kanda on April 13, 2009 at 1:00 PM

Thank you for posting that, Kanda… an unsurprising spin that doesn’t hold up terribly well under scrutiny.

WASHINGTON – The U.S. economy is showing only glimmers of life and two costly wars remain in the balance, but President Barack Obama’s “no drama” handling of the Indian Ocean hostage crisis proved a big win for his administration in one of its first critical national security tests.

Nice inclusion of an irrelevant comment about the economy. Does anyone remember the AP giving Bush credit for scoring “big wins for his administration” after the Army or Marines jacked up terrorists in Iraq and Afghanistan, even when they bagged one of the big fish? Does anyone feel like three dead Somali pirates really eases the pain of the tremendous amount of wealth destroyed in the economy since Obama became president? Man, if some Army snipers manage to blow al-Zawahiri away while Obama’s sitting in the Oval Office, I won’t care if the Dow never gets over 9000 again!

Obama’s two quiet backstage decisions to authorize the Defense Department to take necessary action if Capt. Richard Phillips’ life was in imminent danger gave a Navy commander the go-ahead to order snipers to fire on the pirates holding the cargo ship captain at gunpoint.

For Obama, the benefits were instantly clear: an American life saved and a major victory notched against an increasingly worrisome scourge of the seas off the Horn of Africa.

Yes, that’s a major victory all right. Listen up, Somali pirate chiefs: if you grab some American hostages, and put their lives in imminent danger, Obama will authorize the Navy to blow you away after four or five days. Meanwhile, he’ll spend his time whining that you’re distracting him from his primary job, which is throwing tomorrow’s money at today’s problems. He will also watch you very closely on CNN, so be careful when you look into those news cameras – the Messiah could be looking right back at you.

Obama’s handling of the crisis showed a president who was comfortable in relying on the U.S. military, much as his predecessor, George W. Bush, did.

We’re lavishing praise on presidents because they’re comfortable relying on the military now? Bill Clinton was comfortable in relying on the military, too – he just didn’t give them the armor they needed to stay alive while he was comfortably relying on them. Jimmy Carter was comfortable sending brave men to die in a sandstorm while Iran’s thugs laughed at him. What would be an example of a President who didn’t deserve this meaningless praise? A President who hid under the table when the Joint Chiefs walked into the room? A President who ordered all military weapons replaced with balsa-wood duplicates, because he was afraid to let them have all that firepower?

But it also showed a new commander in chief who was willing to use all the tools at his disposal, bringing in federal law enforcement officials to handle the judicial elements of the crisis.

It was like a two-hour commercial-free special episode of CSI meets NCIS! It may have escaped the AP writer that the only “tool at his disposal” that made ANY difference in resolving the crisis was a team of Navy sharpshooters. I doubt any of them had a law degree. If any of them DOES have a law degree, and he can shoot like that, we should make HIM president, immediately.

The rescue appeared to vindicate Obama’s muted but determined handling of the incident. What won’t be known for some time is whether Obama will benefit politically.

That’s the most ridiculous line of the article. If Obama had dressed in a chicken costume and run around in circles for four days crying like a baby, then tearfully sobbed his consent to letting the Navy marksmen take their shot before using his tears to write “America is doomed” a thousand times on the White House wall, the exact same outcome would have been achieved. Would the heroic accuracy of those Navy shooters have “vindicated Obama’s strategy” then?

Something tells me the AP already has some ideas about whether this will “benefit Obama politically,” and will be sharing them with us very soon.

Doctor Zero on April 13, 2009 at 1:39 PM