Reminds me of this incredible, jaw dropping post that appeared on Firedoglake in 2007 that posited a world with Al Gore as president. Needless to say, in this fantasy, Gore prevented 9/11 because…well. he’s Al Gore:
July 10, 2001: Kenneth Williams, an 11-year veteran of the counter-terrorism squad of the FBI in Phoenix, notifies FBI Headquarters that several Saudi, Algerian, United Arab Emirates and Pakistani flight school students in his area could be followers of Osama bin Laden, and that they might be terrorists learning how to fly so that they could hijack a passenger plane. After interrogating several of them and noting their hostility to the United States, he recognized that these students were suspiciously well informed about security measures at American airports. He suggested that the FBI conduct a nationwide survey of Arab students who were attending American flight schools; Director Nunn, after consulting with Sandy Berger, agrees.
It’s good for a laugh, albeit through grit teeth. But Ron Paul, basking in the worship of 6,000 screaming paulbots, was being absolutely serious about claiming an alternate history:
At a speech today in the Sun Dome at the University of South Florida ahead of the Republican convention, the Libertarian former Republican presidential candidate said if he had been in charge 9/11 wouldn’t have occurred. “Somebody — rather nationally —- said the other day on the Internet ‘if those Paul people had been in charge Osama Bin Laden would still be alive.’ But you know what I think the answer is? So would the 3000 people killed on 9/11 still be alive!”
The 9/11 Commission determined that one of the major reasons 9/11 happened was the dysfunction of our intelligence agencies and roadblocks put in place that prevented the sharing of information that might have headed off the hijackers.
Are we to believe that Ron Paul — a man paranoid about his own government — would have alleviated that situation? Are we to believe that Mr. Paul would have taken down the “Gorelick Wall” that prevented the CIA and FBI from sharing intel? Are we to believe that Ron Paul would have somehow been able to reach down to the Phoenix office of the FBI and force higher ups to look into their allegation that Arab students were taking flight training?
The problem with believing that Ron Paul — or Al Gore, or anyone who had been president on September 11,2001 — could have prevented that attack presupposes a gift of second sight to a different chief executive that President Bush was not given. It is possible, given Paul’s stated animus toward the CIA, that the agency would have been gutted and there wouldn’t have even been a PDB warning of an attack by al-Qaeda.
Ron Paul is many things, but perhaps more than anything, he is a blowhard.
He said 9/11 wouldn’t have happened because if he were President we wouldn’t be occupying/attacking other countries. The term is called ‘blowback’. His point was not about CIA Intelligence at all.
Now if only we’d actually been, you know, “occupying/attacking” countries PRIOR to 9/11 he might have something that vaguely resembles a point.
It has been amply established that we have been the world’s cop since the days of Truman. Paul is just voicing his opinion that if the U.S. had stuck to non-interventionism and isolation we would have not been subject to attack. He is wrong on that part based upon the realities of mankind. And this is really all conjecture on his part.
Some idiot said once, “You may not be interested in war, but war is definitely interested in you.”
“The problem with believing that Ron Paul — or Al Gore, or anyone who had been president on September 11,2001 — could have prevented that attack presupposes a gift of second sight to a different chief executive that President Bush was not given.”
Not always – a lot of my progressive friends believe that if Al Gore (or anyone else) were elected, the “Arab street” would be happier with the US and Bin Laden would have no reason to attack. As if AQ came up with the plan on Jan 20th, 2001 in a rage that Gore didn’t win Florida.
Most of that can be dismissed with the fact that the Bush administration was starting to reach out to the Taliban regime in early 2001 in an effort to combat heroin smuggling. We were going to give them money and support to in the name of The War on Drugs.
“Blowhard” is much too kind. The would-be Man on Horseback With Gynecological Stirrups is a deranged freak.
So basically, if Ron Paul were president for Clinton’s…and Bush’s…and Reagan’s…and Carter’s…tenure, he would have totally never invaded any countries.
Imaginative assumptions, like assuming that people of perfect virtue will enforce your laws after your limited tenure in office and on this earth, are the hallmarks of the failed policies that plague us today. Ron’s slipping from libertarian into liberaltarian territory. No one can predict how one will respond to the fashion or the bent of the times, and no one should make laws or engage in legislation on the assumption that they’ll be around to fix it if it goes wrong. Time and chance happen to the best-laid plans.
What about the countries we invaded during Nixon’s, Johnson’s, Kennedy’s, Eisenhower’s, and Truman’s terms?
Then there are the countries we invaded during Roosevelt’s, Hoover’s, Coolidge’s, and Harding’s terms.
And then . . .
Oh let’s just face it – we’ve been invading other countries since Washington’s term.
Once you are delusional or dishonest enough to pretend that the Founders were in perfect lockstep to your post-modern anarcho-libertarian revisionism you can make all sorts of nonsense messianic statements like that. Just look at the current occupant of the White House.
Ron Paul says that if he were President instead of Jefferson, the Barbary (muslim) Pirates wouldn’t have attacked American merchant ships taking slaves and booty because he wouldn’t send in the Navy and Marines, he would just keep paying the Tribute/Jizya to the muslims for permission to exist.
How many Americans in the Navy and Marines were involved in war on piracy? How much did it cost?
Were all shipbound travelers subjected to searches? Did Jefferson borrow money from less-than-friendly foreign countries in order to employ hundreds of domestic spies to track citizens? Did Jefferson order the censorship of newspapers in the name of preventing future piracy?
How many foreign countries did Jefferson direct the military to occupy to quell Barbary Pirates? For how many years? How many Americans lost their lives in the fight?
LOL, what a Rontard
Concern Troll Rick Moran – attacking Republicans so the Dems don’t have to!
I’m certainly no Paulbot, and I deplore ANYONE who blames the USA or Americans for the Islamic atrocity of 9/11, but Moran’s bilious screed at PJM is very bad timing. The entire array of leftist MSM is out there, fangs gnashing, claws slashing… so why is it necessary for Rick Moran to pile on?
The Ronulans are clever traders and build excellent spacecraft but have never mastered the art of time travel.
What the leader RonPaul (or R’oon Ypa’e-el as he is known elsewhere) does not know is that had Bin Ladin not made the mistake of attacking the US the time-space vectors point to a much worse outcome. Unopposed the Al Queda forces backed by Afghan fighters would have overrun Pakistan, then Iran and Saudi Arabia. The united Islamic front would have quickly established domain over the entire middle east except for Israel which would have been rendered unihabitable for at least 3 centuries thanks to Pakistani nukes.
The United States, after losing the cities of New York and Baltimore would have signed a treaty of nonagression dependent on a yearly tribute on the condition that Ron Paul remain president for life.
So I do see his point but it is in another dimension.
If he believes that America being attacked was due to “blowback” alone and that by dis-involving America from the world that affects it, he must believe two things: 1st, that other countries would never do anything preemptively against the United States, unless provoked; and 2nd, that the United State, unlike the rest of the world, WOULD preemptively attack other countries. Thus, Ron Paul MUST believe that America is, or has, a unique and terrible evil.
Can we PLEASE now stop taking this man seriously?
The easy way to tell whether you’re in the universe with Ron Paul as President is that Spock has a beard in that one.
An intruder enters your house and you shoot him. When asked why you shot him, you say “because he entered my house”.
When American citizens purchase weaponry and offer it as support to other foreign bodies, you will make enemies with those affected.
I am curious about the author’s thoughts on the current occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Good policy, bad policy?
What a missed opportunity Ron Paul is. He has a tremendous and much needed message of small government, anti-corruption, sound money, and even some valid points about our foreign policy. Then he chucks it all in the toilet with idiotic statements like this one.
His son seems much too bright to utter such nonsense. Hopefully Rand Paul and other liberty minded Republicans can continue the fight without the stupid sideshow distractions.