George Will

I'm certain that I missed something this morning regarding George Will's admonishing of the guests on Stephanacropolis' week-end show, This Week.

Nevertheless, I have a beef with his statement concerning stateside security since 9/11. He said something on the order of, "Of course our intelligence agencies are doing a great job as we've not had another attack since(September 11)."

Yup, that's true, George. But terrorists don't need to expend valuable capital, you know, using trained fighters in martyrdom missions when the US Gov't. does their bidding for them. Allow me to explain. Terror alerts. How many elevated terror alerts have we had since 9/11 2001? Me, I don't know. But I have asked lots of people about this, and the range of responses I've gotten is from, "about one a week", to "around six?" And all manner of answers in between.

Last week's call to stock up on supplies including duct tape and plastic sheeting only served to fuel peoples' fears. If you add the fact that the Gov't's own preparedness page has terrorism protection information that could potentially be fatal. Asphyxiation via duct taping yourself into an enclosed space isn't a really good idea.

Now, amongst the most egregious of things turns out to be that the latest round of heightened terror alerts are allegedly false. The alert level was raised because of bad information as reported here last week. This of course raises the spectre that all of the previous terror alerts were also of dubious origin. This is free terrorism. The co-opted US press corps, in concert with the government have left a scared, angry populace. If, and when there is a REAL terror alert, will the people respond? So far the answer is a resounding, yes. But how long will this continue? I have nary a clue.

To recap, we have had a flurry of elevated terror alerts, really bad information from the federal government--that could kill you, and increasing skepticism regarding terror alerts. The credibility gap seems to be wdiening daily as new revelations about plagiarised dossiers, fabrications about the administrations "stimulus" package, the dismissal of our long time allies over the Iraq issue, and a myriad other things.

Given the above, and the fact that terrrorists aims are to disrupt, confuse, and instill fear and panic amongst the population, a good case could be made that the terrorists are making real progress toward their goals.

I feel, we need more transparency from our elected and appointed officials, and a press corps that is truly independent and objective. Tom Ridge, the Secretary of Homeland Defense needs to be more out front on these issues, and most importantly, the DHS needs to be fully funded. If this administration's new mantra is: Distract! Iraq! It is certainly working. Harden our borders, Mr. Bush. It is the most you can do. It is the least we deserve.

From where I'm sitting, it is clear that the terrorists continue to strike blow after blow at America. They have been able to do this without spending any capital. We have the most powerful military the earth has ever seen. It's power is being usurped by a series of false starts. We the people, need reliable information. Rhetoric is not what we need at this most important point in out history.

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