To the editor:

Responding to Jim McMurray’s Oct. 3 letter, I totally disagree. How can you put blame of 9/11 any more on Clinton’s watch than on Bush’s watch. Like you said, Bush had been in office nine months. Clinton did not run the CIA or the FBI or any other government security agencies. If you want to place blame, place it on the inability of the security agencies to cooperate and exchange information.

You can blame 50 years of foreign policy blunders, especially in the Mideast, where this country has meddled in clandestine operations and supported such thugs as the Shah of Iran and Saddam Hussein. Clinton did fail early to have bin Laden extradited but that is being a Monday morning quarterback. He did, however, come close to killing him in Afghanistan. Bush also failed to get him, having him trapped but prematurely withdrawing the troops from Afghanistan to invade Iraq.

I would ask McMurray how the pre-emptive invasion of Iraq has made us any safer. As far as Clinton lying to Congress, yes he did, but you are not so naive as to believe Bush was not lying to Congress regarding Iraq’s involvement in 9/11 attacks or weapons of mass destruction or the presence of al-Qaida in Iraq, which took advantage of the chaos of the invasion to set roots and cause the war to last years longer.

Perhaps instead of pointing fingers and placing blame we need to learn from history, change our misguided foreign policy and avoid future disasters!

Craig Tucker,
Lawrence