Yeaah.. That's the Ticket!

Fox says:

Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright insisted Wednesday that she was just kidding when she wondered aloud whether the Bush administration is holding Usama bin Laden captive, waiting to break him out at the best political moment.

It was a "tongue-in-cheek comment and was not intended in any other way," Albright told Fox News.

But witnesses to Albright's comment said the ambassador did not appear to be joking Tuesday when she suggested President Bush may reveal bin Laden's capture as an "October surprise" (search) before next November's presidential election.

Albright was in the Fox News studio's green room waiting to appear on an evening program when she made the remark.

"She said, 'Do you suppose that the Bush administration has Usama bin Laden hidden away somewhere and will bring him out before the election?'" said Fox News analyst and Roll Call executive editor Mort Kondracke. "She was not smiling."

Two makeup artists who prep the guests before their appearances also reported that Albright did not ask her question in a joking manner.

Interesting, coming from someone who recently (dated 8 Dec) made this somewhat rambling statement on the failure to capture or kill Osama Bin laden and Saddam Hussein:

"Saddam Hussein's continued life is more of a problem than Osama bin Laden's. Because if we look at what has been happening with the insurgency [in Iraq] and stories in the last few days [about] funds that Saddam Hussein somehow has access to ... in many ways he has a lot of levers he was used to pulling. The question is whether the strings are attached... His continued life is creating huge problems. And while the [Bush] administration is basically saying none of this matters any more, I think it does matter. Whether they capture him there is no way of telling. Osama bin Laden ...I think it would be better if Osama bin Laden were captured. That is what they promised us and it hasn't happened."

And this on Afghanistan from a story dated 13 Dec "Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar are still at large and warlords continue to rule."

And this classic from just a couple months ago:

The United States would now be safer and more popular overseas had Al Gore instead of George W. Bush won the 2000 presidential election, former secretary of state Madeleine Albright said in remarks published yesterday.

In an opinion piece published in the September/October 2003 issue of the scholarly journal Foreign Affairs, Albright also accused the Bush administration of blundering by invading Iraq before Afghanistan was truly stabilised, Osama bin Laden had been caught and his al-Qaeda network smashed.

"I remain convinced that had Al Gore been elected president, and had the attacks of September 11 still happened, the United States and NATO would have gone to war in Afghanistan together, then deployed forces all around that country and stayed to rebuild it," she wrote.

So if it's true, why the sudden reversal on the claim?

My theory: Angling for a veep slot on the Dean ticket.

Dean Dec 1: I don't know. There are many theories about it. The most interesting theory that I've heard so far, which is nothing more than a theory, I can't—think it can't be proved, is that he was warned ahead of time by the Saudis. Now, who knows what the real situation is, but the trouble is that by suppressing that kind of information, you lead to those kinds of theories, whether they have any truth to them or not, and then eventually they get repeated as fact. So I think the president is taking a great risk by suppressing the clear, the key information that needs to go to the Kean commission.

Dec 9:
Scott Spradling, WMUR-TV: Governor Dean, you had once stated that you thought it was possible that the president of the United States had been forewarned about the 9/11 terrorist attacks. You later said that you didn't really know.

A statement like that, don't you see the possibility of some Democrats being nervous about statements like that leading them to the conclusion that you are not right for being the next commander in chief?

Howard Dean: Well, in all due respect, I did not exactly state that.

Update: I'm kidding!!!

Update: No I'm not!

Update: Yes I was!