9-11 Anniversary a Boon for Dems?

I'm pretty sure journalists call it the Rule of Three: three examples make a trend. And over the last few days, I've seen at least 3 promotions for major bin Laden documentaries & books. CNN's "In the Footsteps of bin Laden," National Geographic's "Triple Cross: bin Laden's Spy in America," and Lawrence Wright's The Looming Tower. Plus, Slate is running this (somewhate bizarre) comic book of the 9-11 Commission's Report.

Now what struck me about all this is the focus on Osama himself. Because, as you may recall, we never caught the son of a bitch (as Paul Hackett brilliantly put it the other day, "Where's the six-foot-two, left-handed guy with the flowing white robe and the kidney problem? [This Republican yahoo on TV with me] doesn't understand the war on terror."). And, especially with Americans doing a better job of distinguishing between the (failed) war in Iraq and the (stalled) "War on Terror," I think that reminders that Bush and the Republicans took their eye of the ball mere months after the attacks (indeed, Ground Zero was literally still smoldering when Iraq talk began) are definitely not in the Republicans' best interests. If the Dems have the guts to call them on this - and I think that signs are that they're ready to do it - then we may not have competing pageants over the next couple of weeks, with Dems pumping up Katrina memories and Rove going back to the smoking well one last time. Instead, it may be more like a one-two punch for the Dems.