Using A Wife As A Human Shield!

Did you manage to read about Osama bin Laden using one of his wives as a human shield? The story began here:

"Here is Osama, living in a million-dollar compound, hiding behind women who were put in front of him as a shield," Brennan said. "It speaks to just how false his narrative has been over the years...he's putting other people out there" to wage jihad while he is secure in his luxury compound.

...

Brennan also identified bin Laden as the combatant who had used a woman as a human shield. She was the only woman who died in the operation, which also killed a courier for bin Laden, the courier's brother, and one of bin Laden's sons, Brennan said. Brennan later said it was his understanding that the woman was one of bin Laden's wives, but officials later said Brennan was mistaken -- his wife had only been injured in the attack.

So the woman used as a shield (if this happened) was not one of bin Laden's wives. But Jonathan Chait thought so when he wrote this analysis:

This morning I forgot to take out the trash, but if my wife is upset when she sees me tonight, I'm going to bring up this.

...

Let's see if "At least I didn't use you as a human shield" gets me off the hook.

More seriously, I wonder if this will help destroy whatever romantic allure bin Laden has left. I don't know very much about Muslim cultures, but it's hard to imagine there's any culture in which hiding behind your wife, or any woman, rather than fighting for yourself is not considered about as shameful and cowardly as it gets.

Hmm. Chait hits all the points in a particular gender relations plot.

The next round of possible information on the human shield topic:

President Obama's counterterror chief John Brennan also initially said that bin Laden used one of his wives as a human shield and the woman was killed in the gun battle. That has turned out to be incorrect and officials attributed the mistake to the confusion that usually accompanies a fast moving gun battle, or "the fog of war."

And also:

When the SEALs entered the room in which bin Laden was hiding, his wife charged them and was shot in the leg, Carney said. Bin Laden was then shot in the chest and head.

Wow. My head spins. We move from a wife being used as a human shield in the most reprehensibly anti-masculine way to a wife charging Navy Seals.

I am now eagerly awaiting Chait's new funny post, based on that latest information!

More seriously, as Chait might say, this reminds me about the way evo-psycho popularizations are spread over the world in a nanosecond whereas the later corrections are only known to those inside the ivory towers.