Titus, you probably shouldn't have linked to the Newsweek article. It shows exactly where you've lied in your claims. For example:

Sorry, but Clinton in fact did nothing about al-Qaida

Curiously enough, the article says something different: "Clinton appeared to have been referring to a December 1999 Memorandum of Notification (MON) he signed that authorized the CIA to use lethal force to capture, not kill, bin Laden."

Now, while "capture, not kill" might not have been ideal, it's that much more than Bush did prior to 9/11, isn't it? (Apart from fishing, of course.)

Really, the most damning aspect of the report is focused on Tenet (to whom Bush gave the Medal of Honor) and Hayden (who is Bush's Director of the CIA). Based on that article, I don't see that 9/11 was Clinton's fault, nor do I see that Bush has managed to glean any wisdom from the failings that took place during the Clinton years. Can you?

Like someone with Tourette's Syndrome, the paranoiacs just can't keep their paranoid fantasies from popping out of their mouths (or keyboards, as it were). Yeah, it's all those Jews and neo-cons who are instigating all this.

Leave the strawmen for the Wizard of Oz, nobody said anything about Jews. Neocons, sure, since they are self-described, and came up with the PNAC position papers, which Bush has followed. Is it so outrageous to connect the dots between major GOP players in the BushCo, the position papers they wrote in the 90s, and the actions they took 10 years later?

And as for "dealing with the threat"? How many attacks have there been since 9/11? How many attacks were there after the first WTC attack in 1993?

Well, we've got 3,700 American troops dead, half a million dead Iraqis, and millions of displaced Iraqis. That is the result of attacks. But as for the lack of attacks since 9/11, that particular attack was an amazing stroke of luck (for the terrorists and for Bush) that won't likely be repeated.

And remember: Bush explicitly stated that we were not just going after the perpetrators of 9/11 but against all terrorists

No, not all terrorists. Just some. That doesn't include anti-Castro terrorists, but does include the leader controlling the world's 2nd largest oil reserves. Interesting, isn't it?

http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=1364

Name a single freedom you've lost.

Amendment 1: While Congress hasn't specifically passed laws preventing freedom of speech, the executive branch has done extensive work in this regard. "Freedom Zones" and other anti-protest activity.

Amendment 4: The government can now spy on us, search our homes, monitor our communications, without ever having to let us know.

Amendment 5: It used to mean "No person shall...be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law." How quaint, eh? The MCA of 2006 eliminated that one.

Yeah, with his super weather-wand, Bush directed Katrina towards New Orleans... Nope, they bear no blame at all.

Again, dispense with the strawmen arguments, they don't help you. Nobody claimed Bush caused Katrina, just that he oversaw the abysmal failure of the relief effort. I didn't say local authorities weren't also to blame. However, FEMA and DHS had primary responsibility for the effort from the moment a state of emergency is declared. Bush's involvement was to appoint a crony, and go play guitar.

So is that why everyone from Ted Kennedy to John Kerry to Hillary Clinton to Bill Clinton to Al Gore were saying that Saddam's WMD were a threat that had to be dealt with?

I won't defend the political posturing of those idiots during the fall of 2002. And that was what it largely was, political posturing. Didn't want to be labeled soft on terrorism in advance of the elections. Really, those congressmen were not shown the same intel as Bush and Cheney were privy to, and therefore were left in a position to take the president's word as to the nature of the threat. With that in mind, many of them voted for use of force, as a means to coerce Saddam to allow inspections (which worked). Most of the statements by the people you specify above, upon voting for the use of force, state specifically that.

I guess now it's only a matter of hours before he suddenly finds Jesus.

The clock is definitely ticking. Shall we take a poll?

I expect Craig will have found Jesus by end-of-business today, Atlantic time.

The pattern is now clear: Demand that everyone else withhold judgment on Iraq until some new assessment arrives, announce that you're doing whatever you want to do no matter what, declare the ensuing debate to be too late, and then start the whole process over again six or nine months down the road by demanding that everyone withhold judgment again.

You forgot this part: at some point the Dems are going to realize that their anti-war constituents are enraged over these developments. At that point, the Dems will need to go through the motions of holding hearings and investigations, and making a lot of threatening remarks. Then they'll vote to give Bush everything he asks for.