Parents upset (surprise, surprise) after school yearbook lists George W. Bush, Dick Cheney as worst people of all time.

Verne Strickland Blogmaster, June 2, 2011

PEOPLE, WHAT THE HECK (NO . . . WHAT THE HELL) IS HAPPENING TO THIS COUNTRY? WHERE IS THE RESPECT FOR DECENCY AND AMERICAN VALUES? THIS STORY FROM LITTLE ROCK, ARKANSAS, BREAKS MY HEART. IF THIS IS THE WAY OUR KIDS SEE THEIR COUNTRY, WE SOMEHOW MUST START OVER. GOD HELP US.

Cutest couple. Most likely to succeed. Class Clown. Top 5 Worst People of All Time.

OK, so that last list probably isn't seen in most school yearbooks, but it's raising the ire of parents and community members in Arkansas. The Fox affiliate in Little Rock reports the names in the Russellville Middle School yearbook include, in order, Adolph Hitler, Osama bin Laden, Charles Manson, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

Parents were outraged when they discovered the list, according to the station, and, in reaction, the school district had the list with black duct tape.

Superintendent Randall Williams says the printing of the list was "an oversight," Fox 16 reports, and said he was disappointed to learn the tape could simply be peeled off the page.

"I'm furious as a parent and as a board member and as a tax payer and as a resident of Russellville," School Board Member Chris Cloud, who has two children in the district, tells the station. "It's wrong."

Williams tells Fox 16 the yearbook sponsor -- a teacher -- is "very, very, very" upset that she didn't pay more attention the page with the list, and that the yearbook editing process is being reviewed.

"I think she maybe just scanned the whole page and went on," he tells the station, adding that he can't talk about disciplinary action.

WHAT'S GOING ON DOWN THERE? IS ARKANSAS STILL SUFFERING FROM THE DEPRAVITY OF STAR CITIZENS BUBBA AND HILLARY CLINTON? GET WITH IT, HOGS, OR GET OUT! THE TEACHER GOT BURNED, PARENTS GOT FRANTIC. BUT WHO DID IT? AND WHY? WHO IS SHAPING THE MORALS AND 'PATRIOTISM' OF OUR CHILDREN?

http://www.parentdish.com/2011/06/02/school-yearbook-worst-people-list/?icid=maing-grid7|main5|dl1|sec1_lnk3|67696

Evidence at bin Laden’s home raises serious nuclear concerns . . .

Pakistani government links suspected 

Supporters of the Pakistani religious party Jamaat-e-Islamial Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, in Lahore, Pakistan. Osama bin Laden was killed by a helicopter-borne U.S. military force on Monday, in a fortress-like compound on the outskirts of Pakistani city of Abbottabad. (Associated Press)

By Eli Lake

The Washington Times

9:46 p.m., Thursday, May 5, 2011

Pakistan army soldiers and a police officer patrol past the house (background) where al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was killed by U.S. forces on Sunday, ending a nearly 10-manhunt after the Sept. 11 attacks on U.S. soil. (Associated Press)

Intelligence analysts are sifting through phone numbers and email addresses found at Osama bin Laden’s compound to determine potential links to Pakistani government and military officials while U.S. officials and analysts raise concerns about the safety of Pakistan’s nuclear materials.

According to three U.S. intelligence officials, the race is on to identify what President Obama’s top counterterrorism adviser, John Brennan, has called bin Laden’s “support system” inside Pakistan. These sources sought anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to reporters.

“My concern now is that we cannot exclude the possibility that officers in the Pakistani military and the intelligence service were helping to harbor or aware of the location of bin Laden,” said Olli Heinonen, who served as the deputy director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) from 2005 to 2010.
“What is to say they would not help al Qaeda or other terrorist groups to gain access to sensitive nuclear materials such as highly enriched uranium and plutonium?”

The U.S. has worried quietly about the infiltration of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and military for years. Those concerns heightened in recent months when the CIA learned that bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad was a stone’s throw from Pakistan's military academy.

Politico first reported this week that CIA Director Leon E. Panetta told members of Congress that bin Laden’s clothing had two phone numbers sewn into it at the time of the raid. Those numbers and other contacts found at the compound are key clues in an effort to determine what elements of Pakistan’s national security establishment provided support to bin Laden and al Qaeda.

“I can tell you that concern about al Qaeda and other terrorists’ infiltration into the ISI is not new on the part of the Congress or the [George W.] Bush and Obama administrations,” said Rep. Steve Rothman, a New Jersey Democrat who serves on two House Appropriations subcommittees that fund defense and foreign aid.
Mr. Rothman has attended top-secret briefings on the Abbottabad raid and the impact of the raid on Afghanistan and Pakistan.

“As a matter of course, and for good reason, the materials that were removed from bin Laden’s home in Pakistan are being run down for leads that could assist the United States in apprehending individuals or entities who have sought to harm Americans or who have enabled others to harm Americans,” he said.

Another U.S. intelligence official told The Washington Times that other phone numbers and emails were recovered in the raid.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/may/5/evidence-at-bin-ladens-home-raises-nuclear-concern

Verne Strickland Blogmaster

Five questions Obama needs to answer as he basks in the giddy glow of success

By JOE KLEIN  May 4, 2011

Joe Klein is TIME's political columnist and author of six books, most recently Politics Lost. His weekly TIME column, "In the Arena," covers national and international affairs. In 2004 he won the National Headliner Award for best magazine column.



President Obama is basking in the after-glow of the successful operation that led to the demise of Osama bin Laden. As I have said previously, he deserves credit for making the gutsy decision to use a Navy SEAL team to take Bin Laden down. Of course, the lion’s share of the credit belongs to the special operations forces themselves, who overcame immense odds to mount the incredibly risky attack ordered by their commander-in-chief.

However, as President Obama savors the high point of his time in office to date, there are some questions that he needs to answer to the American people. Here are just a few of them.



1. Does the president have any change of heart about the harsh criticisms he leveled at his predecessor for using renditions of suspected terrorist detainees and enhanced interrogation techniques in light of the crucial information they yielded on the identity of bin Laden’s trusted courier, which in turn led us to locate Bin Laden himself?

Since taking office, President Obama has largely followed the counter-terrorism policies of President George W. Bush, despite criticizing them while campaigning to succeed Bush. Guantanamo remains open. Military commissions are still being used by the Obama administration to try some detained terrorist suspects. Renditions and indefinite detentions of high risk suspects without trial have continued. It’s time for President Obama to admit that he was wrong in castigating the Bush administration during the campaign and acknowledge the continuity of Bush’s policies that are necessary to fight an evil foe determined to kill as many Americans as possible.

2. Why have there been so many conflicting reports on what happened during the mission?
First we were told by the president’s chief counterterrorism adviser, John O. Brennan, who reportedly observed the mission in real time from a live feed transmitted by the Navy Seals as it went down, that Bin Laden had a firearm which he was using when confronted and shot.
Brennan said in his initial account that Bin Laden was

engaged in a firefight with those that entered the area of the house he was in

We were also told that he used one of his wives as a human shield.
The next day we learned that Bin Laden was not carrying a weapon when he was killed by our forces, but was somehow resisting arrest. We also learned that Bin Laden had not used any human shield. Given the fog of war in a fast-moving operation, why did Brennan speak with such certainty in the first place on what happened when apparently he did not know the whole story?

Was there an attempt to justify killing Bin Laden, rather than taking him into custody, in order to satisfy international law sticklers including President Obama himself?  Will the Obama administration, in its usual deference to the United Nations, comply with the request from the UN’s senior human rights official, Navi Pillay, for detailed information on the operation to confirm its ‘legality?’

3. Why did the Obama administration show such concern in handling and disposing of bin Laden’s body to make sure it conformed to Islamic law?
President Obama said in his speech to the nation on Sunday night that

“Bin Laden was not a Muslim leader; he was a mass murderer of Muslims.

If Bin Laden represented a perversion of Islam, why obsess that he be buried within 24 hours and cleansed in accordance with Islamic law? Why not bury him in an unmarked grave or drop him into the sea to live with the fishes after making absolutely sure that we have confirmed his identity?

4. What are we going to do about double-dealing Pakistan where al Qaeda terrorists are finding sanctuary?

Shouldn’t we re-focus our efforts in the region from counter-insurgency, nation-building in Afghanistan to more limited counter-terrorism operations in Pakistan and Yemen where our enemy is now concentrated?
The Obama administration wisely left Pakistan in the dark about the Bin Laden mission until it was completed. Elements of Pakistan’s military and intelligence services have a record of working with the Taliban and al Qaeda.

There is no way that bin Laden could have been hiding in a town filled with Pakistani military facilities and within yards of Pakistan’s equivalent of West Point without the knowledge and support of members of Pakistan’s military and intelligence service. Advance information about the operation in the wrong hands would have ensured the failure of the mission and could well have brought about significant casualties to our forces.

After initially praising the killing of Bin Laden as a “major setback to terrorist organizations around the world,” the Pakistan government issued a statement yesterday complaining that the United States had undertaken an “unauthorized unilateral action.” It’s time for a major push back against this fair weather, duplicitous ‘ally.’

Is the Obama administration planning to revisit the billions of dollars Pakistan receives each year from our country? Will we continue, and even expand our counter-terrorist operations in Pakistan, including continued drone attacks and commando raids, without seeking Pakistan’s permission as their treacherous government demands?

And aren’t we wasting billions of dollars and sacrificing the lives of our soldiers trying to re-build Afghanistan when the global terrorist networks threatening America are now operating out of Pakistan and Yemen, not Afghanistan?

5. Finally, will the Obama administration continue to mistakenly look at radical Islamist groups like the Muslim Brotherhood and their U.S. affiliates such as the Council of American Islamic Relations and the Islamic Society of North America benignly, distinguishing them from al Qaeda, even though they are using more stealth means towards the same Islamic supremist agenda to impose sharia law as broadly as possible?

President Obama can take pride in his accomplishment of ridding the world of Osama bin Laden. But the American people deserve answers to these and other difficult questions in the days, weeks and months to come.

Joseph Klein is the author of a recent book entitled Lethal Engagement: Barack Hussein Obama, the United Nations and Radical Islam

Verne Strickland Blogmaster

CNN SPECIAL REPORT: Seven Questions after the death of bin Laden.

Osama bin Laden, the longtime leader of al Qaeda, was killed by U.S. forces in a mansion north of Islamabad, Pakistan.

May 2nd, 2011

11:03 AM ET

Editor's Note: Dr. James M. Lindsay is a Senior Vice President at the Council on Foreign Relations (where he blogs), co-author of "America Unbound: The Bush Revolution in Foreign Policy" and a former director for global issues and multilateral affairs at the National Security Council.

By James M. Lindsay – Special to CNN
Article referred by Andy Yates

Americans are cheering the surprising news that U.S. Special Forces have killed Osama bin Laden. The successful military operation is a tribute to the skill of U.S. Special Forces, the perseverance of intelligence professionals who have hunted bin Laden for more than a decade and the nerve of a president to order a military strike that could have failed spectacularly.

THE STRIKE ON BIN LADEN'S COMPOUND RAISES QUESTIONS. HERE ARE SEVEN:

1. Does Bin Laden’s death cripple al Qaeda and jihadist terrorism more broadly? Probably not. Al Qaeda long ago ceased to be a centralized operation. For the last decade bin Laden has been a figurehead than a mastermind. Terrorist attacks, like the bomb plot that German authorities broke up last week, have been planned and carried out by largely independent al Qaeda “affiliates.” Nonetheless, U.S. Special Forces might have picked up valuable intelligence as they scoured bin Laden’s command post that could help uncover terrorist cells and plots.

2.  Can you kill a symbol?  In announcing bin Laden’s death late last night, President Obama noted that “For over two decades, bin Laden has been al Qaeda’s leader and symbol.” Men die, symbols don’t. In death, bin Laden will continue to inspire jihadists as much as he did in life. The biggest threat to bin Ladenism comes not from American bullets but from the prospect that the Arab spring will remake the political order in the Middle East.




3.  Where is Ayman al-Zawahiri? With bin Laden dead, his chief lieutenant and the man frequently described as al Qaeda’s “brains” goes to the top of the most wanted listed. Zawahiri reportedly was gravely injured in a missile strike in Pakistan in 2008. Given his deep operational experience and cunning, the Egyptian-born Zawahiri is more than capable of plotting major terrorist attacks on his own.

4.  Is Pakistan a reliable partner for the United States? President Obama said last night that “our cooperation with Pakistan helped lead us to bin Laden.” But the White House didn’t notify the Pakistani government in advance and Pakistani troops did not participate in the attack. Bin Laden’s compound was located just forty miles north of the Pakistani capital of Islamabad - or about the distance from Washington to Baltimore - in a city that hosts a Pakistani military base and military academy. Expect to hear more doubts inside the Washington Beltway about the value and viability of the U.S.-Pakistani partnership.

5. Can we leave Afghanistan now? Sometime in the next several months, President Obama will decide whether and how fast to draw down U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan. Last week the Pentagon reported mildly optimistic news about progress in the Afghan War. Bin Laden’s death gives the president the political opening to order the sizable draw-down that public opinion polls show that most Americans want. He has always justified the war in Afghanistan in terms of defeating and dismantling al Qaeda, and he can say that with bin Laden’s death that goal has been achieved.

6.  Will Obama benefit politically from bin Laden’s death? The president’s public approval ratings have slipped recently after enjoying a modest bump earlier in the year. Expect another bump in the coming weeks as the public gives the White House credit for a job well done. But if past “rally-‘round-the-flag” dynamics hold true, the boost that Obama gets from bin Laden’s death will be short-lived.

7. Will our current bipartisan moment last? John Boehner, Dick Cheney, and Rudy Giuliani are just a few of the Republican luminaries who have congratulated Obama. As John Kennedy once noted, victory has a thousand fathers. But don’t expect this moment of unity to last. The issues dividing Democrats and Republicans are too deep to be bridged by the death of the world’s foremost terrorist.

Asking these questions does not diminish the significance of what the Obama administration accomplished yesterday. Killing bin Laden brings closure to the families who lost loved ones on 9/11. It shows that terrorists will pay for their crimes. Justice was done.

http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/02/7-questions-on-the-death-of-bin-laden/

The views expressed in this article are solely those of James Lindsay.

Post by: Dr. James M. Lindsay - Special to CNN

Verne Strickland Blogmaster

U.S. tracked couriers to bin Laden compound. Daring attack by Seals is successful.

Verne Strickland Blogmaster

Posted: May 02, 2011 2:17 AM EDT Updated: May 02, 2011 5:28 AM EDT 
 

By Joseph Neese / Raycom via WECT

Osama bin Laden tried to resist U.S. fire, according to defense officials. (Source: CNN)

WASHINGTON (RNN) - Senior Obama administration officials said U.S. forces were led to Osama bin Laden's million-dollar compound by two male couriers, both of whom were killed in the firefight that killed bin Laden.

According to a conference call with reporters in which defense officials released a more detailed account of the operation, the 40-minute attack was carried out early Sunday morning by what the officials called a "small U.S. team" with at least two aircraft.

While the officials would not say if the team was composed of military or CIA operatives, CNN has identified the team members as U.S. Navy Seals.

Bin Laden resisted the assault force and was killed in a fire fight, according to Mike Vickers, under secretary of defense for intelligence.

Three adult males and one adult female were killed in the raid in Pakistan, Vickers said. The adult males were two al-Qaeda couriers and Bin Laden's eldest son. The female was being used as a human shield.
Two additional women were injured. All non-combatants, however, were moved safely away before the detonation.

While one U.S. helicopter was lost in the raid, no U.S. lives were lost, as a backup aircraft was in place.

The U.S. shared no information about the operation with any other country, Pakistan included. Only a small group of U.S. officials, including President Barack Obama, knew about the intelligence operation before it was executed.

At the time of the attack, bin Laden was living on a security compound in Abottabad, Pakistan, which was valued at $1 million. Along with him were his eldest son, youngest wife and the two al-Qaeda couriers and their families.Reports that bin Laden was living in the Pakistani compound first surfaced in August 2010. The reports were deemed to have a sound intelligence basis for pursuit in February.

"The bottom line of our collection and our analysis was that we had confidence that the compound harbored a high-value terrorist target," said the CIA's Michael Morell.

In mid-March, the president began to chair national security council meetings on this issue. He conducted five meetings with the council beginning on March 14 and ending on April 28.

Intelligence officials followed the two couriers, who were brothers and were believed to have been well-connected with upper echelons of al-Qaeda's leadership.

The couriers led the officials to an "extraordinarily unique" compound built on a large plot of land in Islamabad in August 2010. The compound was built in 2005 on a secluded, narrow dirt road in the outskirts of the town.
The compound was eight times larger than the residential homes that came to surround it over the last six years. It was strongly secured and seemed to be hiding someone with significance, according to Morell.

The compound had walls 12- to 18-feet in height, which were topped with barbed wire. The main building on the compound was three stories in height and had a terrace on its top floor with a 7-foot privacy wall. The trash on the property was not dumped and rather burned. Although lavish in cost, the compound had no internet or TV and few windows.

All in all, the compound's location and design were consistent with the type experts believed would hide Bin Laden, Morell said.

http://www.wect.com/story/14551639/us-tracked-couriers-to-bin-laden-compound

BIN LADEN DEAD, SAY SOURCES. OBAMA SPEAKS TO NATION.

       May 1, 2011

FIREBRAND TERROR CHIEF WAS WORLD'S MOST WANTED DESPOT. HIS DEATH CLOSES FRUSTRATING CHAPTER IN U.S. HISTORY.

BIN LADEN SHOT IN HEAD. BODY RECOVERED BY U.S. MILITARY CONTINGENT.

PRESIDENT SAYS BIN LADEN'S DEATH NOT LIKELY TO END THREAT OF TERRORISM, BUT WILL WEAKEN DANGERS OF AL-QUAIDA.

Verne Strickland Blogmaster

Bin Laden has been on the F.B.I.'s most-wanted list for more than 10 years

Usama bin Laden is dead, multiple sources confirm to Fox News.

President Obama is expected to deliver a statement from the White House Sunday night to discuss the major development.

Sources said bin Laden was killed by a U.S. bomb a week ago. The U.S. had been waiting for the results of a DNA test to confirm his identity.

The announcement comes nearly a decade after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks which started a tireless hunt for the terrorist mastermind and Al Qaeda leader.

michellemalkin Michelle Malkin

Glad to hear David Gergen say "We should thank President Bush."


MSNBC CORRESPONDENT MISTAKENLY TWEETS 'OBAMA SHOT AND KILLED'.

By Chris Moody - The Daily Caller

       

In an attempt to release the news of Osama bin Laden’s death quickly late Sunday night, MSNBC correspondent Norah O’Donnell accidentally reported on Twitter

“Obama shot and killed,” Norah O’Donnell posted on Twitter, citing NBC Chief Pentagon Correspondent Jim Miklaszewski as her source.

It was announced Sunday that Osama Bin Laden, the mastermind behind the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, was killed by American forces. President Obama addressed the nation to deliver the news around 11:30 p.m. ET.

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