Osama Dead!
 

Good job to the US military, our President, and our government officials!

HOORAH!!

There is no reason to believe this or think that it will change anything. The whole war on terror has been built on lies.

When we get out of Iraq, Afghanistan and now Libya, I will begin to care.

This could be the final straw that breaks the Afganistan war's back, so to speak. Bin Laden is dead, al Qaeda is out of Afghanistan, and the Taliban has had its nose bloodied rather significantly. There's nothing more to be gained there and it's time the United States concentrates on fixing our own house.

Yep, wake me up when we start pulling troops

Terrorism is a hydra. If anything, this will create more work.

Good job Obama, the covert ops and intelligence agencies.

It will most likely fracture the different terrorist groups more, but it will allow the US military to shift their mission hopefully.

Now that that is over with, maybe i can travel a little more freely now and maybe everyones civil rights can be restored. somehow i dont think so.

if he was killed a week ago now, find it a little peculiar that news leaked exacly a week ago that if he was killed that members of AQ woulf unleash a nuclear bomb in europe. Possibly a case of our governments readying us for this possibility?

i wonder if they will give him back to his family for a dignified funeral.

Good riddance. Hopefully terrorists won't try any new plots in retaliation.

I am not convinced this will make much difference, unless it means that the US will now stand down its operations. Let's face it, the hunt for bin Laden hasn't been the focus of Afghanistan for some time now and Iraq has never been about it ever. As for Libya... also unrelated.

I don't think this will make a difference at all.

Well like one commenter was saying (don't know who it was): Osama's death is more iconic than it is tactical. The biggest impact will probably be on the mood of Americans.

It will bode well for Obama's re-election.

im indifferent.

It was bound to happen whether it was at the hands of his enemies or of natural causes. he's rather have been killed by his enemies anyways. it fulfills his ultimate aim.

i wonder what the mood will be like outside. im inclined to believe that here it would be just another day.

I do not understand why it is alright for USA to go and kill someone and its worth celebrating and yet if anyone else does it it is called murder.

I understand the man did some horrible things in his life, but what happened to that whole trial thing.

Kinda hard to do the whole trial thing when they're shooting back atcha.

A proud and admitted murderer. I'm glad he's dead. A trial would just be theater. Twenty years of appeals on technical and procedural grounds...
This kind of thing is never pretty, probably violated Bin Laden's civil rights, and I suspect the homegrown "USA is never right" crowd that inhabits TFP politics will be out in full force.:shakehead:

Lindy

Osama Bin Laden helped orchestrate some of the more terrible acts of terrorism in the world. Not just WTC, but also on 2 U.S. embassies in Africa. While I abhor everything he was, did, and stood for, I will not celebrate his death. I am relieved that there is one less mass killer in the world. What I will celebrate is the fact that he will not be around to assist in any more killings.

Regarding the trial aspect. I do not have the source, but I do remember reading awhile back that if Osama was captured he would be tried and if/when convicted, sentenced to Gitmo or some other appropriate military installation. From the civilian aspect, he getting killed would be no different from a shootout with police/swat during a drug raid. From the military aspect, according to the reports, he was shooting at military personnel and therefore a viable target.

does this mean that colossal joke they call the "war on terror" is over now?

while reports come in thick and fast, i cant help but notice how similar the case of Osama is to that of Saddam.

replace Saddam with Osama, and replace the Shias with Americans. The amount of celebration and gloating is no different than when saddam was hung. I prefer to celebrate life rather than death.

does this mean that neo-fascism is not ok now?

I had some discomfort with the way Saddam was paraded and executed in a 'trial,' but for Osama, who was responsible for the deaths of 5,000-plus American civilians, so be it.

Taking Osama down feels more personal to me, and one shouldn't blame Americans for feeling vindicated.

its not about vindication.

my point is that no one needs to celebrate the taking of a life. sure, theres relief, and theres closure and all the feelings that come with it. but celebrations and fireworks? how is that better than the palestinians that danced in the street on the morning of the 11th of September 2001?

regardless of where you stand in the spectrum, this is my take

Quran 5:32 - we ordained for the Children of Israel that if any one slew a person, it would be As if He slew the whole people: and if any one saved a life, it would be As if He saved the life of the whole people

I posted my thoughts elsewhere, but I'll put them here as well.

I admit I was more taken with the discovery of the Air France black box than I was with the death by special forces of OBL. The former was a wonder of technical expertise and exploration of the depths of the ocean. The latter was a very meticulous and well performed series of actions by an array of clever and dangerous people. The black box recovery was a more positive result than the death of a wealthy fanatic.

The guy is dead. Killed in a firefight. DNA'd & buried at sea. Finis. The fallout from this, like the rest of the trainwreck that is fundamentalist interaction, will go on for a while until another set of horrors overlays our current mess.

"buried according to islamic traditions"? what a bunch of bollocks!

ive never heard of an islamic funeral at sea. the only tradition that the US wanted to adhere to it seems was that 'two suns should not fall on the dead'. which basically means that the dead need to be buried within 24hrs.

their justification is that no one wanted to bury him in their land. seriously?!?!?
according to islamic traditions the dead need to be buried in the land they died. according to islamic traditions the dead need to be buried in a while in the ground layed on bare earth.
according to islamic traditions the dead are washed, shrouded and taken to the mosque for the funeral prayers
.............
according to islamic traditions, bodies are not discarded at sea.

i find this very strange that the US would discard his body at sea when they can have the possibility of exhuming him later for further evidence. i find it really strange because this will raise more questions than it will solve.

for all we know, bin laden was disposed of at sea because the ship's refrigerator he's been stored in for the past 8 years broke down.

i don't see anything interesting in this. i found it interesting that the infotainment was understood as important enough to warrant it coming up in the 9th inning of the phillies unfortunate loss to the mets. like something from "the harder they come" really.

i'm hoping that this is a final bit of punctuation on the pathetic story of the "war on terror" and the collective lurch toward some nitwit neo-fascism that it engendered.
i'm hoping that the end of that story will open up space for a rethinking of priorities in the united states.
maybe we will see the beginning of the dismantling of the national security state finally and a reallocation of resources away from killing people in great number in the name of freedom and other such words toward developing approaches to making people's lives better.

sadly it won't mean the end of meathead jingoism.
but one can hope for that too.

UBL is dead... hey we've got the DNA and physical descriptions. He may be fish-food or spending some quality time with "interrogators" (he's "dead" right...anything goes). Either way I'm fine with the outcome, the latter would bear more useful fruit.

observation - It's amazing how all the college students suddenly appeared in Time Square. Weren't they like 8 years old in 2001? Orchestrations make good TV and boost failing approval ratings at critical moments. Everyone does it, so that wouldn't be such a surprise. If it was a natural reaction to the event, then I'm glad to see such spontaneous outpourings of national pride. However, I'm afraid it may be playing much like "American Extremism" to the international crowd... much like the celebrations post 9/11 seen in the Arab/Islamic World. We need to be better. I see what's handed to us, let's see what's in the other hand.

This.

That.

Hil-Rod said it best today:

Hillary Clinton’s Remarks on bin Laden’s Death - Washington Wire - WSJ

Today is a good day for all of those needing more closure to the painful events of 9/11. All Americans can be proud of the CIA and the men and women putting their lives at risk in the war on terror.

With all due respect to your much greater knowledge of all things, particularly Islam, I do offer this from the Al-Islam.org site:

Rules about Burial of the Dead Body

If this is correct, there are exceptions allowed to tradition. Now, that being said, respect for Islam or tradition probably had very little to do with it, and desire to mollify Muslims worldwide was probably paramount - they found a "loophole" that met their desire to put the body where no one would ever know, and used it.

if you read my post in the other thread, you will notice that what i have said is in fact consistant with islamic principles. click here --> http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/2898093-post42.html

ive read your link and theres nothing in there that conflicts with what i have said. The first option is always to bury the deceased in the ground. if that is not possible, then you can consider other options. The option to bury at sea is precedent set, based on whether or not the first criteria is met.

the bit you are referring to is here.


here is what Al Azhar University, Islams oldest centre of learning has said about Osamas Burial at sea

As I said, I bow to your greater knowledge... no offense was intended. Basically, I agree that the burial at sea was solely for the benefit of the US, but that the "exceptions" formed their rationalisation that it would be acceptable to Muslims worldwide.

i would like to merely note the obvious absurdity of this official story. thank you.
islamabad is not near the north arabian sea.

Agreed. Call me tin-foil hatted, but...."WE GOT HIM! THEN DUMPED HIM IN TO THE SEA!"

So odd. You'd think they'd at least snap a couple of pictures.

Oh, I'm sure they have pictures. The Arab world is not going to believe he's dead without photographic evidence.

I truly hope they stuffed a pigs cock in his ass before they delivered him to be fish food, kinda hard to meet your virgins in heaven with a pig penis in your ass.

As symbolic as his ass waxing was, maybe now the U.S. will realize that Pakistan and the likes are not our friends, we should pull all aid to the rest of the world and give the more to the leeches here in the US.

thanks for that delightful civilization-optional commentary, recon. it's always good to know where the bottom of the barrel is.

i guess recon hasnt heard that there isnt any 72 virgins, and that the hadith that this theory is derived from is considered weak by the hadith experts.

if they did do that to him, then i want to see pictures dammit! no wonder they gave him a brisk funeral.

greywolf, im but a mere servant of TFP ;)

Civilization-optional Roach? You always crack me the hell up. Sip some more of that intellectual better than thou special green tea, you must drink up there in your ivory tower. Oh I have your fuking bottom of the barrel right here book boy, OBL needed a bullet in the eye, this country NEEDED to put a bullet in his face, now that it is over with you can go back to your we all need to frolic in the dewy meadow together shit.

Now back to your original marxist tfp programing.

OUT

No dignity at Ground Zero | Mona Eltahawy | Comment is free | The Guardian

frat boys with imaginary guns.

why stop at jettisoning civilization. you might as well throw your dignity out the window at the same time.

fuck yeah america.

i know i'm just another new guy here but come on guys, Jazz just had a big thing about talking shit to other members. if you want to go ahead and get kicked off of TFP, be my guest, but don't be surprised if it happens

after reading this

Administration Backs Off Tale Of Osama Bin Laden Using Wife As Human Shield | TPMMuckraker

if it is indeed true that bin laden wasnt armed, should the military have taken him alive? and if so, should they have read him his miranda rights?

i know we've touched on this topic a while back, but in light of these new events, i thought id bring this up again.

You know, the Geneva Convention states that captured non-war combatants must be given procedural protections (hence the establishment of military tribunals). Now, whether those procedural protections necessarily entail miranda is another question, especially when you consider the extra-territoriality of the actions and the non-US citizen.

I think yes, the US should have tried to capture him--both for intelligence value and to show the world that the US still believes in justice, equality, rule of law yadda yadda. The end result would probably be the same though. A dead Osama. One would have probably just taken 14 years and 5 appeals.

But the US doesn't believe in justice, equality or rule of law. That's why so many folks are positively thrilled about that OBL died in the way that he did.

Yea...actually...if you take a look at the tons of 42 USC 1983 Federal Tort Claims Act suits brought against state actors....then, you may realize this government's rule of law is far stronger than other states.

Not to mention, other countries are fully exploiting weaker countries too. (I.e. China and Africa, and squalid working conditions, shoddy workmanship, bribery, etc.)

which is why it takes so long to prosecute anyone in this country right? if anything, i think that the US is overly concerned with doling out the perfect amount of justice to the point where a 10 year trial is worse than the sentence. it shouldn't be "well you broke the law.. uhmmm... 25 years!" but something closer to those lines than the current "check every book on law ever written before reaching a verdict" for the sake that making sure that the criminal can be punished with the closest approximation of justice (with actual deliberation, just not for years), in the shortest amount of time possible.
please go on, are you talking about equality of opportunity or equality of outcome?
isn't the US the country with (one of) the most cases of litigation in the world? if anything the rule of law in the US is sacred to all Americans if for nothing else, it gives them one more thing to sue over, but i think there's more to it that just raking in capital with lawsuits (...hopefully), people really do want justice to be done.

Well, except for the precedent set by Obama, whereby we "look forward" instead of look into all of the possible war crimes, including illegal domestic spying and torture, committed by previous administrations.


Really? You think that a nation whose prison population is heavily weighted by people guilty of the victimless crime of drug possession is one that is overly concerned with justice?

Is there anyone who actually believes that opportunity and success are doled out indiscriminately in the US? Even if the idea didn't defy decades worth of descriptive statistics, the most cursory thought experiment would reveal why the idealized notion of equality peddled in 9th grade civics textbooks is unattainable.

See admitted crimes of previous administration.

Also, most folks support the rule of law only when it comes to laws that don't adversely affect them. I don't think you'll find much support for the rule of law on the freeway, where typical speeds routinely exceed the legal speed limit. This is a microcosm of the average person's respect for the rule of law: laws are difficult to pay attention to if they aren't displayed in front of a backdrop of significant consequences.

i wasn't arguing over whether drug possession is legal or not filtherton, i was talking about the process of justice (gathering evidence, consulting previous related cases etc...). whether drug possession's criminal status is just or not is a discussion for another thread, another time.



uh yeah i'm pretty sure everyone who collects welfare is glad that the people who are very successful are being taxed so that they, the welfare collectors, are included in getting a slice of the money pie.

i'm not talking about communism dude, i'm talking about tightening (not to be confused with closing) the gap between the rich and the poor, the elite and the disenfranchised, coke and pepsi drinkers alike!



last i checked, speeding tickets are still issued by the hundreds of thousands every year. i dont know where you drive, but in rural south dakota, where the cops are very very very far and few in between, people dont drive more than 5 over the speed limit. maybe the problem isnt with the laws, but with the people who are breaking them

Alright Filtherton. Give me the specific statutes/treaties/articles and the manners in which the administration tortured people. Feel free to cite newspapers, and cases. Also make sure that the acts you cite are indeed torture, and prosecutable, punishable offenses.

TESTIFY!KirStang... TESTIFY!!!

...

i was talking about the whole demanding solid evidence part

this is funny. the trick is that bush administration officials constructed a definition of "harsh interrogation techniques" that are classified them as somehow not torture even though by any standard they are torture---but there's been no prosecution of any of these people for their actions---because of that whole "looking forward" thing---so there's been no legal frame established in the context of which the bush administration's (to my mind) bogus arguments have been demolished.

personally, i would like to see bush and rumsfeld and the yoo and adelman (is that his name? i can't remember) hauled up in front of the international war crimes tribunal. but that won't happen because in reality the only real war crime is losing a war.

and the united states lacks the ethics and/or "political will" to self-correct.

interesting developments. more reports coming out that osama wasnt armed.

Osama bin Laden unarmed when killed by US commandos, says White House | Courier Mail

im yet to read a report that said that bin laden or anyone inside that compound shot at the navy seals. is a firefight considered a firefight if only one side is shooting?

maybe some of the more knowledgeable guys here might shed some light, what are the US rules of engagement in this case?

this is something to consider, should you get all caught up in that fuck yeah thing:

How Osama bin Laden perverted US justice | Karen Greenberg | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

As a past poster said I am relieved but not particularly thrilled he is dead.

I find the whole buried at sea shit to be... weird at best. I cannot imagine having neither video or film.

I don't know personally what really went down in that house.

However, you don't have to shoot back to be a combatant.

There are many, many instances of high-level AQ guys and their bodyguards sleeping with suicide vests on, living in houses rigged with explosives (look up Tony Yost for an example), and other threats that may not present as a visible weapon.

When someone moves in an aggressive manner after being told to lay down and not move they will most likely get shot on a high-risk target.

The fact they did not kill everyone (or even most of the people) implies they were discriminating targets and not just blazing away.

slims---what do you think the deal is with the official story about this? why so many bizarre-o details? why so much moving around of them?

the decision to dump the body in the ocean is still excedingly strange. apparently no-one is buying the "respect for custom" line since he would have had to die aboard a ship for there to be such a custom.

my freezer malfunction joke seems more plausible by the day...

Okay, I guess that I mistakenly thought you were replying to the quoted text immediately above your musings about the "process of justice". I don't really see what your response about the "process of justice" has to do with anything I said.



We're all welfare collectors. Anyone who thinks that they haven't benefited immensely from the generosity of their fellow taxpayer isn't paying attention.

I have no idea what you're talking about.

You know that driving 5 mph over the speed limit is against the law? The only reason people do it is because there is this idea that the police won't pull you over if you're only going 5 mph above the speed limit. This is the very definition of casual disrespect for the rule of law.


Well, I'm not going to look up and argue statutes with someone in law school. You win, dude, no contest. I do think that when it comes to bullshitting on the internet, I'm pretty good, so hear me out.

Here's what I know: The previous administration enacted a policy of extrajudicial torture. I'm no legal scholar, but I bet it's illegal. The previous administration enacted or ramped up the practice of extrajudicially exporting detainees to be tortured in other countries. Again, I'm no Johnnie Cochran, but I would probably get arrested if I tried doing the same thing. The previous administration tapped the wires of American citizens without getting the proper warrants. I don't have a statute to cite here, but I'd be willing to bet that it isn't legal.

I also know that the general attitude of Bush seemed to be that of "I don't give a damn about the law, I'll do whatever the hell I think I need to do to accomplish my policy goals." While there likely isn't anything illegal about having this attitude, one might expect such an outlook would be associated with a certain amount of active disrespect for the rule of law. Legal opinions may vary here.

Maybe you think Bush's administration didn't break the law at all, that he'd never engage or enact policies that were counter to the laws of our land. You are certainly entitled to your opinion. I think that such a view is incomprehensible, but perhaps technically sound given the fact that the Bush administration seem to be able to find someone with a JD capable of formulating complex legal arguments to justify the legality everything they wanted to do. A given action can't be illegal if the lawyers at the justice department say it isn't illegal, right? Plus, it'd be nearly impossible to find a lawyer capable of coming up with convincing arguments in support of premises which aren't completely true ;) so there's no way people like John Yoo could be wrong.

But I guess when it comes down to it, Bush probably didn't do anything illegal. A person obviously hasn't broken any laws until they've been convicted of breaking those laws and it's impossible to be convicted of a crime if the people responsible for investigating and prosecuting that crime have decided that they aren't going to investigate anyt of the possibly criminal activities because they want to continue engaging in them.


edit: snarkiness was a part of my bullshitting on the internet paradigm. No disrespect was actually intended.

i was merely trying to steer the conversation away from drug possession (however the hell it even got to that)


my mistake i should've clarified. i was talking about the people who get unemployment benefits/checks, because i sure as hell don't.



equality



i suppose it depends on how you look at it. one could say "the limit is the limit! 1 over is breaking the law! CITATIONS FOR EVERYONE!!" (maybe i got a little carried away). on the other hand, one could notice "hey, they were going down a hill and they weren't trying to weave in and out of traffic like Vin Diesel or those other two nobodies from the F&F franchise, they were obviously sticking close to the speed limit enough to realize one was there and that they were obeying it". can we agree its a matter of perspective?

I understand the consternation about protocol and justice and what have you, but I also think that killing him was the right thing to do. We saw what kind of fiasco the trial of KSM has been (and continues to be); bin Laden would be that x1000. A bullet in the head helped avoid the biggest media circus in history

Drug possession hadn't been brought up yet. I was talking about your response in #46. Can you clarify what your response about justice had to do with anything that I said? Why did your response to my claim that the US lacked respect for justice so closely resemble the last half of a really lame Law and Order episode?


I'm lost. What does this (or odd, poorly constructed digs at welfare recipients) have to do with the US' lack of equal opportunity?

Well, you're somewhat cryptic. Why not just come out with what you're trying to get at instead of talking about communism or cola factions?


No. The speed limit is a pretty clear concept. You are either going over it or under it. This isn't as complicated as the definition of "is". I don't know that I would want someone to be driving if their ability to manage their speed was foiled by a hill.

find the first post where drug possession is mentioned. it seemed like discussion was going down a dark alley to get violently threadjacked.

i'm not poking fun of or trying to humiliate people who get the welfare check. i was illustrating the point that the welfare system is a form of... get ready to google these next three words... equality of outcome.

+1 for clinton reference. well i guess if we can't agree to the fact that its a "by individual" basis that people follow the law, then thats kind of proving the point isnt it? you see it one way and i see it another. its a matter of perspective

apologies for not using the quote feature, i dont want to type "/quote" anymore

---------- Post added at 06:18 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:15 PM ----------

but my bottom line is that the US does believe in justice, equality, and the rule of law (within reason)

LOL, within reason.....either they do, or they don't, none of this, when it's convienient tothem to believe in it......

I googled it. I had no idea it was a formal concept. I'm pretty sure that neither equality of outcome or equality of opportunity are a high priority for anyone with any amount of policy-making power.

Well, everything is a matter of perspective. However, that issue is entirely different than indifference to the law or overt contempt for the law. I think that most people have their own set of rules that they follow when the risk of legal consequences are small.

I'm sure that Moamar Qadafi also believes in justice, equality, and the rule of law ... *drumroll* ... within reason. As certain justice department lawyers have shown, reason is easy to come by when it comes to tossing out the type of rights and responsibilities Americans used to have cause to take for granted.

within reason, to me, means something that a cop can let you off with a warning on. none of this "johnny citizen" or "homocidal maniac" duality

There is the idealism behind justice, equality, and the rule of law, and then there is the practical and unavoidable reality.

The disparity between American idealism and American realities is a gap wide enough to sail the USS Carl Vinson through.

Quit beating around the bush and be a man, recon... tell us what you really think! ;)

Well, the cop can let you off for whatever s/he wants. They have a lot of discretion. In larger terms, this is exactly what happened when Obama decided he wanted to be "forward thinking" with respect to the possible crimes of the previous administration. He used his capacity for reason to come to the conclusion that crime or not, he wasn't going to do anything about any potential criminal acts.

We also use the reason card to completely toss out notions of the rule of law, justice and equality when it comes to dealing with various dictators around the world.

I think the official story is changing because our relationship with Pakistan is changing....Quickly.

I think we straight up went in and killed Osama on a Pakistani Army Cantonment area, in a compound built by ISI deliberately to hide him. The direct implication is that the Pakistani Government supported, sheltered and hid Osama for years while accepting huge sums of money from the United States to 'look for him'. UBL was not inactive, just marginalized due to the necessity to maintain a degree of separation from his organization, so if what I wrote above turns out to be true then the PK government was also allowing him to control Al Qaeda operations... That may very well turn the American public so far against PK that we pull all our support and aid money.

President Obama is nothing if not political, so he very well may have initially shaped the narrative in a more positive light for Pakistan in the hopes that they would accept it as both a warning and an olive branch. The story that initially came out would have allowed PK to save face publicly, kept the US population from becoming enraged, and would have been private leverage for the president to hold over Pakistan in order to push for actual cooperation.

It seems we have released more and more information roughly synchronized with Pakistani government statements. The more the PK government backs away from the raid and condemns it the more we publish regarding PK's complete lack of cooperation in the raid, the fact that they have repeatedly burned CT targets when information was shared in the past, and some choice details such as the fact that the house was actually on the grounds of the military cantonment....

There is, I am sure another factor at work here that has nothing to do with politics but rather the confusion that always happens in a fight. It takes time to sort through the details of exactly what happened. The guys on the ground involved in the action will often remember bits and pieces with big gaps or chronological errors. It is normal for the initial situation reports that are sent up from the objective to be incomplete or wildly inaccurate. It is not anyones intention to get things wrong, but shit happens when adrenaline is up.

Then during the debriefings it probably became clear that some of the initial impressions were inaccurate and we began backing away from the unintentional mis-truths.

I think it was a genius move to bury the body at sea.... It solves many of the problems that would have accompanied any burial. It prevents a spot on the ground from becoming a 'shrine' to that ideology, removes the liability and continuing expenses that would be incurred by any country that hosted his body, and got rid of him before huge riots, etc. could be organized.

I think what we meant by handled in the Muslim tradition is that a Mullah was allowed to give a prayer, the body was cleaned, and the burial took place within 24 hours of the death...That is enough to prevent widespread accusations of impropriety a-la Pershing.

thanks for this, slims.
fascinating account...miles from the domestic framing.

it is interesting the extent to which pakistan as a more-or-less live theater is not central in the presentation of afghanistan. there seems to have been a decision that it's ok to allow the media-image of drift into a kind of busy incoherence, to not have a center. i assume that follows from another decision to basically not try to sell the war. i think the assumption is that the war is simply a fact and has been adequately framed as necessary. but i'm not sure about that.

have to do some stuff...perhaps more later.

This is why I love this forum. So many very good and diverse viewpoints.

Anyway, I thought I'd add more fuel to the fire. Woke up this morning and saw this headline:

New U.S. Account Says Bin Laden Was Unarmed During Raid - NYTimes.com

As Dlish was saying, Osama may have been unarmed when he was shot. I'm sure as Slims stated, this doesn't make him not a threat, but it makes the whole thing less clear cut.

---------- Post added at 10:44 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:43 AM ----------

I also hope the data recovered from his compound leads to the further weakening of Al Qaeda.

I don't believe anything about this Osama assasination. This guy actually worked with Osama during the Soviet war and says he died in 2001. He served as deputy secretary of state under 3 administrations and still works for the Department of Defense today. I'd say he's credible.

Remember the Pat Tillman lies? Remember the WMD lies? Remember how they said we don't torture then we find out that we do torture? Remember how many times the number 2 al qaida guy was killed? Remember Tom Ridge admitting he raised the terror threat level to improve poll numbers?

We can trust NOTHING they say about this war on terror. It's all built on lies.

In evaluating the responses to the death announcement (if not death) of bin Laden, consider the differences between the America many of us knew and post-9/11 America, including the observation below:

Sports, Osama, and the new normal - Opinion - Al Jazeera English

i have thought the use of sports to build consent for this travesty to be utterly nauseating. and even worse than the sportscasters who broke the infotainment were the officially sanctioned moments of maudlin jingo shit that preceded sporty events the next night. made me wonder if there was some kind of co-ordination, since it did not appear one could escape the self-congratulatory horseshit. blech.

but that's not a sickening as the attempt from former bush people to use this to justify torture.

After trawling through this I cannot help but notice No one has posted that if YOU were the Soldier and after months of DANGEROUS covert operations..That if you finnaly..(And i say finally because they didn't catch a taxi there and were escorted in by a bell boy) You got into a room with numerous people,and lets be fair were never more that 6" away from a firearm ... I know I would have just scattered that room!!! Who the hell wants to be remebered as they guy who NEARLY killed OSL but ...ooo bad show old boy better luck .....NEVER!!!!

This probably shouldn't come as any surprise:
White House Won't Release Bin Laden Death Pic | New York Daily News

---------- Post added at 02:57 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:52 PM ----------

If terrorism isn't met with jingoism in equal measure, it would make it appear terrorism is winning. We wouldn't want to make it appear that terrorism is winning. It's bad enough that it actually is.

Weren't we just talking about that justice, equality, and rule of law thing somewhere?

Assuming all of these conditions are correct and nothing is incorrect, you are probably but not definitely right.

Thought I Might be LOL

Celebrating Death? Merkel Comments on Bin Laden Killing Draw Criticism - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International

apparently even a suggestion of american-style flinstone gloating is enough to cause controversy in germany...

Yeah but if OBL had been Jewish...

Sorry couldn't stop myself.

He's trying to explain to you that there are different definitions of "justice" -- each equally valid and valuable to consider.

Some consider "justice" to be following the rules (which seems to be the way you are leaning when you use phrases like "rule of law"). that would mean that OBL should have been captured, tried, and etc. according to pre-defined parameters. The flip-side of that, is that people can "get off" via technical violations or over-sight. That is, sometimes "justice" of that flavor results in no punishment for the offender. More importantly to someone of your political/philpsophical leanings, is that procedural justice does not allow for corrections of social injustice. It doesn't have space for something like an unjust law (competing with your position on unfair drug laws).

You've got a couple mutually exclusive theoretical foundations operating in your assessment. That's one problem.
Law and Order episodes are about the procedural justice side of our legal structures. That's why his response to your procedural justice-ish stance looked like an episode.


"Justice" as an outcome tends to focus on whether the end result is considered appropriate, regardless of the procedure utilized to obtain it. In this specific case, many people consider OBL's actions worthy of death. A trial would only be useful in so far as it becomes a means to that end. To most, it's unnecessary and at worst could be a liability (because regardless of whether they are fair (or "just" in common parlance) our country *does* focus on procedural justice.

This kind of justice doesn't allow the cop to let you go without a ticket simply because you sped up over the speed limit to get your wife to the hospital or to avoid the car accident to your left. It doesn't allow people to refuse to convict the thief who stole a loaf of bread to feed his starving child.

That's the problem with using "justice" willynilly

Nice to see you, smooth. I think that his definition of justice was more along the lines of what I meant when I wrote about the rule of law. Hence, my point about America's over-incarceration of drug users as an example of the US' lack of respect for justice. Drug possession is illegal, and I think this isn't just. I don't think the US is really too concerned with this type of justice, the "making sure motherfuckers get what they deserve" kind. Or, at least we're really bad at it. Or, the other type of justice (rule of law) coupled with corrupt legislative and executive branches makes the "motherfuckers get theirs" type of justice really difficult to pull off. That's even assuming that there's an objective way to dole out to the motherfuckers that which they deserve in appropriate portions.

hmmm...


the way the US position is changing on what actually happened in that compound doesnt really sit well with me. its becoming clearer by the day that the adminstration has masked the true events. his daughter now has said to pakistani intelligence that she saw him be captured alive and then killed, which sounds like an execution style killing more than a firefight. Bin Laden?s daughter confirms her father shot dead by US Special Forces in Pakistan. could the releasing of photos uncover US untruths about this story?


islamic burial? - yeah right.
killed in a firefight? -debunked
holding a hostage? - crap
hiding behind his wife? - bull
holding a weapon? - uh uh
resisted US troops? nup


is it the 'fog of war' or is there more to the story?

Dlish,

Having interviewed asylum applicants (ex-soldiers, torture vics) and other immigrants, and asking them to piece together a coherent, piece by piece story, with absolutely no inconsistencies is difficult, given the extremely emotional nature of their experiences.

While it is unsettling that the story keeps changing (especially the portion about shooting an armed Osama), I think the administration deserves the benefit of the doubt, before we conclude that Bin Laden was executed by some of our most elite soldiers.

In all likelihood, the inconsistencies probably stem more from misconceptions adopted as truth in a rapidly developing situation, rather than a deliberate cover-up by US forces.

Still, my bullsh*t detector pinged at least once or twise. (a) No pictures of the body, citing security reasons (b) quick burial in to water (c) a lot of changing stories. Maybe I'm just a retard know-nothing.

Finally, a 12 year-old daughter claiming that her father was detained then shot in front of the family. In a 2 am raid. I somehow find her credibility lacking.

I guess it will be up to WikiLeaks now.

im wondering if the US will actually give a shit about the UN's request. My guess is that the US will quote national security as an excuse to not provide this information, further deepening the worry that the world has on the US's holier than though attitude

It's strange all the discussion seems dominated by perspectives on the US.

I found i'm more interested about how Osama had lived in Pakistan for so long. And now they are sure that the man to take up his position also lives there. How do we look at Pakistan now?

pakistan has been predictably unpredictable since recent memory, and thats not about to change anytime soon.

between pseudo democracy and the military, as well as islamic militancy and the talibans Pashtun tribal connections to the pakistanis, who the fuck knows whats going on with pakistan. i dont blame the americans for not telling the pakistanis, although it was a major breach of Pakistani soveriegnty.

i dont think ayman al zawahiri is there. the compound has been under surveilance for 9 months. if they were living in the same area, they'd have visited each other and they'd probably both be dead. considering that there is no phone or internet connection to the house, and that zawahiri had not visited OBL for some time, i'd be willing to bet that the AQ network is disjointed at worst.

to be honest, initially when the story broke, i was like..'meh' this was bound to happen, ok lets move on. but with the amount of movement in the information thats been fed to the masses, it's piqued my interest because its telling me that there's more to the story than what's being portrayed.

i personally find it hard to believe the whole islamic burial thing at sea. i dont see the reason for it. he is probably sitting in ice somewhere until someone decides to do something about it.

dish the US doesn't seem to give a crap about the UN unless they agree with and back up some thing we want to do. If not there generally called worthless and ignored.

As far as the story changing I believe I said, after hearing the first press release, it probably happened any way other then the way they described. I figure it's a bout a 95% chance he's actually dead. Dumped at sea... umm no idea, doesn't make a lot of sense... but could be.

so let's summarize, shall we.

the heroic raid narrative is coming unraveled.
problem.
solution? seal up domestic consent with ritual and send obama for photo-ops to the wtc, connect beginning to end (without meaning, you know, the actual end of anything. the end of bad things happening to the narrative maybe).
then pakistan is saying: you know this heroic raid thing? it might have been against certain rules. like national sovergeinty and un agreements and stuff.
response: pshaw. besides, you're pakistan.
then the un hcr demands an explanation.
response: begin releasing other narratives based on the hard drives etc. that operate as a second-order justification for the heroic raid narrative without requiring that any element in the heroic raid narrative be true.

to wit:

Osama bin Laden 'closely involved in al-Qaida plots' | World news | The Guardian

so here we are, ladies and gentlemen, in the tawdry theater of orwellian stage-management again.
that ugly space of badly done ideological manipulation that's been one of the real hallmarks of this noxious period dominated by the meme "war on terror"

i wonder what the next plot point will be.

Yeah, they're really jim-wilkinsoning this whole thing, aren't they?

While I seriously doubt the credibility of bin Laden's daughter, executing the man seems perfectly reasonable from a tactical perspective. This is all armchair quarterbacking on my part, but I imagine that there was a bit of a time crunch imposed upon the shooters. They were operating in small numbers, unsupported by air and ground assets, and so could risk only a very short time on target. They didn't have time to wrestle with or otherwise persuade bin Laden to leave with them.

The guy was obviously protected by factions within PAKMIL and, given his status, probably had a quick reaction force in the nearby area. I dont think it would be unreasonable for to the shooters expect some kind of massive response from the nearby military academy and/or the surrounding community. Once the shooters made their presence known on their infiltration, they had to move fast. If bin Laden resisted and slowed the extraction of the team, shooting him would be perfectly acceptable.

we're all armchair quarterbacks here.

But no, shooting him because they couldnt get the job done isnt a perfectly acceptable reason to kill him. thats an execution style killing. i'd be more cofortable with a shooting from the fog of war than knowing that they killed him because they couldnt get him out. sure they were pressed for time, but a dozen specially trained SEALS could easily put a self styled 60 year old militant out within a few seconds. It has been widely reported that the order was to go in for the kill, so after they got him without a fight, killing him is an execution style killing which wouldnt be sanctioned under international law. But who gives a shit about international law when its the US breaking them right?

the question is, if Osama was killed without a fight as may be the case, and if Obama gave the order to kill Bin Laden, can Obama he be prosecuted by the HRC if he was found of wrong doing?

i also dont think its obvious that Bin laden was protected factions within PAKMIL. If the US intelligence doesnt know for sure, or they are hiding that fact, i dont know how you would know.

As far as Bin ladens daughter is concerned, id be willing to believe a 9 year old girl before i believe the bullshit that the US administration, military and the CIA has been feeding us over the past week.

I don't know about that, Dlish. This guy evaded the full might of the US military for almost 10 fricken years.

I'll comment more on the international law aspect of it, later.

he did evade capture for 10 fricken years. but that doesnt mean that he'd be in any physical shape to take on a dozen SEALS. he was confined to two rooms on the upperfloor for the past 2 years with 3 wives and some kids. I doubt he'd be in any sort of physical shape to take down 1 let alone a dozen military guys with his bare hands.

ive got to go play me some ultimate frisbee. i guess ill be back in a few hours

Osama bin Laden mission agreed in secret 10 years ago by US and Pakistan | World news | The Guardian

so most all of what we've been treated to is in fact cheap, shabby theater.

haha they didn't have anything planned out. that article shows that the US pretty much got permission from Pakistan to pay a visit and thump some skulls if thats what it came to