Bush's Failure To Protect and Defend America Part I

Quick, someone tell Bush we're at war. It's been almost four years since 9-11 and Bush has failed repeatedly to take the obvious, common sense steps needed to improve security here at home.

We posted a few days ago on the Coast Guard, which is responsible for guarding our coastlines and protecting our ports -- two areas the 9-11 Commission have singled out as especially vulnerable. It is dramatically underfunded, with aging vessels, most of whch have been around for more than three decades. Bush looked at old plans made BEFORE 9-11, plans to upgrade the Coast Guard by 2025...and decided to delay them even further to 2030. That's mind-boggling.

But that's just one of many, many areas where any reasonable person can see Bush has utterly failed to protect and defend America.

Another area? His abuse of the National Guard and Army Reserve. Even its own military leaders have described those areas as "broken," thanks to Bush's abuse of those troops with a back-door draft. Here's the latest report, a front page New York Times story that highlights the dramatic decline in available Guard and Reserve forces that are going to be available for overseas duty soon. It also points out that many states have half their forces and vital equipment like helicopters in Iraq when they're desperately needed here at home for their traditional roles of providing public safety in emergencies like Hurricane Dennis and the forest fires that rage annually (that season for fires is about to begin).

That rumour about the British and US planning to pull many troops out in 2006? This story makes clear it might very well happen for the simple reason that WE'LL HAVE NO CHOICE. We are running out of troops.