Breaking News! Al Qaeda Number 3 Killed!

Breaking news! Callooh! Callay!

From ABC’s number one fake reporter, Jake Tapper:

Political Punch

Power, pop, and probings from ABC News Senior White House Correspondent Jake Tapper

Officials: Al Qaeda No. 3 Killed

May 31, 2010 9:30 PM

US officials tell ABC News that al Qaeda’s No. 3 — Mustafa Ahmed Muhammad Uthman Abu al-Yazid, known as Shaikh Sa’id al-Masri and Mustafa Abu al-Yazid – has been killed. Al Qaeda released a eulogy of Shaikh Sa’id tonight, officials said.

“Word is spreading in extremist circles of the death of Sheikh Sa’id al-Masri, widely viewed as the number three figure in al-Qaeda,” a US official told ABC News. “We have strong reason to believe that’s true, and that al-Masri was killed recently in Pakistan’s tribal areas. In terms of counterterrorism, this would be a big victory.”

US officials believed him to have been killed about a week ago in Pakistan.

Osama bin Laden and Ayman al Zawahiri are the spiritual founders, and considered No. 1 and No. 2 of al Qaeda list, but Shaikh Sa’id is considered the link between those two and rest of the operation, and for all intents and purposes the one running the organization day to day. [...]

How many #3′s is that? Five? Ten? Twenty?

It’s getting so that being the Number 3 in Al Qaeda is as bad as being Number 2 in “The Prisoner.” Or a red shirt on “Star Trek.”

But more importantly: it’s always nice to know that Tapper will barf out whatever the Pentagon tells him. Which is why it’s so incredibly believable that we’ve killed our twenty-seventh Al Qaeda number 3.

I believe you. Just like I believe that Antonin Scalia refused to recuse himself in Bush v. Gore, even though his son was an attorney working for the Bush campaign.

They probably weren’t on speaking terms at the time, so it was OK.

And another number 3 bites the dust.

Because, you know, my government never lies to me, and the Pentagon always tells the truth, and Jake Tapper always writes whatever they tell him to write.

OK: one of those assertions WAS actually true.

Courage.