White House says bin Laden has little power

White House Homeland Security Adviser Fran Townsend on Sunday dismissed the influence of al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, saying that making a tape every few years “is about the best he can do.”

“This is a man on the run from a cave who is virtually impotent other than these tapes,” Townsend said on Fox News Sunday. She added that the U.S. is taking the sending of the tapes “seriously” but that they appear to be only “propaganda.”

{mosads}Townsend’s remarks resemble those of new Republican presidential hopeful Fred Thompson. The former Tennessee senator said that he thinks of bin Laden “as more of a symbolism than he is anything else.” Thompson added that the al Qaeda chief “being in the mountains of Afghanistan or Pakistan is not as important as the fact that there’s probably al Qaeda operatives inside the United States of America.”

Thompson’s comments triggered a stinging rebuke from Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), who is also vying for the Republican presidential nomination.

“I think that Fred should appreciate the fact that when this guy uses cyberspace the way that he’s able to use it, and motivate and to increase the radical Islamic extremism and enthusiasm, he is a great danger,” McCain said on ABC’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos. “He continues to communicate, he continues to lead and he continues to be a symbol for them of leadership in this radical hatred and evil radical Islamic extremism.”