Quote:
Originally Posted by soonerliberal
No, it is a logical fallacy called the straw man.
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No, it's not. Perhaps you should look up that term and come back and show how that is the case. But, if you want to believe that contrasting our current President with prior ones who've been in similar situatuations (meaning having been at the helm when terrorist attacks occur), constitutes a straw man argument in your world, then so be it.
In my opinion, the most important issue of our time is protecting our country's population from further terrorist attacks. Everything else is secondary. Bush has done an exceptional job in this respect. While I realize that Bush has his drawbacks, I'll take him and our current situation instead of what might have happened if it were a Democrat in the Oval Office.
You mention foreign policy and that we are no longer as respected as we once were. True, there are certain countries like France that can't fathom actually
doing something about terrorism vs. simply talking about it, but I'm not too concerned about that. Our legitimacy as the world's only superpower is in no way tarnished, except for those who believe that there is nothing worth fighting for. In addition, it's not Bush's doctrine that has emboldened our enemies, but rather the constant high-profile bickering and infighting among our political parties that seem to put politics above common national interests.
I'll leave the argument with what I consider to be the most important item concerning the presidential office. During the prior administration, there were several attacks against our country, our embassies and our mililtary:
- The 1993 World Trade Center bombing, which killed six and injured 1000
- The 1995 bombing in Saudi Arabia, which killed five U.S. military personnel
- The 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, which killed 19 and injured 200 U.S. military personnel
- The 1998 bombing of U.S. embassies in Africa, which killed 224 and injured 5,000
- The 2000 bombing of the USS Cole, which killed 17 and injured 39 U.S. sailors
- Daily attacks against our patrolling aircraft flying over the Iraqi no-fly zone
Attacks under "W":
- 2001 World Trade Center towers / Pentagon / Possible attacks on Congress or the White House.
Now we are fighting them in Afghanistan and Iraq instead of our soil. Why? Because Bush didn't sit around afterward promising to bring those responsible to justice and then proceded to do absolutely nothing of consequence about it. Sadly, I believe that the administration is going to bow to pressure to end the war more quickly that it should be. I think this would be a huge mistake and would send the message that we as a country don't have the stomach to do what needs to be done and finish the job. Perhaps we don't, at least not until the next time some group takes over a school here like they did in Beslan and then it's too late.