Another change since Tora Bora, with no immediate prospect of finding bin Laden, is that President Bush has stopped proclaiming the goal of taking him "dead or alive" and now avoids previous references to the al Qaeda founder as public enemy number one.

In an interview with The Washington Post in late December, Bush displayed a scorecard of al Qaeda leaders on which he had drawn the letter X through the faces of those thought dead. By last month, Bush began saying that continued public focus on individual terrorists, including bin Laden, meant that "people don't understand the scope of the mission."

"Terror is bigger than one person," Bush said March 14. "He's a person that's now been marginalized." The president said bin Laden had "met his match" and "may even be dead," and added: "I truly am not that concerned about him."


Hmmm. Maybe Bush isn't such a bad politician after all. Maybe he is just another slimy snake. Seems like he is slowly moving our focus on to other things. That's not a bad strategy, but he didn't seem to effectively convey his message to the editors at the Washington Post. Not surprisingly, they've been nice enough to inform us that the US military didn't get the job done when it had the chance.