The from the AP:

Obama’s quiet backstage decision to authorize the Defense Department to take necessary action if Capt. Richard Phillips’ life was in imminent danger gave a Navy commander the go-ahead to order snipers to fire on the pirates holding the cargo ship captain at gunpoint

But the real knee-slapper is this one:

Still, it goes some way toward dispelling the notion that a liberal Democrat with a known distaste for war — Obama campaigned on his consistent opposition to the Iraq invasion — doesn’t have the chops to call on U.S. military power.

presides over an operation against four half naked savages in a raft, and poof, he’s Abraham Lincoln, or George Patton, possibly Alexander the Great.
Nah, liberals aren’t nuts.

I’m afraid military success in spite of the Obama administration is going to become the norm.

The administration has been fairly quiet about this. I see no evidence of chest thumping or bragging.

There is one pirate in custody. All of sudden everyone is worried about the guy’s age. Turns out he might be under 18. This is the one that was onboard the Bainbridge negotiating the ransom. My opinion, if he is old enough to be trusted to negotiate with the US Navy alone, then he is old enough to be tried as an adult.

This is not to say that there are not children forced by the pirates to commit crimes. Those we need to rescue and protect. But, I don’t think this one is one of those.

You know they’ll be looking for a chance to do it. The norm in that region seems to be the Palestinian-Israeli model of “we’ll trade you the one soldier we murdered after we captured and tortured him for a few hundred live terrorists in prison cells”.

Meh, this is still a better outcome than the American tourists held hostage for ransom by the Al Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf group in the Philippines May 2001, only to be beheaded the next month due to zero military response or public objection from President Bush himself. Sad it took Sept. 11 for the White House to even investigate Abu Sayyaf’s ties and intelligence to the Al Qaeda network.

Correction: Bush paid the Abu Sayyaf $3 million to release the other two Americans after the first one was beheaded.

I am humbled by you giving my simple comment this much attention. Thank you.

Alert – Obama supporter.
Jeff: You told us a couple days ago that Cap’n Phillips was rescued when he jumped off the life boat a second time and the Seals then took out the pirates. This was not accurate. You also told us that that the Navy did not did not take out the pirates when Captain Phillips earlier dove off the lifeboat because the guidance from President Obama prevented it and further that, when the pirates fired on a Navy vessel, Navy personnel did not return fire because of lack of clear guidance from Washington and because of orders from Obama’s staff not to act. These “facts” appear to have been made up. If you have sources for these, please let us know what they are. And now you tell us that the on-scene commander took advantage of Obama’s failure to tie his hands as tightly as Obama had intended. How do you know this? It seems pretty obvious that you know no such thing but we would, of course,welcome your documentation of these facts.