Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan
Like everyone else, I was transfixed by the media coverage and the joyful young crowds cheering the killing of OBL as it was revealed late Sunday night, May 1, 2011. But today I am still wondering if Obama will not use the killing of OBL to rescue his presidency, taking credit for what was a military mission, declaring national unity, and then blaming Republicans for polarizing the country with their resistance to his fiscal policies.
Read the text of his speech, and count the number of times he said “I” ordered this and that. Note too the typical use of his “family” rhetoric, implying that he is the bold, protective father of his country. He noted that unity had recently been “frayed” so we should assume that it is his decisive leadership in ordering the operation yesterday morning that has bound our wounds, knitting the “frayed” social fabric.
I have no doubt that the more timid Republicans will back off their allegedly “extremist” and “divisive” demands for fiscal responsibility in the face of his probable bump in popularity and their reluctance to be seen as agents of social disintegration now that the happy family has been restored.
I don’t believe that I am overinterpreting the subtext of Obama’s dramatic announcement. And did I mention his nod to the Pakistanis as if they had fully cooperated with the mission to capture OBL?
[Added later 5/2/11: Obama is continuing the same line he laid down after the Tucson massacre; see https://clarespark.com/2011/01/15/healing-trauma-mystery/. Tonight he addressed congressional leaders and their wives at a White House dinner, reiterating the same themes I identified above: unity, frayed unity, 9/11, the Obama kill, but adding Tucson to the mix. I predict that will be the line for the 2012 campaign. He stands for a restored social fabric, while the opposition is ripping it apart with irrational demands. I.e., we’re not “broke.” Listen to this healer.
The Clare Spark Blog 
Perhaps he should just have said, “We got him. Mission Accomplished.” Oh, sorry, somebody already used that line.
Comment by Donald Dreyfus — May 2, 2011 @ 6:57 pm |
Bush erred in allowing that banner to be placed in back of him when he made that famous speech. But he didn’t claim that the war on terror had been won. You didn’t engage the content of my blog, which is the way that the killing of OBL is being used to prop up the failed Obama presidency, using rhetoric so transparent that even a child could decode it were it literate in reading coded messages.
Comment by clarespark — May 2, 2011 @ 7:06 pm |