Seriously, there are some lazy people in Federal Law enforcement. 8 million pings? There are not enough terrorists in this country to justify that many pings in one year.
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Recently in The War On Terror Category
This is what Sarah Palin meant when she said it:
I've been struck by this since the beginning. If it is the case that the president can designate an Office of Legal Counsel functionary to immunize government officials and employees against criminal behavior, then it is true, to all intents and purposes that "if the president does it it's not illegal."And, from this article, we also learn that Cheney, who developed his executive beliefs and values from the Nixon White House, ordered the CIA to not inform Congress about the secret wiretapping programs.
(NYT)The Central Intelligence Agency withheld information about a secret counterterrorism program from Congress for eight years on direct orders from former Vice President Dick Cheney, the agency's director, Leon E. Panetta, has told the Senate and House intelligence committees, two people with direct knowledge of the matter said Saturday.Next week sure is going to be an interesting news week.
From working in a residential setting, I learned quickly that those who were thieves in the past tended to be the ones that complained about there being thieves in the residence. On several occasions, they turned out to actually be the thieves. Hence, my total lack of surprise at the shrill response of the Right Wing Noise Machine.
I also think it's especially ironic that the loudest of shrill networks would actually produce a level-headed piece pointing out the over-reaction of the Right Wing Noise Machine.
I swear, Shepard Smith is trying to get himself fired from Fox.
I also think it's especially ironic that the loudest of shrill networks would actually produce a level-headed piece pointing out the over-reaction of the Right Wing Noise Machine.
I swear, Shepard Smith is trying to get himself fired from Fox.
Somehow, Putin figures into this move. Does he have enough clout with the Kyrgyzstan parliament to cause this move? I suspect he does. Unfortunately, all I have are suppositions and hunches. But, then, once upon a time, that's all our administration had.(CNN) -- Kyrgyzstan parliament has voted to close a base the U.S. military uses as a route for troops and supplies heading into Afghanistan, a government spokesman said Thursday.
Of the 87 members of parliament who attended the session, 78 voted to close it, the spokesman said.
The law must now be signed by the Kyrgyz president. It will then be forwarded to the United States, after which the U.S. military has 180 days in which to withdraw from the base, the spokesman said.
Do you know how nice it is to write "had?"
Finally, a clear sign of this administration breaking with the past.
They can't move fast enough to undue the damage of the last 8 years. But at least they are moving.GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba, Jan. 20 -- In one of its first actions, the Obama administration instructed military prosecutors late Tuesday to seek a 120-day suspension of legal proceedings involving detainees at the naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- a clear break with the approach of the outgoing Bush administration.
The instruction came in a motion filed with a military court in the case of five defendants accused of organizing the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. The motion called for "a continuance of the proceedings" until May 20 so that "the newly inaugurated president and his administration [can] review the military commissions process, generally, and the cases currently pending before military commissions, specifically."
Meanwhile, back at one of the NeoCon sandboxs:
CNNThe Taliban claimed that its fighters used a rocket-propelled grenade launcher to shoot down a U.S. Chinook helicopter in the Wardak province, about 30 miles (50km) west of Kabul.
Maj. John Redfield, a U.S. military spokesman, told CNN a coalition helicopter went down in the Wardak province after an exchange of fire with enemy on the ground.
All 10 soldiers on board were picked up and taken to safety, he said. He could not say if any were injured.
Meanwhile, a suicide bomber on Monday killed two soldiers and wounded three others in northern Afghanistan, a spokesman for the U.S. military in Afghanistan said.
Gosh darn! I am feeling so hunky dory positive and uplifted. Viva La Freedom!
New York TimesOf course KBR is going to deny any wrong doing. They don't want to be sued. Once again, the hallmark of BushCo™ is on display: incompetence in all they do or touch.
Heather Browne, a KBR spokeswoman, would not comment about a company safety study or the reports of electrical fires or shocks, but she said KBR had found no evidence of a link between its work and the electrocutions. She added, "KBR's commitment to the safety of all employees and those the company serves remains unwavering."
I wonder if there will be any war profiteering hearings after the new administration takes power. That has been the most glaring problem with BushCo™. They have made no effort at ensuring competence and integrity with government contractors during their entire tenure at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. But than, their focus has not been on running the government, it has been on lining Dick Cheney's pockets, as well as the Carlyle Group's accounts.
New York TimesIs our intelligence gathering ability that degraded? Or is this because of our deteriorating relationship with Pakistan? In either case, this should not be happening. Our forces are simply not getting the support from the administration that is needed to ensure their safety.
KABUL, Afghanistan -- The Taliban insurgents who attacked a remote American-run outpost near the Pakistan border on Sunday numbered nearly 200 fighters, almost three times the size of the allied force, and some breached the NATO compound in a coordinated assault that took the defenders by surprise, Western officials said Monday.
Star TribuneThis should not be a news story. Afghanistan should not be a problem right now. But, because our piss poor excuse of a president decided to prove he was better than his father, we blundered into an invasion of Iraq. This depleted the military strength required to take out the people truly responsible for the attacks on September 11th, 2001. So, instead of a secure, safe Afghanistan, we have Afghanistan slowly degrading into chaos -- if ever it really had seen stability.
U.S. officials say militant attacks in Afghanistan are becoming more complex, intense and better coordinated than a year ago. Monthly death tolls of U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan surpassed U.S. military deaths in Iraq in May and June. And last Monday, a suicide bomber attacked the Indian Embassy in Kabul, killing 58 people in the deadliest attack in the Afghan capital since 2001.
New York TimesIn the first civilian judicial review of the government's evidence for holding any of the Guantánamo Bay detainees, a federal appeals court has ordered that one of them be released or given a new military hearing.
The ruling, made known Monday in a notice from the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, overturned a Pentagon tribunal's decision in the case of one of 17 Guantánamo detainees who are ethnic Uighurs, a Muslim minority from western China.
The imprisonment of the 17 Uighurs (pronounced WEE-goors) has drawn wide attention because of their claim that although they were in Afghanistan when the United States invaded in 2001, they were never enemies of this country and were mistakenly swept into Guantánamo.
No, it can't be possible. Our government make a mistake?! Not the government commanded by George "No regrets" W. Bush. Oh please oh please tell me it ain't so! I mean, these prisoners sound dangerous, what with peddling their fruits of mass destruction.
The one-paragraph notice from the appeals court said a three-judge panel had found in favor of Huzaifa Parhat, a former fruit peddler who made his way from western China to a Uighur camp in Afghanistan.
I am so disheartened. Poor president Bush. He will never be able to achieve world peace at this rate.
I know I said I was not into politics at the moment. But Scott McClellan is coming out with a book on Monday that a CNN White House correspondent called, and I am trying to recall this from memory, candid and straightforward.
Already the Mighty Wurlitzer's screeching harpies are lining up for blood.
Damn, just when I thought I'd gotten away, they pull me back in.
Update: Here are two more links; C&L and Politico.com
Already the Mighty Wurlitzer's screeching harpies are lining up for blood.
Only problem with that:Frances Townsend, former Homeland Security adviser to Bush, said advisers to the president should speak up when they have policy concerns.
"Scott never did that on any of these issues as best I can remember or as best as I know from any of my White House colleagues," said Townsend, now a CNN contributor. "For him to do this now strikes me as self-serving, disingenuous and unprofessional."
Obviously, Scott didn't coordinate this announcement with the White House; it's not Friday. But more to the point, how can they denounce Scott's job performance when the president himself proclaimed a job done well? Yeah, I know, they will anyway.A former spokesman for Bush when he was governor of Texas, McClellan was named White House press secretary in 2003, replacing Ari Fleischer. McClellan had previously been a deputy press secretary and was the traveling spokesman for the Bush campaign during the 2000 election.
He announced he was resigning in April 2006 at a news conference with Bush.
"One of these days, he and I are going to be rocking in chairs in Texas talking about the good old days of his time as the press secretary," Bush said at that conference. "And I can assure you, I will feel the same way then that I feel now, that I can say to Scott, job well done."
Damn, just when I thought I'd gotten away, they pull me back in.
Update: Here are two more links; C&L and Politico.com
I have to give Digby credit for coining Codpiece Day. However, Kyle E. Moore over at Comments From Left Field makes the point for the day.
Oh hell, of course I don't. Besides, rhetorical question. Duh.
Well, boys and girls, we’re still in Iraq, and since declaring the end of major combat operations, a full 97% of the men and women who have died in Iraq have done so following that potentially great day. And, of course, if we choose to elect John McCain as our next Commander in Chief, we will have many more Mission Accomplished Days to celebrate.Do I really need to add to that?
Oh hell, of course I don't. Besides, rhetorical question. Duh.
The Hastings Star GazetteAfter 5 years this should not be happening. Putting aside the lies, the deception, and the manipulation that led us into this occupation, if the current administration had any competent leadership abilities, this type of extreme rotation would not be needed. Instead, there would already be an international coalition in Iraq, with the Iraqis themselves supply the bulk of security in their own country.
About 50 Hastings-based soldiers from the Minnesota National Guard will soon be returning to Iraq for their second deployment in four years.
The soldiers are part of Charlie Company of the 834th Aviation Support Battalion of the 34th Combat Aviation Brigade. They’ll be leaving near the end of May for an approximately year-long tour, Shane Hudella, a spokesman for the National Guard said.
Instead, we are left as the major, if not sole, security force in the country that does not want us there, while a certain vice-president's company reaps a whirlwind profit. Meanwhile, the Iraqi Army was soundly rebuffed by local militias and shows no signs of being able to improve its standing.
New York TimesYou mean they are not unbiased analysts with integrity and honor? <snark>Well, knock me over with a feather.</snark>To the public, these men are members of a familiar fraternity, presented tens of thousands of times on television and radio as “military analysts” whose long service has equipped them to give authoritative and unfettered judgments about the most pressing issues of the post-Sept. 11 world.
Hidden behind that appearance of objectivity, though, is a Pentagon information apparatus that has used those analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance, an examination by The New York Times has found.
The effort, which began with the buildup to the Iraq war and continues to this day, has sought to exploit ideological and military allegiances, and also a powerful financial dynamic: Most of the analysts have ties to military contractors vested in the very war policies they are asked to assess on air.
It is a long, and damaging article detailing propaganda at its worst.
The Green Zone has been stained red with American blood.
BBCSomehow, I do not think this is going to jive with the testimony I am sure the White House has already written for General Petraeus's appearance before congress.Three US service personnel have been killed and 31 wounded by rocket attacks on the Green Zone and a base elsewhere in Baghdad, the US military has said.
The rocket attack at 1530 (1230 GMT) on the Green Zone, which houses government offices and foreign embassies, killed two personnel and wounded at least 17.
A separate attack at the same time on a forward operating base in the Rustamiya district killed another and injured 14.
The attacks came after fierce fighting between US forces and Shia militiamen.
New York Times<sarcasm>Imagine that. The promised troop reduction pre surge has been abandoned. A raise of hands of all those who are shocked, Shocked! I tell you, at this unforeseen turn of events.</sarcasm>
WASHINGTON — Troop levels in Iraq would remain nearly the same through 2008 as they have been through most of the five years of war there, under plans presented to President Bush on Monday by the senior American commander and the top American diplomat in Iraq, senior administration and military officials said.
New York TimesBAGHDAD (AP) -- The overall U.S. death toll in Iraq rose to 4,000 after four soldiers were killed in a roadside bombing in Baghdad, a grim milestone that is likely to fuel calls for the withdrawal of American forces as the war enters its sixth year.
The American deaths occurred Sunday, the same day rockets and mortars pounded the U.S.-protected Green Zone in Baghdad and a wave of attacks left at least 61 Iraqis dead nationwide.
At this point, rage just won't get anything done. 4000 lives all in the name of Big Oil and Bush's ego. So, do you think he will go to his grave smug in the belief he showed up his father? Yeah, I agree.
USA TodayFive years ago this week, as bombs began to rain down on Baghdad, this newspaper's front-page news story said President Bush's order "signaled the beginning of a preventive war unique in American history and one on which he has staked his presidency."
Subsequent events have shown the pre-emptive attack on Iraq to have been one of the great foreign policy blunders in American history, one that has driven Bush's approval rating down to 32%. Saddam Hussein, it turned out, had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks, possessed no weapons of mass destruction and posed no imminent threat to U.S. security.
While the U.S. deposed a brutal dictator, in the process it destabilized Iraq, emboldened its archenemy Iran and opened the door for al-Qaeda terrorists to establish a foothold in a place they hadn't been. Efforts to defeat the insurgency and salvage a semblance of stability in Iraq have cost nearly 4,000 American lives and more than $500 billion.
Normally, I do not post opinion pieces from newspapers. However, this one is from USA Today. When America's Cheerleader newspaper states that the pre-emptive attack was a foreign policy blunder, that is saying something.
Oh, and they call the invasion "Bush's Blunder." That's going to stick.
The News TribuneStudies: Iraq costs U.S. $12B per monthBy CHARLES J. HANLEY ; AP Special CorrespondentPublished: March 9th, 2008 02:07 PM | Updated: March 9th, 2008 05:02 PMThe flow of blood may be ebbing, but the flood of money into the Iraq war is steadily rising, new analyses show. In 2008, its sixth year, the war will cost approximately $12 billion a month, triple the "burn" rate of its earliest years, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and co-author Linda J. Bilmes report in a new book.Beyond 2008, working with "best-case" and "realistic-moderate" scenarios, they project the Iraq and Afghan wars, including long-term U.S. military occupations of those countries, will cost the U.S. budget between $1.7 trillion and $2.7 trillion - or more - by 2017.
Christ, I can't make the monthly mortgage without facing the prospect of getting my heat shut off. How the hell am I suppose to pay for my portion of this God forsaken clusterfuck?
Musharraf's Party Accepts Defeat - New York TimesYou mean his efforts at rigging the election in Pakistan didn't pan out? I am shocked, Shocked! I tell you. How could such a despicable situation befall a gallant ally in the GLOBAL WAR AGAINST TERROR?
LAHORE, Pakistan -- Pakistan appeared to be heading for a transition to an elected civilian government Tuesday after President Pervez Musharraf told visiting United States senators that he accepted the resounding defeat of his party in elections, and would work with a new Parliament.
Poor, poor President Bush. First the Protect America Act lapses, now Musharraf loses the election. He stands alone, does our quacker of a president.
Technorati Tags: Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf, Election, GWOT
Star TribuneFORWARD OPERATING BASE FALCON, Iraq - Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Monday endorsed, for the first time, the idea of pausing the drawdown of U.S. forces from Iraq this summer.
"A brief period of consolidation and evaluation probably does make sense," Gates told reporters after meeting with Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq. Petraeus has indicated in recent weeks that he wants a "period of evaluation" this summer to assess the impact on Iraq security of reducing the U.S. military presence from 20 brigades to 15 brigades.
In other words, you bastards lied to us about the surge, its purpose, the goals, and its actual success. Had the surge produced positive change, made the political, ethnic and religious conditions more favorable for peaceful coexistence, would there even need to be a discussion of "consolidation and evaluation?" Of course not. We could bring our service personnel home without any type of waiting and evaluating. There would be clear, observable facts on the ground even as I type this post. But that is not the case, is it?
The wingnuts can scream all they want about schools being painted, etc., etc., etc. But in the end, there is still too much conflict, death, and destruction in Iraq to claim any kind of success.
Canadian CynicAnd that's before he gets good and warmed up.
It's bad to kill a blob of cells with little to no consciousness that even the Bible says has no worth until it's been outside it's mother for a month.
But it's good to let people like Michael J. Fox suffer from Parkinson's disease.
and it's good to keep people like Christopher Reeves confined to a wheelchair.
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