While the MSM and any sane person is incredulous and disgusted over Mitt Romney's "Calcavade of Smirks" show over the tragic events in the Middle East, anyone who is familar with the right wing's Bizarro World view of Obama is not surprised. (As Josh Marshall put it, this was an attack lifted straight from the right-wing blogosphere.) Indeed, it totally reflects the right-wing's worldview on Obama as a secret Muslim/terrorist apolgizer/Al-Qaeda sleeper agent, you name it. However, as Salon's Alex Seitz-Wald notes, there's one problem with this worldview:
It's now taken for granted on the far right that the staement issued by the U.S. Embassy in Cairo condemning the anti-Islamic film that sparked the violence (which was expressly not authorized by the Obama administration) is tantamount to "apologizing to Al-Qaida", as Fox News host Steve Doocy said this morning. But for those prone to believe Obama is a secret Muslim raidical, or at least feckless enough to sympathize with them, there's always been that one key bit of evidence that even a heavy dose of cognitive dissonance can't ignore - Obama authorized the mission that killed Bin Laden.
Indeed. How do they cope with that? How do they reconcile that with their worldview without causing a massive group cerebral hemmorrage?
Well, leave it to Rush Limbaugh to come up with a conspiracy theory that'll let them sleep better at night. As flagged by Media Matters, Limbaugh advanced the "wild theory" (his own words) that Al-Qaida gave up Bin Laden to be killed in order to make Obama look good:
What if Ayman al-Zawahiri and other Al-Qaida leaders gave up Osama Bin Laden for the express purpose of making Obama look good? Giving Obama stature, political capital. Obama got Osama! I mean, really, do you think Al-Qaida depends on Osama Bin Laden any more, like it did?...So they give him up, they give away his location. We go in, SEAL Team 6, Obama puffs up...Keep him in power, furthers the cause...Do you think the millitant Islamists will be as hopeful of getting rid of Israel with a Republican president or with a Democrat president? Just throwing it out there.
I love that last line. Code for, "I'm just throwing out this shit to see if it'll stick. Don't blame me for the stink."
Even by Limbaugh's standards, this is ridiculous. (What does he think Al-Qaida are, Bond villains?) But it's prefect for the wingnuts, because it finally allows them to reconcile the killing of Bin Laden with their twisted worldview. Of course Obama got Bin Laden! It's all part of the master plan!
These are the type of people Mitt Romney is apparently taking his cues from. No wonder his campaign is in such trouble.