On the one hand, the United States declared today that we are done paying for the reconstruction of Iraq, on the other hand a Pentagon spokesman fielding a question about the requests for hundred's of millions of dollars that keep popping up in the federal budget for military base construction in Iraq states, "We're building permanent bases in Iraq for Iraqis." 

Now, the White House will point to the elimination of reconstruction funding for Iraq as an example of the new government's ability to take over the rebuilding of the country, however along the same lines the Iraqi government evidently lacks the funds or ability to build large military installations to garrison Iraqi troops?

Oddly enough, if one wanted to deny that we are building permanent US bases in Iraq, you too may have to keep going through these same odd leaps of logic....

As usual, Digby is able to cut throught the B.S. commonly referred to as "the administration's pushback strategy on Iraq":

"It's the violence, stupid. Until that stops, there is no good news."

For years I've shook my head at the multitude of horror stories of good, honest,  God-fearing Christian Americans (eg. true descendents of our Founding Fathers) being persecuted by a wicked society in the throes of radical secular humanism.  Maybe its being married to a Methodist minister or just an inkling that many conservative Christians want to feel persecuted so as to achieve the kind of unimpeachable moral authority and martyrdom that we associate with the Civil Rights movement of the 50's and 60's? 

No matter, it really comes down to something I realized several years ago watching various political campaigns; it is absolutely impossible for a political candidate in this country to run and win political office if they are an avowed atheist or proudly do not ascribe to any religious faith whatsoever.  One would think that if society was so cruel to Christians and other people of faith, that this wouldn't be the case.  Nevertheless, a University of Minnesota study suggests that self-avowed Atheists are somewhere between Dick Cheney and Islamic terrorists in terms of popularity...which is pretty low.  Kevin Drum tries to massage the numbers but it still looks bad for the non-believers among us.

Ben Domenech resigns.

Nothing.

Let me be more specific.  For years the GOP has made plenty of hay by pushing back against mis-characterized versions of the Democrats' party positions.  To take any kind of unified position on anything, especially Iraq is a serious tactical error. 

It is similar to assymetric warfare.  The Republicans' media machine is a finely tuned meatgrinder.  It whirrs into action when it detects anything it can push against.  The machine's existence is the sole reason a minority party whose positions differ widely from the majority of the American public remains in power. 

However, the GOP media machine can only push back.  Its inability to govern is now evident for all to see.  The Republican Party cannot run from its singularly atrocious record of governance.  The GOP can only hope that somehow they can change the subject. 

The worst thing the Democratic party can do now is to try and propose a major program on things which it did not create and cannot possibly hope to create solutions for.  Like Nixon's "Secret Plan" to end the war, this strategy relies on the fact that the election must be about the Republican's record in office, not the Democrats' own plans to fix the many broken windows around the house. 

This seems counterintuitive to many of those inside the Beltway, where I live.  But the simple fact is that the American public is fed up with grand plans and promises of glory.  They want a promise to govern well and that is all.

Okay so Operation Swarmer hasn't lived up to its billing.  No fighting, no shots fired, no airstrikes, most of the people detained were released, the uncovering of a few weapons caches is pretty common anywhere you go in Iraq and as Pat Lang notes an operation of a similar size during the Vietnam War wouldn't have even been given a name.  Chris Albritton suggests that airlifting a force of 1500 troops (700 Iraqis, 800 Americans) to a sparsely populated area was clearly a public relations stunt to give the media pictures of the Iraqi military in action so the White House can come up with a "non-timetable" timetable for withdrawing US troops from Iraq.  Albritton also notes that even if you believe the operation was intended as more than a media stunt it doesn't say much about the capabilities of Iraqi military intelligence and the interior ministry who supposedly provided the intelligence that prompted the operation. 

My only question is after three years in Iraq, why the hell are we still doing big sweep operations like this?  The uselessness of big "search and destroy" type sweep operations in combatting an indigenous insurgency was supposedly one of the lessons learned by the generation of military officers who cut their teeth in Vietnam and I was under the impression that made it into the US military tactics and fighting doctrine studied by every service academy plebe and officer school candidate yet every couple months brings a new one.

The Center for Public Integrity just put out a report saying John Boehner, who rose to House Majority leader as the reform candidate and then shot down his own party's reform package, loves corporate sponsored travel so much that he's spent the equivalence of six-months of the past six years on privately sponsored trips.

Six years after first being elected President, a curious reporter finally notes that Mr. Bush leans heavily on "strawman" arguments when giving speeches.  It will be interesting to see what other long obvious Bush traits will be uncovered in the coming months?

You mean we went through all the DP World crap and increased funding of port security and disaster preparedness still gets voted down along party lines?  Why???

Whatever anyone may say about her boobs, acting choices, love life, whatever, the fact remains I love Pam Anderson because she is speaking for those who can’t speak. Those we must protect because they can no longer protect themselves against us: animals of all stripes, environments and intellects.

Indeed, any faith we have asks us to do this, be it Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist or Hindu. Judeo-Christians: That man was given “dominion over the animals” means not that we are supposed to do as we please, but that we must accept our role as their king – thus words like “dominion” – will we be wicked or good kings?

Always, always, Pam is there for animals. I can think of few people I respect more. Like PETA, for whom she is celebrity spokesperson, she makes people think. A democracy needs to think.

This from Netscape News recently:

“Anderson is using her assets, so to speak, to further her anti-fur position. The New York Post's Page Six gossip column reports that last Friday Anderson attended a luncheon at the House of Flaunt in Hollywood Hills with the Japanese designers of the Sly fashion line. She staged a stand-in of sorts, refusing to sit down until everyone in the room had removed all animal pelts from her sight.

 

“It gets better. With that little task accomplished, the former Baywatch star then refused to take off her trench coat and model a very clingy, very low-cut wrap dress she assured them was underneath it until the Sly designers agreed to never use fur again. Guess what? They did! And then she took off her coat and gave them an eyeful. Page Six quotes Anderson as saying of her bust, ‘They're good for something.’"

Atrios linked earlier to a purported speech by John Howard.  Turns out its a fake. The actual URL for the PM of Australia is www.pm.gov.au  If you go to the official website of the PM, the speech is not there.  The website of the speech linked to is http://www.johnhowardpm.org/speech1817.html When one examines the structure of the site, It appears that each public pronouncement is numbered consecutively.  The numbers are split between the speeches and interviews.  Thus the last 4 speeches are numbered 1811, 1815, 1816, 1818 as the last part of the URL  See the speeches section at: http://www.pm.gov.au/news/speeches/index.cfm.  The last four interviews are numbered 1809, 1810, 1814, 1817. See the inteviews section at: http://www.pm.gov.au/news/interviews/index.cfm  The url of the speech cited is not the official site of the PM and the number is not a speech number but one assigned to an interview with Neil Mitchell of Radio 3AW.The media releases are similary numbered.  The last four media releases are 1801, 1803, 1804, 1813. Thus the URL for the speech is not correct under any analysis.

I didn't think it would happen and DP World pulling out of the deal saved the President from looking like an even bigger idiot.  Yet for a man who supposedly stands so much for strength, integrity and principle he definitely talks a good (at this point, pretty "tired") game but in the end he really doesn't have the guts to pull the trigger on such a controversial losing proposal. 

What is interesting is how the White House massaged the President's stand-tough image up to the end: Get Karl Rove on the line with the people in Dubai, tell them to withdraw from the deal, send the President out the next morning to reiterate his intention to veto all the bills coming out Congress trying to overturn the deal, DP World announces its pull-out a little later that evening and the President gets to say its too bad but Congress wasn't going to go along the next day.  Classic Bush White House.

Did I miss something or doesn't he look bad either way?  Ahh leadership!

I know straw polls from the Southern Republican Leadership Conferences don't mean much now but let's hope this one has some traction!  Bill Frist?  A Party in disarray, indeed.