The Wreckage in the China Shop

[cal04]

By Bob Herbert
After all the sound and fury of the past few years, how is the U.S. doing in its fight against terrorism?

Not too well, according to a recent survey of more than 100 highly respected foreign policy and national security experts. The survey, dubbed the "Terrorism Index," was conducted by the Center for American Progress and Foreign Policy magazine. The respondents included Republicans and Democrats, moderates, liberals and conservatives.

The survey's findings were striking. A strong, bipartisan consensus emerged on two crucial points: 84 percent of the respondents said the United States was not winning the war on terror, and 86 percent said the world was becoming more — not less — dangerous for Americans.

The sound and fury since Sept. 11, 2001 — the chest-thumping and muscle-flexing, the freedom fries, the Patriot Act, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the breathtaking expansion of presidential power, Guantánamo, rendition, the expenditure of hundreds of billions of dollars — seems to have signified very little.


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[ovidsen]

1. Better to have done nothing

I have no doubt that there are groups with an obsessive hatred of all things American that goes far beyond what Americans have actually done to them.

The Bush administration's "sound and fury since Sept. 11, 2001" has only made their numbers grow and deepened their hatred.

Noce job.

[ixion]

2. all that aforementioned illegal crap promulgated by BushCo signifies

a great deal.

It signifies the 'last throes' of the once great American Republic and hearlds its descent into theocracy. :-(

[Vidar]

3. We have made terrorism respectable.