Quote:
Originally posted by RougeUnderoos@Oct 23 2004, 09:44 PM
I've got a question: Why is the Bush/Cheney pair seen as such an obvious "stronger" pair in regards to fighting terrorism? It's always mentioned on the US news, they run ads (with wolves now) portraying themselves as really tough, the polls show Bush ahead on the issue, it's seen as a "strength" for them. Why?
Is it because "liberal" is such a dirty word? Is there some sort of conception that they've had fabulous success fighting wars over the past three years?
On a related note, I don't think I'll ever understand how Kerry gets painted as an anti-war wimp when Bush and Cheney were so obviously anti-war as well.
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Fundamentally the approach Kerry has outlined (as far as anyone knows) is to revert back to the Clinton, Reno, and Richard Clark model regarding terrorism. Kerry has repeatedly stated that he thinks the war on terror should be treated as a law enforcement issue rather than a military issue.
The flaw in that thinking is obvious to anyone that thinks about the primary tool used by law enforcement, which is punishment. Law enforcement works as a deterrent against crime because of the threat of punishment if the perpetrator is caught. The simple fact that more people are arrested after they commit a crime than before they have committed a crime is proof, and why crimes of passion are so difficult to prevent. Even the FBI is limited in preventing crimes and is considered the worlds best crime investigation unit – after the fact. The only major law enforcement type organization in the US that operates strictly on preventing a crime before it can happen is the Presidential and Executive Detail of the Secret Service. The Secret Service also deals with the most criminals that are not deterred by the prospect of getting caught such as Oswald or Hinckley.
Where this law enforcement model falls apart in the war on terror is that most terrorists go into their action intending to die anyway. How can you use a punishment deterrent model against a dead perpetrator? Incarcerate his remains after the fact? Common criminals worry about getting caught and plan accordingly, but terrorists plan on getting caught.
This is why the military model is so necessary at this time when you need to round up the suspects before they can plan and commit an act of terrorism. I had to laugh when Kerry stated that he would round up the terrorists around the world if he was President, but he never suggests how he would do that. President Bush and the UN gave the Taliban many opportunities for them to offer up OBL and the other al Qaeda members known to be in Afghanistan and they refused to cooperate in any way. Saddam has been harboring the 1993 bomber of the WTC for many years and refused to assist the US or the UN in apprehending him or even limiting his involvement in other terror activities. Maybe someone who watched one too many Tom Clancy movies might think that we could just send some covert operation into Afghanistan or Iraq and arrest the bad guys out from under Omar or Saddam’s nose, but it doesn’t work that way in the real world.
Even worse than Kerry’s boneheaded ex-prosecutor perspective on terror is that he would let a country like France unilaterally alter what he knows needs to be done. This despite the fact that he understood that France had a huge vested financial interest in maintaining the status quo no matter what the consequences to the US or the UN’s respectability.
Everyone is anti-war, but there comes a time when war is the only road to peace. Too many on the left today equate lack of war to the same thing as peace and that is far from the truth. No one, including Kerry and the UN, could claim that the people of Iraq or Afghanistan were living peacefully even though they were not formally at war before the liberation. The key is making that decision when war is necessary to bring about peace. In 1971, I was shocked when Kerry told the US Congress that a withdrawal from Vietnam would result in a maximum loss of life or liberty to 5,000 South Vietnamese citizens. He was wrong then by a factor of close to 200 with over one million innocent citizens dieing at the hands of the communists, 500,000 being incarcerated, and several million fleeing as refuges. He has yet to admit his mistake then and he is even more mistaken today about the human suffering that would occur under his current plans – whatever they may be this week.