YEAR FIVE

Today is the fifth anniversary of the attack on New York and Washington by Islamic radicals. 

I'm sure that a lot of you will stop to remember just what you were doing five years ago today when you first heard of the attacks.

I was on the air.  We were nearing the completion of the first half-hour of the show.  The time was about 8:55 when I went into the news break.  Belinda came into the studio to tell me that they were saying that a small plane had crashed into the World Trade Center.  We looked up to the television in the studio and saw the smoke pouring out of the tower.  I turned to Belinda and said "That was no small plane.  This was a terrorist attack."  [Nealz Nuze from 9/11/01 | Time To Decide 9/11/02]

I can still remember letting out a scream when I saw the second aircraft fly into the second tower.  The rest of the day pretty much remains a blur.  I do remember going back on the air at about 3:00 that afternoon to begin taking phone calls.

Much has happened over the past five years.  Today will be a good day to discuss what we've done, where we are, and what we are facing in the future. 

The Islamic terrorists haven't given up.  They're bright, capable and eager.  Can the same be said for us?

Though there won't be extensive notes today .. I will be doing the show live from Tucson, Arizona.  Though I'm on vacation this week, I wanted to do a show on this fifth anniversary of the Islamic terrorist attacks.  Thanks to the people at KVOI Radio in Tucson I'm able to do just that.

There will be much to talk about today.  Here are just a few questions that might elicit some interesting responses:

• Are we, in fact, engaged in a World War against Islamic fascism? 
• Is Islamic terrorism a law enforcement problem or a problem requiring a military response?
• Should we abandon political correctness and get on with the profiling?
• Why aren't Americans aware of the danger still posed by Islamic terrorism?
• How would things be different today if either Al Gore or John Kerry had won the presidency?
• How great a debt do we owe the people of Florida?
• Was it necessary to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq?  Did he present a threat to us?
• Will Democrats protect this country from further attacks if they should gain control of the government?
• What role did Bill Clinton play in enabling the terrorists through his inattention to the problem?
• Would Islamic terrorists find it difficult to smuggle a nuclear device into America?
• How much of our civil liberties are you willing to curtail in order to effectively fight these Islamic radicals?
• Do you expect another Islamic terrorist attack on our country in the near future?

Those questions, and discussion of  the first two hours of ABC's miniseries "The Path to 9/11" today on The Neal Boortz Show. Then it's on with a few days of vacation!

BILL'S NEW AND IMPROVED 9/11

• In the first cut of the movie, Richard Clarke tells an FBI agent that because of the pending impeachment, he doesn't see Bill Clinton taking any chances with killing Bin Laden.  That sure doesn't make Bill Clinton look very good...but no problem!  Presto...after editing, the same scene shows Richard Clarke saying of the impeachment that the president had assured him it wouldn't affect his decision making.  There you go...that's better for Bill.



• The first version showed Sandy 'Pants' Berger hanging up on George Tenet, who had requested permission from the Clinton Administration to attack Osama Bin Laden.  The new version last night did not include the hang-up scene.  The DNC can't buy this kind of censorship.

So there you have it.  To some extent, great or mild (your choice) Bill Clinton got his way.  ABC wound up cutting several minutes from the film and one can presume the next installment tonight will be the same.  Once again the propaganda that the Clinton Administration had nothing to do with 9/11 is further advanced.  By the way, if the movie was critical of a Republican administration do you suppose similar cuts would have been made?  Hardly.

Oh, and the media is portraying ABC as courageous for still airing the movie....even though they sure did move to soften the blow to Clinton's image.  Well .. after all.  The Democrats may be in power in a few years, and you have to be careful about who you chose to infuriate.

UNDERSTANDING THE LESSON OF 9/11

British Prime Minister Tony Blair recently gave an interview to an Israeli newspaper and for the most part, it was a pretty standard interview.  He talked about the recent war in Lebanon between Hezbollah and Israel as well as the peace process and so forth.  But he said a few things about the War On Islamic fascism and the situation in Iran which would explain why the appeasement crowd is trying to run him out of office.

Speaking of Islamic terrorism, Blair said that Western leaders understand the threat it poses, but when it comes to public opinion, there is a big battle to be won.  Translation:  the people in charge realize how bad Islamofascism is, but the general public doesn't.  He's absolutely right and it applies to the United States.  We've become soft.  5 years after 9/11, people have forgotten just who it is we're at war with.

All of the hijackers that killed 3,000 innocent Americans were Islamic followers of Osama Bin Laden.  They people we're fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan....Muslim followers of Osama Bin Laden.  See a trend here?  We know who the enemy is...it's never been more clear.  But we've become weak-kneed.  Just as in Britain, people have lashed out at the Bush Administration for not winning the war in Iraq right away.  People have started to view terrorism as a law enforcement problem again.  It won't be long before we become complacent enough for the terrorists to strike again.

Then Tony Blair closed his interview with something that Ronald Reagan himself could have said.  Speaking of Iran's drive to acquire nuclear weapons, Blair said "I think for a president of a country to say they want to wipe another country off the face of the earth and at the same time he's trying to acquire a nuclear weapons capability....if we don't get worried about that, future historians will raise a few questions about us and about our judgment."

Bingo....and what are we doing about it right now?  We're on the verge of issuing a visa to the leader of that very country, so he can visit the United States.  In fact, he'll be coming to New York City.  Talk about an insult to those who died on 9/11.

SADDAM'S NEW FRIEND IN THE SENATE

The United States Senate released a report about the war in Iraq last week and it was about what was expected.  The standard appeasement garbage about how we were misled, etc.  Nothing new.  But Democratic Senator Jay Rockefeller, who voted for the war in Iraq after seeing the same intelligence, is making some noise about the whole thing.

In fact, Rockefeller has gone a step further.  He calls the invasion of Iraq a mistake.[pdf]  Well ... now we know that Rockefeller is good at parroting the Democrat Party line. 

Actually ... it's fair to ask whether or not the invasion was needed.  There's nothing like that 20/20 hindsight.   So .. there we have a legitimate policy question. 

Then Rockefeller walks off the edge.  He adopts the Hillary position from a few years ago, saying Iraq would be better off with Saddam Hussein in charge.  Who knew that Saddam would become a speechwriter, right from his cell in Baghdad!  Perhaps Saddam was thinking of Jay Rockefeller when he proclaimed that he would once again be put back in charge of Iraq.

It's interesting how Democrats play this game.  They accuse the Bush Administration of misleading them, but they saw the same intelligence that the Bush Administration did.  So they misled people too.  But that doesn't play too well with the anti-war crowd, so they make up new facts to fit the current popular opinion.  Then you have the small fact that numerous government commissions here and abroad have found that no one in the Bush White House misled anyone.  How inconvenient.

And by the way....just how would Iraq be better off with Saddam in charge?  Would the women being assaulted in Hussein's "rape rooms" be better off?  Would the Iraqis who actually got to vote in their first true election be better off?  How about those who were tortured and killed by Uday and Qusay?  Would they have been better off, Senator Rockefeller?

Perhaps a merger of the Democratic Party and Iraq's Ba'ath Party is in the offing.  Jay Rockefeller could be the new chairman.  They could even bring back the Fedayeen, cutting out the tongues of everyone who doesn't agree with them.

REDNECK SCRAP BOOK

You could give one hell of a Cinco de Mayo party with this margarita mixer. More in the Redneck Scrap Book.

READING ASSIGNMENTS

Dick Cheney went on 'Meet The Press' yesterday and said the invasion of Iraq was correct, whether Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction or not.  In fact, Cheney says if the administration had it to do over again, they would still invade.  By the way, Saddam did have WMD and they have been found.

Al Gore still isn't ruling out another run for the White House, even though he says he doesn't expect to.  If he doesn't expect to, why not rule it out?  The answer is because he loves the attention.  He could still run and win after losing once...it's happened before.

The movie portraying the assassination of George W. Bush has debuted in Canada, with some applause at the end.   If this movie ever debuts in the United States, will the company showing it trim out the offensive parts, like ABC did with Bill Clinton and last night's 9/11 special? 

Iran now says it might consider suspending the enrichment of uranium.  They're probably just saying this so their president can get into the United States and make his speech at the U.N., then get out.  After that, they'll go back to their hard line.

Even though he denies it now, Bill Clinton once did admit to passing up an offer to capture Osama Bin Laden.  In fact, his admission was caught on audio tape.  Sounds like he's taking his own advice about his past bimbo eruptions:  deny, deny, deny.

Christopher Hitchens says the attacks on 9/11 weren't so much an attack on America as they were an attack on civilization.  He says people all over should stand against Islamic extremism...or "Bin Ladenism," as he calls it.

Maybe a month ago, it looked like the Democrats were going to be a slam dunk to capture the House and the Senate this fall.  Now things have changed and the left's prospects aren't so certain.  Jonathan Last sizes up the Dems' prospects.

Mark Davis went down to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba and got the grand tour.  He was disturbed by what he saw....he says the detainees are being treated too well.  Did you know that we interrogate terrorists while they sit on nice comfortable couches?  Who knew.

5 years after 9/11, America's enemies are still hiding in plain sight and we're increasingly doing nothing about it.  Mark Steyn recounts that the hijackers too flight lessons in the United States, convinced political correctness would keep them from being discovered.  It worked.

Jeff Jacoby marks a new low in Bush hatred by the Left.  They aren't content enough to compare George W. Bush to Adolf Hitler and all sorts of unsavory characters....now they're actually openly advocating that he be killed.

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