Every few months or so, our nation's high and mighty in command drop a certain name into the pool of media for hungry journalists to eat up. That name is Osama bin Laden, chief of al-Qaida and the predicted mastermind of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
In an interview with Time magazine, CIA Director Porter Goss said he has an "excellent idea" where bin Laden is located. He also said bin Laden will not be found until remaining weak links in the war on terrorism are strengthened.
He refused to say where he is located, but inferences can be made that he is located in the rugged mountains of the Pakistan and Afghanistan border, which has been the prediction of intelligence experts for years.
But don't start popping the celebratory champagne bottle yet.
The truth is, dropping bin Laden's name this time isn't any different than previous times. And saying that the CIA has an "excellent idea" where bin Laden is, well, that's a heap of nonsense. It doesn't mean anything because if they knew where he was, they'd still have a hard time getting him out, which would likely result in another war.
We've been hunting bin Laden for a while, but he has a benefit that the United States doesn't - many dedicated fans in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The United States hasn't found him yet because he is extremely popular to some people, and those people want to help him, not the United States.
Still, there's no tangible evidence either way that the CIA knows where bin Laden is. He could even be dead. I guess we're just glad they're still interested in finding him; we thought they'd traded bin Laden for a name more important to the Bush family - Saddam Hussein. It's too bad we didn't get the job done in Afghanistan before heading to Iraq. After all, isn't bin Laden the one who started all this in the first place?
Dropping bin Laden's name is just a way of reminding Americans that we're still in danger and that the government is still there to protect us. It's a scare tactic, warranted or not. It's too bad Americans are being teased with such vague information and being led to believe everything is going to be perfect if we just put our support into our extremely secretive government.
