There are only three possible reasons that Osama bin Laden released a video tape so close to election day where he made fun of George Bush.
They are:
- bin Laden thinks that releasing the tape and ridiculing Bush will turn American voters away from Bush and thereby help Kerry win. So Kerry is Osama's candidate.
- bin Laden thinks that releasing the tape and ridiculing Bush will result in a backlash that will help Bush. As well, the more Americans think about terrorism, the more likely they are to vote for Bush. So Bush is Osama's candidate.
- He doesn't really care who wins the American election, but couldn't resist ridiculing Bush. He released the tape when he did to get maximum publicity and to get his message out to the American public. more...
There are only three possible reasons that Osama bin Laden released a video tape so close to election day where he made fun of George Bush.
They are:
- bin Laden thinks that releasing the tape and ridiculing Bush will turn American voters away from Bush and thereby help Kerry win. So Kerry is Osama's candidate.
- bin Laden thinks that releasing the tape and ridiculing Bush will result in a backlash that will help Bush. As well, the more Americans think about terrorism, the more likely they are to vote for Bush. So Bush is Osama's candidate.
- He doesn't really care who wins the American election, but couldn't resist ridiculing Bush. He released the tape when he did to get maximum publicity and to get his message out to the American public.
These are the only 3 possible ways bin Laden could intend to effect the American election. And it doesn't matter what bin Laden said. There would still be only 3 possibilities if the video showed bin Laden repeating the Pledge of Allegiance over and over again or was a direct appeal to the American public.
Here's where it gets interesting. Almost everyone says that (1) bin Laden intends the first possibility, helping Kerry and (2) the video will end up helping Bush.
In this view, bin Laden thinks Americans will react as Spaniard's are supposed to have reacted to the Madrid train bombings; they will vote for a government softer on terror. Except, almost everyone believes that Americans would react differently. They certainly reacted differently after 9/11. If al Qaeda attacks the United States or bin Laden criticizes Bush, then Americans are expected to rally round the flag and their president and vote for Bush.
The implicit assumption is that bin Laden is stupid and ignorant. He isn't. Read the 1998 interviews at
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/binladen/who/interview.html.
Moreover, with satellite TV and the internet, it would be impossible for bin Laden not to know that releasing a tape and criticizing Bush is expected to help Bush win.
If bin Laden wanted to get the benefits of having his message get out and at the same time minimize the damage to Kerry, he could have put this tape out 6 months ago. It would have gotten a lot of publicity and might, sublimnally help Kerry a bit. But by election day, it would have lost it's impact.
Or he could have waited until after the election. His video would have still gotten a lot of play, but it wouldn't hurt have hurt Kerry's chance of winning.
So why did Bin Laden releasd this tape so close to election day? The logical conclusion is that eitherbin Laden doesn't care who wins or he's doing his very best, short of attacking the United States, to help George W. Bush win. Take your pick. But there's no logical reason for bin Laden to have released this video when he did, if he wanted Kerry to win.