(May 7, 2011)

Los Angeles Times Says: Time to Stop Doubting the Media and Government

With an Afterword by Michael Hoffman

OBSERVATIONS AND PROVOCATIONS
FROM THE OPINION STAFF OF THE LOS ANGELES TIMES

A note to selected readers: Osama bin Laden really is dead
May 6, 2011 | http://tinyurl.com/64u54y8


Osama Sunday's announcement by President Obama that a team of U.S. commandos had killed Osama bin Laden gave rise to a number of, umm, interesting comments on the blog and at the Opinion section's Facebook page declaring that the whole thing was faked. Like the moon landing, I suppose, or Elvis' death. Convinced that the burial at sea was a telltale sign of a cover-up, some argued that bin Laden wasn't really dead. Others said that he had been dead for years, but Obama staged an assault on a Pakistani compound in order to boost his popularity.

Sometimes the same people made both arguments.

So I wonder what the skeptics will make of the Associated Press' report Friday morning that Al Qaeda had confirmed its leader's passing at the hands of the Great Satan? According to the AP, the shadowy terrorist group posted an 11-paragraph statement online that said, in part:

The blood of the holy warrior sheik, Osama bin Laden, God bless him, is too precious to us and to all Muslims to go in vain.