1115.org

I didn’t get a chance last week to comment on Tony Snow’s remarks about the results of the Connecticut Democratic primary. Quite a performance from our Tony:

Take a look at the blogs today, they’re pretty hot. And the real question for the American people to ask themselves is, do you take the war on terror seriously? With all the developments around the world — and, if so, how do you fight it to win? There seems to be two approaches, and in the Connecticut race, one of the approaches is ignore the difficulties and walk away. Now, when the United States walked away, in the opinion of the Osama bin Laden in 1991, bin Laden drew from that the conclusion that Americans were weak and wouldn’t stay the course and that led to September 11th.
[…]
And it’s really up to Democratic candidates and the Democratic Party to figure out how they want to stand in the war on terror. Do they want to have the sort of time-table approach, leave by a date certain? Do they not want to have something constructive to say about gathering threats from Iran and elsewhere? Or do they want to acknowledge the fact that in a dangerous world it takes commitment, it takes persistence? Throughout American history, generation through generation has been faced with difficulties, and each generation has risen to the challenge and we’re confident this generation will do the same.

Apart from holding George Bush the 1st personally responsible for 9/11, Snow’s comments seem to exemplify the administration’s current wisdom about how to solve its Iraq problems. At this stage, the attitude of a substantial percentage of Americans has progressively hardened into firm opposition to the war, as they are no longer willing to overlook the lies that were told in selling the war, and the fact that we simply keep killing Iraqis and getting Americans killed without getting anywhere at all (except bogged down). However, the Bush-men seem to believe that, even at this stage, America can be taunted and shamed and frightened into supporting the war again.

A few questions for you, Tony:
1) You don’t think that by getting so thoroughly bogged down in Iraq with no clue whatsoever what to do about the insurgency, with no progress whatsoever over the last year and more, America has confirmed itself to be weak and toothless and ineffective in the opinion of Osama bin Laden?

2) You don’t think that over the last two years, Osama bin Laden has slapped his thighs repeatedly in glee and declared: “Interfering in the 2004 elections to get him re-elected was the smartest move I ever made in this holy war against the crusaders and the infidels!” Hasn’t Bush exactly lived up to every hope Osama could ever had?

3) If the Bush administration has been so serious throughout about TWAT, how come the Bush-men took their eyes off the ball, forgot all about Osama bin Laden, and started fighting Iraq instead (which at the time had no known connection to al Qaeda or terrorist activity directed at the U.S.,)?

As Donnie Fowler said in The Huffington Post:

Truth is, Bush has not fought back at the real enemy. He picked a fight with Iraq that he said was going to be easy. He picked a fight that Cheney said would end with flowers and cheers by those the USA liberated. But they didn’t pick a fight with those who really committed the crime.

4) Just give it to me straight; I’ll take it like a man: exactly how dumb do you guys think the American public is?