Props to McClatchy for even looking into this:

In speech after speech, in statement after statement, Bush insists that “this is a war in which, if we were to leave before the job is done, the enemy would follow us here.”...

“The president is using a primitive, inarticulate argument that leaves him open to criticism and caricature,” said James Jay Carafano, a homeland security and counterterrorism expert for the Heritage Foundation, a conservative policy organization.

The function of the meme is to connect a war in a faraway land to the "homeland", making it necessary to domestic safety. As messaging it accomplishes this goal.

But as far as logic and reality, it makes no damn sense whatsover. It never has.

"The war in Iraq isn't preventing terrorist attacks on America," said one U.S. intelligence official, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity because he's contradicting the president and other top officials. "If anything, that - along with the way we've been treating terrorist suspects - may be inspiring more Muslims to think of us as the enemy."

Yet another appeal to the Unconscious, irrational world of story and legend.

Large image by Junko Mizuno