Al Qaeda and the Republicans

Wednesday, October 22, 2008 by Dave Winer.

Al Qaeda could have cut American supply lines in Iraq at any time, stranding our entire force there. And they would have, if the American occupation of Iraq didn't serve their interests.  

The American presence in Iraq keeps the Middle East on edge, and fuels hatred of America, and Al Qaeda feeds off that hatred. In that sense, the Republicans and Al Qaeda are allied, they both want the occupation to continue. Republicans serve the defense industry which earns huge profits off our presence in Iraq, and the oil industry, which hopes to control Iraqi oil reserves. 

Also our presence in Iraq gives them a more convenient place to attack us. 

The American presence in Iraq also drains the American economy, today and in the future, as we pile on a trillion dollars in debt to finance the war and reconstruction. And it keeps the American military occupied, so it can't defend against Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations elsewhere in the world. 

That's why Al Qaeda said, on a password-protected site, that they would welcome a terrorist attack on the US to help assure a Republican victory. The Republicans know this, they're not stupid, and certainly they were hoping that something like the October surprise of 2004 would happen in 2008, but they can't afford to have that out there and in public or else it backfires, as it appears to have. Now the Republicans are right that a terrorist attack on the US would serve Obama, because the intention of the terrorists is so clear. 

Al Qaeda reads our news and watches our cable shows as carefully as we do, and they are not our friends, and are not sympathetic, and they understand how to manipulate us. We should factor that into our thinking and our voting, thoroughly and then it would totally devalue their attempts to influence us. But I suspect we're not yet smart enough, or weary enough, to do that.