Did Osama bin Laden have OSA?

[Richard]

Did Osama bin Laden have sleep apnoea? Do you think that was what made him such a nasty piece of work?

I venture this purely on the tv clips of his bedroom and the device lying on the floor close to his bed with a pipe coming from it. Is this a Pakistani CPAP? Or his wife's hair-dryer?

The shape of his nose gives a clue, and with a beard like that, it would have to be a nasal mask.

So look out on Ebay for a CPAP offered for sale, one careful owner . . .no longer required.

[Richard]

Osama Bin Laden's DNA has been analysed and reveals the following:

24% Cocoa, 52% Coconut, 18% Sugar and 6% Milk

Experts believe this is due to the Bounty on his head.

[gargler]

Osama Bin Laden

I see Elton John has re-released his old 'Classic' in memory of Bin Laden - but re-named it 'Sandals in the Wind'.

[Tigers Fan]

I'm as aware as everyone else that Osama was responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent people but this is, nonetheless, a human being who has died/been killed.

I believe we would do well to show respect for that fact. Who he was, is gone, it is done.

Surely, now the West has had its vengeance, our energies should be directed toward removing the causes of Muslim grievance and anger that lead to anti-West fundamentalism.

Poking fun at the dead ill becomes us.

TF

[dravidio]

I often disagree with Tiger but I think he is spot on here. Eloquently expressed too.

[Berneta]

Osama

I agree with the guys--he has been executed for his crimes, and it is over as far as he is concerned. I would rather they had taken him alive, so that he could have been tried for War Crimes--but evidently that was not to be. (I think Bush should be tried for War Crimes too--the invasion of Iraq was uncalled for.) I think we should all rememeber that it wasn't the Muslims who committed the crime on 9/11--it was terrorists who just happen to be Muslims. There are a lot of decent Muslims out there. Berneta

[Sparticus]

Dance!

I hope the soldiers danced on the bastards grave and anyone else who supported him! (yes I ken he was burried at sea (or was he?) I even has his picture looks a pretty mess!

[Richard]

OK, so maybe he didn't have sleep apnoea and that was the air-con. in the corner of the clip not his CPAP, and the reference to the Bounty was just a joke.

But let's not beat ourselves up about Bin Laden's death. In terms of murder and genocide, he was up there with Hitler, Eichmann, Pol Pot, Milosevic, Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic. All of them thoroughly evil.

Milosevic was arrested and sent for trial, but died before sentencing, Karadzic is in prison awaiting trial and Mladic remains on the run - a fugitive.

Now imagine, the US Special Forces did not kill Bin Laden, instead they arrested him and took him to the US to stand trial. What a show trial that would be, and how much reaction and unrest that would create throughout the world, not just in the Muslim world.

Pakistan would want to try him; Kenya would want to try him; the UK would want to try him. And then there would be the cries that he didn't have a fair trial.

Being sanctimonious about killing a man in cold blood is all very well, but the alternative would have created demonstrations on an epic scale that would endure for years as the trial went on. We should see Bin Laden's vanquishing as a major step forward in ridding the civilised world of fanatical terrorism

Certainly, the swift despatch of a felon without recourse to justice is not to be recommended. I, for one, would never advocate capital punishment, but this was off the scale, with the alternative creating far more unrest and bloodshed.

The world is a safer place without Bin Laden, make no mistake.

Richard

[mintra]

I wonder what the kill ratio is

Yes for every one Bin laden and his lot killed how many have we, yesterday it was 14 to 1 that is one UK soldier to 14 Afghans.

It would be nice now that the perceived leader is dead if we could lay off these people, it would also be a lot cheaper, an attack helicopter buys a lot of cpap machines.

To get back on topic, I did wonder if Hitler or Stalin had the same issue, then I realised that I am a pacifist because I have always avoided conflict, the reason is that conflict was effort and I was just tired.

The idea that CPAP people are aggressive or angry comes from the fact that when you are exhausted you are nice and pliable to other people as it is easier, but when the people who take advantage of this pliability push you just a little too far you would flare up quickly and for a short time, this defence mechanism is a big relative change of personality which scares the normal folk.

I actually find now I have a machine, I could be more of a bastard, just like the normal folk.