This is complete bullshit.
President Bush uses September 11 as his personal political vehicle - a solemn anniversary that should only be about remembrance and respect. The media gives us a day filled with phony Bush photo-ops, capped by an offensive potently-political campaign speech. (Did any media personalities question why the president demands nationally televised 9/11 speeches only during election years?)
Democrats can't get a word in edgewise. It's all about Republicans fighting terrorism, all month long.
Did anyone even hear about the Democrats' Real Security Act of 2006, unveiled just days before September 11? Republicans should pay dearly if they vote down this crucial piece of legislation.
Media Matters is on the case.
More below...
On the
Today Show yesterday, Matt Lauer accused the Democrats of essentially having no position on the issue of terrorism:
On the September 14 edition of NBC's Today, co-host Matt Lauer asked why Democrats -- when faced with the argument that Republicans will "make you safer" -- "haven't come up with a better answer than, 'That's not a fair comment.' " But Lauer entirely ignored the fact that, a week earlier, Senate Democrats had unveiled the "Real Security Act of 2006," which Democratic aides described as "a detailed homeland security and anti-terrorism package ... that significantly expands the size of U.S. special forces units used to track and combat terrorists, while also establishing a comprehensive transportation security plan and implementing the remaining security recommendations of the 9/11 commission," according to Roll Call. Indeed, neither Lauer nor NBC's Nightly News has reported on the plan at all since the Democrats' September 7 announcement. Moreover, Lauer and Today previously ignored the national security platform released by the Democrats in March, as Media Matters for America noted.
The Real Security Act of 2006 is a pretty fucking good plan. It's exactly what we need NOW. We needed it yesterday. It offers detailed recommendations on all security issues facing the nation, including terrorism, homeland security, Iraq, energy independence, and the readiness of our military.
Here's the summary of just the Homeland Security section:
HOMELAND SECURITY
To Protect America from Terrorism and Natural Disasters, we will:
Immediately implement the recommendations of the independent, bipartisan 9/11 Commission including securing national borders, ports, airports and mass transit systems.
Screen 100 percent of containers and cargo bound for the U.S. in ships or airplanes at the point of origin and safeguard America's nuclear and chemical plants, and food and water supplies.
Prevent outsourcing of critical components of our national security infrastructure -- such as ports, airports and mass transit -- to foreign interests that put America at risk.
Provide firefighters, emergency medical workers, police officers, and other workers on the front lines with the training, staffing, equipment, and cutting edge technology they need.
Protect America from biological terrorism and pandemics, including the Avian flu, by investing in the public health infrastructure and training public health workers.
We need to get this into the mainstream media. At the very least, contact the Today Show (today@nbc.com) and express your outrage at Matt Lauer's cluelessness.
Meanwhile, our Homeland Security director is a complete and utter joke.
Michael Chertoff is seriously fucked up.
Do you know what he said? Here's what this incompetent loser said this week:
Congress and the American public must accept that the government cannot protect every possible target against attack if it wants to avoid fulfilling Al Qaeda's goal of bankrupting the nation, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told a Senate committee Tuesday.
and
"I put my daughter in my car," Mr. Chertoff told Mr. Lautenberg. "If I wanted my daughter to be 100 percent safe, I'd put a five-mile-an-hour speed limit cap on the car." But that is not an option, he added, "because that's more safety than we can afford."
Oh, but can't you at least do the bare minimum? Like maybe pick the top 5 or 10 most likely targets, and work on that? To date, you have done NOTHING, except for a few meaningless cosmetic changes at airports. And by the way, aren't the Iraq War and tax cuts for wealthy corporations bankrupting the country??
The New York Times gave him a good slapdown yesterday:
Michael Chertoff, the secretary of Homeland Security, seems determined to outdo his commander in chief in ratcheting up fears of Al Qaeda whenever he wants to score political points. This week, he raised the specter that if the government starts too many expensive antiterrorism programs it could further a plot by Osama bin Laden to "drive us crazy, into bankruptcy" through overspending on homeland defense.
It was particularly ironic that Mr. Chertoff spun this theory while he was fighting off a measure, up for a vote today, that would help protect our ports against the threat that he himself deems most worrisome -- a nuclear explosion within our borders -- without government spending.
When it comes to prioritizing our antiterrorism spending, it's hard to understand what Mr. Chertoff dislikes about a measure, introduced by Senator Charles Schumer, Democrat of New York, that would require that all cargo containers headed for the United States be scanned at foreign ports to search for a possible nuclear weapon.
Read the rest of the Times Editorial here. It's a gem.
We need to make sure that both the media and the public know that Democrats are the only party offering Real Security in 2006.