http://www.ceip.org/people/kagsta10.htm

It was a plan that Clinton lacked spine to carry out himself. Presidents have two choices on what to do during their second terms, since re-election isn't a worry they can stand around playing pocket pool and worrying about how history will judge them, selling the occasional pardon to augment the retirment fund (The Clinton Plan) or they can change the world for the better by leaving no doubt how history will judge them, not that success is guaranteed but history will someday note that they had the guts to try (Reagan plan/Bush plan). All it takes to go down as one of the best presidents of all time is the will power to withstand being called the worst president of all time while you are in office.

BULLWINKLE: Speaking of Clinton's spine I believe that Clinton was such a coward that the real reason he didn't kill Osama bin Laden when he could've (all three times) was that he was afraid of retaliation from him. A foiled plot by OBL to kill Clinton in the mid 90's was known to him, as was Saddam's attempt to kill Bush '41. Apparently this was enough to scare Bill into submission and keep him from doing anything (besides bombing an empty aspirin factory at night killing one of the cleaning staff) to kill OBL even after he attacked us FIVE TIMES killing dozens and dozens before 911. We shall all be paying for Clinton's crimes, incompetance and cowardice for decades to come.

Its funny when the people spontaneously show up to protest in the Middle East, American flags aren't burned but waved.

And it looks like by a fairly decent chick.

It's always freaky to read someone's words and see your own thoughts expressed almost exactly. Ace, you are right on with the "Plan B" theory. Taking it a step further, without the introduction of freedom into the region, it was inevitable that some terrorist group, with the assistance of an Arab government, would get a nuke and destroy an American city (it may still be). In which case the American reaction would, IMHO, be to commit genocide. I don't know about you, but I heard a lot of the "nuke em all" talk after 9/11, and it didn't strike me as that batty.. Bush's strategy heads off that terrible possibility.

Ace--

Fantastic analysis, and I'm not just saying that because I'm full of Gannonlove for you.

You make what's long been a primary point of mine: the war against Iraq, while important (and necessary) because it was about Iraq, was also important because of the potential implications in the region.

My bosses made the point all the time, to anyone willing to listen. Rummy and the Wolf and everyone on down said, "This might work, it might not. But it's worth a gamble, because if we do nothing like we've always done, we've guaranteed failure."

Gamble? Yes. Irresponsible gamble? After 9/11, what was the alternative? Let them continue to fester and seethe until they get WMD?

That's the long-term vision the Left and the MSM never understood. Even if Saddam could've been contained, the evil regime he, his sons, or whoever followed in his wake led would likely continue to pursue weapons to kill Americans. It's not the gun, stupid; it's the muderer holding the gun.

Likewise, the same philosophy applies across the entire Middle East. Kerry et al. liked to talk about how important it was to secure nuclear materials, as if that would be the only thing we could do to keep us safe. While necessary, it's just as important to neutralize the people (and ideologies that breed those people) that would use WMD against us. Hence, "drain the swamps."

We will never put the WMD genies back in the bottle. For this reason alone, the pessimist in me warns that a major WMD attack-- and possible loss of an American city-- are all but inevitable once you chart the line out far enough.

But the only rational approach in this situation is not WMD control but "enemy control." France can have nuclear weapons because, while pricks, they're only pricks, and not enemies. Likewise, Israeli nukes don't cause me to lose sleep at night, even though they give the vapors to the folks over at the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists.

If we can render the Islamosphere into BENELUX, then we will have much less to fear from them in the long-run, even if they get WMD.

This may not work, or even if this does work, we may not be safer for it. But the Clintonian status quo-- boilerplate and blowjobs-- wasn't going to change a damn thing.

Fingers crossed,
Dave at Garfield Ridge

Of course if a present-day Iraqi thinks "George Bush is going to do to Iraq what the Americans did to Germany", and then sees what a panty-waist excuse for a country Germany has now become, he may have second thoughts on this freedom thing.

Sounds like the left misled themselves.