"The chief of al-Qaida was a victim of a severe typhoid crisis while in Pakistan on August 23, 2006," the document says. His geographic isolation meant that medical assistance was impossible, the French report said, adding that his lower limbs were allegedly paralyzed.
Typhoid.
You will probably be given an antibiotic to treat the disease. Three commonly prescribed antibiotics are ampicillin, trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole, and ciprofloxacin. Persons given antibiotics usually begin to feel better within 2 to 3 days, and deaths rarely occur. However, persons who do not get treatment may continue to have fever for weeks or months, and as many as 20% may die from complications of the infection.How hard would it have been to get him antibiotics?
If it's true that bin Laden has died of typhoid -- and I hope it is -- he joins this list of illustrious men felled by the tiny bacterium: Alexander the Great, Pericles, William the Conqueror, Franz Schubert,
ADDED: How long will it take before people start saying this is a scheme to help Republicans in the coming election?
UPDATE: "Saudi Arabia said on Sunday it had no evidence that Osama bin Laden had died...."
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30 comments:
"ADDED: How long will it take before people start saying this is a scheme to help Republicans in the coming election?"
Well, that's the result of an administration that cryed wolf so often.
Is this the seventh or eighth time he's died?
"I'm not dead."
"'Ere, he says he's not dead. "
"Yes he is."
"I'm not."
"Well, he will be soon, he's very ill."
"I'm getting better"
"No you're not, you'll be stone dead in a moment. "
Bioterrorism?
Ruth Anne: I'm thinking: bagged spinach.
Gerry: My thoughts exactly (down to mocking the spelling).
And the French are now part of the vast right wing conspiracy?
My memory, faulty though it may be, seems to recall that previous OBL rumors were products of the LLL. People like Howard Dean saying things like: "We've captured OBL and we're just waiting for an October surprise to use him to Bush's best advantage..."
Notes on Typhoid. The scourge of armies. That's why all those leaders (military leaders) died of typhoid.
Siege = camp in 1 spot.
camp in one spot = lots of latrines
ignorance of the cause of disease = latrines located up stream of camp
high density camps = rapid spread of disease
World War I was probably the first war where the number of deaths from disease was less than the deaths from combat and that was only as a result of the industrial age invention of the machine gun.
WWII was the first war where we had the capability to attack diseases. Sulfa and penicillin.
What's the LLL?
I don't see what breastfeeding has to do with this. ;)
"... many a thousand widows shall this his mock mock out of their dear husbands; mock mothers from their sons, mock castles down . . . "
Henry V, act I, sc. 2, lines 283-86.
How hard could it be to get him antibiotics?
The downside of hiding in extremely rugged, mountainous and remote terrain is that maintaining your supply lines can be a real bitch. If there was a typhoid outbreak, it is not at all unreasonably that the complete local stockpile of antibiotics, such as they would have been, would be exhausted quickly and timely resupply impossible.
That being said, I won't believe that bastard's dead until I see a corpse and positive DNA identification.
If OBL is actually dead from typhoid, then that does NOT help the Administration politically. After all, they didn't get him, except perhaps indirectly.
I don't buy that he is dead for a second.
But even if he were - how would this help Bush? They would have proved themselves incapable of getting him on their own.
And if Osama is dead, people would start to question even further why we are in Iraq. That would probably help the Democrats.
I hope he's dead though.
Icepick:
It doesn't hurt them either. Dead is dead.
Moreover, I doubt that anyone in the administration will be trying to take credit for this if it be true.
That would be bad politics, and unRovelike.
If I were a member of coalition intelligence, I'd spread a rumor he was dead to prompt him to issue one of those loopy audio tapes as a response, which may yield useful information. My $.02.
I just hope the Osama Bin Laden is dead rumors don't get in the way of the Osama Bin Laden got himself a sex change operation rumors I was hoping to spread.
Poor Whitney Houston, first her marriage dissolves, then she loses her biggest fan.
Chirac is now insisting it's all a regrettable misunderstanding. Quel dommage.
Of course, since it's Chirac, maybe OBL is really dead after all.
I've got some info on typhoid, antibiotics, and vaccines here
If he is dead, we'll never be able to prove it. And how can they claim he's a martyr if he died from typhoid?
How long will it take before people start saying this is a scheme to help Republicans in the coming election?
There are people who could convince themselves that the cheesesteak I had for dinner last night was part of a Rovian plot.
However, I doubt that it will help Republicans if bin Laden died of natural causes. "We forced him to go into hiding and then he got sick and died" lacks oomph as a campaign slogan.
Fen,
There is a basic military maxim. Very few operations fail because they have too many troops or explosions because they have too much charge.
If we spot him with a predator, armed with a hellfire, sure take a shot, if not, get me a BUFF with 50 500 pounders and lets make big holes in the ground. :)
when you care to send the very best, get a BUFF.
This far away from the elections, I don't think the news (if true) will have any impact on voting. If US troops got him anytime between now and November, then it's a big boost for the administration, but even then, I'm not sure that it helps Republican politicians in statewide elections.
Frankly, I'm having a hard time figuring out what I would dream up if I had to come up with an "October surprise."
Typhus, spread by flea infested rats and mice, is different from typhoid fever, which is spread by contact with sewage.
What's the LLL?
I don't see what breastfeeding has to do with this.
Those La Leche-ers can be pretty tough...
If you're a martyr, and you die of typhus, do the 72 virgins have VD?
"Whether he is dead or not, bin Laden has been neutralized as anything more than a propaganda threat. Operationally, he is no longer a player."
Strategically, OBL is very important to those in his organization who are operationally important. He is their ultimate military commander and vindicator. He alone struck the decisive blow against us so far in this war.
From a military perspective, OBL is not the greatest of leaders. The hornet's nest he stirred up with 9/11 put him way in over his head and the record bears that out and to make matters worse a lot of his top leaders have been captured or killed. Further, one does not have to be a military strategist to know that you would prefer your enemy have the least capable leader possible. There is the real possibility that if OBL is killed, his replacement may well be a better leader than he - and that would not be good for us.
As it stands, it is clear that OBL is unable (so far anyway - thank everyone who has worked to stop him) to carry through on his pledge to "kill 4 million Americans, 2 million of them children" ( quote from June 2002 if memory serves). His being ineffectual in the post-9/11 world is clear to his adherents and to his enemies.
Whether better or not, he will certainly be different. Much of our current intelligence assessment of Al Qaeda would have to be tossed and redone in light of a new leader's dynamic and process, at great expense in time and treasure.
There is a reasonable argument that killing Bin Laden too soon would be a double-edge sword. Getting him is not the end game (contrary to what many of the not-too-bright variety of the left would like to pretend). On the one hand, killing or capturing the ultimate decision maker behind 9/11 would be psychologically nice and a victory certainly. But on the other hand, if we kill him, he becomes legend to his followers and a never-ending source of inspiration. And we also then have to deal with the new leader who may well be far more capable than OBL.
There is an argument to be made that a reasonable long-term strategy would be to isolate and minimize OBL - but not kill him.
If I was going to concoct a news story about Osama Bin Laden to help in the midterms, I'd concoct a story wherein he was killed in a firefight with a covert ops force, not this weak-ass "dying from typhoid" crap. It's the Democrats who don't even know how to do propaganda right, the GOP's had the hang of it for a while.
Personally, I want him sent to the gas chamber - put in the stocks on the House of Representatives floor until he expires from all the hot air coming out of the minority side. Or, you know, feed him to the lions in Giants Stadium. Whatever works.
Finally the high cost of prescription drugs does some good.
He wanted to usher in a 7th century AD world and he died -- if reports are true -- in a medieval sorta way. Plague might've been better, but typhoid will do.
If I was going to concoct a news story about Osama Bin Laden to help in the midterms, I'd concoct a story wherein he was killed in a firefight with a covert ops force, not this weak-ass "dying from typhoid" crap. It's the Democrats who don't even know how to do propaganda right, the GOP's had the hang of it for a while.
Except you would have to present some kind of evidence if it was done by our military. Just having "Bin Ladin DEAD" hitting every blog, newspaper, 24 hour cable would do much.
Karl Rove fingerprints? I doubt it. But after the hatchet job he did on Kerry, and McCains daughter, planting bugs in his office, there is nothing beneath this guys contempt.
I can't believe how few people realize that the death of bin Laden will *hurt* the Republicans, not help them. Bin Laden's death will make Americans feel that the terrorist threat has lessened; that, in turn, will make national defense and the war on terrorism less-important issues in 2006 and 2008.
Trust me, Karl Rove probably has wet dreams about a world in which bin Laden lives another 50 years and keeps releasing a fresh "death to America" videotape every election cycle or so.
LLL = Loony Liberal Left
revenant said, "Trust me, Karl Rove probably has wet dreams about a world in which bin Laden lives another 50 years" (emphasis added)
I see remarks like this often. I can only speculate that people who use them actually find these thoughts, um, pleasurable. And I'll leave it at speculation because I really don't want to know for sure.
I see remarks like this often. I can only speculate that people who use them actually find these thoughts, um, pleasurable.
Are you implying that Karl Rove isn't one sexy hunka hunka burnin' love? It's Gitmo for you, buddy.
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