Terrorists for Kerry!

Joe Conason takes on this important story, one that we touched on earlier in the week. According to some on the right, Terrorists want Kerry in power. I've noticed they don't usually offer up much "evidence" or "proof." Usually they just heap scorn on anybody who would dare to suggest that the terrorists might be satisfied with President Bush.

Joe Conason, on the other hand, actually takes the daring step of analyzing what the terrorists want and lining it up to how President Bush has done.

The Europeans, whose assistance we rely upon in Afghanistan, and whose help we continue to need both there and in Iraq, believe that the invasion and occupation have "increased the threat of terrorism" around the world. (Incidentally, the same poll shows that 49 percent of Americans agree with that dismal assessment, while only 20 percent believe that the Iraq war has diminished the terrorist threat.)

It isn't that the Europeans don't worry about terrorism, since 71 percent of them said that international terror is an "important or extremely important" problem. It's just that they have lost confidence in the world's sole superpower to lead the war against the terrorists.

Thanks to Bush, the nations that united behind America after 9/11 are now divided and dispirited. Why would bin Laden want that to change?

But of course, who cares what Europe thinks. America has the best military in the world. All we need to do is get the terrorists to go stand somewhere in Afghanistan in a big line, like a real army, and we can mow them down. We don't need no stinking diplomats to like talk other nations into sharing information with us. We don't need no cops or FBI agents to investigate leads and put together dossiers on our enemies, and we certainly don't need any foreign cops or intelligence operatives. All we need to do is get our enemies to stand in a line somewhere so our military can take them out.

OK that might have been a little over the top, and I certainly don't want to give the impression that I don't respect or admire the brave efforts of our men and women in uniform. I do. But I am getting a little tired of pretending that the Bush Administration and their surrogates in the media aren't causing us harm when they pretend that the only legitimate way to fight terrorism is with the military. You might argue that they haven't done that. But that is precisely what they are criticizing Kerry on.

Senator Kerry wants a multi pronged attack on this problem, one that utilizes all of our resources, and the resources of our allies. President Bush, and particularly Vice President Cheney, denigrate this approach as weak. So what conclusions can we draw?

Anyway go read the Conason article, it's quite good.