First I would like to distance myself from the "deathers" (people who think the US government is lying about the death of Bin Laden) I do believe Osama to be dead even if the way they buried him was fishy (lol get it.) I think all stories from all sides point to the real death of Osama(1)(2).
Any one who watched the news the night that this news broke saw video of people celebrating in the streets. It was a block party styled celebration with people chanting national slogans and singing the national anthem and singing America the beautiful. I don't really want to call this nationalism as it is an insult to real nationalism (left-wing nationalism).
What we saw that night was the birth of a new feeling in the US, a more patriotic jingoism that has already existed in the US. Only now the people of the USA will have a excuse to express that jingoist patriotism more publicly and more forcefully. Ive heard the statement "Now that we have killed Osama we can end the war." while these comrades have the best of intentions and I agree that the war is now at a quagmire if it is not ended. We should know from the past, and the fact we live in an imperialist nation with a majority pro-imperialist population. The US government is not going to leave Afghanistan. The trade routes that Afghanistan hold is too valuable to the imperialist for them to let it go. Why else would imperialist powers through out history seek to conquer Afghanistan?
In fact the death of Osama, if anything will allow the Obama regime to muster enough support from the people to justify the invasion of say Libya or Syria or any number of other nations.
Ive also heard things said like "this patriotism over the death of Osama won't last with all of the budget cuts happening"(I'm paraphrasing) If you are a normal reader you already know I don't agree with this statement. If anything, Osama's death will pacify the people enough to allow the budget cuts to pass. Not that the people of the US were going to revolt to stop the budget cuts anyway.
I think that the death of Osama will spark patriotism in the liberals, much how 9/11 sparked patriot jingoism in the conservatives. The moderates may fall for this jingoist patriotism as well for the time being. The American people have waited a long time for revenge on Osama and it is only natural that this will spark patriotism.
But to someone who pays attention to the real situation in the US and doesn't live in their own world where the average citizen here doesn't trust the government. They would know that jingoist patriotism is a rampant disease in the USA that has been around for generations. The average person is generally proud to be an American even if they don't understand all that entitles.
The fact is that we should be vigilant as the government could use this patriotism to attack militant opposition groups. The government was already bold enough to attack the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) and the FRSO (FB) for supporting oppressed people of Colombia and Palestine. This could give them the public support they need to crack down on any group advocating for revolution as terrorist.
(1) http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/osama-bin-ladens-death-confirmed-al-qaeda/story?id=13543148
(2)http://articles.cnn.com/2011-05-06/world/bin.laden.qaeda.comment_1_site-intelligence-group-bin-laden-al-qaeda?_s=PM:WORLD
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