Here is the simple truth, the hardened terrorists required no emboldening. To discuss it a a serious question is absurd. What the NIE is saying is that the terrorists have garnered great sympathy in the Arab and Muslim world because of the Iraq Debacle, bringing them more followers and support.

Is it that the Right does not understand this simple point or that they choose not to? Let's try it one more time -- the Iraq Debacle has not emboldened existing terrorists, but rather it has created more terrorists. Staying in Iraq creates more terrorists. Will leaving Iraq create more terrorists? That's Joyner's view but no one knows. In the meantime, Afghanistan is becoming a failed state because we undertook the Iraq Debacle. Is that emboldening the terrorists?

Let's face it, the Right has never been willing to discuss these isues seriously. It has been nothing but partisan politics to them. So they certainly are not going to start 6 weeks before an election.

One final point - both Joyner and Malkin and the rest of the Right Choir show great disdain for the abilities of the intelligence communities, how they got everything wrong etc. Let's accept that premise. The question is how well did the Bush Administration do? How well did the Right do? Bush, Cheny, Rummy, Wolfowitz, etc., how well did they do? Please. The chutzpah of the Right on this is stunning. Me, I mostly listened to this guy:

I think that there is a substantial risk in the aftermath of the [Iraq] operation that we could end up with a problem which is more intractable than we have today.
One thing we're pretty clear on is that Saddam has a very effective police state apparatus. He doesn't allow challenges to his authority inside that state. When we go in there with a transitional government and a military occupation of some indefinite duration, it's also very likely that if there is an effective al Qaeda left -- and there certainly will be an effective organization of extremists -- they will pour into that country because they must compete for the Iraqi people; the Wahabes with the Sunnis, the Shi'as from Iran working with the Shi'a population. So it's not beyond consideration that we would have a radicalized state, even under a U.S. occupation in the aftermath.

Hmmm. That guy seemed to get it right. That guy was General Wesley K. Clark, testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee on September 23, 2002. You think the Right will listen to him? Me neither.