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Our utter failure of a president is looking to Hollywood for an October 2012 Surprise to save his hopes for a second term. Maureen Dowd says out loud what we all knew the moment the movie’s release date was announced:

Our utter failure of a president is looking to Hollywood for an October 2012 Surprise to save his hopes for a second term. Maureen Dowd says out loud what we all knew the moment the movie’s release date was announced: The White House is also counting on the Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal big-screen version of the killing of Bin Laden to counter Obama’s growing reputation as ineffectual. The Sony film by the Oscar-winning pair who made “The Hurt Locker” will no doubt reflect the president’s cool, gutsy decision against shaky odds. Just as Obamaland was hoping, the movie is scheduled...

The White House is counting on the Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal big-screen version of the killing of Bin Laden to counter Obama’s growing reputation as ineffectual. The Sony film by the Oscar-winning pair who made “The Hurt Locker” will no doubt reflect the president’s cool, gutsy decision against shaky odds. Just as Obamaland was hoping, the movie is scheduled to open on Oct. 12, 2012 — perfectly timed to give a home-stretch boost to a campaign that has grown tougher. The moviemakers are getting top-level access to the most classified mission in history from an administration that has tried...

KABUL, Afghanistan — In the deadliest day for American forces in the nearly decade-long war in Afghanistan, insurgents shot down a Chinook transport helicopter on Saturday, killing 30 Americans, including some Navy Seal commandos from the unit that killed Osama bin Laden, as well as 8 Afghans, American and Afghan officials said.

Georgetown University professor C. Christine Fair has written a post at Registan.net alleging that Nicholas Schmidle’s New Yorker cover story detailing the Navy SEAL raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound may be a fraud. At the very least, Fair alleges, Schmidle failed to interview the Navy SEALs involved in the operation–which is not mentioned anywhere in the article, but is apparent from a close analysis of the text. Is that really the way bin Laden dyed? (pun intended)

President Obama praised the sacrifice of 31 U.S. troops who died early Saturday morning in helicopter crash in Wardak Province, Afghanistan. The Taliban has claimed it shot down the aircraft with a rocket-propelled grenade. Seven Afghan soldiers on board the helicopter also died. My thoughts and prayers go out to the families and loved ones of the Americans who were lost earlier today in Afghanistan,” Obama said in a statement. “Their deaths are a reminder of the extraordinary sacrifices made by the men and women of our military and their families, including all who have served in Afghanistan.” Obama said...

Twenty-five U.S. special forces killed early Saturday in Afghanistan were on a mission to rescue another team of military personnel pinned down by insurgents, a U.S. military official told CNN. The helicopter that went down in eastern Afghanistan carried 30 U.S. military members, including 22 Navy SEALs and three other special forces. They were part of a "quick reaction force" sent in to pick up others engaged in a fierce firefight, the official said. In the single deadliest incident since the start of the decade-long Afghan war, the Army Chinook carrying a team of U.S. special forces and U.S. and...

WASHINGTON -- The Associated Press has learned that more than 20 Navy SEALs from the unit that killed Osama bin Laden were among those lost in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan. Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/08/06/afghan-president-31-americans-killed-in-helicopter-crash/#ixzz1UGZcWiEh

ASPEN, Colo. (AP) — The top commander of U.S. special operations forces said Wednesday that Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida is bloodied and "nearing its end," but he warned the next generation of militants could keep special operations fighting for a decade to come. Navy SEAL Adm. Eric T. Olson described the killing of bin Laden by a special operations raid on May 2 as a near-killing blow for what he called "al-Qaida 1.0," as created by bin Laden and led from his hideout in Pakistan. Olson said the group had already lost steam because of the revolts of the Arab...

Bin Laden Plotted New Attack By SIOBHAN GORMAN Osama bin Laden was working to assemble a team of militants to attack the U.S. on the 10th anniversary of 9/11, according to communications Navy SEALs seized from his Pakistani hideout when they killed the al Qaeda leader this spring. Bin Laden and his operations chief, Attiyah Abd al-Rahman, swapped views about the composition of the attack team, with bin Laden repeatedly rejecting names that Mr. Rahman suggested, according to U.S. officials familiar with the intelligence taken from the bin Laden compound. The plans were only in the discussion phase, U.S. officials...

"'Sort of a knee jerk reflex to say, ‘lets go to international institutions’ when an American criminal justice system and American military justice system is perfectly capable of rendering justice, very nicely thank you, to me makes no sense.'" - David Rivkin on bin Laden & international crimes.

<p>After Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden, the White House released a photo of President Barack Obama and his Cabinet inside the Situation Room, watching the daring raid unfold.</p> <p>Hidden from view, standing just outside the frame of that now-famous photograph was a career CIA analyst. In the hunt for the world's most-wanted terrorist, there may have been no one more important. His job for nearly a decade was finding the al-Qaida leader.</p>

Following are excerpts from an interview with Egyptian lawyer Muntasar Al-Zayat, which aired on Faraeen TV on May 23, 3011: Muntasar Al-Zayat: The Americans are the ones who killed Bin Laden. They killed him and, therefore, he is a martyr. He is considered a martyr because he was fighting for a cause: first, the liberation of the Hejaz from the Americans, and then the liberation of Iraq from the Americans, and the liberation of Afghanistan from the foreign invasion. Interviewer: What about the terrorist operations carried out by Al-Qaeda, which left behind rivers of blood in Islamic countries? Who bears...

Following are excerpts from a Friday sermon delivered by Sudanese cleric Sheik Ali Al-Jazouli, which aired on the Internet, on May 29, 2011: Sheik Ali Al-Jazouli: The notion of the importance of tipping the global balance of terror in favor of the Muslims is the guiding principle of Osama Bin Laden. What is the outcome of this guiding principle? It is what I told you in a previous Friday sermon, about an article written by Friedman Thomas. The American Jew Friedman Thomas wrote an article in The Washington Post, titled "Dialogue with the Rebels." He wrote that in light of...

WASHINGTON -- A cellphone of Usama bin Laden's trusted courier recovered in the U.S. raid last month that killed both men in Pakistan contained contacts to a militant group that is a longtime asset of Pakistan's intelligence agency, The New York Times reported late Thursday.

Egyptian Presidential Candidate Abd Al-Mun'im Abu Al-Fatuh: America's "Gang-Like Political Assassination" of Bin Laden Makes Me Doubt There Is Such a Thing As Al-Qaeda Following are excerpts from an interview with Abd Al-Mun'im Abu Al-Fatuh, Egyptian presidential candidate and former member of the Muslim Brotherhood leadership. The interview aired on Al-Mehwar TV on May 24, 2011. Interviewer: Were you sad that Bin Laden died the way he did? Abd Al-Mun'im Abu Al-Fatuh: I am against political assassinations, whether of Bin laden or of anyone else. Gang-like political assassinations are worse when carried out by a state. If America, with all...

In July 2005, Al Qaeda second-in-command Ayman Zawahiri sent a long letter to the group's lead operative in Iraq, urging him to tone down his activities. In Iraq, Abu Musab Zarqawi had been orchestrating suicide bombings of Shiite Muslim shrines. His followers frequently videotaped the beheading of hostages. Zawahiri, an Egyptian doctor who helped organize the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the U.S. and other violence, told Zarqawi he was going too far. "We are in a media battle, in a race for the hearts and minds" of Muslims, wrote Zawahiri, who was named Thursday to succeed Osama bin Laden...

Al-Qaeda names Zawahiri to succeed bin Laden By Lynne Nahhas (AFP) – 7 hours ago DUBAI — Al-Qaeda on Thursday named Egyptian surgeon Ayman al-Zawahiri to succeed slain leader Osama bin Laden and vowed no let-up in its deadly "jihad" against arch-foes the United States and Israel. "The general command of Al-Qaeda announces, after consultations, the appointment of Sheikh Ayman al-Zawahiri as head of the group," the jihadist network said in a statement posted on an Islamist website. Zawahiri, the group's long-time number two, succeeds bin Laden who was killed by US commandos in a May 2 raid in Pakistan....

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Pakistan's top military spy agency has arrested five CIA informants who fed information to U.S. intelligence before the raid last month which killed Osama bin Laden, The New York Times reported on Wednesday. One of the detainees was reported to be a Pakistani Army major whom officials said copied license plates of cars visiting the al Qaeda leader's compound 30 miles northwest of Islamabad. The fate of the CIA informants arrested in Pakistan was unclear, the newspaper reported, citing American officials. Outgoing CIA Director Leon Panetta raised the issue of the informants' detention during a trip to...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Pakistan's top spy agency has arrested five Pakistani informants who assisted the CIA ahead of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, The New York Times reported on Wednesday. The men arrested reportedly include a Pakistani Army major said to have copied the license plate of cars that drove up to bin Laden's compound in the military town of Abbottabad, two hours from the capital Islamabad. The Pakistani military denied that any army officer had been detained over what it called the "Abbottabad incident". "The story is false and totally baseless," it said in a statement. A...