Skip to content

Osama Bin Laden is Dead

2011-05-02 · Hank · watch on YouTube · World affairs · news analysis

Lower-confidence wave

2011 videos did not pass the QA gate (17 %); their analysis is shown but less reliable.

Hank tells how he learned of Osama bin Laden's killing during a Mario Kart game, then, setting aside the implications, lists what is known about the operation (no torture or rogue agents, a months-long process, an attempt to capture him) and admits he is happy about the death though he knows he should not be.

What is said

00:00:00 — Greeting; Hank's great Sunday, May 1, and learning of bin Laden's death mid-Mario Kart

  • ★★ Hank says Sunday, the first of May, was a fantastic day: breakfast downtown with Katherine, a part in friends' movie, Win Win, and A Clash of Kings on his porch. — 00:00:01 · Katherine Green
  • ★★ Hank calls Win Win, the new Paul Giamatti film, awesome and a really good movie. — 00:00:20
  • ★★★ While Katherine was in the bathroom during a Mario Kart Wii game, Hank checked Twitter and ended up watching Obama's address with the Mario Kart music playing. — 00:00:31 · Twitter, Barack Obama, Katherine Green
  • ★★★ In his address Obama announces that the United States has conducted an operation that killed Osama bin Laden, the leader of al-Qaeda. — 00:00:41 · Barack Obama
  • ★★ Calling it a surreal moment, Hank admits he and Katherine high-fived, then raced the 100cc Banana Cup, which Katherine won. — 00:00:45 · Katherine Green

00:00:57 — What is actually known about the operation that killed Osama bin Laden, before the spin cycle

  • ★★ With the news only hours old, Hank thinks discussing implications (such as high-fiving over a death) is premature and wants to cover what is actually known before the spin cycle. (hedged) — 00:00:57
  • ★★★ Despite Jack Bauer trending on Twitter, Hank says bin Laden's death involved no rogue agents, weird intelligence activities, broken international treaties or torture. — 00:01:18 · Twitter
  • ★★ Hank calls torture a notoriously bad information-gathering technique. — 00:01:24
  • ★★ The operation was a long, thought-out, months-long process of gathering information and putting it together with great deductive minds, Hank says. — 00:01:30
  • ★★ CIA operatives and the Navy SEALs involved tried to take bin Laden alive but could not, according to Hank. — 00:01:44
  • ★ Hank jokes that his guess for when the raid becomes a made-for-TV movie is a minimum of six months. (joke) (hedged) — 00:01:49
  • ★★ Five people were killed in the attack, Hank says: four al-Qaeda members and a woman used as a human shield by one of them, which he calls horrible. — 00:01:54
    • number check: one — doubtful
  • ★★ Hank says Ayman al-Zawahiri remains al-Qaeda's number-one man, long its chief of operations, but per his reading and leaked CIA documents lacks bin Laden's charismatic following. (hedged) — 00:02:05
  • ★★ Hank thinks al-Zawahiri might find it hard to keep the loyalty bin Laden held together in al-Qaeda, which could be a pretty good thing. (hedged) — 00:02:19
  • ★★ Obama ordered the assault just before flying to Alabama to survey tornado damage, and during the attack phoned Pakistan's president to tell him, without asking permission. — 00:02:27 · Barack Obama
  • ★★ Hank cannot imagine Donald Trump making that phone call and is glad Barack Obama was in charge just then. — 00:02:46 · Barack Obama

00:02:55 — Hank's mixed feelings: he should not be happy at a death, but is; sign-off

  • ★★★ Not waxing poetic on the morality of assassination, Hank says his emotions are mixed: he knows he should not be happy at another human's death, but he is. — 00:02:55

00:03:19 — End screen: answering 'when is Hank's first album coming out', reprinted shirts, next album in June

  • ★★ Answering a much-liked question on John's last video about when his first album comes out, Hank says it came out years ago and shows his second album and its reprinted shirt. — 00:03:23
  • ★★ Hank says his next album will hopefully come out the month after this one, in June. (hedged) — 00:03:46

Threads in this video

Replies to

BR2_1c6a885d3f