Just Words

Perfect timing.  As the US prepares to try KSM out pops the former CIA chief of clandestine services Jose Rodriquez with his story on waterboarding.  It'll be on 60 Minutes on Sunday, along with an extensive investigative series about the racist railroading of George Zimmerman by ABC, NBC and CNN.  Ok, just kidding about that last part.

Rodriquez appears a salty ole CIA dog, saying KSM didn't give a 'rat's ass' about his waterboarding adventures and exclaiming 'bullshit' when told that their interrogation of Abu Zubaydah was a dead end that wasted resources.  Apparently he will go on to make the point that Obama is just killing these guys now instead of pouring water and on them and providing a diet of 'Ensure', asking which is more ethical.   It'll be interesting to see if Leslie Stahl has an answer.

Meanwhile, as 60 Minutes takes the opportunity to bash Bush again for torturing terrorists who killed 3000 people on 9/11 a federal judge has denied Larry Klayman's lawsuit against the government to force the release of the bin Laden shot-in-the-head pictures.  Nothing, despite earlier teases.   So we can't see the people jumping from the towers; we can't see the Mohammad cartoons; and we can't see any pictures of the world's most wanted terrorist-enabler in a toes up position to give everyone closure that he's really gone.  But we can talk endlessly about how cruel and "Orwellian" the Bush boys were for trying to figure out what bin Laden was going to blow up next.

Speaking of UBL his entourage of women and children were 'deported' out of Pakistan today, sent to the airport and put on a plane to Saudi Arabia--"their choice".   So the country of origin to most of the hijackers didn't want the body but were willing to take the family.   Evidently Yemen was too dangerous right now.

Speaking of women related to terrorists and Yemen, came across this story from 2007 recently, posted 40 days after Saddam was hung.  Hey just thinking here, we saw pictures of Saddam's sons shot all to hades and we saw pictures of Zarqawi after a bombing.  There were pictures of Saddam coming out of his hole and internet video at the end of his rope.  But maybe those were necessary during Bushitler's time to assuage the disbelieving media.  Imagine Cheney coming out and saying 'we got UBL, but we aren't going to show you any proof'.  Guffaws all around!

Anyway, the story about bin Laden's ancestral home features Saddam's daughter Raghad, apparently still wanted by Interpol and Iraq's new government while hiding in plain sight in Jordan with a bunch of daddy's money.  Or maybe she's just too knowledgeable to be caught.  She talks about the good old days of good will between Saddam's Iraq and Uncle Saleh's Yemen, then goes on to quote her father:      

She recited her father's last will which says, "I am happy because I will meet Allah and Saddam Hussain never haggled for his head...", concluding her speech by reading the slogan which her father Saddam was using. "Allah is greater, long live Iraqi people, long live free Palestine, Allah is greater, long live Jihad and Jihadists," shouted Raghad.

So there you go, the scotch drinking apostate who could never work with terrorists used his last printed words to praise jihad.  It's also ironic that 5 years later Saleh and Gaddafi are gone along with Mubarak, yet we know almost nothing about the connection of any of those regimes to Saddam's.  Hmm.   Well, at least they're all gone and the overseas contingency operation is 'over'.   Did we win? 

MORE  4/27/12

Breitbart is all over the memo discovered by Time regarding Admiral McRaven being given the strategic mission to get UBL, suggesting that it takes away the guts from Obam'as gutsy call.   Now, it's true that Obama might have thrown the Admiral under the bus had the mission gone horribly wrong--assuming it would have ever been a story in the first place--but this piece seems petty.

The gutsy part of the gutsy call was snatching Pakistan's cash cow, who was basically under house arrest, from under their noses.  That's not the kind of thing that if going awry gets credibly blamed on one Admiral.

As to Obama's claim that Romney wouldn't have been as gutsy, pure fluff, but it does show Obama's willing to spike the man-caused disaster football as much as it takes.   It also begs some questions posed by Slick Willie the narrator (who remember, tried harder than anyone to get bin Laden).

1)  Clinton said about the SEALS, "suppose they'd been captured or killed"?  By whom?  The CIA had cased the house for months. They would have known whether the place was an AQ garrison or a safe-house.  Obviously they considered it the latter and didn't think the SEALS would come up against a large resistance force.   If he means by the Pakistanis, why?  They are our allies in the GWoT! 

2)  "I cannot in good conscience do nothing; he took the harder and more honorable path" said Slick of O.   As opposed to what, hearing that UBL was there and NOT going in?  Considering the 'downsides', which would be worse, being told UBL was there and not going in, or being told he was there and going in only to fail and lose several troops?  I think the American people would have an easy answer to that question. 

3)  As to the Romney charge, well the same can be said of Clinton's wife and McCain, who both objected vigorously to Obama's promise to go after targets behind enemy lines in Pakistan if actionable intelligence was received.  And wow, that's exactly what occurred.   So it's not surprising Obama's doing some end-zone dancing.  Still, the political charge is specious because Romney never said he wouldn't go after UBL if actionable intel was received, he was simply responding to the idea that the entire WoT focused on getting one man.  But the ad isn't targeted to people who understand nuance.