His own NIE says Bush is the Terrorists' Best Friend. When will the Democrats?

Huffington Post
Trey Ellis
His own NIE says Bush is the Terrorists' Best Friend. When will the Democrats?

So let me get this straight, the C.I.A, the N.S.A. Negroponte, every single intelligence branch we've got, all got together, produced a National Intelligence Estimate and decided that the way that the Bush administration has prosecuted the war on terrorism has actually made it quantitatively worse. And remember that all of these intelligence branches, for the past six years, have been aggressively purged by the Bushies of Democrats and other pesky non-believers.

And yet the Democrat leadership still has not stood up with one voice and denounced this administration's lunacy.

Democrats still poll lower than Republicans in their ability to battle terrorism because the Democratic response, by and large, has been silence.

Instead of running away from the issues of terrorism and torture the Dems need to wake up and press a coherent response to terrorism across every news cycle from now till November.

Repeat after me:

"The Bush Administration's incompetence is making us less safe, not more. They have inspired thousands more jihadists than they have captured or killed. If you don't believe us believe their own experts. We Democrats have a plan to save our nation from this dangerous bungling. Vote for us and we will quickly turn this ship of state away from the iceberg."

This needs to be shouted at a press conference, yet not only Reid and Pelosi, but Kerry, Biden and Murtha need to be at the mic as well. Dems need to show the world that they speak with one strong voice on the most important issue of the day. They need to start listening to people like Michael Scheurer, former CIA senior analyst, formerly anonymous author of "Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror," and former chief of the Counterterrorist Center's bin Laden unit.

Here's what Scheurer said on the Washington Post online back in 2004. It's still just as true today: "First, I think it's essential that our leaders begin to square with the American people. We are under attack by Islamic militants for what we do in the world -- not for who we are or what we believe in. Quite simply, American policies in the Islamic world are Osama bin Laden's only indispensable ally."


That is a radically different message from what the incompetent Bush administration spouts. Bush is convinced that the terrorists are simply irate at our "freedom," our keg parties, our Girls Gone Wild infomercials. Dems need to shout that that juvenile response is not only wrongheaded but it endangers the lives of each and every Westerner on the globe.

Here are some other suggestions for solutions that I posted last week:

"We will never ever conquer terrorism until we address the legitimate grievances of the vast majority of non-violent Muslims. An intelligent plan to make us safer cannot only consist of aggressive law enforcement. Democrats need to espouse a longer-term strategy for creating conditions that would rob the current jihadi nutjobs of new recruits. First on the list:

The Palestinians

We need to engage fully and fairly in the Middle East peace process for the sake of Israel's future security and for our own. Nothing we do in anywhere else will ever matter as much.

Iraq

We need to restore Iraqi sovereignty by strategically redeploying as soon as possible. As long as we're in there our soldiers over there and our civilians here are at added risk. And if any jerk ever says "cut and run" just punch him in the nose.

Afghanistan

We need to be seen throwing money around everywhere, prying the country from grip of the drug lords and the Taliban.

Aid.

Lots of it. All over the developing world we need to spread money. Every time a Yemeni drinks from a cup full of clean drinking water that cup needs to read, "A gift from the U.S.A." Our aid to northern Pakistan after their devastating earthquake created tremendous good will for us and cost a lot less than Rummy's smart bombs."

If Democrats could roll out a simple, three-or-four-point plan to start making Americans actually safer instead of ever more at risk then they would engender the kind of excitement in them that will propel them to regime change in the midterms.