Baghdadi's death: More details emerge from US raid

[GMDino]

https://www.foxnews.com/transcript/bin-laden-bragging-rights-should-president-obama-claim-credit

Quote:(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: One year ago, from a base here in Afghanistan, our troops launched the operation that killed Usama bin Laden. The goal that I set to defeat Al Qaeda and deny it a chance to rebuild is now within our reach.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GIGOT: Welcome to the "Journal Editorial Report." I'm Paul Gigot.

That was President Obama Tuesday marking the one year anniversary of the death of Usama bin Laden in a surprise trip to Afghanistan. It is just one of the ways the president and his re-election campaign have commemorated the killing. Also, releasing an ad suggesting rival Mitt Romney might not have done the same.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed this week, former attorney general, Michael Mukasey, said it is hard to imagine Lincoln or Eisenhower taking such a victory lap.

Judge Mukasey joins me now.

Good to have you back on the program, Judge.

JUDGE MICHAEL MUKASEY, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: Good to be here.

GIGOT: So presidents advertise their accomplishments, especially when they run for election. That is what they do. Why is what President Obama has done different from that tradition?

MUKASEY: Because they say real leadership consists of taking less credit than you deserve and more blame than you deserve. And President Obama, after his election, said that the president he wanted to be most like Lincoln. If you take a look at Lincoln's record, the night after the surrender of Robert E. Lee, he delivered what turned out to be his last speech in which he disclaimed any responsibility for the victory, and, instead, looked ahead to reconstruction, and advocated black suffrage, something that got him killed because John Wilkes Boothe being in the audience outside the White House. Earlier, in his administration -- he took responsibility for the mistakes General McClellan, of defense secretary -- his secretary of defense --

GIGOT: Right.

MUKASEY: -- constantly, took responsibility for things that failed, gave credit to others for things that succeeded.

GIGOT: But, let's go back to 2004. President Obama, George W. Bush running for re-election in the wake of 9/11, they ran an ad, his campaign, called "Tested," which, really, advertised what they said was his leadership after the attack on the World Trade Center. And they included some footage of the burning towers.
How is this different, what Obama is doing, saying, we got bin Laden finally, how is it different from President Bush taking credit for his post-attack leadership?

MUKASEY: I don't know that he was taking credit as describing something that he had been exposed to that was not of his making and had survived. Here, in the clip you saw, and in the clip you might have shown from his announcement of the killing of bin Laden, it was "I," "me," "I", "My." The perpendicular pronoun was pretty much in evidence.

GIGOT: What about his suggestion, his campaign's suggestion -- I guess he made it personally -- that Romney might not have done the same?

MUKASEY: It is hard to find a word other than outrageous to describe that. And I think the memo that went from Leon Panetta to Admiral McRaven --

GIGOT: This is while --
(CROSSTALK)
GIGOT: -- Leon Panetta was CIA director --

MUKASEY: Right.

GIGOT: -- before the attack, before the raid.

MUKASEY: Right. Describing McRaven's authority as limited to the risk profile that he had presented to the president, is revealing of the attitude that prevailed at time.

GIGOT: How should a commander-in-chief behave? Are you saying Lincoln is the model? Is that what you should do?

MUKASEY: Lincoln is the model. Kennedy is the model. Eisenhower is the model. A lot of people are the model. George W. Bush is the model.

GIGOT: Well -- but you do not think George Bush ever took credit. What about "mission accomplished" banner?

MUKASEY: That is not a banner that he put up. That was put up by other people. And if you look at the remarks he made at the time, they were all by way of giving credit to the troops.

GIGOT: The mistake the president is making is essentially saying, look, this was -- he's taking an exorbitant -- in your view, an exorbitant amount of credit where as, if it had gone wrong, the implication of the memos and things is the blame would have been the people who were executing the policy.

MUKASEY: Correct.

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-host-bush-administration-got-bin-laden-not-obama

Quote:JUAN WILLIAMS (CO-HOST): I don't think most people, I don't think most Americans, even Trump supporters think Donald Trump really knows a lot about how to combat terrorism.


ERIC BOLLING (CO-HOST): I'll tell you about who doesn't know a whole lot about terrorism, is President Obama. And he's proven that over the last eight years. Remember when he said “I want to lead from behind,” he said --

WILLIAMS: He never said “I want to lead from behind.”

BOLLING: -- “Let's pull out of Afghanistan and Iraq.”

KIMBERLY GUILFOLYE (CO-HOST): The “jay vee team.”

BOLLING: -- “Jay vee team.” He's failed on every level as far as counter-terror all the way through.

WILLIAMS: Oh, I see.

BOLLING: And if you point to Bin Laden, that wasn't Obama's administration that got Bin Laden.

WILLIAMS: It wasn't?

BOLLING: That was the Bush administration that set up the kill shot, and Obama took the kill shot.

WILLIAMS: Up to then, I was listening to you. But goodness gracious, you went overboard.

https://www.salon.com/2011/05/02/fox_reaction/