God damn Dick Cheney's shit-filled soul to hell.

They must be pretty annoyed that Obama is taking away the number one rhetorical cudgel that they've been using to bash Democrats for the past eight years. They can't call him weak on terrorism when his record is already better than theirs, but at the same time they can't acknowledge his successes without implicitly admitting that they've been full of shit this whole time.

What an awkward position to be in. And it couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of people. (Terrorism is so last year anyway. Everyone knows the real threat to the nation now is czars.)

It seems a childish game to pretend that it is the president's job to "keep us safe" but the fact is that if Cheney thought that was his and Bush's job, Obama has "kept us safe" a month longer than Cheney/Bush managed.

It always sounds too 'helicopter parent' to me. Something that is bad if a parent does it but good if the president does it.
Authoritarian asshatery in my opinion.

"If Bush/Cheney had put together the kind of successful counter-terrorism record we've seen over the last nine months, I suspect ..."

we wouldn't have suffered 9/11

The Wars are still a mess, but Obama's deft yet tough successful handling of the pirate stand-off (let's all remember that, and remind his critics!) showed something and left critics looking flabby then.

yeah, but what does Liz think?

Yeah, but then we wouldn't have as much glee watching Darth and Company hand wrangling in their hard wooden seats at the Hague. What fun.

We DID all get killed in a terrorist attack! The media's just covering it up!

For those who would mock the President's winning the Nobel Prize it might be noted that he is further into his presidency without a domestic terrorist attack than the last two American presidents, while talking to N. Korea and Iran, while (slowly) emptying Gitmo, without torture, without starting a war, without committing American troops to a new battlefield, while drawing down the number of troops in Iraq, and he is doing all of this while still trying to improve our economy and our health care system. By this time in the GWB presidency we'd already been attacked on 9/11 and Bush had already started to burn though international good will - and he had inherited a more stable economy.

Sometimes I think we are so focused on the arguments over health care and birth certificates that we have missed just how much this president has done for our position in the world and how much the rest of the world appreciates it.

"God damn Dick Cheney's shit-filled soul to hell." -- neill at 1:39 PM

Amen.

Not to mention, Justin Q, GWB had already had his first month long vacation. preznittin' is hard, its hard work!

I wish the Dem side was doing a little more of that myself. Yes it stokes fear mongering but the point is these guys were caught, and let's face it, it'll be generation before the American populace can get past the fear-mongering. Might as well get some use out of it.

Cheney's silent because his black heart finally gave out two weeks ago. The three people on earth who are sad about it forgot to inform the rest of us of his death. The two Labadors can't talk.

Yeah--good point. Where are they?

They're waiting till we do get attacked, which is highly likely, given the level of extremist groups that have been allowed to proliferate at alarming levels both here and abroad all the while we took our eye off the ball for the last eight years.

The next time you feel compelled to write another post like this,DON'T! It is early, there are still lots of crazies that would love to prove you wrong and one slip is all it takes. I am treating this like a no-hitter in progress.

Cheney has made no public comment about the killing of any of these militant leaders and operatives. Nor have Cantor, Steele, or any other Republican leader. Nor have Glenn Beck or Rush Limbaugh.

I know I'm going out on a limb here, but bear with me for a moment. Just throwin' this out there, spit-ballin' as it were. Could it be maybe, just maybe, that all along these guys didn't really care about the US or national security but simply wanted to score cheap political points and justify their past criminal behavior? Nah, couldn't be.

If Bush/Cheney had put together the kind of successful counter-terrorism record we've seen over the last nine months

C'mon, Steve. Bush/Cheney did put Al-Qaeda on the ropes, leaving Bin Laden holed up in a cave. Bush/Cheney also lassoed the whole Al-Qaeda cell responsible for planning and facilitating 9/11.

Bush's Patriot Act, a subject of scorn around these parts, is still being used today, and was used when the Zazi arrests when down.

Bush also led the charge to implement changes in banking laws, allowing the U.S. to "follow the money" when it comes to terrorism. Bush's anti-terrorism money program has severely hampered Al-Qaeda's ability to raise money and to use it as well.

Under Bush, the DoD turned the Predator recon drone into a powerful tool to take out terrorists where missiles and soldiers can't.

Of course, if these programs didn't worked, then I'd think we would have seen Obama end them by now. I guess proof is in the pudding.

Bush/Cheney did put Al-Qaeda on the ropes, leaving Bin Laden holed up in a cave.

Umm, he was holed up in a cave before the attack. So, uh, what did we do exactly? Leave him holed up in a different cave? And this is a win how?

Bush/Cheney also lassoed the whole Al-Qaeda cell responsible for planning and facilitating 9/11.

Really? When did we "lasso" Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri? I must have missed that....

Police work only SEEMS to work to make us safer. It's occupations of other countries that cannot harm the United States that REALLY works.

Maybe you should ask the bookers for every single Sunday morning show that President Cheney and Vice President Cheney (take your pick which one is which) appeared on to say we were all gonna die when they're going to book them again and ask them what they think now. That should get a rousing response.

God damn Dick Cheney's shit-filled soul to hell. - neill

Admit it neill, you have a keyboard shortcut for that sentence to come in first in the comment section.

While Obama's record on this has been strong, I am worried that it doesn't matter to these folks. The torture regime isn't predicated on results, torture is self justifying - an end in itself. So there is nothing in the real world to stop the true believers continuing to maintain that Obama is weak on terrorism - and for it to be held a majority view among 35% of the population.

Part of the answer may be that Cheney had surgery of some kind recently. He may be having a slow recovery.

He may be having a slow recovery.

And deeply painful, I hope. Here, Mr. Vice President, let me get you another pillow...oh, sorry! Did I jiggle your incision?

Dick "I really fucked up so you can now call me an expert" Cheney

Great post Steve! (and David)

Bad assumption. Bush and cronies never wanted to capture any Taliban or Al-Qaeda members as that would put an end to the scare. No scare, no dollars to the war boys.

These terrorism successes are due to policies, practices and personnel put in place by Bush and Cheney.

The FBI started tracking Najibullah Zazi before Obama was even inaugurated.

Obama needs some smarter groupies.

The FBI started tracking Najibullah Zazi before Obama was even inaugurated.

Proof?

While finding it - which would be an official announcement from an FBI official - try determining how the FBI found out about Zazi in the first place.

How can American society tolerate 39,252 deaths associated with automobile collisions in 2005, or 438,000 smoking related deaths in 2008, both instances where we "killed ourselves," and yet devote more resources and political energy to fighting terrorists, who have killed far fewer US citizens? There is a reason which reflects much about us.