They should have killed him, thrown him in the sea and immediately released the photos. The world would have reacted to everything all at once and it would all be dying down by now. This is just casting doubt, giving birth to a lot of bizarre conspiracies, and dragging things out longer than necessary.
It does serve the purpose of keeping the focus off of the economy, the home market, the debt ceiling, the lack of jobs, gas prices, etc. It also allows Obama to bask in the glow of the one good thing for which he can take some credit.
They should have killed him, thrown him in the sea and immediately released the photos. The world would have reacted to everything all at once and it would all be dying down by now. This is just casting doubt, giving birth to a lot of bizarre conspiracies, and dragging things out longer than necessary.
Agreed. I think the photos may turn up around October 2012.
You have nailed the psychology of this thing perfectly. 0bama is going with the opposite view which is typical of liberal cocktail party shrinks. They think there is an ardor to see them born of blood lust and that people will be shocked and repulsed by the gore because it was more than they expected. They think that with time we will have prepared ourselves for that with cooled passions and steeled nerves. That is false on all counts IMO.
What people really wanted was simply to feel a part of this long awaited day of justice regardless of the blood and regardless to our genuine feelings that bin Laden's suffering is deserved. Even if some are in fact uncomfortable that they have those feelings. Some of us aren't at all. It is the victory over our enemy, and its iconic nature inherent to who bin Laden was, that we wanted to celebrate, more than anything else, along with our valiant warriors* who accomplished the actual feat. (*romantic prose intended to underscore the emotional impact and importance of the primary reason immediate release of the pics was important)
The gore will shock and feelings of revenge will be fulfilled but those things would soon be processed and forgotten as they should be. Those things would have been overshadowed by the very real emotional need many of us had for nearly ten years to simply see justice done and the architect of all of these ten years of heartache and anger subdued and rendered harmless.
Yes, that's symbolic in light of the reality of the ongoing war where there are many more enemies to defeat and more heartaches to come for our men and women in uniform and their loved ones. For all of us. But that is nowise any small matter for our hearts, minds and spirit. Perhaps particularly because many of us could not be there to do the hard work and make the terrible sacrifices. This was our V-day even if the war is not literally over.
It was a gross miscalculation to miss that and the opposite effects will occur than this Resident of the WH has figured. The moment passes and our emotions fade anyway. We did celebrate. When the pics finally do become public there will be no heightened sense of the moment of victory left to blunt the grotesqueness or raise us easily above the ugliness of the revenge we wanted but did not want to feel.
If he thought a time to cool off would enhance the perception of veracity any picture might give us he was entirely wrong about that too. From a calculating POV seeing them when we were high on the victory was the time to show them and expect less doubt and scrutiny. As is always the case, time has allowed small seeds of doubt to germinate and grow.
We have been let down by a conniving man who is not even good at his ignominious trade.
pinging all those who unknowingly helped bring this out of me today and to some who help me see things more clearly almost every day. Thank you. If this sucked ... well, tough titty. ;^)