Benghazi flap

From my conservative friend in Ohio:

I’m very angry over the Benghazi fiasco, but I am absolutely astounded that the liberals around the country (yourself included) are not.

The Benghazi flap (not the incident but the flap that you support and are angry liberals are not) is primarily political; an attack on the Democratic President and on a potential future Democratic President. Before you throw up your hands or throw up please consider your reaction to previous terrorist attacks.

April 18, 1983 a suicide bomber drove a truck load of explosives into the US embassy in Beirut killing 63, 17 of them were Americans. Of the Americans killed, eight worked for the Central Intelligence Agency, including the CIA's top Middle East analyst and Near East director, Robert Ames, Station Chief Kenneth Haas and most of the Beirut staff of the CIA. President Regan said that the attack “will not deter us from our goals of peace in the region.” Senator Goldwater said, "I think it's high time we bring the boys home."

Did you feel similarly after the October 23, 1983 terrorist attack in Beirut that killed 241 American servicemen? U.S. President Ronald Regan called the attack a "despicable act” and pledged to keep a military force in Lebanon. Secretary of Defense Casper Weinberger, who had privately advised the administration against stationing U.S. Marines in Lebanon, said there would be no change in the U.S.'s Lebanon policy. Did this make you very angry?

December 12, that same year, a suicide truck bomber drove through the gates of the US embassy in Kuwait City killing 63. It would have been more if the bomb hadn’t misfired. Three terrorist attacks in one year! Were you outraged that nothing had been done to protect our embassies in dangerous places after the first attack? I don’t recall liberals attacking Republican President Reagan either.

Feb 26, 1993 World Trade Center bombing, first terrorist attack on US soil killed six and injured over 1,000. Were you angry at the Democratic President Clinton?

August 7, 1998 two US embassies in East African were bombed by al Qaeda killing 223; 12 were Americans. President Clinton ordered missile attacks in retaliation one of which knocked out a pharmaceutical factory. The administration said there was ample evidence the factory was producing chemical weapons, but a thorough investigation after the missile strikes revealed the intelligence to be false. I don’t recall an uproar from the right or left.

October 12, 2000 seventeen American sailors were killed in the terrorist attack on the USS Cole.

Did you feel the same about any of these as you feel about Benghazi?  My feeling about all of them is pretty much the same, sadness over the loss of life and hope for a better future.

Thinking empathetically

Good news! I have heard the terms “thinking empathetically” and “empathetic thinking” twice in the past week in different contexts. I hope it becomes ubiquitous. If the previous administration had understood empathetic thinking and used it before invading Afghanistan and Iraq, over 4,000 Americans and an untold number of Iraqis would still be alive, and more than 30,000 young men and women would not have received physical injuries not to mention mental injuries.
Thinking empathetically before invading would have revealed that Osama bin Laden’s purpose was not to kill as many Americans as possible but to draw us into a war that could be played up as a religious war. We could have used the compassion and sympathy of people and countries around the world to root out terrorists quietly using our intelligence (and intelligence agencies). By declaring war and using our military might we have helped al Qaeda recruit more terrorists.
After the Christmas bomber some thoughtless people in congress pontificated that the president should be more forceful in his rhetoric. And what!? Scare terrorists?! Think empathetically. If you are hanging out in some al Qaeda training camp and you hear the President say something like, “This dastardly act will not go unpunished. We will track down terrorists wherever they are. We will…” I’m too lazy to look up the previous president’s remarks after any of the terrorist attacks since 911 or Tony Blair’s after the London bombings but they were leveled at the homeland populace and were the laughing stock in al Qaeda camps. Think about it, please. Put yourself in an al Qaeda camp. Imagine yourself sitting around a campfire listening to the President of the most powerful nation in the world spouting threats. As you listen, you are pumped up. “Oh, yeah, come and get us. Ha, ha, ha. How long you been looking for Osama? Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Oh, man, we are scared. We are so scared we may just strap on some more explosives and do God’s work.”
Belligerent rhetoric is ignorant, ignorant of what the enemy is thinking, ignorant of what they want, ignorant of how to deal with terrorism. Thought, empathetic thought, is smart.