There is a disturbing and growing trend among some conservative commentators to claim that there were no terrorist attacks under President George Bush's term. Last November on Fox News' Hannity former Bush Press Secretary Dana Perino suggested the President Obama was playing politics and demanded that the Fort Hood shootings be considered a terrorist attack. She continued by saying "We did not have a terrorist attack on our country during President Bush's term."
On December 28th, conservative commentator and former White House aid to Dick Cheney Mary Matalin claimed the Bush Administration had "inherited the most tragic attack on our own soil in our nation's history."
On Good Morning America earlier in January, former New York mayor Ruddy Giuliani said "We had no domestic attacks under Bush, we've had one under Obama."
To make matters significantly worse, not once did it occur to Fox's Sean Hannity, ABC's George Stephanopoulos, or CNN's John King to stop their line of scripted questions to ask these commentators to clarify their remarks.
How can any American not stop to say, "wait, did you really just say that?" Seriously, are you so incompetent that you'll simply let any pundit spout off ridiculous claims without any fear of retribution?
(Okay, I guess that question is a little naive)
Each pundit has since in their own way rebuked their statements, seeking to qualify them by claiming they "obviously meant during Bush's second term," or only mean an "Islamic terrorist attack since 9/11."So, according to these individuals, after 9/11 there were no domestic terrorist attacks against the U.S.? Let me take this moment to remind them of:
- the 2001 Anthrax attacks against against politicians and media officials, killing five including federal postal employees
- the 2001 Shoe Bombing plot by Richard Reid
- the 2002 Mailbox Pipe Bomber Lucas John Helder
- the 2002 LAX shooting by Egyptian national Hesham Mohamed Hadayet
- the 2002 Beltway Sniper attacks by John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo resulting in 16 deaths across the country
- the 2003 foiled plot by Iyman Faris to aid Al Qaeda by bringing down the Brooklyn Bridge
- the 2005 foiled LAX bombing plot
- the 2006 attack on at UNC-Chapel Hill by Mohammed Reza Teheri-azar to "avenge the deaths or murders of Muslims around the world."
- the 2008 nail-laden pipe bombs that were exploded at a Federal Courthouse in San Diego
- the 2008 infiltration of White House computer archives by Chinese intelligence hackers
The fact of the matter is that the true reality of terrorism is far from the popular paradigm. I must say, I'm utterly confused on just what definition of terrorism the Cheney et. al. camp are going by. Perhaps we should amend the term "terrorism" to include "any attack that can be used by a Democrat or Republican for political gain or by the media to proselytize fear."
The "Bush kept us safe" slogan is a farce. Period. This is not to say that Bush's attempts to keep Americans safe were a failure- I believe President Bush did everything in his power to preserve our security. In fact, I think he did a bit too much. Nonetheless, you can't prevent every attack and the list above is a testament to that. So, instead of politicizing these attacks (which have continued through Obama's Presidency), lets dismiss this new emulation of ambulance chasing by ceasing to listen to distorted partisan rhetoric and instead seek to achieve the common goals every American can support- working together to preserve our own well being.


