If you haven't yet heard, Osama bin Laden is dead!
President Obama just spoke and confirmed that his body
is in the hands of U.S. officials. He took credit for directing the attack and said that there was a firefight but that no Americans were hurt.
Facebook started blowing up around 10 p.m. Sunday with people saying their TV shows had been interrupted with notices that the president would be speaking. A Facebook page called "Osama Bin Laden Is Dead" shows a photo (copied here at left) of a dude with a bloodied face -- not sure where this image came from or whether it is authentic.
The New York Times has an interesting link on how the story leaked to the media. (Brian Williams and other high-profile journalists received a three-word email saying "Get to Work.")
Crowds are gathering in front of the White House.
UPDATE: A government source in Washington tells the Juice that people should "pay attention to potential homeland security concerns due to the death of bin Laden. While he did serve as the 'head' of AQ, the current concern is AQ in Yemen. His death could propel self-radicalized followers to action for one reason or another." He mentioned the past few editions of Inspire magazine, a slick pro-Al Qaeda magazine aimed at the West.
Here's a story about how the U.S. tracked couriers to Bin Laden's compound.
What do you all think?
Does this make Obama's chances for reelection better?
Are you scared of retaliatory attacks?
Do you think the case of CIA contractor Raymond Davis was related to this? (The U.S. paid $2 million for his release.)
Our sister paper, the
Village Voice in New York, is live blogging developments heavily.
UPDATE May 6: In the days since this post was written, it has been pretty well established that the picture at left is a fake, and President Obama has declined to release images of bin Laden's corpse. However, if you are looking for photos of the other men killed in the raid on Osama bin Laden's compund in Pakistan, the Guardian newspaper in the UK has published them here. WARNING: They are graphic.
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