A few weeks back, during my duel of wits with fellow blogger Ian, I asked the question, perhaps rhetorically, who the terrorists wanted to win the American election. If Bin Laden, somewhere in a remote cave in, Afghanistan received an absentee ballot (postmark Florida), which box would he check?
Yesterday, the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, speaking from a news conference after a summit in Tajik must have been keeping up with the blogging at the Seattle Times as he provided an answer:
I consider the activities of terrorists in Iraq … aimed …against President Bush….International terrorism has as its goal to prevent the election of President Bush to a second term. If they achieve that goal, then that will give international terrorism a new impulse and extra power.
The President of our former enemy raises a serious point. If we really want to know who is seen globally as most effective against terrorism, perhaps a close look at our enemies' preference will give us an insight.
Columnist Charles Krauthammer from the Washington Post also raised this point earlier this month. There is a reason all of us have been wary of a pre election attack, and it is because we instinctively know that there are terrorist groups that would love to see George W. Bush removed as the American President.
Respond
Back to top