bin Laden and Reid; the view from the cave
Much like Harry Reid, bin Laden is having problems accepting the fact that al Qaeda has lost Iraq. Writes Salah Nasrawi in the Washington Times;
Osama bin Laden warned Iraq’s Sunni Arabs against fighting al Qaeda and promised to expand the terror group’s holy war to Israel in a new audiotape yesterday, threatening “blood for blood, destruction for destruction.”
Most of the 56-minute tape dealt with Iraq, apparently al Qaeda’s latest attempt to keep supporters in Iraq unified at a time when the U.S. military claims to have al Qaeda’s Iraq branch on the run.
Bradley Brooks, also in the Times, writes about the reality of the situation in Iraq that apparently eludes bin Laden;
Iraq’s Interior Ministry spokesman said yesterday that 75 percent of al Qaeda in Iraq’s terrorist network were destroyed this year, but the top American commander in the country said the terror group remained his chief concern.
Maj. Gen. Abdul Kareem Khalaf said the disruption of the terrorist network was a result of improvements in the Iraqi security forces, which he said had made strides in weeding out commanders and officers with ties to militias or who were involved in criminal activities.He also credited the rise of anti-al Qaeda in Iraq groups, mostly made up of Sunni fighters the Shi’ite-dominated government has cautiously begun to embrace. Additionally, an increase in American troops since June has been credited with pushing many militants out of Baghdad.
Of, course bin Laden goes on to rave that he won’t given “even an inch” to the Jews in Palestine. How he’ll deny living room for Jews with his rapidly evaporating army is beyond me. But, like Harry Reid, bin Laden is getting his news from sycophants instead of investigating for himself. I’m sure the echo chamber inside that cave in Pakistan is just as misleading as the echo chamber in the halls of Congress.
In the Washington Examiner, Nancy Pelosi admits that Democrats have been boneheads this year;
It’s a painful irony for Democrats: In the space of a year, the Iraq war that was the source of party’s resurgence in Congress became the measure of its impotence.
By the end of the 2007, a Congress controlled by Democrats for the first time since 1994 had an approval rating of only 25 percent, down from 40 percent last spring. Then the debate over the war split the party and cast shadows over other issues, spawning a series of legislative failures and losing confrontations with President Bush.
What to do about Iraq has turned into a dissing match so far-reaching and nasty that Congress’s accomplishments are seen, even by some who run it, through the lens of their failure to override Bush and start bringing the troops home.
“There is no question that the war in Iraq has eclipsed much of what we have done,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters. “If you asked me in a phone call, as ardent a Democrat as I am, I would disapprove of Congress as well.”
Now, if only Pelosi would wheel Reid out into the daylight.
Category: Antiwar crowd, Politics, Terror War
