The Thing That Should Not Be

Allow me to introduce myself. As can be seen, my name is Steve, and I've lived my entire life in the suburbs of Chicago. As a frequent pain in the a** commenter on QuestionItNow who enjoys a rousing and (usually) respectful debate, I have been invited by REB 84 to be a contributor and I want to thank him for the opportunity to provide a counterpoint. For quite awhile on other blogs, most notably the one for Michigan Democratic Rep. John Conyers (until I was banned), REB, Ohiodem1 (OD1), and I would go on about this and that, and I found that our debates were usually very good and very informative, and usually quite respectful (although I can be a hothead and prone to snarkiness). I am very much a conservative (but not someone who would be considered a member of the "Religious Right") and, as such, do have different views on many political items that are issues today. Most of those are on my own blog, Scipio the Metalcon. But, I appreciate and thank REB for the opportunity here.

Now that the mutual hogwash is over (just kidding), there are some real problems that do exist, some of which are challenges to the United States Constitution, specifically the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

In recent days, it has come out that an ABC docu-drama, titled Path to 9/11, has drawn the ire of congressional Democrats, as well as former President Bill Clinton and past members of his administration. Now, 9/11 was a definitive moment in many of our lives (I was vacationing with my girlfriend, now wife, in Virginia Beach when the attacks occurred), and America came together in a great way. But with the war in Iraq, plus many other foreign policy challenges that come across in the news, the old partisanship that infected much of the prior three administrations has come to the fore. Even some influential people began their assault on Bush when he and the Congress ordered the military into Afghanistan, saying that using the military in this fashion wasn't the appropriate response (it most assuredly was, in my opinion; OD1 has expressed this to me as well). It has even come down to who is to blame for not protecting the American people from the 9/11 attacks themselves, and this is just ridiculous. In previous debates with OD1 on this, I have asserted that 9/11 didn't occur in a vacuum of time that began on January 20, 2001, George Bush's first inauguration. The problems that led to the government's failure have been shown to have begun long before that day, earlier than even January 20, 1993, the inauguration of Bill Clinton.

Did Bush and his administration make mistakes? You bet, and there's no denying it. A few things should be mentioned:

• Bush spent much of the period before 9/11 on domestic policy, not foreign policy.
• His administration relied a lot on former Clinton appointees, notably Richard Clarke and George Tenet, and others. This, after the bitter battle over who won the 2000 election.
• Bush did not seem to take seriously enough some of the intelligence reports indicating a potential attack on the US.
• Bush left many of the Clinton-era policies and procedures regarding national security in place (especially in relation to Tenet).
  

It was also confirmed by the 9/11 Commission that the CIA itself was an agency with a long history of continuing problems that plagued many administrations.

With that said, one must reasonably assume that these problems were not created solely by the Bush administration. Much of it did occur during Clinton's tenure in the White House, and were brought out by the 9/11 Commission Report. When looking at Clinton's record regarding terrorist attacks against Americans, it was pitiful. In response to bin Laden's declaration of war against the United States (through a fatwa) wasn't enough to induce Clinton to reply with any kind strong diplomacy or force, a characterization of his entire administration. And even though the 9/11 Commission said as such, it has been seen by all sides of the political spectrum to have been a chance at political sniping and whitewashing the roles of those in both administrations, instead of doing what it should have done, which was to improve the federal government's intelligence capabilities and response to emergencies.

What has all of this accusatory finger-pointing done? Nothing. The problems that kept the federal government from stopping the 9/11 attacks came about due to the usual problems we see with government; change doesn't occur until there is a tragedy. The analogy of the implementation of a stop light comes to mind. Dangerous intersections don't usually get a stop light until somebody gets killed. Governments at all levels should do better about a lot of things, but they don't.

And yet, it has come to pass that not only is Bush almost completely blamed for not protecting America on 9/11, there are those who believe Bush or someone in his administration actually caused it. This has now reached Democratic candidates for Congress in the form of Dr. Bob Bowen, running for office in Florida's 15th District (he won the Democratic primary this past Tuesday). Did this kind of event occur during FDR's administration after Pearl Harbor? In some respects it did, but the bipartisanship of the government and the unity of the country looked beyond this idiocy and proceeded to the business at hand, World War II.

So, now it comes to the Path to 9/11 ABC docu-drama. Advertised as based on the 9/11 Commission report, it has put in some questionable scenes that has past and present Democratic politicians riled up. A notorious example is one where Sandy Berger, Clinton's National Security Advisor, cancelled an assasination of bin Laden just as the CIA was to perform the hit. Based on documentation, it didn't happen this way (it is believed that Tenet actually did this). Yet, compressing years of various actions into a five-hour TV show (after all, this is what it is) gave the producers what they thought was creative license. I can understand why this would upset Berger and the others, and the producers have said they would edit some of these scenes out of what will be broadcasted. But individuals like Berger really don't have much to crow about; it has come out that Berger was very much involved in not pursuing bin Laden, even if not in the way depicted. And along with his infamous theft of documents from the National Archives, just prior to his appearance at the 9/11 Commission hearings, Berger has no standing and no credibility in his complaint.

As a result, senior Democrats in Congress (including the aforementioned John Conyers, and the Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid) are trying to get ABC to not broadcast Path to 9/11. While this is not unusual (many Republicans had done the same with regards to CBS's The Reagans, which Viacom pulled from CBS and aired on Showtime), Reid has threatened ABC with imposing retribution using the Communications Act of 1934, something that many (including myself) believe is an overt act of censorship, a complete violation of the First Amendment. The claim is that the free license of ABC to use the public airwaves for broadcasting requires that anything historical or newsworthy in nature is required to stick to what some say is the absolute truth is ridiculous since this is a docu-drama, not a documentary, and that is key. If what Reid says is true, then I would argue that much of what has been said on the network news (and CNN, and MSNBC) regarding the Plame kerfuffle should also be a cause to revoke the licenses of these broadcast entities. It would also mean that movies like JFK and Fahrenheit 9/11 could never, ever be shown on network TV, as their content is questionable (Moore's film) or just outright wrong (JFK). Even if one looks at Braveheart, there's enough there to make a historian wince with the fabrication of the many events in the examination of William Wallace's life. Again, dramatic license was used in a movie, not a documentary.

This is a dangerous road being taken by Democrats. It's one thing to lash out at a network for showing a controversial TV show; it's another to use the threat of political power to come down on them. But that seems to be the nature of debate today. To me, the quality of the criticism of this President has been set so low as to be stifling to free speech. I would say that the Republican impeachment of Bill Clinton started this ball rolling, and I didn't support it then (you'll have to take my word; I wasn't a blogger then). But, I will be happy to add to the ridiculousness of the debate quality if the next President is a Democrat, provided there still is free speech left in this country for ordinary Americans, and not only to those protected by the ACLU (neo-Nazis, Klansman, and the child molesters of NAMBLA).

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