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September 11th killed about 3000 people and destroyed a couple of skyscrapers. It did not destroy the economy or threaten every American in any meaningful way. It was a wake-up call for dealing with terrorism and could have been the start of a new era if handled by a President with half a brain.
After September 11th Bush had nearly every American supporting him - not because he was G.W. Bush or because people thought his policies had suddenly become palatable but because he was the President and we were Americans and we knew we needed to unite to ensure that nothing like this would happen again.
The Taliban in Afghanistan were defiantly sheltering Al Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden. The whole world rallied to America's side when we invaded Afghanistan. Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, Al Gore, hell, even Gerald Ford or Jimmy Carter would have handled it competently. But not W. Instead of prosecuting that war to the end, putting Bin Laden's head on a pike and sending a clear message to the whole world that America was not to be messed with, Bush immediately started planning the invasion of Iraq so that he could compete with his daddy.
The rest is history. America is a laughingstock among terrorists because we have never effectively dealt with them. Our military is stretched and tired, our economy is in tatters. Our reputation is in ruins and along with it our ideals. The Bush administration's sheer incompetence will be their legacy.
