Yes, it was a hot one
The temperature at BWI-Marshall Airport reached 91 degrees Tuesday, setting a record for the most 90-degree days in a calendar year and topping off more than eight months of weather extremes in Maryland. Since last winter's blizzards and record accumulations, 2010 has brought drought, crop losses, rising numbers of heat-related deaths and the hottest summer on record for Baltimore. Above, Kelly West tried to beat the heat in July with an egg custard snowball on North Bethel Street in East Baltimore.
Concerned that police departments nationwide fail to fully investigate rapes, a congressional committee will examine the issue next week at a hearing spurred partly by a Baltimore Sun examination of the systemic underreporting of sex crimes.
For 10-year-old Jacob Krause, getting ready for the new school year wasn't a simple matter of back-to-school shopping. It also involved working out logistics for getting to the bathroom as many as 20 times during a single school day.
Philip Carroll, the 86-year-old patriarch of historic Doughoregan Manor in Ellicott City, died Saturday and was buried Tuesday at what was called a simple graveside service for less than two dozen people at the nearly three-century-old Carroll family estate.
Leslie Shepard, director of the Baltimore School for the Arts who has worked at the prestigious school since it opened, will leave her post after this academic year, officials announced Wednesday.
Comments about Baltimore Reporter:
Perhaps the best part of blogging or the internet in general is the occasional discovery of something unexpected.Over on
Baltimore Reporter and Conservative Thoughts is a great and thought provoking article by Robert Farrow.I hope you will follow
this link and read this great post.
from conservativecontracts.com
I love your blog
Once again - as happens so often - I have been positioned here on the living room couch, immersed in your blog. You are
better than Fox News.
Kevin Dayhoff
Awards and Rankings:
Voted one of the best local blogs:
Baltimore Examiner: 2006
Voted Top 10 most influential blog in Maryland in 2007.
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Unreal. The radical Obama Justice Department sued Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Arizona today.
The Wall Street Journal reported:
The Justice Department filed a civil lawsuit Thursday against Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Arizona’s Maricopa County, accusing him and his agency of stonewalling a probe into policing practices that some call discriminatory against Hispanics.
The suit is the latest move in months of legal sniping between the two sides. They are also fighting over whether federal prosecutors improperly contacted employees of the sheriff’s office directly to seek testimony, instead of going through lawyers.
Robert Driscoll, a lawyer representing Mr. Arpaio and the Maricopa Sheriff’s Office, didn’t have an immediate response to the suit.
Mr. Arpaio is the elected sheriff for Maricopa County, where Phoenix is located. He has become a vocal critic of illegal immigration and has carried out operations aimed at detaining immigrants and turning them over to federal law enforcement for deportation.
Civil-rights groups have long called Mr. Arpaio’s policies discriminatory. Soon after Attorney General Eric Holder took office last year, the Justice Department said it was investigating those complaints and looking into possible violations of Hispanics’ civil rights.
The Justice Department suit, filed in federal court in Phoenix, said the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office receives millions of dollars in federal funding and is required to cooperate with federal investigations as a condition of receiving those funds.
This should surprise no one. After all, Sheriff Joe Arpaio was trying to uphold the law in Arizona.
also:
Awful– Harry Reid Now Denies Saying “This War Is Lost”
What’s worse…
The fact that Harry Reid said, “This war is lost,” while our troops were fighting terrorists in Iraq…
Or, the fact that he now denies that he said it?
In 2008 radio talk show host Casey Hendrickson interviewed Harry Reid. During this forgotten interview Harry Reid denied saying, “This war is lost.”
Barack Obama will take credit tonight for withdrawing US combat troops from Iraq. This is despite the fact that he opposed the successful Bush surge and he even commented that genocide would be better than keeping troops in Iraq.
It will also be interesting to see if President Obama mentions that the agreement to withdraw combat troops was signed under Bush.
The Sunday Times reported this news on November 17, 2008.
All US troops will leave Iraq within three years, and soldiers will withdraw from major towns and cities by next summer, under a landmark deal approved by the Iraqi Cabinet. The last British troops are expected to leave Iraq by the end of next year.
The agreement would draw a line under the campaign launched by President Bush in 2003 to topple Saddam Hussein in which 4,201 US and 176 British military personnel have died.
The pact, which also restricts US operations in the country beyond the end of this year, will be submitted to parliament for a final vote shortly…
…Main points of the agreement
– All US forces to leave Iraq by the end of 2011
– US forces to pull out of towns by summer 2009
– Iraq can try US troops for serious crimes off-duty and off-base
– Baghdad’s green zone to be handed to the Iraqi Government
– Iraqi airspace will be handed over to Iraq
– US forces need Iraqi judge’s order before they raid houses
– Iraq has the right to search shipments of US military material
– Iraqi territory cannot be used for assaults on neighbouring countries
– Either side may end the accord by serving notice of one year
Obama Says He Called Bush – But Doesn’t Thank Him or Give Him Credit on Surge
“I want to announce with a loud voice here that the first package of 20 percent fuel was produced and provided to the scientists,” he said.
Enriching uranium produces fuel for a nuclear power plants but can also be used to create material for atomic weapons if enriched further to 90 percent or more.
[Biden] – I am very optimistic about — about Iraq. I mean, this could be one of the great achievements of this administration. You’re going to see 90,000 American troops come marching home by the end of the summer. You’re going to see a stable government in Iraq that is actually moving toward a representative government.
I spent — I’ve been there 17 times now. I go about every two months — three months. I know every one of the major players in all the segments of that society. It’s impressed me. I’ve been impressed how they have been deciding to use the political process rather than guns to settle their differences.
[2007] – President Bush signed a bill Friday to pay for military operations in Iraq after a bitter struggle with Democrats in Congress who sought unsuccessfully to tie the money to U.S. troop withdrawals.
~~~
Democratic presidential rivals Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama both voted against the bill.
“I fully support our troops” but the measure “fails to compel the president to give our troops a new strategy in Iraq,” said Clinton, D-N.Y.
“Enough is enough,” Obama, an Illinois senator, declared, adding that Bush should not get “a blank check to continue down this same, disastrous path.”
Their votes continued a shift in position for the two presidential hopefuls, both of whom began the year shunning a deadline for a troop withdrawal.
Sen. John McCain, a GOP presidential contender, said the two Democrats were embracing a “policy of surrender.”
“This vote may win favor with MoveOn and liberal primary voters, but it’s the equivalent of waving a white flag to al-Qaeda,” said McCain, R-Ariz. MoveOn.org is a grass-roots anti-war group that rose to prominence in last year’s elections.
Iraq’s new government of national unity will not stop the deterioration. Iraqis have had three such governments in the last three years, each with Sunnis in key posts, without noticeable effect. The alternative path out of this terrible trap has five elements.
The first is to establish three largely autonomous regions with a viable central government in Baghdad. The Kurdish, Sunni and Shiite regions would each be responsible for their own domestic laws, administration and internal security.
Or his assertion that The Surge, the strategy that ultimately won the war in Iraq, was going to be a failure and should not have been implemented:
“I mean, the truth of the matter is that, that the — America’s — this administration’s policy and the surge are a failure, and that the surge, which was supposed to stop sectarian violence and — long enough to give political reconciliation, there’s been no political reconciliation… The reality is that, although there has been some mild progress on the security front, there is, in fact, no, no real security in Baghdad and/or in Anbar province, where I was, dealing with the most serious problem, sectarian violence. Sectarian violence is as strong and as solid and as serious a problem as it was before the surge started.â€
Here’s a story you may have missed over the long holiday weekend: 550 metric tons of yellowcake uranium worth tens of millions of dollars were shipped out of Iraq to Canada. The material was transported in 37 military flights in 3,500 secure barrels, according to the Associated Press.
There hasn’t been much of a fuss about this material because it had been discovered already by United Nations inspectors after the first Gulf War. But it took a second American war in Iraq to move the material out of the Middle East. For all the talk about America’s failure to discover Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, this is a big deal. We’ve reported on claims by top Israeli officials speaking on the record that Iraq smuggled its chemical weapons to Syria before America invaded in 2003.
The uranium issue is not a trivial one, because Iraq, sitting on vast oil reserves, has no peaceful need for nuclear power. Saddam Hussein had already invaded Kuwait, launched missiles into Israeli cities, and harbored a terrorist group, the PKK, hostile to America’s NATO ally, Turkey. To leave this nuclear material sitting around the Middle East in the hands of Saddam and the same corrupt United Nations that failed to stop the genocide in Darfur and was guilty of the oil-for-food scandal would have been too big a risk.
From the beginning we have called for making the Iraq War a case study in democratization rather than disarmament, realizing that nuclear weapons, like any other weapons, are only dangerous in the hands of outlaws. Iraq’s government is no longer hostile to America. It is grateful to us for freeing them from Saddam, who would rather spend money on palaces and yellowcake than on feeding the Iraqi people. But should America retreat prematurely from Iraq and a hostile regime again take hold there, we all will be safer for the act that 550 tons of nuclear fuel are now being put to peaceful use in Canada rather than being stored a few miles from Baghdad. (more…)
Below are selected excerpts from Brigitte Gabriel’s speech delivered at the Intelligence Summit in Washington DC
We gather here today to share information and knowledge. Intelligence is not merely cold hard data about numerical strength or armament or disposition of military forces. The most important element of intelligence has to be understanding the mindset and intention of the enemy. The West has been wallowing in a state of ignorance and denial for thirty years as Muslim extremist perpetrated evil against innocent victims in the name of Allah.
I was ten years old when my home exploded around me, burying me under the rubble and leaving me to drink my blood to survive, as the perpetrators shouted, ‘Allah Akbar!’ My only crime was that I was a Christian living in a Christian town. At 10 years old, I learned the meaning of the word ‘infidel.’
I had a crash course in survival. Not in the Girl Scouts, but in a bomb shelter where I lived for seven years in pitch darkness, freezing cold, drinking stale water and eating grass to live. At the age of 13, dressed in my burial clothes going to bed at night, waiting to be slaughtered. By the age of 20, I had buried most of my friends–killed by Muslims. We were not Americans living in New York , or Britons in London . We were Arab Christians living in Lebanon .
As a victim of Islamic terror, I was amazed when I saw Americans waking up on September 12, 2001, and asking themselves ‘Why do they hate us?’ The psychoanalyst experts were coming up with all sort of excuses as to what did we do to offend the Muslim World. But if America and the West were paying attention to the Middle East they would not have had to ask the question. Simply put, they hate us because we are defined in their eyes by one simple word: ‘infidels.’
Under the banner of Islam ‘la, ilaha illa Allah, muhammad rasoulu Allah,’ (None is god except Allah; Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah) they murdered Jewish children in Israel , massacred Christians in Lebanon, killed Copts in Egypt, Assyrians in Syria, Hindus in India, and expelled almost 900,000 Jews from Muslim lands. We Middle Eastern infidels paid the price then. Now infidels worldwide are paying the price for indifference and shortsightedness.
Tolerating evil is a crime. Appeasing murderers doesn’t buy protection. It earns one disrespect and loathing in the enemy’s eyes. Yet apathy is the weapon by which the West is committing suicide. Political correctness forms the shackles around our ankles, by which Islamists are leading us to our demise. (more…)
So freakin impressive. Here is 13 year old Jonathan Krohn speaking at CPAC:
Also:
Video Of Democrats Covering Up The Fannie Mae/Mac Mess
Here, in their own words, are Democrats covering up the Fannie Mae fiasco in which they say over and over again that there is no need for a fix while Republicans say over and over that it IS a mess and needs to fixed:
Finally:
Obama’s Iraq Speech: Never Used the Word VICTORY!
And he officially abandoned his campaign pledge to get combat troops out in 16 months!
President Obama went to Camp Lejeune, North Carolina to deliver his long awaited plan for withdrawal from Iraq. Text of the full address is here. Above is a Wordle of his speech. Speaking to U.S. Marines, many of whom fought in Iraq, he never used the word “VICTORY” and the only time he used the word “success” was when he said “The long-term success of the Iraqi nation will depend upon decisions made by Iraq’s leaders.”
The closest Obama got to recognizing the extraordinary accomplishment of our military was when he said:
We sent our troops to Iraq to do away with Saddam Hussein’s regime – and you got the job done. We kept our troops in Iraq to help establish a sovereign government – and you got the job done. And we will leave the Iraqi people with a hard-earned opportunity to live a better life – that is your achievement; that is the prospect that you have made possible.
No thanks to President Bush for his leadership. Obama only mentions Bush when he needs a scapegoat for his own failures.
One wonders how the lefties who insisted Obama would get us out of Iraq in 16 months after taking office are feeling today?
Gather your friends, your family, and your neighbors for an entertaining night of fun and frivolity.
KEY:
“Since the Great Depression†– The economic one, not the feeling you’ve had since he signed the “stimulus†bill.
“Save or create†jobs – Obama’s new metric whereby he can claim credit for the outcome no matter what happens (how exactly does one determine the number of “saved” jobs?)
“Crisis†– Excuse to hike taxes and grow the government per Rahm Emanuel’s theory: “Never let a crisis go to waste.”
“Stimulus†– The 1,000 page Pelosi-Reid-Obama pork bill rushed through in the dead of night with no transparency and that not a single member of Congress who voted for it actually read.
“Hope†– The optimistic expectation, against all evidence that this government will be the first in the history of time to succeed in spending its way out of economic problems.
“Change†– Take-home pay of future generations due to massive spending increases and government expansion.
“Bipartisan†– “Pelosi and Reid get to decide what we’ll do, but I’ll have you over for tea first.”
“Children and grandchildren†– The people picking up the tab.
“Shovel-ready†– Vital projects that somehow are not important enough to receive funding through the regular appropriations process at the local, state, or federal level.
“Toxic assetsâ€- Now the responsibility of those who followed the rules and made wise decisions.
“Failed policies of the past†– An overspending problem by George W. Bush to be expanded by Obama
“Investment†– Government spending.
“Sacrifice†– Tax hikes.
“As I’ve said before†– Prepare for a poll tested line from stump speeches.
“Make work pay†– Writing welfare checks through the tax code (and then calling it a tax cut).
“Climate change†– (Formerly known as Global Warming) The natural cycles of the sun and the four seasons.
“FDR†– The last President to attempt and fail to spend the country’s way out of a hole.
“Let me be clear†– Warning to “have your shovel ready.â€
“Executive pay†– A serious problem because large cash awards are only appropriate when politicians dole out taxpayer money to the pet projects of their sons, brothers, wives, or campaign contributors.
“Protecting responsible homeowners†– Forcing you to pay your neighbor’s mortgage.
“Trillion-dollar deficit that we’ve inherited†– Bush overspending – which Obama just doubled.
“Essential services†– Government programs that employ unionized bureaucrats.
“Vulnerable Americans†– People that Obama wants to make dependent on the government.
“Tax cuts to 95 percent of working families†– See “Make Work Payâ€
“Alternative energyâ€â€“ Energy that is either too expensive or hasn’t succeeded in the free market on its own (if it worked, it would just be called “energyâ€)
Also:
AP writers give Obama credit for Bush/Iraq SOFA
Is there no end to the revision of history by journalists? AP bimbos, PAMELA HESS and ANNE GEARAN tout troop withdrawal as fulfillment of the Delegator in Chief’s campaign promise. Pretty damn safe bet since that was already agreed upon prior to his assumption of office, and was always in the cards as part of “victory”.
President Barack Obama plans to order that all U.S. combat troops be withdrawn from Iraq by August 2010, administration officials said Tuesday, ending the war that defined his upstart presidential campaign three months later than he had promised.
Obama’s plan would pull out all combat troops 19 months after his inauguration, although he had promised repeatedly during the 2008 campaign that he would withdraw them 16 months after taking office. That schedule, based on removing roughly one brigade a month, was predicated on commanders determining that it would not endanger U.S. troops left behind or Iraq’s fragile security.
Pledging to end the war in 16 months helped to build enormous grass-roots support for Obama’s White House bid.
The withdrawal plan — an announcement could come as early as this week — calls for leaving a large contingent of troops behind, between 30,000 and 50,000 troops, to advise and train Iraqi security forces and to protect U.S. interests.
As the US media likes to point out, the Bush legacy is intrinsically tied to Iraq. And evidently, they are banking on it’s ultimate failure.
So it comes as no surprise that it takes a UK (not a US) publication, The Guardian, to report on some very notable successes in the wake of the Iraq elections over the weekend.
Polling was peaceful, the results encouraging.
We could yet be looking at a model for Arab states
Despite a lower than expected turnout of 51%, there were no boycotts based on ethic or sectarian lines. In fact, the Sunni turnout in some areas was as high as 60%… a big difference from the 2005 elections. “It was also the first election to have international observers in all 712 constituencies.”
The peaceful polling was remarkable and so were the results. All the Islamic parties lost ground, especially that associated with the so-called “Shia firebrand”, Moqtada al-Sadr, whose share of the vote went down from 11% to 3%. The principal Sunni Islamic party, the Islamic Party of Iraq, was wiped out.
The only Islamic party to gain ground was the Dawa party of the Shia prime minister Nouri al-Maliki – and even that party dropped the word Islamic from its name. The power of Maliki, who has emerged a stronger leader than expected, is further enhanced by these elections. Now no Islamic parties will be able to control any provinces on their own. The election is thus a big defeat for Iran which had hoped that Shia religious parties would control the south and enable Iran to turn them into a mini Shia republic.
Instead, a new generation of Iraqi politicians is coming forward. Many of them are young and secular. They have lived always in Iraq, not in exile; they are Iraqis with local roots first and foremost – they are not pan-Arabs or pan-Islamists. Nor do they have connections to the US.
Low turnout in Iraq’s election reflects a disillusioned nation
BAGHDAD — Voter turnout in Iraq’s provincial elections Saturday was the lowest in the nation’s short history as a new democracy despite a relative calm across the nation. Only about 7.5 million of more than 14 million registered voters went to the polls.
Interviews suggest that the low voter turnout also is an indication of Iraqi disenchantment with a democracy that, so far, has brought them very little.
Since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003 and the fall of a brutal dictator, Iraqis witnessed unprecedented violence in their nation and what they believe is humiliation under a foreign occupation. Even on Saturday, U.S. tanks could be spotted across Baghdad on largely empty roads.
Are these two speaking of the same election?? But then, coming from McClatchy… who’s reporting must come into question the majority of the time… I can’t say as I’m surprised. But then, McClatchy’s is the publication likely to receive more attention from the US voter over The Guardian. They must be smug in their attempts to diss both the Iraqis and, by association, the former President.
Iraqis held their most peaceful election since the fall of Saddam Hussein on Saturday, voting for provincial councils without a single major attack in a poll that demonstrated the country’s dramatic security gains.
U.S. President Barack Obama hailed the poll as an important step toward Iraqis taking responsibility for their future. “I congratulate the people of Iraq on holding significant provincial elections today,” he said in a statement.
“The purple fingers have returned to build Iraq,” Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said after the polls closed, referring to the indelible ink stains on index fingers that show voters have cast their ballots.
There was something of a holiday atmosphere in many parts of the country. In normally traffic-choked Baghdad, children took advantage of a ban on cars to play soccer in the streets.
“How can we not vote? All of us here have always complained about being oppressed and not having a leader who represented us. Now is our chance,” said Basra voter Abdul Hussein Nuri.
Reuters article did devote the last (pg 2) of the article to the few glitches… none of which sound that dissimilar to our own US elections. Voters failing to find their names on the registration list, with some in the Diyala province taking to the streets in protest. Even that is a sign of progress… the ability to protest in Iraq without finding one’s self in Saddam’s gulag.
Reuters, however, took great pains *not* to mention George W. Bush or Tony Blair, instead giving prominent position to Obama’s reaction instead.
In the more geniune Guardian article, Shawcross was also wise to place cautious caveats on his glowing review. Certainly there is a fragility to this new Arab democracy. The nation is far from united…. but then, so is the US after centuries. Functioning while not in lockstep is, indeed, a hallmark of democracy.
They have their speedbumps ahead. As the US withdraws, security may be at risk if again the jihad movements and disgruntled Ba’athists and Saddam loyalists again try to seize control via a violent coup. The test will be if the Iraq forces can hold their own, without the aid of the US military who are under the control of a POTUS who may be inclined to dole out “tough love” as a result of peer pressure.
But Shawcross knows this momentous occasion in Iraq’s new history is due to a couple of much maligned and hated leaders… George W. Bush and Tony Blair.
There were lamentable failures in the subsequent US occupation, which allowed the rise of the hideous sectarian violence that threatened to tear the country to pieces. But in the last two years the “surge” of US troops under General David Petraeus appears to have destroyed much of the terrorists’ infrastructure and support. Now, as US troops begin their phased withdrawal, the new American-trained Iraqi army is defending the country against Islamist violence.
There will be further setbacks. But who knows, Iraq may yet even become a model for democratic change in other Arab countries. If so, who deserves some credit? The much maligned President Bush. And Tony Blair.
Will the US media give credit where credit is due for Dubya? I’m not holding my breath. It would seriously interfere with their determination to shape the history books and destroy his legacy.
But this is one day where Bush, from the confines of his private abode in Texas, must have been quietly proud… and perhaps feeling a little redeemed. Too bad it had to come from a British media.
Some of us have been warning that it was not healthy for the U.S. media to have deified rather than questioned Obama, especially given that they tore apart Bush, ridiculed Palin, and caricatured Hillary. And now we can see the results of their two years of advocacy rather than scrutiny.
We are quite literally after two weeks teetering on an Obama implosion—and with no Dick Morris to bail him out—brought on by messianic delusions of grandeur, hubris, and a strange naivete that soaring rhetoric and a multiracial profile can add requisite cover to good old-fashioned Chicago politicking.
First, there were the sermons on ethics, belied by the appointments of tax dodgers, crass lobbyists, and wheeler-dealers like Richardson—with the relish of the Blago tapes still to come.
~~~
…there were the inflated lectures on historic foreign policy to be made by the clumsy political novice who trashed his own country and his predecessor in the most ungracious manner overseas to a censored Saudi-run press organ (e.g., Bush is dictatorial, the Saudi king is courageous; Obama can mend bridges that America broke to aggrieved Muslims—apparently Tehran hostages, Rushdie, serial attacks in the 1990s, 9/11, Madrid, London never apparently occurred; and neither did feeding Somalis, saving Kuwait, protesting Chechnya, Bosnia/Kosovo, billions to Egypt, Jordan, the Palestinians, help in two Afghan wars, and on and on). (more…)
American icon, Ford Motor Company, not only escapes the government review of their books by being the lone of the “big three” to say “pass” on the bailout money… but may also come out the big winner.
I’d like to think their advertising in the past years have had something to do with their better-than-fragile status. Their commercial last year conveyed the national pride that that I’d like to believe may just hike them up by their bootstraps to their previous stature in history. If you didn’t see it then, it is worthy of a repeat.
The company had the option to say “no thank you” to the bailout after leveraging it’s assets back in 2006 to raise $24.6 billion.
At the same time, the Dearborn, Mich., car company is likely to benefit from many of the concessions that General Motors and Chrysler exact from the suppliers, unions, dealers and debt holders shared by all three companies.
“The clear winner in this game is Ford,” Kimberly Rodriguez, a principal at Grant Thornton consulting firm and an adviser to Ford senior management, told the Wall Street Journal in an interview Friday.
The Bush administration said it would provide a total of $17.4 billion in loans for GM and Chrysler. As part of the bailout, GM and Chrysler will have to open their books to the government and meet restructuring targets such as reducing their debt and hammering out deals with the United Auto Workers to cut labor costs.
Ford still is seeking a $9 billion line of credit from the government, though it adds it may not need to tap it. In addition, Ford wants $5 billion from the Energy Department program.
Also:
Obama Seeks to Talk to Iran on Same Day Iranian Agent Captured in Iraq
Honestly, ya can’t make this stuff up. No one would believe it. Really, fact is better than fiction anymore.
The incoming Obama administration plans to create a new position to coordinate outreach to Iran and is considering a number of senior career diplomats, State Department officials and Iran specialists say. President-elect Barack Obama promised during his campaign to seek dialogue with Iran without preconditions in an effort to persuade Tehran to suspend its uranium enrichment program, but also has pledged to toughen sanctions. A State Department official said the idea of naming a senior Iranian outreach coordinator was broached in the first transition meetings with Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Mr. Obama’s choice for secretary of state, and her transition team earlier this month. “The idea is that the position should build on the existing diplomatic framework,” the official said. He asked not to be named because a nominee has not been announced.
link
Meanwhile…Senator Obama is getting 2 (sometimes 3) Presidential Daily Briefings on the highest level of classified intelligence reporting. So, sometime after he gave the go-ahead to start setting up to “talk” w Iran (as if it hasn’t already been tried) he went to a PDB briefing-maybe before bedtime-and was told:
Coalition special operations forces captured a suspected Iranian “agent” and an associate during an early morning raids north of Baghdad, Multinational Forces Iraq reported. The Iranian is described as a “commander of Iranian special operations in Iraq who is also believed to be involved in facilitating training of Iraqi militants at Islamic Republican Guard Corps-Qods Force training camps.” The raids took place in the town of Qastin in Diyala province. The Iranian agent then led US forces to his associate.
US and Iraqi forces have captured several high-level Qods Force officers inside Iraq since late 2006. Among those captured are Mahmud Farhadi, one of the three Iranian regional commanders in the Ramazan Corps; Ali Mussa Daqduq, a senior Lebanese Hezbollah operative; Qais Qazali, the leader of the Qazali Network; and Azhar al Dulaimi, one of Qazali’s senior tactical commanders. The US has imposed sanctions on Major General Ahmad Foruzandeh, the former Qods Force commander, and Abdul Reza Shahlai, a deputy commander in Iran’s Qods Force, for backing Shia terror groups inside Iraq.
Iraqi and US forces have killed one Qods Force operative and captured 11 since mid-October.
This must’ve been like a bucket of ice water. I’d love to have been a fly on the wall for that one.
Once again, reality and pipedreams collide over the Obama foreign policy promises of CHANGE.
Finally:
Obama to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan: Democrats Calling For Draft
Need More Troops
Dec 20, 2008
By JASON STRAZIUSO KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) – The top U.S. military officer said Saturday that the Pentagon could double the number of American forces in Afghanistan by next summer to 60,000 – the largest estimate of potential reinforcements ever publicly suggested. Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that between 20,000 and 30,000 additional U.S. troops could be sent to Afghanistan to bolster the 31,000 already there.
The Army is Broken
In the last few weeks, Pelosi has released three official statements designed to highlight the comments of generals who say the military is reaching a breaking point.
“Americans are rightly concerned about how much longer our nation must continue to sacrifice our security for the sake of an Iraqi government that is unwilling or unable to secure its own future,†Pelosi said late last month, responding to comments by Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey that six years of war have left the Army “out of balance.â€
House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (Ill.) compiled a list of examples of National Guard shortfalls in 16 states that hampered their ability to react to natural disasters or terrorist attacks. (more…)
Like we need any more evidence that the media is in the pocket of Barack Obama. In 2004 WLS-TV, a ABC affiliate in Illinois, filed suit against Jack Ryan, a Republican running against Barack Obama, to get his divorce records unsealed which effectively ensured an Obama win:
Dealing a blow to the U.S. Senate candidacy of Republican Jack Ryan, a California judge ruled that several sealed divorce records likely to embarrass the candidate and his ex-wife should be opened to the public.
Ruling on a request brought by attorneys for the Tribune and WLS-TV, Superior Court Judge Robert Schnider acknowledged that the resulting publicity from the disclosure would be harmful to the couple’s son, a key argument Ryan had raised in seeking to keep the documents from public view.
But Schnider said he had weighed the public interest of disclosure against the private interests of the Ryans and their child. “In the end,” Schnider found, “the balance tips slightly to the public.
~~~
Ryan told a small gathering of leading Republicans that while 95 percent of the contents of the divorce file did not threaten his campaign, the remaining 5 percent could cause problems, according to sources familiar with the meeting.
Instead of placating the GOP leaders, who have expressed continued concern since his primary victory over how the divorce-file issue has dogged his candidacy, the sources said, Ryan’s comments raised new questions about the viability of his campaign.
Which is all legitimate. If someone wants to be a representative of the people then their dirty laundry needs to be aired.
“When I was working with government wearing wire, I reported, I observed Rod, the present governor, who was running a gambling operation out in the western suburbs. He was paying street tax to the mob out there,” said Robert Cooley, federal informant.
On a web-based interview show last week, Cooley said he reported to federal authorities nearly two decades ago that Rod Blagojevich had been operating an illegal sports gambling business.
Robert Cooley is a former Chicago police officer-turned mob lawyer-turned federal informant. During Operation Gambat in the late 1980′s and early 1990′s, Cooley’s undercover work and testimony put away 24 crooked politicians, judges, lawyers and cops. Several years ago, when Mr. Blagojevich was running for re-election, Cooley provided the same information to the ABC7 I-Team. Because Cooley did not want to be identified at the time and the governor denied it, ABC7 did not report the story.
Oh, so if your a Democrat all you have to do is deny the charges and its swept under the rug? We all know the press uses anonymous informants all the time but couple that with a denial and they are suddenly not so interested in airing the dirty laundry.
Shocker!
Also:
Generals Propose a Timetable for Iraq And It Ain’t Barack’s 16-Months
WASHINGTON — A new military plan for troop withdrawals from Iraq that was described in broad terms this week to President-elect Barack Obama falls short of the 16-month timetable Mr. Obama outlined during his election campaign, United States military officials said Wednesday.
The plan was proposed by the top American commanders responsible for Iraq, Gen. David H. Petraeus and Gen. Ray Odierno, and it represents their first recommendation on troop withdrawals under an Obama presidency. While Mr. Obama has said he will seek advice from his commanders, their resistance to a faster drawdown could present the new president with a tough political choice between overruling his generals or backing away from his goal.
The plan, completed last week, envisions withdrawing two more brigades, or some 7,000 to 8,000 troops, from Iraq in the first six months of 2009, the military officials said. But that would leave 12 combat brigades in Iraq by June 2009, and while declining to be more specific, the officials made clear that the withdrawal of all combat forces under the generals’ recommendations would not come until some time after May 2010, Mr. Obama’s target.
Transition officials said the plan was described in only general terms to Mr. Obama by Robert M. Gates, who is staying on as defense secretary, and Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, when Mr. Obama met for five and a half hours with his national security team on Monday in Chicago. They said all participants had sidestepped the details of how to reconcile Mr. Obama’s timetable for withdrawing combat forces with the more extended one recommended by the generals. A transition official said that in future meetings, “the military will get a chance to articulate their preferences.â€
Will Barack Obama blow off his frontline generals in favor of his political campaign generals?
Will Barack Obama order a hasty withdrawal from Iraq rather than “be as careful getting out as we were reckless getting in”?
Will Barack Obama completely blowoff his base and the promise to the American people to pull out combat brigades in 16 months?
So many broken promises and failures and the man hasn’t even taken the oath yet. Incredible!
Clinton talked. Bush acted. And now, a nation that was a constant threat to world peace has been transformed into an ally!
What bugs me most about the debate over Iraq is the failure to consider what would have happened had we not taken the action we did. Viewing the 9 minute clip below of the speech President Clinton delivered on December 16, 1998 is a reminder of the constant menace that Saddam Hussein posed to the world and international efforts for peace.
Imagine if Saddam were still in power today. The Oil for Food scandal which robbed his people to pay for Saddam’s weapons programs might still be ongoing. Saddam would still be paying the families of Palestinian suicide bombers who killed innocent men, women and children in Israel. And instead of an ally which has done more to fight the war on terror than any other nation save the U.S. we would have an enemy willing to use whatever power it had to work against our efforts to fight the global war on terror.
“Mark my words, he will develop weapons of mass destruction. He will deploy them, and he will use them. Because we’re acting today, it is less likely that we will face these dangers in the future.” — Bill Clinton, December 16, 1998
That was then, this is now:
President George W. Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki shake hands following the signing of the Strategic Framework Agreement and Security Agreement at a joint news conference Sunday, Dec. 14, 2008, at the Prime Minister’s Palace in Baghdad. President Bush said, ” The agreements represent a shared vision on the way forward in Iraq.” White House photo by Eric Draper
Ten years! It seems like a lifetime. But things have changed for the BETTER all due to the leadership and vision of President Bush!
The Obama “change”: Public perception and a higher tolerance of secrecy
Normally the “honeymoon” stage of a Presidency is the first 100 days. But as Obama continues to prematurely don the mantle of the Presidency, the honeymoon period has kicked in fast and furious by the media and the public.
Sailing to a victory on wings of promise of “change”, it’s realistic to state that no one can evaluate the fulfillment of this promise by his Presidency since the man is not yet President. But what can be scrutinized is the “change” we see… not in an adminstration weighted heavily with “wall to wall [Clinton] retread white guys” (HT to N. O’Brain for the fab phrasing) …but in the public’s perceptions and tolerance merely by the prospect of a new administration. Evidently, they are more willing to give a pass to the incoming POTUS that they have not given to the outgoing POTUS.
Some of this newly demonstrated “tolerance” by the public is long overdue, and welcome. As Obama slowly, and somewhat shrouded in media stealth, moves foreign policy closer to a Bush III term, the outcry from the public is more subdued. Certainly if it were Bush, and not Obama as the orchestrator of the planned 20K troop surge in Afghanistan, the media and Congress would be a’buzz with the negatives.
I’m not sure when the media will finally stop declaring Iraq a “failure”, but I suspect even that too may come to pass after the magic inaugural moment. And that will be a welcomed “change” of public perception and tolerance.
Now we get more of a picture of 28-year-old Muntadhar al-Zeidi, today a hero among many other Arabs for chucking his sneakers. A visiting AP writer noted that al-Zeidi’s apartment was decked out with a poster of murderer Che Guevara, and chatted with his brother, Dhirgham:
“‘He hates the American physical occupation as much as he hates the Iranian moral occupation,’ Dhirgham said, alluding to the influence of pro-Iranian Shiite clerics in political and social life. ‘As for Iran, he considers the regime to be the other side of the American coin.’
…Al-Zeidi may have also been motivated by what a colleague described as a boastful, showoff personality.
‘He tried to raise topics to show that nobody is as smart as he is,’ said Zanko Ahmed, a Kurdish journalist who attended a journalism training course with al-Zeidi in Lebanon.
Ahmed recalled that al-Zeidi spoke glowingly of anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose followers organized protests Monday to demand his release.
‘Regrettably, he didn’t learn anything from the course in Lebanon, where we were taught ethics of journalism and how to be detached and neutral,’ Ahmed said.”
Reading the description of this guy you have to note the similarities to the American left. Anti-American, has a ego the size of Manhatten, and can’t control his anger. And just like the left, is too cowardly to have thrown shoes at a real dictator like Saddam. He waits until the man who gave him the freedom to make such foolish symbolic gestures arrives and THEN does it.
THE Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at US President George W Bush has a broken arm and ribs after being struck by Iraqi security agents, his brother said.
Durgham Zaidi was unable to say whether his brother Muntazer had sustained the injuries while being overpowered during Sunday’s protest against President Bush’s visit or while in custody later.
He said he had been told that his brother was being held by Iraqi forces in the heavily fortified Green Zone compound in central Baghdad where the US embassy and most government offices are housed.
“He has got a broken arm and ribs, and cuts to his eye and arm,” Durgham said.
“He is being held by forces under the command of Muaffaq al-Rubaie, Iraq’s national security adviser.”
They weren’t upset with shoes being thrown at the head of our President, but they are when it comes to injuries given to the man who assaulted the President.
The left never ceases to amaze me.
Anyways, the shoe thrower showed up today with those broken bones and basically pled guilty as charged:
BAGHDAD, Dec 16 (Reuters) – An Iraqi journalist who hurled his shoes at U.S. President George W. Bush appeared before a judge on Tuesday and admitted “aggression against a president”, a judicial spokesman said.
~~~
“Al-Zaidi was brought today before the investigating judge in the presence of a defence lawyer and a prosecutor,” said Abdul Satar Birqadr, spokesman for Iraq’s High Judicial Council. “He admits the action he carried out.”
The court decided to keep Zaidi in custody and, after the judge has completed his investigation, it may send him for trial under a clause in the Iraqi penal code that makes it an offence to try to murder Iraqi or foreign presidents.
The sentence for such a crime could be up to 15 years jail, Birqadr said.
15 years and some broken ribs. Sounds about right to me.
Also:
President Bush in Afghanistan!
No shoes thrown. Plus: more photos from Iraq.
President George W. Bush pauses for photos with troops at Bagram Air Base Monday, Dec. 15, 2008, in Afghanistan. The President made the pre-dawn visit to the base before meeting with President Hamid Karzai in Kabul. During his remarks to the troops, the President said, “What you’re doing in Afghanistan is important, it is courageous, and it is selfless. It’s akin to what American troops did in places like Normandy and Iwo Jima and Korea. Your generation is every bit as great as any that has come before. And the work you do every day is shaping history for generations to come.” White House photo by Eric Draper
U.S. President George W. Bush embraces Afghan President Hamid Karzai as Bush departs the Presidential Palace in Afghanistan December 15, 2008.
President George W. Bush walks alongside Afghan President Hamid Karzai past an honor cordon upon arrival at the Presidential Palace in Kabul, Afghanistan, during an unannounced visit on December 15, 2008. The trip comes immediately following a similar surprise visit to Baghdad, Iraq. (more…)
McCain scolds GOP for whacking Obama
By MIKE ALLEN The Politico
12/14/08
In a surprising rebuke to the warriors who fought for him through tough times, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) on Sunday sided with President-elect Barack Obama and scolded the Republican National Committee for fanning the Illinois corruption scandal.
On ABC’s “This Week,†host George Stephanopoulos asked: “The chairman of the Republican National Committee, Mike Duncan, has been highly critical of the way President- elect Obama has dealt with this.
“He’s had a statement every single day, saying that the Obama team should reveal all contacts they’ve had with Governor [Rod] Blagojevich. He says that Obama’s promise of transparency to the American people is now being tested. Do you agree with that?â€
McCain replied: “I think that the Obama campaign should and will give all information necessary. You know, in all due respect to the Republican National Committee and anybody — right now, I think we should try to be working constructively together, not only on an issue such as this, but on the economy stimulus package, reforms that are necessary. And so, I don’t know all the details of the relationship between President-elect Obama’s campaign or his people and the governor of Illinois, but I have some confidence that all the information will come out. It always does, it seems to me.â€
That’s our boy McCain for you! He didn’t win any votes from the left or the right with that kind of statement but that doesn’t stop him from undermining the GOP message.
Is it any wonder that Obama’s voters didn’t have a clue about the scandals which swirl around Obama?
also:
Bush Makes Surprise Visit to Iraq
And some Sadrist fool throws his shoes at the President! Is that all the fight the jihadis have left?
US President George W. Bush steps off of Air Force One at Baghdad International Airport during an unannounced visit to Baghdad, Iraq, on December 14, 2008. The trip marks Bush’s fourth visit to the country during his presidency. Unlike previous visits, today’s landing by Air Force One was in broad daylight which underscores the improvement in the security situation.
In this image from APTN video, an man throws a shoe at President George W. Bush during a news conference with Iraq Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Sunday, Dec. 14, 2008, in Baghdad. The man threw two shoes at Bush, one after another. Bush ducked both throws, and neither man was hit.
The journalist, Muntazer al-Zaidi from Al-Baghdadia channel which broadcasts from Cairo, was frogmarched from the room by security staff, an AFP journalist said.
President Bush, alongside Iraq’s Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, motions for everyone to sit down after the shoe throwing inciden during a joint press conference at Maliki’s private office.
Obviously the trip wasn’t all bad as President George W. Bush smiles during a meeting with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani.
The purpose of the trip was three fold: First, the President wished to thank our troops who continue to serve in Iraq and whose excellent performance has transformed Iraq. Second, the President wished to say good bye to Iraqi leaders who have risked their lives to begin rebuilding their country. Third, the President and Iraqi leader signed the Strategic Framework Agreement (SFA) that covers our overall political, economic, and security relationship with Iraq, and a Security Agreement – otherwise known as the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) – that implements our security relationship. (White House Fact Sheet)
Charles Krauthammer has this excellent op-ed on that agreement:
Milestone in Baghdad
By Charles Krauthammer Washington Post
Friday, December 5, 2008
The barbarism in Mumbai and the economic crisis at home have largely overshadowed an otherwise singular event: the ratification of military and strategic cooperation agreements between Iraq and the United States.
They must not pass unnoted. They were certainly noted by Iran, which fought fiercely to undermine the agreements. Tehran understood how a formal U.S.-Iraqi alliance endorsed by a broad Iraqi consensus expressed in a freely elected parliament changes the strategic balance in the region.
For the United States, this represents the single most important geopolitical advance in the region since Henry Kissinger turned Egypt from a Soviet client into an American ally. If we don’t blow it with too hasty a withdrawal from Iraq, we will have turned a chronically destabilizing enemy state at the epicenter of the Arab Middle East into an ally.
Also largely overlooked at home was the sheer wonder of the procedure that produced Iraq’s consent: classic legislative maneuvering with no more than a tussle or two — tame by international standards (see YouTube: “Best Taiwanese Parliament Fights of All Time!“) — over the most fundamental issues of national identity and direction.
The only significant opposition bloc was the Sadrists, a mere 30 seats out of 275. The ostensibly pro-Iranian religious Shiite parties resisted Tehran’s pressure and championed the agreement. As did the Kurds. The Sunnis put up the greatest fight. But their concern was that America would be withdrawing too soon, leaving them subject to overbearing and perhaps even vengeful Shiite dominance.
…
That any of this democratic give-and-take should be happening in a peaceful parliament just two years after Iraq’s descent into sectarian hell is in itself astonishing. Nor is the setting of a withdrawal date terribly troubling. The deadline is almost entirely symbolic. U.S. troops must be out by Dec. 31, 2011 — the weekend before the Iowa caucuses, which, because God is merciful, will arrive again only in the very fullness of time. Moreover, that date is not just distant but flexible. By treaty, it can be amended. If conditions on the ground warrant, it will be.
…
A self-sustaining, democratic and pro-American Iraq is within our reach. It would have two hugely important effects in the region.
First, it would constitute a major defeat for Tehran, the putative winner of the Iraq war, according to the smart set. Iran’s client, Moqtada al-Sadr, still hiding in Iran, was visibly marginalized in parliament — after being militarily humiliated in Basra and Baghdad by the new Iraqi security forces. Moreover, the major religious Shiite parties were the ones that negotiated, promoted and assured passage of the strategic alliance with the United States, against the most determined Iranian opposition.
Second is the regional effect of the new political entity on display in Baghdad — a flawed yet functioning democratic polity with unprecedented free speech, free elections and freely competing parliamentary factions. For this to happen in the most important Arab country besides Egypt can, over time (over generational time, the time scale of the war on terror), alter the evolution of Arab society. It constitutes our best hope for the kind of fundamental political-cultural change in the Arab sphere that alone will bring about the defeat of Islamic extremism. After all, newly sovereign Iraq is today more engaged in the fight against Arab radicalism than any country on earth, save the United States – with which, mirabile dictu, it has now thrown in its lot.
No discarded footwear is going to take away the fact that our plan in Iraq is succeeding. No wonder the jihadis are upset!
Finally:
TIME’s Joe Klein Went All The Way To Afghanistan and Didn’t Even Get a T-Shirt
In a recent article for TIME magazine, perpetual whiner, Joe Klein asks, ‘Why Are We In Afghanistan?” He calls it, “The Aimless War.” People should be shocked-absolutely shocked to see a veteran writer go all the way to Afghanistan, talk to troops, civilians, leaders, etc., and still not understand why NATO and the United States are in Afghanistan. Of course, it is Joe Klein, and when it comes to military matters he has all the tactical and strategic understanding of a doorknob. It’s like looking to a comedian or a sportscaster for political or military insight (though it is amazing how many people go to Keith Olberman and Jon Stewart for their information).
Klein returns from his useless adventure with little more than a pimp-punditry paper on excusing isolationist policies rather than engagement of genuinely bad guys; suicidal members of death cults bent on hunting down and killing Americans by any and all means. His article whines about how hard things are over there as if the very word “Afghanistan” isn’t a historical synonym for “ass end of the world,” “land of the nearly impossible,” or at least “graveyard of empires.” Of course it’s hard over there. It’s a war zone in the worst place on the planet. It’s a place that has known little more than war going back almost 10,000 years. The people are not the sharpest knives in the drawer by western standards because building schools has never been as useful to them as building bunkers, trenches, and dugouts. Their ideas about women, human rights, etc are not western, because the west has always asked the two connecting questions: “Why are we there”+”Why not just leave?” …and then left! (more…)
Q Thank you, Mr. President-elect. During the campaign you said that you thought the U.S. had a right to attack high-value terrorist targets in Pakistan if given actionable intelligence, with or without the Pakistani government’s permission.
…do you think India has that same right?
PRESIDENT-ELECT OBAMA: I think that sovereign nations obviously have a right to protect themselves. Beyond that, I don’t want to comment on the specific situation that’s taking place in South Asia right now.
I think it is important for us to let the investigators do their jobs and make a determination in terms of who was responsible for carrying out these heinous acts. I can tell you that my administration will remain steadfast in support of India’s efforts to catch the perpetrators of this terrible act and bring them to justice. And I expect that the world community will feel the same way.
[ie here's my comment, but I don't want to comment, so I'm gonna comment some more so I can really screw the pooch] link to transcript
Brilliant piece of diplomacy there Senator. Our key ally in the hunt for Osama Bin Laden and Al Queda leaders (Pakistan), has just been told that if their nuclear neighbor feels justified in attacking our ally, then we have India’s back…not our ally’s. Call me crazy, but if I’m in a bar fight, and the guy next to me says, “I’ve got your back, unless that guy w the big club over there feels like hitting you” well, that’s not an ally I can count on-not even diplomatically let alone in a fight-be it in a bar room or a nuclear neighborhood.
Way to go! Amazing diplomatic skills. Oh well, can’t say Joe Biden didn’t warn us.
EXIT QUESTION: If India conduct an air raid in Waziristan against suspected leaders of the group that attacked them in Mubai…does anyone think Pakistan won’t go insane?
also:
Lowest U.S. Casualty Toll Since 2003 Invasion
Women look at Iraqi soldiers on a patrol on the outskirts of Basra, 420 km (260 miles) southeast of Baghdad November 23, 2008.
REUTERS/Atef Hassan
The difference between 8 and 6 are rather insignificant; and these numbers might go up and down again. But what is important is whether or not there’s a consistent pattern, trending in a positive direction here. And I do think we are on the right path.
Monday in Baghdad saw 30 more civilians killed as there are still elements within Iraq who wish to reignite sectarian violence and derail the democratization of Iraq:
BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Blasts at Baghdad’s police academy and in the northern city of Mosul killed 30 people and wounded dozens more on Monday, hours after a roadside bomb wounded a senior Iraqi official, police said.
Violence has fallen sharply over the past year as successive security crackdowns dealt insurgent groups a heavy blow, but officials say militants are now concentrating their efforts on attention-grabbing attacks ahead of elections next year.
The attacks were likely aimed at reigniting sectarian bloodshed between minority Sunni Arabs who dominated Iraq under ex-dictator Saddam Hussein and Shi’ites who are now in control.
296 Iraqis died from violence last month; in October it was 238. Part of the rise in violence was related to the attempt by those who were not happy with the SOFA.
What’s ironic here, is that those opposed to any agreement to keep U.S. forces in Iraq, who want the U.S. and Coalition Forces out of Iraq NOW, are probably prolonging our presence there. You want us out of Iraq as soon as possible? Solution: Cease with the violence and sabotage of the budding Iraqi government.
Iraqi soldiers carry coffins bearing remains of fellow Iraqi soldiers during a ceremony at the Iraq-Iran Shalamcha Border Crossing, in southern Iraq November 30, 2008.
REUTERS/Atef Hassan
Ah…..the sweet smell of moral equivalence in the morning. Here is William Ayers being interviewed on Good Morning America (Hot Air has the video) telling us why the things he did along with his group were a-ok:
“What you call the violent past, that was a time when thousands of people were being murdered every month by our own government.
~~~
We were on the right side,†he told “GMA.â€
The co-founder of the Weather Underground was, as McCain has claimed, unrepentant about the the bombings his group committed during the 1960s.
“The content of the Vietnam protest is that there were despicable acts going on, but the despicable acts were being done by our government. … I never hurt or killed anyone,†Ayers said.
“Frankly, I don’t think we did enough, just as today I don’t think we’ve done enough to stop these wars,†he said.
It gets better:
The college professor also argued to “Good Morning America’s” Chris Cuomo today that the bombing campaign by the Weather Underground, the group he helped found, was not terrorism.
The Weather Underground bombed the Capitol, the Pentagon and the New York City Police Department in protest of the Vietnam War.
“It’s not terrorism because it doesn’t target people, to kill or injure,” Ayers said.
You see they meant well. Hell, Hitler meant well also right? He just wanted to get his country back to their former glory you see.
So did Arafat.
They couldn’t be terrorists and murderers because it was all in good faith.
But here Ayers says that they just didn’t dig the war in Vietnam so they thought, “hey….lets set some bombs to terrorise the populace, its all good because we don’t MEAN to kill people.” I mean, who would think a bomb would actually kill a person…
Ayers and Dohrn were credibly accused, in classified testimony before a Senate subcommittee in 1974, of involvement in the murder of a police officer in San Francisco, as well as an attempted (and unsuccessful) anti-personnel bombing in Detroit. It is an aspect of Ayers’ story that the mainstream media has completely ignored and even covered up.
Ayers and Dohrn were never prosecuted for their alleged involvement in Weatherman terrorism because of government misconduct in gathering evidence against them. But Ayers has freely admitted to involvement in Weatherman bomb plots, and he has said he does not regret planting bombs. Ayers has defended his actions, arguing, “The reason we weren’t terrorists is that we did not commit random acts of terror against people.â€
But Larry Grathwohl, an FBI mole within the Weathermen, connected Ayers to the planning — and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn, to the execution— of a police station bombing in San Francisco in February 1970 that killed one officer and injured two others.
Grathwohl testified that Ayers had discussed the deadly incident after the fact. The revelation came as Ayers was talking about the organizational difficulties in running a terrorist cell:
[H]e cited as one of the real problems that someone like Bernardine Dohrn had to plan, develop, and carry out the bombing of the police station in San Francisco, and he specifically named her as the person that committed that act. . . . He said that the bomb was placed on the window ledge and he described the kind of bomb that was used to the extent of saying what kind of shrapnel was used in it. . . . [I]f he wasn’t there to see it, somebody who was there told him about it, because he stated it very emphatically.
Grathwohl also testified about an unsuccessful Weatherman bombing in Detroit, which he said Ayers had planned to be executed when the maximum number of people would be present:
The only time that I was ever instructed or we were ever instructed to place a bomb in a building at a time when there would be people in it was during the planning of the bombing at the Detroit Police Officers’ Association building and the 13th precinct in Detroit, Mich., at which time Bill said that we should plan our bombing to coincide with the time when there would be the most people in those buildings.
Grathwohl tipped off police to this latter plot, and they cleared the area. When they finally found the Detroit bomb, it was unexploded. It contained 13 sticks of dynamite with an M-80 firecracker to detonate them, along with a burnt-out cigarette.
Oh, and he downplayed his relationship with our new President also….no surprise there eh?
Also:
Iraqi Cabinet Approves Security Agreement Keeping Our Troops In Iraq Until 2011
The Iraqi cabinet, in a near-unanimous vote, have approved the security agreement with the US that will keep our forces in that country until the end of 2011.
The decision of the 37-member cabinet, essentially a microcosm of the Parliament, is expected to be a good indicator of whether the agreement will pass. The assembly has not yet announced the date of its vote, but it is scheduled to go into recess on Nov. 24.
The draft approved Sunday requires coalition forces to withdraw from Iraqi cities and towns by the summer of 2009 and from the country by the end of 2011. An earlier version had language giving some flexibility to that deadline, with both sides discussing timetables and timelines for withdrawal, but the Iraqis managed to have the deadline set in stone, a significant negotiating victory. The United States has around150,000 troops in Iraq.
For months, the fate of the pact has been in doubt as Iraqis have pressed for more changes on a variety of issues, including jurisdiction over operations by U.S. troops and the flexibility of the withdrawal date. The United States, which had wanted the pact concluded by midsummer, gave significant concessions. Iraqi officials said minor tweaks were being made as recently as last week.
Under the agreement, U.S. soldiers are still guaranteed immunity except in cases of serious felonies committed while off duty outside their bases.
~~~
In a crucial development, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the most influential Shiite cleric in Iraq, indicated on Saturday that he would support whatever decision is arrived at in Parliament as representative of the will of the Iraqi people. Shiite officials who met with the ayatollah said eh found the latest draft acceptable, if not perfect; Ayatollah Sistani also made clear that he did not side with politicians who refused any agreement with the United States out of hand.
Now, what will happen to Obama’s claim that his plans for a quick drawdown of troops was in agreement with the Iraqi leadership?
U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said on Tuesday he was committed to a 16-month timetable for a U.S. military withdrawal from Iraq, after a trip in which he met Iraqi leaders and U.S. officials.
Will he do as the far left has demanded he do? Will he tear up a cooperative agreement reached after many months of delicate negotiations to do the bidding of the far left?
If so it will go down as a huge mistake and will prove to the world that America and its talk of freedom mean nothing. We went in, took out a tyrant, beat the hell out of terrorists from one corner of the country to the other, and helped the Iraqi’s to stand on their own two feet and build the first democracy in a region that has known only dictatorship and despair.
And now that we have reached agreement with the Iraqi’s to stay until 2011 he would tear it up and tell them we are outta here. I mean that’s what he will do if he keeps his promise.
Somehow I’m thinking he will be waffling very soon on this subject and do his best to spin, spin and spin some more. I’m thinking he will say this agreement will allow him to keep his other promise, that the Iraqi war will end during his term.
But either way, we should be proud of where we have arrived at as a nation at war. Because of Bush and the courage he displayed by not bending to the left’s will, even when it cost him at the polls, we have ensured that those who lost their lives in Iraq did not die in vain and that millions of Iraqi’s will live in freedom.
By the 18th Military Police Brigade Public Affairs Office
BAGHDAD — Security improvements in Baghdad continue to progress as Iraqi security forces conducted a transfer of authority in more than 10 Muhallas (neighborhoods) yesterday in the Karkh Directorate of Baghdad. In the Kindi and Qadasiyah Muhallas of Baghdad, Iraqi Army (IA) Soldiers handed over security responsibilities to the Iraqi Police (IP). “In the past months, the improvement in the security situation and the Iraqi Police capability gains have provided the IP the opportunity to take on independent responsibilities for security in their neighborhoods,†said Lt. Col. Michael Indovina, spokesman for the 18th Military Police Brigade, Multi-National Division – Baghdad.
IP in the past 12 months have expanded their forces to more than 10,000 shurtas (policemen). Through the expansion and development partnership with the 18th Military Police Brigade and other Coalition efforts, the IP have grown and built their capabilities steadily and are preparing to take over more Muhallas in the near future.
IP continue to train daily to develop their community policing skills in order to take over security and police operations here in Baghdad.
In past weeks, IP and IA have conducted a relief in place (RIP) in selected areas of Baghdad. The RIP is a process where the IA Soldiers transition with IP to ensure there is a seamless transition of responsibilities and duties.
Part of the RIP process was for all the Iraqi security forces and community leaders to come together and talk through the transition.
“The transition from IA to IP has been extremely smooth because of the connection between Iraqi Police leadership and the IA,†said Capt. Nathan Brookshire, commander of Headquarters and Headquarters Detachment, 716th Military Police Battalion, who is a native of Richmond, Ky. “The ISF in Baghdad conduct joint security meetings so all the key leaders are in the same room talking about how to keep the area secure.â€
National security minister prepares for receiving Wassit security file
October 24, 2008 – 12:53:06
WASSIT / Aswat al-Iraq: Iraqi National Security Minister Shirwan al-Waeli arrived in Wassit on Friday to supervise the formation of an operations room in preparations for receiving the security file from the Multinational forces by the end of the month. Speaking at a press conference in Wassit, the minister said “my visit today to Kut city aims to inspect the security forces and to hold meeting with security commanders in the province on forming the operations room in preparations for receiving the security file by the end of the month.†“The delay in receiving the security file in Wassit was for its good to complete all its preparations,†he noted.
Twelve out of eighteen Iraqi provinces have received their security file from the Multinational forces, while the remaining six, including Wassit, still waiting. A Shiite province, Wassit, 180 km south of Baghdad, is in the east of the country. Its name comes from the Arabic word meaning “middle,†as it lies along the Tigris about midway between Baghdad and Basra. Its major cities include the capital, al-Kut, and al-Hayy. Prior to 1976 it was known as Kut Province. SH (S)
Security Responsibility Returns to Iraqis in Babil Province (more…)
School Renovations Provide Children New Opportunities in Rashid District
Monday, 29 September 2008
BAGHDAD — At the beginning of their school year, the kids of the Halwan school in Jari Village and Malaly school in Radwaniyah are not returning to the same schoolhouse they left before the summer break in southern Baghdad ’s Rashid District.
Multi-National Division – Baghdad Soldiers, partnered with Civil Affairs Soldiers and local Iraqi community leaders, worked to complete required renovations in time to re-open the schools as scheduled, Sept. 25.
“The whole project had to be completed in less than six weeks,†explained Sgt. 1st Class Eric McCoy, non-commissioned officer in charge of the Civil Affairs team, assigned to the 404th Civil Affairs Bn., out of Fort Dix , N.J.
“The buildings have been re-faced, all of the electrical wires re-ran; a new generator has been installed, and the bathrooms were completely renovated as well,†added McCoy, who hails from Middletown , N.J.
At the first ribbon-cutting ceremony in Jari Village , a neighborhood in the Radwaniyah community, eager students and their satisfied teachers found newly renovated buildings with fresh paint, new desks, new roofing and three additional classrooms.
“The community now has better resources thanks to the hard work of the Coalition forces and Iraqi contractors,†said Sheik Ayad, a local leader of the Radwaniyah District.
Less than one hour later, a re-opening ceremony began for the Malaly school in the Radwaniyah community of Rashid.
Capt. Christopher Johnson, a native of Topsfield, Mass., and is the executive officer for HHC, 4th Bn., 64th Armor Regt., spoke to the crowd of students, teachers, and local leaders.
“This is the future of Iraq ; it begins here with the children,†Johnson said as he reflected on his memories of the school when he first saw it only months ago.
“We all remember when the roof here was falling in, and it was a dangerous environment for the kids,†he said. “This is a better environment for the students and teachers to focus on education now.â€
(By Capt. Mark Miller, 4th Infantry Division)
From Voices of Iraq (Aswat Al-Iraq)
Provincial elections law democratic development-paper
Baghdad – Voices of Iraq
Monday , 29 /09 /2008 Time 11:02:42
AMMAN / Aswat al-Iraq: Arab newspapers on Monday continued their focus on the Iraqi Parliament’s passage of the provincial council elections law following two months of heated debate.
I am taking some time off from the site. I will return September 23rd.
However, I will leave you with this from Flopping Aces:
Kurtz: “Gibson Used Palin’s Own Words Against Her”…
The media establishment is coming out in support of Charlie Gibson’s horrible interview of Sarah Palin last night. Not all of them, but some….like Howard Kurtz who writes this unfortunate piece:
After switching to Fox, I learned that part of the interview was controversial.
GIBSON: You said recently, in your old church, “Our national leaders are sending U.S. soldiers on a task that is from God.” Are we fighting a holy war?
PALIN: You know, I don’t know if that was my exact quote.
GIBSON: Exact words.
PALIN: But the reference there is a repeat of Abraham Lincoln’s words when he said — first, he suggested never presume to know what God’s will is, and I would never presume to know God’s will or to speak God’s words.
On Fox, Newt Gingrich called this “a sad commentary on the growing anti-religious hostility of the news media.” I would call it asking the governor about her own words.
Really? When her own words were NOT the “exact” words she used, as Charlie so smugly stated last night, then I think you may be stepping in it Howie. Her exact words:
“pray for our military men and women who are striving to do what is right. Also, for this country, that our leaders, our national leaders, are sending [U.S. soldiers] out on a task that is from God. That’s what we have to make sure that we’re praying for, that there is a plan and that that plan is God’s plan.â€
Come on Howie, if your gonna gin up some outrage at least get the damn controversy right.
At least some in the media are not behind Charlie here.
Gibson, who sat back in his chair and wriggled his foot impatiently, had the skeptical, annoyed tone of a university president who agrees to interview the daughter of a trustee, but doesn’t believe she merits admission.
In the sit-down with Gibson, she faced questions about statements on the Iraq war that she made at an Assembly of God church that she sometimes attends in her hometown, Wasilla, of which she is a former mayor.
A video shows Palin asking a group to pray that the nation’s leaders were sending troops to Iraq “on a task that is from God.â€
Gibson, however, mischaracterized her as simply asserting that the nation’s leaders were sending troops to Iraq on a task from God.
“Are we fighting a holy war?†he asked.
After Palin disputed his characterization, she paraphrased Abraham Lincoln, saying she meant, “Let us not pray that God is on our side in a war or any other time, but let us pray that we are on God’s side.â€
Gibson went on to take a second part of her comments out of context. Palin had asked the group to pray “that there is a plan, and that plan is God’s plan.â€
But Gibson dropped her reference to praying — and instead quoted Palin as saying the war was God’s plan. He asked if she believed the country was sending her son on a task from God.
Amazing.
also:
Did President Bush Link Saddam Hussein to 9/11?
Mr. RUSSERT: Do we have any evidence linking Saddam Hussein or Iraqis to this operation?
I can’t remember who it was now, but a commenter on another blog posed a challenge to me that echoed what I have already been pondering upon: If Bush didn’t lie, why do (or did) so many Americans think that Saddam is linked to the events of 9/11?
I ran a quick Google search, and found this Washington Post article by Dana Milbank, dated from September 6, 2003. This is months after the Invasion (and a year before I even knew what a blog was). The piece is fascinating to me, as I find disagreement with some of the facts, a perpetuation of some of the media distortions regarding Administration statements, and a few points that do make sense to me.
Nearing the second anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, seven in 10 Americans continue to believe that Iraq’s Saddam Hussein had a role in the attacks, even though the Bush administration and congressional investigators say they have no evidence of
this.
The emphases are mine.
Whenever I ask Bush war critics for evidence where President Bush or Vice President Cheney ever stated that Saddam had a hand in 9/11, the response I get back is, “Well…it was insinuated.”
Sixty-nine percent of Americans said they thought it at least likely that Hussein was involved in the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, according to the latest Washington Post poll. That impression, which exists despite the fact that the hijackers were mostly Saudi nationals acting for al Qaeda, is broadly shared by Democrats, Republicans and independents. The main reason for the endurance of the apparently groundless belief, experts in public opinion say, is a deep and enduring distrust of Hussein that makes him a likely suspect in anything related to Middle East violence. “It’s very easy to picture Saddam as a demon,” said John Mueller, a political scientist at Ohio State University and an expert on public opinion and war. “You get a general fuzz going around: People know they don’t like al Qaeda, they are horrified by September 11th, they know this guy is a bad guy, and it’s not hard to put those things together.”
That would make sense, given that even though America was largely asleep before 9/11 to the metastasizing threat of Islamic terrorism, media reports and politicians throughout the 90′s were pointing to links between al Qaeda and to Saddam; those links weren’t just magically pulled from out of thin air by Feith’s Office of Special Planning.
You don’t suppose the American public might have been “misled” into the Saddam/al-Qaeda connection belief, by following a decade’s worth of news coverage regarding Saddam’s defiance and brutality? “Regime change”/Iraqi Liberation Act of 1998 created as official U.S. policy toward Iraq under Clinton? How about tuning into TV news programs like this one:
The impoverished Sadr City is the scene of a flurry of reconstruction activities, according a senior government official. Tahseen al-Shaikhli, a government spokesman, said 34 projects have been approved to rehabilitate the city’s rickety infrastructure.
Sadr City is a predominantly Shiite neighborhood in Baghdad and has been the scene of ferocious rounds of fighting with U.S. occupation troops. But the city has been relatively quiet since the Mahdi Army, the Shiite militia group of cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, decided to stop challenging U.S. troops and the Iraqi government. Shaikhli said the U.S. alone was executing 17 major projects and the new ones initiated by the government would hopefully improve public utilities. But the city still suffers from a host of problems. “The Sadr City has problems with the supply of electricity. We are trying to alleviate these problems,†he said. He said U.S. troops have supplied new generators and are funding the rehabilitation of the network in the city. Most of the 34 projects announced by the government will be aimed at revamping the city’s infrastructure mainly health and education, he said.
From Voices of Iraq Monday , 08 /09 /2008 Time 10:54:36
2400 displaced families returned home since security plan – official
BAGHDAD, Sept. 8 (VOI) – Some 2400 displaced families returned to their original homes in the province of Diala since Operation Bashaer al-Kheir was first launched at the end of July 2008, an official spokesman for the Iraqi Interior Ministry announced.
“The Interior Ministry is resuming efforts to bring displaced families back to their original homes in Diala after Iraqi security forces wielded control over the province. “Around 2400 families have returned home since the commencement of the military operation Bashaer al-Kheir,” Abdelkareem Khalaf told Aswat al-Iraq – Voices of Iraq – (VOI). (more…)
Rams WR Clayton thinks he can be ready Sunday (AP)
After one practice, new St. Louis Rams wide receiver Mark Clayton thought he'd be ready in time for Sunday's opener against Arizona. Rookie quarterback Sam Bradford was optimistic, too, after seeing Clayton in action on Wednesday. Bradford said it appeared Clayton already had a "great grasp" of the offense.
The Pack is back: Panel of former NFL players and coaches say Green Bay is the team to beat (SportingNews.com)
While Sporting News Today officially picked the New York Jets over the Dallas Cowboys in Super Bowl 45, a panel of former NFL coaches and players has other ideas. The Green Bay Packers lead the pack as the team picked to win it all in 2010, with the Baltimore Ravens as a close-second favorite. Brian Baldinger, former offensive lineman: "Packers over Ravens. I think Aaron Rodgers and that offense is the best in football and will carry them start to finish all year, much like Drew Brees did with the Saints a year ago." Steve Beuerlein, former QB:...
NFL division races: AFC North (SportingNews.com)
A look at the strengths, weaknesses, rehab issues and what to expect in the AFC North, as provided by SN's NFL correspondents: Baltimore Ravens The strength: The Ravens play outstanding run defense. They have two great run stoppers in DTs Kelly Gregg and Haloti Ngata, and they have linebackers who can run in Ray Lewis, Jameel McClain, Terrell Suggs and Jarret Johnson. Most important, seldom do you see their linebackers off their feet. The weakness: The secondary is suspect because the Ravens lack a legitimate star in the starting group.
McNabb will play Sunday, talks about Haynesworth (SportingNews.com)
Washington Redskins quarterback Donovan McNabb will start against the Dallas Cowboys in Week 1 despite the fact that his ankle isn’t 100 percent, he told ESPN980. “Yes, I will be starting this weekend, and I look forward to it,” McNabb told the radio station. “Is it 100 percent? No. … But it’s getting better. McNabb returned to practice Monday after spraining his ankle 2 ½ weeks ago in a preseason game against the Baltimore Ravens. He also told the radio station that he’s still getting multiple treatments every day.
Week 1 matchup: Baltimore Ravens at New York Jets (SportingNews.com)
Three story lines 1. How rusty is Revis? The Jets get back holdout cornerback Darrelle Revis, but will he be a little bit rusty after sitting out 35 days during the preseason? The Jets cannot afford that, as his suffocating man coverage is what allows the Jets to send their trademark blitzes. 2. Is Flacco ready for the next step? The Ravens expect QB Joe Flacco to be more of a game manager this year, especially with a team whose defense is banged up going into the season.
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