He's Ba-a-a-ack!

Just in time for the sixth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on the United States, Osama bin Laden has released another of his videotaped diatribes. There he is, big as life, rested and ready, none the worse for wear, despite all of Bush's original rhetoric of getting him "dead or alive."

Experts believe bin Laden's video may be a harbinger of more attacks on the U.S.

"CIA Director Michael Hayden on Friday also warned that Al-Qaeda was planning new, large-scale attacks on US targets.

'Our analysts assess with high confidence that Al-Qaeda's central leadership is planning high impact plots against the American homeland,'Hayden said."

According to the article linked above, Osama made some points that, unfortunately, I have to agree with:

"He says the Democrats who now control the US Congress have failed to stop the war, and even 'continue to agree to the spending of tens of billions to continue the killing and war there.'"

The video was his first in three years, and in it he appears to have dyed his beard black, which may be a symbol of impending war.

Of course, the White House is downplaying the importance of the video. Homeland Security adviser Frances Townsend said on Fox News Sunday that Osama is "virtually impotent," and that the video was just "propaganda."

This stance is refuted by the information in this article from the Seattle Times:

"Dodging the U.S. military in Afghanistan after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, al-Qaida Central reconstituted itself across the Pakistani border, returning to the rugged tribal areas surrounding the organization's birthplace, the dusty frontier city of Peshawar. In the first few years, Pakistani and U.S. authorities captured many senior leaders; in the past 18 months, no major figure has been killed or caught in Pakistan.

Al-Qaida Central moved quickly to overcome extensive leadership losses by promoting loyalists who had served alongside bin Laden for years. It restarted fund-raising, recruiting and training. And it expanded its media arm."

If the purpose of invading Iraq was to destroy al-Qaeda, all I can say is it's doing a "heckuva job."

In the meantime, Down Under, our revered President is playing his usual part when he attempts diplomacy: acting like an idiot.

Bush with Australian P.M. Howard

Between mixing up Australia with Austria, OPEC and APEC, and trying to exit in the wrong direction, all while pranksters dressed as terrorists plagued the conference he was attending, W's performance in Australia could be a scene out of Saturday Night Live. Truth is truly stranger than fiction.

Meanwhile, Osama bin Laden looks on and smiles.