TERRORIST JESSE JAMES?

I have a grudging admiration for the infamous outlaw Jesse James. He and his Civil War comrades continued to raid trains and banks long after the War had ended. He lived a nice middle class existence in Missouri while he robbed and murdered.

By all reports, the leader of the group that murdered our Ambassador in Libya is a kind of modern day Jesse James. The Libyan is using religion instead of racism as his excuse for murder.

Jesse was able to continue his personal war because of the sympathies of his neighbors and the governmental chaos that always follows a civil war.

Now Republicans are accusing President Obama of not providing enough security for the Ambassador. Of course, it was difficult to provide security as the House Republicans had insisted on drastically cutting the State Department's security budget.

Too many people seem to think that PRETTY WORDS mean more than BUDGETARY ACTIONS. BUDGETS ARE THE WAY WE CHOSE WHAT IS IMPORTANT TO US. Security of our embassies is important to me. It should be important to us all.

Rather than blaming the President, who is not usually involved in the travel plans of an individual ambassador, we should be blaming the Republicans. The House Republicans insisted on cutting the budget for embassy security or they would not vote for the budget. This meant there was not enough money for extra security when our Libyan Ambassador traveled from the capital to visit Benghazi.

Libyans reacted to the Ambassador's death by resolving to bring to justice the groups still fighting for a private cause.

Meanwhile, the Republicans are hiding their budget agenda, saying, "Trust us." Experience should tell us that trusting Republicans is probably a very bad idea.