| Friday, September 05, 2008 |
| Sarah gets her neocon training wheels |
The WaPo reveals that Sarah Palin is being tutored in foreign policy by the same coterie of neocons who brought us the Iraq War:
ST. PAUL, Minn., Sept. 4 -- Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman is among several national security experts helping brief Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin on foreign policy issues as she prepares to hit the campaign trail while cramming for a debate with her Democratic opponent, Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (Del.), in less than a month, according to officials from Sen. John McCain's campaign.
Lieberman, who was the 2000 Democratic vice presidential nominee but is now an independent, has helped introduce Palin to officials of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the leading pro-Israel lobby. In a meeting Tuesday, the day before she delivered her prime-time address at the Republican National Convention here, Palin assured the group of her strong support for Israel, of her desire to see the United States move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and of her opposition to Iran's aspirations to become a nuclear power, according to sources familiar with the meeting. ... So who else is on the team?
The McCain campaign has tapped Stephen E. Biegun, the national security adviser to then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), to be Palin's principal foreign policy adviser. Campaign aides said Biegun, who is currently a vice president of Ford, is not serving as Palin's tutor but is merely briefing her on details of key issues in a way that is similar to what other candidates are receiving.
"The attempt is not to turn her into a professor of foreign policy but trying to get her up to speed on all the nuances of foreign policy issues that are hot and John's positions," said John Lehman, a former Navy secretary who is one of McCain's advisers. "She's surprised everybody at how current she is on Middle East issues. She doesn't pretend to be a foreign policy expert, but neither is she somebody who hasn't thought about the issues." Oh good, she has her own Condi Rice!
And...
Bushies Come to Palin's Aid
Michael Isikoff
By Michael Isikoff
The McCain team has hastily assembled a team of former Bush White House aides to tutor the vice-presidential candidate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, on foreign-policy issues, to write her speeches and to begin preparing her for her all-important Oct. 2 debate against Sen. Joe Biden.
Steve Biegun, who once served as the No. 3 National Security Council official under Condoleezza Rice at the White House, has been hired as chief foreign-policy adviser to the Alaska governor, campaign officials told NEWSWEEK. After taking leave from his job as vice president for international affairs at Ford Motor Co. last Friday, Biegun flew to St. Paul and, together with McCain’s foreign-policy guru Randy Schuenemann, began briefings for Palin on national-security issues—an area where her resume is conspicuously thin.
Plus...
Matt Scully, a former Bush White House speechwriter who helped draft some of the major foreign-policy addresses during the president’s first term, is working on Palin’s acceptance speech to the convention Wednesday night.
Mark Wallace, a former lawyer for the Bush 2000 campaign who served in a variety of administration jobs including chief counsel at the Federal Emergency Management Agency and deputy ambassador to the United Nations, has been put in charge of “prep” for the debate against Biden.
Wallace’s wife, Nicolle Wallace, the former White House communications director, has taken over the same job for Palin.
Tucker Eskew, another senior Bush White House communications aide, is serving as senior counselor to Palin’s operation.
Douglas Holtz-Eakin, the former chief economist at the Council of Economic Advisers who has been serving as top economics guru for the McCain campaign, has moved over to serve as Palin’s chief domestic-policy adviser.
Wow.
Maybe once she's fully indoctrinated, even Charles Krauthammer will learn to like her ... maybe.
Labels: foreign policy, Joe Lieberman, neocons, Sarah Palin |
posted by JReid @ 8:00 AM   |
|
|
|
| Wednesday, July 02, 2008 |
| Joint Chiefs Chair: the forgotten war needs more troops |
The latest in the "Iraq stole our war" saga, courtesy of the Washington Post:
The nation's top military officer said today that more U.S. troops are needed in Afghanistan to help tamp down an increasingly violent insurgency but does not have sufficient forces to send because of the war in Iraq.
Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said insurgent Taliban and extremist forces in Afghanistan have become "a very complex problem" that is tied to the extensive drug trade, a faltering economy and the porous border region with Pakistan. Violence in Afghanistan has increased markedly over recent weeks, and June was the deadliest month for U.S. troops since the war began in 2001, with 28 combat fatalities.
"I am and have been deeply troubled by the increasing violence there," Mullen said, adding that he has made no secret of wanting to send more forces into the country. "The Taliban and their supporters have become more effective in recent weeks. ... We all need to be patient. As we have seen in Iraq, counterinsurgency warfare takes time and commitment."
Mullen said military commanders are looking at the prospects for sending additional troops to Afghanistan in 2009, but conditions in Iraq would have to continue to improve for that to happen. The war in Iraq has occupied as many as 20 military brigades during the troop buildup over the past year. The military is reducing that force to 15 brigades this year.
"I don't have troops I can reach for, brigades I can reach to send into Afghanistan until I have a reduced requirement in Iraq," Mullen said. "Afghanistan remains an economy of force campaign, which by definition means we need more forces there. We have the ability in almost every single case to win from the combat standpoint, but we don't have enough troops there to hold. That is key to the future of being able to succeed in Afghanistan." ...
And as for the neocons' plans for the next war?
Mullen said plainly that he opposes the U.S. or Israel engaging Iran with a military strike.
"My strong preference is to handle all of this diplomatically with the other powers of government, as opposed to any kind of strike occurring," Mullen said. "This is a very unstable part of the world and I don't need it to be more unstable."
Shhh! Don't tell Lieberman and McCain!
| Labels: Admiral Mullen, Afghanistan, Bush administration, Bush's wars, foreign policy, Iraq, Joint Chiefs, the forgotten war, U.S. military |
| posted by JReid @ 6:08 PM |
|
|
|
| Wednesday, March 26, 2008 |
| How to demostrate support for democracy |
I haven't been a big fan of French President Nicolas Sarkozy. Something about him just seems a bit ... well ... never mind (he does have a Jackie O wife (when she's dressed, of course...) a jilted ex a-la Ronald Reagan. (Seulement en France...) But has taken a strong, and I believe, correct stand on Chinese-hosted Summer Olympic Games, which may be well in need of an international boycott, even if just of the opening ceremonies. Without a boycott by leaders of "A list" countries like France, the U.K., and, if we had a real leader with the slightest international stature, the United States, the world must just admit it fears Beijing, and cannot influence its horrific mistreatment of Tibet. Sarkozy can send such signals, because France, having sat out the Iraq fiasco, retains its stature in the international community. (Belgium's leaders have indicated they might boycott the opening ceremonies, too.) Unfortunately, I'm not surprised that President Bush has already ceded the boycott trump card in his supposed "pressuring" of the Chinese government over Tibet, given the corporate nature of his presidency, and the utter dependence of the U.S. on our Chinese bankers. Oh, and Bush says he's a sports fan, so he's goin'! Well yee-haw. Our bumpkin president strikes again. Labels: China, foreign policy, international news, President Bush, Tibet, worst president ever |
| posted by JReid @ 12:14 AM |
|
|
|
| Sunday, September 23, 2007 |
| The next war? |
On his blog for the Atlantic Monthly, Andrew Sullivan writes today:
Bill Kristol knows that the current strategy in Iraq will not work as it was designed to do. He's not crazy. The chances of national reconciliation in Iraq have gone backward, not forward, this past year, and the U.S.'s empowerment of anti-Shiite propaganda in Anbar will only isolate Maliki further. The best that can happen is an indefinite occupation of a dismembered Iraq to slow down genocide and make ethnic cleansing more orderly. But even that is a very risky proposition. And the events of last week mean that the Republican party now owns the Iraq occupation more exclusively and deeply than they ever had - and indeed intend to maintain it for another decade.
So what to do? Remember that Kristol's loyalty to the Republicans often trumps national security. How else to explain his support for the GOP last November, even though a Republican victory would have prevented the surge in the first place and kept Rumsfeld in the Pentagon? One option: Change the subject by launching wars against Syria and Iran, and so polarize the country that the choice is framed as: MoveOn or America? That's much better than having, you know, an actual debate about the merits of the war in Iraq and the war against Islamist terror. On that, Republicans lose. If the war is far wider and more terrifying, if the enemies can be multiplied and amplified, then the dynamic plays to the advantage of the GOP. It's for us or against us again.
Remember it doesn't matter to the current Bush Republicans if they cannot persuade a majority of thie necessity of extending the war to Iran and Syria. They have dropped attempting to persuade a majority on the war. They are concerned only with shoring up their own party, which can enable them to launch new wars before the current presidency ends. ... That being the case, Sullivan reports, via Kristol, that the president must now move to put down potential rebellions against his policy from within the military, from generals who may be "jealous of Petraeus" (whatever that means -- could one possibly be jealous of the military man placed in the service of presidential P.R.?) or who otherwise oppose Bush on the subject of expanding the war to Syria and Iran, in order to prevent them from underminig the neocon project in Iraq.
But not all of the military is in need of "putting down."
The Times of London reports, also today, on a secret Air Force unit already planning for war against Tehran:
THE United States Air Force has set up a highly confidential strategic planning group tasked with “fighting the next war” as tensions rise with Iran.
Project Checkmate, a successor to the group that planned the 1991 Gulf War’s air campaign, was quietly reestablished at the Pentagon in June.
It reports directly to General Michael Moseley, the US Air Force chief, and consists of 20-30 top air force officers and defence and cyberspace experts with ready access to the White House, the CIA and other intelligence agencies.
Detailed contingency planning for a possible attack on Iran has been carried out for more than two years by Centcom (US central command), according to defence sources.
Checkmate’s job is to add a dash of brilliance to Air Force thinking by countering the military’s tendency to “fight the last war” and by providing innovative strategies for warfighting and assessing future needs for air, space and cyberwarfare.
It is led by Brigadier-General Lawrence “Stutz” Stutzriem, who is considered one of the brightest air force generals. He is assisted by Dr Lani Kass, a former Israeli military officer and expert on cyberwarfare. The Israeli connection is alarming, given the myriad signals that the U.S. policy in Iran is heavily influenced by the desires of the Likud government -- which badly wants President Bush to rid Israel of its chief enemies: Iran and Syria, before Mr. Bush leaves office, Saddam Hussein already having been taken care of.
It's not just those on the left who fear that Mr. Bush will launch yet another war on his way out the door. Pat Buchanan and other true conservatives believe as much as well, as do leading journalists like Seymour Hersh.
The question remains, however, whether Congress will sit still for yet another war, and whether Senate Democrats can successfully stop neocons and deocons like Joe Lieberman, from aiding the Bush administration in forcing upon this country a foreign policy that is not in the best interests of the United States.
Labels: Bush administration, foreign policy, Iran, neocons |
| posted by JReid @ 7:59 PM |
|
|
|
| Sunday, March 18, 2007 |
| Four years on... |
Tomorrow, March 19, 2007, will mark the four-year anniversary of the start of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Four years ago tomorrow, I was sitting in a newsroom at an NBC affiliate in South Florida cringing, as some of the people around me cheered the commencement of "shock and awe." The atmosphere at that time, was "we're gonna get the sonofabitches that got us on 9/11" ... that and the resplendant graphics and potential ratings coup for the network that was gonna keep the tube sizzling for months! This was a television war -- complete with dramatic images (Saddam's statue being toppled by around 100 Iraqis, whom we later learned were itinerant young men gathered in Firdos Square by American troops, while less than a mile away, their fellow Iraqis were fighting a guerilla war against coalition soldiers and taking bombardment by U.S. airstrikes... Jessica Lynch bravely emptying her rifle as she and her fellow support troops were captured by the enemy ... of course, that turned out not to be true either ... and of course, that "shock and awe" that was supposed to take out Saddam Hussein and his sons on the first day of the conflict, and by such drama, ending it. Well, we all know how that turned out...)
Four years later, what we're left with are the deaths, of Americans and Iraqis, the mistakes, the bungling, the tawdry execution of Saddam, the protests, the politics, and the excuses, which continue to be marketed on behalf of the Bush administration by such reputable characters as Tom Delay, who along with Richard "there's be a boulevard in Baghdad named for George W. Bush" Perle was demolished this morning on Meet the Press -- despite the best efforts of Tim "Scooter's Alibi" Russert to save them -- by retired Navy Admiral and current U.S. Congressman Joe Sestak (D-PA) and Win Without War director Tom Andrews on the subject of whether the Iraq war made sense in 2003, and whether our remainig there makes sense now. (Best like of the morning came from Andrews, who said he'd much rather take military advice from Admiral Sestak than from Delay...)
Which brings us back to the body count. So far, The Pentagon has confirmed the deaths of 3,204 American servicemen and women as of March 17th. Add to that the 14 pending confirmation which were reported over the last several days, and you're left with a U.S. military death toll of 3,218. On the Iraqi side, estimates range from around 60,000, to 600,000, depending on which study you believe, plus some 2 million refugees (remember when Don Rumsfeld congratulated himself on there not being a refugee crisis? Those were the days...)
If you map out the U.S. casualty count, you find the numbers are heaviest in the blue states, with the exception of Texas. The highest rate of death among American servicemen to date has been in California, where 334 Americans have died in service during the war, followed by Texas (289), Pennsylvania (156), New York (145), Ohio (142), Florida (130), Michigan (125) and Illinois (119). These are the "red states" of the casualty count map -- those with 100 fatalities or more. The states with the lowest numbers happen to be in the middle part of the country -- the politically red part of the map (the deep and middle South included), where political support for the war remains strongest. In fact, the lowest body count of all is in Washington D.C., where so far 3 brave troops have been lost -- one less than in the U.S. territory of the Northern Mariana Islands, and two less than American Samoa.
Perhaps it's a crass way of looking at it, but one wonders if Joe Lieberman is able to be as enthusiastic about the war as he is because his state has lost 24 troops as opposed to 240, while places like Barack Obama's Illinois and Hillary Clinton's New York have borne a much heavier burden (keeping in mind that even one serviceman or woman is too much to lose, for that person's family, and for the country.)
Taking a closer look at Florida (home to the sixth largest casualty count), since that's where I live, the deaths traverse the state, from Apopka to Daytona to Carol City, Gainesville and Hialeah, but the largest numbers have been troops from Jacksonville, Miami, Orlando and Tampa (the latter being a big military town).
Breaking down the deaths by ethnicity, you find that just over 74 percent of the American dead were white, another 11 percent Latino, 9.7 percent Black, and 1-2 percent apiece were Native American, Asian or Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander (another 2 percent undetermined). Black enlistment has plunged over the last five years, as distrust of the Bush administration has kept many young Blacks from enlisting, even after the initial enlistment rush across all ethnicities after 9/11. (Fatalities by sex are more outsized -- women make up just 2.2 percent of the dead, though that translates to 72 American women, plus four women from other countries.)
What's even more outsized, when you look at the statistics, is the toll the war has taken on the United States Army and Marines, which have borne the brunt of this war, losing 1,681 and 788 members respectively, thus far. That's not unusual because this has been a ground war, but what's also disturbing about the numbers, is the heavy toll on the Army National Guard (412 deaths), Army Reserve (106) and Marine Reserve (118), which are so critical to our security here at home. It should not be ignored, of course, that the Navy (58 - including several Navy Seabees from here in Florida), Naval Reserve (13), Coast Guard (1), Air Force and Air National Guard (2) have also taken losses in the war, and their sacrifices are just as important, and just as painful for their families.
And then there is what you might call the "mercenary war." Don Rumsfeld as head of the DoD presided not just over the inexplicable "light force" approach to waging a ground war, but also the Bush administration obsession of privatization, which included the deployment of private contractors to do many of the jobs that used to be done by members of the military. As such, 389 civilian contractors (some former military, some just entrepreneurs or truckers) have lost their lives in Iraq, some in dramatic fashion, like the four contractors who were murdered, burned and then hung in Fallujah, or those beheaded by insurgents, but most without much fanfare in the U.S., and with only their families to mourn. Many would argue that most died unnecessarily, mostly at the hands of roadside bombs, but increasingly, due to small arms fire, or more disturbingly, helicopter shoot-downs by insurgents.
If you really want to be disturbed, look at a chart of fatalities caused by IEDs month to month, and watch how they've skyrocketed since the supposed end of the war when Bush declared "mission accomplished" on May 1st, 2003 aboard the Naval carrier the USS Abraham Lincoln. There have been 37 such attacks so far in March, more than took place in any month in the first year and a half of the conflict.
Meanwhile, this from the National Security Network:
Washington, DC-Six senior retired military officers today sent a letter to Capitol Hill expressing support for immediate action to protect our troops in an effort supported by the Center for American Progress Action Fund and the National Security Network.
Text of the letter:
Dear Members of the 110th Congress,
We are writing to urge you to take immediate action to protect our troops.
We are concerned that the plan to deploy additional troops to Iraq, coupled with the serious readiness deficiencies, have left our armed forces in a state of emergency.
The situation in Iraq, grave and deteriorating, is troubling to us both as former military commanders and as American citizens. Top military officials have consistently acknowledged that the repeated and lengthy deployments are straining the Army, Marine Corps and Reserve and National Guard forces, and are taking a heavy toll on critical warfighting equipment.
We urge you to put pressure on the Iraqi government to take control of their own country and relieve the burden from American troops by setting a clear and definite timeline for a phased and deliberate redeployment of American combat forces from Iraq by no later than August 2008. We urge you to ensure that our troops meet the readiness standards required to protect Americans both at home and abroad. We urge you to ensure that those who serve in the name of this country receive the health care and support they need when they return to us.
Thank you for your consideration of our views. We look forward to working with you.
Sincerely,
Lieutenant General Robert G. Gard, Jr. (USA, Ret.)
Former President of the National Defense University
Brigadier General John Johns (USA, Ret.), PhD
Former Combat Arms Officer; Professor, national security strategy, National Defense University
Colonel Richard L. Klass (USAF, Ret.)
Captain Lawrence Korb (USNR, Ret.)
Assistant Secretary of Defense (Manpower, Reserve Affairs, Installations and Logistics), 1981-1985
Major General Mel Montano (USANG, Ret.)
Former Adjutant General of New Mexico
Lieutenant General William E. Odom (USA, Ret.)
Former Assistant Chief of Staff for Intelligence of the Army, and former Military Assistant to the President's Assistant for National Security Affairs, 1977-1981 We'll have Dr. Korb on the morning show tomorrow to discuss the state of the war, along with James Paul of the Global Policy Forum, which is issuing a damning report on the state of the war to date, as well as D.C. businessman Yasir Shalal, a board member of the Iraqi American Alliance, who has family still in Iraq, as well as family who has fled the country to neighboring Jordan or elsewhere to escape the chaos the war has caused.
And last but not least, the latest poll numbers, starting with CNN:
The CNN poll of 1,027 adults was conducted March 9-11 by Opinion Research Corp. The sampling error for the poll is plus or minus 3 percentage points.
According to the results, 35 percent of Americans are confident about the war, the poll said. When the war began, 83 percent of Americans expressed confidence in the campaign.
Similarly, 30 percent of those polled this month said they were proud of the war, as opposed to 65 percent who expressed that sentiment in 2003.
The poll also showed that 33 percent of Americans are afraid of the war and 55 percent are worried by it. Those percentages are roughly the same as they were four years ago.
Sunday's results came on the heels of a Saturday release indicating that years of war had whittled away at Americans' support for the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
When the Iraq war began, 68 percent of Americans said they felt the situation in the country was worth fighting over. Now, 61 percent of those surveyed say it was not worth invading Iraq, according to the poll.
That survey of 1,027 adults by Opinion Research Corp. was conducted by telephone March 9-11 as well. It has a sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
The poll showed that support for the Iraq war had dwindled to 35 percent. In 2004, support for the war was about 56 percent. Last year, the number dipped to 37 percent, and today about 35 percent of Americans say they support the war, according to the poll.
Support for the war in Afghanistan also has seen a considerable decline as 88 percent of those polled in 2001 said they were behind the conflict. This month's poll indicates that support lingers around 53 percent.
Also, according to the poll, about 55 percent of Americans feel the war in Afghanistan is "going badly," according to the poll. BTW, the CNN poll also found that a majority of Americans favor Congress, not the president, setting Iraq policy at this stage. Other poll results on support for the war:
- NBC News/WSJ (3/2-5, A/D) 27/67
- Newsweek (2/28-3/1) - 27/67
- CBS/NYT (2/23-27) - 23/71
So is there any good news for the Bush administration and their shills friends in Congress? Well there's this: the war is almost as toxic for Democrats as it is for them.
Labels: Bush administration, foreign policy, Iraq, Iraq war, military, polls, shock and awe |
| posted by JReid @ 1:41 PM |
|
|
|
| Wednesday, February 28, 2007 |
| Military intelligence |
You kind of figured that a few too many die-hard fans of the show "24" have begun to mistake the fictional Fox show for "war on terror" reality, didn't you? Well, guess what? Thrown into interrogations without any rules or Geneva restrictions, guess what confused, frustrated U.S. troops turned to when trying to extract information from Iraqi and other detainees?
And speaking of the so-called "war on terror," when will it end, daddy? Oh, right around the time of the 2008 election, dear... just in time to help out the ailing GOP...
In the meantime, how do you keep things like bad publicity over piss poor treatment of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans from sinking the GWOT P.R. flotilla? Why, you shut up the soldiers, of course! From the Army Times:
Soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center’s Medical Hold Unit say they have been told they will wake up at 6 a.m. every morning and have their rooms ready for inspection at 7 a.m., and that they must not speak to the media.
“Some soldiers believe this is a form of punishment for the trouble soldiers caused by talking to the media,” one Medical Hold Unit soldier said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
It is unusual for soldiers to have daily inspections after Basic Training.
Soldiers say their sergeant major gathered troops at 6 p.m. Monday to tell them they must follow their chain of command when asking for help with their medical evaluation paperwork, or when they spot mold, mice or other problems in their quarters.
They were also told they would be moving out of Building 18 to Building 14 within the next couple of weeks. Building 14 is a barracks that houses the administrative offices for the Medical Hold Unit and was renovated in 2006. It’s also located on the Walter Reed Campus, where reporters must be escorted by public affairs personnel. Building 18 is located just off campus and is easy to access.
Also:
The Pentagon also clamped down on media coverage of any and all Defense Department medical facilities, to include suspending planned projects by CNN and the Discovery Channel, saying in an e-mail to spokespeople: “It will be in most cases not appropriate to engage the media while this review takes place,” referring to an investigation of the problems at Walter Reed. Not appropriate, indeed.
Anyway, we wouldn't want the press hyping up those tens of thousands of vets who insist on darkening the doors of the VA system for those silly dental problems... now, would we? Oops, did I say "dental problems?" Sorry, I was quoting a disingenuous Bush administration official. What I mean to say was "catastrophic brain injuries..."
So while we're on the subject of the military and war, just how the hell are things going with that "surge" in Iraq, pray tell? Says the Guardian:
An elite team of officers advising US commander General David Petraeus in Baghdad has concluded the US has six months to win the war in Iraq - or face a Vietnam-style collapse in political and public support that could force the military into a hasty retreat.
The officers - combat veterans who are leading experts in counter-insurgency - are charged with implementing the "new way forward" strategy announced by president George Bush on January 10. The plan includes a controversial "surge" of 21,500 additional American troops to establish security in the Iraqi capital and Anbar province.
But the team, known as the "Baghdad brains trust" and ensconced in the heavily fortified Green Zone around the US embassy, is struggling to overcome a range of entrenched problems in what has become a race against time, said a former senior administration official familiar with their deliberations. "They know they are operating under a clock. They know they are going to hear a lot more talk in Washington about 'Plan B' by the autumn - meaning withdrawal. They know the next six-month period is their opportunity. And they say it's getting harder every day," the former official said.
By improving security, the plan's short-term aim is to create time and space for the Iraqi government to bring rival Shia, Sunni and Kurd factions together in a process of national reconciliation, us officials say. If that works within the stipulated timeframe, longer-term schemes for rebuilding Iraq under the so-called "go long" strategy will be set in motion. But the next six months are make-or-break for both the US military and the Iraqi government.
The main obstacles confronting Gen Petraeus's team are:
· Insufficent numbers of troops on the ground
· A "disintegrating" international coalition
· An anticipated upsurge in violence in the south as the British leave
· Morale problems as casualties rise
· A failure of political will in Washington and/or Baghdad
"The scene is very tense. They are working round the clock. Endless cups of tea with the Iraqis," the former senior administration official said. "But they're still trying to figure out what's the plan. The president is expecting progress. But they're thinking, what does he mean? The plan is changing every minute, as all plans do." And why do we STILL not have enough troops in the theater? ThinkP:
Top U.S. intelligence officials yesterday disclosed to the Senate “that the deployment of Iraqi forces into Baghdad under President Bush’s new plan to stabilize Iraq is running behind schedule and that all of the units sent so far have arrived under strength, some by more than half.“ Nice job, Dubya.
Labels: Bush administration, foreign policy, Iraq, military, troop surge, veterans, Walter Reed, war |
| posted by JReid @ 4:00 PM |
|
|
|
| Monday, February 26, 2007 |
| Quick take headlines: Monday, Monday |
America: You'll come for the Bush administration, you'll stay for the poverty.
A McClatchy Newspapers analysis of 2005 census figures, the latest available, found that nearly 16 million Americans are living in deep or severe poverty. A family of four with two children and an annual income of less than $9,903 -- half the federal poverty line -- was considered severely poor in 2005. So were individuals who made less than $5,080 a year.
The McClatchy analysis found that the number of severely poor Americans grew by 26 percent from 2000 to 2005. That's 56 percent faster than the overall poverty population grew in the same period. McClatchy's review also found statistically significant increases in the percentage of the population in severe poverty in 65 of 215 large U.S. counties, and similar increases in 28 states. The review also suggested that the rise in severely poor residents isn't confined to large urban counties but extends to suburban and rural areas.
Kentucky's deep poverty rate increased 26 percent from 2000 to 2005, adding 59,305 people to the ranks of the severely poor according to the study. Kentucky's poverty rate, 16.8 percent, and deep poverty rate, 7.1 percent, for 2005 are both higher than the national averages of 13.3 percent and 5.7 percent, respectively.
'Permanent underclass'
The plight of the severely poor is a distressing sidebar to an unusual economic expansion. Worker productivity has increased dramatically since the brief recession of 2001, but wages and job growth have lagged behind and the share of national income going to corporate profits has dwarfed the amount going to wages and salaries. That helps explain why the median household income of working-age families, adjusted for inflation, has fallen for five straight years.
These and other factors have helped push 43 percent of the nation's 37 million poor people into deep poverty -- the highest rate since at least 1975. ...
Meanwhile, across the pond, the British government considers classifying an 8-year-old boy as abused, because his parents have allowed him to balloon to 14 stone -- that's 196 pounds in America-speak.
If you want to feel really bad about what's going on in Iraq, read this.
And how FUBAR is American foreign policy in this hemisphere? Colombia, on whom we've pinned all our hopes of avoiding a totally leftist region, turns to an old card that will be familiar to the Bushies: death squads.
Labels: Bush administration, current affairs, foreign policy, news, poverty |
| posted by JReid @ 9:42 AM |
|
|
|
| Thursday, January 18, 2007 |
| Fidel at death's door, along with U.S. Latin America policy |
 As Fidel Castro's health continues to decline, the inevitable questions of what will happen when the Cuban dictator finally kicks the bucket -- of health failure, by the way, and not at the hands of the American government, who have been out to get him for four decades -- are rushing to the forefront.
The U.S. military is making plans to handle a possible mass exodus from the island, by housing refugees on Guantanamo Bay, which we continue, oddly, to lease from the hated Castro regime (the lease predates the dictator by nearly 60 years).
And there are signs that the Castro brothers are formulating plans of their own, for succession, stability and "continuity of dictatorial government..."
Meanwhile, everyone is watching the Miami street, which will erupt in celebration (probably led by Congresswoman Ros Lehtinen, who would have to console herself that Castro wasn't assassinated by pondering the possibile property acquisitions that could be hers if the price is right, and the Cubans decide to go back to the good old days of mob controlled casinos and American sugar plantations...) and that could shut down Miami, which is something like 60 percent Cuban-American...
Added to all this drama is the trial of an anti-Castro militant (were he of Middle Eastern origin, we'd call him a terrorist) Luis Posada, who has been known to blow up an Havana disco or two in search of Libertad! for his country. A witness against him in his trial for sneaking into the U.S. with two other banditos, recently found a pipe bomb under his truck.
Ah, seems the exile community hasn't grown all that much since the days of Orlando Bosch (the 1978 Cuban airline bomber who was pardoned by Pappy Bush in 1990 at the behest of his golden boy, Jeb) ... Posada has strong support in the militant wing of the exile community, at least when it's not fighting over children's school books...
As you probably can tell, I see no good guys in the Cuba issue. Castro is a dictator, straight up, no chaser. He has lorded over that country simply because he wishes to, for far too long, under the typical leftista guise of "having to remain" as the shepherd for his people, who after all, cannot practice proper socialismo on their own (after all, who can?) But American (and Cuban exile) designs on that island are hardly stemming from pure hearts or clean motives. The U.S. wants back its private plantations and casinos, and would love to control the natural resources of that island, as we did before the revolution (hellooooo, Big Sugar!) And the more "Spaniard" of the exiles, many of whom fled the island and left their rich haciendas behind, with the full intention of returning someday to claim their property from the great unwashed (their former servants) who live in the mansions now, cut up into apartments) are looking to regain ownership and domination of the "negritos."
 Throw in the nasty tactics of the exile militants over the years, which include real life terrorism against any Cuban who dares not support the counter-revolution, and it becomes clear that in the case of Cuba, there is no high ground.
And then, there's the fact that Cuba is not some isolated Socialist outpost. It now has friends -- countries that the U.S. once pushed rightward but which are now solidly leftist and anti-US: Nicaragua (which has back Manuel Noriega -- sorry, Olly North, Venezuela, whose president calls our president the devil, plus Argentina, Chile, most recently Bolivia, and on and on... (When historians study the Bush presidency, the debacle in Iraq will dominate, but a proper sub-headline will be how this president, after his father's pretty good strides in the region, lost Latin America... through a combination of bullying over Iraq, and benign neglect.)
This leftist Latin world has embraced Cuba and Fidelism, and they will continue to prop up a socialist government even if it's run by the possibly weaker Raul, encouraging even a new-looking Havana regime to maintain its anti-U.S. positioning.
With all this in the mix, the outcome for the U.S. can't be good, even with the hated Fidel gone.
Labels: Bush administration, Cuba, Fidel Castro, foreign policy, U.S. |
| posted by JReid @ 6:11 PM |
|
|
|
|
