http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/14/AR2007091402451.html?nav=rss_politics

Bob Woodward wrote the article

Doesn't surprise me. Bush's policies have been much more destructive to the free market while Clinton generally left things alone (relatively anyway).

i thought alan greenspan was some kind of outrageous failure, why would anyone quote him

Doesn't surprise me. Bush's policies have been much more destructive to the free market while Clinton generally left things alone (relatively anyway).
just so we're all on the same page, this "free market" stuff means more outsourcing and more chinese imports, right? i thought bush was for that stuff

Doesn't surprise me. Bush's policies have been much more destructive to the free market while Clinton generally left things alone (relatively anyway).

Just like he left Osama & Al-Qaeda alone.

Doesn't surprise me. Bush's policies have been much more destructive to the free market while Clinton generally left things alone (relatively anyway).
i thought alan greenspan was some kind of outrageous failure, why would anyone quote him
just so we're all on the same page, this "free market" stuff means more outsourcing and more chinese imports, right? i thought bush was for that stuff
Just like he left Osama & Al-Qaeda alone.
^ did anyone bother to read the article before commenting?

Greenspan clarified his "Iraq war was mainly about oil" statement. He believed there was concern in the Administration of the possibility of Saddam Hussein taking control of the Strait of Hormuz and cutting off most of the world's oil supply.

just so we're all on the same page, this "free market" stuff means more outsourcing and more chinese imports, right? i thought bush was for that stuff

Not as policy - and that is the difference. Bush has deliberately pursued this result as policy.

Just like he left Osama & Al-Qaeda alone.

Yup, and now Bush's war has incited the entire Muslim world against us and has sent over 5,000 American soldiers and tens of thousands of civilians to their death. Oh, and Al Qaeda and Osama are more powerful than they were before he took office.

on free speech radio they said something under 5000 americans and something OVER ONE MILLION iraqis had died because of the war. i could not restrain my mirth upon hearing these figures, even though they are probably false like everything on free speech radio news

i actually really want to read greenspans book

im taking an economics course next semester
i mean, i really should know this stuff

Yup, and now Bush's war has incited the entire Muslim world against us and has sent over 5,000 American soldiers and tens of thousands of civilians to their death. Oh, and Al Qaeda and Osama are more powerful than they were before he took office.

Oh, I agree, this misguided war has done nothin' but help "recruitment" of "martyrs" for Al-Qaeda. Not to mention Bush not taking too seriously that report he received days before 9/11 warning of an imminent Al-Qaeda attack in the United States. What I blame Clinton for during his Presidency and the failure to take down al-qaeda and Osama is his unwillingness to "get his hands dirty." Consider that for sometime years before 9/11 we had special forces in Afghanistan tracking this guy's every move, practically knowing where he was at all times. Rather than have these forces "take out" Osama or kidnap him, Clinton only went so far as to launch a couple failed cruise missile strikes from ships hundreds of miles away. Apparently some in the government, be they from the Justice or State Department, questioned the "legality" of killing/kidnapping him. And when Al-Qaeda operatives basically committed an act of war, the bombing of the USS Cole in 2000, aside from sending a team of FBI investigators to Yemen, he sat on his hands and did nothing, presumably concerned about the reaction of him starting a war with Al-Qaeda basically on his way out the door.

Of course the hypothetical question is whether the 9/11 attacks still would've been carried out if Osama had been eliminated months or years before 2001. It's tough to say, considering the eventual hijackers had been in the country for years prior to the attacks.

Fair enough. I have read the literature on Clinton's bungles and you accurately describe them. However, I see this current foreign policy of preemptive war as only making the problem worse.

Oh, I agree, this misguided war has done nothin' but help "recruitment" of "martyrs" for Al-Qaeda. Not to mention Bush not taking too seriously that report he received days before 9/11 warning of an imminent Al-Qaeda attack in the United States. What I blame Clinton for during his Presidency and the failure to take down al-qaeda and Osama is his unwillingness to "get his hands dirty." Consider that for sometime years before 9/11 we had special forces in Afghanistan tracking this guy's every move, practically knowing where he was at all times. Rather than have these forces "take out" Osama or kidnap him, Clinton only went so far as to launch a couple failed cruise missile strikes from ships hundreds of miles away. Apparently some in the government, be they from the Justice or State Department, questioned the "legality" of killing/kidnapping him. And when Al-Qaeda operatives basically committed an act of war, the bombing of the USS Cole in 2000, aside from sending a team of FBI investigators to Yemen, he sat on his hands and did nothing, presumably concerned about the reaction of him starting a war with Al-Qaeda basically on his way out the door.

Of course the hypothetical question is whether the 9/11 attacks still would've been carried out if Osama had been eliminated months or years before 2001. It's tough to say, considering the eventual hijackers had been in the country for years prior to the attacks.
have you read the 9/11 comission report? it illuminates a lot of the constraints we were under (internationally) in our pursuit of OBL.