Bush Holds Cocktail Hour to Raise War Funds

So today we can only wish that were the truth as Bush demands we shell out $46 Billion More in War Funds. And he's demanding it by the end of the year. The rate Bush is going of course, his little foreign adventures are going to cost a total of $1 trillion dollars by the time his term is up. Yeah, that's more than the total of Vietnam and Korea. The total for this year alone in appropriations will be the highest year since the "War on Terror" began in 2001: $196.4 billion. As Pelosi points out, for the cost of 40 days in Iraq, we could provide health care to 10 million children for a year. Even though Bush insists the war contractors need the money to buy nonexistent troops Christmas trees and pudding, we know the Pentagon doesn't need a penny more until after February and the primary elections. Bush made his announcement at the White House while surrounded by the family of a dead Marine, and exorting Democrats to prove they support the troops. Political theater much? Does this family have granite countertops?

Meanwhile, with the border between Iraq and Turkey heating up, we are faced with yet another Bush lie: that by staying in Iraq we reduce the chances for regional war. Undoubtedly, the presence of US troops gives courage to Kurdish insurgents, who dart into Turkey and back out to Iraqi strongholds which are technically within US borders. The surge of refugees out of Iraq continues to destabalize the societies and governments of countries that surround it, placing an enormous economic and social strain on allies in the region. Relief from them is likely never to come, as Iraqis displaced by ethnic fighting become the new international Palestinians, forever holding an identity with a country to which they can never go home. And after all of the reconstruction efforts in Iraq, the aggregate of the lives of Iraqis is worse than before the invasion of 2003. Far from reducing terrorism, the one last goal clung to by the Bush administration, Iraq has become a proving ground for terrorism tactics, and the successes are exported to Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan.

What does Bush plan to do with this windfall if we give it to him? Get it stolen. Let's take a little peak into the $44.5 billion Iraqi reconstruction effort, and the auditing of just one $1.2 billion contract:

In a January audit of DynCorp's work under the INL contract, [auditors] found that the State Department paid $43.8 million for manufacturing and temporary storage of a residential camp that had never been used. The audit also questioned the State Department's payment of $36.4 million for weapons and equipment, including body armor, armored vehicles and communications equipment that couldn't be accounted for because "invoices were vague and there was no backup documentation." [Auditors] raised questions about INL's payment of business-class travel expenses for DynCorp officials. After INL questioned the charges, it said DynCorp re-paid $108,000. INL officials, according to Bowen's report, "have no confidence that the government has paid for only valid expenses under the contract."

Meanwhile, we find out that Blackwater ducks payroll taxes by calling it's employees "private contractors." Which might go a long way to explain why Blackwater takes no interest in their conduct. Who thinks Bush should get money to pay for this $H!T??!!

Blackwater Attacked "Not Even By a Stone"

So today the Iraqi government released it's report concluding that Blackwater fatally shot 17 people at Nisoor Square without provocation on September 16th. The Iraqi government also reports that the number injured in the shootings is 27. The spokesperson for the Iraqi government, Ali al-Dabbagh, stated that Blackwater's presence was in response to a bombing near a State Department convoy earlier a mile away, but that the convoy in the Square itself had been threatened "not even by a stone." Ali al-Dabbagh went on to classify the incident as "an intentional murder that needed to be called to account according to the law." The findings of the Iraqi government reflect similar after action reports filed by the US military, which responded to the scene. Meanwhile, the US Embassy announced today a shift in the goals of the joint US-Iraqi Commission towards establishing a blueprint with the intentions that there even are ways to ensure that US-employed mercenaries "do not endanger public safety."

Britan will have it's troop strength to 2,500 by next spring. Brown made his announcment to day to ward off calls from political opponents for a definate time-table on withdrawal, also stating that logistics staff would be redeployed to surrounding nations, and that Britain will not guarantee to Bush to keep troops in Iraq past the end of 2008. Brown also stated that security around the south of Basra would be passed to Iraqi security forces by the end of two months time, ending Britan's combat operations in Iraq. Elsewhere, Petraeus spent the day holding a conference continuing accusations that Iran is actively destablizing the security situation in Iraq. Petraeus commented to Reuters that, "They are responsible for providing the weapons, the training, the funding and in some cases the direction for operations that have indeed killed U.S. soldiers." However, his press conference provided no evidence or declassified intelligence to support his assertions. The Iranian embassy didn't bother to comment.

Despite the public outcry in both the US and Iraqi, despite the reports coming from both the (supposedly independent) Iraqi government and from out own military, conservative commentators still cling to a candle for Blackwater. Despite of course, the enormous government malefescence that Blackwater's contracts represent, which is surprising for the supposedly fiscally responsible Republican Party. Richard Novak published a commentary in the Washington Post today containing a glaring number of inaccuracies, especially concerning the events of the attack on a Blackwater-escorted convoy of kitchen equipment in Fallujah of 2004. For one, he boldly lies that those who attacked and killed Blackwater's mercenaries wore the uniforms of Iraqi national police officers, in an attempt of conservatives to make the shooting of any uniformed Iraqi always justifiable.

Novak goes on to boldly lie that the congressional hearings of last Tuesday had not been scheduled until after the September 16th shootings, when they were in fact scheduled early last year. Novak also goes on to accuse the lawyers of the families of the Blackwater mercenaries killed in Fallujah (and the families by extension) of being more interested in a big payout than justice. As to the question of the purpose of the hearings, Novak pushes the idea that Democrats have only the right to explore questions of the Iraq War which have occured since they took control of Congress in early 2007. Such assumption is rooted of course in the de facto assumption that Blackwater is as innocent now as Novak claims it was innocent of gross misconduct in the planning of the 2004 Fallujah convoy. Novak clings to Blackwater's innocence the way some wives cling to the innocence of their cheating spouses, even when the mistress shows up at the husbands birthday party trailing her bastard children.

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troop surge, Blackwater, iraq war, iran, current events, politics, moonbat, war contractors

Evict Blackwater and Get Your End to the War

So today five witnesses and one senior Iraqi police officer gave public testimony against Blackwater, attesting that the mercenaries opened fire without provocation in the September 16th shooting incident in Baghdad, which left at least eleven innocent civilians dead. Blackwater mercenaries involved claimed last Friday to ABC NEWS that they opened fire on a white car after if refused to give way to them in rush-hour traffic... even after they threw water bottles at it and gave the driver the finger. After an outraged Prime Minister Maliki announced his intention to hurl Blackwater out of his country, he was pressured by a phone call from Secretary of State Condollezza Rice. If Blackwater was gone the next day, the occupation would be shut down. Crying shame, really.

The horror continues... despite claims by representatives, Blackwater didn't kill those civilians in defense of any State Department officials. The timeline works like this: a car bomb went off near a place their "State" was visiting. Half an hour later, as they are leaving to go back to the Green Zone, Blackwater dispatches two other groups to help escort them back. TST-22, the first group of back-up finds the original group, and escorts them back to the Green Zone. TST-23, the second group gets "delayed," which given it's a group of men in SUVs read "lost and refused to stop for directions." TST-23 ends up in a crowded traffic circle, and gives in to a fit of bloody road-rage, then flees back to the Green Zone. TST-22 doubles back to provide protection for TST-23, and ends up in the traffic circle after they have left. At which point, TST-22 end up surrounded by a quick-reaction force from the Iraqi Army with it's large caliber machine guns. A US military QRF scrambled onto the scene to mediate before Blackwater got slaughtered, and TST-22 retreated to the Green Zone. You read me right, our "money-saving" mercenaries had to be rescued by the real deal. Yet another classic bail-out of a bad private investment scheme.

The State Department released a report yesterday detailing how in fact, Blackwater is quite trigger-happy.

"The officials said that Blackwater’s incident rate was at least twice that recorded by employees of DynCorp International and Triple Canopy, the two other United States-based security firms that have been contracted by the State Department to provide security for diplomats and other senior civilians in Iraq.

The State Department would not comment on most matters relating to Blackwater, citing the current investigation. But Sean McCormack, the department’s spokesman, said that of 1,800 escort missions by Blackwater this year, there had been “only a very small fraction, very small fraction, that have involved any sort of use of force.”

In 2005, DynCorp reported 32 shootings during about 3,200 convoy missions, and in 2006 that company reported 10 episodes during about 1,500 convoy missions. While comparable Blackwater statistics were not available, government officials said the firm’s rate per convoy mission was about twice DynCorp’s."

What is the State Department afraid of if it has to conceal this information? Accountability?

The Pentagon hurried to show their equal support for Blackwater with a $92 million dollar contract. The money goes to Blackwater's aviation subsidiary Presidental Airways... who killed three American soldiers by flying a helicopter into the side of a mountain. Right after one of the Blackwater pilots assured his passengers that "All we want is to avoid seeing rock at twelve o'clock" Yes, because you should give $92 million dollars to men who can't tell mountain from clear sky. Given the difference.

And despite the infusion of cash, there may be more blood in the water than people think. Just last Wednesday, "the North Carolina private military contractor canceled a $5.5 million deal to buy 1,800 acres of farmland near Fort Bragg, where it was going to set up a training ground for soldiers and corporate executives." Blackwater refused to officially comment to the press, of course. And in a little story from September 9th there's more innocent blood in Iraq that's on Blackwater's hands:

A clerk in the Iraqi customs office in Diyala province, she was in the capital to drop off and pick up paperwork at the central office near busy al Khilani Square, not far from the fortified Green Zone, where top U.S. and Iraqi officials live and work. U.S. officials often pass through the square in heavily guarded convoys on their way to other parts of Baghdad.

As Hussein walked out of the customs building, an embassy convoy of sport-utility vehicles drove through the intersection. Blackwater security guards, charged with protecting the diplomats, yelled at construction workers at an unfinished building to move back. Instead, the workers threw rocks. The guards, witnesses said, responded with gunfire, spraying the intersection with bullets.

Hussein, who was on the opposite side of the street from the construction site, fell to the ground, shot in the leg. As she struggled to her feet and took a step, eyewitnesses said, a Blackwater security guard trained his weapon on her and shot her multiple times. She died on the spot, and the customs documents she'd held in her arms fluttered down the street.

Before the shooting stopped, four other people were killed in what would be the beginning of eight days of violence that Iraqi officials say bolster their argument that Blackwater should be banned from working in Iraq.

So beyond a few dropping jaws, where is the liberal outrage? Rice was clear enough with her marching orders for people who want a change in Iraq. Get rid of Blackwater and it all comes tumbling down...

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Blackwater, Iraq, iraq war, moonbat, current events, war on terror, politics

Hidden Pentagon Conservatives Corrupt US Snipers

So today we get more sordid details the the case of US snipers on trial for killing an Iraqi man out mowing his lawn. The facts of the case are that Spec. Jorge Sandoval and Staff Sgt. Michael Hensley stand accused by the military of shooting an innocent Iraqi out cutting grass with a rusty sickle, and then planting a spool of wire on his dead body to make the shooting look legitimate. Meanwhile, other snipers in the same unit, who face discipline for falling asleep while on a mission, have come forward to reveal the secret program they were recruited for by members of the Pentagon's Asymmetric Warfare Group. In January, these conservatives visited the snipers and passed out boxes of bait: ammunition, wire and explosives. The snipers were to litter the ground in a hostile area with these items, and shoot anyone who picked them up. Like someone annoyed that there was litter in the middle of the street.

"Baiting is putting an object out there that we know they will use, with the intention of destroying the enemy," Capt. Matthew P. Didier, the leader of an elite sniper scout platoon attached to the 1st Battalion of the 501st Infantry Regiment, said in a sworn statement. "Basically, we would put an item out there and watch it. If someone found the item, picked it up and attempted to leave with the item, we would engage the individual as I saw this as a sign they would use the item against U.S. Forces."

..."We don't discuss specific methods targeting enemy combatants," said Paul Boyce, an Army spokesman. "The accused are charged with murder and wrongfully placing weapons on the remains of Iraqi nationals. There are no classified programs that authorize the murder of local nationals and the use of 'drop weapons' to make killings appear legally justified."

It is unclear whether the program reached elsewhere in Iraq and how many people were killed through the baiting tactics.

Members of the sniper platoon have said they felt pressure from commanders to kill more insurgents because U.S. units in the area had taken heavy losses. The sniper unit -- dubbed "the painted demons" because of the use of tiger-stripe face paint -- often went on missions into hostile areas to intercept insurgents going to and from hidden weapons caches.

"It's our job out here to lay people down who are doing bad things," Spec. Joshua L. Michaud testified in Iraq in July, discussing the unit's numerous casualties. "I don't want to call it revenge, but we needed to find a way so that we could get the bad guys the right way and still maintain the right military things to do."

While neither Sandoval or Hensley themselves had been debriefed and included, of course they found out about the program in short order. They saw the white ammunition boxes go out with other snipers, and saw those snipers come in with "kills" of Iraqis who had possession of those items, to the great satisfaction of their commanders. Now of course, we find out where this bright idea devolves to, when you are all alone on a dark street of an Iraqi province, with commanders waiting back at camp for that kill count. Some rise above temptation and some become seduced... Increasingly, the best of our soldiers, such as these, are finding a way out of our military.

In short, we operate in a bewildering context of determined enemies and questionable allies, one where the balance of forces on the ground remains entirely unclear. (In the course of writing this article, this fact became all too clear: one of us, Staff Sergeant Murphy, an Army Ranger and reconnaissance team leader, was shot in the head during a "time-sensitive target acquisition mission" on Aug. 12; he is expected to survive and is being flown to a military hospital in the United States.) While we have the will and the resources to fight in this context, we are effectively hamstrung because realities on the ground require measures we will always refuse - namely, the widespread use of lethal and brutal force.

Given the situation, it is important not to assess security from an American-centered perspective. The ability of, say, American observers to safely walk down the streets of formerly violent towns is not a resounding indicator of security. What matters is the experience of the local citizenry and the future of our counterinsurgency. When we take this view, we see that a vast majority of Iraqis feel increasingly insecure and view us as an occupation force that has failed to produce normalcy after four years and is increasingly unlikely to do so as we continue to arm each warring side.

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Asymmetric Warfare Group, Pentagon, Iraq, war, current affairs, democracy, politics, moonbat

Blackwater Kills Infant Girl "Insurgent" to Protect US

So today we will explore the most recent disgrace the Bush Administration has set up country up to suffer in Iraq. Blackwater lashed out at rush-hour traffic in Baghdad with a deadly hail of bullets last Sunday, and the Iraqi government is leading a heroic, yet likely doomed, attempt to oust the mercenary firm from its (supposedly) sovereign soil. After seeing their State Department barrel up to a busy traffic circle, Iraqi police officers stepped out into traffic to attempt to clear a path. When they failed to do so quickly enough, Blackwater’s mercenaries open fired on a car with young parents and their infant daughter, killing all three. They then continued to straff construction workers, a bus full of school girls, other fleeing commuters, and shot to death one of the Iraqi police officers. At some point, Blackwater’s helicopters joined in the shooting spree that is reported to have lasted twenty minutes and initially killed eleven. Survivors continue to die of their wounds in local hospitals, and the death toll rises. Blackwater released claims that the young parents and their baby girl were insurgents and had opened fire first.

"We will not tolerate the killing of our citizens in cold blood," al-Maliki told reporters. "The work of this company has been stopped in order to know the reasons."

Al-Maliki said the shootings had generated such "widespread anger and hatred" that it would be "in everyone's interest if the embassy used another company while the company is suspended."

Blackwater spokeswoman Anne E. Tyrrell said in a statement late Monday that its employees acted "lawfully and appropriately" in response to an armed attack against a State Department convoy.



"The `civilians' reportedly fired upon by Blackwater professionals were in fact armed enemies and Blackwater personnel returned defensive fire," she said. "Blackwater regrets any loss of life but this convoy was violently attacked by armed insurgents, not civilians, and our people did their job to defend human life."

…The Interior Ministry had said Monday it had lifted Blackwater's license and ordered its 1,000 employees to leave the country. The next day, Iraqi officials said Blackwater's operations were merely suspended pending an investigation. ….

"It's going to turn the world upside down," said retired Marine Lt. Col. Bill Cowan, an independent military analyst and the co-chairman of WVC3 Group, a security consulting firm. "You can bet the U.S. embassy is doing backflips right now pressuring the Iraqis not to revoke their license."

CODEPINK held a protest in DC against Blackwater on Wednesday, in front of the International Peace Operations Association, the lobbying group which presses the interests of mercenary companies like Blackwater to Republican lawmakers. For a little back ground, view a self-made Blackwater pilot video to grasp how they define themselves.

The New York Times relays that the Iraqis refute Blackwater's claim that its personel were ambushed. The Iraqi government’s initial report, though unverified, says that Blackwater personnel "were not ambushed ... but instead fired at a car when it did not heed a policeman's call to stop, killing a couple and their infant." CNN interviewed several of the Iraqi survivors: "As we turned back they opened fire on all cars from behind. The bullets are in my back. Withing two minutes teh helicopters arrived. They started firing randomly at citizens. No one fired at Blackwater. They were not attacked by gunman. They were not targeted." Other Iraqis report hearing explosions and gun-fire, but no one except Blackwater actually saw any insurgents open fire on the State Department motorcade. That would include the surviving Iraqi police officer who had stepped out in traffic to clear their path.



None of the US employed mercenaries, Blackwater or not, have ever been prosecuted for any of the shootings clearly done by them, even when their targets clearly were not insurgents:

"[There] have been several fatal shootings involving Blackwater guards including one last Christmas Eve [reported by the Wall Street Journal] when a drunk Blackwater employee walking in the Green Zone reportedly fatally shot an Iraqi guard for Vice President Adel Abdul Mehdi. Spend any time hanging out with private security contractors in Iraq and invariably everybody has a favorite Blackwater story. A few weeks ago, a British security contractor showed me a bullet hole on the windshield of his armored Chevy Suburban. He said it happened one evening when Blackwater guards shot at him while he was driving in the Green Zone. "While they were armed and shooting in the Green Zone remains the mystery to me," he says. "But frankly, nothing surprises me about them anymore. I'm just glad I had bulletproof glass"."

Blackwater totals of contracts with the Department of State run $678 million since 2003. Private contractors still enjoy total immunity to prosecution under Iraqi Law, and none have been prosecuted inside the United States for incidents that occurred in Iraq. Blackwater currently fights litigation by the families of several of it’s employees killed in Fallujah in 2004, contesting that any allowance to sue their company directly hinders the ability of the President as Commander-in-Chief to engage in combat operations in Iraq. The State Department exempts Blackwater from needing an Iraqi Ministry Liscense, although such requirements are included in Defense Department contracts. Blackwater remains exempt from being tracked and monitored by US military commanders, from the procedures for reporting shooting incidents that apply to US patrols, or from operating under offensive weaponry restrictions that apply to US soldiers.

"The Iraqis despised them, because they were untouchable," said Matthew Degn, who recently returned from Baghdad after serving as senior American adviser to the Interior Ministry. "They were above the law." Degn said Blackwater's armed Little Bird helicopters often buzzed the Interior Ministry's roof, "almost like they were saying, 'Look, we can fly anywhere we want.' "
…Blackwater's conduct at times inflamed tensions inside the Interior Ministry, Degn said. On May 24, Degn was evacuated from the building after an armed standoff between Interior Ministry commandos and Blackwater guards, who had shot and killed an Iraqi driver outside the gates. U.S. and Iraqi officials feared the incident might lead to retaliatory attacks against Americans.

After shooting the unarmed Iraqi driver, Blackwater’s mercenaries found itself surrounded by Interior Ministry commandos with AK-47 assault rifles, but refused to identify themselves. A passing US military convoy attempted to mediate, but eventually a State Department official was called upon to negotiate the return of Blackwater’s employees to the Green Zone.

Later, both Blackwater and the State Department initially denied that the shooting occurred. The company and agency officials then confirmed that the incident had taken place but defended the guards, saying they had followed the rules on the use of force. The State Department said it planned a thorough investigation. Four months later, no results have been announced.

Despite irregularities in Blackwater’s contracts which permit the company a pyramid scheme to make profit off of the State Department, by including profit in it’s contracts twice, and so that the second calculation of profit is calculated off the contract’s total including the first calculation of profit, the Republican lawmakers and Bush officals continue to shield and favor their company. Guess to whose election campaigns Blackwater renders donations, effectively allowing Republicans to fund their politics through tax-payer’s money?

If you don’t understand how the supposedly frugal Republican Party can swallow this, look here for a key insight. You will not find Blackwater’s culpability for the deaths of its mercenaries in Fallujah in 2004 given an accurate recounting, and there will be no mention of unarmored bright red SUV, inferior weaponry, too few men for such a patrol, a lack of experience training as a team, or the fact that they were escorting trucks to pick up pots and pans. All of the truth of how those men were sacrificed by a greedy corporation to increase it's profit margin must be buried to preserve the neo-con world view, where only liberals are capable of sin:

Despite popular belief, contractors are professionals that are held accountable for their actions. Our nation should not resort to criticizing their service, as they fulfill a portion of the war process to the best of their ability. Maybe instead we should reevaluate the circumstance of the media in war time. Just perhaps the veterans of war know better how to conduct operations than politicians, journalists, and peace activists. This is precisely why a high level of attention is given to the prior military service of presidential candidates, because if elected they will serve the role of Commander in Chief.

When the situation’s structure is scrutinized, what one will find at the base is the left and liberal media so opposed to the war in Iraq they will pursue any means necessary to discredit it. The cycle of anti-war activist attacks has proven itself over and over again, as attempts are made to vilify President Bush, his Republican backing, private military companies, the United States Military, and often the United States. They continue to make out America as the national bully, acting only to weaken our democracy from within.

Yes, your eyes do not deceive you. According to this proposal, if Blackwater wants to wander through traffic in Baghdad shooting up school buses full of girls, we must clap and cheer to show we are good patriots and understand our place. We the people are too ignorant to render judgments on issues like war and peace, and should just shut up. When we scrutinize the public uproar over this situation, what we really find is the basic assumption on the part of the liberal media and the American Left that our soldiers should have been doing this duty instead of mercenaries, since they are the real and true professionals, and know what conduct is due their uniforms.




Immediately following Sunday’s incident, Blackwater revoked clearance for any travel out of the Green Zone, which despite four years of occupation and a “troop surge,” requires heavily-armed escort. Yet our politicians should not so easily give into calls that Blackwater must be forgiven in the name of the greater good and the “War on Terror.” Here we look at an astounding opportunity to cut away a major determent to our military’s ability to function in a time of war; reliance on silent partners motivated by profit. No blind eye should be turned to the fact that the operating procedures for private security contractors were written by Lawrence T. Peter, director of the 50- member Private Security Company Association of Iraq. In a blatant conflict of interest, the Pentagon's Defense Reconstruction Support Office employs Peters to consult on it’s issuance of contracts to the members of his organization.

We on the Left wait to see if the Iraq government passes the test to it's people of not actually being a puppet of the Bush Administration, and whether or not Pelosi can seize this opportunity to force a real policy change in Iraq. Blackwater remains silent on the incident via it's website press releases. To the press, Blackwater reportedly describes Sunday's shootings as "Blackwater professionals heroically defended Americans in a war zone.” A Blackwater contractor told the conservative Washington Times: "They will hem and haw, then money will exchange hands and it will go away."

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Blackwater, troop surge, Iraq, withdrawal, politics, current affairs, moonbat

MoveOn Haters Require the Suspension of Disbelief

So today C-SPAN took a stream of callers on that phony ginned-up artificial manufactured vat-grown faux-controversy over Move-On's "General Betray Us" ad. Moonbat found herself chewing the steering wheel when none of the Democratic callers could stay focused on the statistics, but at least the Republicans were amusing enough to use Petraeus' report as a justification to nuke Baghdad. Guiliani's frogs hop about promoting his own, closer to the front page, denouncement of Hillary Clinton, for not being a spokesperson for MoveOn, so that she can hurt her own campaign by being stupid enough to give into his demands to apologize for the ad. MSNBC's political analyist Joe Watkins claims on television that MoveOn's ad contained only the words "General Betray Us?" and a mug shot of General Petraeus, so outrageously taken of his unflattering side. And oh yes... TalkLeft's call for liberals to denounce MoveOn has been reposted to raise advertising revenue.

Con-blogs whipped themselves into hysteria over the idea that MoveOn got a $167,000 full page-ad for only $65,000. "This is tantamount to an endorsement in my opinion. If THE preeminent paper in the nation is willing to go so far as endorse this deplorable and mindless behavior, then "baby killers" shouted in the streets can't be far off." (Beware the ad-ware that downloads off this site!) Heck, it's even McCarthyism to demand accountability, not for your political affiliation anymore, but testimony you're going to give to Congress. McCarthyism? MoveOn must be calling Petraeus a communist, oh my!

BlackFive takes the cake by filing a very sad complaint with the Federal Elections Commission. "I sold political advertising ...during the 2006 elections. We were informed that there could be absolutely no discounts to the rate card prices for political or advocacy advertising ...to stop the paper from favoring one viewpoint over another. It seems evident that if the reports are true, the NY Times has favored MoveOn by offering a huge discount to them for political advocacy advertising." Blackfive and it's dear readers seem unaware that the New York Times is available online, where spokeswoman Catherine J. Mathis explains how political advocacy groups can save a little green by running ads on ""standby." Wait.. it get's better!!

Who backs up the NYTimes against Blackfive but Freedom Watch. “The New York Times representative explained to us that we could run a standby rate ad for $65,000, but we could not pick the date or placement of the ad.” Freedom Watch expresses the doubt that MoveOn would have the political savvy to leak it's own ad once the NYT phoned them before putting the paper to bed.. but who cares about sour grapes? Perhaps it's even too little to point out Blackfive's selective revision of the English language when UncleJimbo "defines" betray... as "to deliver or expose to an enemy by treachery or disloyalty: Benedict Arnold betrayed his country." Now, clicking on the link provided we find something beyond such an elementary understanding of our language:

1. to deliver or expose to an enemy by treachery or disloyalty: Benedict Arnold betrayed his country.
2. to be unfaithful in guarding, maintaining, or fulfilling: to betray a trust.
3. to disappoint the hopes or expectations of; be disloyal to: to betray one's friends.
4. to reveal or disclose in violation of confidence: to betray a secret.
5. to reveal unconsciously (something one would preferably conceal): Her nervousness betrays her insecurity.
6. to show or exhibit; reveal; disclose: an unfeeling remark that betrays his lack of concern.
7. to deceive, misguide, or corrupt: a young lawyer betrayed by political ambitions into irreparable folly.
8. to seduce and desert.

Moonbat discovered that not a single one attempted to actually defend Petraeus' redefinition of determining who is or is not a terrorist by how they pump you with lead. In fact, poor reading skills led Newsbusters to claim MoveOn cited Iraq sectarian death statistics wrong. MoveOn's Ad stated "For example, death by car bombs don't count." Newsbusters quoted the NewYorkTimes incorrectly to refute that statement:

Victims from car bombs are treated as sectarian casualties if the attack appears to be directed at a sectarian or ethnic group ....Casualties that result from fighting between groups, like the Mahdi Army and the Badr Corps, however, are not classified as sectarian, as they are the result of clashes between two Shiite organizations. But victims of all car bomb attacks and Shiite and Sunni infighting are included in the overall civilian casualty count.

Key parts they misread are in bold. Car bombings that strike open market places in cities, or random buses, or police stations, or Coalition military personnel are not counted. Only the overall civilian count, which General Petraeus did not use, includes all deaths by car bombs. Unless a car bomb strikes a mosque or an isolated tribe, that car bombing has been excluded as an indication of the continued insurgency. The difference made means de facto, MoveOn is right.

Giuliani forgets Aesop's parable about the little yappy dog who tries to bite two steaks at once and looses both, aiming poorly at MoveOn and Hillary at the same time. At least he's not as sad as Thompson, whose words of wisdom are that veterans are stupider than youngsters who he doesn't trust to drink beer. McCain perhaps does him better by saying Hillary can prove she's a man's-man by not showing she understands something as hard as math. Moonbat will let her dear readers be the decider.

Interesting to see if this fantasy love-affair between MoveOn and Hillary Clinton will become the stuff of pop legend. Beyond conservatives insisting that any elite with a PhD or who has been called a Great Leader by a magazine deserves having their reputation defended by a congressional resolution, Hillary Clinton's full testimony gets hacked into unrecognizable tidbits which she "huffed" when she pointed dared grill the General over the point that to accept his report as accurate, several other recent independent reports must be dismissed wholesale. Clinton even went out of her way to point out that no one should expect Petraeus to have to answer for the years of Bush's policy, to be a spokesperson for everything that came before him. Sheesh. Giuliani dearly would love Americans to be so uncultured as to equate the phrase "the willing suspension of disbelief" with deliberate falsehood... but no, we is more learned than that, yes?

While the surge strategy gets hashed to pieces, at least the BBC got around to asking the Iraqi people what they thought of the surge:

"The United States has increased the number of its forces in Baghdad and surrounding provinces in the past six months. Please tell me if you think this increase of forces has made it better, worse, or had no effect?"



"How long do you think US and other Coalition forces should remain in Iraq?"

"Some 47% of respondents now back an immediate withdrawal, compared with 35% in February. The poll also shows dwindling support for troops remaining in the country, even in support of the Iraqi government and security forces. Only 10% of those surveyed favor coalition forces remaining for that purpose."



Con-blogs better batten down the hatches, pile up the Pepsi, and hook up that pee-bag: MoveOn Moves On to presidential shrubbery on September 17th. "Before the surge, George Bush had 130,000 troops stuck in Iraq," says the narrator of the new ad. "Americans had elected a new Congress to bring them home. Instead, Bush sent 30,000 more troops. Now he's making a big deal about you guessed it . . . pulling out 30,000. So, next year, there will still be 130,000 troops stuck in Iraq. George Bush. A Betrayal of Trust." 130,000 + 30,000 - 30,000 = 130,000 Which means the surge got us right back to start. But wait, I suppose that's more math moonbat shouldn't worry her cute little curls over??

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General Petraeus, troop surge, Iraq, Move On, withdrawal, politics, current affairs, moonbat

Passengers Fail to Observe 9-11 Moment of Silence

So today, the vast majority of Americans seem to have chickened out on flying, count that towards what you will: no one believes Petraeus, people have noticed how many Al-Q terrorist cells keep getting arrested trying to make explosives, rainy weather. Those few who trickled through airports local to moonbat overwhelmingly booked flights without realizing what date they were picking, or else flew for business, because heck, gotta make that buck. Several offical attempts were made to observe moments of silence when the first World Trade Center was struck, as passengers rolled their eyes and continued to take off their shoes. Moonbat found herself off eating lentil soup and completely missed the correct time. Headquarters provided nifty little posters for everyone to sign stating that they remembered the reason why they came to work. As a mark of low morale, no one signed.

En route to and from defending the nation from Osama bin Laden, and to and from the one intelligence class at her college there's been enough student interest in to run, moonbat has been listening to tidbits of Petraeus' "I swear I wrote this despite that the White House rewrites everyone else's testimony, but I hid mine in my underwear drawer and Cheyne would never think to look there" testimony. So sectarian violence is down 45% since last December and 80% in Baghdad alone... as long as you don't include car bombs, Diyala province and anyone shot anywhere else than the back of the head. What are we to do with a General who defines the difference between a terrorist and a criminal by how they shoot you?? Under the spit and polish, the truth remains that the surge has failed. Sectarian violence remains above levels in 2004, 2005, and 2006. Ducking under one month in the last twelve by spinning numbers is political manuevering unexpected from General Betray Us.

People should read the ad before swallowing the inevitable attempts at Republican spin and give MoveOn a fair chance. A difference remains between calling someone a traitor for voicing dissapproval of their President's policy and the commendable act of saying the General has no clothes. When numbers given as Congressional testimony are misleading and false, a General who speaks them betrays the trust of the public, and that act is not removed from moral outrage just because even moonbat favors a few of his overall ideas. Nor should Democrats feel the need to return MoveOn's money. You'd think con-blogs would assume Petraeus had any skin at all.

Six years later.... our military tetters on the edge of an abyss and meets it's recuitment goals only by large cash payments. We still can't translate most of our intercepted SIGINT. Our country got milked by almost $60 billion in wasted contracting dollars by Republican election donors pretending to "work" in Iraq. Electricity production in Baghdad remains 2 hours a day. The Taliban are just about as popular as ever in Afghanistan. Al-Q's mobile terrorist training camps still churn out bomb-makers from international schools in Pakistan. China spends it's time on a Marshal Plan for Africa. Osama bin Laden finds the time to die his beard and follow the real estate mortage crisis in the United States. What has the Republican party done for you lately??

Military Draws Iron Veil Over Combat in Iraq

So today the Pentagon pulled the plug on soldiers posting hand cam shots of combat in Iraq by using free access through Defense Department computers. If soldiers find the cash to shill out, they can continue to upload through private Internet cafes. For as long as they remain open on military bases, one imagines. However, access to such cafes remains limited to the large forward operating bases, the very ones that the new new new new newest strategy seeks to disband, for bases much smaller and Internet-free. American soldiers in Iraq are banned from youtube.com, pandora.com, photobucket.com, myspace.com, live365.com, hi5.com, metacafe.com, mtv.com, ifilm.com, blackplanet.com, stupidvideos.com and filecabi.com.

Officials claim the measure is necessary because even in the fifth year of occupation, the American military's Internet access still sucks, and that it's in no way a massive block of footage that shows that anything in Iraq sucks. Meanwhile, the Defense Department plans to continue to upload it's own footage onto those sites showing more a positive "boots on the ground" perspective.



Stars and Stripes runs the WaPost story as "Pentagon limits troops' web access" at the top of its news cycle, and at the bottom the story "soldiers face punishment over blogs."

"Soldiers will be punished if they publicly reveal sensitive information, such as troop movements, planned raids, travel itineraries of senior leaders, or photographs of casualties, new technology or other material that could compromise their location."

Also running is a news story on a new incentives program to try to get officers to not get the hell out. One imagines there are no plans to throw in free Dells with free wireless access.

Everyone's scrambling to spin the story, but a soldier's perspective cuts the cake. Noted down as horrendous sensationalism are mere lines reporting the measure at all, and the AP gets denounced for hiding all the relevant facts of the story by using the means of actually reporting them. No one believes anything they read in the MSM because of all that liberal bias, so of course the most diabolical way to hide the facts are to actually report them. Then the AP is slammed because there is no possible way to report all the facts in the same sentence at once, and so merely having to report any one fact before any other fact is liberal bias.

Human speech is liberal bias, and it's all the AP's fault. Why don't they teach these things in school eh? Speaking of school, take your average public college, thousands of students in dormitories, and the ability to handle all those social lives and JSTOR at the same time. Ah the wonder of the modern information age.

Perhaps the military's new motto really is "what happens in Iraq, stays in Iraq."



Technorati Tags:
Iraq, internet, war, war on terror, global jihad, troop surge, pentagon, military, youtube

Counterinsurgency in the American Military

So fine the line between bravery and domestic counterinsurgency when one ventures an opinion on the American military's conduct in Iraq. Especially if you accuse your boss generals of 'intellectual and moral failures.' Yet, a young and snappy Lt. Col. Paul "Beergoggles" Yingling roars to the world about 'a failure in generalship' in the American Forces Journal. "Beergoggles" fails to be uncivilized enough to name names, so the gossip's pretty mild, and well-warmed over by several New-York Times Bestsellers. Yingling snarks at these "tell-all books" where generals speak of private concerns they failed to speak of publically before the invasion. The author of one of the said tell-alls, Thomas Ricks of 'Fiasco', wrote the glowing WaPost coverage of Yingling's expose. The main of the Lt. Col.'s beef begins:

"For the second time in a generation, the United States faces the prospect of defeat at the hands of an insurgency. In April 1975, the U.S. fled the Republic of Vietnam, abandoning our allies to their fate at the hands of North Vietnamese communists. In 2007, Iraq's grave and deteriorating condition offers diminishing hope for an American victory and portends risk of an even wider and more destructive regional war.

These debacles are not attributable to individual failures, but rather to a crisis in an entire institution: America's general officer corps. America's generals have failed to prepare our armed forces for war and advise civilian authorities on the application of force to achieve the aims of policy. The argument that follows consists of three elements. First, generals have a responsibility to society to provide policymakers with a correct estimate of strategic probabilities. Second, America's generals in Vietnam and Iraq failed to perform this responsibility. Third, remedying the crisis in American generalship requires the intervention of Congress."

Does it surprise you to learn that Yingling graduated from the University of Chicago with a Master of Arts in Political Science?

....After failing to visualize the conditions of combat in Iraq, America's generals failed to adapt to the demands of counterinsurgency. Counterinsurgency theory prescribes providing continuous security to the population. However, for most of the war American forces in Iraq have been concentrated on large forward-operating bases, isolated from the Iraqi people and focused on capturing or killing insurgents. Counterinsurgency theory requires strengthening the capability of host-nation institutions to provide security and other essential services to the population. America's generals treated efforts to create transition teams to develop local security forces and provincial reconstruction teams to improve essential services as afterthoughts, never providing the quantity or quality of personnel necessary for success....

"....The need for intelligent, creative and courageous general officers is self-evident. An understanding of the larger aspects of war is essential to great generalship. However, a survey of Army three- and four-star generals shows that only 25 percent hold advanced degrees from civilian institutions in the social sciences or humanities. Counterinsurgency theory holds that proficiency in foreign languages is essential to success, yet only one in four of the Army's senior generals speaks another language. While the physical courage of America's generals is not in doubt, there is less certainty regarding their moral courage. In almost surreal language, professional military men blame their recent lack of candor on the intimidating management style of their civilian masters. Now that the public is immediately concerned with the crisis in Iraq, some of our generals are finding their voices. They may have waited too long."

Yingling plugs "Learning to Eat Soup With a Knife" by one John Nagl and On Strategy: A Critical Analysis of the Vietnam War," by Col. Harry Summers. In November of 2006, Yingling cowrote with Nagl an essay New Rules for New Enemies in... Armed Forces Journal. Within they argue:

"To win the Long War, the Army must develop a more adaptive organizational culture. To create such a culture, the Army must change its focus from a centralized, specialized focus on major conventional wars to a more decentralized and less specialized focus on full-spectrum operations. This shift in organizational culture cannot occur within existing organizations — indeed these organizations can be an impediment to change. The best way to change the organizational culture of the Army is to change the pathways for professional advancement within the officer corps. The Army will become more adaptive only when being adaptive offers the surest path to promotion."

Moonbat thinks Beergoggles wants a promotion, eh? John Nagl was on the writing team that produced the Army's new Counterinsurgency Field Manual. Who also wrote that? Petraeus!! Who got a Teddy Award from Time Magazine last December for his leadership in encouraging institutional change in the Army towards effective counterinsurgency tactics at the U.S. Army Combined Arms Center (CAC) in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Guess who also spent that year assigned to Fort Leavenworth? "Beergoggles!!" Who in turn got interviewed by the Combat Studies Institute, a military think tank run by Petraeus' CAC. {The CSI gets described as an 'academic department' of the CAC by this private contractor, who creates "virtual staff tours" to help train officers about Iraq, but I digress.} Oh, Yingling's 2006 interview:

"The thing the Army institutionally is still struggling to learn is that the most important thing we do in counterinsurgency is building host nation institutions-building security forces, building local government capacity- and yet all our organizations are designed around thelear important line of operations: combat operations. There is a real danger in over-determination based on the organization's design. There's the old saying, "If you give a man a hammer, he sees every problem as a nail." Similarly, if you give a unit tanks and Bradleys, they see every promblem as a movement to contact. That's an oversimplification, but it is a problem. I've now had two combat tours where I was involved in developing ISF and I've been to every Army school you can go to as an officer, and no one has ever talked to me about that challenge. No one has ever given me classes on how to do that...

....The institutional Army.. has not caught up in either professional education or organizational design with the challenges of counterinsurgency. So as I go into battalion command, I'm going to focus my troops on those tasks and give them the mental models that will allow them to anticipate those problems and solve them. (That he has just learned from... Petraeus. You guessed it!) Eventually the institutional Army will catch up and they'll get that stuff into schools and there will be MTOE positions for security force development and civil-military operations; but until that day I think individual commanders will have to solve that problem on their own, because when we get into theater we certainly have to solve it...

...I do think that having organic to our institutions the ability to develop intelligence- to collect on our friends, if you will; to be able to find our friends- is extremely important. Because once you find your friends, finding the enemy is very easy. In a city of 200,000, there are people who know who's complicit with the insurgency. So I guess if I had to condense this into a pithy little bullet it would be: don't train on finding the enemy; train on finding your friends and they will help you find your enemy."

WaPost's Thomas Ricks, author of Fiasco and Yingling's shining write-up for his expose, interveiwed Yingling on this very subject, later in November of 2006, Flaws Cited in Efforts to Train Iraqi Forces: where Yingling again gets a chance to showcase how much he has learned at Fort Leavenworth.

"Lt. Col. Paul Yingling, a staff officer with the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment in Iraq in 2005 and 2006 who worked with Iraqi units, came away thinking that the Army fundamentally is not geared to the task of helping the advisory effort.

"The thing the Army institutionally is still struggling to learn is that the most important thing we do in counterinsurgency is building host-nation institutions," he told the interviewers, "yet all our organizations are designed around the least important line of operations: combat operations."

Yingling came to a broader conclusion. He recommended an entirely different orientation in Iraq, both for trainers and for regular U.S. units. "Don't train on finding the enemy," he said. "Train on finding your friends, and they will help you find your enemy. . . . Once you find your friends, finding the enemy is easy."

SmallWarsJournal blogged to promote Yingling's expose, stating that "In this morning’s Washington Post Tom Ricks reports on an Armed Forces Journal article that should be required reading for anyone who cares about our nation’s capability to successfully prosecute the LONG WAR." Their About page states that Small Wars Journal is a private site. It is run by Small Wars Journal, LLC, a private company formed in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Its principals are Dave Dilegge (Editor-in-Chief) and Bill Nagle (Publisher). SWJ in turn gets listed as an item of particular interest on the official Marine website, Small Wars Center of Excellence. But that probably has nothing to do with Petraeus helping the Marines with their own version of a counterinsurgency manual. Surprising the flack Yingling's getting from con-bloggers of all stripes, eh?

Yingling popped up in The Wall Street Journal's December 2006 article Despite $168B Budget, Army Still Faces Cash Crunch:

"At Fort Hood, the Third Armored Cavalry Regiment, which returned from Iraq in March and will go back in fall 2007, is already worried about time to prepare. The regiment will spend most of the winter receiving new soldiers, fielding new equipment and learning to use it. The regiment left most of its tanks and Humvees in Iraq for follow-on units.

That means troops won't have much time to train for other critical tasks. Junior leaders need to know everything from how to assess a water plant to the tribal politics of the area where they are deploying, says Lt. Col. Paul Yingling, the unit's deputy commander. They must know enough Arabic to interact with locals.

"It is incredibly frustrating for combat veterans to return to Iraq for the third time with only minimal training on the skills we know are essential, like language, culture, intelligence and local security force development" Col. Yingling says. "Army units don't fail to train on these tasks because we're stupid or lazy; we fail because we don't have the time to do it right"."

An article in which we hear something familiar:

"Junior officers know that success in these wars is about a lot more than killing the enemy. It depends on providing security for the people, finding friends and fixing infrastructure," says Maj. John Prior, who served as a company commander in Baghdad. "A lot of senior officers just don't get it."

And again Yingling (as in Rick's Nov. 2006) gets tapped for the last say:

Some question how quickly the Army will be able to shift its thinking. "All our organizations are designed around the least important line of operations in these fights -- combat operations," says Col. Yingling. "If you spend your whole career in tanks, you tend to see the solution to every problem as a tank."

Yingling cut his teeth on counterinsurgency PR way back in 2004, in an official Army article called Training the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps. Here with Julian Urquidez, Yingling presents an 8-step training program for Iraqis, which they developed and implemented in Iraq. {I digress again: Julian Urquidez ran the 'Honolulu Marathon in Iraq' this year in 4:05:16. Useless trivia, hooray!} Yingling's been working on his counterinsurgency credentials for far too long not to be getting any credit. What do I mean?

Paul Yingling's Wikipedia entry currently stands in stunning dissarray, containing factual errors and conservative bias as regards Yingling's supposed political opinions on continued U.S. involvement in Iraq: assumed as against. In Paul Yingling's "Also See" section, a link exists to Ehren Watada, who is "also against the Iraq War" and to Ann Wright, who is incorrectly described as having resigned from the U.S. Army in protest of the invasion of Iraq. No external links exist to any military writings of Yingling's other than his current expose. The Masters in Political Science mentioned; not mentioned would be his education at the Command and General Staff College and the School of Advanced Military Studies... at the same time as General Petraeus resided there, expounding about the neccessity of counterinsurgency training and institutional change in the Army. Not mentioned also: Tal Afar. Yingling gets quoted in March 2007 for his part in the successful elimination of the insurgency in Tal Afar, just before he publishes his expose. Someone passed his number on to the reporter. President Bush praised Yingling for his conduct in Tal Afar. Of course, who listens to Bush. Heh.

Now moonbat ponders the worth of Yingling's counterinsurgency operations. Hook himself to Petraeus' rising star and if Petraeus shines in Iraq and continues up that ladder of promotions, so will "Beergoggles." Inch too far out, and those boss generals who Petraeus stands to dethrone use you for target practice. Work this spin wrong, and have your name tarnished too much for future quotations for journalists. Will this growing domestic counterinsurgency succeed or will the old Army regime remain dominant over it's military institutions. Bush promises by the Fall we will know which side shall fall.

Technorati Tags:
war on terror, Iraq, Petraeus, Paul Yingling, troop surge, Bush, Wikipedia, conservative, liberal, counterinsurgency, Combat Studies Institute, american military, moonbat

Let's Withdraw From Iraq Down to Real Soldiers

So today someone actually struck up a political conversation with your favorite moonbat. At work. This may be a first. And it was even international politics, even if it was just about Iraq. Now I live in a Democratic state where it's a rare Republican who supports the troop surge with any language stronger than "can we please not talk about politics today?" So it's no big surprise that the Iraq veterans I work with are.. gasp... Democrats and think withdrawal is spot on. One of them felt like venting a bit, at length, about an article which otherwise would have gone unnoticed, about those American mercenaries- oh sorry, private security contractors, in Iraq. There's nothing that annoyed my veteran friend than the subject of someone who got paid about 100% more than himself with his own tax dollars, payable today, April 15th.

And you know, my good veteran has a point. How have we gotten to the point in our love affair with all things privately contracted that Rambo gets paid more than GI Joe when they ride on the same convoy and guard the same checkpoint? How have we gotten to the point when we think all of these mercenaries are free, and accept that so many of our soldiers are on food stamps? For those who snarl that people spit on soldiers, isn't this ... worse? Here you have guys getting paid $600 a day to drive around as guards, even for Bremer himself, and my good veteran doesn't make enough in the reserves to keep his cellphone turned on 6 months out of twelve. Isn't how much you value a soldier measured by how much you value his service on payday? Or just parade day?

Moonbat became highly irked with Petraeus over this particular issue given that he likes mercenaries even when they are 'compromised.'

"Beyond that, tens of thousands of ministry security forces and tens of thousands of civilian (often third country) contracted guard forces protect key sites in Baghdad (including, for example, the US Embassy, MNSTC-I HQs, the Ministry of Oil, etc.) that MNF-I and the Iraqi government would otherwise have to detail soldiers or police to protect. These forces, again, number in the tens of thousands – and although by no means all are of high capability and some are undoubtedly compromised, they do secure hundreds of sites that otherwise would require coalition or Iraqi military or police forces."

Why does that make accountability sound like an accounting hat-trick?

How about we add a string to this supplemental bill to withdraw foreign mercenaries from Iraq- especially if they happen to be American or be employed by America. And oh we have them there and we have almost no control:

"In November of 2005 a disgruntled Aegis ex-employee posted a so-called "trophy video" on the Internet depicting Aegis contractors—Tim Spicer's men—shooting at Iraqis in civilian cars. In one sequence, the Aegis team opens fire with an automatic weapon at an approaching silver Mercedes. The Mercedes rams a taxi, sending the taxi's occupants running. In another sequence, an Aegis employee fires at a white sedan, running it off the road. Elvis Presley's "Mystery Train" provides the soundtrack. Aegis subsequently conducted an investigation and concluded that the actions represented "legitimate operations" undertaken in compliance with the rules of engagement. Aegis argued further that the video was "taken out of context" and noted that there was no evidence that civilians had been killed. The Pentagon looked into the video and declined to take further steps.

According to a February 2006 Government Accountability Office report, there were approximately 48,000 private military contractors in Iraq, employed by 181 different companies. There may now be many more. These are the kinds of people Tim Spicer and Aegis are supposed to coordinate. The bulk of the military contractors are American and British, with a sprinkling of other nationalities. Formal oversight is lax, to put it mildly. Many are retired from elite units such as the British Special Air Service or the U.S. Special Forces. According to a report in The Economist, a former British official who now heads a trade association for private military companies estimates that mercenaries are Britain's largest export to Iraq. Not food, medicine, or construction material—mercenaries."

So it's remarkably idiocy for the spokesman for the United States Central Command to reply to the armed joyrides of our mercenaries, saying "This is not a Centcom issue. It's whoever was running that contract. We're fighting a war here." Did someone spend too much time watching March Madness and miss that we have a new strategy in Iraq?? Time to withdraw the mercenaries from Iraq, and make a lot of soldiers happy on payday. Too bad Bush and his cronies would rather enrich their friends than actually support our troops.

Technorati Tags:
Iraq, troop surge, Bush, Middle East, liberal, conservative, democrat, republican, war on terror, Iraq War

McCain Takes Photos, Leaves Bloodshed In Iraq

So just a few merry months ago everyone figured McCain the front runner for the Republican ticket in 2008. Till he took a little saunter in a market in Baghdad to try to fake progress in the troop surge in Iraq. McCain held a photo-op in which he mishandled the press and dodged questions on a possible invasion of Iran. McCain smiled big for the American audience and said, "things are getting better in Iraq." The next day, 21 Shia market-workers from that same market were kidnapped, tortured and murdered by Sunni insurgents provoked by his little stunt. Snipers also made an appearance to show how impressed they were with this particular candidate. McCain's definition of "improvement" entails a whole 4% drop in civilian deaths, although the insurgents should feel free to kill as many Iraqi police as they desire. America surely can find a military contractor somewhere to train more.



McCain lies about these very numbers in a conference call with con-bloggers. "One of the key elements which has given us dramatic hope is the amount of dead bodies they’re finding in the streets each morning. It’s down from 100 to as much as about 20 each day. That’s still horrible, but it’s a sign of progress." McCain also remarks on the Democratic Congress's push for a withdrawal date, that "if they want to cut off funding - fine!"


McCain defended his shopping trip with Petraeus in an op-ed to the WaPo:

"For the first time, our delegation was able to drive, not use helicopters, from the airport to downtown Baghdad.....Today the market still faces occasional sniper attacks, but it is safer than it used to be. One innovation of the new strategy is closing markets to vehicles, thereby precluding car bombs that kill so many and garner so much media attention....The new political-military strategy is beginning to show results. But most Americans are not aware because much of the media are not reporting it or devote far more attention to car bombs and mortar attacks that reveal little about the strategic direction of the war. I am not saying that bad news should not be reported or that horrific terrorist attacks are not newsworthy. But news coverage should also include evidence of progress....This is not a moment for partisan gamesmanship or for one-sided reporting."

Ah... the old, if there isn't good news, it's because the evil liberal media oppresses the good news. No good news must be a lie. Heh. For someone who claims Americans aren't getting the full picture, funny that McCain leaves out his chaperons for the day: 100 infantry soldiers, 3 Blackhawks, 2 Apache gunships and 1 bullet-proof vest. Who can say that constitutes "walking freely" through the market with a straight face?

McCain admits that he lied to Wolf Blitzer that "General Petraeus goes out there almost every day in an unarmed Humvee" after he himself tooled around Baghdad in Petraeus' armored Humvees. McCain remarks that obviously there are no unarmored Humvees, as if anyone who had believed that statement was a fool, and then absolves himself by saying: "I’m trying to make the point over and over and over again that we are making progress."

McCain then linked his presidential bid to the success of the surge strategy in Iraq. Curious. Having done so, McCain then argues for patience, as the surge will take longer than Pelosi's September 2008 end to combat funds. So McCain predicts the surge will work by October '08? November 1st, 2008? Just in time to swoop him into the White House. Now that doesn't leave much of a margin for error, and certainly, should Petraeus retire early due to stomach ulcers, McCain ends up having run for two years as the champion of failure. Nowhere will you find that McCain defines what success in Iraq will look like, aside from the complete destruction of Al-Qaeda, which can be achieved in Iraq even though the U.S. military failed in that mission in Afghanistan. Sure.

Trying to look presidential after the debacle of his press conference last week, McCain gave an extended remix of his op-ed at the VMI:

I just returned from my fifth visit to Iraq. Unlike the veterans here today, I risked nothing more threatening than a hostile press corps. And my only mission was to inform my opinions with facts. We still face many difficult challenges in Iraq. That is undeniable. But we have also made, in recent weeks, measurable progress in establishing security in Baghdad and fighting al Qaeda in Anbar province.

McCain risked nothing, because the Marines who swept the market before he arrived, and the 100 infantry soldiers in a giant ring around him, they risked it all for him. Onward. Do we really want a President who decides how the situation really is and then selects those facts that support his opinion and disregards those that do not help him out? Given that such a very mindset is regarded as how the intelligence community erroneously concluded that Saddam had WMD in the first place? Yikes. Do we want a President so openly contemptuous of the American public that he chides politicians who might "take advantage of the public’s frustration" as if we were drunk women on a date whose honor was a stake. Do we?

McCain just can't help lying again, or else he's completely off his rocker:

Before I left for Iraq, I watched with regret as the House of Representatives voted to deny our troops the support necessary to carry out their new mission.....Responsible political leaders — statesmen — do not add to the burdens our troops carry. That is what Democrats, intentionally or not, have done by failing to provide them with the resources necessary to succeed in their mission. Everyday that passes without the necessary funds appropriated to sustain our troops, our chances of success in Iraq dwindle and our military readiness declines further. We have sent the best Americans among us to fight in Iraq, at the least, we must give them the tools they need to do their job.

McCain... McCain... McCain... that would be your party that has them over there right now without the tools they need to do their job. This is an emergency supplemental spending bill, which means, it's like a moneygram to the irresponsible college kid who spent his textbook money on pizza. Yeah, Bush screwed up for 4 long years, but he was your party's candidate and you were part of the majority, and you've already wasted hundreds of billions groping around in the dark. The 2007 bill passed, and the money's there for the taking, but oh my gods... Petraeus only has a year to show us what he's got. Yeah, if he's your sunshine boy there McCain, you'd think you'd show a little love. But all Petraeus gets from McCain is doubt and backpedaling. Bush asked for one more chance. No backing out now.

Technorati Tags:
Bush, Iraq, McCain, war, Iran, war on terror, politics, 2008, republican party, democratic party

TalkLeft Learns to Say "Yes, Mistress!!"

So today marks the day when moonbat addresses an unfortunate incident when she was addressed as "SIR." Given gender and a stunning photo of my lavish red hair, this was very wrong, wasn't it??

TalkLeft: Yes, Mistress.

Let's choose a "safe word" for today. I know, that self-described "service" for busy progressives who want their own voice heard inside the legislative and electoral progress in an age of big money... Move On.

So, why is the anti-war movement so sick at heart? Why do the turn outs to the marches and rallies still suck even after a few thousand pairs of feet are argued one way or another? 2% turnout of a city so liberal the Democratic winner of the primary for Mayor orders his stationary the next day with city funds is piss poor. Especially since the march got infusions from around the country. Where was this majority of the country that disapproves of the Iraq War and elected a Democratic Congress, and why does nobody talk about Iraq?

"Now that this atrocity has moved into its fifth year, I don't overhear any street-corner, café, or waiting-room debate about what is being done in my name and yours. Of course, the war and endless war are the main topics when I'm with my friends and fellow members of the different peace organizations....Perhaps, soon, more and more of our young will awaken, throw off that blanket of apathy, examine the crimes committed by this administration against the people of Iraq and the people of the United States, and emerge as defenders of justice who will not allow the peace baton to ever be dropped again."

But it's not the anti-war movement's fault!! Oh no. Never let that cross your mind. Despite the fact that at the Pentagon, the only way they came up with that crowd was to give microphone time to causes that had nothing to do with Iraq. Like immigrants. Save the cheap lettuce, and all, but you are standing outside the Pentagon. Despite the fact that they spent more time denouncing the crimes of the Democratic Party than they actually spent denouncing the Iraq War of the polices of Bush. Despite the fact that so many of the protesters showed up to put pressure on the elected members of their government while waving the face of Hugo Chavez. But don't say it's the anti-war movement's fault they couldn't come up with the numbers to actually surround the Pentagon.

The anti-war movement explains that the Iraq War is the liberal anti-Iraq War voting public's fault: they have an imperial mindset, the fact that a majority of Americans don't support a phased redeployment is kept from them, and they've been duped into believing that the only way they can fight injustice is to shop. You see:

Let's remember, by the way, that, unlike mainstream Democratic "withdrawal" plans, the American public is talking about actually leaving Iraq, as in that old, straightforward slogan of the Vietnam era: Out now! In other words, there is a hardly noted but growing gap -- call it, in Vietnam-era-speak, a "credibility gap" -- between the Washington consensus and what the American people believe should be done when it comes to Iraq.

What I love about the anti-war movement is the whole "planting the seeds of your own destruction part." Yes, after cutting your teeth on movements to tell a whole lot of people what they can and can't do (save the rain forest, save the whales, dolphin-free tuna, stop violence against women, yadda yadda), you are told that all your skills are imperialistic. Right. Yes, because if you follow the links the anti-war movement provides to prove that the American public no longer backs the Iraq War, you find out that the answer to the question "Which of the following comes closest to your view? The U.S. should immediately begin to withdraw all its troops from Iraq. The U.S. should withdraw all its troops from Iraq within a year. The U.S. should keep its troops in Iraq as long as is needed to turn control over to the Iraqi government." is not something the anti-war movement wants to have anyone talk about. The numbers? Oh yeah. Only 21% support an immediate withdrawal, 37% in one year, 39% to stay as long as necessary for peace, 4% unsure. RightAnd I sure have noticed all the "spend your money here" payment links at the bottom of the only anti-war emails moonbat is privileged to receive. Right.

Heh. Right. If ill people need it explained to them that it's stupid to quote sources that disprove your own agenda, then yeah, that makes you an "idiot." The cameras of FOX News and the blogs of the gung-ho are just waiting to use such idiocy to feed the process of internal sectarian strife in the land of liberal, so that all out civil war will justify their having to remain in occupation until the job is done and liberals have stopped shedding each other's blood and learned to live in peace and share their toys. And back to Iraq.

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MoveOn, TalkLeft, anti-war, Iraq, politics, liberal, conservative, Bush, moonbat