Much was made last week of Tom Tancredo's campaign ad depicting an illegal immigrant with a knapsack, presumably filled with explosives, entering a US mall. "The politics of fear" was the near immediate refrain from the mostly liberal comments posted in response to this news item. "A vote for anyone but Tancredo is a vote for letting your children get murdered by Islamofacists and your wife raped by Jihadists. You have been warned" opined another commenter.
I was in New York on September 11th, 2001, along with millions of other New Yorkers, from both the left and right persuasions. The terrorists didn't discriminate between those following a particular political belief set, killing anyone they could possibly reach. How then did we get to this point where nearly half of this country has deluded themselves into thinking that any such talk of another terrorist attack happening again must be some sort of manipulation or fear mongering?
Mr. Tancredo appeared on Tucker last week defending the premise of his ad, citing that the scenario depicted was actually mentioned in a recent National Intelligence Estimate. It's worth mentioning that the NIE has been used by many on the left to disparage the Bush administration when convenient.
Convenient? We are talking about protecting Americans, the government's first and foremost job. Is that the sad state of affairs we are in where real threats cannot be acknowledged without treading over a political taboo? Where suggesting the reality that terrorists are here and actually do want to repeat and improve upon 911 immediately results in a charge of fear based manipulation? I know that we are just under a year away from a contentious election, but the lack of leadership and responsibility shown by those on the left never ceases to amaze me.
Rather than the politics of fear, I would argue that many on the left are indulging in the politics of willful ignorance. It was one thing when the left engaged in some nose cutting to spite the face when they had rejected the President's plan to privatize Social Security, even though before Bush took office Democrats were for privatizing Social Security. Not having a workable social security plan for the future won't kill (many) people. But being willfully ignorant of the serious threats that face this country is the sort of self destructive side effect of Bush Derangement Syndrome that could result in the deaths of quite a few innocent Americans. Not to mention the impacts to the economy, and our society as a whole. Take a gander at the severely dampening effect recurring terrorists attacks have had on the once booming society in Israel, it can happen here too if we aren't careful. This isn't the politics of fear that I am talking about, it's the politics of reality.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Sissy
Did you even watch the ad? It has nothing to do with Mike Huckabee- it's a Tom Tancredo ad. I mean, honestly
2 - Franco
Good opinion pieces. It would be a welcomed addition if more of the MSM pointed this out too.
It will be interesting to see the premise on which critics of the piece base their reasoning.
3 - Lapdog
"Sure, America has made its mistakes,..."
Mistakes?? What are you referring to?
4 - The Obnoxious American
Happy Thanksgiving to you too Moon Raven!
5 - moonraven
Offensive American, too.
Native Americans do NOT celebrate Thanksgiving, [Personal attack deleted by Comments Editor].
6 - Baronius
OA - Liked the article; loved the Thanksgiving wishes. Brilliant.
7 - moonraven
Right. Genocidal Baronius kicks off Thanksgiving by trying to roast a Mohawk. [Gratuitous vulgarity deleted by Comments Editor]
8 - Matthew T. Sussman
I love Thanksgiving too!
9 - Baronius
Lighten up, Moon. For someone whose stock in trade is abuse, you should learn to admire it when done so well.
10 - Dr Dreadful
It will be interesting to see the premise on which critics of the piece base their reasoning.
I don't have a problem with the article so much as the ad - I think the MSM reaction had it about right. It was as crass and uncalled-for as the infamous LBJ "daisy" atom bomb ad.
I've said before that the most likely explanation for 9/11 is that Atta and his team just got lucky. There's never been another terror attack on US soil on anything approaching that scale, simply because it would have been next to impossible to set up without being detected. The OA points out that much hard work is done by the security and intelligence services to prevent further attacks. But they can't stop all of them and one day, another terrorist will get through the net. I think every reasonable person realizes this, and it's really not a partisan issue. As such, Tancredo's ad was uncalled-for.
To be fair, I think Tancredo realizes he hasn't got a Bill's chance in New England of winning the nomination, so he probably figures he can be as outrageous as he likes.
11 - moonraven
ALL little gringo piggies love Thanksgiving--so they can simultaneously pig out on turkeys filled with chemicals, canned cranberries, plastic potatoes and Purina's pumpkin pie--while celebrating the empire of Macy's and giving the finger to the remnants of the Native tribes they slaughtered so that they could pig out on garbage and cheer for credit card debt.
12 - moonraven
B: Bet your favorite flic is that masterpiece of film history, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, too!
13 - Baronius
Doc - Sure, al Queda got lucky on 9/11, but they were trying to do something big. It's their M.O. - big, multibomb attacks. They've done it before, and they've done it since. They hit London, Madrid, and Manila, all free cities fighting Muslim extremism.
They got lucky in the same way a bank robber gets lucky outsmarting bank security. Not in the way that a pickpocket gets lucky by finding $10,000 in a wallet. Actually, for the size of the targets they chose, the body count was remarkably low. The point is, you have to take an audacious enemy seriously.
14 - moonraven
So llucky, in fact, that Dick Cheney did everything for them.
God, you guys are such gullible fools.
Al Qaeda did not exist until it was created by the CIA.
And Osama Bin Laden is STILL on the CIA payroll.
But YOU aren't.
15 - Dr Dreadful
The point is, you have to take an audacious enemy seriously.
And we do. Hence the paucity of operations which al-Qaeda has actually been able to see through. The attacks against New York, Washington, London, Madrid and Manila were all one-shot deals and the various security agencies have learned from them. Further attacks on Britain, Spain and America have been tried, and have failed miserably.
However, al-Qaeda is probably very pleased with its enduring success in disrupting the way of life in the countries it has attacked and in thereby keeping people fearful of it. As I said, I don't disagree with the article as much as I do with Tancredo trying to make crude political capital by playing on that fear. It doesn't make him much better than those he warns against.
16 - Clavos
"Al Qaeda did not exist until it was created by the CIA."
Totally wrong.
Read The Looming Tower, by Lawrence Wright.
In it, Mr. Wright (who won the Pulitzer for this book), traces the beginnings of Al Qaeda back through the originally Egyptian organization known as The Society of Muslim Brothers, formed in opposition to, and during, the British occupation of Egypt. The Brothers, founded by Hasan al-Banna, were followers of Professor Sayyid Qutb, whose book, Milestones, was and is one of the seminal influences on modern Islamic Jihadists, including Ayman Al-Zawahiri and Osama Bin Laden.
The Brothers were instrumental in helping Gamal Abdel Nasser take control of Egypt. Shortly after the revolution, Nasser a secularist, and the Brothers, devoutly religious, and by then led by Qutb, clashed, and a struggle for the hearts and minds of the Egyptian people ensued.
Nasser finally had Qutb and some of his followers arrested and tried for an assassination attempt by the Brothers on Nasser in 1954. Qutb was imprisoned, but later released by Nasser.
In 1966, Qutb (now working with Saudi backing) again attempted an unsuccessful coup.
Again arrested and tried, Nasser had Qutb hanged in 1966. But the damage was done, as by then, Al-Zawahiri and Bin Laden had met and begun to collaborate, and Nasser's hanging of Qutb served only to make him a martyr, and his ideas became the cornerstone of Islamic Jihadists worldwide.
Al-Qaeda (The Base) sprang from this chain of events, coming to full flower as a result of two events in 1979: The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and the ascension to power in Iran of the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, also a militant religionist and Islamic supremacist.
According to Wright, Khomeini's takeover of Iran marked "...the first successful Islamist takeover of a major country."
Khomeini's success emboldened Islamists all over the world, dealing a major blow to the secularists, and reinforcing the cause of the religionists.
17 - gonzo marx
accurate to it's point...
but it was indeed the extensive training and financing received during the Afghan/Soviet conflict that created an effective unit and gave it both the strategic and tactical know how (as well as experience)to plan long range and implement short rage operations
sometimes more effectively than other
from the "shoe bomber" to 9/11...it's how the working Cell has been trained and operates that determines just how effective, or not, they are
the cell structure, as well as how to hide, was indeed taught the mujahadeen (like bin Laden) by CIA and other U.S. agencies...the same Tricks that were taught to them to evade the Soviets are what they use to this day...very rare updating or innovation has been demonstrated so far...
just for the Record
Excelsior?
18 - bliffle
"...the repercussions of any terrorist attack on our homeland, especially one that happened because we ignored, or worse, politicized our self defense.."
It was Bush and his flunkies like C Rice who ignored the warnings one month before 9/11, although it was clearly spelled out.
Then they tried to alibi their careless neglect by saying "who'da thought they'd steal airplanes and fly them into buildings...?" Who indeed, except 12 different government reports.
And those reckless, malevolent idiots till haven't even solved THAT problem.
19 - Clavos
According to Wright's book, in 1948, when the Egyptian government officially dissolved the Muslim Brothers,
"Although the Brotherhood was a mass movement, it was also intimately organized into cooperative 'families'--cells that contained no more than five members each, giving it a spongy, clandestine quality that proved difficult to detect and impossible to eradicate."
20 - gonzo marx
hence why i note that the tactic was taught to the "mujahadeen"
sorry if it appeared to imply that some didn't already know that specific bit
i'm very familiar with Qutb, and his root cause influence in current radical philosophy
the early history of it is more in the political theatre of Egypt...what came in the second generation of well off Arabs...
many of those became the first cadres of the Afghan mujahadeen
you will also see the tie in to the 1950's overthrow of the democratically elected Iranian government to install the Shah (another root cause) influencing Qutb and his immediate followers (the first generation)
again strictly for the Record, and a sheer waste of my Time...
Excelsior?
21 - Clavos
"again strictly for the Record, and a sheer waste of my Time..."
Pardonnez moi...I certainly don't want to impose on your busy schedule.
22 - gonzo marx
ain't anybody in particular..don't flatter yerself and get yer panties all in a twist
any of It i do, is strictly my own Responsibility
Excelsior?
23 - Clavos
Meh.
24 - Dave Nalle
the cell structure, as well as how to hide, was indeed taught the mujahadeen (like bin Laden) by CIA and other U.S. agencies...the same Tricks that were taught to them to evade the Soviets are what they use to this day...very rare updating or innovation has been demonstrated so far...
Just for your favoriete friend, 'the record', those tricks weren't exactly uniquely invented by the CIA for the use of the Muj. They were already well established by that point and had been used extensively by German agents in the two World Wars, by the French Resistence, by the OAS by various Soviet sponsored groups around the world and by many others. Insurgency techniques and 'leaderless resistence' could easily have been learned from many sources, and in fact had been used by prior Islamic reistence movements going back hundreds of years. The point being that it certainly didn't take the CIA to teach al Qaeda most of these things and it's a mistake to assume that they are an American creation.
Dave
25 - Franco
#10 " Dr Dreadful
I think the MSM reaction had it about right. It was as crass and uncalled-for as the infamous LBJ "daisy" atom bomb ad.
I don’t think the LBJ ad and this one are even in the same camp. First, we still live under the threat of that same LBJ insinuation, perhaps even more so today then back then. Second, we have always had the highest security measure in place concerning a nuclear missile launch anywhere in the world, and we know exactly who to watch and where they are. In addition to that, the reality of mutually assured destruction (MAD) has played one of the biggest parts in prevention.
Tancredo ad is taking specific aim on our lack of those same kind of security measures being applied to your boarders.. Our lack of committed attention in study and effective solutions to our lack of border controls. No one is saying there is any easy solution and that’s the point. No one is willing to seriously address what we can and should do because it is mired in a mix of good, bad, and ugly politics and special interests when in comes to illegale entery into the US from Mexico. Even Presidet Fox got on Bush about cracking down to hard on it.
When considering the risks we live with today and will for decades to come, it’s an open opportunity for terrorests, and Tancredo is tying illegal immigration to terrorism and he sights some important facts.
Tancredo cited congressional testimony by FBI Director Robert Mueller in 2006 that there is evidence of persons of Middle Eastern origin learning Spanish and taking on Latin American identities. He also said there is evidence Hezbollah is organizing opperations in Central and South America. Now add Chavez to this mix.
Tancredo has replied to his critics in saying. "It is not fear-mongering to suggest that terrorists will join in taking advantage of our porous borders,"
If we were to give our border security anything approaching even 50% of the same security attention we give enemy missile launches detection that would be different, but we don’t. And a little irony here is that a nuclear devices or chemical “dirty bomb” could get through our borders undetected a 100,000 times easier then a missile launch going undetected.
I've said before that the most likely explanation for 9/11 is that Atta and his team just got lucky. I think every reasonable person realizes this, and it's really not a partisan issue. As such, Tancredo's ad was uncalled-for.
So here in lies that question. What part and or degree of luck was increased for the terrorests by the likes of Sandy Berger and Bill Clinton in their Millennium Alert After Action Review (MAAAR). Berger did not steel and or destroy docs pertaining to that for nothing. The fact of the matter was that the Millennium attack was prevented by sheer luck, our luck, not the other way around.
I’m not interested in rehashing what the Clinton Administration or even Mr. Berger did or didn't do vis a vis the al Qaeda threat pre-9/11. Nor am I much interested about Mr. Berger's criminal activities and breading the law. What does interest me is what other damage to national security has taken place and has still not required us to face those consequences yet.
In 1999, Berger failed to inform President Clinton of his knowledge that the People's Republic of China had managed to acquire the designs of a number of U.S. nuclear warheads. In fact it took Berger months to bring it up to the attention President Clinton. And only then because it had started to be a regular security breach by the Chinese taking place repeatedly.
This kind of luck afforded our enemy is scary shit.
So let me turn it all around now. Let’s say your right and it was a crass ad and he was being as outrageous as he likes for the reasons you sugjest. Then answer me this. What if Tancredo is right?