Yep.

The US government is large and beauracratic, but good or evil are two things I would not attribute to it. It will do what it needs to keep the country running, and not much more. For better or worse I think the sense of security comes from the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, and the carrier battle groups the US is more than will to use that ply them. The 9/11 terrorist attacks were a fluke due to disintegrating relations between the FBI and the CIA.

So I would expand the saying to include the following: "Never attribute to malice what can be attributed to stupidity or inertia."

Plus you're preaching to the choir if you're telling 'Spode to not trust in the US government.

I'm not trying to tar the whole govt. with the same brush by saying it is either good or evil. I'd like to think most of us are intrinsically good, but due to the basic fact that it is run by humans (and... wait for it....they're not perfect!), the actions taken by the govt. are subject to error. The margin of error is the 'Evil' i'm talking about.
Also I don't think you're giving the poeple who run your country(I don't mean Dubya or his cronies) the credit they deserve. They may not be taking the high road at the moment but jeez louise I don't think stupidity or inertia got the US to become a superpower. I hate to say it but someone has to be doing something right over there because you basically control the world's economy!
I think you took my sense of security comment in the wrong context. I didn't mean defense against attack from outside forces, I meant the security in believing that your govt. is working for your benifit without jeopardising the freedom and/or lives of other nations.

So if 9/11 was a fluke, what was the 1993 WTC bombing?

OK, now THAT was funny.

Don't believe too much in the many conspiracy theories, but This thread about people in one of the towers is one of the most fascinating I've read.

There wasn't any parking left under the building they actually wanted to blow up ... that's why the towers didn't fall on that attempt. They only had enough explosives for the Chrysler building in the van that first time.

Just a quick disclaimer, the purpose of that link was to see some fascinating pictures of a close up shot of one of the towers, and the debate about what is there or not there.

To the best of my knowledge, there are no jumper pics in the actual thread itself.....I know at would be very disturbing for some. Although the pictures there aren't real graphic, they can be disturbing.

I've seen the jumper pics many, many times.

What was more disturbing was watching the documentary 9-11-01 that was made by that french film crew ... during one of the segments filmed in the Battallion Command Post in the South Tower Lobby, you could hear the sound of the bodies hitting the ground (the narration including the explanation of the noise, that it wasn't just falling debris). That's chilling.

No wolf, I mean, were the CIA and FBI playing games when that one happened?

Not to derail this back to the topic of Spain, but here's an article on why they voted the Popular Party out.

NYTimes Link (reg req'd)

OK, by my count, that's the 3rd country.

1) Pakistan held local elections shortly after the Afghan war in which many local pro-taliban leaders were elected as a direct result of that country's pro-US stance.

2) In South Korea, the winner of that election won based almost entirely on an anti-Bush platform.

3) Now Spain is the third country to toss out its leaders because they were in bed with Bush.

The British aren't too happy with Blair, but the US is having the next election, so we'll see who's next.

Germany was in there: Schroeder rode in on anti-US sentiment.

I'd say to be careful about whether it's anti-Bush or anti-US.

It's anti-Bush. The sentiment was primarily pro-US in Europe in the timeframe between 9-11 and Bush's Iraq adventure. And even before 9-11, the sentiment was much more pro-US than it is now. And even more so again when Clinton was in office.

That's not to say that we were loved, but Bush has been a massive wedge in all of the cracks between the US and the rest of the world.