An article at Frontpage Magazine makes the case.

Many on the left, always fond of making moral equivalence “arguments”, wish to compare the limited coercive interrogation of terrorists like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to the brutal torture of political dissidents by totalitarian regimes such as that of Saddam Hussein or the old Soviet Union. (Here is a prime example) But this is foolishness. These are no more equivalent than the imprisonment of convicted criminals is equivalent to the imprisonment of political dissidents. Context is everything.

Does this mean we should go around cavalierly waterboarding every person we capture in Iraq or Afghanistan, at the slightest suspicion they might be allied with our enemies? No, of course not. But when we are dealing with a known terrorist (the prime example being Khalid Sheikh Mohammed) who we have strong reason to believe has information that will save lives, perhaps thousands of lives?

Pouring water on a terrorist’s face for a minute or two, versus thousands of innocent civilians dead – seems to us like the ethics are pretty straightforward in that type of circumstance.

If the pacifist, defeatist Left has a counter argument, they should stop the vapid moral preening and make it.

Ayman al-Zawahri – BDS* sufferer:

Al-Qaida No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri condemned President Bush in a video statement released Friday, calling him a failure and a liar. “Why don’t you tell them how many million citizens of America and its allies you intend to kill in search of the imaginary victory and in breathless pursuit of the mirage towards which you are driving your people’s sons in order increase your profits?” al-Zawahri said in a portion of the video released by the Virginia-based IntelCenter.

Next thing you know he’ll start a diary at The Daily Kos.

Via Michelle Malkin, we get this from filmmaker and conspiracy theorist Oliver Stone:

Filmmaker Oliver Stone blasted President George W. Bush Thursday, saying he has “set America back 10 years.”

But ten years ago was 1996, in the Golden Age (according to Democrats) of the Clinton administration – the economy was booming, we were at peace, the “world community” loved America – all was right with the world, right? Is Stone insulting Bush, or Clinton? Who dies he think he is, Chris Wallace? He might want to think harder before he tries to hurl any more insults.

Here is an excerpt of the NY Times‘ hysterical editorial on the legislation passed by the House yesterday dealing with terrorist detainees:

Here’s what happens when this irresponsible Congress railroads a profoundly important bill to serve the mindless politics of a midterm election: The Bush administration uses Republicans’ fear of losing their majority to push through ghastly ideas about antiterrorism that will make American troops less safe and do lasting damage to our 217-year-old nation of laws – while actually doing nothing to protect the nation from terrorists. Democrats betray their principles to avoid last-minute attack ads. Our democracy is the big loser.

….

Last week, the White House and three Republican senators announced a terrible deal on this legislation that gave Mr. Bush most of what he wanted, including a blanket waiver for crimes Americans may have committed in the service of his antiterrorism policies. Then Vice President Dick Cheney and his willing lawmakers rewrote the rest of the measure so that it would give Mr. Bush the power to jail pretty much anyone he wants for as long as he wants without charging them, to unilaterally reinterpret the Geneva Conventions, to authorize what normal people consider torture, and to deny justice to hundreds of men captured in error.

First, how does the Times editorial board know that any of the remaining detainees were “captured in error”? (Hundreds have been released already, after receiving hearings, a point the Times ignores.) They provide no basis for their assertions.

Second, note that “normal people” agree with the Times editors, and presumably “abnormal people” are those who agree with the president and a majority of the members of Congress. How open-minded.

Seemingly, according to the Times and their fellow Democrats, we must give foreign enemy combatants and terrorists the same rights as American citizens, or we’re barbarians and totalitarians – there is no middle ground at all. That seems to be the position of those on the left. Lay one finger on the likes of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and it’s “torture.” Deny any legal protection granted to citizens of the U.S., and it’s “un-American”, an affront to the Constitution. (How dare they question our patriotism!)

Also notice it’s always those nasty Republicans who are engaging in politics (Imagine! politicians engaging in politics!); Democrats, including the Democrats who write editorials for the Times, never engage in politics. Right.

Others:
The Washington Post, also not a bastion of conservative thought, reports on the legislation here.

So no surprise, the NY Times cherry-picked the intel they received via leak from the CIA to present the public with the most anti-war/anti-Bush slant they could manage.

The actual NIE, partially declassified today by the Bush administration, does not support the “Iraq made terrorism worse” spin from the Times and in fact can be read to discredit the Democrats’ preferred strategy of retreat and defeat in Iraq.

The key excerpts:

Greater pluralism and more responsive political systems in Muslim majority nations would alleviate some of the grievances jihadists exploit. Over time, such progress, together with sustained, multifaceted programs targeting the vulnerabilities of the jihadist movement and continued pressure on al-Qa’ida, could erode support for the jihadists.

This is the key to President Bush’s strategy of democratization in Iraq and the region. Will it work? That is up to the people of the region. We are giving them an opportunity for something better, not a guarantee.

We assess that the Iraq jihad is shaping a new generation of terrorist leaders and operatives; perceived jihadist success there would inspire more fighters to continue the struggle elsewhere.

If we do what the Democrats want – cut and run – the jihadists will perceive it as a victory, inspiring them to continue the “struggle”.

The Iraq conflict has become the “cause celebre” for jihadists, breeding a deep resentment of US involvement in the Muslim world and cultivating supporters for the global jihadist movement. Should jihadists leaving Iraq perceive themselves, and be perceived, to have failed, we judge fewer fighters will be inspired to carry on the fight.

If, on the other hand, we do not do what the NY Times and the Democrats (somewhat redundant, we know) want, if we defeat the jihadists in Iraq and Afghanistan, fewer will be inspired to continue their terrorism.

So contrary to the NY Times original spin on the story, the NIE seems to suggest that following the path preferred by the Democrats will lead to a greater threat from Islamist terrorism.

Previous:
WaPo: Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Hurting U.S. Terror Fight

In a related note, good old AP “reporter” Jennifer Loven engages in some more opinion journalism trying to pass for a news report.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice responds to Bill Clinton’s attack on the Bush administration on Fox News Sunday:

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday accused Bill Clinton of making “flatly false” claims that the Bush administration didn’t lift a finger to stop terrorism before the 9/11 attacks.

Rice hammered Clinton, who leveled his charges in a contentious weekend interview with Chris Wallace of Fox News Channel, for his claims that the Bush administration “did not try” to kill Osama bin Laden in the eight months they controlled the White House before the Sept. 11 attacks.

“The notion somehow for eight months the Bush administration sat there and didn’t do that is just flatly false – and I think the 9/11 commission understood that,” Rice said during a wide-ranging meeting with Post editors and reporters.

“What we did in the eight months was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton administration did in the preceding years,” Rice added.

We don’t want to wade back into that whole debate yet again, so We Report, You Decide.

Previous:
Bill Clinton goes wild on FOX

The Washington Post reports on a new National Intelligence Estimate (which apparently comes as a result of yet another leak of classified material from the intelligence commmunity), that offers a grim assessment of the state of the war on terror today and the effect of the war in Iraq on the broader war on terror:

The war in Iraq has become a primary recruitment vehicle for violent Islamic extremists, motivating a new generation of potential terrorists around the world whose numbers may be increasing faster than the United States and its allies can reduce the threat, U.S. intelligence analysts have concluded.

A 30-page National Intelligence Estimate completed in April cites the “centrality” of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and the insurgency that has followed, as the leading inspiration for new Islamic extremist networks and cells that are united by little more than an anti-Western agenda. It concludes that, rather than contributing to eventual victory in the global counterterrorism struggle, the situation in Iraq has worsened the U.S. position, according to officials familiar with the classified document.

First, isn’t it interesting how the president’s critics take as Gospel Truth any assessments from the intelligence community that they believe reflect negatively on the Bush administration, given that this is the same intel community that told us before the invasion that there were WMD in Iraq?

But this NIE assessment is really not a surprise at all. Of course confronting the terrorists is going to stir them up and make them fight back harder. The fight against Japan was harder after we responded to the Pearl Harbor attack too. Like trying to get rid of a hornets’ nest is likely to result in some stings, it’s a given that confronting the jihadists is going to result in some blowback.

The question isn’t whether there is an increase in the terrorist threat in the short term; we always expected that. What matters is whether we can change the dynamic in the Middle East to lessen the terrorist threat long term. The jury is still out on that question. But we know the old way of responding to individual terrorist attacks as crimes, but never confronting the broader threat head-on, was a failure; terrorist threats occurred regularly throughout the 1980s and 1990s.

So President Bush decided to confront that broader threat, to try to defeat Islamo-fascism once and for all. As the administration has argued repeatedly and consistently, this is a war that will take many years. The expected uptick in terrorist activity in response to our fighting back is not necessarily a foreshadowing of the ultimate outcome of the war.

More:
A good analysis from Ed Morrissey

And another from Rick Moran:

I am not disputing the conclusions in this leaked report. I am resisting the implications that some would draw from it; that if only we had not confronted the jihadists or worked to solve the root causes of terrorism, none of this would be true today.

I totally reject that notion. In fact, I believe it delusional thinking to say that we’d be any safer if we hadn’t invaded Iraq or if we had just lobbed a few cruise missiles at Osama Bin Laden following 9/11, or even if we had put enormous pressure on Israel to come to an agreement with the Palestinians. All of this ignores the one overarching truth about the nature of our enemies (and their tens of millions of supporters around the world); what they seek, we cannot give them.

UPDATE: Unsurprisingly, the Democrats have decided to use the report as another opportunity to play politics:

Dems use intel report to attack GOP

“Democrats on Sunday seized on an intelligence assessment that said the Iraq war has increased the terrorist threat, saying it was further evidence that Americans should choose new leadership in the November elections.”

It would do little good at this point to rehash the Clinton record on terrorism, especially given the almost impossible task of avoiding the introduction of hindsight into the analysis. Let’s just say the record is mixed.

Overall, Mr. Clinton made a good case this morning on Fox News Sunday defending his record responding to terrorism in the 1990s. He admitted he didn’t do enough, as the failure to get bin Ladin demonstrated. But no one had the view of the terrorist threat in the middle of the 1990s that we all have today, after 9/11.

Judging events then based on what we know today is unfair. It’s unfair to judge Clinton that way, just as it’s unfair to judge President Bush’s actions in his first 8 months in office based on what we know today, or to judge the invasion of Iraq based on what we know today. But that’s exactly what the slanderous “Bush lied us into war” crowd does every day.

Mr. Clinton really undermined his case in a couple of ways. First with the “they [the Bush administration] had 8 months” line. The obvious response to that is “you had 8 years, not 8 months.” That comparison is an obvious loser for Clinton.

Second, he made his temper tantrum and crazed conspiracy mongering the story, rather than the defense of his record. He bizarrely admitted the question was legitimate, but then went on to attack the questioner because he works for FOX News. That’s a line that will play well on the BDS-suffering* Angry Adolescent Left blogs [Link warning: left-wing blogs often contain material unsuitable for children or civilized adults], but not among normal Americans. Mr. Clinton would have defended himself much more effectively by simply answering the question without the red-faced conspiracy-theorizing and ad hominem.

More:
HotAir has video
Mark Levin has another view at NRO
Michelle Malkin has a roundup: “He doth protest too much”

And a rebuttal from Byron York at NRO:

“…in his interview with Fox News’ Chris Wallace, the former president based nearly his entire defense on one source: Against All Enemies: Inside America’s War on Terror, the book by former White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke. “All I’m asking is if anybody wants to say I didn’t do enough, you read Richard Clarke’s book,” Clinton said at one point in the interview. “All you have to do is read Richard Clarke’s book to look at what we did in a comprehensive systematic way to try to protect the country against terror,” he said at another. “All you have to do is read Richard Clarke’s findings and you know it’s not true,” he said at yet another point. In all, Clinton mentioned Clarke’s name 11 times during the Fox interview.”

But Clarke’s book does not, in fact, support Clinton’s claim.

….

“…the bottom line is that Bill Clinton, the commander-in-chief, could not find the will to order the military into action against al Qaeda, and Bill Clinton, the head of the executive branch, could not find the will to order the CIA and FBI to act. No matter what the former president says on Fox, or anywhere else, that is his legacy in the war on terror.”

UPDATE: Patterico fact-checks Clinton and ThinkProgress, and rather unsurprisingly finds them playing fast and loose with the truth. Good catch.

Whenever a conservative mentions his religious faith, or gives any hint that his public policy positions are in any way informed by his personal values, he is likely to be accused of being a theocrat by someone on the left.

But as we’ve noted many times before, those who make the theocracy charge tend to be quite selective in their opposition to mixing politics and religion. They aren’t really against mixing politics and religion, they’re against conservative values, and want to impose left-wing values as free from opposition as possible. The “theocrat” charge is merely a means to that end.

From The Washington Post today:

Kerry Talks of Loss, Renewal of His Catholic Faith

In a speech he said he wishes he had given before the 2004 presidential election, Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) yesterday described his religious life in greater candor and detail than ever before.

….

Kerry is the third high-profile Democrat to give a reflective, deeply personal speech on religion and politics in recent weeks, following Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) and Robert P. Casey Jr., the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania.

….

The addresses fit into a broader effort by liberal religious groups and Democratic candidates to appeal to religiously motivated voters in November’s midterm elections. A pair of opposing events in Washington this week neatly encapsulates the battle.

Yesterday, a new group called Red Letter Christians, named for the colored type that highlights the words of Jesus in popular editions of the Bible, called for Christians to “vote their values” by considering the war in Iraq, torture, environmental degradation and helping the poor to be vital religious issues.

“We believe in a Jesus who said ‘Blessed are the peacemakers,’ ” said the Rev. Tony Campolo, a founder of the group, which says it is forming a grass-roots network of 7,000 clergy members.

….

“For 12 years I wandered in the wilderness, went through a divorce and struggled with questions about my direction. Then suddenly and movingly, I had a revelation about the connection between the work I was doing as a public servant and my formative teachings,” [Senator Kerry] said.

While it’s debatable whether Jesus or any other “peace-maker” would want to see the Taliban or Saddam Hussein back in power, what’s interesting here is that these liberal groups and Democratic politicians feel that it is perfectly legitimate to tie their left-wing values to their religious beliefs, while at the same time so many on the left decry any mention of religious values in a political context by conservatives.

Again, they aren’t against religion in politics, they’re against conservatives in politics.

At least he didn’t call us “only evil and inhuman”. Chavez insults (Video), Americans remain calm:

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez took his verbal battle with the United States to the floor of the U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday, calling President Bush “the devil.”

The impassioned speech by the leftist leader came a day after Bush and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sparred over Tehran’s disputed nuclear program but managed to avoid a personal encounter.

“The devil came here yesterday,” Chavez said, referring to Bush’s address on Tuesday and making the sign of the cross. “He came here talking as if he were the owner of the world.”

The leftist leader, who has joined Iran and Cuba in opposing U.S. influence, accused Washington of “domination, exploitation and pillage of peoples of the world.”

“We appeal to the people of the United States and the world to halt this threat, which is like a sword hanging over our head,” he said.

In response to Chavez’s insults, Americans did not riot. Americans did not burn Chavez in effigy. Americans did not call for his murder. Americans did not burn the flag of Venezuela.

Americans will likely react with the same consistent lack of violence when Madonna next insults America’s Christians.

More:
A related dose of optimism from blogger The Anchoress

Christopher Hitchens: Saddam’s Man in Niger

To summarize: The Senate report gives two versions of Zahawie’s name without ever once mentioning his significant background. It takes at face value his absurd claim about the supposedly innocent motive for his out-of-the-way trip. It accepts similarly bland assurances made by the government of Niger. It is unaware of the appearance of A.Q. Khan in the narrative. It does not canvass the views of our allies, or of tried-and-tested experts like Ambassador Ekeus. It offers little evidence and no argument in support of its conclusions. It is a minor disgrace, but a disgrace nevertheless.

Stephen F. Hayes: How Bad Is the Senate Intelligence Report? Very Bad

According to a report released September 8 by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Saddam Hussein “was resistant to cooperating with al Qaeda or any other Islamist groups.” It’s an odd claim. Saddam Hussein’s regime has a long and well-documented history of cooperating with Islamists, including al Qaeda and its affiliates.

….

The mainstream press has treated the Senate report as the definitive word on Iraqi links to al Qaeda. It is not. It is worth remembering that while critics of the Bush administration have long since decided that there was no relationship at all between the Iraqi regime and al Qaeda, there are many observers who continue to hold a different view. If these individuals disagree on the extent of the relationship and its meaning, they agree that there was one.

There are a lot of “reporters” in the MSM who in reality are doing no reporting, they merely regurgitate the conventional liberal (anti-Bush) line on Iraq, and ignore any evidence that doesn’t fit.

Is there not one professional journalist at ABC, NBC, CBS, The NY Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, et al, who is willing to address the questions raised by Hayes and Hitchens? Are they content merely to play make-believe toughguy reporter like David Gregory in the White House press room, and regurgitate reports from the Senate essentially verbatim, take their conclusions as definitive, ask no questions, and do no investigation?

There are but two possibilities – the MSM is grossly incompetent, being unable to fulfill the most basic requirements of their job, or they are openly and purposely placing a political agenda above the pursuit of the truth.

The Washington Post has a grossly disingenuous editorial today, titled “A Defining Moment for America” The subhead: “The president goes to Capitol Hill to lobby for torture.”

PRESIDENT BUSH rarely visits Congress. So it was a measure of his painfully skewed priorities that Mr. Bush made the unaccustomed trip yesterday to seek legislative permission for the CIA to make people disappear into secret prisons and have information extracted from them by means he dare not describe publicly.

Of course, Mr. Bush didn’t come out and say he’s lobbying for torture…

Of course he didn’t, because then he would be lying just like the Washington Post editorial board is.

The delicate flowers on the Post editorial board may believe that forcing terrorists to listen to The Red Hot Chili Peppers or putting them in a cold room are “torture”, but that is their opinion, not a matter of fact or definition. The president does not believe those types of things are torture. Many people do not believe those types of things are torture. The Post’s editors are being disingenuous about what the president is advocating. Their readers deserve a serious analysis of this very important issue, not hysterics and hyperbole.

The president is not lobbying for torture. There are some interrogation techniques that equate to torture, there are other interrogation methods that, while perhaps more aggressive than the editors of the Post would like, do not equate to torture. The president is asking congress to define what is legal under Article III of the Geneva Conventions, which is imprecise about what is and is not allowed.

And how it is a “painfully skewed priority” for the president to work with congress to define the acceptable methods to extract vital information from people like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is a mystery. They may vehemently disagree with President Bush’s conclusions on the issue, but to suggest the issue isn’t of great importance, that it shouldn’t be a high priority, makes no sense at all.