Mr. President, Osama’s Death Can Breathe New Life into Your Presidency

Beneath the Spin * Eric L. Wattree

Mr. President, Osama’s Death Can Breathe New Life into Your Presidency

First, Mr. President, allow me to congratulate you on bringing Osama Bin Laden to justice. That one act alone separates you from the disingenuous chest-beaters who have been manipulating American misery to gain political traction. No longer can they wrap themselves in the flag and strut around in their ineffectual, faux patriotism while they accuse the President of the United States of “palling around with terrorists.” The quiet and effective way in which you’ve gone about carrying out America’s business clearly distinguishes who’s the adult in the room, and who's the true American.

But Osama’s death could also provide you with an opportunity to correct one of the biggest mistakes of your presidency. It gives you a second chance to extricate the United States from the no-win quagmire in Afghanistan, and that part of the world.

In my November 2, 2009 article, Could Obama Fall Victim to a Lack of Change We Can Believe in?, I said the following:

"There's only two legitimate reasons to have our troops in that part of the world [Afghanistan/Pakistan]. The first is obvious - to make damn sure the nuclear missiles in Pakistan don't fall into the hands of Al Qaeda. The second reason is to bring Osama Bin Laden to justice. So why can't we simply pull out of Afghanistan and deploy enough troops in Pakistan to protect the missiles, then let the CIA and law enforcement deal with Osama? That way we save both treasure and lives, and we're not creating more enemies for the United States by killing innocent people.

“The President needs to recognize that there is nothing he can do that's going to make him acceptable to the GOP - that is, unless he agrees to appoint a Republican vice president, then resign. By now it should be clear that even while he's asleep, the GOP is trying to hatch plans to destroy him. So by spending more time thinking about them than he is his base, he's playing right into their hands.

"But many Independents suspect that there's another agenda afoot. Actually, Cheney's giving it away. Independents recognize that Dick Cheney has absolutely no integrity, so when he gets passionate over an issue we know to follow either the money or power. Thus, many Independents suspect that what's actually behind Cheney's insistence that we go recklessly rushing into Afghanistan has much more to do with Halliburton's bottom line than it does America's best interest. And while Obama has shown himself to be an excellent president in many ways, his one shortcoming - and a shortcoming that may very well bring him down in the end - is his tendency to try to appease the stupidity and greed of the GOP.

“I mentioned power as one of the reasons that Cheney's trying to rush the president into Afghanistan. I wonder if the president has considered the fact that Cheney just might be trying to get him to make the same kind of mistake in Afghanistan [and now Libya] that the Bush Administration made in Iraq in order to take the Iraq issue off the table for the 2012 election? If during the 2012 campaign America is bogged down in Afghanistan with the useless death of thousands of U.S. troops, all of a sudden, Bush, Cheney, and the GOP won't look all that bad. The president should think about that possibility, since the machinations of Dick Cheney makes Machiavelli look like a trainee.

“On the other hand, if the president would have the CIA go after Osama Bin Laden (through the use of intelligence, instead of blindly shooting at rocks), then pull out of Afghanistan, and make an agreement with the government of Pakistan to help them protect their nuclear arsenal, he'll be looking pretty good in 2012, and he won't have the deaths of thousands of U.S. troops to have to justify.”

So it seems that I was right on the money, at least, with respect to the way to go after Osama Bin Laden, and I’m virtually certain that I’m right about the rest as well. So Mr. President, at this point you should simply say, “Ok, we’ve done what we set out to do. We’ve brought Osama Bin Laden to justice so our job is done.” Then you should get the hell out of there as fast as you can go.

Eric L. Wattree

http://wattree.blogspot.com/
Ewattree@Gmail.com
Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)

Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.