Bush’s failing report card

The former 9/11 commission issued a report today straight up saying the Bush administration is failing in its efforts to combat terrorism.

It gave the government five failing grades of F -- including for failing to provide emergency communications and appropriate security funding -- 12 barely passing grades of D and nine mid-level grades of C. It received two "incompletes," and only one top grade, an A- in counter-terrorist financing.

Is this surprising to anyone? Bush and his cabal may think they have a successful plan in place, but it’s obvious there is some strategic flaw in their planning. And Dubya can invoke 9/11 all he wants, but even people in his own party are starting to see the light.

“I think we’ve too quickly forgotten the lesson of 9/11,” said Republican ex-commissioner and former Governor James Thompson, “And I think the odds are very good that we’re going to pay a terrible price for forgetting that lesson.”

Indeed. For example, the 9/11 commission recommended that control of WMDs be of utmost priority. But as I posted last month, you can’t control or prevent the proliferation of WMDs if you’re going to give yourself the option of using them to preempt a potential attack by another country. Duh.

Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) keeps it real:

Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York called the report a "top-to-bottom indictment" of the government's approach to fighting terrorism. "The report shows that while the administration and Congress are focused on fighting an offensive war in Iraq, they are dangerously neglecting the defensive war on terror we should be fighting here at home," he said in a statement.

I understand that we as a nation may not be able to return to the halcyon days of pre-9/11, but when we have incidents like the one we had on the Bay Bridge yesterday (which I had the wonderful privilege of sitting in, by the way), we show our citizens just how reactive - and ineffective - our nation’s policy on terrorism really is. I remember sitting in my car, on the bridge and feeling trapped. What if it *had* been a bomb and not a suitcase full of Christmas lights? 9/11 was four years ago, and really, has the U.S. made any progress in putting a stop to terrorism as Bush had promised? Hell no.

Unfortunately, there is no summer school course available to help Dubya get his administration's grades out of the toilet. This administration's tradition of short-sighted foreign policy is inherently flawed, and I guarantee we will be feeling the ripple effects of this quagmire for years to come.