Who Would Osama Vote For Redux

Wow, when I wrote the "Who Would Osama Vote For?" article a few days back, I was serious but not that serious. But it appears that some new translations of the Election 2004 Osama tape are pretty explicit.

MEMRI said radical Islamist commentators monitored over the Internet this past weekend also interpreted the key passage of bin Laden's diatribe to mean that any U.S. state that votes to elect Bush on Tuesday will be considered an "enemy" and any state that votes for Kerry has "chosen to make peace with us." Yigal Carmon, president of MEMRI, said bin Laden used the Arabic term "ay-wilaya" to refer to a "state" in that sentence...That term "specifically refers to an American state, like Tennessee," Carmon said, adding that if bin Laden were referring to a "country" he would have used the Arabic word "dawla."

This is sad and should not change any votes in either direction. But it is still infuriating.