Waiting For The Balloon Drop (cont.)

It's Capture Osama Day over at the TNR, and boy, am I positioned for some crow if they are right.

Meanwhile, Osama's purported hiding place, Waziristan, has come to New York, or at least to the New Yorker. Eliza Griswold was there; the story is not available on-line, but there is some discussion here and here.

UPDATE: Head Fake! (and we thank the Crank.)

UPDATE 2: Getting warmer... (And the current AP Dateline is Friday, 5:02 PM - International Date Line issues? Here is CNN; Most Wanted.)

UPDATE 3: Our Secret Source tells us that the NY Times has a front page ready - Just In Case!

Comments

[MattJ]

Announcement to come in the middle of Kerry's speech, so that all the networks cut away... right?

[Crank]

No, they meant "capture Obama."

Personally, I'll eat that crow anyday. That there's some tasty crow.

[Crank]

Head fake!

[lyle]

The evil genius/moron Bush bait-and-switched us!

Hey, maybe for the dem convention, it's Zarqawi. Big news but not mythic.

But on the eve of the GOP convention in NYC, word comes that Osama's bin captured. Dubya, touring Ground Zero, tells a gathering of NYPD and FDNY, "Three years ago, on this spot, I told you that the people who did this were gonna hear from us. And now I have good news..."

[SamAm]

Banner at CNN as I write this...

> BREAKING NEWS Security forces have captured a high-level al Qaeda operative in a raid in central Pakistan, Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat said.

Is it a pump fake to go along with the headfake? If it's true, it's interesting. If it's not true, it's interesting.

Either way, we'll see.

Does crow taste like duck, or is it less fatty?

[Paul Zrimsek]

Say, have you been reading the Corner today? It seems that someone out there is claiming that Dick and Lynne Cheney's first daughter was... wait for it... suspiciously timed!

[SamAm]

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=5818050

From that article the man, captured on Sunday, is a Tanzanian wanted by the US for his connection to the 1998 Embassy Bombings.

I'm glad he's captured, but this news obviously reeks of an attempt by Pakistan to help the administration. There's no other way to rightly describe it. Now, that doesn't mean there was a calender sent to Musharraf with this week circled in red.

But that didn't have to happen for there to be a quid pro quo. If nothing else, at least Pakistan believes that gaming with the US election is helpful to their situation. Troubling indeed; the news really does carry bad implications for the administration.

[HH]

LMAO... "Bad implications for the administration." There's no way on God's green earth that this (a biggie, but hardly a household name) takes a bit of the shine away from Kerry in the media.

[Crank]

SamAm: So, let's say the Pakis have an extra incentive right now to go catch some terrorists because they think Bush will be extra thankful if they get some big fish before November.

In the grand scheme of things, isn't that, you know, a good thing? Wouldn't you want Colin Powell to go over there dropping any hints he could that would light a fire under Musharraf?

lyle - I'd love to see Bush come out to accept the nomination with bin Laden's head in a box. It could be like the end of "Seven."

[capt joe]

Crank

Depends on your perspective. Good for the country but not for Kerry's election prospects.

Come on man, get your perspectives in order. ;)

[martin]

From the original TNR story:

"But according to this ISI official, a White House aide told ul-Haq last spring that "it would be best if the arrest or killing of [any] HVT were announced on twenty-six, twenty-seven, or twenty-eight July"--the first three days of the Democratic National Convention in Boston."

That's close enough for me man.

I think TNR has been completely vindicated.

Too bad for the White House this was just the highest HVT they could scrounge up.

[TM]

TNR is looking good, and the night is still young.

And the NY Times is ready. Just in case.