"The idea of trying to cast blame on President Clinton is just wrong for many, many reasons, not the least of which is I don't think he deserves it...I don't think President Bush deserves it. The people who deserve blame for Sept. 11, I think we should remind ourselves, are the terrorists -the Islamic fanatics-who came here and killed us and want to come here again and do it."
The person who said this is talking about September 11, 2001 and is the one American politician that knows that dark day intimately...former New York Mayor Rudy Guliani.
There has been a lot of hullaballu over who is to blame for not stopping 9/11 with conservatives trying to tar President Clinton which gets liberals up in arms, and liberals (such as President Clinton) blaming President Bush (remember all the "My Pet Goat" stories?).
It's pretty pathetic that five years after this horrid event where 3000 people were killed in the space of 90 minutes conservatives and liberals are still trying to score political points about who is to blame. There is really only one person or group to blame: Osama bin Laden and his ilk. What's past is past. We can't change what happened. All we can do is try better in the future to prevent the fanatics from doing this again.
Guliani continues:
"Every American president I've known would have given his life to prevent an attack like that. That includes President Clinton, President Bush...they did the best they could with the information they had at the time."
I frankly don't give a rat's behind which president slipped. I think both Clinton and Bush could have done better and I also think they tried. But pinning blame on either does nothing to stop the terrorists from planning another 9/11.
I wish that more politicians would follow Guliani's example and stop using such a horrific event for political gain. The times are too important to be wasted on a pissing match.
Joe Gandleman has a worthwhile if somewhat biased piece on Guliani's run for the Republican presidential nomination.
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