Freedom's Fidelity

Monday, November 01, 2004

Osama's Message

Well, I had been operating under he assumption that Osama is dead until further notice, does this count? Was this really Osama? He looked positively fat and sassy instead of frail and sickly. And what about the rhetoric? He's toned it down quite a bit from promises of "rivers of blood flowing on American streets" to we'll leave you alone if you leave us alone. Perhaps most astounding to me was his use of Michael Moore's talking points:

"It never occurred to us that the commander in chief of the country (Bush) would leave 50,000 citizens in the two towers to face those horrors alone ... because he thought listening to a child discussing her goats was more important," bin Laden said, referring to Bush's visit to a school when the attack occurred.

If this is him, he is a beaten man. The Belmont Club has this take:

It is important to notice what he has stopped saying in this speech. He has stopped talking about the restoration of the Global Caliphate. There is no more mention of the return of Andalusia. There is no more anticipation that Islam will sweep the world. He is no longer boasting that Americans run at the slightest wounds; that they are more cowardly than the Russians. He is not talking about future operations to swathe the world in fire but dwelling on past glories. He is basically saying if you leave us alone we will leave you alone. Though it is couched in his customary orbicular phraseology he is basically asking for time out.

The American answer to Osama's proposal will be given on Election Day. One response is to agree that the United States of America will henceforth act like Sweden, which is on track to become majority Islamic sometime after the middle of this century. The electorate best knows which candidate will serve this end; which candidate most promises to be European-like in attitude and they can choose that path with both eyes open. The electorate can strike that bargain and Osama may keep his word. The other course is to reject Osama's terms utterly; to recognize the pleading in his outwardly belligerent manner and reply that his fugitive existence; the loss of his sanctuaries; the annihilation of his men are but the merest foretaste of what is yet to come: to say that to enemies such as he, the initials 'US' will always mean Unconditional Surrender.

Osama has stated his terms. He awaits America's answer.

Lots of interesting comments to the post as well.

Oh, and be sure and read this comment from Roger Simon's blog.

So what to make of this? I don't know, but I would hope that everyone will vote who they were going to vote for before Osama's latest release. But if this is real can anyone doubt we are winning? The first new bin-Laden release in months - just days before the election - hardly survived the 24-hour news cycle!

LATER: One more thing, isn't this the first time that Osama publically took credit for 9/11? That's a significant break from his previous line, not that it will do anything to discourage the conpiracy theorists.

posted by Paul  permalink | |