Is Bin Laden Really Dead?
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Quote: odiousgambitAl Qaeda acknowledged they got him.
All they know is what we told the world. The way info is trickling out is consistent with a capture. If they're really sifting through 100 flash drives then the info is coming out much too fast. You just never know.
Quote: odiousgambitAl Qaeda acknowledged they got him.
Even thats fishy. How is it to their benefit to announce he's dead? They would get far more mileage out of a statement that says he's still alive.
Quote: EvenBobI Something fishy is going on.
He sleeps with the fishes.
Quote: EvenBobI'm thinking, how do we really know? Where's the proof? Obama says so, big deal. Did they capture him and have him squirreled away somewhere? Where is the pic of his dead body?
You can fake a photo. If you are going to doubt something you question any so called "proof".
Saddam was a secular leader and he doesn't have the near religious worldwide following of Bin Laden. I support the president's decision on this one.
Quote: pacomartinYou can fake a photo. If you are going to doubt something you question any so called "proof".
Saddam was a secular leader and he doesn't have the near religious worldwide following of Bin Laden. I support the president's decision on this one.
The problem is that it is simply yet another accomidation to jihadist muslims. We didn't worry about "offending" Germans by showing the concentration camps. If they want to riot over it, let them.
Quote: NareedIs water really wet?
What is the oppisite of oppisite?
Quote:The problem is that it is simply yet another accomidation to jihadist muslims.
I'm okay if our troops are okay with it. There the ones that have to deal with it, not me, you, or the President. General Petraus wasn't on board with burning the Quarans. I assume it's not because he's really sympathetic to Islam.
Maybe he's wrong -- but still the people in favor of offending them should be on the front lines then.
Quote: rxwineI'm okay if our troops are okay with it. There the ones that have to deal with it, not me, you, or the President. General Petraus wasn't on board with burning the Quarans. I assume it's not because he's really sympathetic to Islam.
Maybe he's wrong -- but still the people in favor of offending them should be on the front lines then.
So, I guess we should not have put out all that propoganda during WWII about Germany and Japan being evil, the soldiers would have had it better?
40-50% of this country refuses to accept the world struggle going on. The sad part is when muslims riot over a koran burning; or when they put out a hit on a guy who drew cartoons; or who wrote a book they didn't like, when that happens that 40-50% takes the side of the group who riots and calls for murder.
I don't get it.
Quote: AZDuffman
I don't get it.
I do. The world is full of mostly ignorant people on both sides. They see whats in front of their nose and thats about it.
Quote: AZDuffmanSo, I guess we should not have put out all that propoganda during WWII about Germany and Japan being evil, the soldiers would have had it better?.
I think it depends on what you're trying to achieve.
If you're going to call-out all of Islam on the carpet, you've got a big job. Plus, it's probably no more accurate than saying all people who call themselves Christians are all alike in their beliefs.
I won't pretend to understand how any religious people dissect what part, or whole they believe and practice. It mostly seems illogical to me, but I'm aware that the bigger the religion the more fractured the actual practice.
Quote: EvenBobEven thats fishy. How is it to their benefit to announce he's dead? They would get far more mileage out of a statement that says he's still alive.
Maybe they think that pushing his martyrdom forward, will benefit them by bringing new recruits to their cause.
Quote: AZDuffmanSo, I guess we should not have put out all that propoganda during WWII about Germany and Japan being evil, the soldiers would have had it better?
40-50% of this country refuses to accept the world struggle going on. The sad part is when muslims riot over a koran burning; or when they put out a hit on a guy who drew cartoons; or who wrote a book they didn't like, when that happens that 40-50% takes the side of the group who riots and calls for murder.
I don't get it.
If it helps my mother agrees with you. While she may agree that the huge majority of Muslims are peaceful people, it means the same to her as the fact that possibly the overwhelming majority of Germans when she was a little girl didn't hate people and just wanted to live in peace.
As far as she is concerned the Muslim leadership has declared open war on the Christian West with the goal of global confrontation. She gets very upset with out president for his speeches in Cairo, and his attitude toward the Muslim world. I think she thinks he is as delusional as Neville Chamberlain.
Quote: pacomartinI think she thinks he is as delusional as Neville Chamberlain.
And you don't?
Quote: EvenBobAnd you don't?
For that to be accurate Neville would have had to landed in London w Hitler not a document. However if you want to find a president who spoke of the peacefulness of Islam more than any other president in history it would be George W Bush. So President Obama has a long way to go before he even comes close to his predecessors praise of Islam.
Quote: Wavy70For that to be accurate Neville would have had to landed in London w Hitler not a document. However if you want to find a president who spoke of the peacefulness of Islam more than any other president in history it would be George W Bush. So President Obama has a long way to go before he even comes close to his predecessors praise of Islam.
You must be kidding? Obama has done more Koran-thumping than any POTUS. Bush did far too much for my tasts, but Obama all but states directy that he has a mission to "reach out" to muslims. Heck, he told NASA to make it one of their primary objectives, whatever that has to do with space and science.
Quote: pacomartinIf it helps my mother agrees with you. While she may agree that the huge majority of Muslims are peaceful people, it means the same to her as the fact that possibly the overwhelming majority of Germans when she was a little girl didn't hate people and just wanted to live in peace.
As far as she is concerned the Muslim leadership has declared open war on the Christian West with the goal of global confrontation. She gets very upset with out president for his speeches in Cairo, and his attitude toward the Muslim world. I think she thinks he is as delusional as Neville Chamberlain.
She sounds like a wise woman. I won't make a wiseass comment like someone above did. But what she thinks is spot-on. It will take an attack far larger than 9-11 to wake this country up.
Remember "Amerika" and how the USSR said the USA was easy to defeat because the average American had life so good they would rather keep comfort than freedom? (or something like that.)
Quote: AZDuffmanIt will take an attack far larger than 9-11 to wake this country up.
Oh, the country has 'woken up', of that there is no doubt. There is an undercurrent in this this country thats unmistakeable now, we are past the point of no return.
Quote: EvenBobI'm thinking, how do we really know? Where's the proof? Obama says so, big deal.
Something fishy is going on.
Probably dead. There's no proof, though. And yes, something fishy is certainly going on.
It's unlikely that Osama has survived this long, with his already shaky health the last time confirmed information about him was available. But how he died will remain a mystery. And BHO's version has only as much credibility as any other joe's.
Quote: P90But how he died will remain a mystery.
If this was Bush with 14 changing stories of what happened, and not releasing pic's, the media would be going berzerk pulling their hair out. But because its B.O., they just shrug their shoulders.
Yes, I think bin Laden is dead. No, I don't think Obama is lying about THAT. Lying about that doesn't serve his political purposes, which in this case align with the betterment of the American situation. So yeah, bin Laden is really dead.
Do I think it happened EXACTLY the way(s) that it's being told as having happened? No, not really. But from my perspective, that's a distinction without a difference. What do I care about the details? It doesn't bother me that the Obama Administration is surely spinning a story that ostensibly better serves the overall war on terror. That happens in warfare. I would WANT it to happen. Give the man credit for that.
But if the question is one of trust ... no, I don't trust Obama. I don't think he's particularly intelligent in a solving-way, but only in a repeating-what-he-thinks-will-make-him-popular way. He may be the best at that that we ever encounter. Believe me, the guy played basketball with some of my Stanford cohorts while he was at Harvard law, and Rob (a dedicated liberal and particularly successful lawyer living in Pelosi's district ... not to mention a very cool guy and good friend) described Obama as the kind of guy who "is like trying to pick a fragment of eggshell out of the bowl when it accidentally drops in there." That was in 2005, after his "rock star" speech in Boston.
So, yeah, bin Laden is dead. Obama is telling the truth about that. There are other things that, as a matter of war, he is either hiding or disinforming us about, but I would expect that of any president. What I don't trust is that he actually believes in the purpose of defeating terrorism or in what he preached in the campaign of 2008 ... hence all the broken promises like closing Gitmo, et al. I really think he's in it for himself first and the purpose of harming the nation second. Anything that ultimately serves those purposes, he will pursue. Insofar as they align with the national good is just a coincidence.
I think the nation, as a large majority, discerns this, which is why I predict a Reagan-esque defeat for him and is party in 2012.
{Relax, liberals. It's just a prediction. Either I'm wrong or I'm right. Pull this quote after the 2012 election, and we'll see then.}
Quote:Chinese analysts had begun the guessing game of where Washington will focus its attention next.
"Why didn't they catch him alive?" speculated military affairs analyst Guo Xuan. Because he was no longer needed as an excuse for Washington to take the anti-terror war outside of the US borders. It is because of bin Laden that the US were allowed to increase their strategic presence in many places around the world as never before. But Libya and NATO's attack there have changed the game. They (the US) no longer need bin Laden to assert their authority."
[…]
Chinese public reaction to the news of bin Laden's death has mixed reluctant admiration at the success of the secret mission played out reportedly on screens in front of US president Barack Obama with outright fear over what comes next.
"The whole thing seemed like an intelligence operation lifted straight out of '24' (a TV series about US counter-terrorism agents)," said Huang Mei, a TV producer with barely concealed awe. "How advanced and confident they must be to ask their president to watch the killing mission on screens live!"
But some see bin Laden's demise as a blow to efforts to promote a school of Anti-American thought.
"The great anti-America fighter bin Laden was murdered by the US! How sad!" wrote one commenter on Sina's popular Weibo micro-blogging site.
"Is this real? Excellent!" wrote another of the news. "Now the only terrorist left is the United States!"
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