Bush said:

“You can’t just see a threat and hope it goes away,” Mr. Bush told a friendly gath­er­ing con­vened to dis­cuss home own­er­ship. “That’s the les­son of Sept. 11. Remem­ber, prior to Sept. 11 we thought oceans could pro­tect us. But the strate­gic cal­cu­la­tions of Amer­ica must shift in order to do our duty to keep this coun­try safe.”

– Pres­i­dent George W. Bush
Nashua, N.H., March 25, 2004

This is a minor point that Team Bush brings up with some reg­u­lar­ity. If “we” — by which I assume the pres­i­dent means the gov­ern­ment — thought attacks on the main­land were unlikely because of North America’s iso­la­tion, isn’t that an implicit acknowl­edg­ment that they felt the threat of ter­ror­ism to be less than urgent? And by say­ing that strate­gic cal­cu­la­tions “must shift,” doesn’t that imply the pre­vi­ous strat­egy wasn’t the right one?
On the one hand, National Secu­rity Advi­sor Condi Rice is attempt­ing to refute Richard Clarke’s alle­ga­tions that al Qaeda was not a top pri­or­ity in the Bush White House until 9/11. On the other hand, her boss told Bob Wood­ward, accord­ing to Bush at War, that

… “that bin Laden was not his focus or that of his national secu­rity team” before Sept. 11.
Wood­ward also quoted Bush directly, with the pres­i­dent say­ing that he knew bin Laden was a prob­lem, “But I didn’t feel that sense of urgency, and my blood was not nearly as boiling.”

Condi Rice said yes­ter­day that Clarke needs to “get his story straight.” Sounds like the White House could do the with some of the same advice.