Blitzer cited "this notion that the Democrats are weak when it comes to national security" -- not according to polling
SUMMARY: In response to Cybercast News Service editor-in-chief Terry Jeffrey's statement
that "[i]f the Democrats in the Senate want to ban the procedure by which we got
vital information out of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, Harry Reid ought to put up a
bill right now that says: 'Waterboarding is forbidden. What we did to Khalid
Shaikh Mohammed may not be done again.' " CNN's Wolf Blitzer replied: "It sort
of reinforces this notion that the Democrats are weak when it comes to national
security. That's been a very successful strategy for the Republicans for decades
now." In fact, polling shows that the public is split on which party is better
on handling terrorism, with some polls showing Democrats with a slight lead.
On the November 1 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, in response to Cybercast News Service editor-in-chief Terry Jeffrey's statement that "[i]f the Democrats in the Senate want to ban the procedure by which we got vital information out of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, [Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid [D-NV] ought to put up a bill right now that says, 'Waterboarding is forbidden. What we did to Khalid Shaikh Mohammed may not be done again,' " host Wolf Blitzer replied: "It sort of reinforces this notion that the Democrats are weak when it comes to national security. That's been a very successful strategy for the Republicans for decades now." However, while many in the media have claimed that the Democrats continue to have a disadvantage in public opinion on issues of national security, polling does not show that Republicans have an advantage. Instead, polling shows that the public is split on which party is better on handling terrorism, with some polls showing Democrats with a slight lead and some showing Republicans with a slight lead.
In an article about a Pew Research Center for the People & the Press poll released October 31, Politico senior political writer David Paul Kuhn wrote on November 1 that "polling has also showed that, for the first time in decades, Americans now see the two parties as equally qualified to face down national security threats -- erasing the 'security advantage' Republicans have long relied on." Kahn did not specify which polls he was discussing. Similarly, Atlantic Monthly senior editor Clive Crook wrote in an October 6 National Journal column: "The Republicans' slender hope in 2008 is that voters trust them more on national security than they do the Democrats. But the polls increasingly say otherwise."
Indeed, three September polls showed a Democratic lead on the issue of which political party the American public trusts more on terrorism and national security, while an October poll shows Republicans leading:
- A September poll by Rasmussen Reports, based on surveys with margins of error of +/-2.9 and +/-3.5 points, found a statistical tie between the parties: 44 percent trusted the Democrats more on national security and the fight against terrorism, while 43 percent preferred the Republicans.
- As Media Matters for America has noted, a September 14-16 Gallup poll with a margin of error of +/-3 points, asked: "Looking ahead for the next few years, which political party do you think will do a better job of protecting the country from international terrorism and military threats?" Forty-seven percent answered Democrats, while 42 percent said Republicans.
- A September 30 Washington Post/ABC News with a margin of error of +/-3 points found that 41 percent of respondents said they trusted the Democrats on "[t]he U.S. campaign against terrorism" as opposed to 40 percent who said they trusted Republicans.
- An October Rasmussen Reports poll, based on surveys with margins of error of +/-2.9 and +/-3.5 points, 41 percent of respondents trusted the Democrats more on national security and the fight against terrorism, while 45 percent of respondents preferred the Republicans.
Blitzer, Jeffrey, and Democratic strategist Stephanie Cutter were discussing attorney general nominee Michael B. Mukasey. Several Democrats have declared their opposition to the nomination following Mukasey's unwillingness to declare the interrogation technique known as waterboarding to be torture in an October 30 letter to Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT).
As Media Matters noted, on the previous day's Situation Room, Blitzer claimed that there was "political torture" involved in Mukasey's political nomination process.
From the November 1 edition of CNN's The Situation Room:
BLITZER: I'll play the clip of what the president said, making this analogy to the bad old days. Listen to this.
BUSH [video clip]: Bin Laden and his terrorist allies have made their intentions as clear as Lenin and Hitler before them. And the question is: Will we listen? America and our coalition partners are listening. We have made our choice. We take the words of the enemy seriously.
BLITZER: All right, Stephanie, that -- that, obviously, very strong words. It's going to scare a lot of people, but will it work politically?
CUTTER: Well, I don't think it's even going to scare a lot of people. I mean, these words now ring hollow to so many Americans, because we've been hearing these threats for going on seven years.
And, if he wanted to do something about the war on terror and address the threat that's raised by our enemies, he'd change the policy in Iraq; he'd put more troops in Afghanistan; and he'd listen to his own generals about breaking the back of the military.
BLITZER: His credibility is sort of weak right now, you got to admit, Terry.
JEFFREY: Well, Wolf, it's been more than six years since September 11th. We have not had another Al Qaeda attack. I think, if you'd ask most Senate Democrats on September 12, 2001, they would not have believed that would happen.
Right now, they're talking about holding up the confirmation of Mr. Mukasey as attorney general of the United States over the issue of waterboarding.
Brian Ross of ABC News reported that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the 9-11 attacks, was broken by our CIA after he was waterboarded, and he, in fact, revealed ongoing Al Qaeda plots against the United States. If the Democrats in the Senate want to ban the procedure by which we got vital information out of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, Harry Reid ought to put up a bill right now that says, "Waterboarding is forbidden. What we did to Khalid Shaikh Mohammed may not be done again."
BLITZER: It sort of reinforces this notion that the Democrats are weak when it comes to national security. That's been a very successful strategy for the Republicans for decades now.
CUTTER: Mm-hmm. Well, it's not just Democrats that think waterboarding is wrong; it's Democrats and Republicans. [Sen. John] McCain [R-AZ] and [Sen.] Lindsey Graham [R-SC] think that waterboarding is wrong. You know, this is the attorney general of the United States. The attorney general is supposed to be executing our laws. Waterboarding is illegal. Why can't he just say that?
AAARGH!!
Don't talk at me with "weak" or "strong" on national security.
I want SMART on national security.
Yeah, and I want my own private island... We're talking politicians, here. Don't confuse the issue with fantasy.
On a kind-of-related topic:
Eff Feinstein.
EFF Schumer.
Please, if they're YOUR bums, toss them out. They obviously don't have your best interest - or that of the country - at heart.
it was condi rice who told bob kerrey of the 9-11 commission that it would not have been a good idea "to respond to the cole" bombing.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/04/08/rice.transcript/
It's weird, MMFA is equating trust with strength. The argument Republicans have made (to some success) for years is not simply that Democrats cannot be trusted. It's that they are weak in the sense of not being strong, of not being mighty, and of being unwilling to express the might they do have. The thing about trust is that--with seven years of the near constant and foolish expression of might--the American people have begun to question the wisdom of the aggression that so often accompanies physical strength, so they've begun to be more skeptical of those they view as strong.
Arguable. We can discuss the merits of STRONG on national defense as opposed to SMART on defense but I just dont see people trusting anyone they thought WEAK on national defense. So I am comfortable on the fact that those polled saying they trust dems on national defense do not see them as weak. Not as aggressive maybe but you know well that isnt the same thing.
Pete hit the nail on the head. We need smart leadership. No one is listening to Condi, she's a joke in the international community. Last week on the BBC they reported that our threat of economic sanctions against Burma were sneered at. They said the United States doesn't have anything they want. They can get that elsewhere. Since we began outsourcing our manufacturing and have gone into global debt, we no longer carry any weight to go with our words, just military striking power. In that sense this administration has greatly weakened the US.
"If the Democrats in the Senate want to ban the procedure by which we got vital information out of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed..."opines Terry Jeffrey.
That's really not the question. The question is whether this is already illegal. And there's a lot of reason to think that it is. "The procedure" has always been considered torture and is outlawed by treaties which the US is signatory to. Committing torture is a war crime.
If Terry Jeffrey thinks that the United States should legalize torture, then somebody should introduce the required legislation to Congress. Absent that, the Executive Branch should either obey the law or face the consequences.
SAVE DEMOCRACY, VOTE FOR A DEMOCRAT!!
I hope, I pray the Republicans make their National Security record the issue in '08!
I was worried they would change the subject and afford themselves some glimmer of hope!
Happy Thoughts;
Dan Grady
If the guys who do the waterboarding want to be immune to prosecution for their actions, fine, do it. But there is no immunity for hell. If you waterboard, you are going to hell. Strange tradeoff.
"If you waterboard, you are going to hell. Strange tradeoff."
Funny how the people who claim to believe in places like Hell are also the ones most likely to condemn themselves to it.
I guess it's time to define where we stand as a society. I suggest what Terry Jeffries is really saying is "we as Americans are not brave enough to stand on our principles. We would gladly and proudly torture anyone we suspect of being a terrorist." But let's not stop at waterboarding let's put burning bamboo shoots under people's fingernails pins in their eyes. Bring back the iron maiden. Just because there's no blood does not mean there's no pain, and it's only simulated drowning. If you know it's simulated.
Imagine that your aunt or your mother was visiting the Taj Mahal and the Indian government thought she was a spy or a terrorist. In a country with a lot of poor people, and a bounty for everyone turned in as a terrorist. It's easy to believe that charges could easily be trumped up. I am sure that you would gladly subject your mother, aunt and/or brother or son for the Indian peoples peace of mind. But then again, you really wouldn't know would you, because they would have just disappeared off of the street. Would you prefer due process be in place? Or would you prefer that they use the secret methods of interrogation preferred in Guantánamo and clandestine rendition prisons around the world. Is it so easy for you to forget that these are suspects. With so little evidence against them that our Justice Department refuses to even bring them into the country.
Save your energy. It seems to me the founders already defined where we stand.
Between the Iraq war; the recent failures of our "critical ally" (sarcasm), the utterly ineffectual Pervez Musharrif; the inability to bring the 9/11 planners to justice; and the watering down of our victory in Afganistan by the resurgance of the Taliban; the Republicas have lost all credability on defense and terrorism.
Remember when they spent the first 2-3 years trying to convince us (against our common sense) that the Iraq War was crucial to the war on terror? Then in 2006, with the war going as it did, they tried to SEPERATE it from the War on Terror, so as they could still claim competance, despite their obvious lack of judgement?
Couple with with losing credability on...:
1) Spending (which, let's face it, is intertwined with TAXES.)
2) "Values" (Foley, Craig, etc...)
3) Limited Federal Power (that only lasted until they took control of the federal gov't)
... And what exactly do they have left? (Aside from bending over and biting the pillow for the sake of industry and big business?)
The republican party stands for NOTHING anymore. They have no pride, no soul and no brains. Hopefully soon, as retribution for their shameless selling-out, they will have no power.
(Now how do fix the damage these idiots did to the supreme court...? Maybe Ann Coulter's idea: some anthrax in the creme brulee?)
Democrats are weak on national security, but Dubbya wanted to sell our ports to the United Arab Emirates. Right.
Are we on the same planet?