{"id":165,"date":"2004-03-24T06:39:04","date_gmt":"2004-03-24T11:39:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vmalt\/?p=165"},"modified":"2005-12-30T19:19:15","modified_gmt":"2005-12-31T00:19:15","slug":"revisionist-memories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/revisionist-memories","title":{"rendered":"Revisionist Memories"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 9\/11 commission is in full witch-hunt mode, blaming Clinton for not (illegally) assassinating Bin Laden and blaming Bush for not preemptively invading Afghanistan.<\/p>\n

The commission members and their staff seem to have forgotten the administration-crippling effects of Clinton’s philandering. Thanks to his inability to keep his cock in his pants, years of his administration were paralyzed, and his every action was second-guessed to an unimaginable degree.<\/p>\n

Remember when, just before the House voted to impeach, he launched a cruise missile strike? That, we were told at the time, was an instance of Wag the Dog<\/em><\/a> syndrome. Now the debate seems to avoid any mention of the effects of blowjobgate on the presidency. (By the way, that attack involved a launch of 200 cruise missiles on Iraq, which had recently kicked out UN weapons inspectors who were trying to ascertain the status of Hussein’s WMD. The shooting war with Iraq was going on long before Bush came into office.) Why, check out this report<\/a> on the hearings, which discusses Clinton’s actions and inactions from 1998 on, and do a word search for “impeachment”, “Monica”, or “blowjob in the oval office”, and you’ll come up blank. The entire episode has been elided because, I suppose, it’s too sordid. Sorta like Lacuna, Inc.<\/a><\/p>\n

After the bombing of the Cole and the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania (and the truck bombing of the WTC in 1993), the consensus seemed to be that Bin Laden’s targets were military or overseas. Bush, it’s now implied, should’ve foreseen a massively destructive attack on American soil, and preemptively invaded Afghanistan to uproot Al Qaeda and the Taliban. A few months after the most contested election since 1876. With the backing of no foreign power. With a secretary of defense who was hated by the military establishment and was being touted as “first to get fired” in the weeks before 9\/11.<\/p>\n

Both administrations made tons of mistakes, but think back to 9\/10\/2001, and remember who you were then, and let me know if you honestly thought that anything like the next day was possible. It was so far outside the world we knew that I don’t blame anyone for not predicting it and acting on it. Even the Israelis didn’t have to deal with attacks like that day.<\/p>\n

Just venting, sorry. This sort of revisionist history really irks me. I mean, it’s just like when I read a Mitch Lawrence column on the NBA and can see that he’s got his facts wrong. It shouldn’t be my job to catch this stuff!<\/em><\/p>\n

Update: Gregg Easterbrook writes about this<\/a> so much better than I do!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The 9\/11 commission is in full witch-hunt mode, blaming Clinton for not (illegally) assassinating Bin Laden and blaming Bush for not preemptively invading Afghanistan. The commission members and their staff seem to have forgotten the administration-crippling effects of Clinton’s philandering. Thanks to his inability to keep his cock in his pants, years of his administration … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Revisionist Memories”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-165","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4C7K-2F","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1082,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/murder-he-wrote","url_meta":{"origin":165,"position":0},"title":"Murder, he wrote","author":"Gil","date":"August 16, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"In Page 6 today, there's an item about the believability of Tom Cruise's heroic exploits: The wacky superstar and fianc\u00c3\u0192\u00c2\u00a9e Katie Holmes were widely reported to have pulled over when they saw an accident on L.A.'s 101 freeway last Saturday, and waited with motorist Jon Henningsen and his wife until\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":169,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/we-could-put-on-a-seminar","url_meta":{"origin":165,"position":1},"title":"We could put on a seminar!","author":"Gil","date":"March 22, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Andrew Sullivan discusses Europe's response to 3\/11, and tears appeasement a new hole.[The Islamist war] existed and grew in strength and potency throughout the 1990s. it draws its roots from the Egyptian Brotherhood in the 1970s and 1980s. 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