Now we fast forward now to October 1, 2010 with Bin Laden once again raising the specter of bogus climate change and using the devastating floods in Pakistan as his rationale for both criticizing ongoing relief efforts in Pakistan and to once again call for action against climate change. This latest display of concern regarding the effects of climate change came in what appeared to be the latest audio tape from the al-Qaida leader issued on Friday in an Islamist forum. In this new message Bin Laden once again touches on global warming, thus making it the second time he has chosen to make climate change a prominent theme of one of his periodic ravings. "The huge climate change is affecting our (Islamic) nation and is causing great catastrophes throughout the Islamic world," he says in the tape. "It is not sufficient anymore to maintain the same relief efforts as previously, as it has become crucial to deliver tents, food and medicine.” Pakistani and U.S. officials have expressed on several occasions concern regarding the Taliban and other militant Islamic groups possibly being able to exploit the disarray in the implementing of relief efforts in their attempt to gain additional recruits. Bin Laden seems to have departed from his usual topics which usually center around the calling for more armed attacks on the West, especially the U.S., to now center around a more global theme focusing around the making of natural disasters or economic crisis the centerpiece of his latest messages. This most recent screed follows a statement in mid-September by al-Qaida number two Ayman al-Zawahri who also accused the Pakistani government of reacting far too slowly to the floods and a later statement by an al-Qaida spokesman, Adam Gadahn, sounding pretty much the same theme. Again like Democrats, everyone getting the same talking points. The most recent Bin Laden message, about 11 minutes long, was broadcast with a video accompanied by still images of Bin Laden as well as images of natural disasters, on the Islamist website used by al-Qaida. The authenticity of the tape and its precise release date could not be immediately confirmed and I'm not sure if that has yet been accomplished. However, Bin Laden does congratulate Muslims on the holy month of Ramadan, which started on August 11 and ended September 9. He describes the fate of the Pakistani people following catastrophic floods, saying: "Millions of children are out in the open air, lacking basic elements of living, including drinking water, resulting in their bodies shedding liquids and subsequently their death." Al-Qaida has never really pursued any attempts at systematic humanitarian work during natural disasters of the kind carried out by various aid organizations and Islamic relief charities, analysts say. With this latest tape circulating on the Internet, it shows that apparently Bin Laden now feels that weighing in on climate change and linking the catastrophic floods in Pakistan to man-made warming may be something he sees as being useful. “The number of victims caused by climate change is very big, bigger than the victims of wars,” says a voice that the watchdog group SITE has identified as being that of Bin Laden. It says the challenge “calls for generous souls and brave men to take serious and prompt action to provide relief for their Muslim brothers in Pakistan.” Australian counter-terrorism expert Leah Farrall described the statement as nothing short of "hypocritical," noting that a number of internal al-Qaida documents found in Afghanistan and dated about 2000 commanded members not to be "distracted by relief and aid operations." Bin Laden urged a big transformation in how relief work is executed in this message that was bin Laden's first since March 25, when he threatened to execute any Americans captured by al-Qaida if accused September 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was executed.
Now I don’t think it's realistic to expect Bin Laden to be making an appearance at any future international climate summit. After all, there would really no need for that, after all, he has any number of cohorts that could very easily appear in his stead, such as the previously mentioned Al Gore or anyone from the Barry administration, or even any Democrat for that matter. However, the State Department did respond rather sarcastically to Bin Laden’s January message saying, “So we’ve gone from being the ‘Great Satan’ to the ‘Great Emitter,’ ” a spokesman, Philip Crowley said. “He’s working hard to stay relevant — that’s all I can say.” I'm sure what kind of response if any was made regarding the most recent tape on the same topic. It would seem very reasonable to assume that should Bin Laden ever want to run for office, with his list of grievances against the United States he would very likely be welcomed in with open arms to the Democrat Party. He may be asked to lose the beard and his typical headgear before having his image placed on a Democrat campaign commercial somewhere, but his general philosophy is one that fits in rather nicely with what is seen as being the typical Democrat platform. But then again, there are several places around the country, such as California, Michigan or Massachusetts where he might not even be called upon to lose the beard or the headgear and still be considered as being a viable Democrat candidate. I mean really, just how different are his positions on any number of issues from those of guys like "Dingy" Harry, Bawny "The Banking Queen" Fwank, or Russ Feingold just to name only three. Is it really that much of a stretch of the imagination to envision Bin Laden as being a Democrat candidate for either the House of the Senate? I don't really think so.
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