The BBC on a recent NYT article:
The US has carried out nearly a dozen anti-terror attacks in Pakistan, Syria and elsewhere in the past four years, the New York Times has reported.
The previously unreported attacks were authorised in 2004 by Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, the Times quoted senior officials as saying.
I have a question for you. Let's take Iran as an example, since they are the most likely country to have a negative reaction among Americans.
If you were sitting down to eat an evening meal, and an airstrike took out the building next to you, but one or more of your family members was also killed by the force of the blast, and it later transpired that Iranian special forces attacked the house next to you because they suspected someone they defined as a terrorist was there - would you or would you not call that an act of terrorism?
President-Elect Obama is making some good noises. He's already talking about closing Gitmo, and restoring America's right to have an icon depicting liberty as a symbol, a right that Bush shamelessly destroyed. But now we're starting to discover something even more sinister.
That the Bush Administration's senior figures have been deliberately finding ways to keep the so-called "war on terror going".
By committing terrorist acts.
It's apparently policy, approved by Donald Rumsfeld, to extend the illegal invasion of Iraq by making it policy to directly attack ANY other country regardless of their status as ally or enemy, purely because intelligence suggests there may be a "terrorist target" there.
Over the years since 9/11 there have been a lot of unexplained attacks all over the world. Carefully trained to immediately suspect Al-Qaeda, we naturally jump to the conclusion that any such attack that results in civilian casualties, or appears to be an unwarranted attack in civilian territory, must be down to them. Now it emerges that America has an open policy to carry out just such attacks, anywhere in the world, anytime without consulting either its own congress or the governments of any other country.
This is quite deliberate. There is no reason for a "war on terror" so one has to be manufactured. In order to maintain power, in order for the weapons manufacturers to continue making massive profits - the war on terror has to go on. And if Al-Qaeda can't or won't do something, then Donald Rumsfeld will.
As it gets closer to the day when President Obama will take office, more and more rocks are being turned over, and more and more evil little policies that haven't been discussed in congress or the house are scuttling out.
President Obama will have a lot to do, more than was at first thought. It will be hard to undo the mess Bush has caused. Yes, we can - but it's going to be very, VERY hard.