Wow. I loved John Kerry’s speech last night. Sure, it was a little long on time and short on specifics, but it was the perfect speech to sell him to the American people. For me, last night was when the election became more about electing John Kerry than defeating George Bush. When all is said and done, I think John Kerry will make a damn good president.

Since most political speeches these days are a collection of soundbytes anyways, lemme quote some of my favorite parts of the speech :

I will be a commander in chief who will never mislead us into war. I will have a Vice President who will not conduct secret meetings with polluters to rewrite our environmental laws. I will have a Secretary of Defense who will listen to the best advice of our military leaders. And I will appoint an Attorney General who actually upholds the Constitution of the United States.

Great way to remind people that it’s about more than just Bush himself, but his whole administration.

They say this is the best economy we’ve ever had. And they say that anyone who thinks otherwise is a pessimist. Well, here is our answer: There is nothing more pessimistic than saying America can’t do better.

I love that he’s addressing the President’s attacks directly.

I know what kids go through when they are carrying an M-16 in a dangerous place and they can’t tell friend from foe. I know what they go through when they’re out on patrol at night and they don’t know what’s coming around the next bend. I know what it’s like to write letters home telling your family that everything’s all right when you’re not sure that’s true.

As President, I will wage this war with the lessons I learned in war. Before you go to battle, you have to be able to look a parent in the eye and truthfully say: “I tried everything possible to avoid sending your son or daughter into harm’s way. But we had no choice. We had to protect the American people, fundamental American values from a threat that was real and imminent.” So lesson one, this is the only justification for going to war.

And on my first day in office, I will send a message to every man and woman in our armed forces: You will never be asked to fight a war without a plan to win the peace.

Even with the Vietnam thing being repeated ad infinitum for a week, this is the most effective mention of his service I’ve seen yet. He’s basically saying “I know what it’s like to fight a bullshit war and I’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again”. Perfect.

For four years, we’ve heard a lot of talk about values. But values spoken without actions taken are just slogans. Values are not just words. They’re what we live by. They’re about the causes we champion and the people we fight for. And it is time for those who talk about family values to start valuing families.

Yeah, it’s essentially a one-liner, but it’s a damn good one.

Perhaps the most important part of the speech was when he aimed his words at President Bush :

I want to address these next words directly to President George W. Bush: In the weeks ahead, let’s be optimists, not just opponents. Let’s build unity in the American family, not angry division. Let’s honor this nation’s diversity; let’s respect one another; and let’s never misuse for political purposes the most precious document in American history, the Constitution of the United States.

My friends, the high road may be harder, but it leads to a better place. And that’s why Republicans and Democrats must make this election a contest of big ideas, not small-minded attacks. This is our time to reject the kind of politics calculated to divide race from race, group from group, region from region. Maybe some just see us divided into red states and blue states, but I see us as one America ? red, white, and blue. And when I am President, the government I lead will enlist people of talent, Republicans as well as Democrats, to find the common ground ? so that no one who has something to contribute will be left on the sidelines.

And let me say it plainly: in that cause, and in this campaign, we welcome people of faith. America is not us and them. I think of what Ron Reagan said of his father a few weeks ago, and I want to say this to you tonight: I don’t wear my own faith on my sleeve. But faith has given me values and hope to live by, from Vietnam to this day, from Sunday to Sunday. I don’t want to claim that God is on our side. As Abraham Lincoln told us, I want to pray humbly that we are on God’s side. And whatever our faith, one belief should bind us all: The measure of our character is our willingness to give of ourselves for others and for our country.

Damn good sentiment, but was the President listening? Of course not.

Meanwhile, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Kerry’s acceptance speech was “nicely crafted” — but contained “nothing new in terms of vision.”
. . .
The spokesman said the president didn’t watch Thursday night’s speech to the Boston nominating convention – but has gotten a briefing on it from aides.

So this is our ultimate decision. Do we want a president whose pledge to “enlist people of talent, Republicans as well as Democrats, to find the common ground” is validated by the fact that he married a Republican or one who is so allergic to opposing views that he can’t be bothered to watch a 45 minute speech by his rival?

Here’s some great advice from the “we’re not elitists like those damn Democrats” Bush Administration : Don’t have a job? Take Prozac.

There’s only one problem with that of course. Unemployed people don’t usually have the kind of healthcare that would cover yuppie pill-popping. Of course, if Bush wants to soften his reluctance to healthcare reform that doesn’t involve handouts to big pharma and screwing the little guy, I’d be willing to give this proposal a second look.

Yeah, I know the prozac line was a joke, but I’d imagine it’s only funny to people who think the suffering of the un- and under-employed is funny too.

Some good economic news for Bush the other day….

Consumer confidence reached a two-year high in July, the fourth straight month of improvement, as the job market continued to recover. The jump was higher than analysts were expecting and helped push stocks higher on Wall Street.
. . .
The Conference Board, a private research group based in New York, reported yesterday that its index of consumer confidence in US business conditions jumped to 106.1 in July, up from 102.8 in June and well ahead of the figure of 102.0 that investors had been expecting. It was the highest level for the indicator since June 2002.

The group attributed the sharp increase to continued improvement in the labor market, with more consumers reporting that they believed jobs were plentiful and fewer expecting that conditions would worsen over the next six months.

…that is, until you read the fine print.

The Conference Board reports that in June, consumer confidence in the economy reached its highest level in two years. This is an important indicator. When confidence is up, consumers are likely to spend more money, which gives the economy a further boost.

But here?s a little-noticed fact: How confident you are about the economy depends largely on how much your family is earning. According to the University of Michigan survey of consumer sentiment, which takes account of income levels, families earning over $50,000 a year ? roughly, the top half — are indeed much more optimistic. But among families earning under $50,000 ? the bottom half — confidence in June actually declined.

Yes, the economy is bouncing back, and some families are starting to feel the benefits — but not those in the bottom half. In fact, they seem to be feeling worse. Why? For one thing, the prices of food, gas, and health care have been rising briskly. The costs of these necessities take a bigger chunk out of the pockets of lower-income families. Interest rates are also on the rise, which imposes a particular burden on families with a lot of debt. Again, its families with incomes under $50,000 that have the hardest time carrying it. Finally, take a close look at the jobs that are being created in this recovery ? for non-college grads, they’re mostly jobs in the local service economy, with low pay and scant benefits.

This confidence gap may help explain something of a widening sales gap between companies that sell to these two different groups of consumers. Sales by upscale manufacturers and retailers are booming, exceeding expectations. But that?s not the case for companies like Wal-Mart and Target, whose customers generally have lower incomes. Wal-Mart sales have been lagging. Last week, Wal-Mart lowered its official expectations. And Target said its sales are well below plan.

What we?re witnessing in America is the emergence of two different economies with two contrasting rates of consumer confidence, and two very different levels of sales and commercial expectations. Yes, consumer confidence is up, overall. But that?s on average. In a society that?s continuing to see a larger and larger divide between the have-mores and the have-lesses, the ?average” disguises what’s really going on.

In the end, if there isn’t much good economic news, but the status quo pumps out misleading information in order to make things look great, isn’t the “consumer confidence” index really more of a way to judge the effectiveness of propaganda rather than the robustness of the economy?

If you’ve been waiting to donate money to John Kerry, today is the last day. Once he accpets the nomination, he’s bound by campaign finance laws and can no longer accept any cash. So if you wanna help get rid of Bush, click on the link to the right.

There have been some great speeches at the senate Convention, but I really hate the parts that involve the crowd chanting along with the speaker. In a convention that’s being unjustly slammed for being “overly scripted”, these portions really do seem hollow and insincere. As silly as the whole “send me!” repetition was in Clinton’s speech, Edwards’ “hope is on the way” riff from last night didn’t seem to have that spontaneous charm when you see the crowd full of people holding signs bearing the new catchphrase. I think if I was giving one of those little shit speeches during the day, I’d have a hard time not going into the “Fear does not exist in this dojo…” scene from The Karate Kid.

You’ll never guess how much they’re charging for this red string in an envelope (via BoingBoing):

“What makes this particular piece of string so special is, in part, the fact that it has traveled to Israel, to the ancient tomb of Rachel the Matriarch, and returned, imbued with the essence of protection. The string is tied to the left wrist?the left being the body and soul’s receiving side?and worn to essentially deflect the negative energy brought forth by unfriendly and envious stares, unkind glances and looks of ill will. A feeling we’ve all experienced, the evil eye is considered by Kabbalah to be a powerful force and an influential factor in regards to achieving goals and everyday well-being. The string draws upon the connection to and awareness of Rachel and must be tied on by a loved one and sealed with Rachel’s protective energy by reciting the Ben Porat prayer (included on a card).”

That’s it. I need to start my own trendy religion. If I can convince people to pay more than $25 for a piece of string, or thousands of dollars to sit around in a sauna, just just convince little old ladies that god’s gonna kill me if they don’t send me cash, then I’ll be set for life!

There was a great bit on Crossfire yesterday in which Jerry Springer, of all people, explained why this race is Kerry’s to lose :

BEGALA: Let me ask about this, the positive tone that the Kerry campaign has set down.

SPRINGER: Sure.

BEGALA: Some of it a little too prescripted for some people’s tastes. Do you think they’re making a mistake? An incumbent’s election, the first question is, should we throw out the incumbent? Are the Democrats, is my party, are they jumping over that to just sort of extol the virtues of John Kerry? Should they be putting the wood to George Bush a little more?

SPRINGER: No.

And I disagree with a lot of Democrats on this issue. I think this election is a lot like 1980. In 1980, all the polls seemed to indicate — most of the polls indicated that most Americans thought the Carter presidency wasn’t working, and yet those same polls showed that Carter and Reagan were dead-even. And then there came that first debate, like five days before the election. And people were seeing, could they really trust Ronald Reagan with the presidency or was he a crazy guy with his finger on the button?

When Reagan came across as OK, comfortable, all of a sudden, everything shifted over to Reagan and he won pretty big. I see the same thing this time. Let me just finish for a second.

SPRINGER: All the polls seem to indicate that Americans believe the country is moving in the wrong direction, and yet those same polls show Kerry and Bush dead-even. If John Kerry can make the sale Thursday night, not on bashing Bush — people already have made up their minds up George Bush. They either love him, hate him, whatever. Everyone has made up their minds.

What they’re not sure yet is, is it OK to trust the country to John Kerry? You and I strongly believe that it is. He’ll make the case Thursday night. If he does, I don’t think you’re just going to see a blip. I think what you’re going to see is a steady move towards him, as people become more comfortable with John Kerry.

CARLSON: Well, you may be right. I don’t think that’s a crazy theory that you’ve just outlined.

However, there’s one piece missing in the analogy to Reagan in ‘80. And that is the vision. Reagan of course was helped by kind of a crummy four yours under Carter, but he also had — he had a platform. He was able to tell you in nine sentences what he stood for. John Kerry doesn’t have that. He’s got the same position as Bush on Iraq. When are we going to find out his vision is?

SPRINGER: Well, Thursday night, you’re going to see it.

Those people who are close to him knows that he has that vision. And the truth is, if you put partisan politics aside and you just talk about where he stands and what he really believes in, he has that vision. Here’s the problem. With this gotcha politics we have today, you know, you take a vote of something he did a few months ago or several years ago and then, oh, he shifted there.

Here’s the difference I think between Republicans and Democrats. I think Republicans see the world in bumper sticker slogans. In other words, very clear, in one sentence, you say this is where I stand, period. That’s very attractive. But, in the real world, issues have complexities and issues come in different shades depending on circumstances. It’s always harder to explain that.

And yet the simplicity of some of the Bush positions, even though they make great slogans, like, we’re going to find them, we’re going to hunt them down, we’re going to gun them down, whatever, great slogans, but they get us into trouble. And we are in trouble because of that.

Like most elections, this is all gonna be determined by the undecideds. As this report shows, they’re leaning strongly against Bush (via MyDD) :

An axiom in politics is that undecided voters rarely end up casting their ballots for well-known, well-defined incumbents. If a well-known and established incumbent picks up one-quarter to one-third of the undecided vote, he is lucky indeed. Just a cursory look at the current pool of undecided voters suggests that Bush is unlikely to get even one-quarter of the undecided vote.
. . .
Among all registered voters, 41 percent agreed with the statement that the country was headed in the right direction, while 56 percent thought it was off on the wrong track. But among undecided voters, only 18 percent said that the country was headed in the right direction, and 75 percent said it was on the wrong track. Although undecided voters aren’t quite as pessimistic about the national direction as those already in the Kerry column, they are much closer to the attitudes of the Kerry electorate than they are to the Bush voters.

On Bush’s job-approval rating, 49 percent of those surveyed approved of the president’s overall performance, and another 49 percent disapproved. But among undecided voters, only 22 percent approved, and 69 percent disapproved.
. . .
As a general rule, undecided voters follow politics less closely than voters who have made up their minds; they read newspapers and news magazines and watch television news less than those who have chosen sides. They simply focus and decide later than others, and not all of them end up voting. It would be very unusual for these people to break for an established incumbent.

Kerry simply needs to come across as credible and acceptable to this group, which will only now be checking into this race for the first time. He has an opportunity to do that Thursday night in his acceptance speech.

Bush’s challenge is much greater. He has to convince people who do not like what’s happened for the past four years, who do not approve of his performance, and who are significantly more pessimistic about the economy than other voters to support him anyway. That is a challenge.

Maybe it’s because I’m in the middle of a convention haze, but I really think Kerry’s gonna win this thing. Kerry doesn’t have to hit a home run on Thursday night to convince the undecided voters to go with him, all he has to do is convince them that he’s a strong, confident leader who people can trust to do a better job leading this country than George Bush. With the bar set that low, my bet is that John Kerry will gain a solid, comfortable lead starting next week that’ll lead him all the way to the White House.

Last night Bill Clinton gave one of the most effective anti-Bush speeches I’ve ever heard. The Republican response? That John Kerry looks stupid.

Well, damn. I was all excited, but now that the GOP has this photo, we might as well cancel the rest of the convention and start making plans for 2008. It’s too bad the only embarrasing pictures of Bush we have are this one…



…this one…



…this one…



…this one…



…this one…



…these two…




…this one…



…and this one.



Dukakis, Dukakis, Dukakis!!!!

UPDATE : Here’s one more for you :

Goddamn, does he think there’s oil in there or something?

Wow. Bill Cllinton’s speech was amazing. It was the best argument I’ve seen or read anywhere for why someone should vote against George Bush.
You should check out the whole thing here.
My favorite parts were this devestating critique of Bush’s spending priorities :

When I was in office, the Republicans were pretty mean to me. When I left and made money, I became part of the most important group in the world to them. At first I thought I should send them a thank you note?until I realized they were sending you the bill.

They protected my tax cuts while:

Withholding promised funding for the Leave No Child Behind Act, leaving over 2 million children behind

Cutting 140,000 unemployed workers out of job training

100,000 working families out of child care assistance

300,000 poor children out of after school programs

Raising out of pocket healthcare costs to veterans

Weakening or reversing important environmental advances for clean air and the preservation of our forests.

Everyone had to sacrifice except the wealthiest Americans, who wanted to do their part but were asked only to expend the energy necessary to open the envelopes containing our tax cuts. If you agree with these choices, you should vote to return them to the White House and Congress. If not, take a look at John Kerry, John Edwards and the Democrats.

In this year?s budget, the White House wants to cut off federal funding for 88,000 uniformed police, including more than 700 on the New York City police force who put their lives on the line on 9/11. As gang violence is rising and we look for terrorists in our midst, Congress and the President are also about to allow the ten-year-old ban on assault weapons to expire. Our crime policy was to put more police on the streets and take assault weapons off the streets. It brought eight years of declining crime and violence. Their policy is the reverse, they?re taking police off the streets and putting assault weapons back on the streets. If you agree with their choices, vote to continue them. If not, join John Kerry, John Edwards and the Democrats in making America safer, smarter, and stronger.

On Homeland Security, Democrats tried to double the number of containers at ports and airports checked for Weapons of Mass Destruction. The one billion dollar cost would have been paid for by reducing the tax cut of 200,000 millionaires by five thousand dollars each. Almost all 200,000 of us would have been glad to pay 5,000 dollars to make the nearly 300 million Americans safer?but the measure failed because the White House and the Republican leadership in the House decided my tax cut was more important- If you agree with that choice, re-elect them. If not, give John Kerry and John Edwards a chance.

These policies have turned the projected 5.8 trillion dollar surplus we left?enough to pay for the baby boomers retirement?into a projected debt of nearly 5 trillion dollars, with a 400 plus billion dollar deficit this year and for years to come. How do they pay for it? First by taking the monthly surplus in Social Security payments and endorsing the checks of working people over to me to cover my tax cut. But it?s not enough. They are borrowing the rest from foreign governments, mostly Japan and China. Sure, they?re competing with us for good jobs but how can we enforce our trade laws against our bankers? If you think it?s good policy to pay for my tax cut with the Social Security checks of working men and women, and borrowed money from China, vote for them. If not, John Kerry?s your man.

…and this brilliant take on Bush’s former promise to be a “uniter, not a divider”.

To build that kind of world we must make the right choices; and we must have a president who will lead the way. Democrats and Republicans have very different and honestly held ideas on that choices we should make, rooted in fundamentally different views of how we should meet our common challenges at home and how we should play our role in the world. Democrats want to build an America of shared responsibilities and shared opportunities and more global cooperation, acting alone only when we must.

We think the role of government is to give people the tools and conditions to make the most of their lives. Republicans believe in an America run by the right people, their people, in a world in which we act unilaterally when we can, and cooperate when we have to.

They think the role of government is to concentrate wealth and power in the hands of those who embrace their political, economic, and social views, leaving ordinary citizens to fend for themselves on matters like health care and retirement security. Since most Americans are not that far to the right, they have to portray us Democrats as unacceptable, lacking in strength and values. In other words, they need a divided America. But Americans long to be united. After 9/11, we all wanted to be one nation, strong in the fight against terror. The president had a great opportunity to bring us together under his slogan of compassionate conservatism and to unite the world in common cause against terror.

Instead, he and his congressional allies made a very different choice: to use the moment of unity to push America too far to the right and to walk away from our allies, not only in attacking Iraq before the weapons inspectors finished their jobs, but in withdrawing American support for the Climate Change Treaty, the International Court for war criminals, the ABM treaty, and even the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

Wow.

Michael Lind perfectly articulates what I’ve been been trying to say in defense of the pro-war votes of Kerry and Edwards :

Neither John Kerry nor any other member of the U.S. Congress voted for the war in Iraq. They voted for the threat of war as a tool of coercive diplomacy. The Iraq Resolution was a conditional declaration of war, like Eisenhower’s Formosa Resolution of 1956 and Johnson’s Southeast Asia Resolution of 1964. Conditional declarations of war allow the president to threaten war in an effort to achieve diplomatic results.

Congress authorized President Bush to use the threat of war in order to coerce Saddam Hussein into allowing intrusive arms inspections to determine whether his regime possessed weapons of mass destruction in violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions. The policy worked. The buildup of U.S. armed forces pressured Saddam into allowing arms inspectors. They discovered that, indeed, he probably had no weapons of mass destruction. Since it was likely if not certain that Saddam posed no real threat, the existing sanctions regime should have been continued, with the addition of intrusive arms inspections. Most of the U.S. troops who had taken part in the buildup as part of America’s successful coercive diplomacy should have been transferred to Afghanistan, where they were needed to fight al-Qaida and the Taliban and to pacify the country.

The members of Congress who voted to give the president the threat of waging war to pressure Saddam into allowing intrusive arms inspections were vindicated, when coercive diplomacy in Iraq succeeded. By proceeding to wage war, President Bush disobeyed the express terms of the congressional resolution, which authorized him to use “necessary and appropriate” force only in two circumstances: to “defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq” and to “enforce all relevant United Nations Security Council Resolutions regarding Iraq.” Because the inspectors had determined that there was no threat to the U.S. from Iraq, and because Saddam had broadly complied with all “relevant” (arms-related) Security Council resolutions, neither of the two express conditions for either the threat or the actual use of force had been met.

George W. Bush waged the war in defiance of the terms of the resolution which he claims authorized it. Bush asked Congress for the authority to threaten force to pressure Saddam Hussein into admitting international arms inspectors. Then, after the success of that policy made war unnecessary, he proceeded to wage a war of regime change which Congress had not authorized. Bush, not Kerry, is the flip-flopper.

Yeah, I think he’s glossing over what led to the Democrats conceding on the war resolution prior to the 2002 midterm elections. Not only was it incredibly stupid for the senate leadership to think they could stand a chance in the elections by ceding the most important issue of the year to the Republicans, but it was also one of the most cowardly things I’ve ever seen a major party do. But that’s not why we went to war.

We went to war because the President was “running out of patience”. As the inspection process went on and on, it was more and more likely that Hans Blix and his crew weren’t gonna find anything and that the U.N. wouldn’t support an preemptive war. A decent leader would use this as a sign that he should re-evaluate his evidence and work harder to unite his allies, but Bush isn’t even a mediocre leader. He’s a shitty one who had a boner to go to war, so he undermined the weapons inspectors and issued a now-forgotten 48-hour ultimatum. The Democrats may have been cowards, but that doesn’t excuse the President acting like a goddamn cowboy.

Please please please, don’t let “Johnny B Goode” be the Kerry/Edwards campaign theme. I like Chuck Berry, but there are few things less inspiring than the sight of a bunch of baby boomers cheering while the words “GO JOHNNY GO” are flashed on a giant screen. Both of them are named “John”…we get it.

As a liberal, let me go down on record as saying that the uproar over Teresa Heinz Kerry’s “shove it” remark is unfair. This is America, dammit, and we can say anything that we want here. Call me crazy, but I look forward to having a first lady who’s tough and speaks her mind.

While I’m on the subject, let me also say that Arnold’s Schwartzenegger’s “girlie men” remark was vile and uncalled for. This is America, dammit, and there’s no room for that kind of filth in the public square. Call me partisan, but the governorship is no place for him to display his “tough guy” act.

Okay, so I’ve got a really low-quality stream of the senate Convention on, so I could be mistaken….but I could swear that they just cut to a shot of pro-wrestler Mick Foley in the middle of the National Anthem.

And speaking of the National Anthem, couldn’t they have found someone to sing it who could carry a tune? The Miss Teen USA or whoever they got to sing it reminded me of a ban American Idol audition. Granted, it’s a an improvement over Mr Miyagi’s performance from four years ago, but that’s not saying much.

Remember the post I did last month about the Bush campaign using a clip from the Oscars without permission? Roger Ebert’s most recent “Movie Answer Man” column has the final word on that mini-scandal :

Q. Regarding the Bush campaign’s new TV ad, “Kerry’s Coalition of the Wild-eyed”: I linked to a script of the spot, and noticed that they are using what’s described as a “video clip” from the 2003 Oscars, when Michael Moore berated George W. Bush.

I’ve always understood that Academy is extremely vigilant about protecting its copyright, and permits clips from the Oscars to be rebroadcast only in very special cases (for example, when a presenter or recipient dies). If the Oscar clip really is in the Bush ad, does this mean AMPAS has relaxed its licensing/usage policy? If not, will its leaders demand that Bush & Co. cease and desist?

A. Bruce Davis, executive director of the Oscars, replies: “Your correspondent is correct that the Academy prefers that the copyrighted footage from its shows be reused — following the brief grace period immediately after each broadcast — only in the context of obituaries or definitive biographies. We are not enthusiastic about clips from our broadcast being used in political ads, whether they’re blue, red, green or any other hue, but we’ve been advised by our attorneys that the clip in the Bush ad is short enough, and oddly enough political enough, to be protected under the fair use doctrine.

“Fair use trumps copyright infringement. So while we’re not happy about what we regard as a misappropriation of our material, there doesn’t seem to be much that we can do about it beyond grousing in the columns of movie critics, when we get the chance.”

I’m still surprised the mainstrem news never picked up on this. It seems like one of those “tempest in a teapot” style scandals that they love hyping to death.

In case you were wondering why the 9/11 Report is being sold in bookstores, the first paragraph of the first chapter is a good indication of how this thing reads :

Tuesday, September 11, 2001, dawned temperate and nearly cloudless in the eastern United States. Millions of men and women readied themselves for work. Some made their way to the Twin Towers, the signature structures of the World Trade Center complex in New York City. Others went to Arlington,Virginia, to the Pentagon. Across the Potomac River, the United States Congress was back in session. At the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, people began to line up for a White House tour. In Sarasota, Florida, President George W. Bush went for an early morning run.

After reading that, I couldn’t help but think “I wonder if this report has any sex scenes or car chases?” Or maybe an old detective character who’s been an alcoholic ever since his brother/partner was killed while on a case. Having skipped to the end, I see that the hero wasn’t able to get there in time to save the day.

From what I’ve read of the report so far, the examination of what went wrong can pretty much be summed up by this paragraph from the chapter “The System Was Blinking Red” :

In sum, the domestic agencies never mobilized in response to the threat. They did not have direction, and did not have a plan to institute.The borders were not hardened.Transportation systems were not fortified. Electronic surveillance was not targeted against a domestic threat.54 State and local law enforcement were not marshaled to augment the FBI?s efforts.The public was not warned.

I sure am glad the President “looks forward” to “studying” this report. Maybe later we can quiz him on it.