces from engagement in the Moslem world....

[pretzel4gore]

2. Aint it obvious the 911 event was part of the big fraud?

JFK too....October surprise, KAL 007 shootdown, Sara palin, the OJ Simpson media frenzy in '94, the impeachment of Billy Jeff, the wmd scam....Perle Harbour, the nuking of Jap cities after Hirohito begged USeh to accept surrender, the fake Dieppe attack that cost Canada over a thousand lost- in order to piece off Stalin re '2nd front' and increase deaths from Russain Nazi battles until USSR actually found strength and threatened to conquer Europe which necessitated 'D-Day' landing in a big hurry)
etcetra etcetra...
'a fool and his money are easily parted' ...that means repukklicans and dino's ($50 TRILLION is missing from the world's till hahaha) not to mention you and me!

[The Magistrate]

3. That, Sir, Is A Bit Rich To Actually Engage....

[pretzel4gore]

4. we're being defrauded....massively

that's fairly clear. The details(?) ...now let's agree to disagree on the details...