For news and stuff. Until the Overnight Open Thread.

I haven't done these; would these be useful? A news-focused open thread for the later hours, before the Overnight?

Posted by: Ace at 04:42 PM | Comments (246)
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Our resident trolls like regg or eggr or whatever he calls himself when pretending to be wise and conservative jumped on the "Obama is now unstoppable" bandwagon.

So lets take a look at the ENORMOUS binLadenisnowwormfood bounce:
Per RealClearPolitics.com, the latest Presidential Job Approval results:

[Chart moved below the fold]

That far, far right end of the chart shows the results including the post-bindeaden polls- CNN's poll of adults putting Obama at 52/43 approve,
Newsweek's putting him at 48/49 disapprove, and the Washington Post's laughable 600-adult poll of 56/38 approve.

Obama has received an average bounce- including the WaPo moonland poll, of about 6.6.

Yep, 6.6. Mind you there is time for more rescue polls, but the driving concerns for Americans aren't in Afghanistan/Pakistan right now. They haven't been there in nearly a decade.

President Obama in fact received a larger bounce at the end of last year thanks to the tax cut extension agreement with Republicans than he has so far killing bin Laden.
But hey, never let facts get in the way of a poor narrative, the trolls will argue that quite well I am sure below (much like their predictions of no wave last year, no loss in Massachussetts last January, or Prosser being destroyed in Wisconsin). Teflon Presidency right now, baby. more...

Posted by: CAC at 04:10 PM | Comments (96)
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Two reasons not to release the funeral video. One: We're undermining "moderate Muslims" by treating what is supposedly someone guilty of "anti-Islamic extremism" (as the Brits euphemize Islamic terrorism) as a Muslim.

Here's another reason:

Because we need to stop jumping when pre-medieval savages tell us to jump.

So, a bunch of primitive shamans and witch-doctors are shaking their savage beards and chanting the Magic Summoning Rituals of Mighty Hatred.

Why are they doing this? Power. They want to know they can intimidate us and boss us around.

It's all they have. They're shit. Less than shit. They've accomplished nothing, they have nothing. Except for barbarism and rape.

But what they do have is the ability to snap their little fingers and bring the Big Dog to heel.

We need to stop this.

We need to let these primitives know we don't believe in their Dark God and nor do we believe in their Big Medicine.

Osama was dropped in the sea to be consumed by crustaceans and bottom-feeders and other unclean water-animals. As it should be.

Enough of the endless groveling and deference to 7th century religious fanatics and neo-Hashassim.

This raises their morale. This causes them to want to keep on fighting. Because we are feeding into their delusion that their Murder God is real and that we worship him too (at least when compelled to).

Stop. Stop with it.

Does anyone in power ever stop to think that we're feeding into their own fantasy of a Bloody-Bladed Allah conquering the world when we time and time again bow down to their god of war and slaughter?

We can't blame these primitives for believing their bloody god will lead them to victory when every day we behave as if we expect that too -- and are trying to get in good with him before we're killed next.

He's dead and being processed into shark-shit and that's all these savages need to know.

Do we have to be apologetic about the Enlightenment and about decency? Why do we always owe the indecent savages an accounting?

(I'll tell you something else: If I see anyone washing this nasty monster's body and covering it white cloth -- with honor -- I think I might "Go Jihadi" myself.)

Posted by: Ace at 03:14 PM | Comments (332)
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This is the same woman who was previously caught endorsing political violence and revolution. She claimed Team Breitbart edited her remarks, which they hadn't, and she also never explained what on earth could have been deleted which would have rescued her advocacy of violence.

Now she tells people it's "useful" to use contrived unfair employment practices lawsuits to drive non-union companies out of business.

Let me guess -- you were "edited" again, huh?

I don't see a single break in the tape here.

Posted by: Ace at 03:04 PM | Comments (30)
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The ISI says it's an "intelligence failure."

I say it's just a personnel failure. Because if they put this 12-year-old boy on the payroll, the mystery of bin Ladin's location would have been solved.

Further embarrassment followed today when the BBC interviewed a 12-year-old boy who said he used to visit the building where Bin Laden had died and had met the Al Qaeda leader's family.

'I used to go to their house. He had two wives, one spoke Arabic, and the other one spoke Urdu. They had three children, a girl and two boys. They gave me two rabbits. They had installed a camera at the outer gate so they could see people before they entered the house,' Zarar Ahmed said.

Psst: ISI! Check over here!
In this tastefully-appointed Villain's Lair!

To be honest, I don't know if the Daily Mail is slanting this-- I am unsure if this kid is saying he met bin Ladin and knew he was bin Ladin, or if he just met a man who he later learned was bin Ladin.

Either way I guess it's pretty bad.

Actually: I think the Daily Mail did slant it, or I guess I just didn't read carefully.

They say the kid met bin Ladin's family, but not bin Ladin.

I don't know if this is my fault or theirs. Both, I guess. I think they wrote this a little hyped-up but then I read more into it than what was there.

Posted by: Ace at 02:44 PM | Comments (79)
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Was bin Laden resisting? Well the White House has made a hash of that today.

Now though we get what's probably closest to the truth. Why didn't we take him alive?

When Benson asked the first U.S. official whether bin Laden tried to grab a weapon or physically attack a commando, the official said only, "He didn't hold up his hands and surrender."

Always trust content from Ace of Spades HQ. Here's what I wrote this morning.

The obvious and potentially wrong inference to be drawn from that is that capture was not really on the menu at any point. Maybe if he had his hands up or was lying face down on the floor when the SEALs burst in he could have been taken alive

It's all window dressing now. This was a clean and easy story and this administration has managed to screw it up. The White House should just say, "We sent the SEALS to kill bin Laden. They did. You're welcome".

Also from the CNN link...the women who 'rushed' a SEAL was shot in the leg. Does anyone really think SEAL Team Six hits legs if they are trying to kill the person? As someone in my Twitter feed said, shooting her in the leg was SEAL talk for SIT DOWN NOW.

They went to kill one guy and the did. As they say in the Navy, BZ!

Related Enough: You know the now famous picture of Team Obama watching the mission? Notice Hillary! looks kind of shocked and puts her hand over her mouth. I'm going to guess she HATES the White House photographer for releasing that shot.

Also in that photo note the Air Force officer who seems to be running the A/V gear. He's a one-star general. And not just any one-star, he's Gen. Marshall "Brad" Webb, a special ops pilot who happens to have a Distinguished Flying Cross on his record. When that's the tech guy, you know whatever is going on is pretty big time.

Thanks to Jeff Emanuel for that.

Unconfirmed rumor...shortly after that shot was taken Joe Biden turned to Obama and asked Obama why they were watching people play Call of Duty online.

Here's Panetta.

On rules of engagement:
BRIAN WILLIAMS: Did the President's order read capture or kill or both or just one of those?

LEON PANETTA: The authorities we have on Bin Laden are to kill him. And that was made clear. But it was also, as part of their rules of engagement, if he suddenly put up his hands and offered to be captured, then-- they would have the opportunity, obviously, to capture him. But that opportunity never developed

A SEAL with a firearm or a B-2 dropping a JADAM on his head, he was going to be dead. Good riddance.

Posted by: DrewM at 01:53 PM | Comments (164)
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George Bush was relentlessly mocked for waiting seven minutes (actually waiting for his security detail to ready the exit and for his vehicle to be readied) before leaving the school he was visiting. He calmly finished reading My Pet Goat for the kids before going to his now-ready helicopter.

On the other hand, after Obama was told (most likely for the fifteenth time) that the CIA was really, really, really quite confident that Osama bin Ladin was at that compound in Abbottabad, he decided he needed to sleep on it.

Sixteen hours later (hours during which Osama might have fled-- bear in mind, his courier's name had just been outed by WikiLeaks), he made up his mind.

How does the media report this? Well, relying upon those in Obama's inner circle (that is to say, his political flunkies and spinners), we're told this:

"But the next morning after 16 hours, Obama summoned four top aides to the White House Diplomatic Room. Before they could speak, the president put his fist on the table and declared 'It's a go'."

Why does it matter that he did this "before they could speak"? They had spoken already yesterday when they strongly, strongly urged the president to give the order, and he had decided to sleep on it.

They were only waiting on him, after all.

So, after 16 hours of vacillation, during which the operation might have been rendered a failure by intervening invents, he fist-bumps a piece of furniture and finally makes up his mind.

This is something to brag about? This is, in Howard Fineman's words, "almost Biblical"?

Seems like a very cautious, feckless, indecisive individual delaying and delaying on critical decisions and then attempting to sound heroic when he finally does what he's being paid to do.

Thanks to OCBill. This is from the Daily Mail, via Drudge.

To Be Honest: I don't begrudge a president some thinking time before a big decision.

But the media still hasn't explained to me which of the previous presidents and which of the potential/hypothetical future presidents wouldn't have ordered this.

If everyone including Jimmy Carter would have ordered this, then I'm afraid I don't see why President Made a Poopie should be so praised for doing what everyone else would have done. That is, why praise him for being ordinary?

And yes, even Jimmy Carter probably would have ordered this. At least the 1970s version Bear in mind: He did order a failed hostage rescue attempt -- also fraught with peril, obviously, since the choppers crashed in the desert.

A commando hostage rescue is a lot trickier than a hit, of course. A lot more moving pieces, and you have to get all those people safely away.

So why should I praise Obama for a choice that every single one of his predecessors and every plausible successor would also make?

And probably not requiring 16 hours to do so, either.

Posted by: Ace at 01:30 PM | Comments (239)
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"By calmly and meticulously overseeing the successful targeting of Osama bin Laden, President Barack Obama just proved himself -- vividly, in almost Biblical terms -- to be an effective commander-in-chief of the armed forces of the United States."

"Calmy and meticulously overseeing" seems to be a resume-padding way of saying "He watched the SEAL team act on closed circuit video."

Like, "I facilitated urgent inter-organizational communications" (i.e., I routed calls to my boss).

Yes, he was Commander in Chief. He ordered the strike -- or acquiesced to it, when Leon Panetta really urged it.

But does anyone, apart from Howard Fineman, believe he was making tactical decisions? That's what his "meticulously overseeing" is meant to stupidly, and dishonestly, imply-- he crafts words which are deliberately vague but can be read to mean quite a bit.

No, Obama wasn't "meticulously overseeing" this. He was authorizing others to act. Those others "meticulously oversaw" it and then reported back that everything was being "meticulously overseen."

Amazing.

But of course they're going to do this -- bear in mind, this is a media which has praised Obama for accomplishing nothing at all. The media even swooned over drawings he drew as a seven year old!

They might as well have gone the full proud-parent route and babbled praise at him for making a nice poopie.

So, of course, when he finally achieves (as in, was a part of) something important -- well, all that previous, ahem, restraint they demonstrated goes out the window.

Question: Is the media saying it was possible that Obama might have made the decision to not authorize the raid?

That's how a decision becomes critical -- only if there was the possibility of choosing the other way. If there's no other possible decision, there's no real decision.

So -- is the media telling me that Obama is the sort of man who might have chosen not to take out Obama?

If so, please elaborate: And tell me why this should be a reason to vote for him rather than against him, which seems the more reasonable response.

Howard Fineman Is Truly An Idiot: I said it back in 2007, in a very funny piece in which I noted his tendency to drool on down to his pants when the name "Barack Obama" was mentioned.

Good to see his trousers are still wet.

Question for a Debate: "Mr. President, I'm going to read you the names of several people who were president, or who might have been president, had history worked out differently.

Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George Bush the Elder, Bill Clinton, George Bush the Younger, John McCain, Rudolf Giuliani, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, and Sarah Palin.

Now, Mr. President, I'd like you to tell me which of those people, if any, would not have made the decision you did to take out Osama bin Ladin."

Posted by: Ace at 12:36 PM | Comments (340)
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The left made such a ridiculous habit of calling "I question the timing" that Google is full of references to that stupid catchphrase from this site alone.

Always mocking the left for it.

It became such a source of fun we didn't even bother writing "I question the timing." We just shorthanded it as "IQTT!"

But it's suddenly smart when we do it?

Here is my question:

If you say this date was picked for political opportunism, then I need for those claiming this to tell me: Name a date upon which you think the attack should have been scheduled, when it would not have been politically opportunistic.

You don't like May 1. Fine. Then I'm going to need for you to go ahead and name a date where you wouldn't suspect political opportunism.

Give me your date. If not May 1, then when? January 26th? February 10th?

September 15th, 2010?! But note if it's any time before November 2010, then it's politically better timed to influence the last elections.

If you can't tell me a date upon which this event would not be "politically timed," then all you are saying is that you wish it had not happened at all. Which is bizarre.

Or you're saying Obama should have let bin Ladin live until after the November 2012 elections, so that he wouldn't have this to his credit.

But why? Why should he do that? Why let Osama live that long? Just so there is no poll-boost for Obama?

Wouldn't that be politically timed -- but to help Republicans?

There is one version of this claim that is possible-- but it's not about political timing.

If you postulate that Obama is risk-averse and weak, then Obama may have refused to act, like Clinton did, out of fear and out of weakness.

But only when he saw his presidency slipping away from him did he agree to take a chance and authorize the raid.

Now, that is possible, I admit. But in that case, it's not Obama picking and choosing which month he'll decide to get bin Ladin; that's Obama's natural weakness finally being overcome by panic at being Jimmy Carter II.

Further, in that case, political pressure actually helped produce a good result by overcoming Obama's built-in weaknesses and flaws.

We may yet wind up hearing about that -- about the CIA coming to him multiple times saying "We're pretty damn sure about this" and Obama voting present as always, saying, "Give me more evidence."

Perhaps that went on for months and months. Obama always refusing to make a decision.

This is possible. It doesn't contradict what we know, and plays into what we think we know about Obama's indecisiveness and weakness.

And we saw the exact same thing happen with Clinton.

But this stuff about him being able to to take out Osama at anytime he wanted and choosing, for maximum political impact, May 1, 2011, as the "best" month for doing this?

No, the best month for doing this is either August or September or October of 2012, taking all the oxygen out of the presidential race and showing Obama in his finest moment right before the election.

The next-best time would be August or September or October of 2010 -- having the same effect, and boosting Democrats running for Congress.

But now?

Now, six months after one election and eighteen months away from the next?

Again: If you're bothered by the timing what you're really bothered by is the bigger-picture timing: This happened on Obama's watch, period, and not during better periods for us, like Bush's terms or Obama's successor's term.

There is no date you can actually name where you'd say this was not politically timed.

As is typical in conspiracy theories, the theory is unfalsifiable by design and deliberately vague on details.

If you really want to push this, name me a date upon which there would be no "political benefit" and then we can talk about that.

If Bush... Caught a lucky intel break and discovered this just before the 2008 elections, and acted promptly -- would that have been done for political impact?

Or does this only apply to the other party?

A lot of people on the left agree with the IQTT brigade. The left are, in fact, the founding members of the IQTT brigade. This is their number one export to the cybernetic world.

They also think that this is a great thing to say, but only applies to the other party. Just because.

It seems to me that if there's an inconsistent and illogical kneejerk response beloved by some on the left, as well as some on the right, and the only disagreement between them is upon which politicians to play the card -- that seems to me pretty good evidence that there's nothing rational behind this except partisan pique.

Andrew Sullivan, 2006: He questioned the timing of the SkyBomb busts -- in which British and US agents acted against terrorists planning detonations of up to ten transatlantic flights, about simultaneously-- suggesting maybe it had to do with Tony Blair's desire to congratulate Joe Lieberman for having already won a primary against a man supported by Sullivan.

rt. I wonder if this story is going to get more interesting. I wonder if Lieberman's defeat, the resilience of Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the emergence of a Hezbollah-style government in Iraq had any bearing on the decision by Bush and Blair to pre-empt the British police and order this alleged plot disabled. I wish I didn't find these questions popping into my head.

Me too, Andrew. Me too.

I responded to him:

Nope, no evidence [that this plot was real]. All just a confabulation of Bush and Blair to, ummmmm, help Joe Lieberman. Yeah. The Brits are all queer for Joe Lieberman. He's like the fucking BEATLES, man, only without the baggage of Ringo.

And help Joe Lieberman after the election, I kept noting: This whole I Question the Timing thing doesn't even make sense if the timing is poor, as it was in this case, and as it is in the killing of bin Ladin.

Explanation for the Timing? Suppose Obama is doing what he usually does -- playing golf and voting present.

He could have ordered this before but has resisted, being risk averse. Doesn't want to risk a helicopter raid into the heart of Pakistan.

Now WikiLeaks reveals the name of the courier.

The administration denies it... but they know it's true.

What do they do? With the courier's name out there, the courier must start suspecting that something bad is coming.

They may lose their opportunity for the raid.

So Obama finally orders it.

I obviously don't mind narratives that play Obama as weak, timid, or stupid.

I just object to the goofy ones that are just all made up and illogical to boot.

Posted by: Ace at 11:35 AM | Comments (288)
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Via Hot Air, which excerpts the meat of the thing.

Full article at the Telegraph.

This is a bit byzantine, but here's what I'm gleaning from various articles, including this fresh one:

1. 2003: Enhanced Interrogation of Khalid Sheikh Mohammad Results in the Nom De Guerre of bin Ladin's Courier.

Enhanced interrogation techniques did not, however, produce the real name of the courier -- at least not this earlier; it seems to have happened later.

This is giving the pansy liberals and McCain "We're better than this" types the pretext to deny the usefulness of such techniques:

“They waterboarded KSM (Khaled Sheikh Mohammed) 183 times and he still didn’t give the guy up,” said one former U.S. counterterrorism official who asked not to be identified. “Come on. And you want to tell me that enhanced interrogation techniques worked?"

Yes, because he did give the guy up: he gave you the nom de guerre.

Further, I can think of a rather obvious possibility as to why he didn't give the real name up: He never knew it. Bin Ladin told him the codename; why would KSM need to know more than that? The most important practice in any covert organization is compartmentalization of information -- the famous "need to know."

If KSM's job only requires that he know the codename of bin Ladin's courier, in order to make contact with and identify him -- why would bin Ladin tell him his real name? Why would he tell him his family name and place of origin? None of this is necessary, and it a covert organization it would be secret.

And yes, secrets are kept from other members of any covert organization. Terrorist groups are specifically built in the "cell structure," such that no cell knows much at all about any other cell, so if the members of one cell are captured their ability to give information about other cells is drastically limited.

In a cell structure, the superior cell -- bin Ladin -- would know the identity of the leader of the subordinate cell (KSM), and would be able to contact him at will.

But this is not reciprocal. The whole point is that KSM doesn't know how to contact or where to find bin Ladin. So if KSM gets captured, bin Ladin is still safe.

And this would apply to his couriers -- why would bin Ladin instruct KSM on the precise identity of a crucial cut-out who could be followed back to bin Ladin should his real identity ever be discovered?

But sure, stupid liberals: Let's just assume KSM knew all of this but wouldn't break on it. He broke on almost everything else -- the nom de guerre of the courier, other terrorist operatives -- but this one thing he wouldn't tell.

Let's just assume that. Because when you assume, you make a GENIUS out of ME and YOU.

It is my belief the interrogations that led to the nom de guerre occurrecd in the "black sites" of Poland and/or Romania. I am pointing that out because we have heard two stories-- that the information originated in the "black sites," and that the information originated at Guatanmo. I think now the answer is both things happened -- this piece, the nom de guerre came from the "black sites" interrogations of KSM. The next piece, which I'm coming to, came from Guantanamo.

2. 2004: Enhanced Interrogation of al-Qahtani Confirms the Nom De Geure of bin Ladin's Courier.

I'm actually sort of guessing on this part, but it seems reasonable. Here's the new information from the Telegraph article, based on WikiLeaks:

The file for the Guantanamo detainee, Muhammad Mani al-Qahtani, who was to have been the "20th hijacker" on 9/11, contains a reference to the key US intelligence thread that led directly to bin Laden.

According to the file, al-Kuwaiti [bin Ladin's courier, and the man whose false step gave away bin Ladin] provided al-Qahtani with computer training for the mission to attack the US in the summer of 2001. Al-Qahtani was told by the lead 9/11 hijacker, Muhammad Atta, “to make reservations and buy airline tickets to Orlando for five individuals” including himself.

“Detainee [al-Qahtani] received computer training from al-Qaeda member Abu Ahmad al-Kuwaiti in preparation for his mission to the US,” according to the file, dated 30 October 2008.

Did al-Qahtani reveal the man's real name, or just that he was very important in the bin Ladin command structure? And did he confirm that he was bin Ladin's courier?

Not quite sure yet -- it appears the answers are "No, he didn't reveal the real name" (that is still later), probably because he didn't know it, but yes, he revealed this al-Kuwaiti was absolutely crucial, and yes, he probably confirmed he was bin Ladin's courier. (Assuming he even knew that-- perhaps he didn't. But our analysts knew that from KSM.)

And Qhatani did get the enhanced treatment:

The identity of at least one of the detainees who provided early information about the courier who led to bin Laden could be politically explosive. According to a U.S. official, that detainee was notorious Saudi al-Qaida operative and accused 9/11 conspirator Mohammed al-Qahtani, who was subjected to some of the most humiliating interrogations at Guantanamo. Among the enhanced interrogation techniques used on him were being forced to wear a womanÂ’s bra, being led around on a leash and forced to perform dog tricks and being subjected to cold temperatures that twice required his hospitalization, according to a later U.S. military report.

U.S. officials have accused Qahtani of being the so-called 20th hijacker for the 9/11 plot based on his unsuccessful attempt to enter the U.S. in August 2011 at the Orlando airport, where lead hijacker Mohammed Atta had arrived to meet him.

But in January 2009, Susan Crawford, then chief of the U.S. military commissions under President George W. Bush, rejected the proposed prosecution of Qahtani because of what had been done to him in interrogations at Guantanamo. “His treatment met the legal definition of torture,” Crawford told the Washington Post’s Bob Woodward.

Thusfar we have the nom de guerre revealed by enhanced interrogation and further confirmed by enhanced interrogation. No real name yet -- that's next.

3. 2006 (?): Enhanced Interrogation of an Al Qaeda Captured in Iraq, Ghul, Produces the Real Name of the Courier.

Finally, the real name. We get this, I think, in 2006. How? Well first of all from an al Qaeda captured in Iraq.

Iraq. Huh. Who'd've thought that Iraq would end up being so crucial to getting bin Ladin, who of course had nothing to do with Iraq and Iraq had nothing to do with him?

Further, this particular guy gets enhanced interrogations, it seems -- apparently, he's interrogated by the CIA in Pakistan, which I'm taking as code for "'outside the jurisdiction of the United States so wink, wink."

The file suggests that the courierÂ’s identity was provided to the US by another key source, the al-Qaida facilitator Hassan Ghul, who was captured in Iraq in 2004 and interrogated by the CIA. Ghul was never sent to Guantanamo but was believed to have been taken to a prison in Pakistan.

He told the Americans that al-Kuwaiti travelled with bin Laden. The file states:
“Al-Kuwaiti was seen in Tora Bora and it is possible al-Kuwaiti was one of the individuals [al-Qahtani] reported accompanying UBL [bin Laden] in Tora Bora prior to UBL’s disappearance.”

The picture that emerges from al-Qahtani’s Guantanamo file supports statements given in the last 24 hours by US officials, who named Ghul as the “linchpin” in the intelligence operation to find bin Laden.

So far, the entirety of the case is put together by a team commanded then by Bush. Before Obama was a gleam in Chris Matthews' eye, our nation and its operatives, under Bush's command, had used enhanced interrogation on at least two men and almost certainly a third, that third captured in Bush's unnecessary war in Iraq, which as it turns out, was pretty damn necessary.

We now have his real name -- and can begin the gruntwork/brainwork of figuring out where he likely is. We probably start with his hometown, of course -- that's likely. Criminals like to operate close to home.

4. 2006-2009: NSA Begins Furiously Intercepting Any And All Communications Made By Anyone "al-Kuwaiti" Has Ever Known.

All of al-Kuwaiti's family, anyone known to be an associate, clerics from the region he grew up in... everyone, as Gary Oldman advises.

At some point they figure out the approximate region he's living in, whether it's because he calls a family member and they trace it back to the place the call was made from, or because someone he knows mentions his area of operation.

I note liberals aren't that big on warrantless, wide-ranging wiretaps against people, even non-Americans, who aren't actually under suspicion for a crime.

5. Late 2010 (?): al-Kuwaiti Places a Very Ill-Advised Phone Call.

Corrected: I wasn't sure about how this phone call worked, exactly, to give away the courier's position. But Gabe sends this article that fills in the details.

Then in the middle of last year, the courier had a telephone conversation with someone who was being monitored by U.S. intelligence, according to an American official, who like others interviewed for this story spoke only on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive operation. The courier was located somewhere away from bin Laden's hideout when he had the discussion, but it was enough to help intelligence officials locate and watch him.

In August 2010, the courier unknowingly led authorities to a compound in the northeast Pakistani town of Abbottabad, where al-Libi had once lived. The walls surrounding the property were as high as 18 feet and topped with barbed wire. Intelligence officials had known about the house for years, but they always suspected that bin Laden would be surrounded by heavily armed security guards. Nobody patrolled the compound in Abbottabad.

Ah. So he called one of his associates that we were already wiretapping, and then we figured out about where he was, and then we started following him, and he led us to Abbottabad.

6. 2011: Surveying Abbottabad, We Grow Confident We've Found Bin Ladin's Hideout.

Even at this point we don't know he's there -- we never see him. But the circumstantial evidence -- tall walls, garbage burned, pricey digs -- is suggestive.

(Rewritten: Based on Gabe's article, at this point we have traced the courier to the compound and are now just deciding if it's likely OBL himself is there.)

7. April 29-May 1 2011: Obama's Team Tells Him They Have High Confidence Bin Ladin (or at Least His Most Trusted Courier) is In the Compound, and Obama Agrees, and Orders the Raid; On May 1 It's Executed By SEAL Team 6.

8. May 2011: Begin a Disinformation Campaign To Convince the Public That 2003-2008 Never Happened.

And now the Democrats begin the real covert operation, the important mission:

But one Democratic communications hand sent advice to a slew of other Democratic operatives in the wake of the announcement hammering on the need to make sure Obama comes out on top.

“In your day jobs, do not let Republicans turn this into continuing the Bush legacy. This has to be about Obama’s decisive leadership,” the guidance said. “He is the one who oversaw bringing bin Laden to justice, much like how Bush failed to do so at Tora Bora and then claimed Osama wasn’t a priority.”

I am still fuzzy on this. I will correct my mistakes when I find them. This is my best reconstruction of events, but I don't know all that much, just what comes out in drips and drabs.

Let me say something: I believe the media could put together a clear timeline like I have but I think they never will, because they do not want to make it clear where and when and how this information originated.

Better to just leave it vague and keep saying, "Obama got him." They do not want to even talk about critical steps 1-4, as those were thanks to Bush; they only want to talk about the very end of the game, steps 5-7, because that's where Obama enters the game. Late.

In fact, they don't even want to talk about the NSA and CIA and SEAL Team 6; they want to focus on one relatively minor thing: Obama agreeing that the raid should happen.

And Obama's men will not leak the real story out, even though, given that the operation is concluded, it can be released. Because the real story cuts in Bush for some credit -- and cuts Obama out of some credit -- it must be suppressed like our nuclear warhead launch codes.

Added: Step 8 was added at the suggestion of a commenter called "The Prez."

Alternate Timeline: Commenter Dan offers up alternate critical steps 1-4, from the media's/Democrats' perspective.

1. 1/21/09 OB gathers his inner circle and tells them that there is this real bad guy that Bush totally forgot about and didn't care that he secretly murdered 3,000 people early in Bush's administration and OB wanted him found ASAP.

2. 2/14.09 OB kicks out Bush incompetent an replaces him with super sleuth Leon Panetta because of his vast experience in espionage and fabulous motivational skills.

3. 2/15/09 OB tells Panetta that I'm 95% confident OBL is in Pakistan, probably somewhere just North of Islamabad in a house with high walls and maybe three stories and two security gates.

4. 2/21/09 OB tells Panetta that he intercepted a call from a guy who is really close to OBL and to drop everything else and totally focus only on him.

Ah, That Makes Sense Too: Esteemed Professor Rusty Shackleford suggests a different reason that al-Qahtani and KSM wouldn't know al-Kuwait's real name.

Not that it was secret -- so much as he simply had abandoned his old name entirely for his jihadist name.

I think a better explanation than compartmentalization would be that this wasn't a "code name" as much as it was probably a new name taken on by the guy. It's pretty much standard operating procedure within the circle of Islamic fighters to take on a new "mujahideen" name. These guys almost always do this, not to throw off intel or anything like that, but because they think it's cool. Most of these names are throwbacks to some great fighter in the past, such as the first generation of Muhammad's followers.

Asking KSM what the courier's real name is would be like me asking you who Snoop Dogg really was.

I'm just surprised that any one knew it.

Yes, that makes sense; at some point the real name of "Stalin" just becomes a trivia questions. When you're holding yourself out only by a made-up name, that becomes your real name. Why would someone else know it? Only people who'd known you from your youth would have reason to know it. Everyone else knows you by your d.b.a. (doing business as) name.

This happens on the internet, too: our handles, or made-up noms de cyber become, more or less, our real names, for most purposes.

Posted by: Ace at 09:27 AM | Comments (345)
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