Bush Speaks

I’m watching Bush’s address on the war on terror, and he’s talking about how—get ready to be surprised, Shakers!—9/11 changed everything. And how he’ll keep us safe by listening to incoming calls from al-Qaida so we know when they’re going to attack us. Uh huh. He’s also describing our “side” as “the side of peace and moderation.”

Now he’s talking about all the plans that were thwarted because of information we gleaned from detainees. Absolutely no qualifications about the realistic probability that these attacks could have been carried out; for all we know based on what he’s saying, one of the detainees said, “We thought about attacking X,” but had no ability to actually do it (much like the “terror cell” broken up in Florida), but he’s calling it a victory. And we have to take his word for it.

Now he’s just said: “Osama bin Laden and other terrorists are still in hiding. Our message to them is clear: No matter how long it takes, we’re gonna find you, and we’re gonna bring you to justice.” Huge applause.

Now this: “Recently parts of a classified document called the National Intelligence Estimate were leaked to the press… It’s an indication we’re getting close to an election. The NIE analyzes the threats we face… Its unauthorized distribution has set off a debate about the threats we face, particularly here in Washington… [The argument that the war in Iraq has made us less safe] buys into the terrorist propaganda that they are attacking us because we are provoking them. I want to remind America that we were not in Iraq on September the 11th, 2001.”

ARGH!

“We do not create terrorism by fighting terrorism… The terrorists war against us because they hate everything we stand for. We stand for freedom. We worship freedom… They can’t stand the thought that people get to go into the public square and express their differences with government.”

OMG.