On Quoting bin Laden

Deja Vu All Over Again

Although the journalists covering yesterday's event seem to have forgotten, this wasn't the first time Bush tried quoting bin Laden. More than a year ago, facing sagging poll numbers and a growing antiwar sentiment, Bush did almost exactly the same thing. Here's the text of his June 28, 2005, speech.

"Hear the words of Osama Bin Laden," Bush intoned. "'This Third World War is raging' in Iraq. 'The whole world is watching this war.' He says it will end in 'victory and glory, or misery and humiliation.'"

See more in my column from the following day.

Reality Check

The president gave bin Laden way too much credit in his speech, casting him as the oracular leader of a global movement and taking seriously his vision of an Islamic caliphate "stretching from Europe to North Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia." Even the White House's own report on terrorism issued yesterday morning barely mentioned bin Laden, noting that the terror threat has become more widely diffused during Bush's tenure.

Chas Freeman , president of the Middle East Policy Council, told me in an interview earlier this year: "Only two people in the world actually believe that there's any possibility of a new caliphate being established, stretching from Spain to Indonesia: Osama bin Laden and George W. Bush. . . .

"So, rather than simply passing along what our own politicians and pundits say -- often on the basis of nothing but the congealed prejudice of stereotypes -- that people in the Middle East want, the press should be digging into what they are actually demanding, and why."

Opinion Watch

Maureen Dowd writes in her New York Times opinion column (subscription required): "After playing down bin Laden for years, barely mentioning him and minimizing his importance, W. has once more picked up a metaphorical bullhorn on the cusp of the 9/11 anniversary to make Osama the villain, using his name 18 times in a 40-minute speech. Once it would have made a difference to decapitate Osama, and it would still be great to do it. But it's too late to stop Al Qaeda that way now. The organization has diffused to a state of mind, fueled by hatred of U.S. occupation of Muslim land.

"W.'s plan to save his legacy and keep Congress out of Democratic hands is to absorb a misbegotten and mishandled war, Iraq, into the good wars of the 20th century, World War II and the cold war. Instead of just admitting he bollixed up Iraq, W. and his henchmen are ratcheting up, fusing enemies willy-nilly, running around giving speeches with the simplistic, black-helicopter paranoid message: All those scary Arabs are in league to knock us off and institute the rule of Allah."

Liberal blogger John Aravosis writes: "What this idiot doesn't understand, or chooses to ignore, is that regardless of how evil the enemy, the problem isn't that the American people don't understand the dangers we face. The problem is that the American people have finally understood that we have an incompetent buffoon in charge of tackling said danger. And no amount of prattling about Lenin or Hitler is going to quell people's concerns that Bush is simply not up to the task."

Keith Olbermann expounds on MSNBC: "It is to our deep national shame -- and ultimately it will be to the President's deep personal regret -- that he has followed his Secretary of Defense down the path of trying to tie those loyal Americans who disagree with his policies -- or even question their effectiveness or execution -- to the Nazis of the past, and the al Qaeda of the present. . . .

"And it becomes necessary to reach back into our history, for yet another quote, from yet another time and to ask it of Mr. Bush:

"'Have you no sense of decency, sir?'"