He's got it right. (partly)

Jim Kunstler actually gets it right in Conflicted and confounded -- (though sad-to-say it is in his still grossly-named if definitely much better-designed blog; on that last point I have always been amazed that a guy so sensitive to design could have such a totally ugly web site.) Anyway, he writes well here:

The strange assumption gathering behind the 9/11 Commission is that the government ought to be omniscient and omnipotent. And, oddly, those who seem most disappointed with the government's failure to know absolutely everything about everybody, and to control what they do, are the very faction who would most object to a government that actually tried to do so -- namely, Democratic progressives. This is one of many palpable ironies in our conflicted national mood these days.

(Of course then Jim loses it in when he tries to link our problems to diversity. It is precisely our tolerance, diversity and openness to new ideas which is the strength of the West and precisely why the bad guys hate and fear us. Why is that so many middle-aged middle-class white guys are still whining about diversity? I've noticed a fair bit of it recently and it amuses me. But I do know what Jim means, in a sense; but I attribute it to something besides diversity. I was talking to a fellow a few nights ago -- a middle-aged middle-class white guy it so happens -- and for the life-of-me he came up with a sentence about Osama bin Ladin which had the cant-phrase "self-expression" in it. I was appalled -- he seemed to believe that the problem is that terrorists don't have enough legitimate peaceful means of self-expression. I really couldn't believe what I was hearing. So I do agree that there is a lot of naivete about in the liberal circles I inhabit; but to pin the problem on diversity rather than mere stupidity seems like ignoring Occam's razor.)

Anyway, I am sympathetic to Bush on this one. Yes he should have done more; he should have been smarter; he should have done this or that. But it's inconceivable to me that our psychic outlook in August 2001 would have allowed, say, the 'rules of engagement' (that means, basically, when you can shoot) for an on-board air marshall to have said "Go ahead and shoot to kill, thus endangering the lives of the 300 people on your flight, when and if you think in your sole discretion that the hijackers mean to fly your plane into the ground."

It flies past any plausibility that security services would have been allowed to train their officers to take that sort of action, at least before 9-11 offered us a glimpse into the abyss of such a possibilty. If Bush was asleep, then most of us were at least dozing.

Comments

[Brian Miller]

As a liberal who is defintiely in the ABB crowd (Anybody But Bush), I would still agree with you that it is not all that helpful to second guess past decisions. Still, the sloppiness in decisionmaking, and the ideological blinders DO serve to further emphasize the problems with this Administration.

As for Osama being "stupid," I think you are falling into ANOTHER trap of middle class intellectuals, David, believing that evil can be attributed to lack of intelligence-or education. Can't we all accept that some world views and philosophies are hostile, even "evil" against our interests? Its not just stupidity that wants to return the Middle East to an imagined pure AD 902.

[David Sucher]

No, I didn't mean that Osama was stupid but that a better explanation for whatever ills we suffer is not diversity but stupidity on our part.

[Bill Seitz]

Well, by "diversity" I think he really means "a form of relativism that insists that all cultures are equally valid".

[Bill Seitz]

I think part of what's driving the 9/11 commission is a feeling that pre-9/11 blindness toward domestic risk of terrorism is a mirror of post-9/11 fixation on Iraq.

Kinda the way that the whole MonicaLewinsky scandal was pumped partially because people felt it was symptomatic of a general lack of moral character (relating to marriage and other dimensions) on the part of Clinton.

Such is the Madness of Crowds.

[Brian Miller]

Oh. Your explanation of what you meant makes more sense than my misinterpretation.

I agree with Bill Sietz posts, also. Kunstler is a classic "traditional conservative" with the unique caveat that he is not religious. Thus, he is suspicious when "liberals" give too much sympathy to "Third World" cultures. I actually agree a little bit with him. Being somewhat agnostic, I find religious fanaticism frightening, no matter what the "explanation."

[winifer skattebol]

In THE GREEN IMPERATIVE: Natural Design for the Real World, Victor Papanek doesn't use the buzzword "diversity", but he does talk about 3rd World countries:
"We are neatly caught between our own wasteful habits and the temptation to patronize the Third World by preaching discipline and modest habits which we ourselves have never followed...although designers are frequently activists, eager to intervene in human and social ecology, we are really at our best if we intervene through design. The creep of dirty factories and polluted workplaces from the rich and powerful countries to the poor is a systemic political failure..."

Diversity is one of those words, like pluralism and multiculturalism, which should be stricken from the English language. Witness this PC horror currently sponsored by Haverford College:

"The Center for Peace & Global Citizenship Intercultural Dialogue Institute".

[Francis Morrone]

Good piece by Gregg Easterbrook on what would have happened if GWB had actually done what it would have taken to prevent 9/11:
http://www.tnr.com/easterbrook.mhtml?pid=1545

[Francis Morrone]

Brian Miller wrote: "Kunstler is a classic "traditional conservative" with the unique caveat that he is not religious."

Kunstler is a favorite of the "crunchy cons" (so is Jane Jacobs), or environmentalist conservatives (called "crunchy" for their devotion to granola). While Kunstler is not religious, many of the crunchy cons are Mel Gibson Catholics. See Rod Dreher at NRO: http://www.nationalreview.com/dreher/dreher101102.asp

[JRoth]

Actually, Easterbrook's piece is part of the newest strawman defense for W. It's asinine and insulting to suggest that critics of Bush think that his pre-9/11 failure was in not invading Afghanistan. Actually, those words are insufficient for the disgust I feel at Easterbrook's piece. He's trivializing the issue, making a mockery of the idea of accountability, not to mention the concept of reasoned response.

The appropriate response to the information that the Bush admin had before 9/11 was not unilateral invasion of Afghanistan. It was to take action - any action - to try to disrupt al Qaeda terror cells then known to be operating WITHIN the US. Dick Clarke himself said that invading Afghanistan, etc. (even had it been feasible), would not have prevented 9/11. But he also said that all-out internal action on the part of the US gov't could have.

But Easterbrook and other apologists don't want to respond to the second point, so they harp on the first, writing elaborate, cynical screeds knocking down strawmen that no one else has presented. It's sickening that this sort of crap is considered elevated discussion at a "serious" polictical magazine.

Everyone who reads the papers knows that the dots were there to be connected pre-9/11. Massaoui had been caught, and his laptop - with Atta's number in it - had been seized. When Colleen Rowley asked for a warrant to look at that laptop, her superiors said "no." (One of those superiors, incidentally, got an award from W in 2002 for a job well done) Do you think that if every day in August, 2001, George W Bush had pulled together all of the relevant Secretaries and demanded to know what info they had regarding "Bin Laden Determined to Attack in US," maybe Rowley gets that warrant? Do you think identifying the ringleader of 9/11 in August maybe goes some ways in preventing him from boarding an airplane under his own name in September?

To reference the original post, I should note that that scenario has no implications of omniscience or omnipotence. There's nothing in there to frighten the most ardent ACLU member. It's about following leads and having the right priorities at the top. In 2001, Bush's top priorities were Iraq and missile defense. He was wrong. He doesn't think he was wrong (witness last night's press conference). What more information do you need to have when you go into the voting booth in November?