Nearly five years after George Bush vowed to bring Osama bin Laden to justice “dead or alive”, it’s the end of the line for the CIA’s Alec Station, the unit dedicated to the hunt for the al-Qaida leader.
The unit, named after the son of a counter-terror official, was disbanded last year, it emerged this week, and its agents reassigned in what intelligence officials described as a recognition of the changing nature of al-Qaida.
Pshaw. Isn’t it great how the Mission Accomplished crowd stays the course?
Given the CIA’s utterly abysmal performace leading up to 9/11, their shamelessly manipulative behavior since then, as well as their utter failure to predict the collapse of the Soviet empire a decade earlier, are you sure this is such a bad thing?
Hahaha, what a puppet you are, sagrilarius.
As I’ve said several times previously, I will happily vote for a Democratic presidential candidate when they nominate one that is less stupid than the Republican candidate. Sadly, that’s happened only once in the past four decades.
Hell, anybody is less
stupidwillfully ignorant than Bush.The sad part about this whole mess is, that if John ‘Hanoi’ Kerry was elected, the Democrats would be claiming a victory in Iraq. Funny how defeat always comes from within.
smartalix –
Sorry, but in spite of the millions of Americans who are smarter than Bush, the Democrats can’t seem to be able to nominate any of them. Instead they nominate even bigger idiots like Kerry, and chose idiots like Dean to lead their party.
Kerry has issues, but stupidity isn’t one of them.
quick question:
does wondering what would have happened if kerry won the election change anything about how poorly g.w. has executed his vendetta against saddam hussein?
simply no.
george w. bush is responsible for his own actions, and the actions of the military of which he is commander-in-chief.
sagilarius –
Maybe if the Democrats would stop whining about conspiracies, and figure out what kind of candidate they need to nominate that could actually win an election, they, and the country as a whole, would be better off.
This CIA unit will now be focused more on hiding/protecting the Ken Lay’s of the world as they have done for bin Laden in recent years.
Membership in Skull & Bones Society of both Bush and Kerry trumped any chance for a real election. All Kerry did was aid illusion of us having a choice and kept 3rd parties from gaining any significant vote count.
Frank IBC and I may see some things different but i agree with him on this. The Democrats can not seem to pull a election out. I do think the last election was stolen BUT show me a time when elections are not. The only reason why Bush is in office is the Democrats didnt present anything worthwhile to vote for. Kerry isnt bad but thats the point. He isnt much of anything. Bush has the thought process of a 12 year old but at least it was known. Democrats will complain and thats it.
On to the subject. I think this is fine. everything else that Bush has done to make us worried about the war on terror this is no different. You hear less and less about terror alerts.
Do we even have troops in another country other then Iraq? you never hear about it.
This to me is pointless hearing about the team is disbanded. All this war on terror has been, to me, is trying to keep our focus on one item while Bush (or his administration) do something else. Like jiggling keys in front of a baby.
They had to be disbanded. They were all too busy data mining through our emails to our grand parents, and sifting through phone calls to 1-900-spank-me.
As if we needed more proof of the sincerity of the Bush administrations’ on going rape of the bill of rights.
Of course the special unit has been disbanded…. they no longer had anything to do. Osama Bin Laden was either captured or more likely killed years ago, but his continued virtual existence is beneficial to the continued ‘War on Terror’. It keeps the jihadists under one umbrella, so they are easier to track, and it provides an gullible American public a bad guy to point the finger at and rally against. And if he is dead (as I suspect), he then becomes a martyr, which in the Muslim culture is the equivalent of sainthood.
A lot of military decisions, political alliances, political manipulation can only take place under the pretext of hunting down Bin-Laden.
There has been zero reliable evidence of the continued existence of Bin Laden since we went into Afghanistan… some muddy audio tapes are all we have heard from the guy.
We tracked Bin-Laden to a specific cave, and then he supposedly got away. There is a Gazzilion dollars reward to whoever turns him in… 5 years and nothing.
A brief pause from the “Bush Bashing.
From reading the posted comments it seams few have read the article. The reason why the unit was disbanded is that bin laden has been reduced to a figure head and no longer “commands” anything. This by no means indicates that we have stopped looking for him, just that the over-all war on terror has effectively rendered him impotent as a strategic leader. Sounds to me like the CIA team was so successful they worked themselves out of a job.
You may now return to your regularly scheduled “Bush Bashing”
the story I read yesterday quoted a CIA guy as saying….*the unit had become a cult, really weird, thats why it was shut down*
Things do change in war, John. Luckily for us, you write articles and not plan combat maneuvers. Note this section of the article:
“Since 9/11, the original al-Qaida has spawned dozens of regional affiliates from Indonesia to Iraq. Terrorism experts believe that Bin Laden and his Egyptian lieutenant, Ayman al-Zawahiri, no longer exercise centralised control over international jihad, although they continue to offer inspiration with audio tape messages and other more secret communications.
“Al-Qaida used to be a large hierarchical organisation, and five years out from 9/11 you have an organisation where many senior leaders, facilitators, and planners have been captured and killed, but you have a growing number of groups and individuals who have been inspired by al-Qaida and act independently of al-Qaida,” the intelligence official said.
CIA officials insisted today that the hunt for al-Qaida’s founder continued. “Tracking and gathering intelligence about Bin Laden, Zawahiri … remains a high priority for the CIA and the intelligence community,” one official said.”
Uh, Matt — send in a postcard when you learn to distinguish between the journalism part of an article — and the PR crap stuck in to keep government sources happy?
I think the cartoon tells it better than the article.
It must get really old to be a dedicated career analyst at the CIA or some other Intelligence service and have to hear about all the mistakes you have made over the last 20 years. They can’t disclose their findings directly. And if they are outranked by a politician misrepresenting their work, they have to be a good soldier and let time and the political system sort out the truth. They don’t have an entirely free hand at where they focus their attention. And if they do step out of rank somewhat, patriots like Bush and Cheney use their political muscle to defame and discredit their work, then blame the agency for failing to deliver the accurate intelligence which they have been suppressing. They aren’t afforded the respect of having one of their own allowed to lead the agency. Instead they must contend with a series of political appointees whose primary job is to protect a politician’s interest and secondarily to run the CIA effectively.
Their families can’t talk to them about what happened at the office today. They don’t get the respect and benefit of the doubt given to the military. When one of them dies for their country they don’t get their names on a public monument in Washington. They get a small anonymous star on wall at a building visited by fewer Americans than the National Zoo.
Dead or alive… Or untill we give up.
The world looks on and thinks about how much the US has fallen – Al Qaeda must have won.
Frank, the Incredibly Bad Conservative. Your jealousy that the Democrats have had responsible, intelligent, sophisticated, and knowledgeable candidates in every election shows. I’m sorry that the Republicans had to steal TWO elections for such a useless armpit.
In case you haven’t noticed, even though the elections were stolen, Democrats haven’t taken up arms. Not like the right winger did when Clinton took over. Remember Waco, Ruby Ridge, Oklahoma City and Atlanta? Remember how these zealots weren’t satisfied with just the political process, they had to let their guns do the talking? Although Republicans did try the Court system and then special legislation to try and save a brain dead woman, even though a viable baby was looking for a hospital in Bush’s own Texas. The baby died from legislation signed by Bush.
Ya, you really have a lot to be proud of.
How can I be jealous of candidates that don’t win?
This “stolen election” crap is pathetic. Even the New York Times admits that Bush won Florida, and the Democrats have done nothing towards instituting direct popular election of the president, by abolishing the Electoral college.
And I’m not a “conservative”, in spite of your desperate need to label and pigeonhole those who disagree with you. As I’ve said many times already, I will happily cast my vote for a Democratic presidential candidate when there is one that is more intelligent and more capable than the Republican. I’ve voted Democratic many times at the state and local level.
I’m not sure why you’re bringing up Waco and Ruby Ridge, given that the Ruby Ridge happened under Bush Sr. and both cases it was the Feds that let “the guns do the talking”, not the people who were kiled there.
Osama, if still alive, is probably brokering fast food franchises in Baghdad, profits to go for a Jihadist Heroes Museum, complete with random exploding laptops, just to make everybody feel at home.
Although Republicans did try the Court system and then special legislation to try and save a brain dead woman, even though a viable baby was looking for a hospital in Bush’s own Texas. The baby died from legislation signed by Bush.
Two errors here. Sciavo, while severely brain-damaged, was not “brain dead”. If she had been “brain-dead”, she would not survived on her own without a respirator. However, she would have survived indefinitely had the feeding tube been kept in her.
And here is the background on the case in Texas that you mentioned:
If any of you think Texas Children’s Hospital is hard-hearted in going to court to seek to take 4 1/2 -month-old Sun Hudson off life-support machines, consider this:
Texas law allowed them to do it months ago without going to court.
What’s more, some experts in medical ethics consider the Texas law to be a model.
If you haven’t kept up with the story, Sun was born with a form of dwarfism that is almost always fatal not long after birth. What’s more, it typically restricts the growth of the rib cage and lungs, so that as the rest of the baby grows he slowly suffocates.
Doctors at Texas Children’s came to the conclusion last November that keeping Sun on a ventilator would only delay his death, possibly painfully.
But Wanda Hudson, the baby’s mother, insisted that Sun be kept alive. Discussions with her did not get far. Among other things, she says her son was not conceived by a man but by the sun and that he will never die.
Source: Houston Chronicle
Lots of crystal ball rationales in your “reasoning” Frank. Is that cordless or hard-wired? Stats on severely brain-damaged survivals with feeding tubes ain’t really so great. Ask a neurologist instead of a professional christian.
And after all the what-if’s and maybe’s near and dear to the heart of the creation crew, the significant legal precedents for next-of-kin were bent and re-bent to satisfy political and superstitious chicanery.
———-
Haven’t wandered by this Post since this morning; but, per usual, the defenders of neo-con crappola have wandered miles afield from the article, etc.. Do Fearless Leaders’ clay feet [and matching transparent clothing] automatically require such defense and denial?
You’re full of assumptions, aren’t you? I am not a Christian, moss, let alone a creationist. The only reason I’m bringing up this whole sad affair is because Mr. Fusion dredged it up in a lame attempt to smear those with whom he disagrees.
Schiavo had been on the feeding tube since 1990 – that’s 15 years. As I said previously, she would have lived indefinitely had she remained on it. I made no claims about her quality of life, other than to point out Mr. Fusion’s misuse of the term “brain-dead”, and that she would have lived longer and with much less pain than Sun Hudson.
I personally would not want to live indefinitely in the state that Terri Schaivo was in. However, her family did want to keep her alive and were willing to care for her. Unfortunately Terri did not put her wishes in writing, and we only have the word of her husband who had been living with another woman and stood to personally benefit from her death.
Frank IBC is using the usual tactic for Bush viral marketers.
“Heck I’m not a Christian or a Creationist or a Republican. I only support Bush and everything in his agenda because I’m sooooooooo disgusted with the Democrats. Yes siree I was a lifelong Democrat untill they became a bunch of traitorous perverts and I’m voting Democrat just as soon as they come up with a candidate who’s a living God like Bush is.”
“After all there’s so many people like me you have to believe me!”
Again, neurologists aren’t as confident of their crystal ball as is Frank.
And the law as generally interpreted outside the cloud-cuckoo-land of christianity says a husband is next of kin. Because you happen to ascribe to some jive morality that says your rights are supposed to be interpreted, case by case, to satisfy this week’s political bushwa — doesn’t justify throwing precedent out the window.
Milo –
I’ve never been a Democrat. I’ve never been a Republican. I did not vote for Dole in 1996, and I did not vote for Bush in 2000. I’m not “disgusted” with the Democrats (I will seriously consider voting for Hillary, Obama, or Lieberman if they run in 2008), nor do I “love” the Republicans. But given a situation where there are exactly two viable presidential candidates, between a dumb candidate (Bush), and a dumber candidate (Kerry), I will chose the “dumb” candidate without hesitation. He’s obviously capable of a higher level of reasoning than you are, that’s for sure.
Moss –
You’ve missed my point entirely. As I said previously, I’ve made no claims about the quality of Schiavo’s life, nor did I defend Jeb Bush and Trent Lott’s sordid performance in this sad affair, I was merely pointing out that Mr. Fusion misused the term “brain dead”. “Brain dead” means that there is no brain function whatsoever. “Brain dead” means that the individual will not survive unless s/he is on a respirator. There is a huge difference between a low level of brain function, and NONE.
And given that Michael Schiavo had a common-law wife, with whom he had lived for several years, that seriously undermined his claim to be the “next-of-kin”. And again, the only reason I bothered discussing it was because Mr. Fusion brought it up (along with Ruby Ridge) in an attempt to divert attention from his faltering argument that “Bush stole the election”.
You can go ahead and label everyone who disagrees with you in the slightest “conservative”, “republican”, “fundamentalist creationist christian”, whatever. And once again in 2008 you will be left wondering why your candidates lost a third election in a row.
Frank — you’re the dude who’s stuck with the kooky kristian allies. All you’re doing is trying to find a PC way to justify your “moral” judgement of Schiavo.
And haven’t you been around this site long enough to know I’ve been a registered Independent for a half century? I registered once as repulican, once as democrat. Got fed up both times with hypocrisy, deceit, and chickenshit fence-sitters.