Twenty-five years ago the process of identifying someone by typing their DNA was extremely difficult and time consuming. It was not done on a large scale.
Fast-forward to today, where we are told that the military and the CIA were able to genotype Osama bin Laden's DNA and identify him with 99.9% certainty in less than 12 hours.
How is this possible? Following is a primer on the current state of DNA forensic technology that answers this question and raises others.
First, however, full disclosure: I am no fan of President Obama's policies, particularly his decision to extend tax cuts for the wealthy and his willingness to buy into Republican frames by focus on the deficit. That being said, I am perfectly willing to give him total and full credit for planning and authorizing a gutsy military operation if he can prove it was bin Laden, both because that would be the right thing to do, and because I think it can get us out of Afghanistan (see below). Second, particularly in light of Benazir Bhutto's statement in November 2007and because I believe the War on Terror was ginned up by the military establishment to increase military spending for reasons of empire building (and BTW thereby create thousands of new Republican voters), I will believe that Osama bin Laden was killed when I see some evidence, and will not just trust the word of various CIA and military officials. Finally, even if bin Laden is not dead, I do believe we can and should use the "Witch is Dead" theme to extract our country from the Oz-like PermaWar footing we have been on for the last decade (more on this later).