Another day, another Bush speech. Fortunately, right near the start, he tells us, “Many Americans look at these events and ask the same question: Five years after 9/11, are we safer? The answer is, yes, America is safer. (Applause.)” Who really needs to know more than that?
Making the case that one of the major goals of The War Against Terror (TWAT) is to deny “safe haven” to the terrorists (no one thought to excise this bit after Pakistan ceded Waziristan to the loons?), he quotes a “fatwa” issued by Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan in 1996, “by the grace of Allah, a safe base here is now available.” Notice how Bush subtly included the “by the grace of Allah” bit, which doesn’t add anything substantive to the quote except to remind us that Osama is a Muslim.
Actually, this is another speech with a more clever and effective rhetorical strategy than we’re used to hearing from Chimpy. He narrates the 9/11 plot as it unfolded, interpolating at various points how it could have been stopped if there had been in place the visa screening and unified watch-lists we now have, or the warrantless surveillance he wants Congress to legalize. Most of this is Bush congratulating himself for closing the barn door after the horse has, um, hijacked an airplane with box-cutters, but someone has put better than usual words into his mouth.
How they come out of his mouth is another matter entirely: “And the United States Congress was right to renew the terrorist act -- the Patriot Act. (Applause.) The Terrorist Prevention Act, called the Patriot Act.”
He went on to a fundraiser, where he said:
I fully understand why Americans are troubled by the death and destruction they see on their television screens. I know that. You see, it’s easy to understand because I understand the compassion of the United States of America. Isn’t it a wonderful country when people suffer when they see a child maimed by an extremist’s car bomb. It’s the nature of our country.Makes you proud to be an Amurriken.
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