Grace62 wrote:
[quote=kj]
>>The short term impact of Bush's foreign policy was that terror attacks increased all over the world.
I've never seen this assertion. How would you make this case? Just curious, but not terribly invested. kj.
By Susan B. Glasser
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
The number of serious international terrorist incidents more than tripled last year, according to U.S. government figures, a sharp upswing in deadly attacks that the State Department has decided not to make public in its annual report on terrorism due to Congress this week.
Overall, the number of what the U.S. government considers "significant" attacks grew to about 655 last year, up from the record of around 175 in 2003, according to congressional aides who were briefed on statistics covering incidents including the bloody school seizure in Russia and violence related to the disputed Indian territory of Kashmir.
Terrorist incidents in Iraq also dramatically increased, from 22 attacks to 198, or nine times the previous year's total -- a sensitive subset of the tally, given the Bush administration's assertion that the situation there had stabilized significantly after the U.S. handover of political authority to an interim Iraqi government last summer.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/con...01623.html
I'm sorry, that's seriously an impressive attempt. But it doesn't make a case at all for Bush's foreign policy being
responsible for a world wide increase in terrorism. How were the two events listed related to Bush's foreign policy? Maybe they were, but I think one would need to make a little better case. I certainly wouldn't argue with the assertion that they increased in Iraq though. Plus you said short term. Two or three years doesn't seem all that short-term, unless we're talking geological time.
If your proof works, what does this "prove":
http://articles.cnn.com/2010-05-26/us/te...g?_s=PM:US
I guess Obama's foreign policy didn't work very well in March:
http://www.imra.org.il/story.php3?id=51741
Not to mention that for your point to mean anything at all, you need to show that terrorist activity has decreased during Obama's term, and that it is lower than it was during previous presidents' tenures. Well, and that something he has done caused that decrease.
At any rate, I can't for the life of me understand why people would want to compare Obama to Bush anyway. Low bar? Obama is doing something better than the "worst president ever". Impressive.
kj.