My initial reaction to the Bin Laden release yesterday was about the same as Wretchard’s. The tone has changed.
It is important to notice what he has stopped saying in this speech. He has stopped talking about the restoration of the Global Caliphate. There is no more mention of the return of Andalusia. There is no more anticipation that Islam will sweep the world. He is no longer boasting that Americans run at the slightest wounds; that they are more cowardly than the Russians. He is not talking about future operations to swathe the world in fire but dwelling on past glories. He is basically saying if you leave us alone we will leave you alone. Though it is couched in his customary orbicular phraseology he is basically asking for time out.
On Larry King last evening, Walter Cronkite agrees – Bin Laden would like to negotiate. Of course, he also said this…
“Indeed. Indeed. And the thing that in bringing this threat to us, there is almost, in the fact that he dressed well, that he looked well, he was clean shaven, nearly clean shaven as those folks get.”
Say, what?
update, via Instapundit; Jeff Jarvis is slowly (?) starting to see he’s supporting a candidate whose party is suffering from a case of full-blown political necrotizing fasceitis…
I guess it’s true what they say about a bad penny. As I recall, Cronkite turned against the Vietnam War after the Tet Offensive because the U.S. was conducting World War II-style combat operations; he wanted a multigenerational hearts and minds show — an extended-play version of Malaya. I assume this time he condemns any long-term American commitment to security in Afghanistan or Iraq and wants a strategy for a quick exit?
Senile old Walter also forgot to cinch his Dependz a bit tighter, according to Matt Drudge, when he also told Larry King that he suspects the bin Laden tape could have been a plot by Karl Rove.
I don’t expect anyone sane to just accept this without a link, so….
http://drudgereport.com/flash7.htm
I always hear a miscalculation from Islamic terrorists on TV. They honestly seem to believe that all Americans can be stampeded into timidity by their disassociated threats.
In addition to the troops on inactive duty and inactive reserves, there are the rest of us. VFW halls all over the country swell with former military who know everything there is to know about living with danger, facing threats, and killing the enemy. Do they really think they can panic us with threats of incoming?
For millions of us, this is all familiar territory. We’ve been there before. The enemy would have to crank up the threat level quite a bit to impress us.
I would say this to Islamic terrorists: now you know what we’re like when we fight a constrained action designed to minimize casualties. Believe me, you don’t want to see what we’re like if you piss us off.