The Weekly Standard's Michael Goldfarb doesn't think recruitment is a very important issue in the fight against terrorism.
As to whether Bush is a recruiting tool for terrorists -- who cares? Al Qaeda was recruiting before Bush was in office and they will continue to do so after he's gone. The important thing is that we keep killing those recruits. Eventually, one side will give up. And if Obama wins in November, we know which side that will be.
Others have already weighed in on this, but we miss the point if we assume that Goldfarb's ultimate goal is to eliminate terrorism. That would be counterproductive to the actual goal of neoconservatism, (as Matt Yglesias explains in this month's issue of TAP) which is to keep us fighting wars forever so that Republicans can keep getting elected so they can start more wars, because wars build character and make us strong.
So if you want to keep fighting a war forever, what's the point of trying to inhibit Al Qaeda's recruiting? It's not like you want them to run out of people. Then you'd have to go through the trouble of finding a whole new rationale for violating the Constitution and providing no-bid contracts to war profiteers.
--A. Serwer
