This passage in a David Sanger piece today in the Times is pretty ridiculous. He contrasts Bush’s silence yesterday about Falluja with Clinton’s response to various outrages: “The contrast with some of his predecessors is notable.

On the grim day in 1993 when American soldiers were killed in Somalia in an incident that many recalled on seeing the Falluja photographs, President Clinton declared that he was sending reinforcements.

’He said he was not satisfied that we are doing everything we can to protect the young Americans that are putting their lives on the line so that hundreds of thousands of Somalis can stay alive.’

When Americans died in bombings in Saudi Arabia in 1996, Mr. Clinton flew to Florida from a summit meeting in France and participated in memorial services.

He stepped into the Rose Garden to denounce the bombing of the Navy destroyer Cole and to promise to hunt down those who carried out the attack, now attributed to Al Qaeda.”

What is most notable, of course, is that none of this Clinton rhetoric was followed up with meaningful action—we cut and run in Somalia, we let the Saudis jerk us around after Khobar Towers, and there was no response to the bombing of the Cole. But he certainly talked a good game.