Smooth Operator
So, you know, this happened. But according to wingnuts, Obama is a pussy who gets pushed around.
January 25, 2012 2:41 am
Posted in: Foreign Affairs
47 Comments
Balloon Juice Store
Pet Calendar
-
-
-
-
Click to support us!
Support this site- Shop
47 Responses
El Cid - January 25, 2012 | 2:46 am · Link
Obama just did it to empower his Kenyan allies over their Somalian rivals.
Roxie - January 25, 2012 | 2:47 am · Link
Dude, you really can’t sleep, huh?
Suffern ACE - January 25, 2012 | 2:49 am · Link
Followed by
If they’re in a group, they’re probably organized, but they aren’t militants, or are they?
David Koch - January 25, 2012 | 3:10 am · Link
This hostage rescue was illegal as it violated the rights of the kidnappers by not reading them their rights!
This kind of gross affront to kidnappers would never happen under Ron Paul!
Joseph Nobles - January 25, 2012 | 3:10 am · Link
Stone Cold Barack Obama.
David Koch - January 25, 2012 | 3:19 am · Link
Fucking Obama thinks he’s Rooster Cogburn.
When he’s not killing the bad guys, he’s comforting the injured girl.
amk - January 25, 2012 | 3:21 am · Link
paging greenwald. get on it dood.
Amir Khalid - January 25, 2012 | 3:22 am · Link
No, no, no. Obama didn’t do anything. That Kenyonesian Islamocommie tyrannical wuss usurper president was never in the loop at any time. This was all on Seal Team Six’s own initiative, just like when they whacked Osama bin Laden. Those guys are so badass, they don’t need a chain of command to give them orders; they come up with their own missions.
amk - January 25, 2012 | 3:25 am · Link
so did the thugs boo during obama’s sotu today ? any call him the name that noot is desperate to say in public ?
hhex65 - January 25, 2012 | 3:31 am · Link
my gawd, I feel so lazy—y’know, when Bush was President a guy like me could get away with just looking busy
David Koch - January 25, 2012 | 3:32 am · Link
The military loves Obama
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/.....283a_z.jpg
http://www.flickr.com/photos/d.....otostream/
ranger3 - January 25, 2012 | 4:17 am · Link
The Teatards would be happier had this hippie chick died over there.
Sophist - January 25, 2012 | 4:50 am · Link
Bah, Obama was probably bowing to some furrin type while this was going down, so it doesn’t count.
As an aside, why do people always gotta be such unmitigated cocks? These people were in your country to make sure your children don’t get their limbs blown off of their bodies by explosive devices, couldn’t you see your way to not pointing guns at them, at the very least?
SFAW - January 25, 2012 | 6:05 am · Link
It’s clear that Osamabama has done all he could to keep the SEALs from being able to do their jobs. Fortunately, Bush and Rush allowed them to keep training at a secret camp, which they (BushRush) had set up years ago. (Said camp was set up “just in case” a blackity-black Kenyan Mooslim commie fascist ever takes over the entire US Government, of course.)
So, once again, anything Osamabama “accomplished” is due to the pre-existing work done by Republicans.
kd bart - January 25, 2012 | 6:59 am · Link
Anxiously awaiting Greenwald’s column condemning this action.
kindness - January 25, 2012 | 7:09 am · Link
Why are you giving credit to Obama? Don’t you know President Bush is the one who should get the credit?
Linda Featheringill - January 25, 2012 | 7:18 am · Link
@Amir Khalid:
[hee-hee.] Excellent! [chortle]
r€nato - January 25, 2012 | 7:56 am · Link
our badass gangsta president FTW
notice how he doesn’t go around talking tough like the semi-literate Texas hick dimestore cowboy predecessor; he just quietly gets the job done.
A mini-review of Bush the Lesser’s tough-talking smack that he never backed up with action:
July 2003 – “bring ‘em on” – Bush’s dare of Iraqi insurgents to do their worst against US troops. The former gladly obliged and did, indeed, bring it on. 3.5 years of bloody sectarian violence followed.
March 2003 – just six months after 9/11 and Bush’s promise to get Bin Laden “dead or alive”, at a WH press conference Bush blithely insists he doesn’t worry much about Bin Laden.
January 2003 – Bin Laden and his lieutenants were nearly captured at Tora Bora (some reports insist that they were just meters away at one point) but slipped away in large part due to the US using unreliable Afghani irregulars to conduct the hunt rather than US troops and special forces. It’s almost as if the administration’s highest figures didn’t really want to capture him so quickly…
The Other Bob - January 25, 2012 | 8:20 am · Link
Mr. President. You know, executing this mission on the night of the SOTU is what is called “burying your headline”.
JimF - January 25, 2012 | 8:36 am · Link
He did a call out to the Secretary of Defense as he was walking up to the podium for his address.
rikyrah - January 25, 2012 | 8:46 am · Link
love it.
love it
gnomedad - January 25, 2012 | 8:55 am · Link
Obama is taking credit from our brave troops, unlike Bush, who Kept Us Safe (single-handedly, it seems). After the worst attack on American soil. Which was Clinton’s fault.
Adam G. - January 25, 2012 | 9:04 am · Link
After the Maersk Alabama rescue, I got an email from the resident wingnut at my former place of employment. It basically stated that Obama was weak since he first sent over an FBI negotiation team rather than immediately sending in the SEALs. No matter that all the good guys came out ok, and all the bad guys were killed or captured, he showed weakness since he took the time to do it right. The wingnut was confident that Bush would have immediately sent in the cavalry, and likely everybody would have been killed, but at least he wouldn’t have been a pussy about it.
So give the wingnuts time, they will have an excuse for why it was actually a failure for Obama.
drew42 - January 25, 2012 | 9:13 am · Link
Is this “Navy SEAL team” really the A-Team?
I’ll bet at one point, they were locked in a Somalian tool shed, which happened to be filled with machine guns and welding supplies.
Chris - January 25, 2012 | 9:15 am · Link
@SFAW:
You’ve read the last couple Tom Clancy novels too?
slim's tuna provider - January 25, 2012 | 9:33 am · Link
i mean it’s a great job by all involved, but the fact that they had to mention that it’s the same special forces team gave me a bit of a Hunger Games vibe. maybe war has a bit of a reality TV vibe these days like everything else and we just have to live with it.
scav - January 25, 2012 | 9:42 am · Link
Oh dear, is the man blatantly and overly multitasking again? That is just so unfair.
RossInDetroit - January 25, 2012 | 9:47 am · Link
This is the same SEAL team that took down OBL’s compound and sent him to his 72 raisins, apparently.
It’s wrong to think of them as superhuman but boy do I not want to be on the wrong end of that much kickass.
Villago Delenda Est - January 25, 2012 | 9:55 am · Link
@kindness:
Who is this “President Bush” of whom you speak?
I thought GOP dogma was that the economy went to shit because we were all stupid enough to elect Bill Clinton to 3rd and 4th terms?
stinkfoot - January 25, 2012 | 10:34 am · Link
No flight suit, no credit.
On serious note: why does this invite Greenwald-bashing? It’s not like predator drones were used to kill children and innocent adult civilians – which tend to be GG’s concerns.
RalfW - January 25, 2012 | 10:37 am · Link
You have to wear a flight suit with a sock in the crotch to get credit for these things.
Speechifying in a dark suit while SEALs fix problems is boring.
Sitting in the back seat of a jet, pretending you can still fly, that’s how ya get cred.
So, uhh, Bush! Yeah.
RalfW - January 25, 2012 | 10:39 am · Link
ETA: stinkfoot was faster than me. So to the victor goes the flight suit. Or the sock.
kindness - January 25, 2012 | 10:44 am · Link
This one of those where Obama will be able to do no right and the right would of course have done everything better had they only been in charge.
I’d like to see Obama in a flight suit just to have him walking about with a (giant) codpiece just so the reichtwingnuts get codpiece envy and go home and get even angrier. Really I don’t want to see Obama in a flight suit but would like the right to become even more unhinged if that is at all possible.
PhoenixRising - January 25, 2012 | 10:45 am · Link
Best part in the update: All 9 of the captors were killed in the rescue.
Those guys slipped on a hell of a banana peel, huh? All nine of them accidentally stepped in front of a shot that went wild?
Tractarian - January 25, 2012 | 10:47 am · Link
Wait a minute.
The SEAL team went in, killed all nine captors and managed to save the two hostages, with no friendly casualties?
Yeah right. I’m not buying that for a second. You can never trust the military.
And, even if it is somehow true, what does this say about the hegemonic American terror-state? I mean, getting mowed down by a bunch of SEALs might even be worse then getting blown up by a drone. So how is this not terrorism?
And do I even have to mention the administration’s disgusting failure to get pre-approval for this raid from Congress? I mean, Obama was right there at the Capitol; he could have at least asked for a show of hands. Oh well, I guess that’s just par for the course for The Imperial Presidency.
But what really worries me is the precedent this sets. I hope you’re all happy when President Gingrich unilaterally orders a SEAL team to “liberate” some Christian missionaries in a faraway land.
PhoenixRising - January 25, 2012 | 11:06 am · Link
@Tractarian: We have a winner. You can use your completed bingo card for $2 off the silver dollar pancake breakfast, sir; just have it validated at the change window.
James Hulsey - January 25, 2012 | 11:08 am · Link
@Tractarian: Glenn Greenwald, is that you?
Brachiator - January 25, 2012 | 11:19 am · Link
@Amir Khalid:
Actually, they only take orders from Chuck Norris, who communicates with them through his bushy eyebrows via webcam.
maya - January 25, 2012 | 11:29 am · Link
None of this comes anywhere close to the mighty Battle of Granada coordinated and communicated through the coalition of Ronald Reagan and Nancy’s astrologer.
daveNYC - January 25, 2012 | 11:35 am · Link
@PhoenixRising: Not likely. Once you’re sending guys with guns to rescue hostages from guys with guns, the hostage takers are pretty much all gonna die unless they start running or are really good shots. Each dead hostage taker is one less person who can shoot a hostage.
Less Popular Tim - January 25, 2012 | 12:09 pm · Link
@RossInDetroit:
From a deterrence perspective, I wonder if it would be better not to disclose it was the same team. Sure, we have an unbelievably lethal and effective platoon, but wouldn’t it be scarier for the miscreants if they thought we had hundreds of these teams, all equally effective and fungible, and odds are one of the teams was within 30 minutes of you?
Regardless of how many of these teams we have, instead of “Seal Team 6,” call it “Seal Team 316.” Like when you used to order checks and start with a higher number.
Calouste - January 25, 2012 | 12:20 pm · Link
@daveNYC:
And one less hostage taker in prison who his mates are going to create another hostage situation for to have him released. Shooting all the hostage takers on sight has been pretty much standard operating practice among security forces worldwide since the 1970s.
SFAW - January 25, 2012 | 1:01 pm · Link
Fixed.
r€nato - January 25, 2012 | 1:36 pm · Link
@Tractarian:
uh, they killed the armed bad guy kidnappers rather than innocent civilians?
r€nato - January 25, 2012 | 1:37 pm · Link
@RalfW: I can’t believe I forgot to mention Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” moment when I listed his tough-talking, bullshit-walking moments.
Tone In DC - January 25, 2012 | 3:27 pm · Link
@kindness:
LULz.
Maus - January 25, 2012 | 6:21 pm · Link
Chickenhawks, projection, yadda yadda.