02 Nov 2004 Bin Laden’s Conflicting Goals

Bin Laden aims to bankrupt the United States, says this UPI story:

Among comments not released until Monday, bin Laden said: “We are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy,” adding it was “easy for us to provoke and bait this administration.”

Bin Laden’s reference to provking and baiting the Bush Administration makes it clear that he’s referring to the costs of Bush Administration anti-terror policies (presumably, the invastions of Afghanistan and Iraq), not 9/11-related economic costs.

Bin Laden presumably is trying to make the American people believe the invasions worked against our interests. That’s pretty good evidence they didn’t.

(It is also pretty good evidence that Bin Laden knows no more about economics than he does about theology.)

Bin Laden is showing his weakness. He has claimed he attacked the U.S. to get us out of the (supposedly holy) lands of Saudi Arabia. Now he claims his strategy all along was to get us to send armies to the Middle East.

You can’t have it both ways, Osama. Bottom line: America’s tiniest little baby girl is a better man (and strategest?) already than you’ll ever be.