Where's MY Name?

Casey,

He is such a loser, you shouldn't waste your time with that moron. As far as your letter goes, he probably couldn't understand most of it.

Casey,

I checked out his pitiful list. I couldn't believe it when I saw MSNBC.

Yes, but that loser was on The Today Show this morning givng commentary on Bush's speech for the MSM, and calling Jack Murtha a Hitler sympathiser.

Normally I appreciate people who, like myself, tend to speak their mind regardless of the consequences. Maybe Bill and I are more alike thaan I'd like to admit. However, there is often a clear distinction between voicing one's opinion, and ranting about a topic which one knows nothing about. I too may speak my mind openly, but unlike O'Reilly I tend to reserve my thoughts to subjects in which I have some knowledge. When Bill O'Reilly, as a rich white male Fox Entertainment commentor who never served his country becomes qualified to speak about the War in Iraq and how to handle the situation, I will then become qualified to tell Oprah what it is like being one the most revered African American Women in the world as a white, blonde hair/blue eyed college male.

Queeg me, daddy, eight to the bar...

Je fais des excuses, Casey, mais je ne parle pas le français,
M. Loutre

(P.S. --- Goddess bless you, Nancy Pelosi!)

Otter...

Is the pain worse when you type in French?

Can You Digit?

Behind the 'National Strategy' for victory
An unconventional war requires an unconventional strategy

By Howard Fineman
MSNBC contributor
Updated: 10:18 a.m. ET Nov. 30, 2005

WASHINGTON – As usual, the rhetoric surrounding the war in Iraq is about two elections – one there and one here. President Bush and the Republicans need the first one to succeed to have a chance of surviving the second.

With his new “National Strategy for Victory in Iraq,” the president isn’t really aiming for “victory” in the conventional sense. Nothing is “conventional” in a war against Islamist terrorists, and Iraq will remain a breeding ground for them regardless. Rather, Bush’s goal is to begin a draw down of our troops before next year’s Congressional elections. To do that, he needs the Dec. 15 election in Iraq to go well, with Sunni participation. Then the troop reductions can begin.

The weak “cut and run.” This president, nudged by Karl Rove, will trim and tiptoe. That way, White House advisors hope Bush can pay homage to the Cheney neocon vision and save his presidency at the same time.

At Annapolis, the president was speaking to audiences in both countries, but primarily to the one in Mesopotamia. Part of his purpose was to convince Iraqis that we still mean business there, and that our own voters don’t have the political leverage to demand an immediate, mass exodus of American troops.

White House aides say Bush’s speech is only the first of a series between now and Dec. 15. That’s a good indication of who the real audience for them is.

Bring out the magnifying glasses
As for the ’06 elections here, the stakes are enormous in both countries for a simple reason: subpoena power.

If anything, the Democrats’ hunger is growing to probe such questions as: why we went to Iraq; how we bungled the planning for the aftermath of the war; and who has profited from our presence there.

But Democrats have been blocked from serious (and headline-grabbing) investigative hearings by the Republicans’ control of Congress. The GOP often has refused to issue subpoenas or call witnesses to testify under oath.

Secret joint committees, journalists and, indirectly, Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald have all been looking into the roots and rationale for the war in Iraq. If the Democrats get control of either half of the Congress, expect a flood of subpoenas, a parade of high-profile hearings, and constitutional confrontations over access to administration documents that might show “who knew what when.”

The last two years of the Bush presidency will be nothing more than an investigative rehash of the central decision of the first two, which was to go to war in Iraq.
A 'new' morning in America?
And so what are the chances that the Democrats can win back one of the two chambers?

The other day I bumped into the semi-legendary Grover Norquist, the tax lobbyist and conservative activist who is bosom buddies with Karl Rove.

Norquist was, not surprisingly, imperturbably optimistic about the GOP’s prospects in ’06. “This year was a perfect storm of factors that hurt us: Katrina, the war, Harriet Miers, gasoline prices,” he told me. “The good news for us is that the election is NEXT year.”

Miers was a mistake, not a betrayal of the conservative base, he said. Lessons Were Learned after Katrina. Gasoline prices won’t skyrocket next summer. Norquist didn’t say why he thought this would be true (but I have my own idea: the oil companies and the Saudis don’t want the Democrats back in power anymore than Dick Cheney does).

Finally, Norquist said, the situation in Iraq will improve. The election will work, the U.S. troop numbers will be going in the right direction – that is, downward. “We’re not looking at a big change in Congress,” he said. Unless, he added, things didn’t go well in Iraq.

Exactly.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10254949/

And on the Administration of Torture front from the Washington Post:

General: Americans Must Stop Iraqi Abusers

By WILLIAM C. MANN
The Associated Press
Wednesday, November 30, 2005; 3:19 AM

WASHINGTON -- The nation's top military man, Marine Gen. Peter Pace, said American troops in Iraq have a duty to intercede and stop abuse of prisoners by Iraqi security personnel.

When Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld contradicted Pace, the general stood firm.

Rumsfeld told the general he believed Pace meant to say the U.S. soldiers had to report the abuse, not stop it.

Pace stuck to his original statement.

The unusual exchange occurred during a discussion at a news conference about the relationship between U.S. forces in Iraq and an Iraqi government considered sovereign by the United States.

read the rest of the article...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/30/AR2005113000173.html

tu nous manquais Otter!

My dear monkeymango,

If I were only in the company of Digit Alice, my heart would go out to you even as we type.

otterland, otterland uber alles,
haariges endstuck

(P.S. -- why do Republicans like to play golf when they are supposed to be working instead? Because it's the only time they can dress up like pimps and get away with it. *fnord*)

Oh, yeah --

(1) How many angels can dance on a pinhead of an O'Reilly?

(2) I apologize for my previous P.S., I know that was a cheap shot and a tacky joke. It's just that I don't know that many other funny things to say about people who play golf. (Not that there's anything wrong with that, you understand... *ahem*)

remember: "Faux News" is aka "fairway and ballast",
Otter

Clue: Otter with a putter at the puter.

I wonder... what would become of an Otter and Monkey creation?

Just FYI... new diary on dailykos...

CA-48: Election TUESDAY! Help Needed Now

more details here...
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/11/30/121833/47

Posted by: Casey Morris at November 30, 2005 12:50 PM

Calling Jack Murtha a Hitler sympathizer will not help O'Reilly. I hope he keeps it up.

Casey, you certainly deserve to join the list!

Billmon has an excellent blog post today.

An excerpt:
"Now the thrust of the story -- and of the outrage expressed by the anonymous Pentagon sources who passed out the paperwork on Lincoln's little payola scheme -- is the utter hypocrisy of preaching democracy and transparency while secretly bribing journalists to print government propaganda.

But knowing what we already know about how the Cheney administration and the semi-official media (Fox News, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, Judy Woodward, etc.) operate here at home, it's not exactly a surprise to learn the same techniques are being used to shape the information "battle space" in Iraq. After all, why should the Iraqis get more democracy than we do?"

A link: http://billmon.org/archives/002347.html

IMO, O'Reilly seems to have quite a bit of bitterness and hatred bottled up inside. Self-hatred too.

He seems to carry a cloud of negativity over his head.

It would be hard to like yourself if you sold your voice to the dark side.

But, then that's just my opinion.

And now this would be the part of the program wherein Mr. Swill O'Reilly will be kindly invited to join El Arbustito in cordially biting my furry otteristic asterisk.

Not that there's anything wrong with that, you understand.

don't blame me; I voted for the other guy,
Otter

Don't worry about O'Reilly. It's far more glam to have an FBI file and a national security letter.

Ahhh, O'Reilly's just jealous of Rush Limbaugh -- it's *really* glam to have CNN's Daryl Kagan for a main squeeze, rather than O'Reilly's undeniably talented but nonetheless less famous wife, nu?

But then again, not only is Kagan's CNN stablemate Judy Woodruff married to the Wall Street Journal's longtime editor Al Hunt; but MSNBC's showcase reporter Andrea Mitchell is herself married to -- get this -- none other than Alan Greenspan.

I guess that politics really *does* makes strange bedfellows, as they say...

gee who'd'a thunk it,
Otter

Posted by: Otter at November 30, 2005 06:31 PM

Who's Woodward been sleepin' with?

Mrs. Woodward?

http://www.nndb.com/people/316/000022250/

The following post is a response to someone else's post on firedoglake. It stopped me in my tracks. I think the author is absolutely right to redirect our attention. The post begins with a quote from another poster named Pacha followed by the response from suntzu.

Pacha: The big picture, once again, is this: Rove is not the main target. I don't care if he gets off if the whole Republican party leadership structure is effectively decapitated and disgraced.

Right, Rove is not the main target, never was. Rove after all is a surrogate for Bush, and if you want to make the case, then Bush is the main target. But why stop there? Bush is a surrogate for an oligarchical network of power brokers who put him in the Oval Office in the first place.

So who are these power brokers? What I see, through a glass darkly, is several power centers that though they not be working lock-step and in concert, are working synergistically to advance their own agendas: the military/industrial/corporate/oil complex, the religious fundies, the neocons, the right-leaning MSM, and of course the Republican party structure itself. And if you really want a dark view, you can throw in the Supreme Court under Rhenquist/Scalia/Thomas. Sorry to bring the bad news, but the combined effect of all these influences is not going to be cancelled by putting a few leakers in jail. At best it can be a straw in the wind.

Bush is done, no doubt about it. But being done does not mean he is harmless. Not with 3 more years to wreak havoc. Like a cornered rat, he is going to be meaner and cleverer as things get tougher. He co-opted the Dems into getting into the war, and he will do it on the way out. If things go well, he will take the credit, if not the Dems take the blame. When he announced a withdrawal plan "very much like the one advanced by the other party" he is setting the Dems up for blame.

But I digress. The main point is that if we see the start of a new Golden Age for American democracy being throwing Bush and the Pubs out of office, that is sadly delusive. For the simple reason that the power centers I referred to will still be in place and secure. In some ways they are getting stronger, the SCOTUS being a ready example. With the single exception of the neocons, who are losing clout, the rest of the oligarcy is likely to grow in strength at the expense of the rest of us.

What to do? I don't have the answers, obviously. But in the sense the "all politics is local" saving the future of the country is also "local" and begins in the two square feet you occupy as you go about your business of living. We need to play the same game as the big power brokers and establish power centers of our own to influence whomever we encounter towards a continuing vision of peace, harmony, and true democracy.

Will that work? Don't bet on it, but that is your best shot, and you better take it.
suntzu | 11.29.05 - 8:11 am | #

http://www.haloscan.com/comments/firedoglake/113320491520257379/#176626

Pssst, look who's defending the president...

Miller 'sorry' for WMD inaccuracies

Judith Miller, the US journalist at the heart of the CIA leak probe, has apologised to her readers because her stories about WMD and Iraq turned out to be wrong.

The US journalist, who spent 85 days in prison over the summer before agreeing to give evidence to a grand jury investigating the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame, made the apology during an exclusive interview for BBC Newsnight.

She said: "I am obviously deeply chagrined that I ever write anything that turns out to be incorrect. I'm deeply sorry that the stories were wrong."

Ms Miller also confirmed that former senior White House aide Lewis "Scooter" Libby was one of her sources who revealed that Ms Plame was employed by the CIA.

She claims Mr Libby did not out Ms Plame as a covert agent, but as someone who worked for the CIA. Ms Miller said she assumed that Ms Plame was an analyst, not an operative.

Mr Libby denies any wrongdoing.

Sources

When pressed to confirm or deny that President George W Bush's senior adviser Karl Rove was another source, she declined to do so, saying: "I can't talk about the specifics of this case as I might be a witness in a criminal trial."

Although Ms Miller apologised for the intelligence being incorrect she defended her journalism saying she was right to publish and had done everything she could to verify the facts. She said: "I'm deeply sorry our intelligence community got it wrong.

"I am deeply sorry that the President was given a national intelligence estimate which concluded that Saddam Hussein had biological and chemical weapons and a active weapons programme."

more... http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/newsnight/4486750.stm

dw:

One does *so* hate to be potentially accused of being another go-along-to-get-along conspiracy theorist, eh wot?

However, having clicked, followed, and then continued to research and read up on the link you so thoughtfully provided above...

Hmmm.

Hmmm, hmmm, hmmm, hmmm.

just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you,
Otter

Don't miss Matt's birthday:

http://www.democracycellproject.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=970&pid=3791&st=0&#entry3791

Lead story on msnbc.com right now...

Bush’s view of Iraq doesn’t square with reality
Iraq’s capabilities, American support fall short of confident assessments

ANALYSIS
The Associated Press
Updated: 8:10 p.m. ET Nov. 30, 2005

WASHINGTON - President Bush’s depiction of Iraqi security forces as “helping to turn the tide” is difficult to square with persistent setbacks in handing control of the country back to its own people.

His suggestion that Americans are solidly behind the mission also understates opposition at home, and his hard sell on the rising quality of Iraqi forces overlooks complexities on the ground.

Bush on Wednesday declared the Iraqi army and police forces are “increasingly taking the lead in the fight against the terrorists,” even as recruits patrol Iraq’s most violent cities barely three months after learning how to use weapons and police forces struggle to get officers to come to work.

The president, in a major speech on Iraq war aims and in an accompanying strategy paper, acknowledged all has not gone as planned, speaking several times of a need for “adjustments” along the way.

Still, the White House paper cited a number of positive statistics on the recovery of the Iraq economy, asserting “our restore, reform, build strategy is achieving results.”

A more sober view
The International Monetary Fund, in its latest World Economic Outlook, in September, issued a more sobering view.

“The new government faces daunting medium-term challenges, including advancing the reconstruction of the country’s infrastructure, reducing macroeconomic instability and developing the institutions that can support a market-based economy,” the survey stated.

The IMF staff cited a “volatile security situation” as one of the biggest challenges and said only “slow progress” had been made in restoring Iraq oil production to prewar levels.

Bush, making his remarks at the U.S. Naval Academy, spoke as if the debate about Iraq were limited to Washington and only politicians were questioning the mission.

“When you’re risking your life to accomplish a mission, the last thing you want to hear is that mission being questioned in our nation’s capital,” he told cadets. “I want you to know that, while there may be a lot of heated rhetoric in Washington, D.C., one thing is not in dispute: The American people stand behind you.”

Bush’s public standing and support for the war have declined. In an AP-Ipsos poll taken in November, 62 percent said they disapproved of his Iraq policy, and his overall job approval rating dropped to 37 percent, the lowest level of his presidency.

more... http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10267077/

"Democrats and Republicans called on the president to change course and release a strategy for success in Iraq with specific benchmarks by which the progress could be measured. Today, President Bush failed to meet this call. Instead, he recycled his tired rhetoric of 'stay the course' and once again missed an opportunity to lay out a real strategy for success in Iraq that will bring our troops safely home."

-- Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada

"Iraq is making steady progress in defeating the terrorists, meeting political milestones, building democratic institutions and establishing security forces. Today the president has continued this progress by laying out a national strategy for victory in the fight for freedom."

-- House Majority Whip Roy Blunt of Missouri

"I was disappointed. The president relied too much upon rhetoric, upon a laundry list of tasks accomplished, but not a coherent view of where we are realistically and where we must go to succeed. It was more generalities than specifics."

-- Democratic Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island

"I hope the partisan claims that our military does not have a plan in Iraq will cease. We are making significant progress training Iraqi security forces, which will allow American forces to return home. However, we must not prematurely leave Iraq, which would be a disaster for Iraq and for our security."

-- Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas

"Some Democrats have been playing politics with the war in Iraq for partisan political gain. Today we saw real leadership. By looking past the rhetoric and examining the results on the ground, it's clear that we continue to make progress on the political, security and economic fronts, and that as Iraq progresses, so does our strategy."

-- Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee

Seattle Times will be printing Elizabeth's letter

Subject: GOP Challenges - timing and location indicate voter suppression tactic

Dear Editor:

I am writing in response to recent articles covering GOP challenges to voter registrations. The Republicans assert that they are only trying to clean up the voter roles. This is clearly not their motive since the challenges were made only in highly democratic districts and only a few days before the election so that the challenged voters’ votes would not be counted. If the Republicans were sincere about their motive, if they truly intended to clean up the voter roles, they would have conducted their computer search of suspect addresses throughout the entire state, or at least in every legislative district in King County. Instead, they only chose the three highly Democratic legislative districts. No challenges were made in Bellevue or other east side districts. They also would have challenged the voters’ registrations a month or more before the election, giving the voter time to correct his or her registration, so as not to disenfranchise voters.

Wake up Washington. The partisan dirty tricks that were so prevalent in the 2004 election in highly contested states such as Ohio, Florida, and New Mexico are now being executed here in our state. If the GOP truly intended to clean up the voter roles, they would have conducted their computer search of suspect addresses throughout the entire state, or at least in every legislative district in King County. Instead, they only chose three highly Democratic legislative districts. No challenges were made in Bellevue or other east side districts. This trend to suppress votes needs to stop now lest our state’s election process become corrupted like that in the above mentioned states. If this voter suppression tactic goes unpunished, we will certainly see more dirty tricks executed in our elections. Lets stop it now.
Elizabeth Walter

Mrs. Woodward?

http://www.nndb.com/people/316/000022250/

Posted by: dwahzon at November 30, 2005 07:34 PM

In looking for some information on Mrs. Woodward, aka Elsa Walsh, I came upon a rather interesting article Ms. Walsh wrote on Saudia Arabia Relations information in 2003. It was first printed in The New Yorker March 24, 2003. I found it rather interesting in the mention of Vice President Cheney's action and attitude, as well as showing Bush's naivete' and ignorance on some realities of the Middle East conflict, and Saudi Arabia and the U.S.'s attitudes toward the Iraq war.

Written by Elsa Walsh: http://www.saudi-american-forum.org/Newsletters/SAF_Item_Of_Interest_2003_04_30.htm

Juan Cole | Did Bush Plan to Bomb al-Jazeera?
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/113005Q.shtml
The American press is predictably ignoring the story. Yet it is only too plausible that Bush wanted to wipe out what he saw as a nest of terrorists.

Excerpt:

    The reaction in the Arab world to the Daily Mirror report has been a firestorm of outrage. Some Qataris are calling for the government to end US basing rights in that country. Others are lamenting the hypocrisy of a superpower that represents itself as the leading edge of liberty in the Middle East but has so little respect for press freedom that its leader would cavalierly speak of wiping out hundreds of civilian journalists. If the British documents surface and the story's seriousness is borne out, whatever shreds of credibility Bush still has in the Middle East will be completely gone. After all, the current phase of US involvement in the Middle East, and the two wars Americans have fought in the region, came in response to the terrorist bombing of innocent civilians in downtown office buildings.

Companion piece:

US Is Said to Pay to Plant Articles in Iraqi Papers

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/01/politics/01propaganda.html?hp&ex=1133413200&en=9f62482797121962&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Di:

Sounds more like "the bleeding edge of liberty" if'n you was to ask me...

not all kinds of courage comes with red badges,
Otter

Poll: Most doubt plan for Iraq victory

(CNN) -- As President Bush launched a new effort Wednesday to gain public support for the Iraq war, a new poll found most Americans do not believe he has a plan that will achieve victory.

But the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll released Wednesday night also found nearly six in 10 Americans said U.S. troops should not be withdrawn from Iraq until certain goals are achieved.

Just 35 percent wanted to set a specific timetable for their exit, as some critics of the war have suggested.

White House officials unveiled a 35-page plan Wednesday to achieve success in Iraq, and Bush used a speech at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, to tout what he said was progress in getting Iraqi security forces in place to protect their own country.

The poll conducted Wednesday does not directly reflect how Americans are reacting to Bush's speech, because only 10 percent of the 606 adult Americans polled had seen it live and two-thirds had not even heard or read news coverage about it.

But it does indicate the scope of the battle ahead as the Bush administration seeks to regain support for the war among an increasingly skeptical public.

Among poll respondents, 55 percent said they did not believe Bush has a plan that will achieve victory for the United States in Iraq; 41 percent thought he did.

The sampling error in the telephone survey was plus or minus 5 percentage points.

Asked about Bush's handling of the Iraq war, 54 percent said it was poor, while 44 percent thought he was doing a good job.

Those polled were split over whether they think a democratic government can be established in Iraq that won't be overthrown, with 47 percent saying that was likely and 49 percent saying it was not.

Fifty-four percent said they thought it is unlikely that Iraqi forces alone will be able to ensure security without U.S. help, and 44 percent said otherwise.

Also, 63 percent said they think it unlikely that Iraqis will be able to prevent terrorists from using their country as a base of operations, and only 33 percent said they thought it likely Iraq could be prevented from becoming a terror base.

Asked if the war will make the United States safer from terrorism in the long run, 48 percent said yes and 43 percent no, within the poll's sampling error.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/11/30/iraq.poll/index.html

MSNBC.com

How does President Bush's plan for victory affect your confidence for a good outcome in Iraq? * 9350 responses


Thumbs up: The president's plan shows the United States has both a vision of Iraq after the war and a sound strategy to realize it
17%

Thumbs down: The president's plan is more of the same recycled pledges and flag-draped bromides we've heard before
83%

Iraq insurgents launch raids on U.S. facilities
Senior human rights official fired after Baghdad prison torture scandal

Updated: 6:45 a.m. ET Dec. 1, 2005

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Insurgents attacked several U.S. bases and government offices with mortars and rockets Thursday before dispersing in the capital of western Iraq’s Anbar province, residents said.

News of the attack came as Iraq’s interior minister dismissed the senior inspector in charge of human rights on Thursday in connection with a scandal involving the torture of dozens of prisoners at a Baghdad prison, an official close to the minister said.

Nouri al-Nouri, the ministry’s chief inspector for corruption cases and human rights violations, was fired on the orders of Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, the official said on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media.

Al-Nouri, a Shiite Muslim, had been in the post since the hand over of sovereignty to Iraqis in June 2004.

Attacks interrupt U.S.-Iraq meeting
The attacks in Ramadi occurred as local tribal leaders and U.S. military officials were to hold their second meeting in a week at the governor’s office in the city center.

Residents said that within minutes, scores of masked gunmen, believed to be members of Jordan-born militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s al-Qaida in Iraq group, ran into the city’s streets but dispersed after launching attacks with mortars and Russian-made Katyusha rockets.

It was not clear whether the attacks left any casualties — most residents fled to their homes after the exchange began.

Ramadi is the provincial capital of Anbar province, a Sunni stronghold, where clashes between insurgents and U.S. and Iraqi troops have left hundreds of people dead in the past two years.

U.S. and Iraqi troops launched a joint operation near Ramadi on Wednesday, sweeping through an area used to rig car bombs.

The offensive came as President Bush said he hopes to shift more of the military burden onto the Iraqis as part of a strategy to draw down American forces.

About 500 Iraqi troops joined 2,000 U.S. Marines, soldiers and sailors in a move to clear insurgents from an area on the eastern side of the Euphrates river near Hit, 85 miles west of Baghdad, the U.S. command said in a statement.

'Suspected al-Qaida safe area'
In a statement, the military said the Hai Al Becker region “is suspected to be an al-Qaida in Iraq safe area and base of operations for the manufacture of vehicle car bombs, roadside bombs.” It described the area as a transit point for foreign fighters and Iraqi insurgents infiltrating from Syria into Iraq.

There were no reports of casualties during the first day of the operation, part of a series of sweeps through Sunni Arab towns along the Euphrates believed to be major insurgent strongholds.

Residents reached by telephone said U.S. forces warned townspeople by loudspeakers to stay in their homes for the next three days.

Two U.S. service members died of wounds suffered in combat and a Marine died in a non-hostile traffic accident, the U.S. military said Thursday. That raised the U.S. death toll for November to at least 84.

The victims included a Task Force Baghdad soldier who died of gunshot wounds received Wednesday and a Marine who died of wounds suffered the same day in Fallujah, the U.S. command said. The traffic accident involving a Marine from the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing occurred near Camp Taqaddum, 45 miles west of Baghdad, another military statement said.

The November death toll was below the October figure of 96 — the fourth deadliest month for U.S. forces since the U.S.-led invasion began in March 2003.

In Baghdad, the U.S. military said American and Iraqi forces rounded up 33 suspected insurgents in a sweep Tuesday night through southern parts of the capital. Clashes broke out late Wednesday between insurgents and Iraqi forces in the Mansour area of western Baghdad, police said.

U.S. commanders have been using Iraqi forces in the recent Euphrates Valley operations, although American forces continue to bear the brunt of the fighting.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10276071/

Remember the logic from 35 years ago:

We had to destroy the country in order to save it.

war, unh-huh, what is it good for? absolutely nuthin',
Otter

Hey Otter,

Welcome back!

We're still all here fighting to get our democracy back.

Posted by: monkey at December 1, 2005 06:53 AM

Well no wonder...you're using MSNBC as a source, a totally unreliable out-of-touch-with reality source that's not trusted by Bill O'Lielly...

One of Today's NYTimes op-eds seems to think the same thing as MSNBC...maybe it's a conspiracy... ;)

Plan: We Win
We've seen it before: an embattled president so swathed in his inner circle that he completely loses touch with the public and wanders around among small knots of people who agree with him. There was Lyndon Johnson in the 1960's, Richard Nixon in the 1970's, and George H. W. Bush in the 1990's. Now it's his son's turn.

It has been obvious for months that Americans don't believe the war is going just fine, and they needed to hear that President Bush gets that. They wanted to see that he had learned from his mistakes and adjusted his course, and that he had a measurable and realistic plan for making Iraq safe enough to withdraw United States troops. Americans didn't need to be convinced of Mr. Bush's commitment to his idealized version of the war. They needed to be reassured that he recognized the reality of the war.

Instead, Mr. Bush traveled 32 miles from the White House to the Naval Academy and spoke to yet another of the well-behaved, uniformed audiences that have screened him from the rest of America lately. If you do not happen to be a midshipman, you'd have to have been watching cable news at midmorning on a weekday to catch him.

The address was accompanied by a voluminous handout entitled "National Strategy for Victory in Iraq," which the White House grandly calls the newly declassified version of the plan that has been driving the war. If there was something secret about that plan, we can't figure out what it was. The document, and Mr. Bush's speech, were almost entirely a rehash of the same tired argument that everything's going just fine. Mr. Bush also offered the usual false choice between sticking to his policy and beating a hasty and cowardly retreat.
--snip--
Americans have been clamoring for believable goals in Iraq, but Mr. Bush stuck to his notion of staying until "total victory." His strategy document defines that as an Iraq that "has defeated the terrorists and neutralized the insurgency"; is "peaceful, united, stable, democratic and secure"; and is a partner in the war on terror, an integral part of the international community, and "an engine for regional economic growth and proving the fruits of democratic governance to the region."

That may be the most grandiose set of ambitions for the region since the vision of Nebuchadnezzar's son Belshazzar, who saw the hand writing on the wall. Mr. Bush hates comparisons between Vietnam and Iraq. But after watching the president, we couldn't resist reading Richard Nixon's 1969 Vietnamization speech. Substitute the Iraqi constitutional process for the Paris peace talks, and Mr. Bush's ideas about the Iraqi Army are not much different from Nixon's plans - except Nixon admitted the war was going very badly (which was easier for him to do because he didn't start it), and he was very clear about the risks and huge sacrifices ahead.

A president who seems less in touch with reality than Richard Nixon needs to get out more.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/01/opinion/01thur1.html?th&emc=th

I love the smell of truth in the morning...

Check out today's Five Minutes, please!

And future generations thank you...

It's not "your" democracy, Cap'n Sparrow -- it's mine! Mine, mine -- MINE, I tell you! All MINE!! BWAH-hah-hah-hah!!

jes' waiting for the meds to kick in,
Otter

FREE SPEECH AT HAMPTON UNIVERSITY!

(Speech at Harvard, Yale, and Stanford Universities also available at slight extra cost. Ask your server for details.)

because the public has a right to, no?,
Otter

M. DeFarge:

The moving finger, having writ, joined MoveOn.Org.

cheers (and roebuck),
Otter

jes' waiting for the meds to kick in,

Posted by: Otter at December 1, 2005 07:40 AM

Sounds like they already have ;-)

Otter: The paws that refreshes.

Looks like O'Lielly better add WashPo to his list...they didn't get the memo about how effective the Clueless George's speech was yesterday...

In Baghdad, Reality Counters Rhetoric
BAGHDAD, Nov. 30 -- Through the smoke of car bombs on the streets of Baghdad, Ali Kathem has trouble seeing the progress that President Bush described Wednesday in a speech in Annapolis.

"At least we didn't have terrorism under Saddam Hussein. Now, we have explosions, kidnapping, stealing," said Kathem, 24, a stocky man who has sold cigarettes on a busy roadside in the Iraqi capital for nearly a decade.
--snip--
Bush, in his speech at the U.S. Naval Academy, spoke of progress toward independence, of land restored to Iraqi control, of gains in stability and democracy, and of the "skill and courage" of newly trained Iraqi security forces.

But on the streets of Baghdad, such optimistic rhetoric contrasts sharply with the thunder of suicide bombs, the scream of ambulance sirens, the roar of racing police cars bearing men with masks and machine guns, and the grim daily reports of assassinations, murders and hostage-taking.

On the same day Bush spoke, nine farmworkers were killed when gunmen opened fire on a bus near Baqubah, snipers fired on the office of a National Assembly member in the capital, and three Iraqi army officers were wounded when a bomb went off near their patrol. In Fallujah, 20,000 people marched in a funeral for a Sunni cleric shot while leaving prayers.

For Iraq, that was a quiet day.

Read the rest of the "lies" at
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/30/AR2005113002259.html

I hope like heck that this latest "campaign" by the Blight House totally backfires. I am so completely sick of this regime trying to sell everything like a product.

I mean, did you see the backdrop at the speech yesterday? The "Plan for Victory" LOGO and posters all over the room, and in a repeating pattern behind the SCROTUS, like at a postgame press conference after the Stupor Bowl.

Totally disgusting. Speaking of which, don't let America forget the postgame comments of SCROTUS' lapdogs.

"Iraq is making steady progress in defeating the terrorists, meeting political milestones, building democratic institutions and establishing security forces. Today the president has continued this progress by laying out a national strategy for victory in the fight for freedom."

-- House Majority Whip Roy Blunt of Missouri, 11/30/05

"Some Democrats have been playing politics with the war in Iraq for partisan political gain. Today we saw real leadership. By looking past the rhetoric and examining the results on the ground, it's clear that we continue to make progress on the political, security and economic fronts, and that as Iraq progresses, so does our strategy."

-- Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee, 11/30/05

"I hope the partisan claims that our military does not have a plan in Iraq will cease. We are making significant progress training Iraqi security forces, which will allow American forces to return home. However, we must not prematurely leave Iraq, which would be a disaster for Iraq and for our security."

-- Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, 11/30/05

Senatards.

Press skeptical about Bush speech

President Bush's speech outlining his plans for a "complete victory" in Iraq prompts one Baghdad paper to call for action rather than words.

In the wider region, several papers attack Mr Bush's refusal to set a deadline for the complete withdrawal of US troops, arguing that their presence is fuelling the insurgency.

Some also urge Iraqis to speed up their reconciliation process and take their fate into their own hands.

Quotes from other news outlets in the region:

TARIQ AL-JUBURI IN IRAQ'S AL-MADA

"The Iraqi citizen has endured a lot. He has long been patient, waiting to see part of his dream for a secure future for himself and his own sons come true. Thus, he has the right to get answers to many pressing questions, and not just statements and rhetoric. He wants actions not words, translated into reality on the ground - into projects, job opportunities and prosperity."

QATAR'S AL-RAYAH

"Nobody from the US Administration, including President Bush, has ever explained the meaning of 'victory' that the US is seeking. It seems that the word victory, in the tradition of US policy, means the total refusal to set a timetable for the withdrawal of US troops, since this would incite the terrorists."

ABD-AL-WAHHAB BADR KHAN IN AL-HAYAT

"Even if President Bush calls withdrawal a 'national strategy for victory in Iraq' it will not make any difference on the ground, just as it will not make any difference either calling the withdrawal a redeployment of the occupation forces. Neither Cheney, Rumsfeld nor those in the extremist and obsolete gang of the right wing will ever admit their strategic faults in the war against Iraq."

EGYPT'S AL-JUMHURIYAH

"The occupation forces should admit the need to withdraw or at least announce the timetable for their pullout, which is a prerequisite for any possible settlement. This is something that President Bush does not seem willing to accept after he said yesterday that there will be no Iraq pullout without victory."

JORDAN'S AL-RAY

"That there will be no Iraq pullout without victory is a story that not even children would believe and Washington itself realises that its 'victory' is impossible."

PAN-ARAB AL-QUDS AL-ARABI

"President Bush will face serious difficulties in fulfilling his promises to achieve victory in Iraq because his war was immoral, unjustified and based on lies. History has shown that all past occupations ended up as failures and the US occupation will not be an exception."

OMAN'S OMAN

"The US announcement to reduce the number of its troops in Iraq indicates that the Iraqis will have to take on more and more responsibility for their country's security. It is crucial for the Iraqis to be prepared and to be able to handle their lives and their country's affairs in the way they want and prevent groups from turning Iraq into a terrorist haven."

SAUDI AL-JAZIRAH

"The Iraqi parties should put their desire to seek reconciliation into practice and realise that the organisation of the Iraqi house is an Iraqi task from the very beginning to the very end."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4487798.stm