WASHINGTON (CNN) — President Barack Obama said Thursday the Bush administration took America’s national security “off course” in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attack.
After September 11, “faced with an uncertain threat, our government made a series of hasty decisions,” Obama said.
“I believe that many of these decisions were motivated by a sincere desire to protect the American people. But I also believe that all too often our government made decisions based on fear rather than foresight. That all too often trimmed facts and evidence to fit ideological predispositions.”
Obama argued that instead “of strategically applying our power and our principles, too often we set those principles aside as luxuries that we could no longer afford. And during this season of fear, too many of us – Democrats and Republicans; politicians, journalists and citizens – fell silent.”
“In other words,” he said, “we went off course.”
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