Tell me something I don't know

You know, I’m really getting tired of Commander Codpiece assuming that we’re all as fencepost-dumb as he is.

Yesterday, he declassified an intelligence report and released it to the world amid much solemn fanfare.

The report tells us that Osama bin Laden, as recently as two years ago, directed his top al Qaeda guy in Iraq to form new terrorist cells there for the purpose of attacking the West, in particular, the U.S.

Excuse me, but this is news? To anyone?

I guess George W. thought this would come as a shock to us. We’d be scared right back into line and stop all our annoying complaining about his nasty war. The proof of everything he’s been saying about al Qaeda in Iraq is right there, after all. Why, it’s in black and white.

Well, duh, George.

I’ll tell you what the news made me think. Even before I’d read past the headline, “White House Says Bin Laden Ordered Iraq Plots,” my first thought was that this startling release of intelligence to the masses could only be more propaganda designed to influence the mouth-breathers among us. My second was, ‘I bet the intelligence is a couple of years old.’ My third thought was, ‘So, why haven’t you caught bin Laden yet, cowboy?’

Then I read the story. The top guy bin Laden gave his orders to back in 2005 was al Zarqawi, who was later killed by an American bombing raid in June 2006 amid much crowing and strutting by the Bush administration. Presumably bin Laden said “darn!” when he heard al Zarqawi was dead, and like most decent CEOs, instructed the next guy in line pick up the ball.

This is a surprise?

Al Qaeda wasn’t in Iraq before Codpiece had his minions think up lies he could tell so he could have his vanity war and tell the world that “I’m the war president.”

We’re moving in on six years since Sept. 11, 2001. In spite of all his strutting around dressed in tailored commander costumes, Junior has not captured bin Laden. I suspect this is because no one has thought to look in Dubai, where all the best criminals set up shop, dahling. Ask Halliburton. There, Osama could live quite comfortably in a Burj al-Arab executive suite, complete with his personal dialysis machine, piped-in calls to worship, a memory-foam prayer mat, Fox News, WiFi and three squares a day, with snacks, from room service. When he gets bored, he can whack golf balls into the Persian Gulf from the hotel’s helipad 60 stories above the city. It’s all the rage.

Don’t laugh. Has anyone looked there?

I’ve always thought that bin Laden was far too smart to hole up in the mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan. He’s a rich man. He can afford better. And there are lots of really posh places in the world where a wealthy man can live in discreet comfort. Money has a way of shutting mouths and keeping secrets.

Or, if he really is an outdoorsy type, as the rumors tell us, Osama’s likely camped out in the mountainous, disputed Kashmir region between India and Pakistan, where our trusty ally General Musharaff of Pakistan turns a blind but supportive eye to the many terrorist training camps tucked away there under his nose.

With allies like this, who needs ...?

Anyway. As a reason to keep our troops in Iraq, where they’re dying horribly in daily dribs and drabs, your intelligence release sucks, Dubya. We’re supposedly fighting the terrorists “over there so we don’t have to fight them over here.” By turning Iraq into an oil-rich abattoir, the rarified thinking goes, al Qaeda fighters will flock there so they can take pot shots at our poor, staked-goat soldiers and dodge bullets from other sects in the civil war we let loose. I guess that will keep them so busy they won’t have time to come up with a way to bomb an American shopping mall.

But ... there are plenty of places where al Qaeda can establish terrorist cells. The world is full of ‘em. Why waste precious resources in Iraq, where the chances are they’ll be killed while picking out tomatoes at their local open-air market when that car bomb blows?

Honestly, Junior. I just despair.

Listen, dork: Don’t bother me with two-year-old intelligence that tells me things I already knew intuitively. Bring our kids home from Iraq, buckle down and do some real diplomacy and find a way to clean up the mess you’ve made over there. Grow up, will you? And dammit, find bin Laden, capture him and turn him over to the World Court for prosecution. You can be a star witness, Junior. And while you’re visiting the Hague, you can check out those prison cells personally and pre-order your color scheme. With any luck, you’ll get a cell right next door to Osama.