Kerry's Last Debate: "Do You Feel Safer Than You Did Four Years Ago?"

[ruggerson]

At the close of the upcoming last debate, Kerry should first acknowledge Ronald Reagan's famous "Do you feel better off than you did four years ago" and then ask the updated, more relevant: "Do you feel safer than you did four years ago?"

"If you feel safer than you did on Jan. 20th, 2001, then you should vote for my opponent.

If you think, on the other hand, that the world is now a far more dangerous place, if you fear for your family and your children's safety, if you think America has been headed in the wrong direction over the last few years, if you worry about deploying 200 billion dollars for a war that makes us less safe, not more, then I am offering you a clear alternative. The choice could not be clearer, the stakes could not be higher. If you want a new course, a course that will chart us to safer waters, a course that will reverse the dangers of the last four years, a course that will resolutely increase security here at home, while diligently and tirelessly seeking out terror in foreign lands and crushing it before it reaches our shores, then we offer you a clear path to the future. America's best days are ahead and I humbly ask for you to stand with me as we change direction and move to higher, safer ground.

[Edwardsgroupie]

1. Although...

On Jan. 20, 2001, America was crawling with terrorists taking flying lessons and so forth, unbeknownst to any of us, and plotting the destruction of the twin towers.
While it is true that we felt safer then, I guess it is a legitimate debate whether or not we were safer, at least here domestically.

[teach1st]

2. Unbeknownst to any of us

Hasn't it been shown that intelligence agencies know about the terrorists taking flying lessons? Didn't the August 6th PDB inform some people about intentions? Not to mention the severe warnings we were receiving from foreign intelligence.

Citizens didn't know, but government did, or should have.

[kentuck]

4. I think the information was there but some folks chose to ignore it...

In one instance, I recall that an FBI agent was trying to get the word to Washington and was ignored or rebuked?? I think it should be a legitimate debate that there was so much incompetence in this Administration, as they bullshitted people into believing they were the adults and the professionals. They were Barney Fifes, in actuality.

[teach1st]

5. Some info....

(This is from an April '04 post. Some of the links are dead, so I removed them or found an alternate source. I don't know if any of this has been proven untrue)

http://www.voanews.com/article.cfm?objectID=322AC9B9-07F1-4C58-BC536CB275B7FE50

President Bush says he received no information prior to September 11, 2001, indicating a terrorist attack on America was imminent.

It was a memo prepared for the president about a month before the September 11 attacks. The top-secret document detailed what was known at the time about possible al-Qaida activities in the United States.

Seldom, if ever, has the White House released classified information shared with the president during an intelligence briefing. Mr. Bush says the memo shows that there was no indication that al-Qaida was about to hijack planes and fly them into buildings.

"There was not a time and place of an attack," he said. "It said Osama bin-Laden had designs on America. Well, I knew that."

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3067907/

AT THE CENTER of the dispute is a more-than-800-page secret report prepared by a joint congressional inquiry detailing the intelligence and law-enforcement failures that preceded the attacks—including provocative, if unheeded warnings, given President Bush and his top advisers during the summer of 2001.

(snip)

Some sources who have read the still-secret congressional report say some sections would not play quite so neatly into White House plans. One portion deals extensively with the stream of U.S. intelligence-agency reports in the summer of 2001 suggesting that Al Qaeda was planning an upcoming attack against the United States—and implicitly raises questions about how Bush and his top aides responded. One such CIA briefing, in July 2001, was particularly chilling and prophetic. It predicted that Osama bin Laden was about to launch a terrorist strike “in the coming weeks,” the congressional investigators found. The intelligence briefing went on to say: “The attack will be spectacular and designed to inflict mass casualties against U.S. facilities or interests. Attack preparations have been made. Attack will occur with little or no warning.”

--------------------------------

The Taliban warned:
"Weeks before the terrorist attacks on 11 September, the United States and the United Nations ignored warnings from a secret Taliban emissary that Osama bin Laden was planning a huge attack on American soil."
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=331115

The Germans warned:
"According to an article in one of the major daily newspapers in Germany, published just after the destruction of the World Trade Center, the German intelligence service BND told both US and Israeli intelligence agencies in June that Middle East terrorists were 'planning to hijack commercial aircraft to use as weapons to attack important symbols of American and Israeli culture.'

"The newspaper cited unnamed German intelligence sources, who said that the information came through Echelon, the US-controlled system of 120 satellites which monitors all worldwide electronic communications. Echelon is operated jointly by the United States, Canada, Britain, Australia and New Zealand, although its existence is not officially admitted."
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/jan2002/sept-j16.shtml

The Egyptians warned:
"Egyptian intelligence warned American officials about a week before Sept. 11 that Osama bin Laden's network was in the advance stages of executing a significant operation against an American target, President Hosni Mubarak said in an interview on Sunday."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/04/national/04WARN.html

The Russians warned:
According to Russian press reports, Russian intelligence notified the CIA during the summer that 25 terrorist pilots had been specifically training for suicide missions. In an interview September 15 with MSNBC, Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed that he had ordered Russian intelligence in August to warn the US government "in the strongest possible terms" of imminent attacks on airports and government buildings.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/jan2002/sept-j16.shtml

The French warned:
"A key point in unraveling why the FBI failed to follow up leads on Al Qaeda terrorism now centers on the Bureau's contemptuously brushing aside warnings from French intelligence a few days before 9-11."
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0222/ridgeway2.php

The British warned:
"Britain gave President Bush a categorical warning to expect multiple airline hijackings by the al-Qaeda network a month before the September 11 attacks which killed nearly 3000 people and triggered the international war against terrorism."
http://www.sundayherald.com/24822

The Israelis warned:
The London Telegraph: "Israeli intelligence officials say that they warned their counterparts in the United States last month that large-scale terrorist attacks on highly visible targets on the American mainland were imminent."
http://tinyurl.com/28rrh

The Moroccans warned:
"A Moroccan secret agent, Hassan Dabou, had penetrated al Qaeda for two years, breaking cover the summer of 2001 to warn of 'spectacular' attacks in New York in the summer or autumn of 2001. Secret service chiefs are said to have taken seriously the tip from one of its veteran informants and immediately passed on the details to Washington."
Times of London, June 12, 2002

Arab intelligence agencies warned:
"When the hubbub about what the White House did or didn't know before Sept. 11 dies down, Congressional or other investigators should consider the specific warnings that friendly Arab intelligence services sent to Washington in the summer of 2001."
http://www.iht.com/articles/58269.html

[Dark Jedi]

3. Feeling LESS Safe, Actually....

Bush and his cronies have ruined everything domestically for us. But they keep trying to sell this "homeland suckurity" crap to the simple-minded type as though it is some sort of achievement in American presidential history.