Al-Qaeda’s Obama problem

In George Bush, al-Qaeda had a truly useful idiot. Bush is despised in the Muslim world (to say nothing of pretty much everywhere else) and as such gave al-Qaeda a potent recruiting tool and target for propaganda. And really, demonizing a smug half-wit with imperialist designs on the Middle East was easy, both from a strategic view as well as a practical one – big fish, small barrel. Now that President Obama is the face of America, it seems the propagandists in al-Qaeda are having a bit more trouble developing an effective anti-Obama meme.

The torrent of hateful words is part of what terrorism experts now believe is a deliberate, even desperate, propaganda campaign against a president who appears to have gotten under al-Qaeda's skin. The departure of George W. Bush deprived al-Qaeda of a polarizing American leader who reliably drove recruits and donations to the terrorist group.

With Obama, al-Qaeda faces an entirely new challenge, experts say: a U.S. president who campaigned to end the Iraq war and to close the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and who polls show is well liked throughout the Muslim world.

Whether the pro-Obama sentiment will last remains to be seen. On Friday, the new administration signaled that it intends to continue at least one of Bush's controversial counterterrorism policies: allowing CIA missile strikes on alleged terrorist hideouts in Pakistan's autonomous tribal region.

But for now, the change in Washington appears to have rattled al-Qaeda's leaders, some of whom are scrambling to convince the faithful that Obama and Bush are essentially the same.

"They're highly uncertain about what they're getting in this new adversary," said Paul Pillar, a former CIA counterterrorism official who lectures on national security at Georgetown University. "For al-Qaeda, as a matter of image and tone, George W. Bush had been a near-perfect foil."

Yet another reason to thank God that Bush is gone and Obama has arrived.