This week, the U.S. launched a surprise airstrike inside the border of Pakistan, attempting to kill either the erstwhile Al-Qaeda #2, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, or the head of the Taliban, Mullah Mohammed Omar. At this point, all accounts indicate that the U.S. acted on bad intelligence, the result being that 18 innocent people--including women and children--were killed.

During the Clinton presidency, something simliar was tried--an airstrike in Afghanistan which was an attempt to kill Osama bin Laden. That also failed, and Clinton was ridiculed and scorned (and still is, to this day) by both the Republicans in Congress and by the media.

Watch carefully, and compare the way Republicans and the media react to this new situation.

For a little perspective, here are President Clinton's own words about his failed strike:

Now, I had one other option. I could have bombed or sent more missiles in. As far as we knew he never went back to his training camp. So the only place bin Laden ever went that we knew was occasionally he went to Khandahar, where he always spent the night in a compound that had 200 women and children.

So I could have, on any given night, ordered an attack that I knew would kill 200 women and children that had less than a 50 percent chance of getting him.

Now, after he murdered 3,100 of our people and others who came to our country seeking their livelihood, you may say, 'Well, Mr. President, you should have killed those 200 women and children.'

But at the time, we didn't think he had the capacity to do that. And no one thought that I should do that. Although I take full responsibility for it.

Do you feel safer and more content knowing that we currently have a president without such hesitations (see the at least 30,000 civilians killed in Iraq)?

Labels: Politics