A decision of State
President Obama’s decision to launch an operation in Pakistan to eliminate Osama bin Laden was an act of government. Therefore, it’s reasonable to mention it during the re-election campaign as one of his administration’s accomplishments.
In light of this, what his Republican critics are arguing makes no sense. They claim that the White House is inappropriately politicizing an operation that had support from Democrats and Republicans, like the death of the mastermind of 9/11.
Interestingly, Obama’s expected presidential rival, Mitt Romney, hours after accusing the president of politically exploiting bin Laden’s death, appeared at a New York Fire Department station with former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani to take advantage of the anniversary date and get involved in 9/11.
Clearly, being in the White House has its advantages. Obama marked the occasion to sign a cooperation accord over the future of Afghanistan. He also used the moment to remind voters of his promise to bring the troops back home from Iraq and Afghanistan. This was an act of State and a campaign speech. Well, there is nothing really new about that.
That is why , the idea that the war on terrorism should remain outside the realm of political discourse is a novelty. At one time, George W. Bush’s administration even questioned the patriotism of Democrats in order to gain political brownie points from terrorist attempts. Republicans took advantage of every opportunity available to attack Democratic candidates for being supposedly “soft” on terrorism.
This well-worn accusation is worthless against Obama-who, in addition to bin Laden, continues the war on terrorism using unmanned drones.
Since now they can’t say Obama is “soft,” they argue the issue of national security should be apartisan-when it never was-to detract any merit from the president. It’s interesting when someone wants to do election politics by telling the rival not to do the same.
It’s true that intelligence operations, like the search for bin Laden, take a long time. However, no one can take away from Obama the results of the decision he made a year ago.
