Taliban attack on US CIA base begs the question: Do you miss Bush now?

It was no surprise that the Taliban took responsibility Thursday for a terrorist attack that claimed the largest loss of American life in Afghanistan since October. What was surprising is that the bombing occurred inside a U.S. CIA base, and represents the third terrorist attack on American civilians in 4 months, in areas that should have been safe.

On Wednesday, a suicide bomber entered the U.S. Forward Operating Base Chapman in Khost city, a known Taliban stronghold, near Afghanistan's eastern border with Pakistan. The bomber, wearing an Afghan National Army officer uniform and suicide vest containing explosives, entered the base gym and blew himself up, Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said in a statement.

The explosion killed seven American civilians, including the base chief, and one Afghan, and injured six additional Americans. The slain base chief, whose name was not released, was female, and the mother of three children. It is not known how many victims were CIA employees. No U.S. or NATO military troops were injured.

Forward Operating Base Chapman was a military base converted into a CIA base, according to an unauthorized U.S. official. Some service men and women work there on a Provincial Reconstruction Team, a joint civilian-military unit that secures and develops areas in Afghanistan. A NATO spokesman said "other personnel" work at Chapman as well, but said he could not elaborate.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai issued a statement of condolence to America. "Your children sacrificed their lives for the people of Afghanistan and the threat of terrorism. The Afghans will not forget your sacrifice." 

While it's no surprise the Taliban, with its longtime support of Al-Qaeda, was responsible for the recent attack, Americans are surprised, and worried. This attack, the panty-bomber's attempt inside a Chicago airplane and the Ft. Hood massacre, all occurred within 4 months, a year into Obama's presidency, in places Americans assumed they would be safe from terrorists.

More than half of the American people, 55 percent, believed the United States and its allies were winning the war on terror when George W. Bush left office almost a year ago. Now, Rasmussen says, that number has dropped to just 36 percent, which reflects a decline in America's confidence in the Obama administration's war on terror.

"Obama has, at most every opportunity, downgraded the U.S. response to terror," according to Peter Roff, a senior fellow at Let Freedom Ring, a non-partisan public policy organization. "His administration has changed and softened the language of the issue, casting the 'war on terror' phrase into the ashcan. He's bringing terrorist detainees into the United States for imprisonment and trial, closing the facility at Guantanamo Bay and ordering them tried as though they were common criminals, rather than one-time armed and dangerous enemy combatants. And his approach to our enemies has been for us all to understand one another and to come and reason together."

Most Americans felt safer under President George W. Bush, despite his many faults. Is it any wonder Americans are questioning the Obama Administration's ability to keep them safe?

"Some bullies don't listen to reasoned words or impassioned pleas. They only listen when someone bigger, stronger and more threatening commands them to "stand down, or die!" ~ Mother of two American boys

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