Bin Laden is dead, official

[August]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

Strange how there's no consistency here. Obama inherits the worst recession in decades and the right wingers immediately start screeching about how he needs to stop blaming Bush. But now two and a half years into his presidency the majority of the credit for taking down Osama is due to a guy who hasn't cared about him for 9 years?

You can't have it both ways.

Your argument boils down to"If you don't like Oranges you have no right to dislike Apples".

Candidate Obama promised the immediate closure of the Gitmo prison but a couple years later he ends up using information gained through the interrogation of it's detainees to go after bin Laden.

Apparently he can have it both ways right?

[AVGWarhawk]

Strange how there's no consistency here. Obama inherits the worst recession in decades and the right wingers immediately start screeching about how he needs to stop blaming Bush. But now two and a half years into his presidency the majority of the credit for taking down Osama is due to a guy who hasn't cared about him for 9 years?

You can't have it both ways.

Inherited worst recession that was helped along by a Democratic Congress. So yes, he needs to stop blaming Bush. I give no credit to Obama or Bush. It was the guys who went in and did the job they trained for.

[Bakkels]

Originally Posted by August

Your argument boils down to"If you don't like Oranges you have no right to dislike Apples".

Candidate Obama promised the immediate closure of the Gitmo prison but a couple years later he ends up using information gained through the interrogation of it's detainees to go after bin Laden.

Apparently he can have it both ways right?

His argument makes sense, but you choose to ignore it. Aside from that you bring up a point . Obama promised to close down Gitmo in a year.
However, how can you close a prison who's prisoners were deliberately not given any status? What were they? Criminals, suspects, prisoners of war? They were given no status whatsoever, so they could be treated in whatever way their capturers saw fit.
Closing down a facility like that is nearly impossible. And Obama hugely overplayed his hand by saying that he could close Gitmo in a year.
But does failing to clean up the mess your predecessor left you with, make you a worse president? I don't think so.

[mookiemookie]

Originally Posted by August

Your argument boils down to"If you don't like Oranges you have no right to dislike Apples".

Candidate Obama promised the immediate closure of the Gitmo prison but a couple years later he ends up using information gained through the interrogation of it's detainees to go after bin Laden.

Apparently he can have it both ways right?

So if Gitmo was such a godsend (and believe me, I hold it against Obama that he did not stay true to his word and close it down) then why did Bush do nothing with the intelligence gathered there? It's because he didn't care about bin Laden, as he said so. Don't get it twisted - Bush, by his own admission, DID NOT CARE about bin Laden.

[tater]

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/osama-...ry?id=13544154

Either the admin are morons, or this information is useless. Else we'd not know about it, cause publishing it is, well, dumb.

Regarding mookie's post:

Strange how there's no consistency here. Obama inherits the worst recession in decades and the right wingers immediately start screeching about how he needs to stop blaming Bush. But now two and a half years into his presidency the majority of the credit for taking down Osama is due to a guy who hasn't cared about him for 9 years?

You can't have it both ways.

It's not like Obama has enacted any policies to stop the government hemorrhaging money. During the election democrats rightfully bashed Bush overspending, then Obama goes on to spend more into the red in a couple years than Bush did in 8.

Obama took out OBL. I give him credit for that, but he's a showboat, and makes everything about himself. He's the least self-deprecating president in a long time. The intel came about in part because of stuff he himself claims to be very much against. The very framework that allowed the raid was built by Bush for the Global War On Terror.

When OBL disappeared, in order to continue the rest of the fight, it was politically expedient to send the message that OBL was a bit player, marginalized. Its not like the US started ignoring intel on OBL, it's just that they wanted public perception to be that it was not the be all and end all, else every day without nailing him looks like a failure.

You can argue Iraq, but the reality is that AQIraq became (after we invaded) the principle theater of action for AQ. Their humiliating defeat in Iraq dealt AQ a serious blow. Even Sunnis rose up to eject them. What happened to AQ in Iraq was as unforeseen by them as the US response to 9-11 was (it's clear from OBLs statements before 9-112 he expected some tomahawks and a subpoena as a US response).

Regardless, the bulk of credit goes to Obama cause it's on his watch. Still, a better man would have talked less about himself, and more about everyone else.

Credit for the botched handling of the post-OBL information is all Obama, though.

Seriously, they are not showing pictures, but they ARE leaking information about the intel they gathered? WTF? Anything they even mention to the press is instantly NON-actionable. Ideally they'd have bumped off OBL (or interrogated him, then bumped him off), and kept it quiet while they used the intel to kill bad guys. Every time they open their mouths about all the great intel they got in the raid they lose---unless they got crap, and are trying to get the bad guys to move so we can catch them in a mistake.

[tater]

Yeah, I know, it's the daily mail. So sue me...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...rn-leader.html

Interesting story. The idea is that Zawahiri intentionally tipped the US off because: "The courier who led U.S. forces to Bin Laden was a Pakistani national working for Zawahiri, according to the source."

The claim made in the paper is that they knew he'd be tailed...

Assume that the story is NOT true, but is planted by the US. Might cause some AQ to be rather miffed with their new leader, no?

It's plausible if true, and either way it might create a good civil war in AQ.

[August]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

So if Gitmo was such a godsend (and believe me, I hold it against Obama that he did not stay true to his word and close it down) then why did Bush do nothing with the intelligence gathered there?

I wouldn't exactly call it a Godsend but nothing? I wouldn't call putting our people on the trail that eventually led to the most wanted man on the planet "nothing". But whatever, Obama has no problem taking both advantage and credit for something he and you have publicly opposed so I guess I shouldn't be surprised that you would get so upset over a silly political cartoon.

[Aramike]

Just to interject slightly regarding this article: After a week of debilitating strikes at targets across Afghanistan, the Taliban repeated an offer to hand over Osama bin Laden, only to be rejected by President Bush.

The offer yesterday from Haji Abdul Kabir, the Taliban's deputy prime minister, to surrender Mr bin Laden if America would halt its bombing and provide evidence against the Saudi-born dissident was not new but it suggested the Taliban are increasingly weary of the air strikes, which have crippled much of their military and communications assets.

I just have one question for you, mookie: What on earth makes you think it would be wise to give AN ENEMY so-called "evidence" of Osama's guilt, when such evidence could give away intelligence tools and capabilities with it?

As August said, it was a stalling tactic. In fact, it was questionable whether or not the Taliban even had the capacity to do so. http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles...iveuposama.htm

[Pelle71]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjtNiTm99e8 Look at the hole interviev. Very intressting!

That Taiban offer was viewed by everyone at the time as just a stalling tactic.

That Taliban offer was the offer the people running any nation would give. If you want them to hand over a suspect then you hand over some evidence to show you have a case.
It does of course lead to complications as asking a government to extradite someone would imply that you have some recognition of that government.
But anyway if it was a stalling tactic what where they supposed to be stalling?
If they were just trying to stall the ongoing bombing why was the offer the same as before the bombing had started?

What on earth makes you think it would be wise to give AN ENEMY so-called "evidence" of Osama's guilt, when such evidence could give away intelligence tools and capabilities with it?

Someones working on a long run of guesswork. At the time of the first request the Taliban were not deemed AN ENEMY, they became AN ENEMY when they didn't hand him over.
And Wow they might find out that the world superpower has really extensive intelligence capabilities.

In fact, it was questionable whether or not the Taliban even had the capacity to do so.

Oh no, he is linking to a wingnut loony who thinks Bin Ladens frozen corpse has just been wheeled out of storage for Obama to get a popularity boost and the whole al-qaida thing is really a scare story created by the Whitehouse branch of the secret world government

Yeah, I know, it's the daily mail. So sue me...

But it might be true, Glen Beck is also running with that theory

[MH]

Originally Posted by Tribesman

But it might be true, Glen Beck is also running with that theory

Reading your post make me think that GB is maybe correct

[MH]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

So if Gitmo was such a godsend (and believe me, I hold it against Obama that he did not stay true to his word and close it down) then why did Bush do nothing with the intelligence gathered there? It's because he didn't care about bin Laden, as he said so. Don't get it twisted - Bush, by his own admission, DID NOT CARE about bin Laden.

Another case of deep reasoning.

[MH]

Originally Posted by Bakkels

His argument makes sense, but you choose to ignore it. Aside from that you bring up a point . Obama promised to close down Gitmo in a year.
However, how can you close a prison who's prisoners were deliberately not given any status? What were they? Criminals, suspects, prisoners of war? They were given no status whatsoever, so they could be treated in whatever way their capturers saw fit.
Closing down a facility like that is nearly impossible. And Obama hugely overplayed his hand by saying that he could close Gitmo in a year.
But does failing to clean up the mess your predecessor left you with, make you a worse president? I don't think so.

Maybe its one thing to shout election propaganda and another when you are the president.
When all info is available to you.

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by Pelle71

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjtNiTm99e8 Look at the hole interviev. Very intressting!

Alex Jones? Really?

[joea]

Originally Posted by Dowly

Alex Jones? Really?

Russia Today's favourite American pundit.

Can't open the link for some reason.