[MAGI]

What absolute arrogant IGNORANCE!

An article about the slick tricks our Rethugs continually play from :

The Times Record News: Washington

http://www.timesrecordnews.com/trn/nw_washington/article/0,1891,TRN_5707_4777941,00.html

House debates Iraq war
By MARGARET TALEV
June 14, 2006

"The House of Representatives on Thursday began its first formal debate on the Iraq war since the 2003 invasion, with GOP leaders saying Congress must restate its support for the mission and Democrats accusing Republicans of rigging the debate.

As the House argued,the Senate quickly brought up and shut down a proposal to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq by year's end, a move engineered by Republicans to embarrass Democrats in that chamber.

In the House, a non-binding resolution, which lawmakers are not being permitted to amend, came up for discussion as the Pentagon announced a milestone of 2,500 U.S. troops killed in Iraq. The resolution could be voted on Friday."

other excerpts:

"Rep. Jane Harman of California, ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said she would vote against the resolution, which she called "a press release for staying the course in Iraq." She said she supports a phased, strategic redeployment of troops to be designed by military commanders, not Congress.

Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., a decorated Marine veteran who argues the United States has exhausted its military usefulness in Iraq, said Thursday, "There's less than 1,000 al Qaeda in Iraq but we're caught in this civil war between 100,000 Shias and 20,000 Sunnis fighting with each other.

"You know who wants us to stay in Iraq right now?" Murtha said. "Al Qaeda wants us there because it recruits people for them. China wants us there. North Korea wants us there. Russia wants us there. Stay and we'll pay, not only pay in dollars. . . . I figure it took us through the Reagan administration to pay for the Vietnam War."

In the Senate, the vote to table an Iraq withdrawal plan came unexpectedly.

Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., had been trying to round up support within his own party for a proposal for a Dec. 31 timetable for withdrawal. Only it wasn't Kerry but Majority Whip Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who called up the plan. Democrats balked, saying that wasn't a fair way to debate it, and they helped reject the move, 93-6. Kerry said he planned to offer his own amendment next week and hoped for a serious debate."

and......

"The Republican leadership has turned what could have been a serious debate into a charade," said Rep. Tom Lantos of California, ranking Democrat on the House International Relations Committee. "

Looking forward to putting an end to this............... rethug force-fed, manipulative propagandism

see top for full article

[JamesP]

Yes, the Zarqawi killing certainly was the turning point in Iraq we've been hoping for! :roll eyes: :roll eyes:

How can one group (Bush & supporters) be so wrong, so much of the time on subjects of such great importance?

Wave of Bodies in Baghdad Morgue Signals Increased Sectarian Killing
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/070506M.shtml

The central morgue said Tuesday that it received 1,595 bodies last month, 16 percent more than in May, in a tally that showed the pace of killing here has increased since the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq.

[FDRfollower]

Remember my warnings to Gip and the other clueless conservatives about the administrations stupidity making the country defenseless?

At the Senate Armed Forces Committee:

* Senator Jack Reed attacked Rumsfeld for the fact that the U.S. has no ready strategic reserve. ``Mr. Secrertary, it's very clear that two-thirds of the Army operating force, active and reserve, is now reporting as unready. There's not a single nondeployed Army brigade combat team in the United States that is ready to deploy. The bottom line is that we have no ready strategic reserve. and this is a stunning indictment of your leadership.'' General Pace admitted that Reed was right: ``About two thirds of the brigades, as you have pointed out, would report C-3 or C-4.'' Reed: ``Not ready for duty.''

[JamesP]

Rumsfeld is truly a disgrace.

[FDRfollower]

Rumsfeld is truly a disgrace.

Amen brother! :angel:

[FDRfollower]

Lets thank Sen. Byron Dorgan for holding hearings on military oversite, since, as he pointed out, and the Generals he had give testimony also stated, the Republicans have been refusing to have any.thumbs-down Safer, my ass.

I'm looking for a transcript, since playing the video always gives me trouble. Does anyone else have trouble playing video on CSPAN? Its really annoying when the video cuts out in the middle of something important.

[MAGI]

Two and a half months later............
Rummy gone! :thumbup:

So much worse in Iraq! :(

And the, IMHO, BS ISG Report. (There were no progressive liberals on that panel I learned ).............: :mad:

from firedoglake.com :

http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/12/12/merry-christmas-g-bush/#more-6030
Merry Christmas, G. Bush

By:


I expect you are all getting sick of the Baker/Hamilton Iraq Study Group report by now. Well, if it is any consolation that is exactly what Bush and his Administration want you to do. Since its release on December 6, the weaknesses and biases of the ISG report have been out there for all to see and comment on. It has been out less than a week and it already risks slipping into oblivion. Several factors have conspired to this end.

The report was originally slated for release to coincide with the seating of the new Congress in January. This would have put it in the spotlight early and it was hoped keep it there. Events on the ground in Iraq did not cooperate with this timing. Violence was spiraling out of control so fast that there was a real fear that the report would be irrelevant (a charge that has been leveled against it anyway) even before it became public.

The November elections didn't help matters. In the days before them, Baker and Hamilton had been making the rounds of the media political talk circuit. Despite a lot of hinting that their report was going to have something Big to say about Iraq, these appearances were generally uninformative. Given the timing, they seemed to be signaling to the American electorate that the grownups were back in charge, they were going to take care of Iraq, and that therefore it was still safe to vote Republican. When the election results came in and the size of the Democratic victory was clear, the ISG had the choice of trying to catch the wave of popular discontent or watch it as it left them behind. As a result, the date of the report's release was moved forward to December 6.

This would get the report out in the one week that Congress was in session before the end of the year. The presentation, the news conference, the appearance before Congress, the nightly news shows, the Sunday talk shows, all came and went. Meanwhile, Bush wiggled and waffled. He deferred and demurred. He would think about it. He would pick and choose. He would listen to other reports (that he had ordered and which were under his control). He would get back to them and the American people later.

Bush's goal is to dissipate the impact of the report. He is aided in this by the fact that while the timing of the report's release was the best that could be expected under the circumstances, it still was not very good. Yes, the Congress was in session, but not for long, and it was the last gasp of a lame duck and largely discredited Congress at that. Worse, the political doldrums of Christmas and New Year's are upon us. That's a month, an age in politics, that Americans have to forget this report.

The carnage and chaos of Iraq will go on. Bush has promised his own "thoughts" on Iraq to be delivered while we are otherwise engaged, no doubt somewhere between the eggnog and the ball falling in Times Square. He is already stealing the report's thunder by his much publicized series of consultations. Why he has waited 3 1/2 years to do so is a question that should be asked each and every day but won't be. Bush wants us to be sleepy and happy, and forgetful. This gets to one of the reasons I love the Net. However much Bush may wish us to forget, it is in the very nature of the blogosphere not to. For all its flaws, the ISG report has put an official seal on the need for there to be real change in our Iraq policy and not just a change in Bush's rhetoric on it. However imperfect and convoluted the ISG's recommendations are, its underlying message is one of withdrawal, whether Iraq meets the stated goals or not. We must not let Bush blur this central point, a point that is shared not just by the ISG but 70% of the American people. We must not let Bush get away with it. We must remember.

Please read on to see what the firedog bloggers have to say:


http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/12/12/merry-christmas-g-bush/#more-6030

[FDRfollower]

Well well well. Roman empire anyone? Boston Globe article (http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/12/26/military_considers_recruiting_foreigners/)

The lunatics from the Temple of Doom have spoken!

Would you buy a second car from the auto dealer that sold you a car without an engine? Well, the good people of the "American" Enterprise Institute think that even with all the insanity they have created in SouthWest Asia, people should trust them with making sure things turn out ok, i.e. "the surge".

Wash Post article (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/26/AR2006122600773.html)

[Mr. Anderson]

Well ... well ... well ... the U.S. Military wants to enlist foreign fighters to join our military. One more step towards a global fighting force ... towards a one world government ... towards a one world bank. You might say it's kind of like ... a New World Order. How ducky.

My first thought upon reading the article was ... how much easier it would be for foreign fighters to control and fire upon U.S. citizens.

Like I said ... just ducky.