I just finished watching the second part of the Path to 9/11. I have to say that I am not particularly impressed with anything I saw. I mean, I already knew most of what was going on and I knew of the failures in both administrations. I have always maintained that the Bush administration had eight months to get done what Clinton did not do in eight years but that does not mean that Bush and his people are blameless. It also does not mean that our Congress, our agencies, and the Clinton administration are blameless.
Our government is made up of people who are supposed to run the country as a team, not as opposition parties. They can fight about welfare and health care all they want and play political games but when it comes to national security they all need to be on the same sheet of music. The wall established by Gorelick made it impossible for information to be shared and that mentality moved across administrations. We have always had a smooth transition from one administration to the next so that our enemies could not attack us at a point where they figured we would be weakest.
The bitterness of the 2000 election and the terribly partisan attacks from both parties likely fueled an environment where parties did not cooperate. In addition, we had people who were unwilling to pull the string without absolute proof or, as they said in the movie, something actionable. I want to know if the planes hitting the buildings were actionable enough for these jackasses who kept avoiding a response.
This movie showed both administrations as having some culpability in the attacks of 9/11 and I saw nothing in the movie to argue with. I am more upset that ABC decided to edit out parts that the Clintonites objected to when they should have left it alone. No one in the Bush administration demanded that things be changed. Additionally, this administration stood up and said there were intelligence failures and that they took responsibility and would not let it happen again. If only the last group could stand up and take their licks and then get on with life. That, of course, is what separates the leaders from the pretenders.
I watched this movie with my son. He was more disgusted with our government than with the terrorists. As he put it, we have to expect that the enemy is going to attack us and should accept that. That is why they are the enemy. What we should never accept is our government being its, and our, own worst enemy. He said that he was disgusted with both administrations and the government in general. He was very upset at the way high ranking government officials waffled on making decisions and how they ignored the most obvious signs. I have to say that I can not disagree with how he feels.
I have said before, the may hem and terror aside, the attacks were brilliant. From a purely tactical standpoint they were well planned and they hit us hard and caused a lot of damage. I hate the people responsible and would have no trouble just shooting them between the eyes and moving on. But, I blame my government more than I blame the enemy because we knew they wanted to attack and did nothing. As my son said, we expect our enemies to want to hurt us but we do not expect our government to help them.
Anyway, the movie was no big deal but I think it shows a couple of things. ABC means Always Backed Clinton. They bowed without any evidence, to the demands of the Clintonites. We also know that the Democrats do not care about our freedoms and that they will take them away if they do not agree with the message. We should remember this when we go to the polls in November.
One other thing that I must throw out there. Bush is not as dumb as the left would have you believe. Instead of demanding that the movie be cancelled or changed and raising a big stink like the Clinton folks did, he took a different approach. He scheduled a speech about an hour into the movie, just about the time his administration was under fire in the film. Then he laid out all kinds of things and told us how well we were doing and that we could not forget those who died. When the movie came back on we had his words in our heads as we watched less than stellar behavior by his young administration. Did he do it on purpose? Who knows but if so, it was genius.