"Support the Troops"? Yeah. Right. Uh-huh. Sure.

Speechless.

I still don't think Kerry's so-called "botched joke" was out of line. I thought it made sense either way. There is still a knee-jerk response by many Americans to question patriotism any time there is dissent. After the primaries, Democrats will be expected to demonstrate that they are tough on security, no matter how the war is going. That's timeless in this country.
Republican operate under an authoritarian model and alot of people are conditioned to respond to it as though any one who doesn't is a wimp (and unpatriotic, used in the sense of nationalism as a positive).

Of course it's illegal for those in the military to question. Think of what happened to Ehren Watada. It's not quite illegal for those of us not in the military to question, though it's hard to be heard. It's fear that keeps us all in line. We need to be brave.

Posted by: DiAnne at February 20, 2007 11:15 AM

Did the Home of the Brave stuff get sold off with the Land of the Free merchandise?

Casey says:

Remember, folks, privatization of everything to be run by individual donors and organizations with agendas instead of having to take back some of those huge-tax-giveaway dollars from the richest 1% to pay for doing it governmentally is supposed to be a Good Thing, at least according to the greedhead neocons in the West Wing. Do you buy that? I sure as hell don't.

--I completely agree. What are we paying taxes for? Why do we have a government at all if they only wage war and don't even clean up their messes, if they help unscrupulous individuals to profit off the miser of others, and if they purposely create the conditions (war, munitions dealing, supporting dictators) to create more misery.

These WaPo articles help us to understand that there is an aftermath to war. Even with neglect, think of the even worse conditions for Iraqi and Afghan soldiers who will be left with permanent physical and mental scars and even less technology, cleanliness, etc. to deal with it, with bigger and poorer families left behind. & what a robbery to the potential of those countries - men in their prime killed off. So many don't care - with all their talk of spreading democracy to the middle east, I'm not convinced these "troop supporters" and "patriots" in the rightwing don't consider those who aren't Americans to be subhuman.
Our "leader" sets a poor example with his black and white statements that you are with the terrorists or with us, with his implied or stated links between 9-11 and Iraq, or Iran and Iraq.

Back to privatization - of every thing. Watch these groups make money hand over fist and find tax breaks so they don't even feed back into the system. We'll end up like Mexico, where families have to provide meals for family members who are in prison, or like Thailand, where there is no Social Security. Only we're geographically spread out and working all the time, so we don't even have the extended family structure any more to "take care of our own."

Um, Casey doesn't say that (or at least, in this case, didn't). But your ruminations on it are spot on anyway.

And BTW, DiAnne -- this link's for you: http://oldamericancentury.com/QUESTION.jpg

Here's someone who's taking on the yellow ribbon waving brigade in Congress who claim to support the troops but whose actions reveal otherwise.

The diary explaining the background is here...
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/2/20/91939/0056

The website is here...
http://www.empoweringveterans.org/

This roots of this problem - this scandal - can be traced back to the first Bush administration, which decided that downsizing the military and handing the work over to defense contracting firms would save the goverment money.

That was the official claim, although the reality looks a lot different. Ostensibly, the savings would come from not having to train a soldier, pay him a salary, medical care, housing allowance, and food allowance for 20 plus years, and then to issue him retirement pay for the rest of his life.

Yes, those costs are high, but not as high as what the government ends up paying a contractor who took over this soldier's position.

Worse even is the fact- as evidenced by the WRAMC scandal - that with this contracting out of former military and government positions, quality control is severely lacking.

These firms don't face any substantial recrimination other than losing their contract for the next round. Even that is no problem for them, because they just have one of their sub-contractors put in a new bid, and still manage to profit that way.

Besides the US military and vets who are victimized by Bu$hCo & cohorts, there are the other forgotten victims:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070220/ap_on_go_su_co/detainees_lawsuits
Court: Detainees can't challenge cases
WASHINGTON - Guantanamo Bay detainees may not challenge their detention in U.S. courts, a federal appeals court said Tuesday in a ruling upholding a key provision of a law at the center of President Bush's anti-terrorism plan.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled 2-1 that civilian courts no longer have the authority to consider whether the military is illegally holding foreigners.

Barring detainees from the U.S. court system was a key provision in the Military Commissions Act, which Bush pushed through Congress last year to set up a system to prosecute terrorism suspects.

The ruling is all but certain to be appealed to the Supreme Court, which last year struck down the Bush administration's original plan for trying detainees before military commissions.

The Military Commissions Act was crafted in response to that decision and the president hailed it as a necessary tool for bringing terror suspects to justice.

Civil libertarians and leading Democrats decried the law as unconstitutional and a violation of American values. The law allows the government to indefinitely detain foreigners who have been designed as "enemy combatants" and authorizes the CIA to use aggressive but undefined interrogation tactics.

But the most criticized provision of the law was the one stripping U.S. courts of the authority to hear arguments from detainees who said they were being held illegally.

{More on link....}

This is why MCA '06 NEEDS to be repealed in its entirety, not just the reinstatement of habeas corpus that has been with us since June 1215....

The Chairman of the Veterans Affairs Committee in the Senate is Daniel Akaka of Hawaii

The Chairman of the Veterans Affars Committee in the House is Bob Filner (D-CA 51st)

The Veterans Affairs Committee in the Senate is chaired by Daniel Akaka.

The Veterans Affairs Committee in the House is chaired by

Bob Filner (D-CA 51st)

Otter -

I agreed with Casey saying "I sure the hell don't" at the end of that paragraph. Read again and you will understand. I was agreeing with the paragraph in its entirety, with her opinion of it.

Move On - Stop the Escalation Letter delivery:

Dear MoveOn member,
On Friday the House voted to condemn the president's plan to escalate the war. A good first step. But we have to keep moving. The night before the vote, Rep. Jack Murtha—who's been leading the fight to stop the escalation—told MoveOn members, "The time to act is now...We can get this done. We can bring our troops home."

Congress is in recess this week and we need to keep the pressure on. This Thursday, MoveOn members are showing up at hundreds of local congressional offices to deliver letters asking Congress to stop the escalation.

The more of us who add our voices, the more pressure they'll feel to act. Can you take a moment to write a short letter that other MoveOn members will hand-deliver for you on Thursday?

http://pol.moveon.org/lettertocongress/?id=9899-1907725-yGibZV&t=2

Rep. Murtha told MoveOn members that the most important thing we could do during this critical week is write letters to our representatives and visit them while they're home for recess. With progress being made in the House, but a handful of Senate Republicans continuing to dodge the most important debate in the country, his call to action couldn't be more timely.1

The president is out of control and Congress has to rein him in. President Bush's plan to deal with the mess in Iraq is to escalate the military conflict. He's not just escalating war in Iraq, he's provoking an escalation with Iran—a confrontation that could inflame the entire Middle East. This is a situation of the most serious proportions and we have to make sure Congress stops him.

We've made a lot of progress together since January alone. Through petitions, calls to Congress, rallies, movie nights and other work we've done together, we've helped make it clear that a vast majority of Americans oppose escalating the war.

If we keep the pressure on now, we can make sure Congress does the right thing by blocking the escalation and taking steps to bring our troops home. Can you write a letter to your representative and senators that we will hand-deliver this Thursday? Click below:

http://pol.moveon.org/lettertocongress?id=9899-1907725-yGibZV&t=3

Thanks for all you do,

DiAnne --

As far as reading again and understanding goes, ahem, my issue wasn't with the content of the paragraph. I was just pointing out that it wasn't Casey who wrote it.

Happy Fat Tuesday!

Laissez les bons temps rouler!

Posted by: Otter at February 20, 2007 01:14 PM

Oh, it's rollin', don't you worry, furry.

(oh man, that mighta been offtopic!)

737 U.S. Military Bases = Global Empire
By Chalmers Johnson
By the end of the 1990s, the neoconservatives were developing their grandiose theories to promote overt imperialism by the "lone superpower" -- including preventive and preemptive unilateral military action, spreading democracy abroad at the point of a gun, obstructing the rise of any "near-peer" country or bloc of countries that might challenge U.S. military supremacy, and a vision of a "democratic" Middle East that would supply us with all the oil we wanted.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17123.htm

Excerpt:

These numbers, although staggeringly big, do not begin to cover all the actual bases we occupy globally. The 2005 Base Structure Report fails, for instance, to mention any garrisons in Kosovo (or Serbia, of which Kosovo is still officially a province) -- even though it is the site of the huge Camp Bondsteel built in 1999 and maintained ever since by the KBR corporation (formerly known as Kellogg Brown & Root), a subsidiary of the Halliburton Corporation of Houston.

The report similarly omits bases in Afghanistan, Iraq (106 garrisons as of May 2005), Israel, Kyrgyzstan, Qatar, and Uzbekistan, even though the U.S. military has established colossal base structures in the Persian Gulf and Central Asian areas since 9/11. By way of excuse, a note in the preface says that "facilities provided by other nations at foreign locations" are not included, although this is not strictly true. The report does include twenty sites in Turkey, all owned by the Turkish government and used jointly with the Americans. The Pentagon continues to omit from its accounts most of the $5 billion worth of military and espionage installations in Britain, which have long been conveniently disguised as Royal Air Force bases. If there were an honest count, the actual size of our military empire would probably top 1,000 different bases overseas, but no one -- possibly not even the Pentagon -- knows the exact number for sure.

Bush & Co - Against The War, Before They Were For It
2 Minute video
Did they really say that?
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17128.htm

Robert Parry | Shame on the Washington Post, Again
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/022007J.shtml
"Just days before the perjury/obstruction trial of former White House aide I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby goes to the jury, the Washington Post's Outlook section published a bizarre front-page article by right-wing legal expert Victoria Toensing suggesting that the prosecutor and one of the chief victims in the case should be put on trial," writes Robert Parry. "Given the Post's prominence in the nation's capital and Toensing's former position in the Justice Department," he adds, "the article has the look and feel of an attempt to influence the jury that will be judging whether Libby committed perjury and obstruction of justice."

The New Iraqi Oil Law: Leaked
By Raed Jarrar
Privatizing Iraq's oil and splitting Iraq into three regions are just two negative features of this new law.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17120.htm

Making Martial Law Easier
New York Times Editorial
A disturbing recent phenomenon in Washington is that laws that strike to the heart of American democracy have been passed in the dead of night. So it was with a provision quietly tucked into the enormous defense budget bill at the Bush administration’s behest that makes it easier for a president to override local control of law enforcement and declare martial law.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17124.htm

{That pesky MCA '06... again.}

More bad news about vets... (And we have 699 more days of this regime to endure???)

Pentagon Underreporting War Injuries?

Veterans Groups: Non-Combat Injuries Being Ignored, Real Number Is More Than Double

(AP) Veterans groups and Democratic Sen. Barack Obama say U.S. government officials are obscuring the actual number of wounded in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars by leaving out of some public documents troops who suffer non-combat injuries.

From the Pentagon Web site to press materials handed out at the opening of an amputee center in Texas last week, the number of wounded in the wars often circulated publicly is around 23,000.

That number only accounts for those wounded in combat. When troops from those wars who were wounded in other ways are counted, the number more than doubles, to about 53,000.

That latter number is not heavily circulated by the Pentagon. Recently, a Defense Department official publicly criticized a researcher who used it and pressured another government agency to change a public document to report the smaller number.

Obama, a presidential hopeful, wants the government to be more straightforward in reporting on the wounded. He has introduced legislation with Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe to require the Veterans Affairs Department and the Defense Department to "start keeping honest figures on our troops and the potential future costs of the war."

"It doesn't make a difference whether you were hit by enemy fire, or injured because your vehicle crashed, or got sick because of serving in a war zone," Obama said in a statement. "The effects on the soldiers and their families are the same. And the impact in terms of the current fighting force and future demands on the VA are also the same."

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/02/07/national/main2441466.shtml

The sounds of New Orleans ...

http://www.wwoz.org/

Thanks for reminding us of the WWOZ link, mardimonkey. Am listening to it even as we type.

Otter
I caught that (author) - thanks
I liked the story.

Happy Mardi Gras!

Talkin 'bout eggnog (eggnog)
Eggnog (eggnog)
I can go CIA
Eggnog (eggnog)
Eggnog (eggnog)
Checkin' my feet all day.

I read about Condi going to Bagdad but it didn't tell if she wore Ferragamo or Manolo Blahniks or what.

However..

Following talks in London to persuade the international community to provide political and financial support, for the displaced, Andrew Harper, the UN's Iraq support co-ordinator, told The Observer that 1.8 million Iraqis were now internal refugees and some two million others had fled, mainly to Syria and Jordan.

'For every person taken out and shot - by far most of the victims being men and breadwinners - there is the effect on the rest of the family,' Harper said. He added that Syria and Jordan were being overwhelmed by the influx and needed help.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2015765,00.html

[Anybody who's never heard "Iko Iko", of course, no doubt thinks that yr hmbl otr crspndnt has just gang aft agley. Whatever. Today is Fat (City) Tuesday, and I am channeling my inner monkey now.]

Accused Terrorist Is Big GOP Donor
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/022007B.shtml
The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) won't say what it plans to do with thousands of dollars in campaign donations it received from an accused terror financier.

Gareth Porter | Rove Said to Have Received 2003 Iranian Proposal
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/022007D.shtml
Karl Rove, then White House senior political advisor for President George W. Bush, received a copy of the secret Iranian proposal for negotiations with the United States from former Republican Congressman Bob Ney in early May 2003, according to an Iranian-American scholar who was then on his Congressional staff.

E.J. Dionne | The Anti-War Rallying Point
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/022007E.shtml
E.J. Dionne writes: "Two things are now abundantly clear about the future of US policy toward Iraq. First, majorities in both houses of Congress have lost faith in President Bush's approach to the war. Second, the president will do all he can to resist changing his strategy by trying to split his critics into ineffectual factions."

Paul Krugman | Wrong Is Right
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/022007F.shtml
For the last six years we have been ruled by men who are pathologically incapable of owning up to mistakes. And this pathology has had real, disastrous consequences. The situation in Iraq might not be quite so dire - and we might even have succeeded in stabilizing Afghanistan - if Mr. Bush or Vice President Dick Cheney had been willing to admit early on that things weren't going well or that their handpicked appointees weren't the right people for the job.

Bob Herbert | The Real Patriots
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/022007H.shtml
Bob Herbert writes: "I don't think most Americans are up for perennial warfare. And whatever the polls might say, it's very hard for me to accept that the men and women who rise from their seats and cover their hearts at the start of sporting events are really in favor of dismantling the system of checks and balances, or holding people in prison for years without charging them, or torturing prisoners in US custody, or giving the president the raw power and unsavory privileges of an emperor.

http://www.americanprogress.org/cartoons/2007/02/022007_equip.html
Getting Boots on the Ground

Posted by: Otter at February 20, 2007 03:38 PM

I don't see what the big deal is... I feel fat every Tuesday...

BTW, check out "American Routes" at http://www.americanroutes.org/

Cool link, mdf, thanks. And FWIW, here's the same link without the trailing parentheses mark for those who can click on it directly from their browsers rather than copying & pasting it: http://www.americanroutes.org/

Posted by: Otter at February 20, 2007 04:00 PM

Oops. Thanks for cleaning up after me.

Posted by: Otter at February 20, 2007 03:38 PM

Confuse Us Say, When You Channel Your Inner Monkey, You Get the Fiyo on the Bayou.

This is an inspiring bit of teamwork.

Kerry Joins Obama, McCaskill To Improve Conditions At Walter Reed Hospital

Legislation will be aimed at helping patients with counseling, rehabilitation

WASHINGTON, DC – Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) announced today that he will co-sponsor legislation to improve the lives of recovering veterans at Walter Reed and other medical centers by eliminating paperwork and improving physical conditions. Kerry also said he would explore options for directing new funding to Walter Reed and to make immediate improvements to the buildings where veterans are housed. Kerry said he was “saddened” by a recent Washington Post series exposing poor sanitary conditions and other hurdles faced by injured veterans returning to the states after service in Iraq and Afghanistan, along with a story in the Army Times about 15 month delays facing vets seeking a physical evaluation. The sponsors of the legislation are Sens. Obama and McCaskill.

“We owe our returning veterans a debt of gratitude, not sub-standard treatment at an overcrowded medical facility,” said Kerry. “The Administration has consistently talked a big game but shortchanged the needs of veterans. How can the president talk about a troop escalation in Iraq while failing to keep faith with the Iraq War veterans we’ve already brought home? Brave men who have been blinded or lost a limb in Iraq should not be sitting in moldy, mouse-infested buildings. Period. It’s unacceptable and this Congress needs to do something about it.”

The legislation that Kerry is co-sponsoring would do the following:

Simplify the paperwork process for recovering soldiers;
Improve the ratio of caseworkers to recovering soldiers;
Increase the training of caseworkers;
Require more frequent IG inspections of hospital facilities and standards of care;
Establish timelines and benchmarks for repairs to substandard facilities;
Provide recovering soldiers with psychological counseling; and
Require regular reporting to Congress on: the total number of recovering soldiers at military hospitals; the number of caseworkers; the average waiting time for treatment; and the number of suicide attempts, accidental deaths or drug overdoses.

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/02/20/countdown-shameful-treatment-of-the-troops-at-walter-reed/
Countdown: Shameful treatment of the Troops at Walter Reed

Keith Olbermann....

DiAnne, do you have a link to that last news story about Walter Reed, please? Thanks!

Hey now (hey now)
Hey now (hey now)
Iko iko un day
Jockomo feeno ah na nay
Jockomo feena nay
[repeated twice]

My grandma see your grandpa
Sitting by the Bayou
My grandma see your granpa
Gonna fix your chicken wire

[chorus]

My spy dog see your spy dog
Sitting by the Bayou
My spy dog see your spy dog
Gonna set your tail on fire

[chorus]

My little boy see your little boy
Sitting by the Bayou
My little boy see your little boy
Gonna fix your chicken wire

[chorus]

My grandma see your grandma
Sitting by the Bayou
My grandma see your grandma
Gonna fix your chicken wire

[chorus]

Otter
I got the news about Kerry, Obama, McCaskill from Liz Richardson, Kerry's press agent, so it'll be hitting the papers any time. So I
don't have a link per se.

Alternatively:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iko_Iko

http://www.bayouthreadsgifts.com/catalog/images/Laissez%20bon%20Temps%20Roule%20agian%20Girls%20Tee.JPG (basically work safe)

Laisse les bon temps roule

OT, but Fitzgerald is giving his closing arguments rebuttal.
http://www.firedoglake.com/2007/02/20/libby-live-fitzgeralds-rebuttal/

"Iko Iko" is one of those oft-covered songs that have oodles of alternative lyrics. The Wikepedia entry about it gives some good background info on where those lyrics most likely come from, though.

t'row me sumpin mistah,
Otter

Setback to Guantanamo detainees, to democracy

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/02/20/news/gitmo.php

no habeus corpus

Do we have any recourse?

UK Prime Minister Tony Blair will announce on Wednesday a new timetable for withdrawing British troops from Iraq, with 1,500 to return home in several weeks, the British Broadcasting Corp. reports.

Yes, DiAnne, we do have recourse:

Investigate.

Indict.

Impeach.

Imprison.

Any questions?

And by the way, if reading this dKos diary doesn't worry the crap out of you, then you're just not paying attention:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/2/20/155035/633

Posted by: monkey at February 20, 2007 05:59 PM

Apparently not. He's still Boosh's poodle...

Blair delays plan to have Iraq troops home within weeks
Last updated at 23:39pm on 20th February 2007
Tony Blair has been forced to put back plans to withdraw British troops from Iraq within weeks - after pressure from the U.S.

http://tinyurl.com/ywkc6y = Daily Mail

peeking at headlines -
Blair to Withdraw Troops from Iraq
Al Quaida Gaining Strength
Britney to Enter Rehab in Wig

Truth is so much stranger than fiction.

Another press release:

Kerry Response to British Redeployment Plan

WASHINGTON, DC – Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) issued the following statement today, in response to Prime Minister Tony Blair’s expected announcement that he would be withdrawing British troops on a fixed timetable, including the redeployment of 1,500 soldiers in the coming weeks and 3,000 troops home by Christmas.

“America’s leading ally in Iraq has decided that a timetable for the phased redeployment of troops is the only responsible policy to help force Iraqis to stand up for Iraq,” said Kerry. “After years of touting Prime Minister Blair’s resolve, the Administration should now pay attention to his new policy. This announcement makes it all the more inexplicable that the President and leading Republicans actually want to send more American troops into the middle of an Iraqi civil war.”

Posted by: DiAnne at February 20, 2007 07:56 PM

Blair delays plan to have Iraq troops home within weeks
http://tinyurl.com/ywkc6y = Daily Mail

Our friend John Pike says we may be bombing Iran on or around Feb. 21. That would be tomorrow.

The Military Commissions Act is, according to two judges out of three, just a peachy keen piece of Constitutional legislation.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17239258/

Walter Reed story getting worse and worse (last three DCP thread headers).

And I am in need of serious drugs to spell my ongoing rage.

Tonight we are hosting Liam Madden (http://tinyurl.com/2e8h3s) and Sunsara Taylor at our house and Lori Perdue (Vets for Peace) and Tina Richards (Military Families Speak Out) will stop by for spaghetti and talk. We will support all of these folks, because it is what we can do.

But I read stuff like the stories on this page:
http://mfso.live.radicaldesigns.org/index.php

and I want to throw up. Or throw things. At Congress.

I can't wait for them to come back to town. We will be talking...

Hope Mr. Pike is wrong.

Regarding your MFSO link... When I dropped by the small peace surge in Chelsea, there was only a small number there, but the cars were honking and thumbs were up too.

We spoke about how the tide has been turning. In o4, peace protestors were greated with glares. In 05, they were greated with mostly glares but a few thumbs up. In early 06 they were greated 1/2 and 1/2 or 55-45. But by Feb 07, the glares were minimal. We agreed it was about 90% supportive.

Of course that does no good to know all this if Mr. Pike's prediction is accurate.

http://mfso.live.radicaldesigns.org/index.php
and I want to throw up. Or throw things. At Congress.
I can't wait for them to come back to town. We will be talking...
Posted by: karen at February 20, 2007 08:18 PM

Those testimonials NEED to be read to Congress Critters sitting in one room, tied to chairs and forced to LISTEN to what military families are saying!!! (They'll have emails waiting from me when they get back, too.)

Enough with corporations - oil corporations, in particular, along with corporations who hire mercenaries - running the show via The Cretin and the Vice Cretin who are making such a tidy profit off of their private war paid for with our tax dollars and the tax dollars of generations who have not yet been born.

Those dirty, rotten, no good sorry sons of pit vipers need to be IMPEACHED...! Before they start another war on false pretenses...!

Army Times has an investigative piece on Walter Reed!
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/2/20/152344/516

Bush compares the Iraq war to the Revolutionary war
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2003579968_bush20.html

He must mean we are "the British"

Madame defarge
Boy they must have bribed Blair

from Nyc at A Pen Dipped in Blood

They need black backpacks and international phone calling cards.
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/02/20/more-on-walter-reed/

Support The Troops.

publicity for the private Center for the Intrepid - note John McCain in the front row - depressing

health care should be part of our national government's role, not farmed out to the private sector like this

http://www.defenselink.mil/home/features/2007/intrepid_center2/

and all those amputees and rows of wheelchairs would not have had to be

Our society is becoming increasingly militarized and it seems the war could expand and there isn't much we can do.

Last I heard on quickie news this afternoon was that Blair was set to announce the beginning of the redeployment of British troops tomorrow.

I thought maybe it was a publicity ploy to make it look more necessary for the U.S. to send the surge.

To be a fly on the wall..

VFW Calls for Congressional Investigation of Walter Reed Problems

http://www.kwtx.com/breakingnews/5958996.html

(It just occurred to me I have a friend who works at Walter Reed - I should get into contact)

And I am in need of serious drugs to spell my ongoing rage.

and I want to throw up. Or throw things. At Congress.

Posted by: karen at February 20, 2007 08:18 PM

You are hardly alone. I may not be posting much re: poor treatment of our soldiers at Walter Reed, but that's because this is beyond disgust and disbelief. I am literally speechless.

This is proof that all the talk about supporting the troops by the warmongers is really about supporting the weapons contractors.

I am truly ashamed to have VOLUNTARILY naturalized into a nation whose greatest selling product is DEATH. (After all, we armed Saddam, we armed Osama, we armed countless other dictators.)

Our society is becoming increasingly militarized and it seems the war could expand and there isn't much we can do.

Posted by: DiAnne at February 20, 2007 11:30 PM

If we still had a democracy, we WOULD have plenty to do.

But our democracy was so fragile that a primitive Korean immigrant with $3 billion was able to corrupt it one-handedly.

I'm gonna take apart my computer and throw out ALL Samsung chips in it.

Posted by: Julie in Portland at February 20, 2007 11:45 PM

VFW ought to be ashamed of having supported the Republican pro-weapon, pro-death (as opposed to pro-soldier) agenda. They are irrelevant in this discussion.

Those dirty, rotten, no good sorry sons of pit vipers need to be IMPEACHED...! Before they start another war on false pretenses...!

Posted by: NonnyO at February 20, 2007 10:43 PM

If the Democratic Congress will not start impeachment proceedings against W, then the Democratic Party is irrelevant. Irrelevant to the media, irrelevant to the general voting population, and irrelevant to even the activists like us.

I'm back up - the only Korean component in my computer was the battery. No chip-pulling for me tonight.

Here's an excellent diary at dkos. You'll recognize yourself in it quickly but I encourage you to read to the end.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/2/20/18401/4865

Posted by: DiAnne at February 20, 2007 11:16 PM

Apparently, the Daily Mail got it wrong (which I guess is no surprise, since they are about as reliable as the Chicago SunTimes).

Here's a more reliable source: The Independent
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article2291300.ece

Blair made his announcement to withdraw 1600 troops "within weeks." I'm still waiting to hear what "within weeks" means. That could be a number anywhere from 2 to 52 (or more).

As Al Franken says, it's a "coalition of the leaving."

U.S. House of Reps. Members & Their Floor Speeches
C-SPAN has clips indexed by state

http://www.c-span.org/resources/house_feb2007.asp

February 21, 2007 08:14 AM

Speeches on Iraq Resolution, that is...

But in an exclusive interview with ABC News, Vice President Dick Cheney said the move was actually good news and a sign of progress in Iraq.

"Well, I look at it and see it is actually an affirmation that there are parts of Iraq where things are going pretty well," Cheney told ABC News' Jonathan Karl.
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=2891713

Spin, spin, spin...

If this is a "positive sign" that things are going well in Iraq, why the hell does the US have to send more troops???

And how come the UK's troop withdrawal doesn't "embolden the enemy?"

For those who may have missed this, Snow was a complete blithering idiot (again) at yesterday's press conference when asked about the horrors at Walter Reed Hospital.

Here's a good diary about it:
White House Reacts To Walter Reed Horror Stories
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/2/21/45530/5708

Posted by: madame defarge at February 21, 2007 08:26 AM

Cheney said he had spoken to a friend who had made the trek from Baghdad to Basra recently and had "found the situation dramatically improved compared to where it was a year or so ago."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17246357/

Yeah, the Perrignon was chiiled, the caviar was room temperature, and flower petals were literally falling from the sky... not to mention the rich Corinthian leather.

Fire. Aim.

Ready?

Oregon's two Senators came to Bend for a town hall meeting and this is how television reported it:

The story covered the main topics the people asked about... and got comments for others. 4 people interviewed want the war defunded and our troops home. ZERO pro-war, support Bush interviews!

Then the report stated: "But some attendees were not pleased with the what the Senators had to say...."

(Pan to Astrobuff..... who said:

I am not satisfied with what each of the Senators had to say about our wounded soldiers. I came today to express my concerns about how our wounded veterans are being treated. They are not getting the help they need. We have 25,000 injured soldiers in this country today, and they are being denied disability. If they are disabled, they need to get those benefits.

Hold On Tight
by Electric Light Orchestra

Hold on tight to your dream
Hold on tight to your dream
When you see your ship go sailing
When you feel your heart is breaking
Hold tight to your dream.

Its a long time to be gone
Time just rolls on and on
When you need a shoulder to cry on
When you get so sick of trying
Just hold tight to your dream

When you get so down that you cant get up
And you want so much but youre all out of luck
When youre so downhearted and misunderstood
Just over & over & over you could

Accroches-toi a ton reve
Accroches-toi a ton reve
Quand tu vois ton bateau partir
Quand tu sents -- ton coeur se briser
Accroches-toi a ton reve.

When you get so down that you cant get up
And you want so much but youre all out of luck
When youre so downhearted and misunderstood
Just over & over & over you could

Hold on tight to your dream
Hold on tight to your dream
When you see the shadows falling
When you hear that cold wind calling
Hold on tight to your dream.

Oh, yeah
Hold on tight to your dream
Yeah, hold on tight...
To your dream.