President Obama may say that we've decimated al Qaeda and that they are on their heels, but he sure plans to be killing them for a long time:
Over the past two years, the Obama administration has been secretly developing a new blueprint for pursuing terrorists, a next-generation targeting list called the “disposition matrix.”
The matrix contains the names of terrorism suspects arrayed against an accounting of the resources being marshaled to track them down, including sealed indictments and clandestine operations. U.S. officials said the database is designed to go beyond existing kill lists, mapping plans for the “disposition” of suspects beyond the reach of American drones.
Although the matrix is a work in progress, the effort to create it reflects a reality setting in among the nation’s counterterrorism ranks: The United States’ conventional wars are winding down, but the government expects to continue adding names to kill or capture lists for years.
Among senior Obama administration officials, there is a broad consensus that such operations are likely to be extended at least another decade. Given the way al-Qaeda continues to metastasize, some officials said no clear end is in sight.
“We can’t possibly kill everyone who wants to harm us,” a senior administration official said. “It’s a necessary part of what we do. . . . We’re not going to wind up in 10 years in a world of everybody holding hands and saying, ‘We love America.’ ”
From outreach to reach out and kill someone.
Not that I'm complaining. I'm on record as thinking the only good jihadi is a dead jihadi. But what about our left that used to drone on (until January 2009) about "no endless wars?"
I wasn't upset about the concept of "endless" war, preferring to think of it as fighting "until we win"--and that we can hardly be blamed for not being able to predict how long that will take.
But again, I'm supposedly the knuckle-dragger in this debate.
Now we have a matrix of terrorists to kill or capture. Because they won't love us. And there is no end in sight. Huh. And our left is fine with this? Again, huh.
While I'm at it, remember when our left was deeply concerned about the mere potential for the federal government to see what books we borrow from the library?
And now the death matrix is nothing to comment on, it seems.
Not that I'm trying to keep track of what is permissible and what is not. Depending on who is sworn in this coming January as president, the standards will change again, I'm sure.
