The year 2004 was one of the worst in living memory for the Republic.  Let us move forward with the hope that 2005 will be a year of national renewal and political change.

Funny things have been happening in North Korea for months.  First strange things began happening with the telephones.  Foreigners couldn't call out.

Then Kim Jong-Il went for a summit in China in September.  He was out of the country for several days.  He reentered Korea near the northern town of Ryonchon.  At some point near the time that his train was passing through the town, a massive explosion destroyed the town.  Speculation was rife that the attack was an assasination attempt.  They don't fool around in North Korea. 

Then strange things began happening in the last Stalininst enclave on earth.  Pictures of Kim Jong-Il began coming down.  Rumors that hundreds of North Korean general officers had defected to China swirled.  Reports indicated that there was unrest amongst the people.

North Korea responded.  

Quite contrary to what the U.S. claimed, not even a button of a general officer's uniform, to say nothing of more than a hundred of general officers, has ever been found across the border.
We do not know such a word as "defection".

Reports now filtering out of the country may indicate that the collapse of the Demorcratic People's Republic of Korea is around the corner.  Expect Bush to claim victory.

There's a lot going on right now:

Seven weeks after a U.S. offensive on the guerrilla bastion of Falluja in a bid to quell the revolt before the Jan. 30 vote, there are signs the insurgency has recovered much of its vigor. . .

In the bloodiest of Tuesday's attacks before the Baghdad explosion, insurgents overran a police post near Saddam's home town of Tikrit, 110 miles north of Baghdad.

They hauled out 12 men and shot them dead, then blew up the police station in a dramatic show of force. . .

Where is the new plan to get this election going and defeat the insurgency?

Elsewhere. . .

Workers from Indonesia to India rushed to bury corpses to ward off disease Wednesday as cargo planes touched down with promised aid — from lentils to water purifiers — to help the region cope with its tsunami catastrophe. The death toll soared to 63,000.

But our president is leading out front on these issues from . . .

Q At the ranch?

MR. DUFFY: At the ranch, yes

Phil Carter and I have a lot in common.  We both are newly minted attorneys and we both write for blogs, and we both agree that the current statistics on American troops killed in action aren't reflecting the intensity of combat faced by our soldiers.

Early this month, the Iron Mouth featured a short analysis of Iraq causalities compared to those of other wars.  Our look at the numbers attempted to factor in the advances in medical science which allow soldiers who would have died in an earlier era to survive being wounded and even return to the battlefield.  When the effect of medical advances was factored in, American casualty rates were comparable to those in other wars.

Today Phil Carter and Owen West did their own analysis of the effects of medical advances on the casualty numbers in Slate, and came up with a similar result.  Phil also went into more depth on his unrivaled blog, Intel-Dump.

The Iron Mouth's analysis showed that without the effect of advances in medical technology and science, the number of killed in action for the entire Iraq war up to the end of November, 2004 would have been around 5593 soldiers killed in action.  Phil's analysis came up with similar numbers: 2,975 for 2004 alone.  

Now Phil and I aren't alike in every way--he works at a much larger firm than I do, and he also writes for Slate on top of his duties as a first-year associate.  But it is reassuring to see a writer of his caliber applying a similar analysis to the problem of the Iraq casualty numbers and coming up with a similar result.

Turns out America's Top CEO's miss the Big Dog:

No wonder.  The current idiot can't do anything right.

Holiday reading. (from the ever-useful Metafilter.)

The folks over at that paragon of reason Little Green Footballs are sure that Osama is dead. 

Well it didn't take too long to answer my question.  It seems the AP is reporting that the suicide bomber was wearing an Iraqi National Guard uniform.  I guess that relief expressed in the moments after the attack that at least the bombing came from a distance and not infiltration has all but been put to bed and we enter a whole new phase in this long running trainwreck called Iraq.

I have been looking at the write-ups on the bombing in Mosul and since no one has touched on it yet I thought I'd throw this question out there:

What if it turns out that the bomber was a member of the Iraqi National Guard?

I ask because early reports are so confusing that they inexplicably seemed to suggest that it was some random Iraqi who wandered onto base and somehow passed through several layers of security without raising suspicion.  Since this is a joint US-Iraqi military base and mess hall and we've heard untold numbers of reports on the unreliability of Iraqi National Guard and other security forces the probability it was ING rises significantly.  Now I'm perfectly willing to concede it might have just been a local who worked at the base but you'd think that someone reporting on this mess might actually raise the question.

Scandal, anyone?

Harsh interrogation methods of Iraqi prisoners went "beyond the bounds of standard FBI practice," the FBI's top official in Iraq said in a memo released Monday. . .

While the memo doesn't directly say who authorized the practices, two government officials who spoke on condition of anonymity said the methods were approved by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. . .

The memo includes several references to an "executive order" signed by President Bush. . . White House officials also said the memo's reference to an executive order from the president was a mistake.

"No such executive order exists or has ever existed," said Frederick Jones, a spokesman for the National Security Council.

A June 25 memo from an FBI agent to Director Robert Mueller, which was also released Monday, said individuals "were engaged in a cover-up of abuses." The individuals' names were blacked out.

The agent included a report from an unnamed witness of "numerous physical abuse incidents of Iraqi civilians" including "strangulation, beatings, placement of lit cigarettes into the detainees' ear openings and unauthorized interrogations." . . .

Knight-Ridder continues to get the best scoops on the oozing blob of ethical problems that is the Bush Administration.  Expect more soon.  Gonzales isn't going to make it to Justice.

President Bush needs help in getting Sunnis to fully participate in elections scheduled in Iraq next month.  Who might help?  Saddam.  Turns out the former President of Iraq has a few things to say about the election:

"President Saddam Hussein urged the unity of his Iraqi people, regardless of their religious and ethnic creed, to confront U.S. plans to divide their country on sectarian grounds."

Saddam sent a plea to Iraq's men of religion from all persuasions to "shoulder a historic responsibility" in rallying people in Iraq's difficult times, the lawyers said.

This Philip K. Dickesque moment brought to you by President George W. Bush. 

Pilot Error Blamed in N.J. School Shooting.

Here's the key part:

the pilot never intended to strafe the Little Egg Harbor Township Intermediate School . . .

 "There's a nanny," said Tacopina. "I swear there's a nanny."