fatherphil

what do you think its reaction would have been? what actions do you think he would have taken?

please avoid slamming bush in this one and just offer conjecture on what might have been.

winterwooskie

i think his reaction would have been the same as bush's and he would have put more policing measures but i doubt he would go the patriot act route. i'm not trying to bash bush, but i think he would have done things differently from him. also he would not have tried to link saddam and osama together.

fatherphil

so we would have been limited to the war in afghanistan?

Mark

Not necessarily, but Gore may have had the sense to check it was ok with the world before he tried anything and get a diplomatic disaster on his hands.

winterwooskie

not having the patriot act or not going after saddam does not limit going after afghanistan in any way.

and there would have been no war with iraq, i doubt. but it's a good thing bush wanted that, because we would be unamerican to not want a war with iraq. also before this whole iraq situation i suppose the whole country was being unamerican since they were either not pushing for iy or even considering before 9/11. (oopsie bush bashing, but i can't help it since it needs to be considered if gore were in, instead)

Majestyk

Can any of us truly say how we would react if, we were the president on 9/11? Let alone speculate on someone else's reaction?

I agree that I don't think that monstrosity called the "Patriot Act" would have been adopted.

winterwooskie

it is not that difficult to speculate how someone would react. it is not like what you say is the word of god or anything, it's just amusing to do so.

Pomp

Off the top of my head, I would speculate that he would have handled actual repurcussions for al-Queda more or less the same way, although I do think he would have been a bit more graceful and diplomatic in pre-bomb-the-fuck-out-of-you negotiations.

We probably would have seen a simliar overreaction to 9-11 in the form of something akin to the Patriot Act.

I highly doubt that Al Gore would have launched an unprovoked war on Iraq.

fatherphil

sure you can. if gore had taken office, folks would not even give a second thought to bush.

lpetrich

I think that the right-wingers would have concluded that those kamikaze hijackings are ultimately Gore's fault and that he ought to be impeached for dereliction of duty.

And that efforts to hunt down Al Qaeda are nothing more than "wag the dog" distractions, and otherwise joining the Noam Chomsky Fan Club.