9/11 should have changed everything.

On 9/12, all -- or almost all -- Americans joined to fight terror and ban this appalling species of warfare from our planet. But as the Bush administration proceeded to act on this mandate, more and more people dragged their feet, attempting to slow the process down or hinder it from achieving its vital goals.

What happened to the unity that so blessed America after 9/11? Where did our sense of determination go? When did our focus on battling terrorism become blurred?

In the days and weeks immediately after 9/11, there was notably little dissent. As we invaded Afghanistan to take down the evil Taliban regime, virtually the entire nation supported our troops and hailed their every difficult, treacherous step through the mountains in search of those who had scarred our souls.

But then, it seemed, some of us began to lose our way. They became convinced that President Bush had "hijacked our grief," that he had "manipulated" us for his own political ends. Some began to feel that the weekly vicissitudes of the economy, and the scandals that gripped Wall Street, should be treated more urgently than stopping future acts of terror. Many demanded a miraculous settlement of the intractable Arab-Israeli conflict, even when becoming mired in yet another round of shuttle diplomacy was likely to erode the impetus for fighting the war on terror. When a settlement of the West Bank dispute proved elusive, tens of millions of Americans dissented from President Bush's decision to disarm and remove Iraq's dictator from power.

Peace marches started, as if our current troubles were somehow comparable to Vietnam. In some quarters, George W. Bush was more reviled than Saddam Hussein. We became a nation divided.

Demonstrators, who might have better spent their time outside the Iraqi embassy demanding disarmament, flocked instead to march in front of the U.S. embassy, begging for inaction.

This book is about those political, journalistic, and cultural leaders who have mounted a campaign to oppose and impede the war on terror that seemed so vital in the rare moment of clarity we shared after 9/11. As a New Yorker, I find 9/11 is still very fresh in my mind. I feel the absence of the missing towers of the World Trade Center like I would molars extracted from the back of my own mouth. In the moments after the terrorist attack, almost all of us silently vowed to do what we could to stop this slaughter from happening again. As some have lost sight of that commitment -- or forsworn it altogether -- our momentum in battling terror has slowed.

As the days have unfolded since 9/11, the forces that cast obstacles in our path have proliferated; those who are working to carry through the resolutions we made on that horrific day are at risk of becoming overwhelmed, outnumbered, and outmaneuvered. This book represents an effort to expose the distortions, obfuscations, and sleights of hand with which opponents of this war on terror seek to mislead us all.

If America is truly united, we can slay any dragon; witness the way our nation was galvanized to defeat the threat of fascism during World War II. But we are a nation that insists on embodying its values even as we fight to defend and promote them. We have a strong national conscience, and sometimes, as Hamlet says, "conscience does make cowards of us all." Our conscience must drive us to defend our values at the time of maximum danger, not strip us of the will to action.

Even as we confront our enemies abroad, we must also be vigilant about those who sap our will from within, undermining our resolve and our unity. They do so through no treasonous intent, nor does this book suggest that their voices should be stilled. But they must be answered, with all the strength and commitment our war for self-preservation demands. For in exercising their constitutional rights of free expression, they might make cowards of us all, if their arguments go without rebuttal and their criticisms without a parry.

And, finally, as we look within our borders, we must remain equally alert to threats that may seem secondary to the war on terror -- but that nonetheless, in their various ways, weaken the welfare, the economy, and the very democracy we are fighting to preserve.

Sounding a warning call, on all these fronts: that's what this book is all about.

* * *

To put it more personally: What I take on in these pages are people, forces, and institutions that make me mad. A lifetime in politics may have made me cynical, but I'm not numb. When I see distortions and deceit dominating our political dialogue, it drives me crazy. This book is my personal cri du coeur about deception in politics, journalism, and business -- especially when it stops us from following through on the work 9/11 has left for us all to do.

This book takes on some pretty sacred cows, but it's about time they became fair game.

* * *

In Part I, I take on those who are overtly hindering our efforts to wage war against terror. Not because they are unpatriotic. Not because they wish us ill. But because they are wrong.

First I go to the leader of the opposition, the drummer whose cadence governs the step of the march against President Bush's battle to fight terrorism -- the New York Times.

I still pick up my copy every day, as I have since I was eight years old (although back then I turned to the sports pages first to see how the Yankees were doing). But it is no longer my father's New York Times -- impartial, fair, understated, and reliable. It's a new kind of New York Times, remade by managing editor Howell Raines, who took over just days before 9/11, and I don't like it one bit. It has turned from a tower of rectitude into the Leaning Tower of Pisa -- leaning left.

Each month, the Times trots out a new line in its efforts to counter Bush: the civil liberties of the captured al Qaeda, the rights of Muslim immigrants questioned by the FBI, the priority it says we should give to the economy. The left picks up on its signals like football receivers watching their quarterback. The Times sounds the theme, and a thousand liberal groups perform their own variations on it. Its editorial biases, slanted news coverage, weighted polling, and persistent repetition of its stories go out like a daily talking-points message to Democrats and the left. But the signals come not from a political party but from a newspaper that is supposedly impartial.

When other newspapers distort or propagandize, some of us may go astray for a few moments. But when our national newspaper of record does it, we are all thrown off course. It's as if the compass no longer points north but, instead, points left. The television networks and other establishment media are just as bad as the Times. During the war with Iraq, we saw just how biased they really are -- constantly hyping their point of view at the expense of objectivity. The truth doesn't seem to matter. Only their collective ideology and predispositions are important. They shine the news through a prism, so it comes out in precisely the colors they want.

* * *

Bill Clinton and his record in the war on terror is my next target.

Clinton has had a tough ex-presidency. The pardons and the payoffs, the gifts and the guilty pleas: that was one thing. But now the much more dangerous legacy he left us is coming clear: his disastrous record in "fighting" terrorism. Anyone who saw 9/11 realized that Bill Clinton had failed to prepare his nation for an imminent terrorist threat.

But that horrible day turned out to be just the beginning. Soon we learned more: how his "agreement" with North Korea to curb its desire to acquire nuclear weapons was flawed and unenforceable. How Iraq had taken advantage of the expulsion of U.N. inspectors, and the elimination of the ban on its oil sales, to finance and build armaments, including weapons of mass destruction. These concessions, granted by Bill Clinton, rearmed Iraq and made it again a threat to the world.

Clinton left these time bombs -- al Qaeda, Iraq, and North Korea -- ticking under the White House, knowing full well that they could explode on his successor's watch. His motto might well have been, Après moi, le deluge: After me, the disaster.

Don't misunderstand: This isn't about digging up ancient history. It's about investigating the mistakes Clinton made -- about uncovering where the time bombs are buried, when they're likely to explode, why they were put there, and how to dig them up.

In my earlier book Behind the Oval Office, published in 1997, four years before 9/11, I recounted how I told Clinton in 1996 that I felt that his place in history depended on "breaking the back of international terror by military and economic means." But he would have none of it. Deny driver's licenses to illegal aliens, and give highway cops the technology and data to pick up those here illegally? No way. That might "lead to racial profiling." Issue a list of charities that raised money for terrorist groups? Nope. Attorney General Janet Reno thought it would be too much like McCarthyism.

Enforce sanctions against Iran so foreign companies don't subsidize its oil production? So Iran can't fund terrorism or acquire nuclear weapons? Negative. Deputy National Security Advisor Sandy Berger thought it would antagonize Western Europe. Require photo identification to board planes? Federalize airport security workers? X-ray all checked luggage? Nyet. Vice President Al Gore declined to put them in his recommendations for aircraft safety and security.

On welfare reform, balancing the budget, fighting crime, and a dozen other topics, Bill Clinton was active, astute, aware, and alive. On terrorism, he was AWOL. And now we are paying for it.

* * *

But Bill Clinton isn't the only one who has failed us in the war against terror. Some of our most admired writers, journalists, actors, actresses, social commentators, humorists, directors, pundits, and others have become the Hollywood apologists, jumping on the bandwagon to blame the American people and their government for 9/11, and they are opposing our efforts to disarm Iraq and protect the safety of the world. Their rationalizations may sound principled -- but even a cursory examination reveals that they're based on pure ignorance.

These icons of stage and screen, song and dance, are no longer content with making us tap our feet. They want to change our minds. But they bring to their advocacy their old habits -- they follow their scripts. They are not intellectuals. They are actors, actresses, singers, and stars who are impersonating deep thinkers. The same skills they use to persuade us that their stage characters are really in love, or truly locked in mortal combat, they now employ to try to convince us our country is going in the wrong direction. Their skills are formidable. But let's not forget the reality: These are human parrots, mouthing lines fed to them by the fashionable, social, trendy elite. Their information is as shallow as their conclusions are vacuous.

The danger is that some of us might be deluded into following these stars as we navigate our way through the seas of international terrorism. Accustomed to following them in their crafts, we might mistake the celebrity for the cerebral -- and be led down the garden path to appeasement or defeat. They claim the United States has blood on its hands, that it deserved to be a target of terror. They claim we are trading blood for oil. Some even say that we are becoming terrorists ourselves in the name of fighting terror.

So here the apologists are: Gore Vidal, Woody Harrelson, Dustin Hoffman, Susan Sarandon, Tim Robbins, Barbra Streisand, Andy Rooney, Bonnie Raitt, Sheryl Crow, George Clooney, Danny Glover, Senator Russ Feingold, Sean Penn, Susan Sontag, Norman Mailer, Rev. Jerry Falwell, David Clennon, Bill Maher, Noam Chomsky, Adlai E. Stevenson III, Ozzie Davis, Ed Asner, Gerda Lerner, Alice Walker, Barbara Kingsolver, Grace Paley, Eve Ensler, Tony Kushner, Laurie Anderson, and... President Bill Clinton. Their arguments are based on emotional, illogical, unfounded clichés, which contradict the facts at every turn.

Don't buy any of it -- not for a minute.

* * *

The perfidy of our oldest ally -- France -- draws my special scorn. I've always loved France and visit it several times a year. I even worked hard to learn to speak French. My wife's grandfather was wounded twice defending the French people: a twenty-year-old Irish immigrant at the time, he joined the American army and fought at the Battle of Château-Thierry in World War I. His citation hangs on our wall. A visit to the Normandy D-day graveyard never fails to move me to tears.

But, now, when we are under attack, when it is our lives and our nation that are in danger, where are the French? Doing their best to trip us up, foil our efforts, tip off our opponents, and aid those who are our enemies. Indeed, it is they who helped create the monster Saddam Hussein, leading the fight to allow Saddam to sell as much oil as he liked and do as he pleased with the money.

France is no longer an ally of the United States. When our backs were turned and we were at our most vulnerable, they proved a fickle friend and a selfish sister. Regardless of the sacrifices we made to save them in two hot wars and one cold one, when we needed their help, they said "Mais non."

* * *

In Part II, I go after those who have attacked us from within.

Let's start with those who led the attack on our economy. The recession that gripped America after 9/11 has weakened our ability and undermined our will. We were all so worried that we stopped flying, buying, and investing. The result? The funds we need to fight terrorism are no longer flowing freely through the adrenaline system of our economy.

But Osama bin Laden did not cause our recession single-handedly. He had help. The corporate executives at Enron, Arthur Andersen, Global Crossing, WorldCom, and a host of other companies chose that moment to pull off the greatest robbery in history, which further tested our confidence as it set the stock market plunging.

We all know the story of how Enron misrepresented its revenues and profits and how the accounting firm of Arthur Andersen taught Enron how to lie and get away with it. But that's not the full story. Why didn't the Securities and Exchange Commission stop the shenanigans? And why couldn't the investors intervene either to prevent the larceny or, at least, to get their money back?

The answer lies not just with these corrupt firms but with two leading politicians -- Senators Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) and Phil Gramm (R-Tex.), who cut a political deal that paved the way for the Enron debacle and the other scandals. Both parties were in on it. And President Clinton followed along, pretending he was opposed.

How do I know? I was there.

The reform legislation of 2002 will do nothing to help those who have lost their life savings get it back. All the laws that protect the corrupt and punish the misled are still on the books, and they will make it impossible for individual investors to achieve justice. Until these laws are repealed, Washington may reform Wall Street for future investors, but those who have imperiled their retirement by investing in the 1990s will have no hope of redress.

* * *

Then there are those party bosses who led the attack on our democracy.

Not all the threats to our democratic way of life fly airplanes into buildings or create weapons of mass destruction. These terrorists may seek to destroy the Capitol in Washington from the outside, but the incumbent congressmen who work there have shown that they're just as intent on destroying our democracy from within.

Unbeknownst to the American people, before the 2002 election, incumbent congressmen of both political parties got together to reapportion their districts so craftily that they, in effect, denied us the right to choose anyone but them for Congress. They took the power of the vote right out of our hands, gerrymandering themselves into a life tenure in office. And they did it while we weren't looking -- while we were bracing ourselves for the battle against terror that will define our generation.

As a result, 96 percent of incumbents got reelected -- and some who were beaten lost to other incumbents!

The way they've left things, 415 members of the House of Representatives are all but chosen before you get into the voting booth. Only one American in twenty gets to cast a ballot for the handful of seats that are really contested. They call that democracy.

And politicians wonder why turnout is dropping.

* * *

My final two targets are those who exploit the very young and the very old. They repeat the pattern of 9/11, punishing the innocent and rewarding the guilty. Their inhumanity saps our national virtue and will.

No terrorist ever killed as many innocent Americans as those who attack our children -- cigarette company executives -- do each year. Bin Laden is small-time next to the owners, employees, and directors of the cigarette companies. But lately they have had a partner in killing American adults and addicting our children: state governors who are squandering the tobacco settlement money on their big-spending schemes, sacrificing public health in the process.

It didn't have to happen this way. The amazing tobacco settlement between the state attorney generals and the cigarette companies in the 1990s promised to usher in a new era in public health, promising to pump $9 billion a year from tobacco companies into antiteen smoking programs. The results were sensational, better than anyone had hoped. Lung cancer deaths dropped 14 percent in California, where the anti-smoking effort was most intense. Teen smoking dropped by 20 percent. Death was losing its grip on hundreds of thousands of us.

Then came the politicians -- like California's governor Gray Davis -- to spoil it all. Pressed for cash as his state deficit mounted, Governor Davis diverted the tobacco windfall -- money that could have been used to stop kids from smoking -- and squandered it on big-spending programs instead. Anxious to avoid higher taxes, he degraded the health of his state instead. Now, tens of thousands more kids will smoke, and adults will die in pain, all because Governor Davis needed to balance his budget.

* * *

At the other end of the aging spectrum are the vicious entrepreneurs who attack our elderly. There is no terror worse than that felt by elderly people locked in nursing homes, supervised by abusive employees and absent owners. America's nursing home owners are offering worse care for more money than ever before. They keep 3.5 million of our parents in hellholes that offer bad service and little care, and invite death by starvation, dehydration, bedsores -- and even, recently, arson.

The federal government estimates that 92 percent of nursing homes are understaffed. The record is replete with instances of massive physical abuse, rape, torture, verbal tongue lashings, beatings, and even murder inside our nursing homes. Congressional studies indicate that actual abuse of residents -- not just neglect, but abuse -- takes place in one-third of America's nursing homes.

Moreover, the two-thirds of all nursing homes that are owned for profit are raking in outrageous profits, at the expense of care for those who live in them.

To ensure that they get away with this mayhem, the nursing home owners have cooked up a deal with the politicians to make litigation against homes almost impossible in many states. So the abuses flourish, and neither the courts nor Bush do anything about it.

* * *

And, so, to these men, women, companies, and countries who abuse the public trust in business, the media, and politics, I say, with apologies to Lewis Carroll's Queen of Hearts:

OFF WITH THEIR HEADS!

Copyright © 2003 by Eileen McGann