Nobody in a responsible position on either side of the aisle is calling Bushit on the NIE briefings because there is a kernal of truth to them. Theoretically, al-Qaeda could nuke us tomorrow so nobody wants to be the moron who goes out on a limb and declares the GWT is over. That is unless you are a Salon writer like Blumenthal and Greenwald who act as if the GWT is over and that Happy Days are back. Look at the steam pipe break in NYC yesterday...everyone thought of 9/11 and ran for cover. There is palpable fear generally that al Qaeda is looking for a way to outdo 9/11 and to drive a wedge particularly between the US and Europe. Also, Al Qaeda is very selective in its targets and, above all, does not want to be marginalized by finishing in second place behind 9/11. So they wait and plan.

I just hope the other postees to this article don't believe their own Bushit and think that happy days are back...where headlines are mostly about free blow jobs in the Oval Office.

This same piece could have been written in 1970, 1975, 1980, etc. but the reality is that young people (under 30) generally don't vote. They are too busy with their lives and they leave voting to "older" folks (like me). I would be more than happy to push the lever down for all the twenty-somethings that think voting and politics in general is "boooring". It's no secret that if the twenty-somethings actual voted in droves, as they should, no Repub would have a prayer of winning. Furthermore, women between the ages of 20-35 are particularly notorious for not voting and imagine what that crowd, if energized, could do for a Democratic candidate.

Glenn Greenwald is one among many far-left critics of the war who specializes in keeping score but always looking backwards. He offers no real vision of the future. Frankly, Greenwood belongs in the Edwards campaign where he could spend all day pounding Hillary on her war record. I value opinions and analysis that place more weight on what is in front of us as opposed to keeping old scores straight. 20/20 vision hindsight is great, but, so what!

Why isn't Tim Grieve going berserk over Obama's assertion that as president he would just shove Musharriff aside and invade Pakistan if he doesn't do more to chase down al-Qaeda in Pakistan? Sounds like a little pre-emptive war in the making from the left-wing of the Dems. Very interesting. Sounds like a little double-standard here as well. If Dick Cheney had suggested this, the streets of DC would be filling up with today with demonstrators, Glenn Greenwald and the other unnotables from Salon would be going beserk and the anonymous posters would stop being anonymous.

With the Repubs in disarray and with nobody stepping up to seriously challenge Hillary and Obama, the Dems are getting their first taste of actually waging the GWOT and they are finding it a bit complicated and full of contradictions.

That's my point exactly: the outcome of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were known in advance had anybody spent 8 hours in any public library. What Greenwald does is he diligently reports all the little minutae each day and fits all of his data to his lefty worldview. It is basically propaganda that is being fed to the Salon base and provides no long-term value to the reader. He comes across as a political hack. What does Greenwald say about Obama proposing today to attack Pakistan if they don't get on the program real fast re: al-Qaeda? He has been unusually quiet...probably digesting the implications of a lefty president starting a preemptive war someday.

Joe Conason reveals his lack of understanding of the Middle East by characterizing the Muslim Brotherhood as "moderate". He probably also thinks that the "war of terror is just a bumper sticker" like another useless presidential candidate we all know. Conason also thinks that a little police action can rein in the al-Qaeda types, like Barney the Cop has a chance against the likes of al-Zawahiri.

Hamas, for example, is a direct spin-off of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Muslim Brotherhood was outlawed in Syria and Egypt and Assad thought so strongly about these guys he had them completely destroyed in the city of Hama in 1982. That's Hafsed al-Assad, the father, not the son. The Muslim Brotherhood morphed into Egyptian Jihad who assassinated Sadat in 1979 and then teamed up with al-Qaeda. Conason should google "Hama" and see what he gets. Once, this was a city of 30,000 in Syria. Today, it's a parking lot. Canason, like Greenwald, need to do more balanced research and not cherry-pick their facts.

At least Guiliani does not mince words and is not interested in pleasing everybody. The '08 election will be all about the GWOT and less about Iraq or the economy. The Dems will try to make Iraq the centerpiece of their campaign but the Repubs will out-flank them on the issue and could very well win. The best chance for a Democratic win is actually Hillary because I think she has anticipates this strategy better than the other "useless" candidates who are more interested in sucking-up to the Salon and Kos base.