House of Eratosthenes

The world must now realize that the domestic antiwar movement is dead, kaput; it cares not a whit whether we assassinate bin Laden or a son of Qaddafi or go into Libya. Everything is on the table now and there are no self-restraints, no snickers on The Daily Show, no quirky insider winks on Letterman, no Barbara Streisand crazy faxes. A Nobel peace laureate is now the Left’s totem and he can send quite deadly Americans on quite deadly missions as he sees fit — and without worry about a New York Times op-ed barrage or an ACLU lawsuit. That gives the US newfound advantages, a veritable blank check, from keeping Guantanamo open indefinitely to using a Cheney “assassination” team and valuable water-boarded intelligence wherever it wishes to.

Militant feminism took a hit, from which it has never recovered, when it sought a waiver from its own militancy for the benefit of President Clinton. People may overlook this, may choose to deny it, but this is only achieved by means of a derelict long-term memory. Two or three decades ago, if you were in a position of authority and the feminist movement came gunnin’ for you, you were gone — it was a when, not an if. You were history. That isn’t true anymore.

Militant anti-war advocacy is now in the same position, forced to seek a reprieve from its own militancy for the benefit of President Obama.

Militancy is like a windshield, or a soap bubble — it retains a certain structural strength until such time as there is a breach. It doesn’t work well with these breaches. But politics is ultimately all about breaches; give a little to get a little; half-a-loaf and go onward. And so these militant movements enjoy a working timespan in full vigor until there is a breach, then they deflate.

I’m very happy to see the anti-war movement deflate. But then, of course, there is Judge Napolitano’s concern from the video.

I’m not cool with the President noodling over His decision carefully, with His “dithering,” careful and meticulous as it might be, even if it took Him sixteen hours. Say what you want about George W. Bush, but that President had to make the case to somebody; to prove something to somebody.

Still happy bin Laden is dead. I still think about that scene from the Warner Brothers Batman movie — keep hearing Jack Nicholson’s voice in my head saying “You’re a vicious bastard, Rotelli, and I’m glad you’re dead!” But you know, it is possible to come to the correct decision following the wrong process. And when that happens, it can still be a problem. I believe it’s a problem here. And it will probably bite us in the butt down the road.

To be fair, just how much due process did Stretch and his merry men give the folks on the planes and in the buildings before they made jihad on them? Perhaps Stretch should have given The Great Satan the benefit of the law for his own safety’s sake.
- Rich Fader | 05/04/2011 @ 07:09
Yeah, yeah, Judge, I get it, and your point is on target, in general.

On the other hand, is there anybody on the planet who really needs to give Osama Bin Laden “due process”? He’s had 20 years of “due process”.

There are exceptions to rules, and it’s one of the reasons we have a President who is the Cheif Executive, and it’s why it matters that that person be of strong moral character and that the people trust him … (or her). Because at some point, that person is going to have to make a call that may be outside the letter of the law that is nonetheless prudent and necessary for the good of the country, and in this case, the World.

Every 4 years we get a chance to vote the guy out if we don’t like what he does, and if it’s really bad, we can impeach him.

Seriously, anybody REALLY wanna impeach (or even vote out of office) Obama over ordering the death of Osama Bin Laden? Really? C’mon, Judge, I like ya and all, but serioiusly ….

I got plenty of good reasons to want him voted out and perhaps even impeached, but this isn’t one of them.
- philmon | 05/04/2011 @ 08:39
Well that’s kind of the point, Phil. Obama uses His considerable powers of “grok” to anticipate the result that…if I bring bin Laden’s head on a pike, My approval ratings will enjoy a net gain. Not exactly going out on a limb there. But with this Obama mindset, the public’s influence on its executive begins & ends there.

You know, I understand we’re not a “pure democracy” and all…but I just think the Founding Fathers would have expected us to have more to say about things than just that. Or Congress, or somebody. The President needs to be accountable to more than just what-will-happen-to-the-poll-numbers.
- mkfreeberg | 05/04/2011 @ 09:08
But my point is that he will be held accountable when the election rolls around, and the Founders ultimately put the trust, the final say, in We the People. Congress does have a say. If they feel that the president is behaving recklessly outside the law, they can impeach him. The Senate will try him, and he’ll either be convicted or not.

There’s nothing in the Constitution that sanctions black sites and interrogation techniques, either.

It was understood from before Obama was elected that we and most of the rest of the world would be quite happy to see OBL’s head on a pike. Obama giving the nod to go ahead once we had extremely good intel on where he was … any president would have done it given who we are talking about and what he openly admits he is responsible for.
- philmon | 05/04/2011 @ 09:18
Napolitano’s argument is punctured by his own statement about due process. bin Laden waived his due process rights when he declared war on the United States. His acts of terrorism put him outside international law. He was, by definition, outlaw, and there is no due process for outlaws. The Constitutional argument is sound, for American citizens. The appeal to international law is sound, up to a point, about extra-judicial killings. However, terrorists, by definition, are operating outside the law. They waived all claims of “fair” treatment by their actions. They are anathema.

I would be more concerned about the reports that bin Laden was unarmed when shot, which would indicate that no provision was made to take him alive. This raises the question of whether this operation was running under strictly military protocols, or whether they were a de facto hit team.

I’m still glad the vicious bastard’s dead. If only he’d been barbecued like Rotelli.
- chunt31854 | 05/04/2011 @ 12:47
I completely agree with the first part there. And I’m not concerned about the second part.

I have no doubt that it was a defacto hit team, and I have no problem with that. The unintended consequences of taking him alive would be quite predcictable, and not good at all.

Besides, this sends the proper message.

I loved how Gagdad Bob put it:

Regarding my delicate digestion, I could only stomach about thirty seconds of Obama’s vulgarly self-aggrandizing statement on Sunday night. And it wasn’t just the pettiness and gracelessness that I found disturbing.

My aesthetic sensibilities were also wounded by his attempt to reach beyond the limitations of his eighth-grade level of prose. Where is Bill Ayers when you need him? Probably professional courtesy. He didn’t want to get involved in dissing a fellow terrorist.

a bright September day was darkened… The images of 9/11 are seared into our national memory… a cloudless September sky… The empty seat at the dinner table… a gaping hole in our hearts…. the American people came together… We reaffirmed our ties to each other… we were united as one American family…

Oh, c’mon. Here’s what happened in the real world: an evil psychopath with religious delusions took out two of our buildings with 3000 human beings inside. Do this and we will destroy you. We will dispatch men of granite from the future who will reach down into your festering sinkhole of history and pull you out by the gonads. We will tear your evil ideology from the earth, root and branch. If you want to live like a stinking animal, hey, move to some desolate corner of Pakistan and go nuts. But don’t even think about imposing this on the rest of us, because we will put a sunroof in your skull faster than a jihadi can hide behind his whore, and pass the rest of you through whatever sea creatures happen to find you floating by.
- philmon | 05/04/2011 @ 12:58
I’m concerned with the second part. Hitler killed himself because he knew that Stalin would have paraded him through the streets of Moscow in chains. We were denied the opportunity to capture bin Laden and parade him, much less prove him a coward for being taken alive. We are not spending near enough energy degrading and belittling our opponents. You’d think a Chicago thug would understand this, but hey, maybe bin Laden wasn’t a real threat to our magical leader.
- chunt31854 | 05/05/2011 @ 05:25

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