CIA Disbands Osama bin Laden Unit

Has anyone heard Bush say lately that he still considers it a priority to capture Osama bin Laden, the mastermind of 9/11 and the man responsible for the death of 3,000 Americans? Here's the story from Reuters:

The CIA has disbanded a unit set up in the 1990s to oversee the spy agency's hunt for Osama bin Laden and transferred its duties to broader operations that track Islamist militant groups, a U.S. intelligence official said on Tuesday.

The bin Laden unit, codenamed Alec Station, became less valuable as a separate operation as counterterrorism operations eliminated top al Qaeda operatives and the movement's focus shifted more to regional networks of militants, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The Bush Administration gets very excited for a few days every time a new Osama bin Laden tape is released and then nothing happens. Nevertheless, Bush seems to get a small political bounce in the polls every time Osama issues one of those tapes.

There have been times in our long history as a republic that we have taken our future seriously and dealt seriously with the problems of the day. It is not one of those times in the White House.

But America is larger than George W. Bush. Happy Fourth of July!