Charlie Black’s Quote Revisited

Having gotten a good nights sleep after posting McCain’s Posse Causes More Problems last night something else occurred to me.

While it was in exceedingly bad taste and showed a lack of judgment on the part of Charlie Black, I suspect Mr. Black was dead on target when he said another terrorist attack on U.S. soil would be provide “big advantage to him” (him being Candidate McCain).

Polling data and the narrative coming out of the main stream media throughout the this election has left everyone, myself included, with the feeling that the Republican candidate would be a shoe in this fall if voters focused on nothing but national security and terrorism. It’s been hammered into the American consciousness to the point where we don’t even think about it anymore.

We know that Bush’s top approval ratings came immediately after the September 11th attacks in Washington and New York and part of that approval rating stemmed from his hard line stance on Islamic extremism and his promises to bring the perpetrators to justice.

It’s going on seven years now and Osama Bin Laden is still at large and even Bush and House and Senate Republicans accept that Iraq has become a magnet and prime recruiting ground for al-Qaeda and similar idealogical militant groups.

This all brings me back to the idea behind Charlie Black’s quote:

The assassination of Benazir Bhutto in December was an “unfortunate event,” says Black. “But his knowledge and ability to talk about it reemphasized that this is the guy who’s ready to be Commander-in-Chief. And it helped us.” As would, Black concedes with startling candor after we raise the issue, another terrorist attack on U.S. soil. “Certainly it would be a big advantage to him,” says Black. (From the current

From The evolution of John McCain in Fortune Magazine

President Bush and members of his party controlled virtually the entire Federal government for the five years following the attacks of 9/11. Ordinary citizens accepted changes to their personal liberty in the passage of the Patriot Act and many people accepted the Bush administrations contention that deposing Saddam Hussein in Iraq was an integral part of making Americans safe in their homes.

So my question is, WHY would another attack be good for McCain’s candidacy?  A Republican president with a Republican majority in both houses of Congress could not bring the leader of the terrorist group that killed Americans to justice in the five years they were in charge.  Why do we accept the idea that  a new Republican president with a Democratic house and senate would make us safer?