Froomkin Missing the Message Again...Deliberately

On Quoting bin Laden

By Dan Froomkin
Special to washingtonpost.com
Wednesday, September 6, 2006; 12:46 PM

The spectacle of the president of the United States extensively quoting Osama bin Laden to bolster his controversial policies during political season deserves notice, and reflection.

By all rights, President Bush ought to be embarrassed that the al Qaeda leader who masterminded the September 11 terrorist attacks remains at large almost five years later.

But Bush yesterday let bin Laden share his bulliest of pulpits, giving the mass murderer precisely the attention he craves and endorsing his extreme view that a Third World War is under way.

Here's the text of Bush's speech.

Mentioning bin Laden so much couldn't help but remind listeners of Bush's failure to capture or kill him. But the risk was easily offset by the fact that bin Laden remains the most effective bogeyman out there, and job one for the White House in the run-up to a potentially crippling mid-term election is to scare the hell out of people.

Uhh...Danny Boy, before you get too excited by the fact that the President has not yet captured Bin Laden, let's not forget that if Billy Boy had accepted the Sudanese offer in 1996, instead of "not have[ing]sex with that woman, Monica Lewinsky," President Bush wouldn't need to find Bin Laden, he would be dead or in prison.

Be that as it may, there is no evidence or even any reason to suspect that the Democrats could or would have done a better job. In fact, all evidence points to the opposite. The Democrats most likely course of action following the attacks on 9/11 would have been to wail and moan, make a big public showing of grief, lob a few cruise missiles into Afghanistan and proclaim victory. That is the way Democrats have traditionally handled our enemies from 1946 onward.

Of course your and those of your co-conspirators in the Democrat Party Propaganda Wing are ignoring the message the President was presenting, which was that it is people like yourself and our Democrat Party leaders who are providing our enemy's talking points. Bin Laden and Hassan Nasrallah don't need speech writers, they have you guys.

Full Story: Democrat Talking Points Provide Al Qaeda's Speeches

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