The Head of the Snake.........

I awoke around 10:30 last night to loud beeps and a deep presenter's voice repeatedly directing me to tune in to a radio news channel. My first thought was that we were under a tornado warning as a record number of those monsters has been plaguing the US recently. My wife, who was reading, eased my sleepy confusion by explaining that Osama bin Laden had been killed in a raid by US personnel near Islamabad.

My initial reaction was that Osama was not anywhere near Islamabad, but rather in the Northern Territories hiding among the ungovernable tribes of Wazsiristan. Indeed not, I discovered this morning, but smack in the midst of the Pakistan equivalent of our West Point and in the company of retired and active Pakistani army residents.

I first went to the New York Times to read the story, and then to al Jazeera followed by the BBC, the Telegraph and the Daily Mail. That sequence says something about my priorities as learned over the years. I probably still don't have it right, but in a crunch, I will consult the NY Times. Al Jazeera has won a special place as it is deeper, more serious and has a more transparent bias than the other papers. Yes, I selected the BBC before the Telegraph, but found the latter offering greater depth and insight. As for the Daily Mail, that was for old times sake as it was our paper of choice during my formative years.

Spontaneous celebrations broke out in New York and Washington and undoubtedly elsewhere as the news broke. O immediately claimed authorship as he is growing more and more insistent about marking his territory these days. The only glitch of note was the malfunction of a helicopter resulting in its having to be destroyed and abandoned by the Navy SEALs who were charged with the assassination. The helicopter issue brought back memories of Jimmy Carter's abortive raid in Iran to rescue American embassy hostages.

The daring and successful effort put some lead in our pencil. It will give increased vigor and self-confidence to our nation as a whole; attributes which I dare say will be justifiably shared with our allies who, I read, are also celebrating, at least in the UK.

The far right will certainly be conflicted and will struggle to find the proper phrases to record their joy over bin Laden's demise and their agony over the political uplift this action will give to O. His ratings will surely go up, after all the mission was his, as were the troops, the ordinance, and just about everything except, I am sure, the errant helicopter.

We can expect some thrilling books on the raid followed by a Hollywood film starring our most alluring actors along with a chesty actress or two. Both book and film will surface within a year. We may have to wait a bit longer for the real story, unless of course Julian Assange gets hold of some more top secret correspondence on the subject.

The villains have to be the Pakistanis who are surely drafting statements to the effect that a) they were not consulted, b) they had no idea bin Laden was in Abbotistan and c) had they been told of his whereabouts by the US, they would have dealt with him themselves.