Dems Have Another Bad Week

Joan Vennochi, a writer for the Boston Globe, is clearly no fan of President Bush, and her angst with her own Democratic party is clear as she writes about another bad week for the Dems and the fact they they still have not developed a strategy for national defense in the post-9/11 world:

The past week illustrated the Democrats' continuing dilemma.

On Monday, Republicans and Democrats grilled Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales about the legality of Bush's order to allow the military to listen in on Americans' international phone calls without a warrant. Gonzales was excused from testifying under oath. The courtesy granted by Republican Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania underscored the unchecked power the GOP has to control its message.

The picture that was not snapped -- the country's highest law enforcer raising his right hand and pledging to tell the truth about wiretapping -- was still worth a thousand words. Skepticism about the policy presented by Gonzales led the Bush administration to allow Gonzales and a high-ranking intelligence officer to brief the House and Senate intelligence committees about the domestic spying program.

Then, Coretta Scott King's funeral intervened. Four presidents attended -- Democrats Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton and the Republican father and son, George H.W. and George W. Bush. Carter used the platform to allude to the Bush administration wiretapping controversy. He mentioned the difficulties that Mrs. King and her husband, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., endured as they became the target of secret government wiretapping; he failed to mention that attorney general Robert F. Kennedy, a Democrat, authorized the King wiretapping. In their funeral remarks, the Bushes took the gracious approach, leaving the Democrats to look tastelessly partisan.

One correction - nobody but the extreme left cares that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales did not testify under oath. That's clearly fever-swamp stuff that gets the lefties all excited, but which means nothing to the majority of Americans. In fact, I'll bet if you asked most Americans what happened last week, most of them won't even remember that Gonzales testified. They will, however, remember the classless Jimmy Carter and his attempts to slam the president during a funeral.

Vennochi is also clearly distressed about the fact that the president revealed a terrorist attack against Los Angeles that was thwarted in 2002:

Speaking to the National Guard Association this week, he revealed that the United States and governments of several Southeast Asian countries disrupted a plan by Al Qaeda to hijack a commercial airliner and fly it into a Los Angeles skyscraper in early 2002. Vice President Dick Cheney told a group of conservatives at the Heritage Foundation that the country has been protected from additional terrorist attacks by ''more than just luck."

Average citizens smirk, and Democrats scoff. Bush never fails to entertain. This time, he referred to the West Coast target as the ''Liberty Tower" instead of the ''Library Tower."

But until Democrats come up with a post-9/11 strategy, the Bush White House and the GOP get the last laugh.

So, according to Vennochi, Democrats scoff at the idea that a terrorist attack was stopped. That's a real good platform for '06 & '08. Good luck with that, Hillary.