What would the Democrats have done differently if there had been a Democrat as President on 911?

Question

This is not an invitation to bash the opposition. I am honestly curious what different approaches people think would have been employed. Just for the purpose of expediency I will concede that we probably would not have invaded Iraq.

JOLLADY: Social Security is another matter and definitely a hotbed issue with me. There have been several attempts to open debates about the problems with Social Security, none started by Democrats. The Democrat response to such attempts is not to debate and create counter proposals, but rather to start fear mongering and telling seniors that they are going to robbed of their sole means of support if anyone suggests changing the system. I would love meaningful debate on that subject, but to say that it will be started by Democrats, who by the way claim everything is fine the way it is with the system is purely wishful thinking. I don't know if either side has the answers to this problem, but I do know that continuing on the path we are will only lead to higher taxes and lower benefits as baby boomer begin to reach retirement age and system begins to buckle under it's own weight.

Answer 1

They probably wouldn't have gone to war at all. They would've placed the blame everywhere else except on the people responsible, and that includes blaming their own countrymen somehow. They would've looked back to the most recent Republican president and blamed him for it, and at best might've fired a few cruise missiles at random places in Afghanistan to make it look like they were "doing something". The Taliban would've remained in power in Afghanistan, repressing the Afghan people; Al Qaeda would've still had free reign there, and Saddam would still be in power in Iraq, torturing and killing his own people. A Democratic president would be far too concerned with his own popularity to risk taking action in the best interests of his people or the world, regardless of the risk of ignoring the problem and having a repeat of 9-11.

EDIT: Don C... if Clinton was so successful thwarting terrorist attacks, he sure let a lot of them slip through his fingers during his presidency, not to mention let Bin Laden and other high-profile terrorists get away back in the days when they were far easier targets. He also did his best to cripple the military, cutting its strength by 300,000 and its funding, both of which would've left our military in far better shape for the problems of THIS decade. He also wasn't terribly effective at stopping Saddam from killing his own people or getting him to adhere to UN resolutions or keeping him from laundering money from UN relief programs. He also wasn't very effective at putting any real pressure on the Taliban, to stop them from overthrowing the legitimate Afghan government, harboring Al Qaeda, or repressing their people. In case you've forgotten, only two or three countries even recognized them as a legitimate government at the time; the country was being run by a terrorist outfit and had been there for five years by the time Clinton left office. His inaction set the stage for much, if not most, of the strife we are dealing with now.

Answer 2

How about this for an idea. Let's just pretend that we counted the votes in Florida and Al Gore became president.

In the summer of 2001, President Gore hears news that Al Qieda is planning to attack the US in September 2001. Dispite having forced the Clinton anti-terrorism proposals through the obstructionist Republican Congress, President Gore knows that more can be done. So he returns from vacation and takes action. Thankfully, he did not implement George Bush's plan to lower security at airports. Instead, he took a page from Bill Clinton's page book and raised security at airports and put sky marshalls on the planes. As with the Clinton administration, most of the terrorists were captured at the airport. The few that made it onto the planes were quickly grabbed by the sky marshalls. As in the past, the media gave little coverage to the issue and Republicans attacked the President for wasting tax payer money on what Trent Lott called "a phoney issue".

Result: No 9/11, no forged intelligence, no economic slowdown, no invasion and occupation of Iraq. No federal deficit. No weakened dollar. No loss of American prestige. No high gas and oil prices.

In other words, just like when Bill Clinton was president.

Of course, that hypothetically assumes that the Supreme Court upheld the law and the Constitution and allowed the votes to be counted.

Answer 3

Actually, Clinton was speaking with Guatemala in '98 to discuss an Iraqi Invasion. It was always on the table since '94. The Democrats aren't stupid, and neither are the Repubilicans. The Dems lined up to sign off on the Invasion of Iraq just like they did for Afghanistan. Due to their position, they are able now to complain of not being told the facts. Reality is, the Dems would have done the same thing the Repubilicans did and the Republicans now would be seeking to sway the votes their way by claiming a mass conspiracy to cover the truth.
I was in the Marine Corps during Clinton's time as President, and got out in 2000. Two year before I got out, our unit essentially received a blank check for training. For two years solid we were getting all kinds of training missions, especially while on deployment to Okinawa. Breeching training, Military Operations in Urban Terrain, Riot Control training, etc. While these aren't unconventional training sessions for an Infantry Unit, to have them delivered in rapid succession was a bit odd. And we were one of 4 Infantry Battalions at 29 Palms, CA and they all were getting this steroidal pump up. Training budgets like this don't come up too often and certainly not without damn good reason. The Secretary of the Navy sanctioned this, which means this was coming from the White House.
Just because Clinton appeared to be a dove, doesn't mean he was weak. Iraq was always on target for a re-invasion. Once the war against Iraq was authorized, 29 Palms became a ghost town.
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as for the previous post...if the newly elected Dem was going to take the Intel seriously from Clinton, why didn't the Clinton take it seriously. Your mindset is flawed. Bin Laden came in under our radar because he had a decade of working with the CIA to understand how flawed our intelligence system really was.

Answer 4

As history has shown, the last two Democtratic presidents: Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, kept us out of major conflict. There were some excursions but we did not have conflicts like Grenada, Panama, Desert Storm, Somalia, or Iraq. Clinton helped get us out of Somalia because we were in Somalia when he took office.

Democtrats are more conservative than the Republicans. So, I am pretty sure that we would not have invaded Iraq. We probably would have had more talks to fight the war on terrorism.

Answer 5

It would have taken 3 years to figure out who attacked us on 9-11 and then they would have blamed the "vast right wing conspiracy".

Answer 6

If the Democrats win next year we better start praying 5 times a day. Blessed Be

Answer 7

I honestly believe that we'd still be studying the problem trying to decide what an appropriate next step would be.

Answer 8

Brendon is WRONG

Clinton was President when the first WTC attack took place
Did not blame Bush I administration for first World Trade Center bombing even though it occurred 38 days after Bush left office. Instead, worked hard, even obsessively -- and successfully -- to stop future terrorist attacks.

Of Clinton Administration's efforts says Robert Oakley, Reagan Ambassador for Counterterrorism: "Overall, I give them very high marks" and "The only major criticism I have is the obsession with Osama"
-Paul Bremer, current Civilian Administrator of Iraq disagrees slightly with Robert Oakley as he believed the Clinton Administration had "correctly focused on bin Laden.
-Barton Gellman in the Washington Post put it best, "By any measure available, Clinton Administration left office having given greater priority to terrorism than any president before him" and was the "first administration to undertake a systematic anti-terrorist effort"

Answer 9

we would only have went to afgahnastan for bin laden the person responsible for 9/11, social security would be on its way to being fixed, debt would be going down, borders would be more secure from having our soldiers guarding them instead of policing other countries.

Answer 10

No one is questioning the initial response of 911, what is in question is the attempt to use that tragedy to attack other countries..