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Schooling Donald Rumsfeld
[Editor's note: This is reprinted in its entirety. It was sent to me with a request to reprint is in order to disseminate it as far and wide as possible. Many thanks to Pat Lang, Larry Johnson, Barry McCaffrey, Booman Tribune and Joe Galloway.]
This is one of the most important things I have read in the blogosphere lately. It is original e-mails between Joe Galloway and Larry DiRita (with whom I have had some dealings myself, featured on this blog). I share Joe's feelings wholeheartedly. Please read and share.
From Larry Johnson, writing at Booman Tribune:
Pat Lang at Sic Semper Tyrannis has a terrific posting that features a recent exchange of emails between combat correspondent Joe Galloway and Larry Dirita, Rummy's press spokesman. As Pat notes, "Joe Galloway is the "Ernie Pyle" of my generation and one of the greatest friends the American soldier ever had. He is the reporter who went to LZ X-Ray in 1965 with the First Battalion, Seventh Cavalry Regiment. Yes. He is the reporter in the film "We Were Soldiers." Joe sent the exchange to General Barry McCaffrey in the following email:
----- Original Message ----- From: Jlgalloway2@xxxx.com To: b.r.mccaffrey@xxxxxxnet ; xxxxx Sent: Thursday, May 04, 2006 5:20 PM Subject: a little exchange of email
barry & jill: yesterday i had a lengthy exchange of messages with rummy's mouthpiece, larry darita, over my column last week about paul van riper and the rigged war game in 2002. thought you might find it of interest:
General Barry McCaffrey read the exchange and encouraged Joe to allow it to be disseminated far and wide:
Subj: Re: a little exchange of email Date: 5/4/2006 10:50:30 P.M. Eastern Standard Time From: b.r.mccaffrey@xxxxxxx.net To: Jlgalloway2@xxxxx.com
Joe,
This is the most powerful stuff hands down I have ever read about this war. You need to put the grammar right with capitals, etc and the PUBLISH IT ON LINE IMMEDIATELY JUST AS IS...BOTH SIDES.
This exchange ought to be your going away gift to the capital. Thanks for your ferocious protection of our soldiers and marines, thanks for your dedication to the truth, thanks for your enormous moral courage. Barry
Joe Galloway got the ball rolling with his newspaper column taking Rumsfeld to task for ignoring the war game lose inflicted on his planner by retired Lt. General Paul Van Riper. It appeared on Wed, Apr. 26, 2006:
Commentary
After losing war game, Rumsfeld packed up his military and went to war
By JOSEPH L. GALLOWAY
Knight Ridder Newspapers
WASHINGTON - Of those generals who have stepped forward to criticize Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and his conduct of the Iraq War, none has pointed out the mistakes of a man who admits no error with more specificity than retired Marine Lt. Gen. Paul Van Riper.
Van Riper is widely respected as a military thinker who emerged from combat in Vietnam determined to help get to the bottom of what went wrong there and why and how it should be fixed.
Van Riper, who commanded both the Marine War College at Quantico, Va., and the prestigious National War College in Washington before retiring in 1997, told an interviewer in October 2004 that the military got the lessons all wrong after World War II and that mistake resulted in two disasters - Korea and Vietnam.
"My great fear is we're off to something very similar to what happened after World War II, that is getting it completely wrong again," the general said of the course in Iraq.
The general made it clear he is no anti-war crusader. "We have to stay," he said of Iraq this week. "We have to finish it, but let's do it right."
Van Riper told Knight Ridder that in looking at Rumsfeld's leadership he found three particular areas of inability and incompetence.
First, he said, if any battalion commander under him had created so "poor a climate of leadership" and the "bullying" that goes on in the Pentagon under Rumsfeld he would order an investigation and relieve that commander.
"Even more than that I focus on (his) incompetence when it comes to preparing American military forces for the future," Van Riper said. "His idea of transformation turns on empty buzz words. There's none of the scholarship and doctrinal examination that has to go on before you begin changing the force."
Third, he said, under Rumsfeld there's been no oversight of military acquisition.
"Mr. Rumsfeld has failed 360 degrees in the job. He is incompetent," Van Riper concluded. "Any military man who made the mistakes he has made, tactically and strategically, would be relieved on the spot."
One event that shocked Van Riper occurred in 2002 when he was asked, as he had been before, to play the commander of an enemy Red Force in a huge $250 million three-week war game titled Millennium Challenge 2002. It was widely advertised as the best kind of such exercises - a free-play unscripted test of some of the Pentagon's and Rumsfeld's fondest ideas and theories.
Though fictional names were applied, it involved a crisis moving toward war in the Persian Gulf and in actuality was a barely veiled test of an invasion of Iran.
In the computer-controlled game, a flotilla of Navy warships and Marine amphibious warfare ships steamed into the Persian Gulf for what Van Riper assumed would be a pre-emptive strike against the country he was defending.
Van Riper resolved to strike first and unconventionally using fast patrol boats and converted pleasure boats fitted with ship-to-ship missiles as well as first generation shore-launched anti-ship cruise missiles. He packed small boats and small propeller aircraft with explosives for one mass wave of suicide attacks against the Blue fleet. Last, the general shut down all radio traffic and sent commands by motorcycle messengers, beyond the reach of the code-breakers.
At the appointed hour he sent hundreds of missiles screaming into the fleet, and dozens of kamikaze boats and planes plunging into the Navy ships in a simultaneous sneak attack that overwhelmed the Navy's much-vaunted defenses based on its Aegis cruisers and their radar controlled Gatling guns.
When the figurative smoke cleared it was found that the Red Forces had sunk 16 Navy ships, including an aircraft carrier. Thousands of Marines and sailors were dead.
The referees stopped the game, which is normal when a victory is won so early. Van Riper assumed that the Blue Force would draw new, better plans and the free play war games would resume.
Instead he learned that the war game was now following a script drafted to ensure a Blue Force victory: He was ordered to turn on all his anti-aircraft radar so it could be destroyed and he was told his forces would not be allowed to shoot down any of the aircraft bringing Blue Force troops ashore.
The Pentagon has never explained. It classified Van Riper's 21-page report criticizing the results and conduct of the rest of the exercise, along with the report of another DOD observer. Pentagon officials have not released Joint Forces Command's own report on the exercise.
The e-mail exchanges begin here:
From: Di Rita, Larry, CIV, OSD [mailto:larry.dirita@osd.mil] Sent: Friday, April 28, 2006 6:58 AM To: Galloway, Joe Subject:Your column about gen van riper is just silly, joe. To tag the secretary of defense with being responsible for every sparrow that falls out of every tree is just ludicrous.
General Kernan, who was commander of the Joint Forces Command when van riper's wargame occurred, had very pointed things to say about van riper when van riper made his first notoriety on this whole thing.
To tag rumsfeld with a wargame when there were about three or four layers of the chain of command between rumsfeld and the wargamers just misunderstands the way the world works.
Let's at least be honest about this: there is a lot of change taking place, and that change forces people to re-examine the way we have always done things. That is bumpy, and that can make people anxious.
I don't have any idea what might have happened in van riper's experience with this wargame, but to blame the secretary of defense for it just sounds crazy.
You talk about "rumsfeld's fondest ideas and theories" as if you have the first clue as to what those are. I have worked with him side-by-side for five years, and I wouldn't even try to divine what his fondest ideas and theories are.
The debate about defense transformation was going on long before rumsfeld showed up at the pentagon. I'd wager that the war game van riper was so offended by probably began in planning before rumsfeld showed up.
Van riper has never even met the secretary to my knowledge. For him to make such sweeping comments as he did in your piece is just irresponsible.
As a journalist, don't you think you owe it to your readers to challenge when people say things like that as though they have firsthand knowledge. Also, you ought to talk with Buck Kernan, who commanded JFCOM at the time.
You're just becoming a johnny one-note and it's only a couple of steps from that to curmudgeon!!
Best....
From galloway in response to DaRita No. 1:larry: i am delighted that folks over in OSD continue to read my columns with great attention. Who knows, it might make a difference one day.
i've always understood that the guy in charge takes the fall for everything that goes wrong on his watch. this is why the u.s. navy court martials the captain of any ship that is involved in an accident or is sunk for whatever reason. this is why a President, Harry Truman, always kept a sign on his desk in the oval office that said simply: The Buck Stops Here. trouble with this administration is the buck never stops anywhere, on anybody's desk. "victory has many fathers; defeat is an orphan" --Count Ciano, Mussolini's son-in-law in 1945
Last I knew Mr. Rumsfeld was the Secretary of Defense. His is the ultimate responsibility. And I am damned if I can understand how you could work for the man for as long as you have without knowing what he likes and doesn't like in the way of strategy and tactics and fighting wars. In the meantime, I hope you will take note of the fact that throughout the discussion of this and other columns with you I have never once implied that you were "silly" or "crazy" or "ludicrous" or even a "johnny one-note." I will be leaving this town in three weeks, Larry, and there's a lot of people and places I will miss. You aren't exactly at the top of that list..
Joe Galloway
Darita No. 2:That's not what you're describing, though, in your van riper piece.
I also served long enough to know that officers who hide behind anonymity and complain to you and other journalists about what they don't like are causing great harm to the institutions they serve and to the country.
Anyway, I think your columns have been representative of a school of thought within military circles that I don't believe is particularly widespread.
The army is so much more capable and suitable for the nation's needs that it was 5 or 10 years ago. To my mind, the voices your columns represent missed the forest for the trees.
I regret you took offense at our exchanges. Apparently people can tell a journalist the most damnable things about rumsfeld or myers or franks or the president and it's okay, but a little feisty email exchange in response you find offensive!!
Best wishes.
Galloway Response to DaRita No. 2:Subj: Re: Date: 5/3/2006 4:56:42 PM Eastern Daylight Time
From: Jlgalloway2
To: larry.dirita@osd.millarry:
the army you describe as "so much more capable" than it was 5 or 10 years ago is, in fact, very nearly broken. another three years of the careful attention of your boss ought to just about finish it off. this is not the word from your anonymous officers; this is from my own observations in the field in iraq and at home on our bases and in the military schools and colleges. you can sit there all day telling me that pigs can fly, with or without lipstick, and i am not going to believe it. seemingly the reverse is also true. one of us is dead wrong and i have a good hunch that it would be you. you go flying blind through that forest and you are going to find those trees for sure.
whether or not paul van riper has ever met Secretary Rumsfeld is not at issue. one does not have to be a personal acquaintance to find that a public figure's policies and conduct of his office are wanting. Secretary Rumsfeld spent a good number of years as the CEO of various large corporations. He knows about being responsible for the bottom line in that line of work. So too is he responsible in his current line of work; actually even more so given the stakes involved. So grasp that concept harder, friend Larry. Urge your boss to step up to the plate and admit it when he's gotten it wrong at least as quickly as he steps up to run those famous victory laps with Gen Meyer back in the spring of '03.
best
joe galloway
DaRita No. 3:Subj: Re: Date: 5/3/2006 5:09:59 PM Eastern Daylight Time
From: larry.dirita@osd.mil
To: Jlgalloway2@cs.comTime will tell. The army is faster, more agile, more deployable, more lethals. At least that's what schoomaker thinks. The army of 2000 could not have sustained rotational deployments indefinitely. Retention is above 100 percent in units that have frequently deployed. Would all those soldiers be rushing to join a "broken" army. Do you really believe we were better off with tens of thousands of soldiers in fixed garrisons, essentially non-deployable, in germany and korea? I appreciate your depth of feeling. What bugs me though is your implication that rumsfeld doesn't care about it as much as you do. Also, if van riper et al confined their "analysis" to the issue at hand, your comment would be valid. Their comments were ad hominem, and that is a neat trick for someone they never met.
Anyway, time will tell. Best..
Galloway response to DaRita No. 3:larry: [You say]
my response: neither can the army of 2003 or the army of 2005 or 2006. it is grinding up the equipment and the troops inexorably. recruiting can barely, or hardly, or not, bring in the 80,000 a year needed to maintain a steady state in the active army enlisted ranks....and that is WITH the high retention rates in the brigades. and neither figure addresses the hemorraging of captains and majors who are voting with their feet in order to maintain some semblance of a family life and a future without war in it. and what do we do about a year when average 93 percent of majors are selected for Lt Col in all MOSs....and 100 plus percent in critical MOSs. the army is scraping the barrel. then there is the matter of 14 pc Cat IV recruits admitted in Oct 05 and 19pc in Nov....against an annual ceiling of 4 percent??? the returning divisions, which leave all their equipment behind in iraq, come home and almost immediately lose 2,000 to 3,000 stop-loss personnel. then tradoc goes in and cherry picks the best NCOs for DI and schoolhouse jobs. leaving a division with about 65 percent of authorized strength, no equipment to train on, sitting around for eight or nine months painting rocks. if they are lucky 90 days before re-deploying the army begins to refill them with green kids straight out of AIT or advanced armor training.
if they are even luckier they have time to get in a rotation to JROTC or NTC and get some realistic training for those new arrivals. if not so lucky they just take them off to combat and let em sink or swim. this is not healthy. this is not an army on the way up but one on the way to a disaster. we need more and smarter soldiers. not more Cat IVs. so far it is the willingness of these young men and women to serve, and to deploy multiple times, and to work grueling and dangerous 18 hour days 7 days a week that is the glue holding things together. all the cheap fixes have been used; all the one-time-only gains so beloved of legislators trying to balance a budget and get out of town. the question is what sort of an army are your bosses going to leave behind as their legacy in 2009? one that is trained, ready and well equipped to fight the hundred-year war with islam that seems to have begun with a vengeance on your watch? or will they leave town and head into a golden retirement as that army collapses for lack of manpower, lack of money to repair and replace all the equipment chewed up by iraq and afghanistan, lack of money to apply to fixing those problems because billions were squandered on weapons systems that are a ridiculous legacy of a Cold War era long gone (viz. the f/22, the osprey, the navy's gold plated destroyers and aircraft carriers and, yes, nuclear submarines whose seeming future purpose is to replace rubber zodiac boats as the favorite landing craft of Spec Ops teams, at a cost of billions) meanwhile the pentagon, at the direction of your boss, marches rapidly ahead with deployment of an anti-missile system whose rockets have yet to actually get out of the launch tubes. at a cost of yet more multiple billions.
you say i blame your boss for things 3 or 4 levels below him that he can't possibly be controlling and quote accusations from present and former flag officers who he has never eyeballed personally. well the above items are things that he directly controls, or should; things he came into office vowing he was going to fix or change drastically. and in the latest QDR, his last, he made none of the hard choices about wasted money on high dollar weapons systems that make no sense in the real world today. the same QDR quite correctly identifies an urgent need for MORE psyops and civil affairs and military police and far more troops who have foreign language training appropriate to where we fight. and we budget a paltry 191 million, i say MILLION, bucks to do all that. not even the cost of the periscopes on those oh-so-necessary submarines, or the instruments on one of those f22s. this is what has my attention; this is what has me in a mood to question over and over and over, waiting for answers that never come, change that never comes, course corrections that never come. you wanted some specifics. there are some specifics.
joe galloway
PS: those were called VII Corps in the Persian Gulf War. they deployed. they formed the armored spear that penetrated kuwait and broke the republican guard. the garrisons were guarded, while they were gone, by the german army and police. they would have been so guarded in OIF too had we tried a bit of diplomacy instead of bitch-slapping Old Europe as your boss did at a crucial moment. those bases in germany were paid for by germany; still are. and they are a good deal closer to the action at present and in the foreseeable future than fort riley, kansas. now we envision counting on rough and crude forward bases, occupied only occasionally, in places where we have such good friends and allies like the fellow who just ordered us to get out because we harumphed when he slaughtered a few hundred or thousand peaceful demonstrators against his theft of yet another democratic election. you say that by doing this we are positioning ourselves better for the wars of the future. but what if, once again, a curtain of iron descends across Europe and once again the Fulda Gap must be guarded against the new Red Army of our good friend and ally Putin. your boss is fond of saying that this or that thing is "unknowable." the most unknowable thing of all is who your enemy is going to be next time and where you are going to need allies and bases from which to attack or defend. pulling out of europe and south korea may be one of the larger mistakes charged off against your boss five years from now or ten, if we are lucky enough to have a whole decade to repair some of the damage he has done while congress turned a blind eye, too busy doing earmarks for flea circus museums in dubuque and bridges to nowhere, alaska, to do the necessary oversight and questioning of cockamamy ideas with even more dubious estimates of future savings of billions that begin dropping like a rock before the ink is even dry on the report. all i can say is what the hell are you doing questioning my columns when you ought to be in there at the elbow of your boss reading those columns aloud to him every wednesday afternoon and urging him to pay attention to them.best wishes
joe galloway
DaRita No. 4:Thanks for these insights, joe. none of this is easy. Your perspective seems pretty fixed but I do appreciate the experience you bring to it.
Again, what bothers me most about your coverage is your implication that the people involved in all of this are dumb or have ill-intent or are so sure of what they know that they don't brook discussion. That's the part you're just way off on, friend.
This is tough stuff, and we're all hard at it, trying to do what's best for the country.
Best wishes.
Galloway response to DaRita No. 4:i like to think that is what i am doing also, and it is a struggle that grows out of my obligation to and love for america's warriors going back 41 years as of last month. there are many things we all could wish had happened. i can wish that your boss had surrounded himself with close advisers who had, once at least, held a dying boy in their arms and watched the life run out of his eyes while they lied to him and told him, over and over, "You are going to be all right. Hang on! Help is coming. Don't quit now..." Such men in place of those who had never known service or combat or the true cost of war, and who pays that price, and had never sent their children off to do that hard and unending duty. i could wish for so much. i could wish that in january of this year i had not stood in a garbage-strewn pit, in deep mud, and watched soldiers tear apart the wreckage of a kiowa warrior shot down just minutes before and tenderly remove the barely alive body of WO Kyle Jackson and the lifeless body of his fellow pilot. they died flying overhead cover for a little three-vehicle Stryker patrol with which i was riding at the time. i could wish that Jackson's widow Betsy had not found, among the possessions of her late husband, a copy of my book, carefully earmarked at a chapter titled Brave Aviators, which Kyle was reading at the time of his death. That she had not enclosed a photo of her husband, herself and a 3 year old baby girl. those things i received in the mail yesterday and they brought back the tears that i wept standing there in that pit, feeling the same shards in my heart that i felt the first time i looked into the face of a fallen american soldier 41 years ago on a barren hill in Quang Ngai Province in another time, another war. someone once asked me if i had learned anything from going to war so many times. my reply: yes, i learned how to cry.
Jg
DaRita No. 5:
I appreciate what you are saying but your continued implication that rumsfeld does not understand all that is at stake is wrong and offensive.
------ End of Forwarded Message
The dying continues. The incompetence continues. And Rumsfeld continues to blame anyone and everyone but himself.
Casey
Thanks! I posted the whole thing to Vets for Peace & to VA people (current & retired) locally.
http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/36463
The Great Iraq Oil Grab
The official reasons the U.S. invaded Iraq don't hold water. So, as the man said, follow the money ... straight to the oil fields.
There's a story, perhaps apocryphal, that Pentagon planners wanted to name the invasion of Iraq, "Operation Iraqi Liberation." Only when someone realized that the acronym -- O.I.L. -- might raise some uncomfortable questions, was "Operation Iraqi Freedom" born.
Supporters of the Iraq war airily dismiss chants of "no blood for oil" as a manifestation of the antiwar crowd's naïveté. They point out that Iraq's government still controls its oil and argue that we could have simply bought it on the open market.
Both of those claims are true on their face, but bringing Iraq's vast oil wealth under the control of foreign multinationals -- with U.S. firms the best positioned to develop it -- was always central to U.S. plans for Iraq. That Iraq's oil will continue to be "owned" by the "Iraqi people" is what differentiates classical 19th-century colonialism practiced by British officers in pith helmets from the neocolonialism the United States perfected in the second half of the 20th century. The newer brand can be summed up like this: We'll respect your sovereignty and abide by your domestic laws -- as long as we can help you write those laws to guarantee our firms' profits.
(much more at the link & good comments & much more)
It's true they don't get it. Until there is blood at THEIR doors, they will not. It's all a TV game to this administration.
They are 7th grade boys. They watch a lot of cartoons. They do not understand loss, pain, and guilt.
Red wedge
Bono
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/bono/2006/05/by_bono.html
(snip)
There are some really exciting things happening on the ground in Africa and back home that are worth making a song and dance about.
To help us with the HIV/Aids emergency we have come up with the concept of Red products. Why Red? Because Red is the colour for an emergency. And 6,500 people dying in Africa every day of a preventable and treatable disease is an emergency.
Red is where desire meets virtue, where consumerism meets philanthropy, where shopping attempts to meet the need of a continent in crisis, where once HIV/Aids meant a death sentence but where two pills a day can now have you back at work in 40 days.
Really the deal is this. These brands are prepared to share their profits with the Global Fund to Fight Aids in the hope that the association with Red will bring them to new and more loyal customers. At certain price points a consumer usually has a few choices when it comes to t-shirts, trainers and mobile phones. A product Red partner, such as Gap or Nike, hopes it will give them something else: an emotional attachment. It may reflect the values they already have or the values they aspire to: we don't mind.
All Red partners have high standards and work practices: if they didn't and were trying to hide something they would be very foolish to bring all this Red attention on themselves.
This is more hip-hop than indie. What does that mean? A certain generation who grew up wearing grey trenchcoats and crying into their beer about how daddy's bedsit wasn't big enough won't like this. But the generation that came through in the early 1990s under Soul II Soul, the Young Disciples and the British soul movement love it.
Big business is not bad. Big bad business is bad. It is strange that it took the continent of Africa to turn an activist onto commerce, but that's what Africans want now - to do business with us, to trade, to have dignity of labour. Of that, more later ... until you find the vaccine.
All I can say is, 'Wow' and 'Thank you, Joe Galloway' and boy, does the deliberate obtuseness of Larry DiRita piss me off.
Thanks for posting it here on DCP.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1152AP_Veterans_Disk.html
Personal data of 26.5M veterans stolen
WASHINGTON -- Personal data, including Social Security numbers of 26.5 million U.S. veterans, was stolen from a Veterans Affairs employee this month after he took the information home without authorization, the department said Monday.
(snip)
The theft of stolen information comes as the department has come under criticism for shoddy accounting practices and for falling short on the needs of veterans. Last year, more than 260,000 veterans could not sign up for services because of cost-cutting. Audits also have shown the agency used misleading accounting methods and lacked documentation to prove its claimed savings.
On Monday, the VA said it was in the process of notifying members of Congress and the individual veterans about the burglary, setting up a call center and Web site if veterans believe their information has been misused.
(snip)
Nicholson declined to comment on the specifics of the incident, which involved a career employee who had taken the information home to suburban Maryland - on disks, according to congressional sources who were briefed on the incident - to work on a department project.
The residential community had been a target of a series of burglaries and the employee was victimized earlier this month, according to the FBI in Baltimore, which was investigating the incident.
The material represents personal data of all living veterans who served and have been discharged since 1976, according to the department. The information was included the veterans' discharge summary that goes into a government database.
From Center for American Progress:
WHAT NEXT FOR U.S. FORCES? U.S. officials offered different assessments of how the government's formation would impact U.S. troop levels. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday "said it was too early to commit to sending home some of the 130,000 U.S. troops," while U.S. ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told journalists on Saturday: "Strategically we are going to be moving in the direction of downsizing our forces." For his part, Maliki said this weekend "he will lay out an 'objective' timetable for the transfer of security responsibilities to Iraq forces, opening the way for US and British troops to begin withdrawing by the end of the year." (Referencing the "battered and dysfunctional" state of the current Iraqi forces, Middle East analyst Juan Cole noted that Maliki did not "say how he would accomplish this miracle, except by sheer proclamation.") Fifty-three U.S. troops have been killed already in May, "the highest figure in many months," as firefights spread and "the use of air power and artillery against Iraqi cities, towns, and villages...remains commonplace (though...barely noted in the American press)."
CHALLENGES TO COME: "Despite Maliki's efforts to forge consensus among Iraq's rival communities," sharp differences in at least four critical areas highlight "the problems he will face in holding his colleagues to a common policy": 1) the role of Islam; 2) the division of Iraq's natural resources; 3) the structure of the Iraqi state, namely the size and authority of its central government; and 4) the best way to rebuild Iraq's economy and restore essential services. "Chief among the many thorny issues that could tear apart Maliki's government is reviewing a constitution that Sunnis say gives Shi'ites and Kurds too much control over Iraq's vast oil resources and may eventually split the country." (The difficulties of reforming it may be insurmountable, says Nathan Brown of the Carnegie Endowment. "It is very hard to imagine that the political forces behind the constitution will agree to significant revisions.") The rebuilding of Iraq's economy may play a significant role in leading to political compromise on the other, more sensitive political disputes. Lt. Gen. Peter Chiarelli, the second-ranking U.S. general in Iraq, said last week that the key to advancing stability is "getting a government that can revive the economy, 'take the angry young men off the street' and give them an alternative to violence."
Someone on kos did a diary sometime back on how conservatives were going to try to twist the frame to conservatism didn’t fail, Bush failed and Bush’s people failed, and warned against campaigning against Bushco by name. He must have been prescient. Below is the link to the diary and below that is the op-ed published by the WaPo a full 2 weeks after the kos diary. And Mr. Viguerie, (you all recognize that name, right?) twists and spins it just as predicted.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/5/7/142035/1859
----
Bush's Base Betrayal
By Richard A. Viguerie
Sunday, May 21, 2006; B01
As a candidate in 2000, George W. Bush was a Rorschach test. Country Club Republicans saw him as another George H.W. Bush; some conservatives, thinking wishfully, saw him as another Ronald Reagan. He called himself a "compassionate conservative," which meant whatever one wanted it to mean. Experts from across the party's spectrum were flown to Austin to brief Bush and reported back: "He's one of us."
Republicans were desperate to retake the White House, conservatives were desperate to get the Clinton liberals out and there was no direct heir to Reagan running for president. So most conservatives supported Bush as the strongest candidate -- some enthusiastically and some, like me, reluctantly. After the disastrous presidency of his father, our support for the son was a triumph of hope over experience.
~snip~
As long as Democrats controlled Congress or the White House, Republicans could tell conservatives they deserved support because of what they would do, someday. Now we know what they do when they have control. Their agenda comes from Big Business, not from grass-roots conservatives.
But unhappy conservatives should be taken seriously. When conservatives are unhappy, bad things happen to the Republican Party.
~snip~
The current record of Washington Republicans is so bad that, without a drastic change in direction, millions of conservatives will again stay home this November.
And maybe they should. Conservatives are beginning to realize that nothing will change until there's a change in the GOP leadership. If congressional Republicans win this fall, they will see themselves as vindicated, and nothing will get better.
~snip~
I've never seen conservatives so downright fed up as they are today. The current relationship between Washington Republicans and the nation's conservatives makes me think of a cheating husband whose wife catches him, and forgives him, time and time again. Then one day he comes home to discover that she has packed her bags and called a cab -- and a divorce lawyer.
As the philanderer learns: Hell hath no fury. . . .
rav@conservativesbetrayed.com
Richard A. Viguerie, chairman of a Manassas marketing firm, is the author of "Conservatives Betrayed: How Big Government Republicans Hijacked the Conservative Cause" (Bonus Books), out this summer.
-----------------
I snipped a lot out... here's the entire article...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/19/AR2006051901770.html
Note that Mr. Viguerie did publish his email address in the wapo op-ed.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060522/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_6
Bush Says Progress in Iraq 'Incremental'
OK. I just had to find out what DumDum meant by "incremental" (since he has a penchant for using words in ways dictionaries do not define them). In this case, "incremental" seems to mean running in place, going nowhere fast, and stalling tactics while he hopes no one's noticed there has been no troop withdrawal from Iraq or Afghanistan, that no matter what anyone says, he plans to keep our military in Iraq and Afghanistan indefinitely. Next....
As always, I keep wondering how anyone could vote for such a juvenile and paranoid piece of $h!te (his handlers had to steal both elections for the simple reason that anyone with an IQ above a rock would not vote for anyone that patently and pathetically stupid). Just boggles my mind.
PS: What happened to the Kerry demand for some kind of deadlines or withdrawal from Iraq by May 15? Not that his demand ever had any teeth since he's not the president....
"PS: What happened to the Kerry demand for some kind of deadlines or withdrawal from Iraq by May 15? Not that his demand ever had any teeth since he's not the president....
Nonny O"
Kerry had a press conference scheduled in Boston on just this topic at 2:45 pm. I haven't seen any copy of the contents of his remarks, but the Democratic Daily blog has already posted a release from Kerry calling for the firing of the person responsible for the loss of personal data , on 26 million veterans , from the Dept of Veterans Affairs.
See http://www.blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/ for more details.
Presumably, text of press conference will also be released through Kerry's senate office (kerry.senate.gov) soon . .perhaps it also will be on CSPAN?
John Kerry on Developments in Iraq, New Iraqi Government
“Rather than set deadlines and get tough in Iraq, all we hear is more rosy rhetoric from Washington and a presidential advisor worrying that the war has put voters in a ‘sour mood’ for the 2006 elections. This Administration should be worried about the safety of our troops, not the job security of Republican congressmen.
“Our soldiers have done their job. Now it’s time for the Iraqis to do theirs. We must immediately begin working with the new Iraqi government on a schedule for withdrawing American combat forces by the end of this year. Prime Minister Maliki said last week that his forces could be in charge in most of Iraq by December, but the Administration sees no end in sight. Secretary Rumsfeld said he ‘can’t make any promises’ about reducing U.S. troop levels in Iraq and President Bush says that troop reductions ‘will be decided by future Presidents.’
“It is long overdue for a Congress that shares some responsibility for getting us into Iraq to help get us out. It is time for us to demand a change in policy and a change in course – for Iraq, for our troops, and for Americans here at home.”
In his State of the Union address, President Bush declared that "America is addicted to oil." He’s right – his policies are making matters worse.
* The average price of a gallon of regular unleaded in January 2001?
$1.47.
* The average price today?
$2.89.
Actions speak louder than words:
http://www.KickTheOilHabit.org
Watch the video.
Send a message to Big Oil.
Send a message to ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP, Shell, Valero, and ConocoPhillips asking them to pledge to double the number of alternative fuel E85 pumps in the next year and provide E85 at half of all gas stations within a decade.
--
By the way, the Essential Bread Company here (which makes artisan breads for QFC, Trader Joe & many more) is converting their trucks to biodiesel.
I just paid my Quest bill.
On the "For" section of the check, I wrote "for not turning our data over to the government"
My husband tests drivers & he says the number of Prius cars he sees is increasing dramatically. Supply & demand!
We just laid in provisions from Costco, since we know they're a huge Dem donor. Not so Safeway, a heavy Republican donor.
Bush doubts he'll see Al Gore's movie
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Former oilman President George W. Bush sounds like a changed man when it comes to urging Americans to end their addiction to oil. But will he see Al Gore's new movie about global warming?
"Doubt it," Bush said on Monday when asked by a member of the audience during remarks in Chicago. "An Inconvenient Truth," the movie by Gore, who lost to Bush in the 2000 presidential election, opens in U.S. theaters this week.
Bush has this year been emphasizing a need to wean America off imported oil and devote more resources to developing alternative fuels, but environmentalists have slammed his performance during most of his six years in the White House.
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=politicsNews&storyID=2006-05-22T192733Z_01_N22382582_RTRUKOC_0_US-BUSH-POLITICS.xml&archived=False
Here is the link to Galloway's origional article.
It is a month old.
http://www.military.com/opinion/0,15202,95496,00.html
There is a discussion link which has a broad spectrum of attendance. There are real rightwingnuts who see the US as always the good guy and everyone else sucks... Often calling them out tends to shut them up.
About Galloway..
The link with General Barry McCaffrey is interesting.
During GW-1, During Operation Desert Storm, McCaffrey commanded the 24th Infantry Division which was on the far left flank of the attack. Galloway was an embedded reporter attached to McCaffrey's command. McCaffrey wanted him there to essentially censure Galloway. There was no need as Joe did his usual great work. They are still great friends.
The above is from a CSPAN report with War Correspondents prior to GW2.
I have friends who were in the 7th Cav and at they remember Joe with fondness and respect.
One Out of 136 Americans in Jail
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/052206R.shtml
Prisons and jails added more than 1,000 inmates each week for a year, putting almost 2.2 million people, or one in every 136 US residents, behind bars by last summer. Arrests for drug and parole violations were a leading factor.
Across the lines
Who would dare to go
Under the bridge
Over the tracks
That separates whites from blacks
Choose sides
Or run for your life
Tonight the riots begin
On the back streets of america
They kill the dream of america
Little black girl gets assaulted
Aint no reason why
Newspaper prints the story
And racist tempers fly
Next day it starts a riot
Knives and guns are drawn
Two black boys get killed
One white boy goes blind
Little black girl gets assaulted
Dont no one know her name
Lots of people hurt and angry
Shes the one to blame
Tracy Chapman
BREAKING: Wired Publishes NSA Spying Documents
A file detailing aspects of AT&T's alleged participation in the National Security Agency's warrantless domestic wiretap operation is sitting in a San Francisco courthouse. But the public cannot see it because, at AT&T's insistence, it remains under seal in court records.
The judge in the case has so far denied requests from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, or EFF, and several news organizations to unseal the documents and make them public.
Continued, includes the documents:
http://mparent7777.livejournal.com/8763928.html
Information Sharing on the Rove Indictment Story
http://mparent7777.livejournal.com/8764284.html
CALLING ALL ARMCHAIR SPIES
http://www.tpmcafe.com/node/30055
Today's Newswire
http://mparent7777.livejournal.com/2006/05/22/
Where is everyone?
Jimmy Carter is coming here Thursday for Jack Carter's campaign in Nevada - wish I could go but it's a work day.
I hope there are alot of deep pockets around here because
we're competing with fundraisers like Cheney.
Interesting discussion here about the article in the New Yorker that mentions me:
http://tinyurl.com/rddgy
Actually the discussion would be a lot MORE interesting if some of you stopped by and provided some perspective...
Karen,
Can you post a link to the New Yorker article?
Thanks.
oncall,
It's not online yet. They do not post all the stories; the ones they think will make you go out and buy the issue are not posted. Malcolm will post it in his own website in a week or so.
I have a pdf version and will email it to you now, OK?
Posted by: April at May 22, 2006 09:03 AM
I am not quite sure what April is trying to say in her post? Are people who feel that a politician who votes to support his constituency's views a good thing or a bad thing? Dixiecrats had their own perspective and goals and ended up harming the party. Byrd had his own perspective, but shouldn't be pilloried because he is representing his region. I really don't understand, and this is not a snark.
I am reminded of Edward Rutledge from South Carolina ( an original signer of the Declaration of Independence). He was opposed to independence, but did sign it for the sake of unity with the other colonies. He reasoned that his constintuents by sending him to the Continental Congress afforded him the leeway to make independent decisions which he believed were in their best interests. He opposed the original draft of the Declaration and lead the other southern colonies to oppose it as well due to Jefferson wanting to ban slavery. Only after that clause was removed did he sign it. Ironically, after returning to South Carolina he freed his slaves.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Rutledge
http://www.historycentral.com/Bio/RevoltBios/RuteledgeEdward.html
Posted by: karen at May 23, 2006 01:28 AM
Thanks Karen,
I look forward to reading it.
Posted by: April at May 22, 2006 09:03 AM
I would also like to add that I completely agree with the sentiment that the greatest threat to America is the neocons and their agenda.
Bush, Blair to announce 'phased withdrawal' from Iraq
Michael Smith
Published: Monday May 22, 2006
Michael Smith, a reporter for the London Sunday Times, broke the Downing Street Minutes in 2004.
LONDON -- Tony Blair and George Bush will announce that they are to begin withdrawing troops from Iraq at a summit in Washington as early as this week, RAW STORY has learned.
The process has already been carefully choreographed in an attempt to bolster the popularity of both Bush and Blair who have suffered domestically for their handling of the war.
The scope of the phased withdrawal, which will see the 133,000 US force levels cut to around 100,000 by the end of the year and British numbers almost halved, has already been agreed, one senior defence source said.
The actual announcement will come in response to a statement from Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that his government believes coalition forces are no longer needed in a number of provinces.
more...
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Report_Bush_Blair_to_announce_phased_0522.html
May 22, 2006 — President Bush signed into law last week a bill that creates nearly $70 billion worth of tax cuts for American taxpayers, but it could affect the future education of many of America's teens.
While seeking the presidential nomination in 1999, Bush pledged never to increase taxes. But the recent measure does include an increase in taxes for teens 14 to 17 years old who have college savings funds.
Many students need not worry. The bill will not affect the popular 529 college savings plans, which cover college expenses and are tax free. The changes in the bill will affect teenagers with custodial accounts. Those are taxed according to the the "kiddie tax."
The kiddie tax was introduced in 1986 to curb the benefit of the progressive tax rate. Before then, all children with savings funds submitted their own tax returns, but that meant that wealthy families could transfer funds to their children's name, gaining from the lower tax rate (as low as 5 percent compared with up to 35 percent for their parents).
The kiddie tax sought to correct that by considering all children under 14 as supported by their parents.
Under the old rules, children under the age of 14 with investment income under $850 would not be taxed. The next $850 would be taxed at the child's tax rate. Anything above $1,700 would fall under the kiddie tax, in which the child's income would be taxed at the parent's rate. But once the child turned 14 any income would be taxed at the child's usually lower interest rate.
Getting Rid of the Tax Shelter for the Wealthy?
So what changed?
The new law — which takes effect retroactively on Jan. 1, 2006 — raises the age of the kiddie tax from 14 to 18. By raising the age, children will continue to be taxed at the parents' rate for any investment income above $1,700 until they turn 18. The new rules could raise as much as $ 2.2 billion over the next 10 years.
In his speech just before he signed the bill, President Bush expounded on the "good day for American workers and families" and claimed the measure "reduced taxes for every American who pays income tax."
more...
http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/Business/story?id=1991202&page=1
There's a post in the Action Ideas & Support forum that is worth a read by a new forum member, Todd Putnam.
http://www.democracycellproject.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=1091
I learned something new about the effectiveness of boycotts. Please go welcome Todd and check it out.
He also posted some information about what he does in Sites Worth Seeing discussion forum:
http://www.democracycellproject.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=326&pid=4214&st=0&#entry4214
Democratic Rep. William Jefferson, who has not been charged, called an FBI search of his Capitol office "an outrageous intrusion," telling reporters: "There are two sides to every story. There are certainly two sides to this story."
-snip-
CBS News has learned FBI officials considered Saturday night's raid so sensitive that they activated a special command center to monitor the unprecedented search.
-snip-
He called the weekend search of his Capitol Hill office "an outrageous intrusion into separation of powers between the executive branch and the congressional branch, and no one has seen this in all the time of the life of the Congress."
A historian with the Senate Historical Office said there is no record of any member's congressional office being searched.
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, asked about the Jefferson search at an unrelated news conference at the Justice Department, said he understands the concerns raised about FBI agents raiding a congressional office.
"I will admit that these were unusual steps that were taken in response to an unusual set of circumstances," Gonzales said.
The search warrant affidavit spells out special procedures put in place to ensure the search did not infringe on privileged material. The procedures include use of a "filter team" of prosecutors and FBI agents unconnected to the investigation. They would review any seized items or documents and determine whether the documents are privileged and therefore immune from the search warrant.
more...
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/05/22/politics/main1642144.shtml
Sooooo, let's get this straight. Gonzo says an unprecedented search warrant was issued to search ALL items in a Congressmans offie, and THEN a FILTER TEAM would determine what would fall under the parameters of the search, and then those items would be returned???
Starch those red armbands while yer at it.
FYI: Boston Globe columnist Scot Lehigh on Kerry Iraq Plan today:
Boston Globe: John Kerry's encore
By Scot Lehigh, Globe Columnist | May 23, 2006
JOHN KERRY may just be charting his path back to the future.
The man who cast a vote he now acknowledges was a mistake on the Iraq war resolution, and then spent two years awkwardly confronting the fallout as he ran for president, has finally come to a position where he seems comfortable.
Kerry's call for a near-withdrawal of US troops from Iraq by year's end has made headlines. Less noticed is that his new stand puts Kerry back where he first made his name during the Vietnam War: as a voice of the anti-war left.
Whereas Kerry's 2002 vote made him the object of suspicion among anti-war Democrats, who flocked to Howard Dean until that candidacy collapsed, Kerry's new stance places him to the left of the Democratic Party's other major putative presidential candidates. Certainly he has flanked New York Senator Hillary Clinton, widely considered the Democratic front-runner in 2008.
Kerry's proposal calls for a Dayton Accords-like conference, to include the various Iraqi factions, the League of Arab States, Iran, Syria, and the rest of Iraq's neighbors (among others), to try to forge a consensus on Iraq's future; a redeployment of US troops to support roles; and then a withdrawal of US combat troops by year's end.
The senator, who used the weekend announcement of Iraq's new government to highlight his plan again yesterday, says he's trying to offer the country an alternative -- one he will soon present as a Senate amendment to the defense budget.
``It is not going to pass, and I understand that," Kerry said in a Friday interview. ``The purpose of it is to point out to the country that there really is a different way to approach Iraq and to protect American troops and our interests."
The Bush administration, of course, is highly unlikely to adopt his blueprint. If not, ``they will be morally bankrupt for creating a Vietnam II decent-interval withdrawal situation or a stay-the-course policy," Kerry said. ``Either way, it is a loss for the United States of America. It is unacceptable both morally and practically."
US forces in Iraq are not fighting traditional battles with enemy forces, Kerry notes. ``The two biggest killers in Iraq are IEDs [improvised explosive devices] and suicide bombers," he said. ``Are you telling me, three-and-a-half years into this, that you can't have Iraqis driving down the street instead of American soldiers . . . or going out on some of those patrols?"
Kerry acknowledges that if US troops did withdraw, there's a risk that Iraq, which he judges already in a low-grade civil war, would descend into chaos. But that ultimately depends on the Iraqis themselves, he says.
Asked about the political implications, Kerry, who acknowledges he's ``looking hard" at running for president again in 2008 (and whose confidants fully expect a second campaign), says he'll leave that discussion to others.
``I am where my conscience tells me and my mind tells me the best solution to this is," he says. ``If you do this pressure, and you have this summit, you have a chance of getting some kind of a stake hold that resolves this. If you don't, you are going to find yourself in the quagmire and failure mode anyway."
But nothing in public life is ever really divorced from political considerations, and certainly nothing as charged as Iraq. Although some have written Kerry off as a delusional Democratic dinosaur who doesn't realize his time as a serious presidential candidate has come and gone, that actually gives him short shrift.
Kerry wouldn't begin a 2008 campaign as the front-runner, certainly, but neither would he be a laughingstock.
If Al Gore doesn't run, Kerry would start in a position analogous to that which Richard Nixon occupied on the Republican side in the run-up to the 1968 campaign. That is, hardly the favorite, but nevertheless an experienced, acceptable alternative should the early preference (George Romney for the GOP then, Hillary Clinton for Democrats in 2008) falter.
Further, Kerry's new position on Iraq would likely add some energy to an encore effort, perhaps letting him play a 2008 version of Howard Dean to Hillary Clinton's John Kerry. Indeed, Kerry is busy visiting college campuses, where the youthful campaign energy is often found.
If nothing else, at a time when many major Democrats have adopted a cautious wait-and-see posture on Iraq, a posture that has proved frustrating to the party's liberal activists, John Kerry has finally found his voice.
Scot Lehigh's e-mail address is lehigh@globe.com.
Posted by: monkey at May 23, 2006 08:37 AM
WaPo opens their article on the subject with this paragraph..
FBI Raid on Lawmaker's Office Is Questioned
Democrat Jefferson Denies Wrongdoing
An unusual FBI raid of a Democratic congressman's office over the weekend prompted complaints yesterday from leaders in both parties, who said the tactic was unduly aggressive and may have breached the constitutional separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches of government.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/22/AR2006052201080.html