Stardate 20030722.2208

(Captain's log): Ah, yes, the loyal opposition is out in force. A sampling of the reaction to news of the deaths of Qusay and Uday:

Hesiod Theogeny:

Gee. What a coincidence. Bush is getting hammered in the press, his poll numbers have taken a nosedive, there are calls for multiple independent investigations into his handling of pre-war intelligence on Iraq, people are calling for everyone from Dick Cheney's to Condi Rice's resignation, the stock market is coming off a big drop, the economy is still stagnant....and miracle of miracles....

...out of the blue, we get a "tip" that Uday and Qusay Hussein are holed up in Mosul somewhere.

Sure enough..."Uranium-gate" gets knocked off the front pages, the stock market rallies, and the dollar goes up!

Here's what I believe.

I believe we have been tracking the two brothers for some time, and were waiting for an opportune moment to take them out.

You know...like when Bush's approval ratings started to get uncomfortably close to the South side of 50%

Lambert writes:

My reaction isn't mixed.

I think killing Saddam's sons was hog stupid.

First, it's entirely possible that they were valuable sources of intelligence. Perhaps they knew which rosebushes the rest of the centrigures were under! Second, it would be more effective to display them as captives. Imperial Rome knew this when they paraded captives through the streets in triumph. The Peruvians knew this when they captured Shining Path leader Guzman and displayed him in a cage on national TV. Legends grow around martyrs, not captives.

Robert Fisk:

The burned, bullet-splashed villa in Mosul, the four bullet-ridden corpses, America's hopes - however vain - that the death of Saddam Hussein's two sons, Uday and Qusay, will break the guerrilla resistance to Iraq's US occupation troops, all conspired to produce an illusion last night: that the unidentified bodies found after a four-hour gun battle between Iraqi gunmen and US forces must be those of the former dictator's sons - because the world wants them to be. ...

If he [Saddam] and his sons are dead, the chances are that the opposition to the American-led occupation will grow rather than diminish - on the grounds that with Saddam gone, Iraqis will have nothing to lose by fighting the Americans

SF Indymedia:

CNN is reporting that Saddam's sons, Qusay and Uday, have been killed by U.S. troops. Still unconfirmed is whether the Pentagon is lying again. Meanwhile, war criminals Bush, Blair, Cheney, and Rumsfeld are still at large.

A commenter on this thread refers to the American troops involved as being child-murdering cowards.

Via a comment posted on LGF, the Democratic Underground is having a field day:

CNN a single source identified bodies.
What if they were their DOUBLES?
So I bet them hussein son's bodies have some FROSTBITE...
Uday and Qusay are NOT dead!
Did US Know Hussein Sons' Location ALL ALONG?

This particular DU post is extremely nice:

Doesn't a part of you wish that Queasy and Duh-day were alive?

I'll admit they're scum and rightfully so, but anything that lands as even more humiliation on W's grotesque shrivelled face is that much the better.

It's sad, really, that as despicable as they are, Saddam's family seems to be the lesser of two evils when you compare them to the wretched little bastard occupying the White House and destroying America in the process...

I agree. I think it says an awful lot about him that he thinks someone who liked to watch when men were fed feet-first into a shredding machine, so he could listen to their screams as they died, is a "lesser evil" than our current President.

I think it's sad