For many of us, the outrage has not subsided. The questions now are, "how did we get to this point?"

Who got us into this fix? What was the FBI doing and could better intelligence have prevented these atrocities? Why didn’t American intelligence foresee this coming and take countermeasures? These are legitimate inquiries. During this next year, these and other questions are going to be asked by lawmakers and opinion leaders.

In my opinion, these will be pivotal issues in the 2002 elections.

In short, our nation’s national security was undermined and these are issues that won’t go away. And it’s a story that the liberals and the "Left" in Congress don’t want you to hear about or pay attention to.

Beginning in the 1970’s, liberal Democratic members of Congress went out of their way to cripple America’s intelligence agencies. They were aided by Washington-based left-wing think tanks such as the Institute of Policy Studies and the Center for National Security Studies that influenced the "Church" and "Pike" Committees in Congress that were set up to investigate America’s intelligence agencies during and after "Watergate."

In fact, the "Church Committee" had a significant number of former Institute of Policy Studies staff serving on that committee. Many conservatives would argue that without the "Institute" in 1974, the Hughes-Ryan Act (which crippled intelligence operations) would not have been passed or come into existence.

Leading hard-core Congressional Democrats like Charles Schumer, Pat Schroeder and John Conyers, led the pack in consistently opposing "The Intelligence Agents Protection Act." This legislation was designed to protect the lives of American intelligence agents by preventing anyone from revealing their identities.

Opposition by the left in Congress straight-jacketed America’s ability to protect its’ intelligence agents - severely handicapping our ability to defend the home-front. (Thankfully, under the leadership of President George W. Bush and Attorney General Ashcroft, the 107th Congress passed the "Patriot Act," reversing many of the devastating legislative effects of the 70’s.)

The fact is, after the Gulf War, this country felt invulnerable. The swiftness of our victory over Iraq lulled this country into a false sense of security. Many in the Clinton administration did not want to hear that this world is still a dangerous place and that tyrants such as Saddam Hussein are still a threat to his own people and to the citizens of the world. Domestic tranquility trumped our nation's national security. Bill Clinton's focus was on the scandals of his own making and those of his own administration.

The questions many conservatives and Americans have been asking is: Why didn't the Clinton administration go after Bin Laden's network years ago? After all terrorists bombed the World Trade Center in February of 1993 - his first full month as president. Terrorists also bombed U.S. troops in the Khobar Towers in June of 1996 and U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in August of 1998. The attack on the U.S.S. Cole was in October of 2000.

Clinton's response was to fire Tomahawk cruise missiles at targets in Afghanistan and the Sudan in August of 1998. Obviously Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda survived the attacks. The fact is Clinton did not give terrorism a high priority.

Bill Clinton treated previous Bin Laden linked attacks, including the embassy bombings and the attack on the U.S.S. Cole, as law-enforcement cases.

What is becoming abundantly clear is that no one in the Clinton administration was watching the store.

Congressman Bernie Sanders (Independent - Vermont), appointed to the House Intelligence Committee by the Democrats, lost no sleep as he introduced a bill to cut the intelligence budget sight-unseen every year of the Clinton administration. And in the past Sanders has also noted that his job was not to go through the intelligence budget – that he had not even looked at it.

The Clinton team is now engaged in what they do best, and that is "spin." Clinton views his life and his legacy as a permanent campaign. Not content to leave the world stage, Bill Clinton and his aides are attempting to repair his battered image.

Recently, Clinton summoned his former advisors and aides to his Harlem office. He called the meeting to enlist support and to promote his administration's "achievements" in dealing with terrorism while he was president. Clinton wants to launch his surrogates on television and the talk shows to deflect any criticism on matters including his role in the current recession and his failure to deal a fatal blow against Osama Bin Laden or his terrorist network.

What he is attempting to do is rewrite history. Clinton would like us to forget that the Chinese either stole or were given missile guidance technology on his watch. He would have us forget that he was too bogged down in his own personal scandals to deal with Bin Laden, Al Qaeda and the nation-states that support terrorism.

Make no mistake about it, Bill Clinton intends to play a central role in setting the policy agenda for the Democrats in the upcoming congressional races and beyond.

Conservatives have an obligation to make sure that Clinton and his crowd do not get away with rewriting history. Those who stood watch in the Clinton administration and their allies in Congress who turned a blind eye when our intelligence apparatus was being undermined must be held accountable. In the next election showing our displeasure in the voting booths would be a good start.