New York Newsday columnist James Pinkerton's latest column suggests that with last week's release of the Aug. 6 PDB, voids any credibility that the Bush administration has regarding preventing terrorism and the 9/11 attacks.

If you knew that President Franklin D. Roosevelt had received a memo a month before Pearl Harbor entitled, "Japanese Determined to Attack the United States in the Pacific," and that he had done nothing about that information, would that knowledge change your perception of FDR as a wise war leader?

Roosevelt received no such memo, of course, but President George W. Bush got a blunt warning five weeks before 9/11 and he did little or nothing. He even presided over a stand-down in preparations, concentrating on other concerns.

What a load of bull. What Roosevelt did have prior to 12/7/41 was knowledge that the Japanese harbored imperial ambitions in the Pacific (Does the term Greater East-Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere ring any bells?) Both the Roosevelt administration and the the Japanese knew that eventually there would be confrontation in the Pacific -- it was inevitable. Is the Roosevelt administration responsible for Pearl Harbor? No.

Pinkerton, who is not always on the left side of the political spectrum, thinks that the PDB's vague warnings of bin Laden's intentions, but noticiable lack of specifics, somehow disqualify Bush from promoting his leadership against the war on terrorism.

More bull.

Richard Clarke's infamous background briefing shows that Bush was much more serious about the war on terror than the prior administration ever was.