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Man Unknowingly Tweets the Osama Raid

Posted by samzenpus on from the all-seeing-twitter-eye dept.

Sohaib Athar, a.k.a. @ReallyVirtual, had no idea the helicopters he was complaining about on twitter were part of the top secret mission that killed Osama bin Laden Sunday night. 10 hours before bin Laden's death was announced Athar posted: "Helicopter hovering above Abbottabad at 1AM (is a rare event).” From the article: "During the raid, Athar speculates that he was two or three kilometers away from the shooting that took place. Once news broke that bin Laden had been killed in Abbottabad, Athar tweeted, 'Uh oh, now I’m the guy who liveblogged the Osama raid without knowing it.'”

10 of 354 comments (clear)

  1. Call me Crazy... by MonsterTrimble · · Score: 3, Insightful

    But why would they take the body, promptly bury it at sea, then tell the world? I understand that they would want to minimize the impact in the islamic world by not defiling his body in any way which was recorded, but it seems like this would be something you show on television, that it's REALLY him. Who knows, maybe they made a deal with him and he's now in South America to live out his days in (even more) luxury. But that's the George Noory in me.

    And I'm also quite mystified why so many people are celebrating this. It took almost 10 years, trillions of dollars, the invasion of two countries (neither of which he was found in), and an untold number of lives lost to find a 6 foot 6 inch multi-millionaire (with diabetes!) living in a private luxury compound (in a well populated city) which was at least eight times larger then anything nearby. I don't think there is too much to celebrate here.

    --
    I call it 'The Aristocrats'
    1. Re:Call me Crazy... by mspohr · · Score: 4, Insightful
      So why did we invade and occupy Iraq and Afghanistan? It seems to me that all we needed were a good investigation and a team of crack Navy Seals.

      Can we stop killing people now?

      --
      I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
    2. Re:Call me Crazy... by AHuxley · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Re And I'm also quite mystified why so many people are celebrating this.
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_Minutes_Hate

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
    3. Re:Call me Crazy... by vlm · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And I'm also quite mystified why so many people are celebrating this. It took almost 10 years, trillions of dollars, the invasion of two countries (neither of which he was found in), and an untold number of lives lost to find a 6 foot 6 inch multi-millionaire (with diabetes!) living in a private luxury compound (in a well populated city) which was at least eight times larger then anything nearby. I don't think there is too much to celebrate here.

      Some of the guys I work with were all high five-ing and cheering, and I'm like "dude, you know we lost, right?" ... wake me when I can fly on an airplane without my wife and daughter being molested by govt agents, when we've got at least some of our civil rights back, when my tax dollars aren't paying for a concentration camp, etc. So the leader of the guys who won, is now dead. Who cares, as if its going to improve anything for us.

      Roosevelt died right around the end of WWII ... were any of the Germans dumb enough to celebrate, despite their obvious loss? Yeah we're totally screwed here, uh huh, but the boss of the other guys is dead, so lets party like its 1935 again?

      --
      "Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
    4. Re:Call me Crazy... by WSOGMM · · Score: 5, Insightful

      So why did we invade and occupy Iraq and Afghanistan? It seems to me that all we needed were a good investigation and a team of crack Navy Seals.

      Can we stop killing people now?

      I really like your use of "we" in this post, because we really are the ones killing people. People seem to think we are separate from our government.

    5. Re:Call me Crazy... by h4rr4r · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Clearly we should just be barbarians too. Why don't we smack some civilian planes into their buildings why we are at it.

      Your kind are why we have these problems. If petty folks like yourself would grow up on both sides we would not have these issues.

    6. Re:Call me Crazy... by egburr · · Score: 4, Insightful

      49% of us *are* separate from our government. It only takes 51% to vote our leaders in.

      Ok, so that's not exactly true, but in spirit it's close enough. Many of us disagree with a lot of things the government does, but we're effectively powerless to change it. We can vote, but only the majority gets represented. We can revolt, but who has the better weapons, funds, and infrastructure? Until a vast majority of people are ready to revolt, it won't really matter; and, by then they really could just vote the leaders out instead.

      So, although our government is theoretically "the people", most of "the people" really have no say in what goes on.

      Maybe if our government were more open and kept us better informed about what was happening and why things are done the way thy are done, there may be more agreement that those things are necessary. As it is now, though, we are generally treated like kids asking "why" and getting just "because I said so" as the answer. Is it really surprising that so many people don't trust our government?

      --

      Edward Burr
      Having a smoking section in a restaurant is like having a peeing section in a swimming pool.
  2. Dude on vacation by vlm · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I read about this dude, he's on vacation, "trying to get away from it all" and after all this breaks he's complaining that he can't get away from it all.

    Dude, your problem is your idea of "getting away from it all" is warped, in that you're twittering every 30 minutes when you see a F-ing airplane. Give your cellphone a burial at sea, then chill on a lawn chair (they have those in pakistan, right?) with a religiously appropriate mood enhancing substance and enjoy the solitude.

    --
    "Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
  3. Re:All the reports say it was one week ago... by snl2587 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Remember that the 24-hour news channels rarely fact-check anything, preferring instead to report "breaking news". This has the nasty side-effect of turning hearsay into well-reported "facts", which then stick around and confuse people.

  4. Re:This is good to know by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful
    Strawman

    Sure, I did troll you for your thinly veiled racism, but that doesn't mean I was projecting.