Bin Laden Endorses Bush/Cheney
The question that has constantly overhung this election experience for me is, "Are we as stupid as all these people make us out to be?" Now into the fray comes Osama Bin Laden. The very unexpected nature of this appearance has sent policy makers and talking heads scrambling for the right spin. Forty-eight hours later they seem to have hit their stride.
It’s a dumb show in a sense: If you read it literally, he’s calling for the defeat of President Bush, but he's not doing John Kerry a favor. Anyone with a brain in this planet knows that’s a way for President Bush to get support in this country. It’s impossible for us to know if he’s being ironic, clever, shrewd or stupid.
Chris Matthews
Clearly Mr. Matthews is confused as to why Al Queda would come to the aid of President Bush. This would seem to be an intelligent reacton. Eliminate ironic, ol' Osama is not much in the humor department. Stupid? This is the man who masterminded the most complex and successful special ops plan in history. This leaves clever or shrewd. Clever is a bit trite for the situation, so I'll go with shrewd with more on that later.
As a neutral party Chris Matthew's can afford to leave questions like these hanging, but others are not afforded this luxury. Rudy Guliani appeared for the President's campaign today on Meet the Press and had this assessment,
He probably doesn't know at all the American people. He made critical mistakes. He thought when he attacked us on September 11, 2001, that we were going to cower, that we were going to back down. And, in fact, we haven't. We've become stronger as a result of what happened to us and more united. And I hope it's going to continue that way after this election.
Forced to respond, the Republicans would rather go with stupid rather than shrewd. They would rather not answer the question altogether. Did Bin Laden expect us to back down after Sept. 11? Clearly Mr. Guliani insults our intelligence with that notion. Maybe insults our intelligence is not quite as true as doubts our intelligence. I think Bin Laden expected just what he got then and just what he's getting now from Mr. Guliani. More on that later.
Feed this response through the yellow jounalism machine and you get this from Joe Scarborough,
Now, I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume that Hitler didn't do any such thing and that Scarborough is saying this event has the significance of something that did not happen. Rather than split more semantical hairs with a Hannity light who is clearly in over his head let's just say that he is seconding the stupid option.Bin Laden's boneheaded political play has the historical significance of Adolph Hitler addressing Americans struggling through WWII to make his best case for Wendell Wilkie over FDR.
What about journalists of a more "legitimate" ilk? This from Christopher Isham, top ABC News analyst,
Some observers agree that the new tape will remind Americans that Bush has failed to capture Bin Laden and may help Kerry, but most U.S. political analysts believe that the appearance of the tape in the days before the election will bring terrorism back to the top of the agenda and therefore will help the president on an issue that, in most opinion polls, he is perceived to be stronger on than Kerry.
Mr. Isham does not hazard a guess as to why Al Queda wouldn't know how most American political analysts would land on this nor why they would proceed to help Mr. Bush. Isn't he curious about this? Who will handle this hot potato. John McCain, who will not be seen as one to underestimate his enemy, hesitates to take the "stupid" party line. How does this master balancing act handle the subject today on Face The Nation without raising the "awful question"? With this little bit of obfuscation,
So does it, quote, "favor" President Bush or not? I don't know if that's the right description, but I do believe it focuses all our attention back on the transcendent issue, which is the war on terror, and that's where I think any polling data will show you the president has an advantage.
Wow! How do you define "is"? Clearly there is a concerted effort here by the right to avoid associating the concept of help with the reality of, ...well..., help.
At this point the election is all about shaking the weakly committed from the trees. If people were satisfied there would be no indecision. This fact swings the election every time toward the challenger. Every professional politician knows this fact, and Osama Bin Laden knows it too. Bin Laden has appeared in order to bolster Bush's chances. Why? Because Kerry might mean business in a war on terror unencumbered by Bush's zeal for big war and grand scheme. Kerry is the devil he doesn't know. Bush has been utterly predictable and a reactionary dupe for the cause of Jihad.
Perhaps Bin Laden's appearance will stem the tide and preserve a Bush victory. Lord knows the Gulianis and Scarboroughs of our culture are more than happy to do this bidding. The great irony is that Bin Laden will have affected history by goading the conservatives, again.
posted by sequoit @ 7:13 PM
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