Part of the reason Obama won is because Bush kept us so safe that the concerns raised by 9/11 were fading from public memory…but now that liberalism is back in the national security saddle, people are starting to get concerned, again:
Minority Leader John Boehner and Pete Hoekstra, ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, have turned out a new video. “Do you feel safer?” they ask. The message is simple: releasing the CIA interrogation memos, halting enhanced interrogation techniques, and shutting Guantanamo without a viable alternative facility for the terrorists may please the Left, but do not enhance national security.
This comes at a time when Attorney General Eric Holder is in Europe trolling for offers to take the Guantanamo terrorists off our hands. So far only Britain and France have taken any (one each), although Holder seemed sunny about the prospects that others will step forward. Even more startling, Holder did not rule out assisting European governments in their prosecution of former Bush officials, as the Washington Post reported:
Holder did not rule it out. “Obviously, we would look at any request that would come from a court in any country and see how and whether we should comply with it,” he said. “This is an administration that is determined to conduct itself by the rule of law.”
All of that was too much for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who took to the Senate floor today, declaring:
It’s clear from these remarks that the administration is putting symbolism ahead of safety. This becomes even more apparent from Attorney General Holder’s admission that closing Guantanamo will be ‘one of the most daunting challenges’ he will face. He clearly realizes what most Americans realize: closing Guantanamo is not a good option if no safe alternatives exist.
There is an amazing level of immaturity in the Obama Administration approach to foreign and defense policy – it is a sort of policy by incantation: if Obama apologizes enough and if we show ourselves willing to put our own on trial, the world will forgive us the Bush years and thus we’ll be safe. You can be sure that if terrorists kill 3,000 more of us a year or two from now that the world will be profuse in its expressions of sympathy…but that won’t help the dead, and won’t help prevent a repeat. Only aggressive action against the enemy will do anything at all…President Bush kept us safe, in large part, by going out into the world and harrying the enemy at every opportunity. President Obama makes us less safe by stating, in advance, that there are certain things we won’t do…going around begging for others to take the Gitmo detainees off our hands just adds a pathetic element to the mix.
We can only hope – and pray – that over the 8 years of Bush enough damage was done to the terrorist that they won’t be able to mount a large attack until such time as we can get a GOP replacement into the White House. In other words, we have to find a way to win the political fight before Obama loses the military fight. Already the enemy is being encouraged – easily spotting Obama for the fool that he is and presuming that he’ll add “coward” to “fool” when pressed, at least as far as our enemies are concerned.
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