Well this is much more exciting than the interminable take-home exam I'm working on.
Can we declare victory and go home now?
Answer: Why would we want to spoil the fun?
Seriously, this is the most convenient reason to exit that we're ever going to get. Get out of there now.
Wow wow. NYT and CNN are taking forever to load, but http://english.aljazeera.net/watch_now/ is coming through.
And a drone strike!
Andrea Mitchell noting that today's the 8th anniversary of Bush's "Mission Accomplished" and without irony suggesting that Obama can make the same announcement tonight. Ah, TV news.
Yes, get out now.
They just said the strike was not in the Pakistani frontier, but in a mansion outside Islamabad, of all places. Jeez.
Odd that this happens on the rare night I am in a hotel room and have access to CNN.
So enraging to hear them going on about how OBL is the face of terrorism. Only because you *(!#$!&^$!(ers and and the former administration made him that.
I can't even begin to think about the human costs of these two wars. We'll be paying for them for another half-century.
I didn't anticipate how angry this would make me. What an obscenity.
They switched the TV to CNN from a baseball game in the bar we're at, and people hooted and cheered. A little weird?
Declaring victory and going home would be great, wouldn't it.
Other than that... is there much of any reason to care?
They're really falling all over themselves to overstate bin Laden's importance. Our symbolic narrative, let us shove it down your throats some more.
Facebook is way too relieved and teary-eyed over this.
Some CBS reporter is saying that there are still legions of people who want to build a new Islamic Caliphate and we must keep the war going.
A friend pointed out that there are probably people shouting "STOP THE PRESSES!" tonight, which is sort of wonderful.
CNN showing people outside the White House apparently chanting "USA!"
Now singing the national anthem.
Wow. Talk about weird moments in nationalism.
And now she's using the word "penetrated" over and over again.
is there much of any reason to care?
I'm all in favor of getting out yesterday, of course. But it's not like this really changes anything about Afghanistan. We have a weird habit of personalizing international disputes.
It's slightly comforting that only about half the results of http://twitter.com/#!/search/conspiracy are crying "conspiracy"; the other half are mocking / predicting such claims.
This should not be taken as an event with major importance going forward, but I do feel a bit of a rush, and I think that's warranted.
Does this mean the US will celebrate May Day now but just call it something else? Because that would be...weird.
6: but in a mansion outside Islamabad, of all places. Jeez.
Damn! I got close! I always thought he'd be in Karachi.
max
['But then the Sind are maybe not so friendly. Didn't think about that.']
It is a really, really good thing I do not have regular access to TV. I don't think my blood pressure could stand it. I want to throw things.
Yes, it's partly the product of personalizing nationalistic drama, but OBL was still the one who planned the deaths of those thousands.
So what do you figure the American government will do with his body? Return it to the family?
Now singing the national anthem.
So, so tunelessly.
It is a really, really good thing I do not have regular access to TV. I don't think my blood pressure could stand it. I want to throw things.
Yeah, I just turned off the AJE feed; I was getting too upset.
Jesus. Kill, America, Kill Kill! Well, this makes little difference other than to the American ego at this point.
26: "Saddam was buried at his birthplace of Al-Awja in Tikrit, Iraq, 3 km (2 mi) from his sons Uday and Qusay Hussein, on 31 December 2006." (Wiki)
Can we declare victory and go home now?
No, but we can probably declare victory and go with more people to Libya and other places we kinda sorta feel like going to.
John King either has a cold, or had too much chianti at dinner.
Just when Canada had some crazy election results, too. Sorry, guys. We almost paid attention.
What's so infuriating about AJE? Robert Fisk (while generally refusing to stop spooling off everything he knows about OBL) is right now saying this isn't nearly as important as American media would have it.
Now we don't need the DHS or TSA anymore, right? That'll help with budget worries! Plus, the military can get by on a lot less now, obvs.
Anytime the White House wants to start talking would be good. It's been an hour.
max
['Got to get the speech right?']
Well, this makes little difference other than to the American ego at this point.
Having a satisfied American ego is potentially a very good thing for the world.
Bugs Raplin! He's dead! They got him!
Ooh. A hallway. With a flag. Keen.
max
['How much ya wanna bet they're going to call it GWB's war and say he did it all?']
38: I'm thinking it's more that they have to call everyone who's going to be miffed that they didn't get a personal heads-up.
You'd think they'd have had a list ready. Maybe they did.
Did he just say a mission to kick Osama Bin Laden?
Ok, we got the big news. Skip the fancy yadda-yadda and let's get to some IMPLICATIONS, guy.
President speaking now. OBL was "the leader of Al-Queda."
"The worst images were those that were unseen to the world" -- I know he's talking about the human cost of the Sept. 11 attacks, but all I can think of are the Abu Ghraib pictures.
I'm remaining agnostic until Obama produces the original death certificate.
Well, it is marginally more interesting news than that horse-faced kid getting married.
Betchya anything the US bombs a couple of Pakistani wedding parties before the week is out.
"I directed Leon Panetta to make the killing or capture of OBL the top priority" - is that a swipe at GWB?
(I am paraphrasing)
I just want to say unequivocally that this is the place I turn to on momentous occasions such as these. I mean that partly as heartfelt toast to this community, and partly as worrisome symptom.
Also that my first thought upon hearing the news (texted to my houseguest by her brother) was the post body text, verbatim.
Nice what it says about intelligence reform that he directed Panetta and not the DNI.
So the announcement preempted Celebrity Apprentice, did it?
Odd that I find myself impressed primarily by the fact that the video stream hasn't slowed or hiccupped at all for me.
"Today's achievement is a testament to the greatness of our country." -- 2009 Nobel Peace Prize winner
AJE has a hell of a lot of sports news in its crawl.
Odd that they're now showing him walking away.
Favorite comment so far: that he probably got taken down by some little kid in a convenience store.
Anyway, the timing is great for Fox and the GOP presidential hopefuls, because they have all night to come up with reasons why this proves that Obama is a failure.
The rousing conclusion and affirmation of American values would be a lot more moving if it were not coming from an executive who has broken new ground in contempt for the rule of law.
58: And "his demise should be welcomed by all those who (value?) peace and human dignity." Hooray for moral principles there.
If the president is right, then who do I have locked in my basement?
65: I was taken aback by that as well.
Also the frequent claims that justice was done by, one presumes, an assassin.
Hey, we appealed to heaven and things went our way (in this one respect); isn't that enough? I don't think this is the realm of justice, exactly.
Favorite comment so far: "I guess it takes a muslim to catch a muslim."
Well, it was a nice try but the camera angle was all wrong. The guy is still trying to defuse the Republican attack.
max
['Man, that never works.']
60: "and we're just checking with our sources and we believe... no, no, wait, cancel that, President Obama was not going back to bed."
69: Ha. I just watched To Catch a Thief last night.
"Obama Bin Laden Dead, Officials Say" - npr.com
75: aasuhaiuhahahaha so really good
Tomorrow is going to be very very nasty. Especially when it is asserted that the USG used the same set they used to fake the moon landing to fake bin Laden's capture.
max
['Wow. There's so many ways this can go really wrong.']
Now the talking heads are telling me that obviously we should all be wary of retaliation.
"The enemy is dead! Beware the enemy!"
Can I say unironically that I'm glad that bin Laden is dead? Can I say that this is, on balance, good news?
Erm, Obama's speech was quite good. Realize that he needed to speak to freaking everybody: 9-11 family members, blah blah, and the rest of the world, in each part. I much liked the repetition that we're not at war with Islam. I was frankly sobered to hear the repetition that we won't put up with any attacks on our persons: oh, right, there might be terrorists listening who are pissed off about OBL, right! Overall, he hit every point.
And you know, I could not in a million years perform the way that guy -- that would be the Prez -- does.
"The Guy That Would Be Prez" was not as good a novella as its predecessor, by far.
Also, let me say that the comments about this speech and this event that are cropping up in my "twitter" "feed" have been, without exception, totally predictable. There is no information content there at all.
I mean the sincere ``tweets''. Some of the jokes are good.
85: Lutherans always were crypto-Muslims, if you ask me.
Sleeper cells awake!
A minimalist reinterpretation of Bach?
80: Yes.
81: Oh yes, no problems with it that aren't really problems with the American consensus.
87: love
I do wish crowds chanting "USA! USA! USA!" could get a good gander at what they look and sound like. Because it's ugly. However, that Obama is the man who got Osama probaly means the Repubs can kiss 2012 goodbye completely. (Not that that was the point of this, of course.)
Yes, good pretext to get out of Afghanistan. No, they won't, this isn't why they were ever there. But no mourning for Bin Laden.
pwned on my own theme. I am in a fugue.
My recycle bin laden is still here. We should do something about that.
Even AJE is getting annoying now. All the interviewees are repeating "he'd had a purely symbolic role for some years" and the anchor keeps repeating "so what is the practical impact?"
I find it interesting that this is being used as a reason to heighten security (implicitly, I suppose, for a limited time).
90: But no mourning for Bin Laden.
I'd guess there are a non-trivial number of people who will feel somewhat bereft when they hear this news. After all, you go to war with the enemy of capitalist hegemony you have (or think you have.) But ultimately, so what? When you cough into your sleeve, you don't mourn the sputum. But you also haven't cured the disease. There's thousands of bin Ladens waiting in the wings. Some terrorists will kill you with an airplane, and some with a fountain pen.
I want to know how long he'd been living in a fucking mansion instead of holed up in an uncomfortable cave, like we were promised.
87: love
Not even mild affection for my 86? Sigh.
97: it was more of a grotto, and it was attached to the mansion.
97: Countrywide was free with no-doc loans
living in a fucking mansion
ISI Executive Suites?
Apparently the specific place was Abbottabad, The city is situated in the Orash Valley, 150 km north of Islamabad and 200 km east of Peshawar at an altitude of 4,120 feet (1,260 m). The city is well-known throughout Pakistan for its pleasant weather, high standard educational institutions and military establishments. It remains a major hub for tourism of regions in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Kashmir in the summer.
It would have taken them even longer to find him, but the house was on several bus tours.
Huh. I was trying to find out about the town in question, which AJE wrote as "Abadibad," and Wikipedia gave me some neighborhood in Karachi. Seems it's actually Abbottabad, named after one Major Abbott, and actually 116 kilometers from Islamabad by road (much shorter as the crow flies) and in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, another of the Pashto-majority provinces (not the FATA).
Here's a story from last October claiming he was living in a mansion in Pakistan.
81: It's true, the speech could have been a lot worse. I'm letting my general anger at US foreign policy for the last decade color my reaction.
96: There's thousands of bin Ladens waiting in the wings.
Obviously.
104 to be exact the straight line distance 62km. Doing the same googling you did I was surprised to find out that Islamabad is right on the border with the NWFP. I knew it was close, but not that close.
It's a big family, but is it that big?
Yeah, I hadn't known that either - maybe related to Islamabad's being a planned city.
109: He's been hanging out in a sex grotto for ten years. Do the math.
I keep telling you guys, I'm sick of these math threads!
Facebook is way too relieved and teary-eyed over this.
And now you've got a definitive "defriend" list.
I just want to say unequivocally that this is the place I turn to on momentous occasions such as these. I mean that partly as heartfelt toast to this community, and partly as worrisome symptom.
Exactly.
111: You know, I don't think all of these people are from Abbottabad.
Osama's sex grotto was 800 feet from a police station.
Eh, Obama and Cameron have policemen right there in the house with them, and it doesn't seem to do much good.
115: I doubt that is correct for the actual location. That is basically the location that Google gives you when you search for "Abbottabad" and is pretty much the middle of the city.
115: Also, it is the aptly-named 'Cantt Police Station?'
How long has Google known where Osama was? Maybe there's a photo of him flipping off the street view camera.
"Who's in Abbottabad?"
"Yes"
"Who?"
"Yes"
"Can you just tell me who's in Abbottabad?"
"I just did"
"What is the name of the person in Abbottabad?"
"No, he's in Costellobad"
"Who?"
"What"
Yeah, near a maternity hospital and government college sounds to me like dead city center, for a mid-sized place like that.
A tab on CNN says "LIVE BLOG: Latest developments."
11:01 pm Still dead.
11:36 pm Well, yes. Dead. Like before.
11:55 pm Knock knock. Who's there? Dead. Dead who?
12:13 am Dead dead bo bed fanana fana fo fed WHAT ELSE IS THERE TO SAY ABOUT THIS?! DEATH RATHER PRECLUDES LATEST DEVELOPMENTS A LITTLE DON'T YOU THINK?
That is what I imagine is what you get if you click on that link.
Sorry, can't sleep. Was watching a rather tense Barbara Stanwyck movie!
I am also reading references to Osama bin Laden as "OBL" which I find too Rachael Ray for words. Why not just go with "O-La"?
Hmm, Army Helicopter crashes in Abbottabad
ABBOTABAD:
A helicopter crashed in Abbottabad near the Pakistan Military Academy Kakul late on Sunday night, police sources said.
The chopper was seen flying low before it crashed, locals said. The sound of gunfire and two small blasts was heard before a massive explosion, sources said.
124: Yes, very likely. Marc Ambinder is now tweeting a conference call with "senior administration officials," summarizing: "40 minute JSOC raid; two helos, one drone; 4 KIA, inc OBL; DevGru (Seal Team Six) did shooting; only cas was US helocopter." (I don't follow him, Jonathan Cohn is retweeting it.)
My own helpful brain insists on reading "OBL" as "Ol' Birty Lastard."
Liked this from a blog about Pakistan:
What is now confirmed is: (a) Osama Bin Laden has been killed, (b) Osama Bin Laden was killed by US forces, (c) Osama Bin Laden was killed in Pakistan, (d) Osama Bin Laden was killed in an operation that was eventually supported by Pakistani authorities, and (e) CNN has no idea about anything that has to do with Pakistan
Finally, after ten years of pointless butchery, we get our action movie ending. Complete with "Seal Team Six".
Reading the helicopter crash reports it appears that it was near a part of town known as Bilal Town near Kakul Road. PMA Kakul a mile or so up the road at upper right seems to be the Pakistani equivalent of West Point.
I'm tempted to start a rumor that OBL was killed while he was watching a Barbara Stanwyck movie, or one of her appearances on Dynasty.
A lot of the (Pakistani? Indian?) commenters in the blog quoted in 127 are referring to Abbottabad as a "military city."
It's a garrison town, like Rawalpindi, but I don't know if that has anything to do with anything. I wish my having been there gave me some special insight, but I just went through on a bus more than 20 years ago. Didn't notice anything suspicious.
81:I was frankly sobered to hear the repetition that we won't put up with any attacks on our persons: oh, right, there might be terrorists listening who are pissed off about OBL, right! Overall, he hit every point.
Oh, it was a decent speech. It just won't matter. The R's will spin this every which way from Sunday as, basically, Obama's... accident. (Which is not to say Obama is screwed - I'm quite certain, as above, he's already won the election.) It won't move the needle in terms of giving Obama any better ability to resist the deficit offensive. He'll have to win or lose that one on a separate basis, so we're still screwed, whether he gets reelected or not.
Meanwhile, in the real world, the speech basically underlines the point that Osama bin Laden, dead or not, won the war. (I quote him: ""I am confident that Muslims will be able to end the legend of the so-called superpower that is America."") Additionally, emphasizing that we're not at war with Islam, when we've been at war (our initiative) with Islam for ten years isn't going to change any perceptions.
The NYT 'reactions around town' story, has a 9/11 survivor saying he can't find it in his heart to be glad another person is dead, even if it was bin Laden, a perspective I must admit I sorta share.
Also, the obituary of bin Laden quotes him as saying: "This is my message to the American people: to look for a serious government that looks out for their interests and does not attack others, their lands, or their honor."
Yeah, fat fucking chance of that, buddy.
80: Can I say unironically that I'm glad that bin Laden is dead? Can I say that this is, on balance, good news?
I am conflicted. I can't exactly be glad. I'm am glad about the fact that he can now go away, which in previous years I might have hoped would result in return to sanity for the United States, but that isn't going to happen.
I would like it if they cut his head off, cleaned up his skull, cut the top off it and flipped it over (making an ashtray), and then added a green light and a red light (one for each eye). With the addition of a music box inside, and perhaps a mechanism to make the jaw flap in time to words, it could be nicely set up so it you would just push a button and 'La Chuchuracha' would play, while the lights flashed and the mouth sang along. Sick! But mordant! Utterly trivial! Yet packed full of meaning! Cheap! Yet it cost multiple trillions to develop! Funny! Yet stupid! In short an utterly nihilistic embrace of life. Or death. Perfect for the America of 2011.
max
['Order your commemorative edition now for just 39.95$! Operators are standing by!']
What annoys me about all this is that a) they got to kill him _after_ the firefight yet b) they managed to secure the body, why in hell couldn't this elite team of SEALs just bring back a live Osama so there could finally be a trial to determine once and for all how guilty he is of all the things he has been accused off over the years?
What the hell does NMM stand for? No More Misery? Never Mind Minivet? Not Making Minivans?
re: 138
It's a long-running joke that whenever someone dies it's no longer appropriate to masturbate over them;* sparked by something Ogged [pbuh] said years ago.
* especially if it was never really appropriate to masturbate over them.
139: thanks. I do concur: definitely NMM to OBL!
80 : Can I say that this is, on balance, good news?
"I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it."
-- Mark Twain.
I believe NMM originated with Anna Nicole Smith.
I have to say that I don't understand why it would have been inappropriate to masturbate over her.
Because she and I have the same birthday, you monster.
sparked by something Ogged [pbuh] said years ago
Becks, by way of Dan Savage, for precision's sake.
And everyone was getting mixed up when they M'ed.
NMM started with a letter to Dan Savage from someone who'd been masturbating over Smith, and asked if it was gross to keep doing it once she was dead. Savage, oddly for him, came down on the "Yeah, you should quit it" side of things.
It's funny how a running gag embeds itself in your thought process -- 'no more masturbating to' just means 'is dead' now, despite the fact that it makes no sense whatsoever out of context.
128: SEAL Team Six is a real unit, I believe, notwithstanding the action-movie-ready name.
The families of 9/11 victims aren't very enlightening interview subjects.
Buried at sea. I suppose that makes sense, but somehow I find it a bit surprising. Wonder how long it will take before people start saying the U.S. didn't really kill him.
I keep worrying that I'll use the phrase in a non unfogged context and people will first look at me like I've gone nuts, then I'll explain it and they'll think I'm really crazy.
Huh. What a night to turn off the computer and go to bed early.
Wonder how long it will take before people start saying the U.S. didn't really kill him.
About as long as it took the announcment to be broadcast, is my guess.
OBL-a-de, OBL-a-die, life goes on yeah!
Oh but not for Os-am-a
151: Within 24 hours, in accordance with Muslim law. Apparently Saudi Arabia was offered the body and declined it.
"Uh oh, now I'm the guy who liveblogged the Osama raid without knowing it."
@148: I guess it is OK as long as the base footage is dated from when she was alive, no?
Hamas needs to get a better PR department, whatever their private emotions you'd think they'd realize that issuing a statement saying the following is a bad idea:
We regard this as a continuation of the American policy based on oppression and the shedding of Muslim and Arab blood," Ismail Haniyeh, head of the Hamas administration in the Gaza Strip, told reporters. Though he noted doctrinal differences between bin Laden's al-Qaida and Hamas, Haniyeh said: "We condemn the assassination and the killing of an Arab holy warrior. We ask God to offer him mercy with the true believers and the martyrs."
Also, have the bobbleheads announced that we've now entered "a new, more dangerous phase in the war on terror" yet?
OBL-a-de, OBL-a-die, life goes on yeah!
I read that at the WTC site they are singing:
O-O-sa-ma, O-O-sa-ma, hey hey, goodbye.
155: An idiot in my Facebook feed, a self-admiring skeptic and Atheist who nevertheless always falls for every internet rumor, is already crowing about this, but seems to be bouncing back and forth between "we didn't kill him" and "we killed him a really long time ago."
I'm w k-sky and Witt on this, and yet I cant help thinking : PAKISTAN, MIGHT WE HAVE A WORD
At the second May Day march I marched in yesterday, there was a pretty sizable contingent of truthers. Which was irritating, as it was the immigrant workers' rally, which has VERY LITTLE TO DO with 9/11 conspiracy theories. It used to be the NORML people who would show up inappropriately, but I had a little bit of sympathy for them, as at least they were advocating for something harmless and pleasurable.
I think we just have to accept that there's a small percentage of the population that is permanently lost in the fever dream of conspiracy spirals. We're not going to get them back, their mental isolation is too complete. You can reveal the Third Secret of Fatima or whatever, and it just doesn't matter, there's always going to be a reason to believe that something was held back.
Of course, it would help somewhat if the Lizard People would just come clean about the Bilderbergers, but when's that ever gonna happen?
This morning appears to be all about how the muslims are coming, the muslims are coming! Etc. So. That took what, 8 hrs? Sometimes I would like the most cynical predictions of the Mineshaft to be wrong.
164: PAKISTAN, MIGHT WE HAVE A WORD
Yes, he does seem to have been in a pretty interesting place (somewhere in the area where I had linked the helicopter crash in 129).
Rather, he was killed in Abbottabad, a city of about 500,000, in a large and highly secured compound that, a resident of the city said, sits virtually adjacent to the grounds of a military academy. In an ironic twist, the academy was visited just last month by the Pakistani military chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, where he proclaimed that Pakistan had "cracked" the forces of terrorism, an assessment that was greeted with skepticism in Washington.
In addition, the city hosts numerous Pakistani forces -- three different regiments, and a unit of the Army Medical Corps. According to some reports, the compound and its elaborate walls and security gates may have been built specifically for the Qaeda leader in 2005, hardly an obscure undertaking in a part of the city that the resident described as highly secure.
NMM Madame Nhu. Her sense of timing was always fucked up.
I read someplace that Petraeus apparently visited the academy a few months ago, well after the US government had developed a strong suspicion that Bin Laden was hanging out there.
169: Apparently so. Picture captioned: Gen. Petraeus shakes hands with officer training instructors at the Pakistani Military Academy, Feb 24 [2010], in Kakul near Abbottabad in the Northwest Frontier of Province, Pakistan. So a little over a year ago; I had heard it was August of last year when they got the lead--of course he might have visited later, too.
FOX News: Elderly Man on Dialysis Killed by Young African-American Male
168: We thought about telling you, Chris, but you seemed to be having such a good time and it seemed a shame to spoil your weekend.
Hmm, and there might have been some more going on than meets the eye with Petraeus and Kayani. Kayani gives that speech at the Academy last Saturday, and then Petraeus visits with him on Monday in Islamabad.
"They discussed topics of mutual interest and ways to improve regional security," it said in a statement. Ha!
171: pwnd on FB by another commenter!
161: Luckily it is rarely necessary to masturbate & certainly not to that.
I'm becoming a 5-01 truther, now I'm thinking about the timing of the whole Panetta/Petraeus "switch" and the birth certificate release and the comedy dinner ... all cover stories ... 11-dimensional chess. Read my forthcoming book.
153,154:Nah
Watched a Tsai Ming-liang flick, GoT, checked the net, went to bed. Can't figure out how I feel about this, which means not very much, and ain't gonna manufacture something (even sumpin trollish, unless this is) just for the party
Ten years. I've moved on. I didn't need no freaking closure. Never cared much about justice, just utility.
Some say OBL killed America and won the war. Nah, he just handed a suicidal nation the rope.
175: The term is "deather," and I would like to subscribe to your newsletter!
175:a) He wants campaign money, more than a billion, to prevent a serious primary opponent, and to keep every Republican that isn't a wingnut out. Landslide will confirm his policy choices for a second term.
b) Obama wants buchu political capital for the forthcoming deficit decisions.
I'm willing to bet that the right wing conspiracy machine will take up the fact that the compound had been known for quite a while to ask questions implying some sort of shenanigans. Also that there will be assertions that OBL has been dead for a long time and this latest thing is all just a ploy to distract us from whatever crazy-ass thing they make up. I'm going to take a guess that it is a smudge on the long form birth certificate they'll claim is an erasure of the words "Lizard Person."
179: http://www.hiddencodes.com/obama/index.htm
||
Te-Nehisi Coates ...celebrates the killing of hundreds of thousands of people, for a good cause
I think that ground is generally accepted by almost everyone, and for good reasons. Six hundred thousand people died in the Civil War, a shocking figure which doesn't really capture the toll that this sort of violence took on the country at large. And yet when I think about the Civil War I don't feel sad at all. To be honest, I feel positively fucking giddy.
Well. So means justify ends. Now we can talk.
|>
Also that there will be assertions that OBL has been dead for a long time and this latest thing is all just a ploy to distract us from whatever crazy-ass thing they make up.
Sadly, already a leftier-than-thou/you-can't-fool-me,-fascists! trope.
180: Real or parody? Or is it impossible to determine these days?
The witch is dead! Which old witch?
182: I certainly didn't mean to imply anything like that. I do testify that there is no Osama but Osama, and Obama is his killer. I'm just arguing for a little historical perspective. It meant one thing when Custer was killed in 1876, and his death represents something very different today. Same with a lot of people. Archduke Franz Ferdinand certainly springs to mind.
171: FOX News: Elderly Man on Dialysis Killed by Young African-American Male
They're really something.
I liked this FOX headline as well, "Jubilant Crowd Surrounds Geraldo at WH". "They like me, they really like me!"
180: Nice. If you read it he mixes bog-standard wingnut Obame and Dems are Commies with
Reptoid aliens have been using us as a food resource for thousands of years. They came from Earth originally. The aliens cause wars and plagues to start every 30 to 50 years to generate a large supply of meat. The government knows about it but keeps quiet to avoid public panic.
How did the US confirm that the man they killed was really Osama bin Laden? According to ABC News, the body was quickly taken away for a DNA test. The DNA was then matched with that of one of his sisters, who died in Boston and whose brain was kept by the United States. (from the Guardian liveblog)
Brainss, brainss...
187: Well okay then.
"Systems aren't just made of bricks, they're mostly made of people, you might send them into hiding, but they'll be back again."
From 168:
"I would clap hands at seeing another monk barbecue show, for one cannot be responsible for the madness of others," she wrote in a letter to the New York Times. The world was stunned by photographs of monks sitting shrouded in flames; Madame Nhu simply offered to bring along some mustard for the next self-immolation. She later accused monks of lacking patriotism for setting themselves alight with imported petrol.
Those remarks solidified the enmity felt for a woman whom the American press had optimistically described in the mid-1950s as her country's Joan of Arc. ... Madame Nhu revelled in her position. Her often repeated motto was: "Power is wonderful. Total power is totally wonderful."
Emphasis mine. Wow.
So now we know, if you're playing poker with the president and he makes this face, you've just made a mistake.
Kinda on-topic: I was watching Red Dawn again the other night, and was interested to note that the two patriotic songs contained therein are "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" and "America the Beautiful." But no "Star-Spangled Banner". I wonder what that signifies?
That it's a sucky song, musically? No one sings the national anthem because they feel patriotic, they sing it because they're at an occasion that officially requires it (for values of 'official' that include MLB custom).
I was watching Red Dawn again the other night
Why?
I was watching Red Dawn again the other night
What does that signify?
Theres no shame in watching Red Dawn, you hippie elitists. WOLVERINES!!!!!
194, 195: I have a resistant reading of it, mostly based on Colonel Bella's lines, that, in becoming insurgents, the Wolverines are really advancing the cause of liberation. I mean, the whole set-up of a joint USSR-Cuba-Nicaraugan invasion of the US, with a limited nuclear first strike by the USSR, which does not result in a general nuclear war, is so absurd that the audience is clearly supposed to be transmuting some of the plot points into their opposites.
Basically, I was angry about the fascists here, and wanted to feel good about the possibility of resistance.
195, 196, 197: I knew it had significance!
I've never seen it, and I certainly didn't intend to suggest there was any shame in watching it.
Rob's puzzlement might have been more at your "again," but 197 clears that up too.
164: Pakistan has never been very interested in the anti-al Qaeda / anti-Taliban mission, they've simply played along as far as they felt they had to (some elements of the government more than others). The ISI has always had solid geopolitical motives for nurturing the Taliban, and those aren't going to go anywhere in the near future. None of this is news. Whole reason every pronouncement about "turning the corner in Afghanistan" is bullshit and always will be.
That they had the brass to quarter bin Laden next to Pakistan's equivalent of West Point is surprising, but it makes sense when you think about it. Almost the last place anyone hunting him would think to look, as evidenced that it worked for six years.
192, 193: I'm thinking that the early '80s might have been one of the times when replacing "Star-Spangled Banner" with "America, the Beautiful" was in vogue (it has come and gone). And apparently Reagan was a big "Battle Hymn" fan apparently.
Has anyone yet linked to this? (Aptly titled: "Inconvenient possibility?")
the courier who led them to the bin Laden hideout... Detainees at the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, had given the courier's pseudonym to American interrogators and said that the man was a protégé of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed the confessed mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.
If this all checks it, I expect it will quickly become the Fox News angle. ("If we'd closed Guantanamo like Obama wanted, Osama would still be loose.")
America the Beautiful is a nice song to sing. It praises natural beauty and brotherhood. A friend reported several spontaneous singalongs in NYC fall 2001.
Actually I think that was God Bless America, whose bombast inspired Woody Guthrie to write This Land Is Your Land.
204.2 is correct.
America the Beautiful (with the god reference excised and "brotherhood" swapped out) and This Land Is Your Land should be our co-national anthems.
Interestingly, only about 2% of Abbottabad residents apparently speak Pashto (contrasted to a large majority in its surrounding province), further suggesting help from the government or an element thereof, rather than hosting by sympathetic tribespeople as with Eric Rudolph.
205: My vote is still for "Take the Skinheads Bowling." Makes for a more fun sing-along.
200: Yes, we all knew Pakistan was complicit and not really an ally in a helpful way,
This is kind of cool:
The words of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution can be sung as verses of "America the Beautiful", an appropriate mnemonic for the amendment which in 1868 declared African Americans to be full citizens of the United States.
208 cont'd (oops): ...but catching them red handed, publicly, changes things. Now we might be obligated to actually do something abt it, which is...worrisome.
We're now into, what, like hour 14 of continuous coverage? Jeezus.
Shorter 10 p.m. breaking news: Osama Bin Laden dead.
Shorter 11 p.m. news update: Osama Bin Laden dead.
Shorter 12 a.m. news update: Osama Bin Laden killed.
Shorter 1 a.m. news update: Bin Laden killed dead.
Shorter 2 a.m. news update: Bin Laden deceased.
Shorter 3 a.m. news update: Yup, still dead.
Shorter 4 a.m. news update: Bin Laden still no longer alive. Roll clips of 9-11 coverage.
Shorter 5 a.m. news update: Bin Laden? Dead.
Shorter 7 a.m. news update: Bin Laden dead, now buried.
Shorter 6 a.m. news update: Osama Bin Laden is dead.
Shorter 8 a.m. news update: This just in: Bin Laden confirmed dead.
Shorter 9 a.m. news update: Dead, dead, dead.
Shorter 10 a.m. news update: Dead as a doornail.
Shorter 11 a.m. news update: Bin Laden deceased.
Shorter 12 p.m. news update: Bin Laden dead. Stay tuned.
I need to turn off the radio.
I just received an email from a local bar:
Celebration USA! - Monday
U - S - A!
JSOC Rocks!!!
to celebrate:
Makers Mark: $3.00
Budweiser bottles $1.00
All Day and Night!
212: Isn't it great that we can proud to be Americans again!
211: But what if he came back to life? That would seriously suck!
You know what I'm *not* proud about? I only just now realized what the title of the post was referencing.
215: Really? That's funny, because I had pretty much the same assocation as heebie when I heard the news this morning and saw the footage of people celebrating -- come, out munchkins! The witch is dead!
215: You thought maybe it was the Avon lady calling?
211: It's really Chili again, except there is only one miner, he is not actually a miner and he is dead.
Funny, it's not that I didn't get it, but without the rest of the line from the song, what I 'hear' as the title is "Ding-dong!" as delivered by Bridget Jones.
211, 218: It's like the royal wedding all over again, except there's just one guy who isn't a royal, and he married Death, and it was a shotgun wedding.
The most interesting part of 212 is that urple gets e-mail from his local bar.
My dumbass brain thought doorbell and then never questioned that first impression. As in:
[Ding dong]
[Door opens] Can I help you?
[Blam!]
Apo, that's hilariously dark. Like, not only did we find OBL, but we decided to kill him in an unnecessarily funny and humiliating way. It's like the And One video of special forces ops.
That or we sent the Roadrunner after him.
He should totally talk shop with Beaker.
Apparently that should have been "And1." I am extremely white. (Related? I've been told that I'm unfortunately funny when I curse, because my inflections are apparently cartoonishly white. Like, Dave Chappelle's parody of a white person white. "Darnit, Rondell. Just goshdarnit!" Except with actual cursing.)
OT: Dear New York State: The term is "jury duty," not "jury chore."
Donaquixote is extremely white and I'm hilariously dark. I see a buddy cop movie in our future.
You're hilarious where it counts?
Like, not only did we find OBL, but we decided to kill him in an unnecessarily funny and humiliating way.
"Who is it?"
[pause] "Candygram."
"Candygram, my foot. You get out of here before I call the police."
"Wait. I-I'm only a seal."
"A seal? Well...okay."
Or a wacky Adam Sandler "HOUSE-KEEPING!" falsetto.
OK, now I'm happy-- this is the compound on Google maps satellite view. Zoom out to get its relationship to the military academy and city (if you zoom out a few times (scale bar goes to 2000 ft.), the academy is where Kakul Rd. intersects Awami Rd.
In all seriousness, knowing the demographic of the likely doers, it was either "Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your LAS?" or "Would you like to hear about the Book of Mormon?"
From TPM: "White House reportedly debating whether to release photos of bin Laden in death."
Don't do it! Just don't! It is disrespectful; fuck the conspiracy-mongers who will undoubtedly insist that any such photos are fakes anyway; and we really don't need to encourage a certain sector of the American public to freaking masturbate over such photos.
Bleah. Honestly, if people feel the need to have USA! USA! parties for a day or two, fine, whatever. Let it then fade away as it properly should.
Stay classy, America.
Good shots of it here as well. Shows that there were no structures on it in 2004.
238: If you do a Google image search a few places have what they say are pics. Very grainy, look like video frame captures, but plausibly look like him. Not linking.
For whatever reason, 234 reminds me of the all-time classic Ren & Stimpy "Rubber Nipple Salesmen" bit.
237 Continued: Followed by "Motherf&&&er."
215, 216: So that leaves the Wicked Witch of the West. Which would be? Discuss.
216: I almost posted "Ding dong, the witch is dead!" as my FB update this morning. Instead I went with some lame-ass thing about perhaps we can GTFO Afghanistan.
It occurs to me that perhaps the reason OBL's body was "buried at sea" is that they melted him. Seal Team Six are actual seals and they squirted water on him. Then they bounced balls on their noses to signal the choppers for dust-off.
240: If you do a Google image search
But not necessarily recommended:
"The bad guys were quite fast and started to poison searches results in Google Images," said Favio Assolini, a Kaspersky Labs expert on the security software company's blog. "Some of the search results are now leading users to malicious pages."
It occurs to me that perhaps the reason OBL's body was "buried at sea" is that they melted him.
I know you're joking, but the reasoning I heard cited is that they didn't want his burial place to become a shrine for potential terrorists. Makes sense to me.
Further remark on TPM's front page: there's a photo of people in NYC ("Hundreds Celebrate Bin Laden's Death At Ground Zero") with people holding up two fingers in what looks like the peace symbol? Is that the peace symbol they're displaying? If so, good. But maybe it's "V" for victory.
236: According to whom? The search bar just has Abbottabad again, not coordinates.
Oh, I see the coordinates in the URL. Still: source?
243: They're holding primaries next year to determine that.
248, 249: Source is me. Using the views in 239 as guide (they are also available from TPM and apparently came form the military). The match is good, if those aerials are really the compound then I have it right.
231: Flip, are you listening to your fellow citizens debase themselves in order to get out of it? That was intolerable. Luckily NYC mostly doesn't give a shit (cue Liz Lemon in her Princess Leia outfit).
Didn't the TV guys get an alert early enough to make John King a cup of coffee?
Also: I'm having trouble being too concerned about the possibility that the operation was timed for maximum political effect. Breaking into programming in prime time during sweeps & interrupting Celebrity Apprentice. Making the anchors twiddle their thumbs for 45 minutes on air with nothing to say except "We got him". Announcing on the anniversary of the "Mission Accomplished" speech. Having the first "previously scheduled" public event after the announcement at a presentation ceremony for the Medal of Honor where the President can flawlessly pronounce an honoree's Hawaiian name several times. This whole event is more spectacle than substance, but spectacle is an essential skill of leadership.
(I'm less sure about the decision to kill bin Laden rather than even attempt capture.)
241: Is that the one where they ring a doorbell and a horse answers and freaks out: "Can't I make one mistake without paying fir it forever? I have a normal life now! Maybe I should make another mistake. Maybe [leaning down to glare at them, eyeball to eyeball] I should make two mistakes...."
251: Nothing picturesque yet, but the litigators seem to be coming back to the empanelling cell. They'll never take me alive!
Um, like a shrine where terrorists gather to pay homage? Like, all in one, predictable place, together, all at the same time? We have drones. I could see where an OBL shrine could have practical use.
Just in case some of you young pups didn't get the reference, 234 is adapted from an ancient American comedy program that used to be funny before you were born.
Also funny in a not so funny way, the rightwing spin on this thing is even better than I expected.
259: And for the hard of hearing, Generalissimo Osama bin Laden is still dead.
(I'm less sure about the decision to kill bin Laden rather than even attempt capture.)
Well yes. But this is being spun as being done to give the team enough time to go through his files before they had to fuck off.
Umm... maybe not?
It occurs to me that a momentous occasion like this one might be cause for generating a new catchphrase. I suggest "Okay to shave your beard for XXXX".
Wow, shades of Asterix and Cleopatra.
Catching up on accounts of what went down, this really had a chance of (and flirted with when the chopper went down) becoming Blackhawk Down or the failed Iranian hostage rescue--particularly if the Pakistanis truly knew nothing. And apparently there was some video and radio that they could follow in the Situation Room.
Got a lot of computer files, apparently as well. Likely to be pretty interesting stuff.
Rah! Nice to see you.
So far, I think I like Radley Balko's reaction best.
(and flirted with when the chopper went down)
Yeah, that must have been a real shit-or-go-blind moment in the Situation Room.
188: I'm weirdly offended that Osama Bin Laden, architect of murder, got something approximating the appropriate Muslim burial, so that when Gabriel plays the trumpet of resurrection his body will be able to come marching out the sea, while his sister, who was probably a reasonably innocent woman, got her brain carved out just to identify him. What's she supposed to do when Gabriel comes calling? Be the brainless one in paradise?
I have no idea why I find this kind of disturbing, since I don't believe in it at all, and think souls leave bodies when the bodies die, and she's probably fine, and he's probably going to be in Hell for several millenia before starting off as so E-coli again. But if I were her children, I would be pissed.
re: 211
Heh, a friend of mine is a radio news journalist. He was saying yesterday he was glad he hadn't been at work for a few days as they'd have been under pressure to 'go rolling' on the story but there was no actual content to roll with; the entire story could be summarized just like that.
OBL's house was just two miles from one of Pakistan's finest golf clubs.
OBL's house was just two miles from one of Pakistan's finest golf clubs.
Well he had to pass the time somehow, given there's no evidence that he's been actively involved in running "AQ" for years.
272: given they found him by tracking an AQ courier, I think it's safe to say he wasn't completely retired. And why would he retire? He was, to give him his due, highly motivated.
103 is great.
And this off Twitter:
#binladen neighbour: when the kids hit a cricket ball into the compound, they weren't allowed to retrieve it but were given money instead.
"He was a very quiet man, always kept himself to himself".
given they found him by tracking an AQ courier, I think it's safe to say he wasn't completely retired
I bet he was one of those "Emeritus", "Head of Business Development" types who had a bunch of successes back in nineteen-fuckety-whenever, and who have enough mates and former proteges in senior roles that they are still given an office and "consulted" on "global strategy", while the junior executive types whine endlessly about how much of their time is wasted by Granpa Simpson and his dumb ideas which don't recognise how the world has changed, while the higher-level executives tell them to show some respect and that you ought to listen to "Ace" because if you'd done a tenth as much for this firm as he had and blah blah blah.
I bet he had some really trenchant opinions about structured CDOs. I've always seen Obama as the "Management Consultant Boss From Hell" (full of fine speeches, always there to take the credit for successes, strangely reluctant to exercise leadership when it might have negative personal consequences); I am one day going to write that novel that analogises the Second World War to a series of political struggles over an office move.
Reading the account, it seems that they didn't track the courier to OBL's house; they got the courier's name from al-Libbi, tracked him to his own (ie the courier's) house, and then found that he happened to have OBL as a houseguest.
Having your courier also run a safe house seems like an amazingly poor bit of opsec if OBL was really just hiding; you'd want to farm him out to someone with no other operational responsibilities. So either AQ was really stupid or they colocated him with the courier because it made sense from a command and control point of view.
People who have caused massive disasters while insisting they are doing God's work:
Osama
Lloyd Blankfein
275.Last is the beginning of a *very* long list.
So either AQ was really stupid or they colocated him with the courier because it made sense from a command and control point of view.
Or they don't have as many reliable personnel as we are led to believe.
People who have caused massive disasters while insisting they are doing God's work:
Urban II.
i'm more interested in people who kicked ass while being stanists.
||
I'm going to have to keep from talking to my boyfriend's family for about a week. They're really happy about the Conservative victory. I don't know what to make about the NDP outstripping the liberals by such huge margins and whether that might be healthy longer-term.
|>
274: I've always seen Obama as the "Management Consultant Boss From Hell"
b s/b s?
280
Speaking of which, among much talk about the effects on American politics of the OBL news I haven't seen any mentions of the fact that Canada had a big election the next day. Any thoughts?
Nope, nothing. Sorry.
Anyway, following on JP's investigation - this was a real (evil) genius: to get close to an army barracks is really wonderful tactics. If they attack without pre-warning the army they risk to get into a war and if they attack with pre-warning there is every chance that you will be pre-warned again?
Which brings me to the really important question in all of tihis: did they stage a wet T-shirt competition in the barracks at the evening of OBL's shoot-out? Or a viewing of selected Anna Nicole Smith footage?
283
On Canada?
On the effects (if any) on the Canadian election.
BTW, Sky News (Murdoch) is tickertaping a poll which says the 77% of respondents don't think killing UBL makes the world a safer place. Seems about right to me.
All I know abt Canada is that Stephen Harper comes off as the sort of person it would be excusable to punch in the nose. My impression is that the Canadians who've commented here before on this issue might be horrifically depressed by the result (I'm having uncomfortable flashbacks to 2004, when I didn't leave my room for 3 days).
Depressed by the election result, not Stephen Harper's hypothetically broken nose.
So either AQ was really stupid or they colocated him with the courier because it made sense from a command and control point of view.
I think that this is one of those contexts where one should never attribute stupidity when the observable facts can adequately be explained by conspiracy.
Rah! Nice to see you.
So far, I think I like Radley Balko's reaction best.
I agree with Witt.
(One of these days, I am going to disagree with Witt! Just you wait, Witt!!!)
All I know abt Canada is that Stephen Harper comes off as the sort of person it would be excusable to punch in the nose.
I think that makes you an expert, relatively speaking.
I understand that Harper makes David Cameron look like one of the good guys by comparison, but I thought he was expected to win anyway. What I want some Canadian to explain to me is the deal with the NDP.
You down with NDP. Yeah, you know me.
292:What I want some Canadian to explain to me is the deal with the NDP.
Just one, huh? Liberal.
Well I'm not a Canadian, but I know where to find them. Post & Comments section at a recent Tom Slee guest post at Crooked Timber, for instance.
And in the comments section of thisYggles post
What we have from Yggles is his usual astute and sly analysis that shows we must all kneel and kiss Obama's shoes in November and forever after, because a little bit worse every day forever and ever is so much better than a lot worse, then better.
In other words, like Naderites in 2000, NDP voters are the EVIL.
Oh, and after the subtle "Obama is the only hope" post, Matt Y, as is his wont, immediately follows with a post about racism, as if you were still thinking about making any kind of vicious KKK-inspired vote-not-for-Obama in 2012.
You filthy Greens, we know what you are. Ain't fooling us.
First OBL is killed, then Harper wins big. Thus is balance maintained in the universe.
296: Minions of the Wicked Sub-Witch of the Northwest win a majority of seats after receiving 39.6% of the vote. "'What a great night!' he cackled to hundreds of flying monkeys and guards in the courtyard of his castle. "A strong, stable Oz-wide majority Conservative government."
BBC news still has 'LIVE Osama Bin Laden Dead' prominently featured at the top of its home page. Sir Kraab's fourteen hours is lasting a long time.
I'm kind of annoyed by this (by Yggles, linked in 294):
It'll be interesting to see if Canada manages to evolve toward a stable two-party system.
As if there is, or should be, some sort of natural evolution toward that higher form of life known as the American two-party system? This seems to misunderstand the difference between a parliamentary and a USian system.
I have suddenly realize that in English it's Chile and not Chili. Thought y'all might wanted to know that.
I have suddenly realize that in English it's Chile and not Chili.
Unless you're talking about capsicums (capsica?).
301: Excellent. Next week we can do Colombia/Columbia. (I confess that one irks me disproportionately.)