Jeff Greenfield: Bin Laden Better Dead Than Alive

On learning late last night of Osama Bin Laden’s death in Pakistan at the hands of U.S. forces, Jeff Greenfield’s initial thought had been, “Hooray!” His second thought? “May he rot in hell is probably the most elegant way I can put it.”
 
Like many analyzing yesterday’s events, Greenfield noted that the demise of Bin Laden in no way ends the threat from the terrorist organization he founded, Al-Qaeda. It does, however, signal that Bin Laden was not “some sort of superman” above the power of the United States. In that sense, Greenfield believes, the U.S. wins.
 
That Bin Laden was killed inside an elaborate, walled compound 35 miles outside Islamabad, where he was hiding, and not in a cave on the border of Afghanistan raises suspicions about the complicity of the Pakistani government and ISI, its intelligence arm.
 
“ISI was always seen as sympathetic—if not to Al-Qaeda—then to the Taliban,” Greenfield said, providing that the relationship between the U.S. and Pakistan could be strained if Pakistan officials knew Bin Laden’s whereabouts but said nothing.
 
Like Imus, Greenfield thinks the distorted notion that President Obama was sympathetic to Muslims, and would therefore never green-light killing Bin Laden, has been put to rest. Yet Bin Laden’s death does not equal an automatic reelection for the President in 2012.
 
“This would be a complete game-changer if the presidential election was next week,” Greenfield said. As for whether this historic occasion will define Obama’s presidency, Greenfield was cautious. “If unemployment is 8.5 percent next November, it doesn’t define a reelection.”
 
It does snap the American public back to reality a bit. “We’ve been kind of in this weird, silly season of politics, where Donald Trump grabs the lion’s share of publicity,” Greenfield said. “And now we’re talking about a military operation that took out public enemy number one, and a guy responsible for thousands of deaths.”
 
Bin Laden is better dead than alive, Greenfield said, because “if he’s alive, what do you do with him?” Trying him in a public trial would have made him a martyr, Greenfield observed, allowing him and his supporters to skew public opinion. “I also think this means that, for people who believed in some kind of divine invincibility—well, no. He’s dead and buried. Case closed.”
 
Though the brave Navy SEALs who stormed the compound in Pakistan are the true heroes in this story, Greenfield gave Obama a large chunk of the credit, and expressed hope that Republican leaders would do the same. So far, he said, most have been “anything other than unambiguous in saying, ‘Good job!’”
 
Which is not exactly what CBS News said to Greenfield a few weeks ago. “I left CBS News by mutual agreement,” he told Imus. “They said, ‘Don’t work here anymore.’ I said, ‘Okay.’”
 
-Julie Kanfer