Nearly six years after September 11, 2001, Al-Qaeda is as strong as it was in summer 2001, when George W. Bush was handed a red-alert memo on his ranch at Crawford, Texas, advising that the terror group was planning an immediate attack inside the United States. At the time, President Ding-Dong told his advisor, "You've covered your ass, now."

The story about Bush blowing off a CIA operative delivering the bad news was broken in Ron Suskind's book, The One Percent Doctrine.

In the book, Suskind fleshed out some details regarding Bush's receipt of the now-famous August 6, 2001, memo headlined "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." Specifically, he reported that the "analytical arm of CIA was in kind of a panic mode" during that month and CIA officials "flew to Crawford [Texas] to personally brief the President -- to intrude on his vacation with face-to-face alerts." At the end of one such briefing, Bush reportedly responded to the CIA briefer, "All right ... You've covered your ass, now." (Pages 1-2)

Bush ran for re-election in 2004 on the strength of his anti-terror efforts, positioning himself as the only guy in the race who could prevent another attack. The problem was that the troops that could have squashed al-Qaeda were in Iraq, fulfilling Ding-Dong's dream of being a successful war president. He is neither.

Some people wouldn't mind another terrorist attack. "About a month ago, Dennis Milligan, the chairman of the Arkansas Republican Party, sounded pretty excited about the prospect of domestic terrorism. 'At the end of the day, I believe fully the president is doing the right thing, and I think all we need is some attacks on American soil like we had on [Sept. 11, 2001], and the naysayers will come around very quickly to appreciate not only the commitment for President Bush, but the sacrifice that has been made by men and women to protect this country,' Milligan said."

At a news conference today, Bush spun a folksy recap of his career: "And so, when it's all said and done, if you ever come down and visit the old, tired me down there in Crawford, (Texas), I will be able to say I looked in the mirror and made decisions based upon principle, not based upon politics. And that's important to me." Actually, he'll be remembered the same way that we remember the guy who accidently burned the house down.

We already know from our own intelligence agencies that the Iraq War has increased the terror threat. They hated us in 2001. They hate us even more today. It's only a matter of time before they attack us again. We are standing in the wreckage of a political system that has failed us in every way. At the top is a Ding-Dong who never should have been elected or even nominated by his party in the first place. Where is Congress? Why aren't there hearings on the Administration's failure to keep us safe? Living in the shadow of 9/11, as most New Yorkers are, I dread another attack. It will happen because we did exactly the opposite in preventing another 9/11. There is nothing more important than this. If this is not grounds for impeachment, then nothing is.