NO PLACE FOR PARTISAN POLITICS IN AFTERMATH OF BIN LADEN KILLING

            The death of Osama bin Laden provoked an array of emotions that pulsated throughout the American landscape.
            Celebration, triumph, closure and renewed grief made Americans stand upon their feet in unity as our country finally felt a sense of justice brought down upon the leader who darkened the pages of our recent history.
            But as intelligence officials disclosed the trail of evidence that led to the compound in Pakistan where bin Laden was hiding, such short-lived political unity was swept away.
            Instead of those on Capitol Hill basking in the glory of a successful operation, they allowed their moment of eminence to be dragged into the muck and murk by political figures out to enhance their own party's agenda.  Such bipartisanship took form inthe vindication and reproach over the debate on torture.
           Before a day had passed, the chairman of the House of Homeland Security Committee, Rep. Peter T. King (R-N.Y.), told Fox News that the success of the hunt for bin Laden was due to waterboarding.  The following morning, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said plainly: "None of this came as a result of harsh interrogation practices."
          Within a single day, such a moment for rejoicing was turned into a political debacle.
          Quickly following the capture of bin Laden, a chorus of Bush administration officials claimed justification for "enhanced interrogation techniques" such as waterboarding.  Among them was John Yoo, a former justice department official.  "President Obama can take credit, rightfully, for the success today,"  Yoo wrote in National Review, "but he owes it to the tough decisions taken by the Bush administration."
          Yet in the end, the "ticking time bomb" justification often invoked by former Bush officials and politicians where the ends justify the means doesn't apply to the bin Laden scenario.  Tommy Vietor, spokesman for the National Security Council, said: "The bottom line is this: If we had some kind of smokking-gun intelligence fromwaterboarding in 2003.  It took years of collection and analysis from many different sources to develop the case that enabled us to identify this compound, and reach a judgement that bin Laden was likely to be living there."
         No single man, tactic or party can take full responsibility for the success of the mission.  It was an accumulation of various elements that spanned multiple presidencies that led to the capture of bin Laden.  But, as we find so often in our great country of democracy, the urge to politicize such an event couldn't be resisted by Capitol Hill's hardliner bipartisans.
         Quickly, the eyes of party advocates turned toward the elections on the horizon, and the aisles once again were split.  But what the mainstream American should be doing is not following in their lead but rather thinking, who cares?
         Who cares whether or not torture during the Bush years led to the capture of bin Laden, and who cares which president deserves the most praise.  What matters nowis the fact that, through the success of a well-execulted American operation, our world has been ridden of a man whose hands were stained with the blood of more than 3,000 American citizens.
         To politicize such a moment of triumph only shows how low some politicians have sunk in their morals.  As a country, we should be celebrating a sense of closure and helping those who are struggling to handle reopened wounds caused by such an emotional event.
        There is a line to be drawn where politics ends and human compassion and restraint take its place.  To politicize such an event means one isn't clearly seeing the bigger picture.  To divide and bicker when, as a country, we have made a historic turning point against the large-scale terrorist network that still threatens us today, means to turn a moment of greater triumph into a moment of disunity.
        Politics has its place, but not when it begins to stain the pride of Americans.