From the very beginning of the debate about the surge, its stated objective was to provide a stable environment in which the Shiia controlled Iraqi government could settle its differences with the Sunnis and Kurdish populations, reach agreement on the division of their oil revenues, take control of their country and begin rebuilding Iraq.
Some how these stated objectives were forgotten and the Republicans began crowing that the surge was working because of the reduction of ethnic violence. To them... that and that alone has become the definition of victory. Never mind the previously stated political objectives, the reduction in violence has been cause for them to once again cry "mission accomplished."
Some years ago I was married into a multimillionaires family and my father-in-law was a Democratic Party Organizer. He was hideously rich and very linked in with big business.
One night when I we both had far too much to drink I asked him, "Why are you a Democrat? The GOP is the party of big business and it would seem they would fit your interests better?"
To which he responded... "Well that's how I sleep at night. God love the poor because they keep me rich and besides the Democrats will always snatch defeat from the jaws of success!"
At the time I was pretty outraged by his cynicism... after looking on the web today I'm not so sure it isn't deserved.
Strange that this doesn't show up in our press, but European news agencies are breaking the story.
Pravda has announced:
Russia becomes officially involved in war against Georgia 08.08.2008
Excerpt:
The UN Security Council gathered for a special session August 8, after 9 a.m. The meeting, held on Russia’s initiative is devoted to the military conflict between Georgia and South Ossetia. Russia’s constant representative at the UN, Vitaly Churkin, urged the UN Security Council to immediately interfere in the situation with South Ossetia to stop violence.
The Georgian aviation attacked South Ossetia on Friday morning. Five Su-25 fighter jets dropped bombs in the area of the town of S.Ossetian town of Tkverneti. The jets also bombed a humanitarian aid column. The President of North Ossetia, Teimuraz Mamsurov, who was traveling to South Ossetia in the column personally confirmed that the jet fighters attacked the column.
There really isn't much more to be said about this other than... If that hack Ashcroft knew that the President's wiretapping order was illegal, then why don't the Dems in the Senate?
All respect due to Senators Dodd, Fiengold, Boxer, Brown, Cantwell, Cardin, Harkin, Kerry, Menendez, and Wyden for upholding the constitution and our Fourth Amendment rights.
I don't have time to write a diary on this but someone should:
Lawmakers heavily invested in defense
Excerpts:
WASHINGTON - Members of Congress have as much as $196 million collectively invested in companies doing business with the Defense Department, earning millions since the onset of the Iraq war, according to a study by a nonpartisan research group.
Not all the companies in which lawmakers invested are typical defense contractors. Corporations such as PepsiCo, IBM, Microsoft and Johnson & Johnson have at one point received defense-related contracts, notes the report by the Washington-based Center for Responsive Politics.
While the political camps have been tearing each other apart, the Great American Economic Train Wreck is underway and the market looks like a bungee jumper and the dollar... a boat anchor!
And what do today's headlines bring us... but the wit and wisdom of none other than Robert Rubin, former Treasury Secretary to President Clinton... the man largely responsible for the Subprime disaster.
Today the web and TV are reacting heavily to the NYT article on the recession and how the banks are being sued for "predatory" lending practices that specifically have targeted black communities.
I’ve been watching the usual corporate MSM doing interviews with Obama and Clinton for their comments on the coming recession and its linkage to the sub-prime mortgage debacle. As to be expected their media blackout of the Edwards campaign continues despite the fact that he has been speaking out about this for a very long time.
Indeed, Edwards included this in his 80 page written "Plan for One America" from day one. Additionally, I’ve heard lots of folks who support other candidates bashing away at him with innuendo about his campaign attracting racists when nothing could be further from the truth.
In trying to make up my mind about the candidates and who to support I have watched them daily for the last four years.
I had the opportunity to do it because four years ago my mother lost the use of her legs to an "undiagnosed motor neuron disease" in six weeks. After months of test by the best neurologists on the east coast it turned out to be from the use of a statin drug, but none of the doctors will commit to saying that on the record because they don’t want to involved in a law suit.
At the same time, my dad who was a double amputee with congestive heart failure and COPD was declared hospice care. He hadn’t lost his legs because of the usual complications that arise from diabetes, but from an unnecessary invasive surgical procedure that produced blood clots in his legs.
Comedian Bill Maher once quipped, "The Republicans have got such a scam going... they get elected by saying that big government is the problem and doesn’t work. Once elected though, they screw everything up and when we complain they say, "See we told you it doesn’t work."
While this is good for a laugh, because better to laugh than cry after what we have witnessed over the last seven years, there is something far more insidious and destructive going on... a deliberate re-engineering of the US that has been well thought out by conservative think tanks like Federalist Society and the Heritage Foundation.
I have often wondered how so many of the red state’s middle class and lower economic voters could be so duped by the "wedge political issues" not to be able to see the big picture of what is going on with the loss of jobs, soaring costs in health care and education, and simply the whole sale destruction of the middle class.
I won't bother to go into any analysis as none is required and the subject has well documented by other bloggers here at D-Kos.
It simple, there is growing support among Democrats and Republicans for the impeachment of Dick Cheney and Rep. Kucinich's (God Bless 'em) impeachment resolution. It was sent to committee by Pelosi Inc. in the hopes of killing it by letting it die a slow death due to ignorance.
Maybe its time that we let the members of that committee know just how we feel about that... especially now that "you know who" is trying to engage us in yet a third war that we can ill afford!
Pelosi and Hoyer were wrong to say that they were taking impeachment off of the table. Bush and Cheney saw that as a green light for them to do anything that they wanted, including starting another war with a country who has been characterized as a "serious threat."
Iran has an economy smaller than Indiana, so how is it that they should be given such serious consideration? Oil... plain and simple! No more blood for Oil!
You scoffed at Billo. You scoffed at FOX News when they reported on that Al Qaeda memo that suggested starting wild fires. Just because it was four years old didn't mean that it wasn't true any more and now they have caught the monster... albeit a little monster, but a monster never the less!
This is the same weasel like answers we heard from Alito and Roberts during their confirmation hearings and look where that got us!
No nominee for AG who will not say what the rest of the world knows to be torture is torture should even be considered for the post.
Bush and Cheney have dragged the good name of this nation through the mud and destroyed the moral high ground that we once stood for as a nation. They have made torture the "Great American Past-time" in the eyes of all the other nations on this planet.
It is time we took back our good name and stopped this despicable behavior now... right now! Draw the line with Mukasey!
Pick up the phone and call your Senators and tell them hell no on Mukasey!
I won't belabor the importance of Habeas Corpus, "The Great Writ", except to point out that without it we have no rights because this is the only way a citizen can have their day in court to determine whether your rights have been violated.
There is no justice without it!
Right now the Habeas Restoration Act is being debated on the floor of the Senate and the current vote count is:
This is not a diary, but a general FYI announcement for you Edwards fans at DKos land.
Edwards buys ad to rebut Bush on Iraq
WASHINGTON - In the clamor of Democrats assailing President Bush on Iraq, presidential candidate John Edwards has found a way to be heard after Bush addresses the nation Thursday night: He's buying time for a rebuttal.
Edwards has bought two minutes of air time on MSNBC, scheduled to air after Bush's 15-minute televised speech from the White House at 9 p.m. EDT.
While Gonzales like so many other members of this criminal administration try to slink out of the spotlight by resigning, we must not allow this to occur.
Testimony from the various investigations show that Gonzales was a co-conspirator in virtually every criminal act committed by this administration. From the initial planning stages with Cheney and John Yoo on the torture memos and the NSA/NSC wiretap FISA violations to the drafting of the Unitary Executive rationale for Bush's signing statements, Gonzales has been in the thick of it.
There is a precedent and solid reasons for bringing him back to face impeachment.
When I first posted the ACLU press release on Friday morning many of the posters suggested that I should do analysis of what I thought the FISC would do and I began researching FISA and the court with all of the usual constitutional law scholars and legal experts... Glenn Greenwald, John Dean, David Cole, and Jonathan Turley.
As I went all over the web reading and reviewing I found that I could find plenty of opinions about FISA court rulings... but practically nothing about the court itself. At the time I joked earlier about FISC being inside the "cone of silence" but it is and it is not a normal court.
