"A woman should be two things: Classy and fabulous."
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
54% Back Military Tribunals for Terrorists over U.S. Courts
Most Americans believe suspected terrorists should be tried by military tribunals rather than in U.S. courts, as the first such trial began this week at the Guantanamo Naval Base in Cuba.
Seventy-one percent (71%) say the suspects should not be given the rights U.S. citizens have in court, while only 18% think they should, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national survey.
While some politicians, foreign officials and non-government groups like Amnesty International argue that the Bush administration is acting outside of the law in its treatment of these terrorist suspects, just 30% of Americans believe they should have access to U.S. courts, as opposed to 54% who favor the special military trials.
Nearly six out of 10 Americans (59%) also say the special prison camp for terrorists at Guantanamo, where the United States now detains 280 inmates, should not be closed. Twenty-six percent (26%) believe it should be.
Republicans tend to strongly support the status quo, while Democrats are more divided or unsure. Unaffiliated voters generally fall in between.
In a separate survey Rasmussen Reports finds that voters trust Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama more than John McCain on most issues, but the Republican candidate has a solid lead in voters' minds on national security issues.
Americans in record numbers also are becoming increasingly confident that the United States and its allies are winning the war on terror.
The trial of Salim Ahmed Hamdan, who was purportedly Osama bin Laden's driver, began on Monday. Captured in Afghanistan in November 2001, he is accused of helping the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks escape capture several times and of transporting weapons for al Qaeda. He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted. Hamdan has pleaded not guilty.
Unlike trials in U.S. courts, the tribunals allow the use of some hearsay evidence and evidence forced from prisoners. The judge and jurors, not just lawyers, can question witnesses, and conviction can be obtained by a two-thirds vote of the six military officers on the tribunal, rather than requiring a unanimous jury as in a court trial.
Only 48% say they are following stories about the Hamdan trial, while 51% say they are not. Just over half (51%) correctly identified the defendant.
Both major presidential candidates promise to close the Guantanamo camp, saying it hurts America's relationships with other countries.
But when the U.S. Supreme Court last month gave terrorism suspects in the camp the right to sue in U.S. courts for their release, Obama praised the ruling while McCain called it "one of the worst decisions in the history of this country." The Bush administration is now prodding Congress to clear up some of the legal issues raised by the high court ruling.
Eighty percent (80%) of Republicans are opposed to closing the Guantanamo facility, a view shared by 42% of Democrats and 60% of unaffiliated voters. Nearly as many Democrats (39%) believe it should be closed, as do 9% of GOP voters and 25% of unaffiliateds.
McCain has no problem continuing the military tribunals for terrorists, while Obama's position remains unclear, despite repeated questions from the media.
Again, Republicans overwhelmingly support the military tribunals while Democrats are divided. Seventy-seven percent (77%) of GOP voters back the tribunals, along with 39% of Democrats and 52% of unaffiliated voters. Slightly more Democrats (43%) think the terrorist suspects should be tried in U.S. courts, but only 14% of Republicans and 29% of unaffiliateds concur.
Similarly, only 5% of Republicans think the suspects should be given the rights of U.S. citizens in court, as opposed to 30% of Democrats. Eighty-nine percent (89%) of GOP voters and 55% of Democrats disagree. Among unaffiliated voters, 12% favor treating them like U.S. citizens, but 75% are opposed.
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll shows Obama and McCain remain in a competitive race for the White House.
Please sign up for the Rasmussen Reports daily e-mail update (it's free)⦠let us keep you up to date with the latest public opinion news.
This national survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted by Rasmussen Reports July 22, 2008. The margin of sampling error for each survey is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence.
WAR ON TERROR: Soldiers engage in front-line diplomacy
Troops visit Iraq-Iran border, converse with Iranian security
American soldiers look at Iranian soldiers through a gate that divides the two countries at a border crossing near Khaniqin, Iraq.
KHANIQIN, Iraq — The soldiers with the 407th Civil Affairs Battalion and the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment had just planned a short little outing.
They were staying on a base near a border crossing between Iran and Iraq. The crossing is a heavily trafficked route for Iraqi oil going into Iran, and Iranian pilgrims going into Iraq. But crossing would be unthinkable for the Americans. After all, the two countries aren’t talking.
That shouldn’t stop a little innocent tourism, though. The Americans removed their names and ranks. Those wearing hats with the rank took them off. The soldiers left their assault rifles behind. The few with handguns left them strapped to their legs, but everyone else went without a weapon. No one wore body armor.
The Americans checked in at the border office and then walked right up to a pair of closed gates — joking that, of course, the Iraqi gate was the ugly one. They smiled and took turns taking snapshots of one another a few steps from Iran. Occasionally, they waved to one of the dozens of Iranian soldiers watching about 100 meters away.
The Iranians outnumbered the Americans by a huge margin, and there was almost no Iraqi security on the border. Yet the Iranians warily eyed the Americans for several minutes. Gradually, one of them worked up the courage to approach the gate. The others followed.
They stared through the gate at the Americans. The Americans stared back.
Then one of the Iraqi security guards broke the ice by talking with his Iranian counterpart. An Iraqi interpreter with the soldiers spoke a bit of a Persian dialect and soon he was translating small talk between the Americans and the Iranians. The atmosphere was stiff at first — but more like mingling at a stranger’s party than parleying with an enemy.
Both sides soon warmed up to the conversation. Getting into the spirit of the exchange, one of the soldiers offered a patch to an Iranian soldier as a gift. The Iranian soldier’s leader told him he couldn’t accept it, but he was gracious anyway. Eventually, an Iranian soldier decided to address the conversation directly.
"We are proud to be talking to the Americans," he said, then reminded them, "We Iranians are strong people."
The two sides continued talking for a little while longer — no more than a few minutes — before the Americans said their goodbyes and walked away, laughing about what they saw as the Iranians’ hubris and wondering what they’d think of American warplanes.
"We didn’t see them; maybe they will," the Iraqi interpreter said wryly.
But the group wasn’t in the mood to dwell on future wars. The politicians may still be debating whether to talk to Iran. But the soldiers had just done exactly that, and the talk had been pleasant. It would be something to tell their families when they called home.
Perhaps when the Iranian soldiers got home that night, the soldiers pondered, they, too, will tell their families how two countries started talking.
I must admit, Batman reminded me a bit of GWB... how he keeps trying to do the right thing but is often hated and vilified for it.
A cry for help goes out from a city beleaguered by violence and fear: A beam of light flashed into the night sky, the dark symbol of a bat projected onto the surface of the racing clouds . . .
Oh, wait a minute. That's not a bat, actually. In fact, when you trace the outline with your finger, it looks kind of like . . . a "W."
There seems to me no question that the Batman film "The Dark Knight," currently breaking every box office record in history, is at some level a paean of praise to the fortitude and moral courage that has been shown by George W. Bush in this time of terror and war. Like W, Batman is vilified and despised for confronting terrorists in the only terms they understand. Like W, Batman sometimes has to push the boundaries of civil rights to deal with an emergency, certain that he will re-establish those boundaries when the emergency is past.
And like W, Batman understands that there is no moral equivalence between a free society -- in which people sometimes make the wrong choices -- and a criminal sect bent on destruction. The former must be cherished even in its moments of folly; the latter must be hounded to the gates of Hell.
"The Dark Knight," then, is a conservative movie about the war on terror. And like another such film, last year's "300," "The Dark Knight" is making a fortune depicting the values and necessities that the Bush administration cannot seem to articulate for beans.
Conversely, time after time, left-wing films about the war on terror -- films like "In The Valley of Elah," "Rendition" and "Redacted" -- which preach moral equivalence and advocate surrender, that disrespect the military and their mission, that seem unable to distinguish the difference between America and Islamo-fascism, have bombed more spectacularly than Operation Shock and Awe.
Why is it then that left-wingers feel free to make their films direct and realistic, whereas Hollywood conservatives have to put on a mask in order to speak what they know to be the truth? Why is it, indeed, that the conservative values that power our defense -- values like morality, faith, self-sacrifice and the nobility of fighting for the right -- only appear in fantasy or comic-inspired films like "300," "Lord of the Rings," "Narnia," "Spiderman 3" and now "The Dark Knight"?
The moment filmmakers take on the problem of Islamic terrorism in realistic films, suddenly those values vanish. The good guys become indistinguishable from the bad guys, and we end up denigrating the very heroes who defend us. Why should this be?
The answers to these questions seem to me to be embedded in the story of "The Dark Knight" itself: Doing what's right is hard, and speaking the truth is dangerous. Many have been abhorred for it, some killed, one crucified.
Leftists frequently complain that right-wing morality is simplistic. Morality is relative, they say; nuanced, complex. They're wrong, of course, even on their own terms.
Left and right, all Americans know that freedom is better than slavery, that love is better than hate, kindness better than cruelty, tolerance better than bigotry. We don't always know how we know these things, and yet mysteriously we know them nonetheless.
The true complexity arises when we must defend these values in a world that does not universally embrace them -- when we reach the place where we must be intolerant in order to defend tolerance, or unkind in order to defend kindness, or hateful in order to defend what we love.
When heroes arise who take those difficult duties on themselves, it is tempting for the rest of us to turn our backs on them, to vilify them in order to protect our own appearance of righteousness. We prosecute and execrate the violent soldier or the cruel interrogator in order to parade ourselves as paragons of the peaceful values they preserve. As Gary Oldman's Commissioner Gordon says of the hated and hunted Batman, "He has to run away -- because we have to chase him."
That's real moral complexity. And when our artistic community is ready to show that sometimes men must kill in order to preserve life; that sometimes they must violate their values in order to maintain those values; and that while movie stars may strut in the bright light of our adulation for pretending to be heroes, true heroes often must slink in the shadows, slump-shouldered and despised -- then and only then will we be able to pay President Bush his due and make good and true films about the war on terror.
Perhaps that's when Hollywood conservatives will be able to take off their masks and speak plainly in the light of day.
I've read a lot of motivational books, such as The Purpose-Driven Life (I never got past the third chapter) and a bunch of other useless titles I no longer care to remember, but none were as effective and motivating as Robert Greene's The 33 Strategies of War! It is brutal and I love it! I mean, for sure, it's not going to make me charge into the sun with forty-four machine guns stashed in my pink Marti Ponti purse, ready to do battle against the Axis of Evil and the chick who stole my boyfriend, but it does inspire me to work harder! I'm probably not going to make history but I've never been that ambitious anyway. I just want to live life to the fullest and achieve my own success! Anyway, the book mostly reflects on the history of foreign wars, as well as the failed and successful strategies of past generals and commanders, to create 33 strategies you can use in your daily life to get ahead and become an effective leader. But pop culture warriors are included as well, such as Alfred Hitchcock, Joan Crawford, and some Russian novelist. It's a little surprising how their stories of triumph somehow fit well with the rest of the book: Who would have thought that Vice Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson's heroic pounding of the Danish fleet- the risks he took to achieve victory, and Joan Crawford's risky departure from MGM, were somehow allied by nature? But of course, Joan Crawford is no Nelson.
From the book, a quote from Napoleon Bonaparte:
Death is nothing, but to live defeated is to die everyday.
WAR ON TERROR: 48% of Americans now believe we're WINNING.
Chest bump!
Nearly half of Americans (48%) now believe the United States and its allies are winning the War on Terror, as opposed to 20% who give the nod to the terrorists, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national survey. These figures reflect a dramatic improvement from a year ago—in July 2007, only 36% thought the U.S. and its allies were winning. An equal number thought the terrorists held the advantage.
The 28-point difference is the most favorable margin recorded by Rasmussen Reports since tracking began in January 2004 and seems to reflect a growing confidence among adults that the tide is turning in Iraq and in the war on terror in general. The previous high was established on September 6, 2004 when 52% thought the U.S. and its allies were winning but 26% thought the terrorists were winning at that time for a 26-point favorable margin. Thirty-seven percent (37%) now think the situation in Iraq will get better over the coming six months while only 25% expect it to get worse. A year ago, the assessment was far more pessimistic—just 23% said that things would get better while 49% offered the more pessimistic response. Another recent poll showed that 40% now believe it is possible for the U.S. to win the War in Iraq.
The new findings also show 45% now believe the United States is safer today than it was before the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, while 37% believe otherwise. Those figures are also the most optimistic on record.
The findings come as Democratic candidate Barack Obama reemphasized his opposition to the war in Iraq in a major policy speech Tuesday. “As should have been apparent to President Bush and Sen. [John] McCain, the central front in the war on terror is not Iraq, and it never was,” he said, adding that his strategy will be “taking the fight to al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan.”
His Republican opponent, Sen. McCain, quickly criticized Obama both for the substance of his remarks and the timing of them. “Sen. Obama is departing soon on a trip abroad that will include a fact-finding mission to Iraq and Afghanistan,' said McCain. 'And I note that he is speaking today about his plans for Iraq and Afghanistan before he has even left, before he has talked to Gen. [David] Petraeus, before he has seen the progress in Iraq and before he has set foot in Afghanistan for the first time.'
McCain has been a consistent supporter of the war in Iraq and was one of the earliest proponents of the so-called surge of additional U.S.troops into the country which is credited with the growing stabilitythere. Obama has long opposed the war and has criticized the surge, but his campaign now stands accused of purging criticism of the surge from its website.
Forty-four percent (44%) of voters say that they trust Obama more when it comes to Iraq, 43% say they trust McCain more. McCain has an advantage on the broader topic of national security issues.
Rasmussen Reports will continue polling weekly on this topic through the election and then resume monthly tracking. Weekly updates are posted on the Obama-McCain: By the Numbers page. During weekly tracking in Election 2004, confidence that the U.S. and its allies were winning ranged from a low of 45% to a high of 52% but the number who thought the terrorists were winning never fell below 25%. The current findings that only 20% believe the terrorists are winning matches the most optimistic assessment yet recorded.
Seventy-nine percent (79%) of Republicans think the U.S. and its allies are winning, up from 68% last week. There is little change among Democrats, only 27% of whom agree. But 43% of unaffiliated voters, who will be key to the fall election, now think the U.S. is winning, up from 36% a week ago. Both men (54% now, up from 49% last week) and women (43%, up from 37%) also are more confident that the U.S. and its allies are winning in Iraq.
A plurality of voters (44%) still believe the war in Iraq will go down in history as a failure, although that number, too, has fallen six percentage points in a week with most going into the ranks of the undecided. Thirty-three percent (33%) say it will be considered a success, up a single percentage point from a week ago. President Bush’s handling of Iraq gets marginally better marks this week, too, with 27% rating it good or excellent, and 49% judging it as poor. His overall job approval ratings continue to set record lows. During the 2004 election cycle, the War on Terror was the number one issue for voters. Since then voters have identified economic issues as their number one concern.
One of his campaign advisers told me recently: "Why should we take the time for foreign media, since there is Obamania around the world?"
Snubbed by Obama By Christoph von Marschall Sunday, July 20, 2008; Page B07
Barack Obama is on his way to Europe, where an adoring public awaits. But I wonder if the reception would be quite so enthusiastic if Obama's fans across the Atlantic knew a dirty little secret of his remarkable presidential campaign: Although Obama portrays himself as the best candidate to engage the rest of the world and restore America's image abroad, and many Americans support him for that reason, so far he has almost completely refused to answer questions from foreign journalists. When the press plane leaves tonight for his trip, there will be, as far as I know, no foreign media aboard. The Obama campaign has refused multiple requests from international reporters to travel with the candidate.
As a German correspondent in Washington, I am accustomed to the fact that American politicians spare little of their limited time for reporters from abroad. This is understandable: Our readers, viewers and listeners cannot vote in U.S. elections. Even so, Obama's opponents have managed to make at least a small amount of time for international journalists. John McCain has given many interviews. Hillary Clinton gave a few. President Bush regularly holds round-table interviews with media from the countries to which he travels. Only Obama dismisses us so consistently.
This spring Obama allowed at least one foreign reporter on trips to Ohio and Texas. But as the campaign has progressed, access has become more difficult for foreign correspondents. E-mail inquiries get no reply, phone calls are not returned. My colleagues and I know: We are last in line. We don't matter.
In September 2007, I gave a lecture in Iowa titled "The U.S. in the World: How They See Us." People in the audience asked me about the working conditions of foreign journalists and were surprised to learn how little access Obama had given us. Several Iowans wrote to his campaign to protest. In contrast to me, they did hear back: In a letter dated Nov. 24, the campaign assured one of these people that Obama cares about the foreign media and wants to increase openness. The letter even said that my contact information had been forwarded to the campaign's communications department.
There was no follow-up.
Since I followed the Obama campaign in its early stages and published a sympathetic (and widely read) book in German about the Illinois senator, I probably have more access than most. I know the Obama "policy advisers" in Washington think tanks and the like; sometimes I manage a fleeting encounter with the senator's press staff at campaign events. Yet I can only dream of an interview with the candidate. To my knowledge, no foreign journalist has had one. A reported interview in France's Politique Internationale last summer turned out to be a fake. In February, Obama gave Israel's Yediot Ahronot written answers to written questions about his views on Israel and the Middle East.
Perhaps Obama considers members of the foreign media a risk rather than an opportunity. His campaign learned the hard way how comments to foreigners can resonate at home -- recall adviser Austan Goolsbee's hints to a Canadian diplomat that Obama's critique of NAFTA was just campaign rhetoric, or former aide Samantha Power's "monster" remark about Hillary Clinton to the Scotsman. Or perhaps we're witnessing the arrogance that comes from being so close to power. One of his campaign advisers told me recently: "Why should we take the time for foreign media, since there is Obamania around the world?"
Obama is indeed popular in my country and elsewhere in Europe. But Europeans have the same questions about his experience and character that Americans do. Unlike U.S. citizens, we can't vote in the election; its results, though, will affect our lives, much as it will affect theirs. Surely a man who has said he would talk with U.S. adversaries such as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad can spend a few moments with journalists from friendlier countries.
The writer is Washington bureau chief of Der Tagesspiegel, a Berlin-based daily newspaper.
NEW YORK - Television news' royalty will fly in to meet Barack Obama during this week's overseas trip: CBS chief anchor Katie Couric in Jordan on Tuesday, ABC's Charles Gibson in Israel on Wednesday and NBC's Brian Williams in Germany on Thursday.
The anchor blessing defines the trip as a Major Event and — much like a "Saturday Night Live" skit in February that depicted a press corps fawning over Obama — raises anew the issue of fairness in campaign coverage.
The news media have devoted significantly more attention to the Democrat since Hillary Rodham Clinton suspended her campaign and left a two-person contest for the presidency between Obama and Republican John McCain, according to research conducted by the Project for Excellence in Journalism.
News executives say there are reasons for the disparity, such as the continuing story about whether Clinton's and Obama's supporters can reconcile. They even partly blame McCain. By criticizing Obama for a lack of foreign policy experience, McCain raised the stakes for Obama's trip, "especially if he winds up going into two war zones," said Paul Friedman, senior vice president of CBS News.
Obama has traveled to Afghanistan and is expected to go to Iraq. He is also scheduled to visit Jordan, Israel, Germany, France and England. Network anchors stayed home during McCain's recent foreign excursions.
"The question really needs to be posed: Is this type of coverage fair?" said Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va. "This is nothing but a political stunt."
Talk show host Rush Limbaugh said none of this should be a surprise.
"My prediction is that the coverage of Obama on this trip will be oriented toward countering the notion he has no idea what he is talking about on foreign policy and defense issues and instead will prop him up as a qualified statesman," Limbaugh told The Associated Press. "McCain, on the other hand, is a known quantity on these issues and his position does not excite nor fit the mainstream media's narrative on Iraq and Afghanistan, so they simply ignore it and him."
Along with newsworthiness, the question of fairness was discussed within ABC News before it was agreed Gibson would travel, said Jon Banner, executive producer of "World News." Also, if one network anchor decides to hit the road for a big event, chances are the others will follow.
"We have already been in discussions with the McCain campaign to try to afford them the same or a similar opportunity," Banner said. "We have gone to great lengths to be fair and provide equal time to both campaigns."
Shortly after Obama clinched the Democratic nomination, Gibson flew to Miami for a McCain interview, he said.
For each of the weeks between June 9 and July 13, Obama had a much more significant media presence. The Project for Excellence in Journalism evaluates more than 300 political stories each week in newspapers, magazines and television to measure whether each candidate is talked about in more than 25 percent of the stories.
Every week, Obama played an important role in more than two-thirds of the stories. For July 7-13, for example, Obama was a significant presence in 77 percent of the stories, while McCain was in 48 percent, the PEJ said.
Sure, there are some weeks Obama's going to make more news, said Tom Rosenstiel, the project's director.
But every week?
"No matter how understandable it is given the newness of the candidate and the historical nature of Obama's candidacy, in the end it's probably not fair to McCain," he said.
The Democrat has proven an attractive commodity; TV debates involving Democrats this campaign consistently drew more viewers than the Republicans. A Time magazine cover with Obama in 2006 was the second-best-selling of the year, and a Men's Vogue cover outsold every issue but the debut, according to circulation figures reported by Portfolio.com. Newsweek has done six covers with Obama over the past year, two with McCain. A Rolling Stone cover with Obama stopped just short of adding a halo.
If the attention gap continues, the campaign will essentially become a referendum on Obama, Rosenstiel said. While that may serve McCain's purpose — it beats a referendum on President Bush — it could leave the nation electing a president while the media are paying attention to someone else. Past press infatuations, like Howard Dean in 2004 and McCain in 2000, didn't turn into long-term affairs.
TV executives noted that Obama has courted attention, particularly for the overseas trip, more so than McCain. There's some danger involved, too. One Obama gaffe while overseas, or the appearance that he's not ready for an international spotlight, and the media's elite will be there to judge him, said Bob Zelnick, Boston University journalism professor.
Friedman cautioned against reading too much into things like PEJ's coverage index, noting that it's a long campaign. Yet it's an open question about whether Obama is simply a more interesting candidate at this point, partly because McCain has been on the scene longer.
While fairness is the goal, "what are we supposed to do, go gin up some story about McCain to get some rough equality of airtime?" he said. "I don't think so."
NBC News President Steve Capus said he finds it funny this is an issue, considering how much people have accused the press corps — and still do — of being too cozy with McCain. The Arizona senator had been a frequent guest of "Meet the Press."
"We're just trying to do our jobs," Capus said. "There's no question that there's great news value in Sen. Obama's trip overseas. That's why we are doing this.
The AUDACITY of Hope: Obama already planning re-election
Today on CBS's Face the Nation, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., in Afghanistan, told the paparazzi-pursued correspondent Lara Logan that "the objective of this trip was to have substantive discussions with people like President Karzai or Prime Minister Maliki or President Sarkozy or others who I expect to be dealing with over the next eight to 10 years.
"And it's important for me to have a relationship with them early, that I start listening to them now, getting a sense of what their interests and concerns are."
The notion that Obama will be dealing with world leaders for eighjt-to-ten years, possibly up through July 2018, suggests that either (a) he believes that not only will he be elected and re-elected, but the 22nd amendment will be repealed and he will be elected for a third term, OR (b) he was speaking casually and just meant two terms.
(I'm guessing b.)
There is a term in chaos theory describing the how infinitesmal variations of the initial condition of a dynamical system may produce large variations in the long term behavior of the system.
Most of us are more familiar with the more common name for it: the butterfly effect.
The butterfly effect was introduced in Ray Bradbury's 1952 short story "A Sound of Thunder," when time travelers change the world beyond measure by accidentally killing a butterfly in prehistoric times.
Similarly, international diplomacy can be impacted by careless or glibly-chosen words. (Cue President Bush's "crusade" remarks.)
Some Democratic allies of Obama's are -- off the record -- concerned that the senator too often doesn't consider the potential butterfly effect of his diction.
Take his support for an "undivided Jerusalem," or his remarks about women seeking abortions when they're "feeling blue," which upset feminist leaders.
Or the media kerfuffle after his "refine my policies" presser.
On his press plane on July 5, after that incident, Obama said, "I’m surprised at how finely calibrated every single word was measured."
A reporter noted that that is precisely what happens with the president, he can change world affairs with one word, finely calibrating your words is what happens.
"Well, of course, no, I understand," Obama said. "But for me to say that I’m going to refine my policies, you know, I don’t think in anyway is inconsistent with prior statements and doesn’t change my strategic view that this war has to end and that I am going to end it as president."
This week Obama will have his words picked apart like never before, and it will be an international audience of not just opponents but actual enemies.
They will be watching and waiting to see if he kills any butterflies.
Sometimes the hatred for President GWB from those in the far-left and those in the far-right are indistinguishable. I know many Libtards and Conservatives hate the President with equal passion, either because he's too conservative for them or just not conservative enough. I mean, wtf, right? When President Bush sent a top US diplomat to sit down with some Iranian guy, along with representatives from the EU and a bunch of other countries I don't care to remember, many hawks howled with indignation. He's becoming "softer" on the War On Terror, they say. And yet we're talking about the man who invaded two countries (to topple tyrants), forced North Korea to slowly disarm itself, and pissed-off Leftists all over the globe! And yet people on the right say he is "softening" his stance. Well as much as I want to see the terrorists in Iran bombed to extinction, if there is another way to win the nuke enrichment argument with Iran without firing a single shot (a la Ronald Reagan vs. the Soviet Union), then that's fine. If there's anyone in this world who doesn't need to prove himself as being tough on terrorism and socialism, it's George W. Bush. Mention his name to a bunch of jihadists like, say, Hamas, or al-Qaeda in Wherever, and they'll burst into flames with hate and anger. On the other hand, when you say Hussein Obama...
From the American Thinker:
The hollow "victory" of Hezb'allah in southern Lebanon ultimately became a pointless exercise except to awaken Israelis to the need to recommit to strengthening their military. Iran tested President Bush in nearly every way possible over the last five years. President Bush won.
Word in recent days of planned talks between the Iranian government and high level State Department officials has provoked calls of flip-flops from the left and hoots from hawks on the right. There's not much to worry about in the cutesy political carping coming from the left, but the right's reaction is disturbing. How many countries does President Bush have to invade or strike before he gets some "street cred" for being tough on terrorists and despots? Can we take a moment to consider that he is making this move for a good reason? Maybe even for reasons he can't share publicly?
President Bush has consistently held a tough-line with the Iranians. He has criticized those who would offer presidential-level talks to the Iranians with no preconditions (taken personally by the media as a slap at their guy Obama). His requirement for high level negotiations could be summed up as: stop the program to build a nuclear bomb and we can talk.
At the end of 2007, President Bush got a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) that said Iran had stopped development as far as we could tell. Therefore, he is acting according to the best information he has available, and I dare say I trust it more than the judgment of talk show hosts and TV pundits no matter how much I enjoy their shows.
Our intelligence services are not perfect, but at some point we have to start trusting them again; even if there findings go against our instincts. It's difficult to believe that a regime like the one in Iran might change its course toward acquiring a weapon that would alter the balance of power in the world. But let's not forget, that is exactly what happened in Libya. President Bush made that happen: thank you Mr. President.
It might help here to examine Iran's motivation for a nuclear weapon in the first place. Remember that in the 1980's there was an arms race and a war between Iran and Iraq. Although that war ended in '88, Saddam's nuclear weapons program was revealed as part of the inspections process after the Gulf War in ‘91. The specter of a nuclear Saddam set the Iranians on a renewed pursuit for a nuclear weapon in the 90's.
According to the December 2007 NIE, Iran stopped its' nuclear weapons development program in 2003. Why? The NIE said that Iran was reacting to international pressure. But the removal of Saddam, and thus the threat of a nuclear madman, that year and the audacity of President Bush and our military likely had more to do with it than international diplomacy, thank you Mr. President.
Iran apparently abandoned its' nuclear weapons program deciding instead to focus on terrorism as the primary means of pursuing its' goals. That course was successful for a time as the militias in Iraq nearly gained the upper hand in destabilizing the fledgling Iraqi government and turning it into an Iranian puppet as the American political left, and some on the right, went weak in the knees. However, Bush's surge strategy once again frustrated Iranian (and American leftist) ambitions, thank you Mr. President.
Although Iran gained some advantage in Lebanon via its' proxy terror groups, during the 06' Israeli conflict, it still mostly just rules the south, not all Beirut as it surely wanted. Although that conflict was all-in-all a victory for them, it was a hollow one bringing no real change in the balance of power other than rubbing off some of the sheen from the vaunted Israeli military.
In a matter of weeks after hostilities ceased the Hezb'allah supporters in southern Lebanon began expressing buyer's remorse as the Israeli incursion had devastated their homes and livelihoods while bringing no tangible reward. Both the Lebanese and the Israeli government were rushed US military equipment which ended up frustrating Iranian ambitions once again, thank you Mr. President.
As it stands today Iran has lost much of its ability to strike with proxies in Iraq. The Syrian army was run out of Lebanon by US support to the Lebanese government, an act that weakened Iranian influence. The hollow "victory" of Hezb'allah in southern Lebanon ultimately became a pointless exercise except to awaken Israelis to the need to recommit to strengthening their military. Iran tested President Bush in nearly every way possible over the last five years. President Bush won.
With no more nuclear threat from Saddam, against a US government that has raised the stakes on Iranian attempts to hide nuclear development, and faced with an international community that largely agrees with our president that Iran must not get nuclear weapons, it is possible that Iran has run out of options and might actually be looking for a peaceful way out. Because of Iran's recent history trust is out of the question. But there is no reason not to find out what they have to say. That's not weakness. It's negotiating from a position of strength.
I'm not saying give peace a chance. I'm saying give president Bush a chance with the Iranians. He has earned it.
’ve seen this angry, loose cannon on a few talk shows and I predict she’ll be the next, at some point, to be thrown under the campaign gaffe bus. It’s just a matter of time….
In an interview with The Daily Telegraph on the eve of Mr Obama’s week-long trip to Afghanistan, the Middle East and Europe, Susan Rice emphasised that the election of Mr Obama would mark a decision by Americans to “turn the page” on President George W Bush.
Barack Obama has yet to receive his party’s nomination. But the former Rhodes Scholar, who took her Master’s degree and doctorate in international relations at New College, Oxford, made clear that an Obama administration would also challenge Europe to do more after a Democratic victory in November’s election.
Barack Obama has yet to win the presidency. “It would signal a return to the more pragmatic and bi-partisan traditions of American foreign policy, which have been lost to ideology in the Bush years,” she said. “He will not proceed through an ideological frame and seek to impose that frame on every challenge.
Some Eurpoean countries have elected leaders more center-right and are kind of on the same page as President Bush. Maybe an “Obama administration” will be out of touch with Europe…? “There is some truth to the notion that some of the animus at the popular level towards the Bush administration may have made it easier for some of our European partners to avoid taking steps that we may want them to take and that perhaps they ought to take,” she said.
“That has, in some respects, perhaps on some issues, given them an easy out. Barack Obama will lead from a position of strength and seek progress, and he will want to work with Europe in very strong partnership.
“It means we in the United States will have to do our part; but Europe will have to do its part too. There can be no free riders if this is going to be an effective partnership.”
Obviously Ms. Rice has forgotten the European tradition of sitting out conflicts until they arrive at their doorstep.
But this is yet another example of a campaign that’s so absorbed with it’s own biased, fawning press, that an aide (one of hundreds) believes she, on behalf of a nation she does not yet represent, dictate terms to a dozen nations prior to a campaign tour they invited themselves to.
BAGHDAD - Iraq’s largest Sunni Arab political bloc returned to the government fold Saturday after calling off a nearly one-year boycott of the Shiite-dominated leadership—another critical stride toward healing sectarian rifts.
The return of the National Accordance Front does more than politically reunite some of Iraq’s main centers of power.
It was seen as a deeply significant advance toward reconciliation and efforts to cement security cooperation between Shiite-led forces and armed Sunni groups that rose up against al-Qaida in Iraq.
The United States has pressured Iraq’s government to work toward settling the sectarian feuds, which brought daily bloodshed until recent months. The hope is that more parties staked in the future of Iraq could mean a quicker exit for U.S. and other foreign forces.
Iraq’s sharply improved security situation is already bringing plans for a pared-down British force.
On a visit to Baghdad, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said plans are being made to scale back troops in Iraq, but refused to consider an “artificial timetable” for withdrawing Britain’s remaining 4,000 soldiers.
Britain’s moves come about four months after Iraqi opened a major offensive in Basra to root out Shiite militias with suspected links to Iran.
The campaign reclaimed wide control over Iraq’s second-largest city and key oil center.
Brown’s visit came on the eve of an expected stop by presidential candidate Barack Obama on the second leg of a tour of the Pentagon’s war zones. Obama spent Saturday in Afghanistan and is later expected to hold talks around the Middle East and Europe.
The break in the Iraqi political impasse came after parliament unanimously backed Sunni candidates to fill the post of deputy prime minister and head five midlevel ministries, including higher education and communications. Four other Cabinet posts were filled by Shiites.
The Front pulled its members from the 39-member Cabinet last August, complaining it was sidelined in important decisions. The political rift left al-Maliki’s government without partners in bids to find common ground with Sunni leaders.
Sunni Arabs, who represent about 20 percent of the country, were highly favored under Saddam Hussein but the tables turned after his ouster when Iraq’s majority Shiites held sway. The rivalries spilled over into a wave of sectarian killings and al-Qaida bombings apparently aimed at triggering civil war.
But Sunni sheiks last year began to organize militias—which came to be known as Awakening Councils—against insurgents. Their role has been considered key in undercutting al-Qaida and helping reduce violence to its lowest levels in four years.
“What happened today is a national step forward to boost the government’s role and take the national reconciliation ahead,” said the bloc’s spokesman, Saleem Abdullah.
Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, hailed the political pact as “a very important step forward.”
My daddy is the coolest. Whenever I have a problem with something, he's always there for me. When I don't feel like going to work, he gives me a pep talk and drags me off to work. Life can be rather difficult, but my dad and my sister and my puppies remind me of what life is truly about- it's about sharing good times and bad times with the people you love the most. It's about overcoming obstacles and-
DENVER - John McCain was in his favorite campaign setting, a town hall meeting, when he spotted a promising target. "I'd love to recognize you first, sir," the Republican presidential candidate said to a man in a Vietnam War veteran's hat.
Instead of a softball opening question from a fellow vet, however, McCain got a lengthy harangue, as the man insisted the senator had opposed better medical benefits for veterans.
McCain, who spent more than five years as a prisoner of war, politely said the man was mistaken. He finally broke it off, saying, "I'll be glad to examine what your version of my record is."
The July 7 episode in Denver underscored the iffy nature of a campaign strategy that McCain seems to adore. Town hall sessions — in which he makes opening remarks and takes questions for an hour or more — have become McCain's staple, and he constantly needles Democratic opponent Barack Obama for not joining him onstage.
But they are far from risk-free. They make it nearly impossible for McCain to focus attention on a daily message, and they have produced some of his most memorable gaffes.
At the Denver event, for example, McCain called Social Security's funding process "a disgrace." Hammered by critics who noted that Social Security has had essentially the same funding mechanism since it began, McCain later said the problem is that today's young workers may not receive the program's full benefits unless Congress revamps its structure.
Earlier at a New Hampshire town hall, McCain told an anti-war voter that the U.S. presence in Iraq could last "100 years." Obama pounced, although McCain indicated he was talking of a peacekeeping role similar to that still played by U.S. troops in South Korea rather than a century of combat.
As for trying to deliver a well-focused message in town halls, a recent article in The Gazette of Colorado Springs summed up the challenge. McCain "came to Denver to talk about the economy," the paper reported, "but ended up discussing everything from Social Security to articles of impeachment during a town hall meeting."
Despite such pitfalls, the question-and-answer forums serve McCain well in many ways. He appears confident, engaged and often witty. Audiences applaud him for fielding tough questions, and he almost never displays the quick temper he is known for. Allies and opponents agree that he certainly handles the exchanges more skillfully than he reads scripts from a podium.
With 15 weeks to go, McCain seems more devoted to the give-and-take sessions than ever.
"At town hall meetings," he told reporters, "when you respond for an hour to an hour-and-a-half to people's comments and hopes and dreams and aspirations, I'm sure that something I said today could be taken out of context." But audience members get to ask substantive questions, he said, and when they leave, they "know my plan for the future of America."
McCain's top advisers acknowledge the town halls are far from perfect. But they agree that the forums are best-suited for a candidate who cannot match Obama's oratory or fundraising clout.
"If John wins this, it will be because of the engagements he's had with the public," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who often travels with McCain. "It gives him a chance to show his strengths," he said, which include experience and a willingness to tell people unpleasant truths.
McCain takes the exchanges so seriously, Graham said, that after giving a South Carolina questioner an answer that seemed incomplete, "John followed the guy to his car."
Campaign aides portray McCain's town halls as no-holds-barred events in which the candidate urges friends and foes alike to take their best shots. And while he routinely takes more hostile questions than does Obama, McCain's events are not always as open as they appear.
Security officers ordered three women — identified as protesters because they were wearing pro-abortion-rights T-shirts — to leave a line of "overflow ticket" holders at a July 15 McCain town hall in Albuquerque, N.M. And Friday's "Employee Town Hall Meeting" for General Motors workers in Warren, Mich., was advertised as "not open to the general public."
But once a week, usually on Thursdays, McCain holds a town hall with undecided voters, who are identified by the campaign's pollsters at a cost of about $8,000 to $10,000 per event, said campaign spokesman Tucker Bounds. The Thursday forums began when McCain was trying to persuade Obama to join him in a series of events before neutral crowds.
In any given period, McCain usually takes more questions from voters than does Obama, either in town halls or other forums. This past week, for example, McCain fielded questions from two major ethnic organizations: the National Council of La Raza and the NAACP. Obama took no questions after his speeches to the groups.
Except for huge rallies, Obama's campaign events are usually "invitation only." Depending on the subject matter, tickets might be given to local volunteers and supporters; employees or members of a host group; or relevant professionals, such as doctors and nurses for a health care forum, said Obama campaign spokesman Nick Shapiro.
The campaign does not seek public events in which every attendee is an Obama backer, he said. "If you're only talking to your supporters," he said, "you're not getting any new votes."
McCain aides scoff.
"We're confident that we're letting in a greater assortment of questions and voter types than our opponent," Bounds said.
Other news
Rudy G. to make a comback? Wasn't he just charming whenever he called those jihadists "Islamofascists" on t.v.?
WAR ON TERROR: AP Stringer Detained Over Filming of Two Murders, Questions Remain
Journalists are the most despicable people in the world. Read this article to know why!
From The Jawa Report Two unidentified Afghan Women chat with each other a few minutes before they were executed by Taliban in Ghazni province, Afghanistan, on late Saturday, July 12, 2008. (AP Photo/Rahmatullah Naikzad)
It looks like our story got some attention in Afghanistan. AP stringer Rahmatullah Naikzad was detained for two days after he filmed the brutal murder of two women by the Taliban accused of prostitution. The incident was first noted by us here and, as Fox News reports (hey, you guys don't know how to link?), "the AP has been following this case closely with some concern," after we raised several questions about Naikzad's relationship with the Taliban.
It's good to see that Naikzad is now helping local Afghan authorities track down those responsible for the murders. However, Naikzad's version of events still raise some serious questions about journalistic ethics.
Naikzad claims he has no connection to the Taliban. And says:
the Taliban issued a press statement calling all media outlets in the province of Ghazni, which has a large Taliban presence, to cover them “carrying out the Shariah” on a few burglars in their custody. Naikzad said he believed the Taliban would be cutting off the limbs of their prisoners, according to strict Islamic law.
Okay, so according to his own version of events Naikzad knew beforehand that the Taliban planned to administer extra judicial punishment on what he presumed were thieves. He also believed that he would be a witness to the cutting off of these alleged thieves hands?
So, Naikzad knows that a crime-- and what probably would be considered a war crime--- is about to be committed by an internationally recognized terrorist group. Further, he knows the location of the terrorists and the location where the war crime is about to be committed. What does the AP stringer do? Does he call up the local authorities? Does he notify the closest NATO outpost or headquarters? No.
After a member of the Taliban personally called him up and assured Naikzad of his safety if he would come to watch the crimes committed, he then checks with his bosses at the AP: He said he checked with the Kabul office of the Associated Press, for which he works as a stringer, and then set off around sunset on his motorbike to a village on the outskirts of Ghazni City, only to find that no other journalist was there.
Here is an even more important question about the AP's involvement. The AP is an American company. The organization, according to Naikzad, had prior knowledge about the location of a group of enemies of the US. The organization also had prior knowledge that a crime was about to be committed.
Did the Associated Press notify NATO forces with this information? The article makes no mention of this. What it does imply is that the AP gave Naikzad the green light to be a witness to a war crime.
Do journalists and news corporations have a moral responsibility to try to prevent such crimes? I believe they do. Becoming a journalist does not give one a free pass from the normal moral obligations required of human beings.
We'll return to this later.
After Naikzad met with the Taliban he learned that it was not thieves who were to have their limbs amputated, but women who were to be "executed".
Not so incidentally, Naikzad spent some of these daylight hours between the time that he first meets up with the Taliban and later that night when the two women were murdered snapping photos and making video of the Taliban marching and posing for him. Some of the poses show the Taliban in attack exercises.
If you read the Fox News story they also use the troubling word "execute" to describe the cold blooded murder of two women. That is, they allow the Taliban to choose the words to describe their own heinous crime. This is one of the main objections I raised when I first noted the AP's involvement in the murders.
The use of neutral terminology to describe what is clearly a crime is simply unacceptable. Perhaps "execution style murder" would be the only description other than "murder" which would be apt.
Moral equivocation has been all the rage in our institutions of higher learning since the 1960s, but it is perhaps seen clearest in the way reporters and editors are taught that "ethics" require strict neutrality: even when that neutrality is clearly immoral.
Neutrality between liberals and conservatives, Republicans and Democrats are one thing. But neutrality between our country and the enemies we fight is not.
Let's get back to Naikzad's story. As the women are about to be "executed" he claims:
“I told one of the Taliban, ‘These are women, they are harmless. Why would you want to kill them?’ But they didn’t listen to me.”
If true, good for you Naikzad. This is an important piece of context to the story. A journalist with some balls! But, isn't it troubling that Naikzad went to the meeting with the Taliban fully expecting to film/photograph limb amputations? Which the phrase, by the way, makes sound quite clinical. I've seen the way the Taliban "amputate" limbs. They don't take their victims to some hospital. They tend to use common knives, there is a great deal of blood, and horrible screaming.
Again, it's even more troubling that the Associated Press sent him.
One of the things we pointed out in our criticism of the AP and of Naikzad was that the organization had been used by the Taliban to produce a propaganda snuff film for them. I claimed that the AP was worse than al Jazeera because at least al Jazeera only played these types of videos while the AP had now been reduced to producing them.
Naikzad, though, claims that the Taliban told him not to video tape the "execution":
He said the Taliban turned him down, but his camera was already rolling and he kept it on when he placed it on the seat of his bike.
It's interesting to note that Fox's reporter seems skeptical of the claim owing to the fact that the video seems to follow the Taliban murderers after they kill the two women. How is it possible that if he had set the camera down on his motorcycle's seat so that the Taliban wouldn't notice he was filming them that the camera seems to follow their movements?
Naikzad claims:
“I was standing near the bike, so my body may have touched the camera,” Naikzad said, explaining the movement of the camera. He stumbled slightly and added, “I myself nudged the camera a little bit.”
Ookay. Right. I guess it's possible if not entirely plausible.
Here's where we get back to the equivocation:
“If I have photographed Taliban casualties, I have also photographed American casualties. I have been balanced in my journalism,” he said.
Again, this raises serious ethical questions about what it means to be "balanced" in war reporting. Especially in a war against enemy combatants who by every measure of the Geneva Conventions are illegal!
So, two main issues remain even after we hear Naikzad's version of events.
1) Do journalists have a moral responsibility that trumps whatever ethical standards they learned in journalism school to try and prevent heinous crimes that puts life or limb in jeopardy? I think yes. And if the AP had prior knowledge that these crimes were about to be committed then they had a moral (and perhaps legal) responsibility to notify those with the power to stop them. In this case probably NATO.
2) Do journalists have an allegiance to their home country in times of war that transcends the normal peace time journalistic ethic of "neutrality"? Again, I think yes. I do not necessarily think that journalists shouldn't try to understand why our enemies do the things they do. But note that they are our enemies, journalists included.
American journalists must recognize that America's enemies are their enemies. The Associated Press is and American company. Their allegiances must be to America.
There are two problems with the Naikzad incident raised by this second question. First, if the Associated Press, an American company, knew the location of enemy combatants it seems that they would have an obligation to report that, does it not?
Second, when American companies hire foreign stringers to do their reporting for them it would seem that they have a responsibility to add a context to the story which clearly distinguishes between our actions and the actions of our enemies. Such a distinction isn't always easy to make. We shoot at the Taliban, they shoot back.
But in the case where the Taliban's version of events is that two women were "executed" for crimes against Sharia law, but where Americans (and might I add the rest of the civilized world) would see the event as murder plain and simple, then clearly the context of the story must reflect American values and not the values of the barbaric enemies we fight.
The one bright spot in this whole thing is that the AP seems to at least be troubled by what happened. A feeling, I'm sorry to say, they seemed not to have after another one of their stringers in Iraq was caught with an al Qaeda operative.
For some cruel, retarded, and extremely unforgivable reason, my t-zone is oilier than usual. I so want to die now. My once-beloved L'Oreal True Match now feels like goo melting off my face! My 7 Signs Serum can no longer handle the job of keeping my make-up together, so I may have to switch foundations earlier than I anticipated. I just wish I could blow off work, but nooo, I am being overworked this week! Pfft. That's okay, hard work comes with a lotta moolah. A lotta moolah means SHOPPING SPREEES! Anyway I may have to consider two new products in my search for the Holy Grail of all Foundations:
According to Lancome's website, something called "New Liquid Perfect Shine Catchers" will absorb shine for 12 hours. Or "from morning until night"! I don't believe it for one second but "New Liquid Perfect Shine Catchers" sounds so cool that I just may have to flutter over to a Lancome counter and DEMAND for this earth-defying product of heavenly miracles! It also has sun protection, which is nice, but nothing beats Shiseido in that department. Anyway, Lancome also has a shine control make-up base called the Maquibase Shine Control, and I'm thinking of getting that too. 'Cause they match. :P
It's also worth mentioning that the lovely ladies over at Make-up Alley rated this product a cool 100%! Yes, all four of them!
I don't understand the fascination with Obama. I personally don't find him swoon-worthy; He has zero achievements to brag about and his future policies are abhorrent. No, there's nothing about him that makes him drop-dead sexy. And yet people treat him like a rockstar!
He supports mothers killing babies, for pete's sake!
Anyway here is an article from the Washington Times. It's about how much Obama just adores himself.
For the first few months of the campaign, the question about Obama was: Who is he? The question now is: Who does he think he is?
Barack Obama wants to speak at the Brandenburg Gate. He figures it would be a nice backdrop. The supporting cast -- a cheering audience and a few fainting frauleins -- would be a picturesque way to bolster his foreign policy credentials.
What Obama does not seem to understand is that the Brandenburg Gate is something you earn. President Ronald Reagan earned the right to speak there because his relentless pressure had brought the Soviet empire to its knees and he was demanding its final "tear down this wall" liquidation. When President John F. Kennedy visited the Brandenburg Gate on the day of his "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech, he was representing a country that was prepared to go to the brink of nuclear war to defend West Berlin.
Who is Obama representing? And what exactly has he done in his lifetime to merit appropriating the Brandenburg Gate as a campaign prop? What was his role in the fight against communism, the liberation of Eastern Europe, the creation of what George Bush the elder -- who presided over the fall of the Berlin Wall but modestly declined to go there for a victory lap -- called "a Europe whole and free"?
Does Obama not see the incongruity? It's as if a German pol took a campaign trip to America and demanded the Statue of Liberty as a venue for a campaign speech. (The Germans have now gently nudged Obama into looking at other venues.)
Americans are beginning to notice Obama's elevated opinion of himself. There's nothing new about narcissism in politics. Every senator looks in the mirror and sees a president. Nonetheless, has there ever been a presidential nominee with a wider gap between his estimation of himself and the sum total of his lifetime achievements?
Obama is a three-year senator without a single important legislative achievement to his name, a former Illinois state senator who voted "present" nearly 130 times. As president of the Harvard Law Review, as law professor and as legislator, has he ever produced a single notable piece of scholarship? Written a single memorable article? His most memorable work is a biography of his favorite subject: himself.
It is a subject upon which he can dilate effortlessly. In his victory speech upon winning the nomination, Obama declared it a great turning point in history -- "generations from now we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment" -- when, among other wonders, "the rise of the oceans began to slow." As Hudson Institute economist Irwin Stelzer noted in his London Daily Telegraph column, "Moses made the waters recede, but he had help." Obama apparently works alone.
Obama may think he's King Canute, but the good king ordered the tides to halt precisely to refute sycophantic aides who suggested that he had such power. Obama has no such modesty.
After all, in the words of his own slogan, "we are the ones we've been waiting for," which, translating the royal "we," means: " I am the one we've been waiting for." Amazingly, he had a quasi-presidential seal with its own Latin inscription affixed to his lectern, until general ridicule -- it was pointed out that he was not yet president -- induced him to take it down.
He lectures us that instead of worrying about immigrants learning English, "you need to make sure your child can speak Spanish" -- a language Obama does not speak. He further admonishes us on how "embarrassing" it is that Europeans are multilingual but "we go over to Europe, and all we can say is 'merci beaucoup.' " Obama speaks no French.
His fluent English does, however, feature many such admonitions, instructions and improvements. His wife assures us that President Obama will be a stern taskmaster: "Barack Obama will require you to work. He is going to demand that you shed your cynicism . . . that you come out of your isolation. . . . Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed."
For the first few months of the campaign, the question about Obama was: Who is he? The question now is: Who does he think he is?
We are getting to know. Redeemer of our uninvolved, uninformed lives. Lord of the seas. And more. As he said on victory night, his rise marks the moment when "our planet began to heal." As I recall -- I'm no expert on this -- Jesus practiced his healing just on the sick. Obama operates on a larger canvas.
From Blackfive.net: U.S. Marine Corps Cpl. Johathan R. Segovia, personnel security detail, 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, a ground combat element attached to Multinational Force - West, relaxes with Iraqi children in Sha-ban, Iraq, July 9, 2008. U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Taylor J. Schulz .
So next week, or if time does not permit, maybe next, next week, I am planning to splurge on make-up. It's long overdue! Sure, in the past week I bought a couple of products here and there, but never went all-out! Instead, I directed all my financial resources to skincare. lol! It's more important than make-up after all, but now that I've got that settled, I can re-focus all my energy on finding the right make-up foundation, hauling in all the great new products from MAC and Lancome, and hunting down old favorites from NARS (cream eyeshadows), Dior (lippies, shimmer!), Maybelline (back-ups!), and L'Oreal (eyeshadow palettes!). I have got to find the perfect foundation! I think Estee Lauder's Double Wear Light will be the Holy Grail of all foundations, but until I've tried it, I can't be too sure. I've heard mostly positive reviews on it, but I still remember some of my raved-about Chanel/Lancome and even Clinique products being a complete let-down. Anyway, here is one good reason why I want to go to Japan:
Funky make-up!
That's from Maybelline Japan's Angelfit collection which is formulated for Asian skin. I love the pink and silver theme- it's visually orgasmic. Make-up brands from Asia are really good- I hope they take on the global market soon because flying over to Hong Kong or South Korea just to get your hands on some phytogenic pressed powder is not cool.
Gee, wonder how may 'qaeda sympathizers make up his 300-man team!
WASHINGTON: Every day around 8 a.m., foreign policy aides at Senator Barack Obama's Chicago campaign headquarters send him two e-mails: a briefing on major world developments over the previous 24 hours and a set of questions, accompanied by suggested answers, that the candidate is likely to be asked about international relations during the day.
One recent Q. & A. asked, for example, whether Obama supported the decision by Iraq's prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, to include a timetable for American troop withdrawal in any new security agreements with the United States. The answer, provided to Obama with bullet points, was yes — or "a genuine opportunity," as he put it in a speech on Iraq this week.
Behind the e-mail messages is a tight-knit group of aides supported by a huge 300-person foreign policy campaign bureaucracy, organized like a mini State Department, to assist a candidate whose limited national security experience remains a concern to many voters.
"It is unwieldy, no question," said Denis McDonough, 38, Obama's top foreign policy aide, speaking of an infrastructure that has been divided into 20 teams based on regions and issues, and that has recently absorbed, with some tensions, the top foreign policy advisers from Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign. "But an administration is unwieldy, too. We also know that it's messier when you don't get as much information as you can."
The group is on the spot this week as Obama is planning to make his first overseas foray as the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, with voters at home and leaders abroad watching closely to see how he handles himself on the global stage.
Unlike George W. Bush, who entered the presidential race in 2000 with scant exposure to national security issues, Obama has served since his election to the Senate in 2004 on the Foreign Relations Committee and has had a running tutorial from aides steeped in the issues. His campaign says that he is well prepared and that he often alters and expands on the talking points provided to him by his foreign policy advisers.
Most of the core members of his team served in government during President Bill Clinton's administration and by and large were junior to the advisers who worked on his wife's campaign for the Democratic nomination. But they remain in charge within the campaign even as it takes on more senior figures from the Clinton era, like two former secretaries of state, Madeleine Albright and Warren Christopher, and are positioned to put their own stamp on the party's foreign policy.
Most of them, like the candidate they are working for, distinguished themselves from Hillary Rodham Clinton's foreign policy camp by early opposition to the Iraq war. They also tend to be more liberal and to emphasize using the "soft power" of diplomacy and economic aid to try to advance the interests of the United States. Still, their positions fall well within centrist Democratic foreign policy thinking, and none of the deep policy fissures that have divided the Republicans into two camps, the neoconservatives and the so-called pragmatists, have opened.
Obama's core team is led by Susan Rice, an assistant secretary of state for African affairs in the Clinton administration, who has pushed for a tougher response to the crisis in the Darfur region of Sudan, and Anthony Lake, Bill Clinton's first national security adviser, who was criticized for the administration's failure to confront the genocide in Rwanda in 1994 and now acknowledges the inaction as a major mistake.
The core group also includes Gregory Craig, a former top official in the Clinton State Department who served as the president's lawyer during his impeachment trial; Richard Danzig, a navy secretary in the Clinton administration; Mark Lippert, Obama's former Senate foreign policy adviser, who just returned from a navy tour of duty in Iraq; and McDonough.
McDonough and Lippert are paid by the campaign and based in Chicago, and the rest are outside advisers who volunteer their time from Washington.
The group no longer includes Samantha Power, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Harvard human rights expert who resigned in March after she was quoted calling Hillary Clinton a "monster." But Lake still talks to Power, and Obama sent a long personal tribute that was read at her wedding in Ireland this month.
Obama's Republican rival, Senator John McCain of Arizona, has a far smaller and looser foreign policy advisory operation, about 75 people in all, and none are organized into teams. In 2004, the Democratic presidential nominee, Senator John Kerry, had a foreign policy structure similar in scale to Obama's, but it had limited influence on the candidate, who had spent 20 years in the Senate, former advisers said. Obama is not yet receiving the government intelligence briefing that is typically made available to a presidential candidate upon becoming his party's nominee.
WAR ON TERROR: Chertoff: European terrorists trying to enter US
WASHINGTON - European terrorists are trying to enter the United States with European Union passports, and there is no guarantee officials will catch them every time, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said Thursday.
Chertoff's comments on Capitol Hill comes as the country is entering a potentially vulnerable period with the presidential nominating conventions coming up next month; the presidential election in November; and the transition to a new administration in January — all of which may be attractive targets for terrorists.
In his last scheduled appearance before the House Homeland Security Committee, Chertoff said that the more time and space al-Qaida and its allies have to recruit, train, experiment and plan, the more problems the U.S. and Europe will face down the road.
"The terrorists are deliberately focusing on people who have legitimate Western European passports, who don't appear to have records as terrorists," Chertoff told lawmakers. "I have a good degree of confidence we can catch people coming in. But I have to tell you ... there's no guarantee. And they are working very hard to slip by us."
Chertoff and other intelligence officials have delivered similar warnings before, and he offered no new information about specific threats or an imminent attack.
Chertoff reiterated his concern that terrorists could sneak radiological material into the country on small boats or private aircraft. This material could be used to create an explosive device known as a "dirty bomb."
The Homeland Security Department has a strategy to protect against this small boat vulnerability and is testing radiation detection equipment in Seattle and San Diego ports.
Chertoff said that getting out a regulation to prescreen and enhance security of general aviation aircraft coming to the U.S. from overseas is one of his top priorities.
He also said he expects to approve new radiation detection technology this fall.
Responding to a question from Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, Chertoff dismissed any rumor that he is on a list of potential running mates for Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. Chertoff quipped that the only list he has for next year is a list of vacations.
Chertoff's term as the country's second Homeland Security Secretary ends when a new administration takes over the White House in January.
MAKE-UP: STILL SEARCHING for The Perfect Foundation
I raved about L'Oreal's True Match line, but that doesn't mean I've shut my mind off to other brands. As wonderful as True Match is, I've come to the conclusion that it's just not perfect. After a while, L'Oreal's mineral powder foundation actually started to sting, so I had to let that one go. It was the one product that started my obsession with mineral make-up, it had good coverage you can build on, it made concealers unnecessary and it was inexpensive to boot. But a couple of days ago, I somehow became allergic to it and had to let it go. I switched back to using plain ol' pressed powder from The Face Shop- their oil-control powder from the Phytogenic line -and my skin felt okay again. Anyway I am going to go foundation-hunting when I'm done with my bottle of True Match liquid foundation. I am leaning towards powder foundations now, because they're just so much easier to use and I wouldn't need anything else. Maybe just a dab of concealer and that's it.
I'm keeping an eye out on Chanel Vitalumiere Creme Compact Satin Smoothing Creme Compact Foundation SPF 15, which scored an impressive 9 out of 10 from TotalBeauty reviews, as well as Chanel Pro Lumiere Professional Finish Makeup SPF 15, which is actually foundation in liquid form but what the hell, Penelope Cruz uses it! Both products are quite expensive but if it's worth the investment, then I'll go for it.
My other options are: Double Wear Light Stay-in-Place Makeup SPF 10, which claims to be humidity-resistant and oil-controlling, as well as light, photo-friendly and non-acnegenic! It sounds too good to be true! It's like a sheer-to-medium-coverage, oil-free, dermatologist-tested high definition foundation all in one! It has a natural finish, too, though I tend to lean towards the dewy look. There is also the Country Mist Liquid Make-up from Estee Lauder, and it's said to be moisturizing and ideal for women with dry skin. Well I've got an oily t-zone so I think I'll pass, but I do so want that "moist, dewy finish" they claim to have! I think I'll end up getting the Double Wear Light Stay-in-Place foundation and the double matte oil-control pressed powder. But then that kind of beats the purpose of my wanting a new foundation product. Maybe I should just get THIS! Ah well, I'll write back on this when I've found my one true love- and that should be in a week.
WASHINGTON (AP) - Barack Obama’s aides have removed criticism of President Bush’s increase of troops to Iraq from the campaign Web site, part of an effort to update the Democrat’s written war plan to reflect changing conditions.
Debate over the impact of President Bush’s troop “surge” has been at the center of exchanges this week between Obama and Republican presidential rival John McCain. Obama opposed the war and the surge from the start, while McCain supported both the invasion and the troop increase.
A year and a half after Bush announced he was sending reinforcements to Iraq, it is widely credited with reducing violence there. With most Americans ready to end the war, McCain is using the surge debate to argue he has better judgment and the troops should stay to win the fight. Obama argues the troop increase has not achieved its other goal of fostering a political reconciliation among Iraqi factions.
After Bush delivered a nationally televised address on Jan. 10, 2007, announcing his plan, Obama argued it could make the situation worse by taking pressure off Iraqis to find a political solution to the fighting.
“I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there,” the Illinois senator said that night, a month before announcing his presidential bid. “In fact, I think it will do the reverse.”
Obama continued to argue throughout 2007 that the troop increase was a mistake. By the early part of this year, he was acknowledging that it had improved security and reduced violence, but he has stuck by his opposition to the move.
In a speech Tuesday, he argued that since the surge began, the strain on the military has increased, the United States has spent another $200 billion in Iraq, Afghanistan has deteriorated, the Taliban and al-Qaida have rebuilt and Iraqis have not made political progress. “That’s why I strongly stand by my plan to end this war,” Obama said.
McCain said Obama is failing to acknowledge success. “Today, we know Sen. Obama was wrong” to oppose the surge, McCain said.
As first reported Tuesday by the New York Daily News, Obama’s campaign removed a reference to the surge as part of “The Problem” section on the part of his Web site devoted to laying out his plan for Iraq.
The change was part of many broader changes that Obama spokeswoman Wendy Morigi said were made to reflect current conditions. She provided the full text of the old site and the updated version, which includes a new section on the recent resurgence of al-Qaida in Afghanistan and another on this year’s negotiations over a Status of Forces Agreement that would detail the legal basis for the ongoing presence of U.S. military forces operating in Iraq.
The changes stress that Obama’s plan to end the war is responsible and designed to improve national security. They include:
—An updated Obama quote at the top of the page. The previous quote stressed how Obama had the judgment to oppose the “rash war” from the start. This was a popular message among Democratic voters and was meant to draw distinctions with primary rival Hillary Rodham Clinton, who initially supported the war. The new quote focuses on how ending the war will make Americans safer—a message aimed at general election voters who are more likely to trust McCain on issues of national security, according to polling.
—A description of Obama’s plan as “a responsible, phased withdrawal” that will be directed by military commanders and done in consultation with the Iraqis. Previously, the site had a sentence that has since been removed that flatly said, “Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq.” Morigi said that his plan hasn’t changed, but they wanted to expand the description. “There’s not an intent to shift language,” she said.
—A new sentence that says Obama “would reserve the right to intervene militarily, with our international partners, to suppress potential genocidal violence within Iraq.”
Only one of his plan’s subheads remains unchanged, the first one—”Judgment You Can Trust.” That’s a message the campaign wants Americans to embrace.
From the website: Handcrafted from Texas mesquite, finished in solid sterling silver, and featuring the laser-engraved signature of the Chief Executive, President George W. Bush. Refillable.
OMG! Imma get my daddy this! It's the George W. Bush signature pen, and it sure beats out my beloved late grandfather's Cartier fountain pen collection! Plus, it's mucho cheaper- only $79.95! I love it! Gee, I should just buy one for myself- I love GWB more than my daddy does! lol! I wish the George W. Bush store had girly W shirts, tumblers, pens, and whatnot available for fashion-conscious women such as myself! I mean, I wouldn't mind owning a pink W t-shirt or a pink W tumbler- heck, I will proudly show it off! But yeah, after this President leaves office, I wouldn't clunk down any money for a McCain or Obama store. Pfft. (But I must admit I kind of like the McCain bumper stickers!)
POLITICS: President Bush Says Drill, Drill, Drill — and Oil Drops $9!
In a dramatic move yesterday President Bush removed the executive-branch moratorium on offshore drilling. Today, at a news conference, Bush repeated his new position, and slammed the Democratic Congress for not removing the congressional moratorium on the Outer Continental Shelf and elsewhere. Crude-oil futures for August delivery plunged $9.26, or 6.3 percent, almost immediately as Bush was speaking, bringing the barrel price down to $136.
Now isn’t this interesting?
Democrats keep saying that it will take 10 years or longer to produce oil from the offshore areas. And they say that oil prices won’t decline for at least that long. And they, along with Obama and McCain, bash so-called oil speculators. And today we had a real-world example as to why they are wrong. All of them. Reid, Pelosi, Obama, McCain — all of them.
Traders took a look at a feisty and aggressive George Bush and started selling the market well before a single new drop of oil has been lifted. What does this tell us? Well, if Congress moves to seal the deal, oil prices will probably keep on falling. That’s the way traders work. They discount the future. Psychology and expectations can turn on a dime.
The congressional ban on offshore drilling expires September 30, so that becomes a key date. A new report from Wall Street research house Sanford C. Bernstein says that California actually could start producing new oil within one year if the moratorium were lifted. The California oil is under shallow water and already has been explored. Drilling platforms have been in place since before the moratorium. They’re talking about 10 billion barrels worth off the coast of California.
There’s also a “gang of 10” in the Senate, five Republicans and five Democrats, that is trying to work a compromise deal on lifting the moratorium. So it’s possible a lot of action on this front could occur much sooner than people seem to think.
So I repeat: Drill, drill, drill. Deregulate, decontrol, and unleash the American energy industry. Those hated traders will then keep selling oil as the laws of supply and demand and free markets keep working.
more Bush news! The President will not demand conservation! President Bush said Tuesday that he will not call on Americans to conserve gasoline despite the rising price of oil, saying consumers are "smart enough" to figure out for themselves that they should drive less.
“I would ask him to listen to Ryan Crocker [U.S. ambassador to Iraq] and General [David] Petraeus,” Bush said. “There’s a temptation to let the politics at home to get in the way [of] the considered judgment of the commanders. That’s why I strongly rejected an arbitrary timetable of withdrawal.”
Bush said he recognized the pressure on politicians – “MoveOn.org, banging away on these candidates – it’s hard to kind of divorce yourself from the politics.”
BAGSNOB.COM: Dallas jewelry designer, Rachelle Dauphinee, has added jewels to some of the clutches ($425)
These simple but chic clutches were created by Cambodian women rescued from the sex trade. For $80 you can help provide aid to Cambodian women- and children -rescued from prostitution rings. More info at Bagsnob.com!
WAR ON TERROR: Insurgents try to pit Afghanistan against Pakistan
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Insurgents fired simultaneously on Pakistan and Afghanistan positions Thursday night in hopes of provoking a battle between the two military forces, NATO officials said Friday.
U.S. forces were called into action on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border after Afghan security forces came under fire from insurgents inside Pakistan, NATO said. Meanwhile, two Pakistani border outposts also had come under fire.
Six mortar rounds hit one Pakistani outpost, and troops there returned fire, according to Pakistan military spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas.
Six Pakistani security personnel were injured in the exchange along the South Waziristan border, and a number of casualties were "observed/reported" on the other side of the border, he said.
NATO said it had reports that four Afghan border police officers and eight Pakistani military members were wounded in the four-hour firefight.
International Security Assistance Force officials "suspect that the insurgents' dual attack was specifically intended to spark a border incident," the statement said. ISAF is the NATO contingent in Afghanistan.
U.S. forces first responded with artillery fire. U.S. officials with knowledge of the firefight said all rounds landed inside Afghanistan, within 350 meters (383 yards) of the border.
As the firefight continued, a U.S. F-15 aircraft dropped a GBU-13 bomb that also landed in Afghanistan, the officials said.
One day the world will see these Taliban terrorists completely crushed under America's fist. When that day comes- and it is coming -I will celebrate with joy over the heroic deeds of the troops, the deaths of these terrorists (I feel nothing but hate for them!), the grief of mourners over their Taliban dead ("If you're not with us, you're against us"), and I will forever thank and pray for the young heroes who gave their lives to rid the world of this evil. I hate the Taliban, I hate ungrateful Iraqis- yes, I'm just very angry right now.
KABUL, Afghanistan - A multi-pronged militant assault on a small, remote U.S. base close to the Pakistan border killed nine American soldiers and wounded 15 Sunday in the deadliest attack on U.S. forces in Afghanistan in three years, officials said.
The attack on the American troops began around 4:30 a.m. and lasted throughout the day. Militants fired machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars from homes and a mosque in the village of Wanat in the mountainous northeastern province of Kunar, NATO's International Security Assistance Force said in a statement.
"Although no final assessment has been made, it is believed insurgents suffered heavy casualties during several hours of fighting," NATO said in a statement.
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.
U.S. officials are considering drawing down additional forces from Iraq in coming months, in part because of the need for additional U.S. troops in Afghanistan. U.S. officials have said they need at least three more brigades in Afghanistan — or more than 10,000 troops.
NATO confirmed nine of its soldiers had been killed and 15 wounded. A Western official said the nine dead were Americans, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the troops' nationalities. Four Afghan soldiers also were wounded, NATO said.
Lt. Col. Rumi Nielson-Green, the top U.S. military spokeswoman in Afghanistan, said she could not comment because the fighting was ongoing.
The attack was the deadliest for U.S. troops in Afghanistan since June 2005, when 16 American troops were killed — also in Kunar province — when their helicopter was shot down by a rocket-propelled grenade. Those troops were on their way to rescue a four-man team of Navy SEALs caught in a militant ambush. Three SEALs were killed, the fourth was rescued days later by a farmer.
The latest assault came at a time of rising violence in Afghanistan. Also on Sunday, a suicide bomber targeting a police patrol killed 24 people, including 19 civilians, while U.S. coalition and Afghan soldiers killed 40 militants elsewhere in the south.
More than 2,300 people — mostly militants — have died in insurgency-related violence this year, according to an Associated Press tally of official figures. Attacks in eastern Afghanistan are up 40 percent this year compared with last year.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned during a visit to Kabul last week that there are more foreign fighters, including al-Qaida members, in Pakistan's tribal areas, militants who cross the border and launch attacks against U.S. and Afghan troops.
Mullen has said he hopes improved security in Iraq will allow troops to be shifted this year from Iraq to Afghanistan, where violence is rising.
Violence in Iraq is at its lowest level in four years and Iraqi forces are taking on more responsibility, trends that could allow Gen. David Petraeus, the top American commander in Iraq, to recommend to President Bush in September that he resume a troop withdrawal that is being put on hold this month so Petraeus has time to assess the overall situation. A top Bush aide, Ed Gillespie, said Sunday that withdrawing more troops from Iraq after that assessment always has "been a possibility."
Another cause for concern in Afghanistan is the high casualty tolls for civilians killed in violence. This month, an Afghan government commission found that U.S. aircraft killed 47 civilians during a bombing run in Nangarhar province, while a separate incident in Nuristan province is alleged by an Afghan officials to have killed 22 civilians.
The tolls have prompted the International Committee of the Red Cross this week to ask all sides to show restraint and avoid civilian casualties. But violence continued around the country on Sunday.
A suicide bomber on a motorcycle blew himself up next to a police patrol in the southern province of Uruzgan, killing 24 people. The bomb attack on a police patrol at a busy intersection of the Deh Rawood district killed five police officers and 19 civilians, wounding more than 30 others, said Juma Gul Himat, Uruzgan's police chief. Most of those killed and wounded were shopkeepers and young boys selling goods in the street, he said.
Elsewhere, Taliban militants executed two women in central Afghanistan late Saturday after accusing them of working as prostitutes on a U.S. base.
The women, dressed in blue burqas, were shot and killed just outside Ghazni city in central Afghanistan, said Sayed Ismal, a spokesman for Ghazni's governor. He called the two "innocent local people."
Taliban fighters told Associated Press Television News the two women were executed for allegedly running a prostitution ring catering to U.S. soldiers and other foreign contractors at a U.S. base in Ghazni city.
1st Lt. Nathan Perry, a U.S. military spokesman, said he had not heard allegations "anything close to that nature."
Meanwhile, at least 40 militants were killed following an attack on Afghan and U.S.-led coalition forces in Helmand province, the coalition said in a statement. The militants attacked the combined forces near Sangin on Saturday from "multiple concealed and fortified positions," the coalition said. Thirty "enemy boats" and several small bridges have been destroyed on the Helmand River during two days of fighting, it said.
Also Sunday, a soldier with NATO's International Security Assistance Force died in a roadside blast in Helmand province, a statement said. The soldier's nationality was not released and it wasn't clear if the death was connected to the two-day battle.
In the north, a soldier serving with ISAF died of wounds caused by an explosion Saturday, the military alliance said in a statement. The statement did not give any further details of the explosion. The soldier's nationality was not disclosed.
There are nearly 53,000 troops from 40 nations serving in the ISAF in Afghanistan.
Heartbreaking. Tony Snow is dead at 53. I thought he had the cancer beat and hoped to see him more on television. Tony Snow- you are a renaissance man.
From the White House: Laura and I are deeply saddened by the death of our dear friend, Tony Snow. Our thoughts and prayers are with his wife, Jill, and their children, Kendall, Robbie, and Kristi. The Snow family has lost a beloved husband and father. And America has lost a devoted public servant and a man of character.
Tony was one of our Nation’s finest writers and commentators. He earned a loyal following with incisive radio and television broadcasts. He was a gifted speechwriter who served in my father’s Administration. And I was thrilled when he agreed to return to the White House to serve as my Press Secretary. It was a joy to watch Tony at the podium each day. He brought wit, grace, and a great love of country to his work. His colleagues will cherish memories of his energetic personality and relentless good humor.
All of us here at the White House will miss Tony, as will the millions of Americans he inspired with his brave struggle against cancer. One of the things that sustained Tony Snow was his faith - and Laura and I join people across our country in praying that this good man has now found comfort in the arms of his Creator.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Tony Snow, a conservative writer and commentator who cheerfully sparred with reporters in the White House briefing room during a stint as President Bush's press secretary, died Saturday of colon cancer. He was 53.
"America has lost a devoted public servant and a man of character," President Bush said in a statement from Camp David, where he was spending the weekend. "It was a joy to watch Tony at the podium each day. He brought wit, grace, and a great love of country to his work."
Snow died at 2 a.m. at Georgetown University Hospital, according to former employer Fox News.
Snow, who served as the first host of the television news program "Fox News Sunday" from 1996 to 2003, would later say that in the Bush administration he was enjoying "the most exciting, intellectually aerobic job I'm ever going to have."
Snow was working for Fox News Channel and Fox News Radio when he replaced Scott McClellan as press secretary in May 2006 during a White House shake-up. Unlike McClellan, who came to define caution and bland delivery from the White House podium, Snow was never shy about playing to the cameras.
With a quick-from-the-lip repartee, broadcaster's good looks and a relentlessly bright outlook — if not always a command of the facts — he became a popular figure around the country to the delight of his White House bosses.
He served just 17 months as press secretary, a tenure interrupted by his second bout with cancer. In 2005 doctors had removed his colon and he began six months of chemotherapy. In March 2007 a cancerous growth was removed from his abdominal area and he spent five weeks recuperating before returning to the White House.
"All of us here at the White House will miss Tony, as will the millions of Americans he inspired with his brave struggle against cancer," Bush said.
Snow resigned as Bush's chief spokesman last September, citing not his health but a need to earn more than the $168,000 a year he was paid in the government post. In April, he joined CNN as a commentator.
Vice President Dick Cheney was "deeply saddened" by the news of Snow's death, his spokeswoman said.
As press secretary, Snow brought partisan zeal and the skills of a seasoned performer to the task of explaining and defending the president's policies. During daily briefings, he challenged reporters, scolded them and questioned their motives as if he were starring in a TV show broadcast live from the West Wing.
Critics suggested that Snow was turning the traditionally informational daily briefing into a personality-driven media event short on facts and long on confrontation. He was the first press secretary, by his own accounting, to travel the country raising money for Republican candidates.
Although a star in conservative politics, as a commentator he had not always been on the president's side. He once called Bush "something of an embarrassment" in conservative circles and criticized what he called Bush's "lackluster" domestic policy.
Most of Snow's career in journalism involved expressing his conservative views. After earning a bachelor's degree in philosophy from Davidson College in North Carolina in 1977 and studying economics and philosophy at the University of Chicago, he wrote editorials for The Greensboro (N.C.) Record, and The Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk.
He was the editorial page editor of The Newport News (Va.) Daily Press and deputy editorial page editor of The Detroit News before moving to Washington in 1987 to become editorial page editor of The Washington Times.
National Press Club President Sylvia Smith said Snow "was a respected colleague to many in the National Press Club, and we mark his death with deep regret."
Snow left journalism in 1991 to join the administration of the first President Bush as director of speechwriting and deputy assistant to the president for media affairs. He then rejoined the news media to write nationally syndicated columns for The Detroit News and USA Today during much of the Clinton administration.
Roger Ailes, chairman of Fox News, called Snow a "renaissance man."
Robert Anthony Snow was born June 1, 1955, in Berea, Ky., and spent his childhood in the Cincinnati area. Survivors include his wife, Jill Ellen Walker, whom he married in 1987, and three children.
WWII: Officials fell trees inscribed by US soldiers who fought for France
The names “Thomas and Dorothy” were carved in the bark of one trunk. Another said “Bob and Carma”. Other trees were marked with soldiers’ home states - Iowa, Maine or Alabama - and several bore hearts and the names or initials of a wife or girlfriend.
The beech trees of Saint Pierre de Varengeville-Duclair forest bore a poignant testimony to the D-Day landings for more than six decades. Thousands of American soldiers stationed there after the liberation of Normandy spent their spare hours with a knife or bayonet creating a lasting reminder of their presence.
Although the trees grew and the graffiti swelled and twisted, this most peculiar memory of one of the 20th century’s defining moments remained visible - until now. Amid bureaucratic indifference and a dispute between officials and the forest owner, most of the trees have been felled, chopped up and turned into paper.
Claude Quétel, a French historian and Second World War specialist, was horrified when he discovered what he called a catastrophe and a shameless act. “It is a typically French failing to wipe out the traces of the past,” he told The Times. “I am indignant.”
Local people are calling for the few “name trees” that still stand to be classified as historic monuments and saved from the same fate. “It should have been done a long time ago,” said Nicolas Navarro, the curator of a Second World War museum in the grounds of his family’s 13th-century Château du Taillis near by. “It’s sad and pathetic that it wasn’t.”
The trees surrounded land in the heart of Saint Pierre de Varengeville-Duclair forest, near Rouen in Normandy, which was once home to a US army camp named after the Twenty Grand brand of cigarettes. It was one of nine cigarette camps - along with Pall Mall, Old Gold, Philip Morris, Chesterfield, Lucky Strike, Home Run, Wings and Herbert Tareyton - used by troops needing treatment or waiting to be sent elsewhere. They were places of calm between the D-Day landings and the Ardennes, the Siegfried Line or the Pacific.
Camp Twenty Grand, set up in September 1944 and closed in February 1946, had tents for 20,000 US soldiers as well as a few hundred German prisoners. Some of the Americans stayed weeks, others months, bringing chocolate, fruit and parties to a French population emerging from occupation.
Mr Navarro’s museum contains a collection of objects that amazed the Normans: Craig Martin toothpaste, Nescafé, Coca-Cola bottles and a Durex. The soldiers left broken hearts, peach stones - which were planted to give the region its first peach trees - and their graffiti.
“Basically, they spent their time carving their names into the trees with knives and bayonets,” Mr Navarro said. “It became a real fad at Twenty Grand because thousands did it.”
He described the beech trees as one of the finest Second World War souvenirs left in Normandy. But Les Arbres des Noms - most of which stood along a small, winding road in the middle of the forest - were deemed unsafe by local officials. They ordered Patrice Robin, 79, who owns the land, to prune branches overhanging the road. “I said no at first,” he said. “But they threatened to take action against me.”
It costs about €800 (£630) to prune a beech tree, but only about €200 to cut it down. Mr Robin chose the cheaper option. “It’s complete madness - but I couldn’t do anything else.”
Mr Navarro said that more than 150 trees were felled last year, a destruction that went unnoticed beyond the district for months. He is determined now to preserve the ones that remain.
Just surfed for Marchesa photos. See how that blue Marchesa gown turned Ugly Betty into a Grecian goddess? Nice! Anyway, I'm excited for tomorrow. I'm going to pamper myself and get a Diamond peel and Vitamin C facial. 'Cause I feel crappy after re-dating my crappy ex-boyfriend! lol!
HEROES: John McCain's Home While Captured in Vietnam
Respect.
These are the never-before-seen last known photos of Sen. John McCain's Hoa Lo prison cell, images that prove that even after being cleaned up for an American historical filmmaker, the terror of the Hanoi Hilton is real. Debra Watkins, who took the pictures and video in 1993 and 1994 before this and other areas of the century-old prison were destroyed, provided them to Whispers as part of a story that appears in the Washington Whispers column. Watkins did volumes of research before traveling to Hanoi, sparked by reports the government planned to rip down most of the facility. She was able to find McCain's cell which she says is pictured in the above photos. The first shows an official opening the cell.
You can clearly see old locks used presumably to hold leg irons and other torture implements on the inside. The second shot shows the inside of McCain's cell and the leg iron contraption Watkins believes he was tortured with. Amazingly, in her 31 hours of video she also has an interview with McCain, seen in the third photo, as she shows him her pictures of the cell he lived in solitary for two years. She recalls that he "was emotional not teary." He even laughed at some of the shots. We haven't seen these images before because while she planned to produce a film or documentary long ago, it got pushed aside as she dealt with some family illnesses. She is now offering it to cable news companies because she has heard of reports of people questioning McCains POW experience. Asked how she felt leaving the prison years ago, Watkins focused on McCain's efforts at the time to forgive and forget and open relations with Vietnam. "I don't know if I could forgive and forget," she told me. Nonetheless, it is a tourist destination now, one even McCain visited in 2000.
In 1973, McCain wrote a first-person account of his five-year captivity for U.S. News, read it here.
Shock and Awe I think it was in one of the programs on the Discovery Channel that some analyst hailed it as the single most perfectly executed technical feat in history. (Or something!)
PatDollard.Com: Pres. Bush Gives A Well-Placed Kick To The Growing Green-Cult G8 Groin
The President from Texas I'm gonna miss good ol' W!
George Bush surprised world leaders with a joke about his poor record on the environment as he left the G8 summit in Japan.
The American leader, who has been condemned throughout his presidency for failing to tackle climate change, ended a private meeting with the words: “Goodbye from the world’s biggest polluter.”
He then punched the air while grinning widely, as the rest of those present including Gordon Brown and Nicolas Sarkozy looked on in shock.
Mr Bush, whose second and final term as President ends at the end of the year, then left the meeting at the Windsor Hotel in Hokkaido where the leaders of the world’s richest nations had been discussing new targets to cut carbon emissions.
I don't know who those other two guys are, but President Bush outshines 'em both! They look so stiff!
One official who witnessed the extraordinary scene said afterwards: “Everyone was very surprised that he was making a joke about America’s record on pollution.”
Mr Bush also faced criticism at the summit after Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian Prime Minister, was described in the White House press pack given to journalists as one of the “most controversial leaders in the history of a country known for government corruption and vice”.
The White House apologised for what it called “sloppy work” and said an official had simply lifted the characterisation from the internet without reading it.
Concluding the three-day event, leaders from the G8 and developing countries proclaimed a “shared vision” on climate change. However, they failed to bridge differences between rich and emerging nations on curbing emissions.
HEROES: Marine sees birth, thanks to 6,000-mile Web hookup
How sweet!
He was 6,000 miles from Brooklyn, but Marine Lance Cpl. Michael Cintron got a glimpse of his newborn son before his wife did.
"Hi, I'm your daddy," Cintron announced to his minutes-old son. "Look, your nose is squishy."
In a remarkable four-hour Web cast from a maternity ward at Maimonides Medical Center, mom Jeannine Cintron's delivery of son Michael James Cintron was beamed clear across ocean and land to his 26-year-old father in Iraq.
The baby weighed in at 7 pounds, 3 ounces and the new dad weighed in with a fatherly shriek: "Look! He's looking at me!"
In Maimonides' first-ever video conference of a baby delivery, Cintron first heard the baby's heartbeat.
"What's that knocking sound I hear," laughed the Staten Island native.
Then the camera followed as Jeannine was wheeled into an operating room to undergo a C-section on Tuesday. That's when the Marine got to see the baby emerging from his wife's womb.
"He got to see our son first from 6,000 miles away," Jeannine marveled. "He actually saw the baby before I did. They put the Webcam up to the side with the baby."
The video conference was initiated by a nonprofit organization called Freedom Calls, which arranged with Maimonides for covering little Michael's birth.
The proud parents were still in a state of disbelief Wednesday, not only about the birth of their first child, but the electronic wizardry that gave dad a real-time maternity-room experience.
"This is surreal," Jeannine said. "I didn't expect this. I feel so blessed. There are so many women in my situation that don't have this.
"I didn't know what I was in for," she added. "It's only my first baby.
"Pretty much throughout my entire pregnancy, I was most sad about doing it [birth] by myself," she went on. "Delivering by myself was horrifying. No, he couldn't hold my hand, but he was there for hours."
Jeannine, 25, who works in sales for Clear Channel and hails from Sheepshead Bay, and Michael, 26, a sanitation worker from Staten Island assigned to First Supply Battalion S6, were married last year.
The couple found out Michael was going to Iraq only a few weeks after they learned Jeannine was pregnant.
"I think I'll keep him [the baby]," the ecstatic mom said.
One has to really admire Condi. Everyone's raving about Shillary Clinton being such a strong woman- and I don't deny that she is -but Condi's different, in the sense that she got to where she is today on her own. She didn't have a Bill Clinton to hang onto; just her own merits and the determination to get to the top. She ought to be the first woman President!
WASHINGTON - Condoleezza Rice flexed America's muscles in the Middle East Thursday, forcefully warning Iran the U.S. won't ignore threats and will take any action necessary to defend friends and interests in the Persian Gulf. A fresh Iranian missile test prompted a show of force from Israel as well.
Rice said Iran's leaders should understand that Washington won't dismiss provocations from Tehran and has the ability to counter them. "I don't think the Iranians are too confused, either, about the capability and the power of the United States to do exactly that," she said.
Though the White House has repeatedly asserted it prefers diplomacy to war, Rice used some of the administration's most direct language yet to make clear the U.S. is strengthening its military presence to counter Iran in the strategic Gulf region and is prepared to use force. She also referred to U.S. arms sales to Gulf allies and military aid to Israel as protections against any threat from Iran.
"We take very, very strongly our obligation to help our allies defend themselves, and no one should be confused about that," Rice said in Tbilisi, Georgia, before returning to Washington from a trip to Eastern Europe.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, noted Iranian testing of a longer-range missile, representing a "capability that raises the ante in the long run in that part of the world."
Asked on a trip to Afghanistan whether the U. S. had strengthened its position, he said, "We have a very robust presence in that part of the world, have had for some time, and we're robust enough to be able to adjust constantly, which is what we do, and we also try not to be very predictive about where we go and when we go and what we do there."
Rice's remarks were part of a rising rhetorical and strategic face-off between Iran on one side and the United States and Israel on the other. The posturing has raised concerns worldwide about a possible shooting war.
The most likely scenario for that would be an Israeli strike to reduce or eliminate the threat that Iran could soon field a nuclear weapon. Israel could theoretically launch an air strike against one or more of Iran's known nuclear sites and at least set back the timetable for a bomb.
Israel has announced no such intention, although neither it nor its U.S. protector will rule out the possibility and Israel has sent multiple signals that it is ready to defend itself.
On Thursday, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said his country "proved in the past that it won't hesitate to act when its vital security interests are at stake."
Also Thursday, Israel displayed its latest spy plane in what defense officials said was a show of strength in response to Iranian war games and missile tests. Last month, Israel's military sent warplanes over the eastern Mediterranean for a large military exercise that U.S. officials described as a possible rehearsal for a strike on Iran's atomic project.
Iran's latest testing was announced hours after Rice spoke on Thursday. Wednesday's tests were conducted at the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic waterway at the mouth of the Persian Gulf through which up to 40 percent of the world's oil passes. Oil prices rose Thursday after the new announcement.
A U.S. official said analysts had determined Tehran launched seven ballistic missiles and two rockets on the first night. But it appeared that only one weapon — an anti-ship missile — was launched on the second night, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record about the ongoing intelligence analysis.
Whatever the military importance of the testing, Iran has sharply stepped up its warnings of retaliation if attacked. This week, a top official of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, Ali Shirazi, warned Tel Aviv would be "set on fire" in any Iranian retaliation.
Rice said the U.S. preparations, along with a planned missile shield she was in Europe this week to advance, "are all elements of America's intention and determination to prevent Iran from threatening our interests or the interests of our friends and allies."
The proposed shield "will make it more difficult for Iran to threaten and be bellicose and say terrible things," Rice said, because with the shield in place, "their missiles won't work." The shield is a largely untested work in progress, and the proposed defense system from Eastern Europe is at least four years off.
Rice spoke at a press conference with Georgia's U.S.-backed president at the close of a three-day trip to Eastern Europe that highlighted the troubled U.S. relationship with Russia.
Unlike Iran, a U.S. adversary for nearly 30 years, Russia is a partner if not an ally, and American and Russian leaders and diplomats meet regularly. The largest disputes concern Russian attitudes and expectations for territory the old Soviet Union once held outright or controlled from afar.
That's the case with Georgia, a former Soviet republic that accuses its larger neighbor of encouraging separatist movements born out of the Soviet breakup.
"I'm not going to try to judge Russian motives, I'm only concerned about the actions at this point," Rice said. She said Russia should help instead of hurt prospects for a peaceful settlement of Georgia's dispute with separatists in the breakaway province of Abkhazia.
WAR ON TERROR: Bodies of 2 missing US soldiers are found in Iraq
DETROIT - The bodies of two U.S. soldiers missing in Iraq for more than a year have been found, their families said Thursday night. The military would not immediately confirm the report.
The father of Army Sgt. Alex Jimenez, of Lawrence, Mass., said the remains of his son and another soldier, Pvt. Byron W. Fouty, of Waterford, Mich., had been identified in Iraq.
Jimenez, 25, and Fouty, 19, were kidnapped along with a third member of the 2nd Brigade of the 10th Mountain Division during an ambush in May 2007 in the volatile area south of Baghdad known as the "triangle of death." The body of the third seized soldier, Pfc. Joseph Anzack Jr. of Torrance, Calif., was found in the Euphrates River a year later.
Jimenez's father, Ramon "Andy" Jimenez, said uniformed military officials came to his home in Lawrence on Thursday to tell him that his son's body and some of his son's personal effects had been discovered. Fouty's stepfather, Gordon Dibler, said military officials came to his Oxford home to break the news.
The Pentagon generally waits 24 hours after notifying the next of kin before making a release public.
Andy Jimenez told The Associated Press through a translator that the news "shattered all hope" the family had to "see Alex walk home on his own."
"Every day that he's been missing has been a day of `what could have been' ... but after hearing the news today ... I'm still in shock," Dibler said.
He said he spent much of Thursday on the phone talking with family and friends, including Andy Jimenez. The soldiers' families had become friends over the past year, and Dibler said he always considered the two missing soldiers "our nation's sons."
"Byron went to Iraq to help people who couldn't help themselves," he said, adding that conditions there have since improved. "I know their sacrifice was not for nothing. It was not in vain."
Lawrence Veterans Services Director Francisco Urena, who was at the Jimenez home Thursday and translated for the soldier's father, said the family was given no details on the discovery of the bodies or the nature of the soldiers' deaths. Dibler said Fouty's body was found in the Iraqi village of Jurf as Sakhr.
Fouty was identified using dental records, Dibler said, adding that the bodies of both soldiers were taken to Dover, Del., where military officials are expected to perform further tests to positively identify both men and determine a cause of death.
"It's a very sad relief," he said. "But I know I have to go forward, not just for our family, but for the other men and women who are still doing their job over there."
Urena said the Jimenez family expected to receive Alex Jimenez's body in five days.
"He's very thankful for everybody from the community in Lawrence and throughout the U.S. who have provided him support during the difficult time the family has been through during the past 14 months," Urena said of Andy Jimenez.
Massachusetts state Rep. William Lantigua of Lawrence, who also was with Jimenez on Thursday evening, said the family had held out hope for a happy ending.
"That does not take away from the fact that he was doing what he wanted to do," Lantigua said of Alex Jimenez. "We'll just remember his life, and what a gentleman he was. The community will continue to support his family any way we can."
The three soldiers, from the Fort Drum, N.Y.-based 10th Mountain Division, disappeared May 12, 2007, after insurgents ambushed their combat team 20 miles outside Baghdad. An Iraqi soldier and four other Americans from the same unit were killed in the attack.
The soldiers were from Company D, 4th Battalion, 31st Infantry Regiment — nicknamed the "Polar Bears."
Jim Waring of the family support group New England Care for Our Military said he spoke to Jimenez' and Fouty's families Thursday night.
"It's going to be tough on them," he said. "They really had hoped they were alive."
Waring said his group had a banner for the missing soldiers: "Together they serve our nation and together they will come home."
"They did come home together, just not the way we wanted," Waring said.
GLOBAL WARMING: Psychiatrists identify 'climate change delusion' phenomenon...
Doomed to a fatal delusion over climate change PSYCHIATRISTS have detected the first case of "climate change delusion" - and they haven't even yet got to Kevin Rudd and his global warming guru.
Writing in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, Joshua Wolf and Robert Salo of our Royal Children's Hospital say this delusion was a "previously unreported phenomenon".
"A 17-year-old man was referred to the inpatient psychiatric unit at Royal Children's Hospital Melbourne with an eight-month history of depressed mood . . . He also . . . had visions of apocalyptic events."
(So have Alarmist of the Year Tim Flannery, Profit of Doom Al Gore and Sir Richard Brazen, but I digress.)
"The patient had also developed the belief that, due to climate change, his own water consumption could lead within days to the deaths of millions of people through exhaustion of water supplies."
But never mind the poor boy, who became too terrified even to drink. What's scarier is that people in charge of our Government seem to suffer from this "climate change delusion", too.
Here is Prime Minister Kevin Rudd yesterday, with his own apocalyptic vision: "If we do not begin reducing the nation's levels of carbon pollution, Australia's economy will face more frequent and severe droughts, less water, reduced food production and devastation of areas such as the Great Barrier Reef and Kakadu wetlands."
And here is a senior Sydney Morning Herald journalist aghast at the horrors described in the report on global warming released on Friday by Rudd's guru, Professor Ross Garnaut: "Australians must pay more for petrol, food and energy or ultimately face a rising death toll . . ."
Wow. Pay more for food or die. Is that Rudd's next campaign slogan?
Of course, we can laugh at this -- and must -- but the price for such folly may soon be your job, or at least your cash.
Rudd and Garnaut want to scare you into backing their plan to force people who produce everything from petrol to coal-fired electricity, from steel to soft drinks, to pay for licences to emit carbon dioxide -- the gas they think is heating the world to hell.
The cost of those licences, totalling in the billions, will then be passed on to you through higher bills for petrol, power, food, housing, air travel and anything else that uses lots of gassy power. In some countries they're even planning to tax farting cows, so there's no end to the ways you can be stung.
Rudd hopes this pain will make you switch to expensive but less gassy alternatives, and -- hey presto -- the world's temperature will then fall, just like it's actually done since the day Al Gore released An Inconvenient Truth.
But you'll have spotted already the big flaw in Rudd's mad plan -- one that confirms he and Garnaut really do have delusions.
The truth is Australia on its own emits less than 1.5 per cent of the world's carbon dioxide. Any savings we make will make no real difference, given that China (now the biggest emitter) and India (the fourth) are booming so fast that they alone will pump out 42 per cent of the world's greenhouse gases by 2030.
Indeed, so fast are the world's emissions growing -- by 3.1 per cent a year thanks mostly to these two giants -- that the 20 per cent cuts Rudd demands of Australians by 2020 would be swallowed up in just 28 days. That's how little our multi-billions of dollars in sacrifices will matter.
And that's why Rudd's claim that we'll be ruined if we don't cut Australia's gases is a lie. To be blunt.
Ask Rudd's guru. Garnaut on Friday admitted any cuts we make will be useless unless they inspire other countries to do the same -- especially China and India: "Only a global agreement has any prospect of reducing risks of dangerous climate change to acceptable levels."
So almost everything depends on China and India copying us. But the chances of that? A big, round zero.
A year ago China released its own global warming strategy -- its own Garnaut report -- which bluntly refused to cut its total emissions.
Said Ma Kai, head of China's powerful State Council: "China does not commit to any quantified emissions-reduction commitments . . . our efforts to fight climate change must not come at the expense of economic growth."
In fact, we had to get used to more gas from China, not less: "It is quite inevitable that during this (industrialisation) stage, China's energy consumption and CO2 emissions will be quite high."
Last month, India likewise issued its National Action Plan on Climate Change, and also rejected Rudd-style cuts.
The plan's authors, the Prime Minister's Council on Climate Change, said India would rather save its people from poverty than global warming, and would not cut growth to cut gases.
"It is obvious that India needs to substantially increase its per capita energy consumption to provide a minimally acceptable level of wellbeing to its people."
The plan's only real promise was in fact a threat: "India is determined that its per capita greenhouse gas emissions will at no point exceed that of developed countries."
Gee, thanks. That, of course, means India won't stop its per capita emissions (now at 1.02 tonnes) from growing until they match those of countries such as the US (now 20 tonnes). Given it has one billion people, that's a promise to gas the world like it's never been gassed before.
So is this our death warrant? Should this news have you seeing apocalyptic visions, too?
Well, no. What makes the Indian report so interesting is that unlike our Ross Garnaut, who just accepted the word of those scientists wailing we faced doom, the Indian experts went to the trouble to check what the climate was actually doing and why.
Their conclusion? They couldn't actually find anything bad in India that was caused by man-made warming: "No firm link between the documented (climate) changes described below and warming due to anthropogenic climate change has yet been established."
In fact, they couldn't find much change in the climate at all.
Yes, India's surface temperature over a century had inched up by 0.4 degrees, but there had been no change in trends for large-scale droughts and floods, or rain: "The observed monsoon rainfall at the all-India level does not show any significant trend . . ."
It even dismissed the panic Al Gore helped to whip up about melting Himalayan glaciers: "While recession of some glaciers has occurred in some Himalayan regions in recent years, the trend is not consistent across the entire mountain chain. It is, accordingly, too early to establish long-term trends, or their causation, in respect of which there are several hypotheses."
Nor was that the only sign that India's Council on Climate Change had kept its cool while our Rudd and Garnaut lost theirs.
For example, the Indians rightly insisted nuclear power had to be part of any real plan to cut emissions. Rudd and Garnaut won't even discuss it.
The Indians also pointed out that no feasible technology to trap and bury the gasses of coal-fired power stations had yet been developed "and there are serious questions about the cost as well (as) permanence of the CO2 storage repositories".
Rudd and Garnaut, however, keep offering this dream to make us think our power stations can survive their emissions trading scheme, when state governments warn they may not.
In every case the Indians are pragmatic where Rudd and Garnaut are having delusions -- delusions about an apocalypse, about cutting gases without going nuclear, about saving power stations they'll instead drive broke.
And there's that delusion on which their whole plan is built -- that India and China will follow our sacrifice by cutting their throats, too.
So psychiatrists are treating a 17-year-old tipped over the edge by global warming fearmongers?
Pray that their next patients will be two men whose own delusions threaten to drive our whole economy over the edge as well.
WAR ON TERROR: US-funded effort to win over Sadr City residents
Women shop for fish at a marketplace in the Shiite stronghold of Sadr City in Baghdad, Iraq, Thusday, July 3, 2008. This is Sadr City, where black-clad militiamen of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army once enforced discipline across the sprawling slum of 3 million people, half of Baghdad's population. (AP Photo/ Karim Kadim)
BAGHDAD - Hundreds of women in black abayas crowd outdoor food markets, snapping up groceries and fresh vegetables. Stores are open again. Children play soccer on dirt fields until dusk — or later, when there's electricity.
This is Sadr City, where black-clad militiamen of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army once enforced discipline across the sprawling slum of 3 million people — half of Baghdad's population. The Iraqi army won control of the district in May after weeks of battles that damaged scores of houses and emptied the streets.
"Security is better without the Mahdi Army," said a 42-year-old resident who wanted to be identified only by his nickname, Abu Israa. "We don't want them back."
Most residents do not seem to miss the Mahdi Army, and the U.S. and Iraqi governments hope that sentiment sticks. So Sadr City is witnessing a flurry of public works projects — part of an effort to build confidence in the government and make it more difficult for the extremists to return.
The U.S. military has tried the same strategy before in Sadr City after cease-fires but with limited results. This time U.S. officials are more confident that they can do a better job of managing the effort and maintaining the flow of money. They also believe that support for the militia has dropped sharply because residents are tired of bloodshed.
The Iraqis apparently hope to avoid the disappointment that's growing in the southern city of Basra, where many residents blame the government for failing to deliver on its promises to improve basic services, provide jobs and distribute enough food after winning control from Shiite militias last spring.
Taking no chances in Sadr City, hundreds of city workers have spread out across the district to spruce it up. They are resurfacing roads and sidewalks, repairing the sewer system and collecting garbage.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has pledged $100 million to upgrade the quality of life. The U.S. military is also providing some reconstruction and economic aid to help rebuild parts of Sadr City — with about $4 million already being spent and more on the way.
"The Iraqi government is rebuilding Iraq, one area at a time," says a large billboard on one of Sadr City's main roads — part of a U.S.-backed propaganda effort.
To make sure everything goes smoothly, Iraqi troops man scores of checkpoints and are even directing traffic. They have set up small outposts deep inside the district, complete with blast walls and sandbags.
U.S. troops continue to stay in the area's outlying neighborhoods, but residents report nightly forays by American forces and their Iraqi allies to arrest Mahdi Army commanders — moves the government once roundly condemned and the Mahdi Army pledged never to allow.
On Monday, the top U.S. military officer visited Sadr City, where he met with U.S. troops at a coalition observation post and strolled through a market.
"We saw extraordinary progress there," said Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "A few months ago no one could go into Sadr City. I was able to walk openly down a street that until recently was extremely unsafe, and I'm encouraged by that."
With a canny mix of persuasion and intimidation, Mahdi Army fighters and clerics loyal to al-Sadr had governed the enclave since 2003 like a mini-state. They set up Islamic courts, punished offenders and operated hospitals and gas stations.
Rogue militiamen also ran extortion rackets and black-market rings in food and gas, and formed kidnap-for-ransom gangs.
Residents tolerated the abuses because the militiamen protected them from Sunni militants during sectarian strife in Baghdad in 2006 and 2007. But when violence abated, so did the Mahdi Army's welcome.
The setback for the Mahdi Army in Sadr City, its largest stronghold, has presented the once-feared militia its biggest challenge since al-Sadr created it in 2003. The uncertainty over the militia's future is deepened by al-Sadr's voluntary exile in Iran, where he has lived for more than a year.
Behind the scenes, al-Sadr is quietly reorganizing the militia into a smaller force to fight again, according to a senior militia commander. The commander, who fled Iraq in May at the end of seven weeks of fighting in Sadr City between the militia and U.S.-backed Iraqi troops, spoke by telephone from Iran's holy city of Qom.
The commander said al-Sadr and a small clique of trusted aides are working to organize groups of militiamen into small fighter cells that can operate in secrecy and in isolation of each other. Speaking on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media, he said about 20 commanders have been picked to lead the new cells.
The new structure will mirror that of Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite guerrilla group backed by Iran whose popularity soared in the Arab world after it fought Israel to a standstill in the summer 2006 war.
"The last round of fighting was a lesson to everyone and it is the reason behind the restructuring," said the commander.
The recent fighting in Sadr City ended with a truce that allowed the government to take control of the vast district and obliged al-Sadr to take his soldiers off the streets.
It is unclear if the smaller, more mobile force foreseen by the commander would have trouble controlling Sadr City the way the full Mahdi Army did. But it would likely give al-Sadr better control over the proposed fighter cells. His aim likely is to bolster his standing as Iraq's top anti-American figure.
Publicly, the Mahdi Army has melted away.
Gone are the small groups of militiamen hanging out on major roads or racing through dusty streets in pickup trucks. They have even stopped guarding al-Sadr's office and manning checkpoints to search worshippers headed to outdoor Friday prayers.
Many commanders have gone into hiding or fled.
"Anyone with a beard and a black shirt now risks arrest," said Hussein al-Mohammedawi, a 36-year-old, midlevel commander who first joined the Mahdi Army in 2004.
"I often spend the night away from home to avoid arrest," he said.
But others say this is just a waiting period.
"We are still here even if you don't see us," said Mahdi al-Freiji, one militiaman. "There is a time for everything. You just have to wait and see."
US MISSILE SHIELD: Saber Rattling from Iran and Russia
Mother Russia still scared of a few missiles.
The missile-bound game of nuclear tic-tac-toe continued across the Middle East and Europe Wednesday as Russia made a provocative response to an expansion of the U.S. missile shield in Europe, and Iran followed with a provocation of its own. After the U.S. and Czech Republic signed an agreement calling for the basing of a U.S. radar south of Prague, Moscow responded with a threat of unspecified "military" action if the system is ever deployed. Then, less than 24 hours later, apparently responding to increasing chatter from the U.S. and Israel about attacking Tehran's nuclear production sites, Iran test-fired a barrage of missiles at the mouth of the Persian Gulf, a vital waterway through which about 40% of the world's oil - much of it bound for the U.S. and the West - passes.
Iran's nine-missile test shows "our resolve and might against enemies who in recent weeks have threatened Iran with harsh language," Gen. Hossein Salami of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards said in a broadcast over Iranian state television. Iran has threatened to halt the flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz if the U.S. or Israel attacks its nuclear-development sites. The test firings reportedly included Iran's newest missile, the intermediate range Shahab 3, which can reach Israel, Turkey and U.S. military deployments in the region. "Our hands are always on the trigger and our missiles are ready for launch," Salami told the official IRNA news agency Wednesday. While it can carry a one-ton conventional warhead, the Shahab 3 is not very accurate, U.S. officials say. Marrying a nuclear warhead to it - assuming Iran is able to build one - is also a daunting technical challenge.
The Iranians conduct such tests several times a year. While provocative, Iran has defensive motives for such testing as well: it was 20 years ago this month that the U.S. Navy cruiser Vincennes killed 290 people aboard an Iranian airliner as it flew across the Persian Gulf after the ship erroneously identified the airliner as an Iranian F-14 intent on attacking the vessel.
The Persian barrage came shortly after the Russians issued their own threatening reponse to a pact signed Tuesday between Washington and the Czech Republic to move into that country an aging missile defense radar system currently based in the Kwajalein Atoll in the South Pacific. "We will be forced to react not with diplomatic, but with military-technical methods" if the shield is ever deployed, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement. The tracking radar slated to move to the Czech Republic would be linked to 10 interceptor missiles Washington hopes to base in Poland. Russia has threatened to re-aim its missiles at those sites if the system is built.
Defense Department officials expressed exasperation at the latest Russian denunciation of the missile shield that U.S. officials maintain is designed only to protect parts of Europe as well as the United States. "No one's name [in the Russian government] is attached to it," Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told TIME shortly after the Russians released their saber-rattling statement. "It's being reported as a foreign ministry statement - and it's got strange wording in it like 'We would be forced to react with military resources' or 'technical means' - what does that mean?"
Moscow lobbed the verbal missile toward Washington after Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and her Czech counterpart, Karel Schwarzenberg, signed an agreement in Prague for the radar's move, which the U.S. says is designed to warn of missiles headed toward Europe from Iran. "We face with the Iranians, and so do our allies and friends, a growing missile threat that is growing ever longer and ever deeper and where the Iranian appetite for nuclear technology to this point is still unchecked," Rice said after inking the pact. "It's hard for me to believe that an American President is not going to want to have the capability to defend our territory [and] the territory of our allies."
Pentagon officials have wooed the Russians with enticements to get them to participate in the shield, saying that Tehran threatens Moscow as well as other Eurasian nations. But Moscow has steadfastly declined to cooperate. Ever since the U.S. announced several years ago that it planned to spread its missile-defense system to Europe, Moscow has seen it as a ploy designed to emasculate its last remaining claim to superpower status: its nuclear might. In the two decades since the Soviet Union's demise, its slide into international irrelevancy has been slowed only by its nuclear arsenal and the recent rise in oil prices. While superpower tensions have eased considerably since the Cold War, both sides continue to keep hundreds of long-range missiles set on hair-trigger alert.
"This system is not designed to counter a Russian threat - this system is designed to counter what is an emerging threat from the Middle East," Whitman says. "We have been very transparent with respect to our intent and purpose - we have offered the Russians a very attractive, robust collaboration opportunity and we have also offered what is unprecedented transparency."
While President Bush is eager to cement the European element of the missile-defense shield before he leaves office, actually building and deploying it would fall to his successor. Presumptive Republican nominee Arizona Sen. John McCain backs the proposal, while Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee, has been less supportive. What really matters isn't what either does - or what the Russians say - but what the Iranians do. The closer Tehran is believed to having a nuclear weapon, Pentagon officials say, the more necessary such a Euroshield becomes. Wednesday's tests, Rice said while traveling in Bulgaria, are "evidence that the missile threat is not an imaginary one." - With reporting by Eben Harrell/LondonTime.com
other news on iran Iran's Photoshopped Missile Launch! At least one of the photographs released today by Iran and published by an unquestioning Western media is a Photoshop fake:
POLITICS: Senate bows to Bush, approves surveillance bill
Who's tha man! Hussein bows to President GWB too!
WASHINGTON - Bowing to President Bush's demands, the Senate approved and sent the White House a bill Wednesday to overhaul bitterly disputed rules on secret government eavesdropping and shield telecommunications companies from lawsuits complaining they helped the U.S. spy on Americans.
The relatively one-sided vote, 69-28, came only after a lengthy and heated debate that pitted privacy and civil liberties concerns against the desire to prevent terrorist attacks. It ended almost a year of wrangling in the Democratic-led Congress over surveillance rules and the president's warrantless wiretapping program that was initiated after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
The House passed the same bill last month, and Bush said he would sign it soon.
Opponents assailed the eavesdropping program, asserting that it imperiled citizens' rights of privacy from government intrusion. But Bush said the legislation protects those rights as well as Americans' security.
"This bill will help our intelligence professionals learn who the terrorists are talking to, what they're saying and what they're planning," he said in a brief White House appearance after the Senate vote.
The bill is very much a political compromise, brought about by a deadline: Wiretapping orders authorized last year will begin to expire in August. Without a new bill, the government would go back to old FISA rules, requiring multiple new orders and potential delays to continue those intercepts. That is something most of Congress did not want to see happen, particularly in an election year.
The long fight on Capitol Hill centered on one main question: whether to protect from civil lawsuits any telecommunications companies that helped the government eavesdrop on American phone and computer lines without the permission or knowledge of a secret court created by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
The White House had threatened to veto the bill unless it immunized companies such as AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. against wiretapping lawsuits.
Forty-six lawsuits now stand to be dismissed because of the new law, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. All are pending before a single U.S. District Court in California. But the fight has not ended. Civil rights groups are already preparing lawsuits challenging the bill's constitutionality, and four suits, filed against government officials, will not be dismissed.
Numerous lawmakers had spoken out strongly against the no-warrants eavesdropping on Americans, but the Senate voted its approval after rejecting amendments that would have watered down, delayed or stripped away the immunity provision.
The lawsuits center on allegations that the White House circumvented U.S. law by going around the FISA court, which was created 30 years ago to prevent the government from abusing its surveillance powers for political purposes, as was done in the Vietnam War and Watergate eras. The court is meant to approve all wiretaps placed inside the U.S. for intelligence-gathering purposes. The law has been interpreted to include international e-mail records stored on servers inside the U.S.
"This president broke the law," declared Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis.
The Bush administration brought the wiretapping back under the FISA court's authority only after The New York Times revealed the existence of the secret program. A handful of members of Congress knew about the program from top secret briefings. Most members are still forbidden to know the details of the classified effort, and some objected that they were being asked to grant immunity to the telecoms without first knowing what they did.
Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Arlen Specter compared the Senate vote to buying a "pig in a poke."
But Sen. Christopher Bond, R-Mo., one of the bill's most vocal champions, said, "This is the balance we need to protect our civil liberties without handcuffing our terror-fighters."
Just under a third of the Senate, including Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, supported an amendment that would have stripped immunity from the bill. They were defeated on a 66-32 vote. Republican rival John McCain did not attend the vote.
Obama ended up voting for the final bill, as did Specter. Feingold voted no.
The bill tries to address concerns about the legality of warrantless wiretapping by requiring inspectors general inside the government to conduct a yearlong investigation into the program.
Beyond immunity, the new surveillance bill also sets new rules for government eavesdropping. Some of them would tighten the reins on current government surveillance activities, but others would loosen them compared with a law passed 30 years ago.
For example, it would require the government to get FISA court approval before it eavesdrops on an American overseas. Currently, the attorney general approves that electronic surveillance on his own.
The bill also would allow the government to obtain broad, yearlong intercept orders from the FISA court that target foreign groups and people, raising the prospect that communications with innocent Americans would be swept in. The court would approve how the government chooses the targets and how the intercepted American communications would be protected.
The original FISA law required the government to get wiretapping warrants for each individual targeted from inside the United States, on the rationale that most communications inside the U.S. would involve Americans whose civil liberties must be protected. But technology has changed. Purely foreign communications increasingly pass through U.S. wires and sit on American computer servers, and the law has required court orders to be obtained to access those as well.
The bill would give the government a week to conduct a wiretap in an emergency before it must apply for a court order. The original law said three days.
The bill restates that the FISA law is the only means by which wiretapping for intelligence purposes can be conducted inside the United States. This is meant to prevent a repeat of warrantless wiretapping by future administrations.
The ACLU, which is party to some of the lawsuits that will now be dismissed, said the bill was "a blatant assault upon civil liberties and the right to privacy."
Gosh, I am seriously pouring all my money into skincare. I honestly can't live without my dermatologist and her treatments. Work can be chaotic sometimes, but I always make time for necessary facials and other skin treatments. Those of us who are born with acne-prone skin are the ones who must slave away to keep those evil pimples, whiteheads, blackheads and acne scars at bay! Anyway, here's a good article from The Make-up and Beauty Blog:
Your Dreams
Find a pretty notebook, and write out your hopes and dreams for the future. Think about where you’d like to be in a year, two years or ten years. The crazier and more outrageous the dream, the better. Keep your pen moving across the page, and try to avoid self editing while you write — nobody ever has to see your list, so don’t worry about grammar or spelling. Let the words flow unbidden.
Just try to get those dreams down on paper. The simple act of writing things down helps bring them to life.
Inspiration
Study orchids, other flowers and even photographs of beautiful things to inspire your eye makeup color combinations. Hold onto an image of something beautiful in your mind as you try different looks. Remember, makeup washes off.
Buy or make a card for someone special in your life. Make it something you can send by snail mail. Inside the card, write a quote from a song or show that reminds you of this person, along with an invitation to coffee or a movie.
Schedule tea time with yourself. Clear off your desk or your kitchen table, and serve tea from a teapot with a proper cup. Find something uplifting to read while you sip slowly, and let your mind wander.
Listen to Nina Simone during a summer rainstorm. A few choice cuts: I Think It’s Going to Rain Today, Feeling Good and Sugar in My Bowl. Share
Look for beauty everywhere, and share what you’ve learned with others. What inspires you to feel more beautiful?
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Very well-written! These are the best beauty tips anyone can ask for. I love feel-good articles! Don't you? ;)
As we learn more about the Colombian military's daring hostage rescue last week, one detail stands out: In tricking FARC rebels into putting the hostages aboard a helicopter, undercover special forces simply told the comandantes that the aircraft was being loaned to them by a fictitious nongovernmental organization sympathetic to their cause called the International Humanitarian Mission.
It may have taken years for army intelligence to infiltrate the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, and it may have been tough to convincingly impersonate rebels. But what seems to have been a walk in the park was getting the FARC to believe that an NGO was providing resources to help it in the dirty work of ferrying captives to a new location.
I am reminded of President Álvaro Uribe's 2003 statement that some "human rights" organizations in his country were fronts for terrorists. Connecticut Sen. Christopher Dodd got his back up over Mr. Uribe's statement, and piously lectured the Colombian president about "the importance of democratic values."
But as the helicopter story suggests, Mr. Uribe seems to have been right. How else to explain the fact that the FARC swallowed the line without batting an eye?
This warrants attention because it adds to the already robust evidence that left-wing NGOs and other so-called human rights defenders, including Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and Colombian Sen. Piedad Cordoba, are nothing more than propagandists for terrorists.
When passions over kidnap victim Ingrid Betancourt and the other hostages were running high, these actors pressed Mr. Uribe to grant FARC demands. Now it is clear that the pressure was geared more toward strengthening the rebels' hand than freeing the captives.
Left-wing NGOs have made undermining the Colombian government's credibility a priority for many years. A 2003 internal report from the U.S. Embassy in Bogotá titled "A Closer Look at Human Rights Statistics" confirmed as much. It found that NGO analyses – for example by the Jesuit-founded Center for Popular Research and Education known as Cinep – of the human-rights environment contained a heavy bias against the government while granting a wide berth to guerrillas.
Since the late 1990s, the NGO practice of dragging the military into court on allegations of human rights violations has destroyed the careers of some of the country's finest officers, even though most of these men were found innocent after years of proceedings. "Judicial warfare" turned out to be especially effective because under legislation pushed by Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, "credible" charges against officers put at risk U.S. military aid unless the accused was removed. The NGOs knew that they only had to point fingers to get rid of an effective leader and demoralize the ranks. Given this history, it's not surprising that the FARC thought a helicopter from an NGO was perfectly natural.
As to Mr. Chávez, documents captured during a Colombian raid of a guerrilla camp in Ecuador show that, in his role as "mediator" in hostage negotiations since last year, he was advising the rebels as to how to best use their hostages as leverage to advance their revolution.
Last fall, Mr. Chávez and the FARC hatched an audacious plan whereby the Venezuelan would take "proof of life" of Ms. Betancourt to French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris, where the plight of Ms. Betancourt was a cause célèbre. The rebels wrote that Mr. Chávez was sure French pressure for negotiations would cause President Bush to "order Uribe to allow the meeting" between Mr. Chávez and the rebels on Colombian soil, something Mr. Uribe had refused to do. The rebels reported that Mr. Chávez was "super-motivated," because he viewed the rendezvous as a public-relations coup that would give him and the FARC "continental and world renown." [No wide] THE AMERICAS IN THE NEWS
Get the latest information in Spanish from The Wall Street Journal's Americas page.
That plan flopped, but Mr. Chavez had other cards up his sleeve. One involved Ms. Cordoba, who is currently under investigation by the Colombian attorney general for ties to the FARC. She figures prominently in the captured rebel documents, and is notoriously close to Mr. Chávez.
She met at the Venezuelan presidential palace with FARC leaders last fall. From that meeting the rebels reported that "Piedad says that Chávez has Uribe going crazy. He doesn't know what to do. That Nancy Pelosi helps and is ready to help in the swap [hostages in exchange for captured guerrillas]. That she has designated [U.S. Congressman Jim] McGovern for this."
If the speaker of the House was working with Ms. Cordoba in this scheme, her judgment was more than a little misguided. The rebels write that on a trip to Argentina Ms. Cordoba told them, "It doesn't matter to me the proposal that Sarkozy has made to free Ingrid. Above all, do not liberate Ingrid." In short, why give up such a useful pawn?
The cocktails dresses are divine! I love Marchesa- their red-carpet gowns are always stunning and they make plain girls like Amanda Byrnes look glamorous!
In a Monday June 9, 2003 file photo, UN inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) work at the nuclear facility in Tuwaitha, Iraq, 50 kms east of Baghdad. The last major remnant of Saddam Hussein's nuclear program _ a huge stockpile of concentrated natural uranium _ reached a Canadian port Saturday, July 5, 2008, to complete a secret U.S. operation that included a two-week airlift from Baghdad and a ship voyage crossing two oceans. (AP Photo/Saurabh Das, file)
The last major remnant of Saddam Hussein's nuclear program - a huge stockpile of concentrated natural uranium - reached a Canadian port Saturday to complete a secret U.S. operation that included a two-week airlift from Baghdad and a ship voyage crossing two oceans.
The removal of 550 metric tons of "yellowcake" - the seed material for higher-grade nuclear enrichment - was a significant step toward closing the books on Saddam's nuclear legacy. It also brought relief to U.S. and Iraqi authorities who had worried the cache would reach insurgents or smugglers crossing to Iran to aid its nuclear ambitions.
What's now left is the final and complicated push to clean up the remaining radioactive debris at the former Tuwaitha nuclear complex about 12 miles south of Baghdad - using teams that include Iraqi experts recently trained in the Chernobyl fallout zone in Ukraine.
"Everyone is very happy to have this safely out of Iraq," said a senior U.S. official who outlined the nearly three-month operation to The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.
While yellowcake alone is not considered potent enough for a so-called "dirty bomb" - a conventional explosive that disperses radioactive material - it could stir widespread panic if incorporated in a blast. Yellowcake also can be enriched for use in reactors and, at higher levels, nuclear weapons using sophisticated equipment.
The Iraqi government sold the yellowcake to a Canadian uranium producer, Cameco Corp. (CCJ), in a transaction the official described as worth "tens of millions of dollars." A Cameco spokesman, Lyle Krahn, declined to discuss the price, but said the yellowcake will be processed at facilities in Ontario for use in energy-producing reactors.
"We are pleased ... that we have taken (the yellowcake) from a volatile region into a stable area to produce clean electricity," he said.
The deal culminated more than a year of intense diplomatic and military initiatives - kept hushed in fear of ambushes or attacks once the convoys were under way: first carrying 3,500 barrels by road to Baghdad, then on 37 military flights to the Indian Ocean atoll of Diego Garcia and finally aboard a U.S.-flagged ship for a 8,500-mile trip to Montreal.
And, in a symbolic way, the mission linked the current attempts to stabilize Iraq with some of the high-profile claims about Saddam's weapons capabilities in the buildup to the 2003 invasion.
Accusations that Saddam had tried to purchase more yellowcake from the African nation of Niger - and an article by a former U.S. ambassador refuting the claims - led to a wide-ranging probe into Washington leaks that reached high into the Bush administration.
Tuwaitha and an adjacent research facility were well known for decades as the centerpiece of Saddam's nuclear efforts.
Israeli warplanes bombed a reactor project at the site in 1981. Later, U.N. inspectors documented and safeguarded the yellowcake, which had been stored in aging drums and containers since before the 1991 Gulf War. There was no evidence of any yellowcake dating from after 1991, the official said.
U.S. and Iraqi forces have guarded the 23,000-acre site - surrounded by huge sand berms - following a wave of looting after Saddam's fall that included villagers toting away yellowcake storage barrels for use as drinking water cisterns.
Yellowcake is obtained by using various solutions to leach out uranium from raw ore and can have a corn meal-like color and consistency. It poses no severe risk if stored and sealed properly. But exposure carries well-documented health concerns associated with heavy metals such as damage to internal organs, experts say.
"The big problem comes with any inhalation of any of the yellowcake dust," said Doug Brugge, a professor of public health issues at the Tufts University School of Medicine.
Moving the yellowcake faced numerous hurdles.
Diplomats and military leaders first weighed the idea of shipping the yellowcake overland to Kuwait's port on the Persian Gulf. Such a route, however, would pass through Iraq's Shiite heartland and within easy range of extremist factions, including some that Washington claims are aided by Iran. The ship also would need to clear the narrow Strait of Hormuz at the mouth of the Gulf, where U.S. and Iranian ships often come in close contact.
Kuwaiti authorities, too, were reluctant to open their borders to the shipment despite top-level lobbying from Washington.
An alternative plan took shape: shipping out the yellowcake on cargo planes.
But the yellowcake still needed a final destination. Iraqi government officials sought buyers on the commercial market, where uranium prices spiked at about $120 per pound last year. It's currently selling for about half that. The Cameco deal was reached earlier this year, the official said.
At that point, U.S.-led crews began removing the yellowcake from the Saddam-era containers - some leaking or weakened by corrosion - and reloading the material into about 3,500 secure barrels.
In April, truck convoys started moving the yellowcake from Tuwaitha to Baghdad's international airport, the official said. Then, for two weeks in May, it was ferried in 37 flights to Diego Garcia, a speck of British territory in the Indian Ocean where the U.S. military maintains a base.
On June 3, an American ship left the island for Montreal, said the official, who declined to give further details about the operation.
The yellowcake wasn't the only dangerous item removed from Tuwaitha.
Earlier this year, the military withdrew four devices for controlled radiation exposure from the former nuclear complex. The lead-enclosed irradiation units, used to decontaminate food and other items, contain elements of high radioactivity that could potentially be used in a weapon, according to the official. Their Ottawa-based manufacturer, MDS Nordion, took them back for free, the official said.
The yellowcake was the last major stockpile from Saddam's nuclear efforts, but years of final cleanup is ahead for Tuwaitha and other smaller sites.
The U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency plans to offer technical expertise.
Last month, a team of Iraqi nuclear experts completed training in the Ukrainian ghost town of Pripyat, which once housed the Chernobyl workers before the deadly meltdown in 1986, said an IAEA official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the decontamination plan has not yet been publicly announced.
But the job ahead is enormous, complicated by digging out radioactive "hot zones" entombed in concrete during Saddam's rule, said the IAEA official. Last year, an IAEA safety expert, Dennis Reisenweaver, predicted the cleanup could take "many years."
The yellowcake issue also is one of the many troubling footnotes of the war for Washington.
A CIA officer, Valerie Plame, claimed her identity was leaked to journalists to retaliate against her husband, former Ambassador Joe Wilson, who wrote that he had found no evidence to support assertions that Iraq tried to buy additional yellowcake from Niger.
A federal investigation led to the conviction of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice.
General David Petraeus beats megastar Angeline Jolie as Iraq crowd-puller
Jolie ain't the box office hit in Baghdad!
If Santa ever set up his Christmas grotto in a war zone, it might look something like this.
Hundreds of men and women, many of them armed, line up in a marble hall inside one of Saddam Hussein's former palaces, waiting patiently for more than half an hour for their hero to turn up.
The object of so much adulation is General David Petraeus, the 55-year-old commander of US and allied forces in Iraq. General Petraeus, widely credited with the military strategy that has clawed Iraq back from civil war to a semblance of stability, is in such demand for photographs that his aides have had to organise special mass photo-ops every six weeks inside the Green Zone and at the other huge US base at Baghdad airport.
“He's a real leader at a great time,” said Master Sergeant John Fife of the US Air Force, who had brought a group of comrades and local Iraqi staff across the vast fortified compound for the chance to have their picture taken with the general, who devised Iraq's counter-insurgency strategy.
“It's like being at Macy's again when I was nine with the Easter Bunny,” the sergeant admitted. Beside him one of his Iraqi staff, who for security reasons identified himself only as Salaam, described the occasion as a great honour. “I just want to say, ‘Thank you.' This man has done great things for my country,” he said, although he confessed that for his own safety he would hang the picture on his office wall in the Green Zone, rather than in his house in the “Red Zone”, the military term for the rest of Baghdad.
Despite the progress Iraq has made under General Petraeus, Salaam said it would be a long time before he risked hanging such a memento at home; if neighbours knew he worked for the Americans he could be killed by militias or kidnapped by criminals.
The crowd of more than 500 people was a cross-section of life in the Green Zone, the complex that has occupied the heart of the capital for the past five years: American soldiers with assault rifles; British, Australian and Italian troops; security contractors in wrap-around sunglasses; embassy officials in suits; cleaners; men in running gear with .45 automatics on their hips; and a woman dressed as though for cocktail party. All file past the commander, who shakes their hands and poses for the army photographer.
One Green Zone veteran said General Petraeus drew bigger crowds than almost any other celebrity visitor, including Angelina Jolie, Dick Cheney, the vice-president, and Condoleezza Rice, the Secretary of State. Only the right-wing talk show host Bill O'Reilly, known for shouting down liberal guests on his Fox Channel programme, drew similar crowds.
General Petraeus has often said that he has no ambition to run for public office, but this would be perfect training for any campaign trail. His smile never wavers throughout the 45-minute ritual, which, with military precision, gets more than 500 people across the wooden podium in a cafeteria of the Republican Palace.
Only at the very end does he look slightly bemused, when he finds himself posing in a group photo with eight Sri Lankan waiters, far from home and looking for a little celebrity action to relieve the tedium of their daily grind.
Then he steps off the stage and marches briskly back to the business of running the war.
I know I should like Michelle Obama. But . . . I just don’t.
I can’t! Because, every time I try, I’m snake-charmed back by the pearlised nail varnish and Mars Attacks! hair of the one, the only, the ultimate power cheerleader: Cindy McCain.
It all came to a head the other week when the putative First Fembot bowled through London on her way back to America from Vietnam. (Clearly, heiresses don’t worry about their carbon footprint — just as long as it’s a diamond-studded, snake-skin-heeled stiletto mega-stomp.)
With an Air Force One blow-dry and coral-pink lipstick, the former junior rodeo queen was clearly on a charm offensive. “Oh garsh,” she fluttered when asked about the 71-year-old pepaw — far from being over the hill, he actually “wore her out”, and if campaigning ever got too arduous, she sweetly contented herself with the fact that that she had “a ringside seat on American history”. The general impression was that Mrs McCain, in the style of Laura Bush and Nancy Reagan, doesn’t really want to be First Lady at all, and is, instead, rather looking forward to getting back to her diamonds and the delights of the Dallas Crystal Charity Ball once her husband has got this highfalutin political jiggery-pokery out of his system.
How much more reassuring than Michelle Obama, who comes from the “I’ve got a leather skirt, I’ve got a leather Birkin bag, I’ve got a PhD in whupass” school of political wifery. We’ve only just got rid of Chony and Billary, for pity’s sake, and here we are again with yet another twinkly-eyed charisma merchant whose gobby wife can barely stop herself from grabbing the microphone. Cindy has never even seen a microphone, of course.
Normally, I’m a supporter of strong, inspiring, intelligent women such as Michelle. Heaven knows, politics is short of positive female figures. But I do think she is making a mistake, and behaving like a politician herself, rather than a politician’s wife.
What, after all, do we require in a First Lady? (Apart from Valium, valises and a Valhalla hairdo.) Her key and perhaps only quality, surely, has to be that she is happy to take an elegant back seat. When it comes to the role of second fiddle, the candyfloss detachment of a Mrs McCain seems so much more appropriate.
Don’t get me wrong. I also want drama — and John and Cindy McCain can certainly provide it.
A former beauty queen and a Viet vet? You couldn’t make it up.
Nor could you make up this report in the New York Review of Books: “In 1992, after Cindy McCain teased her husband about his thinning hair, McCain snapped at her, in front of the reporters and two staffers: ‘At least I don’t plaster on the make-up like a trollop, you c***.’ ” Now that’s what I call showbusiness. For ugly people.
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Laura Bush still knocks them both out! :P But then, I'm an all-out Bush girl, so I'm pretty biased.
...Everyone in our vehicle knew it was a prime target for Al-Qaeda in Iraq, formerly an awesome force that struck fear into the hearts of cities across the west and centre of Iraq but now reduced to a rump in the north in one of the most sweeping victories of America’s war on terror.
The hunt began just after dawn. Iraqi armoured personnel carriers surrounded the turbulent Zanjali district in the northern city of Mosul, blocking off roads as police acting on an urgent tip-off swept in and searched from house to house.
They were looking for an Al-Qaeda bomb – a big one. Their intelligence suggested it could be detonated as early as today.
As the search intensified, I accompanied Colonel Tawfeeq Abdullah on a tense drive through Mosul to check on the operation’s progress.
A gunner loomed out of the open hatch in the roof of our Iraqi army Humvee, swivelling a heavy machinegun and scouring the bullet-pocked streets for enemy.
A soldier in the front passenger seat scanned the roads for improvised explosive devices (IEDs), the roadside bombs that have wreaked havoc on Iraqis and American forces.
Only three days earlier a roadside bomb had blown up an Iraqi Humvee, killing a policeman.
Everyone in our vehicle knew it was a prime target for Al-Qaeda in Iraq, formerly an awesome force that struck fear into the hearts of cities across the west and centre of Iraq but now reduced to a rump in the north in one of the most sweeping victories of America’s war on terror.
“We are going to a very bad neighbourhood,” said Abdullah, wiping the sweat from his face. It was 41C outside and far hotter inside the armoured vehicle.
Yet despite Zanjali’s reputation as a hotbed of the insurgency, we were able to climb down from the vehicle and walk safely along a road covered in hard-packed dirt from a spate of recent sandstorms.
Most of the metal grates on the roadside shops had been pulled down and the acrid smell of burning rubbish filled the air. A few sheep grazed in scrubby wasteland between the houses.
As the police continued their search for weapons, insurgents and, above all, explosives, a few shopkeepers and residents stood idly watching.
Ambulances were positioned every few hundred yards along the road in case of fighting. It never materialised. A search of hundreds of houses met no resistance and yielded no bomb, just 60kg of TNT and some bomb-making equipment.
All that the soldiers found otherwise was a solitary Kalashnikov assault rifle.
“We let him keep the gun because every Iraqi family is allowed to have a personal weapon,” said Major Awad al-Juburi, 39, standing in the road in full battle gear. “The families have been okay with us so far. They are not objecting. They offered us tea and water.”
In Mosul, Al-Qaeda’s last redoubt, the group still held sway as recently as Easter. Now it lacks the strength to fight the army face to face and has lost the sympathy of most of the ordinary citizens who once admired its stand against the occupying forces and their allies in the Iraqi army.
Yesterday two off-duty policemen were shot dead in a market in the east of the city. Hit-and-run attacks such as this have replaced more organised resistance as Al-Qaeda’s strength has been sapped.
“Two days ago the insurgents fired two RPGs [rocket-propelled grenades] on our post,” Abdullah said. “Yesterday they attacked us with machinegun fire.” To the colonel, these seem small-scale affairs.
Iraqi officials acknowledge that bombs such as the one that had supposedly been made and stored in Zanjali will still claim civilian lives in “spectacular” attacks that are intended to attract publicity, to show that the group is still intact and to inspire supporters.
Brigadier-General Abdullah Abdul, a senior Iraqi commander, said: “Al-Qaeda in Mosul is pretty much not able to do the attacks that they could do previously. They are doing small attacks and trying to do big ones but they are mostly not succeeding.”
The Iraqis and Americans have got Al-Qaeda on the run. How have they come so far, so fast? ON the night of May 9, 87 “target packets” landed on the walnut desk of Abdul, the commander of the Iraqi army’s 2nd Division.
The details of each named target were specific. One read: “Action: capture. Characteristics: white hair, hazel eyes, sunburnt skin. Alias: Abu Mohamed. Car: drives a station wagon. Residence: a two-storey house painted black (with map attached showing location). Credibility of source: reliable.”
By early the next morning – the launch day for Operation Lion’s Roar to recapture Mosul – hundreds of police and army checkpoints had been set up across the city.
Iraqi security forces began conducting raids to round up the targets in the packets on Abdul’s desk. Many of them were detained in the first two days. Two weapons caches were found and cleared. It quickly became clear that the Iraqi army and the Americans’ 3rd Armoured Cavalry Regiment were combining their forces effectively. American tanks formed cordons while Iraqi soldiers went from house to house.
An outer cordon was established to ring the city with a huge bank to keep out bombers and the small number of fighters still arriving in Iraq from Syria to reinforce Al-Qaeda.
Meanwhile, an inner cordon of security checkpoints was set up within the city, cutting off districts from one another to curtail insurgents’ movements.
The Americans built small forts known as command operating posts in areas where control was established to increase the flow of intelligence and ensure that no ground was ceded. The impact of the operation was instant.
In the week before it began there were 195 acts of violence, including roadside bombings, sniper shootings and mortar and grenade attacks. The following week, when the entire city was placed under a 24-hour curfew, this figure fell to 93.
On May 14, in the Hay al-Tenak district, four IEDs, three pipe bombs and five mortar rounds were discovered in a grave. The successes did not come without cost, however. On the same day, five Iraqi soldiers were killed when an IED blew up under their armoured personnel carrier.
Some of the discoveries revealed the brutality of Al-Qaeda’s reign. On May 19 in the district of Muthana, an alert Iraqi soldier spotted a manhole cover that should not have been there.
Beneath it they found a ceremonial knife in an apparent torture chamber, its walls spattered with blood. Videos recovered from the chamber showed Iraqi soldiers and police being executed.
Next to be unearthed, on May 26, was a bomb factory above a shop in the Hay al-Jazair district. It contained 11 tons of homemade explosive, 1 ton of nitrate, 10 bottles of liquid nitrate, 100kg of ball bearings and 500kg of gunpowder, along with gas masks and gloves.
Al-Qaeda suffered perhaps its greatest blow on June 24 when American soldiers gunned down Abu Khalaf, the “emir of Mosul”. He had been a close associate of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the most notorious leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, who was killed in an airstrike two years ago.
An aide wearing a suicide vest died with the emir, as did a woman who tried to pull the detonator on his vest.
Al-Qaeda was also bleeding support as allied Iraqi insurgents accepted an amnesty. It did not apply to Al-Qaeda. “If you are fighting to install sharia [Islamic law] on this country, you are going to have to be killed,” said Colonel David Brown, an American adviser to 2nd Division. WITH its supply lines disrupted, Al-Qaeda is increasingly turning to extortion and kidnapping, further alienating the population.
In the past week, as the weapons finds slowed to a trickle and the attacks declined to just 13, Americans and Iraqis alike were elated but not complacent. A car bomb that killed 18 people and wounded 80 in Mosul 10 days ago served as a reminder that the enemy has yet to be eliminated.
Nevertheless, the speed of Al-Qaeda’s decline in Iraq – not only in the north but throughout the country – has taken many military strategists and observers by surprise.
In Zarqawi’s day, a ruthless campaign of suicide bombings, abductions and beheadings paralysed the country and thwarted US efforts to pacify it. By the end of 2006 some were predicting an American defeat.
The reversal of fortunes is attributed to the “surge” strategy of General David Petraeus, the commander of US forces, who targeted Al-Qaeda in Iraq above all else after securing an extra 30,000 troops last year.
His officers exploited local resentment of the terrorists and promised to protect those who resisted them. Under Petraeus’s plan, they established awakening councils, or groups calling themselves concerned local citizens. These Sunni groups helped to drive Al-Qaeda from many of its bastions.
US and Iraqi forces were then able to retake large swathes of the country and complete the “clearing” of cities such as Ramadi and Falluja and large areas of Baghdad. The overall number of attacks in Iraq has fallen by 80% in the past year alone.
Nouri al-Maliki, the prime minister, has gone on in recent months to reassert control over Basra in the south and Baghdad’s Sadr City, the two main strongholds of the Shi’ite Mahdi Army.
As for Mosul, the battle has been crucial to both sides and the Americans believe that it could have repercussions for Al-Qaeda beyond Iraq. “Al-Qaeda has its propaganda value from fighting the infidels and this is the central operating theatre for that battle,” said Brown. “If they are pushed out of Iraq that is a huge defeat for them.” The signs this weekend were positive. Major Erich Campbell, operations officer for the US advisers, said: “Earlier this year we could have gone down the street waving fistfuls of dollars in the air.
“We couldn’t buy anything. Iraqis told us, ‘If we sell to you, we will be killed’. Now we can buy things from shops.”
The last word was left to the beleaguered people of Mosul. Sa’ad Aziz, 47, stood in his shop, with ice-cream in the freezer and fizzy drinks and sweets on the shelves, watching the search for the Zanjali bomb in virtual darkness because there was no electricity.
His concerns were far removed from Al-Qaeda’s jihad: “We have only two hours of electricity out of 10. I need it for my business. There is only a little water in this area. We need jobs. My son has a university degree but he has no work. We’re all very tired of this insurgency.”
Battlefield veteran
Marie Colvin has been a Sunday Times foreign correspondent since 1986 when she witnessed the US bombing of Tripoli. She has covered the Middle East throughout that time and in 1991 remained in Baghdad during the bombing of the first Gulf war.
She has won a string of awards for her reporting from other troublespots, including Chechnya, Zimbabwe and East Timor.
In 1999 she chose to stay on in a besieged United Nations compound in Dili, East Timor, when her male colleagues left. “They don’t make men like they used to,”
FASHION: Czar's descendants re-launch Roaring 20s fashion house
Amazing! Prince Yussupov- one of the men who murdered Russian monk Rasputin, and who married Tsar Nicholas II's niece, Irina -established a fashion house in Paris after the Russian Revolution crippled the old aristocracy and murdered the entire Imperial Family. But after the 1929 Wall Street Crash, Yussupov had to shut down Irfe (short for "Irina" and "Felix"). Eight decades later, a young Russian woman is trying to revive the old Russian label in the grand city of Paris.
PARIS (AFP) - Descendants of Russia's fallen czars and the cream of global fashion feted the re-launch Monday of a 1920s label founded by high-society Bolshevik exiles, the Romanovs and Yusupovs, for the international elite of the time.
Champagne flowed and waiters kept trays of tidbits circulating at a crowded open-air evening launch appropriately held amid the towering columns of the art deco 1930s Palais de Tokyo in a posh part of town.
"This is incredible, a dream," said star-of-the-evening Countess Xenia Sheremeteva-Yusupov, also known as just Mrs Ilia Sphiris, grand-daughter of the illustrious couple who in 1924 founded Irfe, a fashion house with a brief but equally illustrious history.
"I know how much my grandparents loved that house," she added.
Oxford-educated prince Felix Yusupov, descendant of a famed Russian dynasty dating its roots back to the Islamic Prophet Ali, inherited one of the biggest fortunes of Russia, cavorted across Europe, hob-nobbed with the rich and arty, and wound up banished from court after taking part in Rasputin's assassination.
Prince Felix Yussupov and Princess Irinia
In 1914, he married Princess Irini Romanov, related to Nicholas II and said to have been one of the most dazzling beauties of the time. The couple fled Russia in 1919 to live in relative comfort and style in emigre circles in Italy, then France.
Lovers of fine arts and fine things, the white Russian pair in 1924 founded the house of Irfe in Paris, after the first two letters in each of their names, launching their first collection at the Ritz and then showing inside their own theatre, built in their Parisian home.
Original sketches from Irfe. The dress on the right, c.1927, was worn by Anne, Countess of Rosse.
Noted by Vogue and popular with American millionairesses, Irfe offered hand-embroidered, hand-painted elegance, but crashed in 1931 due to the dire straits of its clientele after the Great Depression.
Monday's 2008 revival harked back to the glory days.
A batch of 24 skinny models, with hair slicked back and thick pencilled eyebrows, posed for cameras in long slinky satin numbers on high steps inside the Paris palace, like a mini-version of a Ziegfeld Follies.
Worn with very, very high heels, the Irfe renaissance collection featured evening tuxedos, flowing gowns, swathes of fur and a couple of chic day-coats perfect for a ride on the Orient Express.
"My goal," said designer Olga Sorokina, a 23-year-old former model from Belarus, "is the revival of Russian tradition. This house was born when Russian people played an important role in fashion."
Irfe, she said, planned to open a store in Moscow next winter not far from top luxury house Louis Vuitton, then open boutiques in Milan and Paris.
Models congratulate each other on the catwalk in April 2008.
"This brand is so much part of Russian history that there was no problem in finding investors," said Sorokina, a tall thin blonde dressed in white satin with a purple bow who heads the house as well as being chief designer.
Countess Sheremeteva-Yusupov, who has given her blessing to the revived Irfe, said the idea of re-launching a Russia house had come from Sorokina and one of her associates.
The Army is shutting down its aging Walter Reed Hospital in the nation's capital - a historic facility that in recent months has been criticized for providing poor living conditions for wounded troops.
A major effort is underway to correct flaws at the aging Army medical center. But this is only a short term solution. Walter Reed is getting a new home.
"I am so excited to be here for what is a grand occasion. This is a big deal, the breaking ground of a new joint medical facility for the men and women of our Armed Forces" said President Bush.
President Bush says this new facility that is to be completed by 2011, will provide state-of-the art care to all branches of the military by merging Walter Reed with the Navy's premier medical facility - Bethesda Naval Hospital.
The expanded compound will take on the Walter Reed name, and a new medical treatment, teaching, and research center will join the existing hospital on the Bethesda grounds. It will include a four-story in-patient building and a six-story out-patient building.
President Bush keeps his cool at Monticello
Crowd boos Code Pink protesters, applauds President GWB! Best part of the vid? When a woman tells one of the protesters to shut up and sit down! lol!
President Bush welcomes new citizens Mary Patricia McFadyen, a native of Scotland, stepped up to the microphone just moments after being sworn in as an American citizen and thanked her friends and neighbors.
But, she added, President Bush was also a powerful influence in her decision.
“Mr. President, I’d like to thank you for inspiring me to complete this process,” she said. “Without you, this day may have never come.”
For new citizens like McFadyen, it seemed especially fitting that the president honored 72 new citizens and reflected on Thomas Jefferson’s legacy during the 46th annual Independence Day and Naturalization Ceremony at Monticello.
Pictures of President Bush at Monticello, courtesy of Free Republic
...Hataw Saadi Taha, who fled the northern region of Iraq 11 years ago, said she wanted to become an American citizen because the United States was the first country that accepted her after leaving the rule of Saddam Hussein.
“I am very proud of my new country,” Taha said. “Especially on the Fourth of July.”
Taha told Bush that she wants to see an end to the violence in her homeland.
“Mr. President, I need peace to my country.”
Taha said she disliked the protesters who tried to disrupt Bush’s speech at the ceremony.
“Everybody can have their own speech,” she said. “But I didn’t like it at all, especially for today.”
Global War on Terror:
Afghan Army kills 25 Taliban Terrorists The Afghan National Army killed 25 Taliban fighters after being ambushed and fighting a 10-hour battle in the northwestern province of Badghis. The attack in Badghis is the latest in a series of Taliban attempts to rout Afghan forces and overrun district centers and forward operating bases.
"At least 25 Taliban were killed and many were wounded in several hours of fighting after the Taliban attacked our troops," Mohammad Ayob Niazyar, the Badghis provincial police chief told AFP.
Afghan troops repelled the Taliban ambush in the district of Muqur, which borders Iran. Afghan police and Spanish soldiers operating in the area provided backup for the Afghan soldiers and routed the company-sized Taliban force. "Twelve bodies of militants were left on the field and many others were wounded during the fight," according to The Associated Press. No Afghan or Spanish casualties were reported.
Analysis: Sadr movement, Mahdi Army shrink under pressure Over the space of several days in early June, Muqtada al Sadr has issued two consequential orders that will affect the future of his movement and that of Iraq. Sadr has ordered the reorganization of his infamous Mahdi Army and has forbidden the Sadrist movement from participating in the upcoming provincial elections.
Sadr’s first declaration addressed the organization and operations of the Mahdi Army, the military arm of the Sadrist movement. Sadr ordered his militiamen to halt the fighting and announced that a small, specialized unit will have the exclusive right to fight the “occupier.” The unit, ironically called the “special groups,” is forbidden to attack Iraqi security forces or government officials.
Indonesia breaks-up terror cell Indonesia’s elite anti-terror squad, Detachment 88, broke up a suspected terror cell on July 1 in south Sumatra and, according to local press reports, may have captured terror fugitive Mas Slamet Kastari.
The terror cell, according to Indonesian intelligence expert Dyno Cresbon in an interview with Tribun Batam, was being watched for over a year and had just begun to practice building bombs. “Noordin M. Top,” he said, “after witnessing the disruption of Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) cells in Java and the death of (bomb maker) Dr. Azahari in Malang, began going after new cadre outside of Java. He decided to move his efforts to the Mantiqi II area in order to spawn the birth of a new generation of JI.”
The geographic structure of JI is built upon regional commands called “Mantiqi.” Mantiqi II covers Singapore, Malaysia and Sumatra.
Tuesday’s raids in Palembang netted a total of 9 suspects, Tempo Interaktif reports. Other reports put the total at 7 suspects.
According to Detik News, the raids began after the arrest in of an English teacher from Semarang, Central Java, who also has a Singaporean work permit. He led investigators to a rented house in the Kecamatan Ilir section of Palembang where a cache of weapons and bombmaking materials were discovered. The cache included 50 kg TNT, 10 guns, 4 fully assembled bombs, plastics, plaster, cabling and various electronic devices.
Ethiopia says its forces have killed 71 Islamist fighters and leaders in Somalia in a joint operation with the Somali government.
State media Friday say the joint operation was launched June 29 to stop what it called a "planned terrorist offensive" in the Meteban and Gura'el areas.
The reports say 13 of those killed were leaders of Somalia's Islamic Courts Union or the al-Shabab militant group. They say one of those killed was a Canadian colonel whose name is on a list of international terrorists.
Reuters news agency quotes Sheikh Abdirahim Issa Adow, an Islamist spokesman, as saying only seven fighters were killed and nine others wounded in the clashes. The spokesman also denied the insurgents had a Canadian colonel in their ranks.
Politics:
John McCain's speech on National Security ARLINGTON, VA -- U.S. Senator John McCain delivered the following remarks as prepared for delivery at the University of Denver in Denver, Colorado, today at 10:00 a.m. MDT (12:00 p.m. EDT):
For much of our history, the world considered the United States a young country. Today, we are the world's oldest constitutional democracy, yet we remain a young nation. We still possess the attributes of youth -- spirit, energy, vitality, and creativity. America will always be young as long as we are looking forward, and leading, to a better world.
Innovative and energetic American leadership is as vital to the world's future today as it was during the Cold War. I have spent my life in public service working to ensure our great nation is strong enough to counter those who wish us ill. To be an effective leader in the 21st century, however, it is not enough to be strong. We must be a model for others. That means not only pursuing our own interests but recognizing that we share interests with peoples across our planet. There is such a thing as good international citizenship, and America must be a good citizen of the world—leading the way to address the danger of global warming and preserve our environment, strengthening existing international institutions and helping to build new ones, and engaging the world in a broad dialogue on the threat of violent extremists, who would, if they could, use weapons of mass destruction to attack us and our allies.
Pro-life black pastors wary of Obama Conservative black pastors nationwide are caught between irreconcilable opposites - congregations that overwhelmingly favor Sen. Barack Obama versus their personal doubts about the Illinois Democrat's politics, particularly on abortion.
"It's a theological contradiction, from the Christian perspective, to be excited about Obama," said the Rev. Levon Yuille, pastor of the 100-member Bible Church in Ypsilanti, Mich. "Very few black pastors have problems supporting Obama because they are fixated on this race thing."
"The congregations are pro-Obama. My congregation is saying Obama is the lesser of two evils," said Bishop Harry Jackson, pastor of Hope Christian Church in Beltsville, a 3,000-member majority black congregation.
"When I say that on third-term abortions, Obama has no conscience, they say [Sen. John] McCain and [Sen.] Hillary [Rodham Clinton] weren't great examples of morality either."
The Rev. John W. Stephenson, pastor of Heirs Covenant Church, a 300-member church in West Chester, Ohio, said he has to "educate" his members regularly.
"People say, 'This is an opportunity that will never come again for our people,' " he said. "I say, 'Yes, we are African-Americans, but we are also Christians."
B. Hussein Obama's plan for the American people: SERFDOM National service mandated by the state is what Europe had for centuries. It was called serfdom. For example, in France, citizens were required to perform public service building and repairing roads and other public projects for hundreds and thousands of hours a year. Serfdom wasn’t eliminated in France until the French revolution, one of the “liberty” parts of that revolution. It was largely the American revolution which inspired this escape from serfdom. Indeed, the American revolution was all about escaping from the European model of servitude, with the American’s insisting that even very moderate taxation without representation was a form of oppressive servitude. Incredibly, Barack Obama somehow believes that advocacy of a return to European style serfdom is a good way to celebrate the American Declaration of Independence from the oppression of English tyranny.
I especially liked this part of Obama’s speech:
when I’m President, I will set a goal for all American middle and high school students to perform 50 hours of service a year, and for all college students to perform 100 hours of service a year. This means that by the time you graduate college, you’ll have done 17 weeks of service. We’ll reach this goal in several ways. At the middle and high school level, we’ll make federal assistance conditional on school districts developing service programs, and give schools resources to offer new service opportunities.
Jesse Helms, former senator, dead at 86 Former Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), a conservative icon who represented the Tarheel State in the Senate for 30 years, died early this morning at the age of 86.
Helms served in the Senate from 1972 to 2002, where he became a leading voice of the right wing of the Republican Party. Nicknamed “Senator No” by his many critics, Helms was a fierce anti-communist whose support for Ronald Reagan in 1976 proved a critical juncture in Reagan’s eventual rise to the Oval Office. To many on the right, it was Helms, not Reagan, who was the true heart of the conservative movement.
"I've had two heroes in my life: Jesse Helms and Ronald Reagan," the late evangelical pastor Jerry Falwell said during a Sept. 2005 tribute to the former senator. Falwell said it was people like Helms who "prevented the country from going to hell in a handbasket.”
“Today we lost a senator whose stature in Congress had few equals,” said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). “Sen. Jesse Helms was a leading voice and courageous champion for the many causes he believed in.”
McCain’s TV biopic, reconsidered “I’m voting for McCain ... but I gotta tell ya, I really like Obama.” So laughs Peter Markle, the director of the 2005 movie “Faith of My Fathers,” based on John McCain’s best-selling memoir. Markle, who has voted for Democrats and Republicans, said he’s choosing the Arizona senator this time around based on the personal connection the two forged during production of the movie about the senator’s Vietnam War POW experiences.
With all the attention currently being lavished on Oliver Stone and his upcoming feature film about President Bush, we thought it might be interesting to go back a few years to check out the McCain biopic. Like the Freudian father-son-fest “W,” the McCain movie focused on the sometimes rocky, sometimes respectful relationship between a young ne’er-do-well and his old man, in this case McCain and his strict military dad, Jack. In the McCain flick, made for the A&E cable channel, actor Shawn Hatosy portrays the scrappy hero, while veteran character actor Scott Glenn (“The Right Stuff,” “The Silence of the Lambs”) plays his stoic dad. Ironically, Glenn also co-stars in “W” as former defense secretary (and real-life McCain bête noire) Donald Rumsfeld. Earlier, McCain had said that he hoped Robert Duvall might portray his father and Edward Norton would take on his role.
Parents were outraged that the two boys from year seven (11 to 12-year-olds) were punished for not wanting to take part in the practical demonstration of how Allah is worshipped.
They said forcing their children to take part in the exercise at Alsager High School, near Stoke-on-Trent - which included wearing Muslim headgear - was a breach of their human rights.
One parent, Sharon Luinen, said: "This isn't right, it's taking things too far.
"I understand that they have to learn about other religions. I can live with that but it is taking it a step too far to be punished because they wouldn't join in Muslim prayer.
"Making them pray to Allah, who isn't who they worship, is wrong and what got me is that they were told they were being disrespectful.
"I don't want this to look as if I have a problem with the school because I am generally very happy with it."
Another parent Karen Williams said: "I am absolutely furious my daughter was made to take part in it and I don't find it acceptable.
"I haven't got a problem with them teaching my child other religions and a small amount of information doesn't do any harm.
"But not only did they have to pray, the teacher had gone into the class and made them watch a short film and then said 'we are now going out to pray to Allah'.
"Then two boys got detention and all the other children missed their refreshment break because of the teacher.
"Not only was it forced upon them, my daughter was told off for not doing it right.
"They'd never done it before and they were supposed to do it in another language."
"My child has been forced to pray to Allah in a school lesson." The grandfather of one of the pupils in the class said: "It's absolutely disgusting, there's no other way of putting it.
"My daughter and a lot of other mothers are furious about their children being made to kneel on the floor and pray to Islam. If they didn't do it they were given detention.
"I am not racist, I've been friendly with an Indian for 30 years. I've also been to a Muslim wedding where it was explained to me that alcohol would not be served and I respected that.
"But if Muslims were asked to go to church on Sunday and take Holy Communion there would be war."
Lord Chief Justice Lord Phillips said that Islamic legal principles could be employed to deal with family and marital arguments and to regulate finance.
He declared: ‘It is possible in this country for those who are entering into a contractual agreement to agree that the agreement shall be governed by a law other than English law.’
In his speech in an East London mosque Lord Phillips signalled approval of sharia principles as a means of settling disputes so long as no punishments that conflict with the established law are involved, and as long as divorces are made to comply with the civil law.
But his remarks - which give the green light from the highest judicial office to the informal sharia courts already operated by numerous mosques - provoked a storm of criticism.
Lawyers warned that family and marital disputes settled by sharia could leave women or vulnerable people at a serious disadvantage.
Tories said that equality under the law must be respected and warned that outcomes incompatible with English law should never be enforceable.
Lord Phillips spoke five months after Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams surrounded himself in controversy with a lecture in which he suggested Islamic law could have official status and that it could govern marital law, financial transactions and arbitration in disputes.
The Lord Chief Justice said today of the Archbishop’s views: ‘It was not very radical to advocate embracing sharia law in the context of family disputes.’
He added that there was ‘widespread misunderstanding as to the nature of sharia law’.
So who do I run to when I run out of Chanel? Here is my emergency back-up!
Maybelline Shine Seduction. Amazing how so few websites seem to be selling this product. It's not that bad of a product, it's actually pretty popular. It's a sheer gloss that comes in several different shades. It has a non-sticky feel to it, but the shimmer ingredient in the product makes your lips feel gritty. When you rub your lips together it feels like sandpaper! Alright, maybe that's taking it a bit too far, but you get what I mean! Yet Maybelline claims that "aqua-botanicals and Vitamin E keep lips kissably soft and smooth". I don't think the "kissably soft and smooth" part holds up quite well, but it does give your puckers a mega-watt shine.Around 7 dollars.
L'Oreal Glam Shine Lipcolour.Coats your lips with a lot of dazzle, for sure! It feels smooth on the lips as well, which is always a huge plus, and the shades are pretty gorgeous. Unfortunately it has a weird scent- it's not your typical lipgloss scent (which is suppose to be delicious!), it actually smells a little chemical to me. Still, it has a decent staying power. Unfortunately, it claims to "re-plump" your lips with a unique micro-crsytal technology- whatever the heck that is -but I never felt any of that tingly lip-plumping action that I know so well from actual lip plumpers! I didn't get that gorgeous Angelina Jolie pout from this gloss either, so I doubt it really works as a lip plumper. But if you love glitter more than shine and some pout, then this one's for you. Around 10 dollars
Bloom's high-shine lipgloss! I like their glossies, even if they tend to be quite sticky. Great shine comes with great scent, so I don't mind the stickyness. My favorite is Pink,pink and Raspberry. It's not a lip plumper, so don't expect an extra pout, but it makes a good lipgloss! It also comes in eighteen ultra-glam shades so you have a good collection to choose from. $22.
CoverGirl Wetslicks Original. Not exactly the greatest lipgloss out there, but it's true to its non-sticky word! It glides on smoothly and comes with great sparkle. Unfortunately, it doesn't last long, and I'm afraid each time I put it on the liquid will just melt away from my lips and spread onto my cheeks. Weird, I know, but it just doesn't have that staying power. Smells reeeally good though (especially Peaches N Gleam!).$5.99
At Camp Victory outside Baghdad, 1,215 troops from the Army, Marines and other services re-enlisted in a mass swearing-in ceremony led by top U.S. war commander Gen. David Petraeus.
BAQOUBA, Iraq - It's Staff Sgt. Edgar Covarrubias' second Fourth of July in Iraq. No family barbecue, no fireworks, but Covarrubias says he'll call his mom, wife and kids to share the day anyway.
Across Iraq, America's Independence Day was a normal work day for most U.S. troops. But the military threw in a taste of home at larger bases with ribs, corn on the cob and red, white and blue cake.
The holiday is even leaner at smaller outposts closer to the violence, where it comes with a can of meat, some cookies and a job not yet done.
"We are not going to stop our operations to celebrate the Fourth of July," said Sgt. Mark Johnson, 26, at a small joint U.S.-Iraqi outpost in the city of Iskandariyah, some 30 miles south of Baghdad.
"Nothing special is planned for today and that's OK because we didn't expect anything," added the 3rd Infantry Division soldier from Waterport, N.Y.
He heads home later this month on his mid-tour break to be with his girlfriend when she gives birth to their first child.
At least things were quiet Friday at the outpost, giving the men who weren't on duty time to watch movies on their laptops and instant message with friends back home.
"It is the same every day since we got here in October," said 1st Lt. William Kuebler, 24, who is nine months into his 15-month tour in Iraq.
"The holidays are not important," added the 101st Airborne Division officer from Moville, Iowa.
Things were a bit more festive at Forward Operating Base Warhorse in Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad. There was a special menu in the chow hall and a three-on-three basketball tournament.
Before hitting the court, Covarrubias from the 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment planned to call his wife and kids and also his mom to wish her a happy birthday.
"If I was home, I'd get together with my family and barbecue, and we'd have carne asada, a family reunion," said Covarrubias.
But the 29-year-old from Hawthorne, Calif., said that although he misses his family, the holiday still made him feel good.
"For me, on the Fourth of July, you remember there's people out there that think about you out here," said Covarrubias.
For others, the day was a reminder of their duty to their country. At Camp Victory outside Baghdad, 1,215 troops from the Army, Marines and other services re-enlisted in a mass swearing-in ceremony led by top U.S. war commander Gen. David Petraeus. At least two husband-and-wife couples were among those signing up for another military stint.
Before an immense American flag hung in the rotunda of the palace headquarters of the U.S. military in Iraq, the troops saluted Petraeus, then sang "God Bless America."
Back at Warhorse, Sgt. Jacob Fultz, 22, of Gardner, Kan., was focused on the day's meaning.
"It's kind of like the fight's never over," said Sgt. Jacob Fultz, 22, from Gardner, Kan. "It started on July 4, 1776 and now it's 2008."
MAKE-UP: The Body Shop's Glow Trend Make-Up Collection
I can't wait to receive my Body Shop Lustre products! I'll let you know if they're any good, but judging from the previous Body Shop make-up products I owned (the eyeshadow and shimmer goodies in particular!) I'm confident they're worth every penny.
Check out their bronzing powder. I've seen nothing but good reviews on it, so I'm sure it won't be a major let down. From the website: This luxurious light diffusing, moisture-enriched powder is embossed and over sprayed with a beautiful floral motif and fragranced with "bronzed camomile" - a deliciously summery scent! Contains moisturizing Community Trade marula oil and calming, soothing Community Trade camomile oil. Perfect for sensitive skin. Available in two glowing shades.
From MakeUpMoxie.Com: Here's a great article on beauty emergencies from Make-up Moxie.Com!
Pimples sometimes surface at the worst possible moments. Nip a zit in the bud by applying an ice cube to the inflamed area for a couple minutes. The cold should help curb the swelling and calm inflammation. If you're lucky enough to have some Visine eye drops with you, apply a drop to the pimple to help eliminate redness.
...Use butter as a moisturizing lip gloss.
One of the last things you want when you're out on a hot date is to have dry, flaky lips. Keep them soft and moisturized by smoothing on some plain old table butter. The oil from the butter is effective in conditioning the lips and it leaves a nice shine. Yes, it's a little weird, but it really works.
“The rescue was long in the planning. We’ve been working with them for a long time. I’m not able to go into many specifics,” White House press secretary Dana Perino said Thursday in Washington.
BOGOTA, Colombia — Former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt embraced her children for the first time in six years Thursday, saying the thought of them helped her stay alive until a daring rescue plucked her and 14 other hostages from the jungle.
“Nirvana, paradise — that must be very similar to what I feel at this moment,” Betancourt said, fighting back tears as her son reached over to kiss her. “It was because of them that I kept up my will to get out of that jungle.”
Betancourt raced to the stairway of the French government plane that flew her children to Bogota, throwing her arms around Lorenzo, 19, and Melanie, 22.
“The last time I saw my son, Lorenzo was a little kid and I could carry him around,” she said. “I told them, they’re going to have to put up with me now, because I’m going to be stuck to them like chewing gum.”
Betancourt, 46, was airlifted to freedom Wednesday in an audacious operation involving military spies who tricked the rebels into handing over their most prized hostages — including three U.S. military contractors — without firing a shot.
The stunning caper involved months of intelligence gathering, dozens of helicopters on standby and a strong dose of deceit: The rebels shoved the captives, their hands bound, onto a white unmarked Mi-17 helicopter, believing they were being transferred to another guerrilla camp.
Looking at helicopter’s crew, some wearing Che Guevara shirts, Betancourt reasoned they weren’t aid workers, as she’d expected — but rebels. This was just another indignity — the helicopter “had no flag, no insignia.” Angry and upset, she refused a coat they offered as they told her she was going to a colder climate.
But not long after the group was airborne, Betancourt turned around and saw the local commander, alias Cesar, a man who had tormented her for four years, blindfolded and stripped naked on the floor.
Then came the unbelievable words: “We’re the national army,” said one of the crewmen. “You’re free.”
The helicopter crew were soldiers in disguise. Cesar and the other guerrilla aboard had been persuaded to hand over their pistols, then overpowered.
“The helicopter almost fell from the sky because we were jumping up and down, yelling, crying, hugging one another,” Betancourt said.
The mission — in which many military intelligence agents infiltrated the top ranks of the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC — snatched from the four foreigners who were its greatest bargaining chips, as well as 11 Colombian soldiers and police.
Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos said it “will go into history for its audacity and effectiveness.” He also acknowledged the risks: “If this had failed, I would have had to resign,” he told Caracol Radio on Thursday.
It was the most serious blow ever dealt to the 44-year-old FARC, which is already reeling from the recent deaths of key commanders and thousands of defections after withering pressure from Colombia’s U.S.-trained and advised armed forces.
Colombia could be “at the end of the end” of its long civil conflict, armed forces chief Freddy Padilla told Caracol Radio Thursday. “We are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.”
But he warned that, even now, “the FARC has an enormous capacity for terrorism” and said, “the most difficult moments are yet to come.”
In an apparently unrelated release, FARC guerrillas on Thursday freed Norwegian-Colombian hostage Alf Onshuus Nino, a 31-year-old mathematics teacher at the University of the Andes in Bogota, Norway’s foreign ministry announced. Spokeswoman Kristin Melsom had no details about his release, but said it was unrelated to Wednesday’s rescue.
Bjoern Omdal Onshuus, a relative, told Norwegian radio that a ransom had been paid. Norwegian news media earlier had reported the FARC was demanding 1 million kroner (US$200,000) for his release.
Many relatives of hostages have opposed rescue attempts, mindful of a botched 2003 operation in which rebels killed 10 hostages, including a former defense minister, when they heard helicopters approach. In Wednesday’s operation, there were no such mistakes.
Through orders they believed came from top rebels, the hostages’ handlers had maneuvered three separate groups of hostages to a rendezvous point in eastern Colombia’s wilds for Wednesday’s helicopter pickup.
“The helicopter was on the ground for 22 minutes,” said army chief Gen. Mario Montoya, “the longest minutes of my life.”
The agents had led Cesar to believe he was taking them to supreme rebel leader Alfonso Cano to discuss a possible hostage swap. A French and Swiss envoy was reported in the country seeking a meeting with Cano, so the operation’s timing was perfect.
“It was an extraordinary symphony in which everything went perfectly,” Betancourt said.
She appeared thin but surprisingly healthy as she strode down the stairs of a military plane and held her mother in a long embrace.
A flight carrying the Americans — Marc Gonsalves, Thomas Howes and Keith Stansell — landed in Texas late Wednesday after being flown there directly. They were to reunite with their families and undergo tests and treatment at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio.
U.S. Ambassador William Brownfield said the Americans were healthy and “very, very happy” but two suffered from the jungle malady leishmaniasis and were “looking forward to modern medical treatment.”
President Alvaro Uribe, in a celebratory news conference flanked by the freed Colombian hostages, said he isn’t interested in “spilling blood” and that he wants the FARC to know he seeks “a path to peace, total peace.”
Although only Colombians were directly involved in the rescue, Brownfield said “close” American cooperation included intelligence, equipment and “training advice.”
“The rescue was long in the planning. We’ve been working with them for a long time. I’m not able to go into many specifics,” White House press secretary Dana Perino said Thursday in Washington.
The two rebels overpowered on the helicopters will face justice, officials said. But the 58 left behind on the ground were allowed to escape as a goodwill gesture, Padilla said.
“If I had given the order to fire on them they would almost certainly all have been killed,” he said. Another 39 helicopters had been standing by, prepared to encircle the rebels and hostages if the rescue failed, Santos said.
Betancourt was abducted in February 2002 while she was campaigning for president. The Americans were captured a year later when their drug surveillance plane went down in rebel-held jungle. Some of the others had been held for a dozen years.
Betancourt, a dual French national who grew up in Paris, had become a cause celebre across Europe. The office of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who had made Betancourt’s liberation a priority of state, said Betancourt was expected to arrive in France on Friday.
Betancourt thanked Uribe, against whom she was running when she was kidnapped, and said he “has been a very good president.”
However, she said, “I continue to aspire to serve Colombia as president.”
I thought the war was lost and the surge didn't work? Omgggzzz, Obama is running as Bush's third term!!!!!!!
Barack Obama told reporters in Fargo, N.D., that he is “going to do a thorough assessment" of his Iraq policy.
Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) on Thursday backed off his firm promise to withdraw combat forces from Iraq immediately and instead said he could “refine” his plan after his trip to Baghdad later this month.
Earlier, a top Obama adviser had said that the senator is not “wedded” to a specific timeline.
Obama told reporters in Fargo, N.D., that he is “going to do a thorough assessment."
"When I go to Iraq and I have a chance to talk to some of the commanders on the ground, I'm sure I'll have more information and will continue to refine my policies," he said, according to CBS News. “I have been consistent, throughout this process, that I believe the war in Iraq was a mistake.”
Obama later said at a second news conference he still intends to stick to the timeline.
At the second meeting with reporters, Obama said: "We're going to try this again. Apparently I wasn't clear enough this morning on my position with respect to the war in Iraq. ... I have said throughout this campaign that ... I would bring our troops home at a pace of one to two brigades per month and at that pace we would have our combat troops out in 16 months. That position has not changed. I have not equivocated on that position. I am not searching for maneuvering room with respect to that position.
"What I said this morning and what I will repeat because it's consistent with what I've said over the last two years is that in putting this plan together, I will always listen to the advice of commanders on the ground, but that ultimately, I'm the person who is making the strategic decisions."
The original Obama plan, still on his website, promises: “Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months.”
In a separate six-page Iraq plan, he says in a section headed “All Combat Troops Redeployed by 2009”: “The best way to protect our security and to pressure Iraq's leaders to resolve their civil war is to begin immediately to remove our combat troops. Not in six months or one year — now.”
David Axelrod, Obama’s chief strategist, began backing off during remarks Wednesday on CNN’s “Situation Room,” telling guest host John Roberts that Obama has actually advocated “a phased withdrawal, with benchmarks for the Iraqi government to meet, that called for strategic pauses, based on the progress on these benchmarks and advice on the commanders on the ground.”
“He's always said that he would listen to the advice of commanders on the ground, that that would factor into his thinking,” Axelrod said. “He's also always said that we had to be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in. So he's been very consistent on this point. ...
“I think he will take the advice, not just the advice of the commanders on the ground but his general assessment of conditions on the ground in calibrating that withdrawal. He said he thought we could get one to two brigades out a month. But he's not wedded to that in the face of events. No president would be. And he's always said that he's never said that this withdrawal would be without any possibility of alteration based on events on the ground. That would not be a prudent thing to do for any president.”
The Republican National Committee plans to make an issue of the evolving statements and has posted “Obama’s Iraq Guessing Game,” rounding up various statements on Iraq by the senator, his aides and surrogates.
POLITICS: Judge tosses wiretapping lawsuit by Islamic group
SAN FRANCISCO - A federal judge on Wednesday tossed out a lawsuit by an Islamic organization that accused the Bush administration of illegally wiretapping its telephones without warrants.
The U.S. branch of the now-defunct Al Haramain Islamic Foundation claimed federal officials illegally eavesdropped on their telephone calls without court approval required by the administration's so-called Terrorist Surveillance Program.
At the heart of their lawsuit was a top secret call log that the Treasury Department accidentally turned over to Al Haramain's lawyers, who say it shows government terrorist hunters listened to their phone conversations with foundation officials living in Saudi Arabia.
The government has designated the former Saudi Arabia-based Islamic charity as a terrorist organization.
U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker barred the foundation from using the top secret document in the case and dismissed the lawsuit. He gave the foundation 30 days to refile its lawsuit with other evidence proving it was a surveillance target.
Al Haramain lawyer Jon Eisenberg told Walker last year that the lawsuit was dead without the use of the call log to prove illegal surveillance.
But public disclosures about the surveillance program in general and about the charity's role in particular since then could help foundation lawyers prove their case, Eisenberg said after the ruling was issued.
Government lawyers did not immediately return a call for comment.
Last year, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals also barred the foundation lawyers from using the call log as evidence after the Bush administration argued that to do so would harm national security interests.
But the appeals court sent the case back to Walker to determine if the administration's claim to state secrets privilege is trumped by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The act, known as FISA, requires government investigators to obtain a warrant from a secret court in Washington to conduct electronic eavesdropping of suspected terrorists inside the country.
Walker ruled that FISA does have precedence over the state secrets privilege, but said Al Haramain's lawyers are barred from using the call log they accidentally received.
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A great article linked by PatDollard.Com. The troops are doing such an amazing job in rebuilding this shattered country. They truly are heroes, and are contributing more to peace than any humanitarian or philanthropist in existence. If anyone should win the Nobel Peace Prize, it's the United States Military. Remember, the troops are not only guarding the fragile peace in Iraq, they are also in other troubled spots in the world, doing what they do best- Fighting for freedom.
There is an unexpected air of normalcy prevailing in Baghdad these days, with consumption flourishing and confidence in the government growing. The progress is astonishing, but can it last?
Pork is available in Baghdad once again. Not just in the Green Zone, where US diplomats can enjoy their spare ribs and Parma ham, but also across the Tigris River, in the real Baghdad, at “Al-Warda” on Karada Street. Bassim Dencha, 32, one of the few Christians remaining in Iraq and the co-owner of Baghdad’s finest supermarket, has developed a supply line from Syria. As a result, he now has frozen pork chops and bratwurst arranged in his freezers, next to boxes of frozen French fries and German Black Forest Cakes. And the customers are buying.
For four years, selling pork or alcohol in Baghdad was a security risk. But the acts of terror committed by Islamist fundamentalists, who once punished such violations of their interpretation of the Koran with attacks on businesses and their owners, have gradually subsided. The supply of imported goods is also relatively secure today, now that roads through the Sunni Triangle are significantly safer than they were only a few months ago.
“It’s worth it again,” says businessman Bassim Dencha. “All we need now is enough electricity to reopen our refrigerated warehouse.”
Two kilometers down the street, business is booming late into the night at Ali Lami’s roadside snack bar. Before the war the establishment, a Baghdad institution, was a favorite hangout for former dictator Saddam Hussein’s henchmen and United Nations weapons inspectors alike. Today professors and students from the university, which is once again open every day, come here to eat shawarma, an Arab fast-food dish consisting of shaved meat and salad served in pita bread.
This fall the manager, Rassak Rashid, 44, plans to open an outdoor seating area in a grove of palm trees behind the snack bar. The lanterns are already hanging in the trees. “Maybe then the police will stop telling our customers to get off the street,” says Rashid.
He isn’t referring to parking violations, but to the fear of bombs that could be hidden in cars parked along the curb. The police patrolling the streets in front of places like Ali Lami’s snack bar aren’t entirely convinced that this fragile sense of normalcy will last. While there are certainly signs of improvement, the dangers of life in Baghdad haven’t disappeared.
‘Fragile and Reversible’
Despite the palpable changes in daily life in the Iraqi capital, people are still being killed, because the Islamic fundamentalists and terrorists are not willing to give in, nor have they been eliminated completely. Eleven people died in attacks last Tuesday, seven on Wednesday and 38 on Thursday.
Is the situation truly improving in Iraq? Is it possible to rely on these changes in everyday life or are they merely an illusion? According to the quarterly report that the Pentagon issued in mid-June, the number of armed incidents has declined by 70 percent since last summer, bringing it down to 2004 levels — from about 180 daily incidents to 45. More than 320,000 of the 478,000 soldiers in the Iraqi Army, the report claims, are now capable of fighting without American support, and more than €3.8 billion ($5.9 billion) of Iraq’s own reconstruction budget totaling €6.4 billion ($9.9 billion) has already been invested in projects. “The security, political and economic trends in Iraq continue to be positive; however they remain fragile, reversible and uneven,” the report concluded.
This sounds like realism underscored by cautious optimism. An interim report by the US Government Accountability Office (GAO), which caused a stir in Washington last week, is more pessimistic. The authors are critical of the Iraqi government for still not having passed a law that would regulate the development of oil fields and the distribution of profits among the country’s 18 provinces. They also criticize the US war effort in Iraq for consuming $400 million (€258 million) a day and point out that there is no evidence “of a strategic plan” by the US government.
The pessimists have strong arguments and experience on their side. And experience has shown that things usually go downhill in Iraq, with only brief uphill periods. Nevertheless, the number of optimists is growing, and the administration of US President George W. Bush no longer has a monopoly on confidence. After years of resistance, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia have now announced that they will be sending ambassadors to Baghdad. Thanks to the high oil price, the economy in Iraq, which produces 2.5 million barrels a day, is also improving. The government has now been able to give its civil servants a generous pay increase, and it also expects to cut the price of gasoline, currently at €0.60 a liter ($3.52 a gallon), in half. Fittingly enough, German automotive giant Daimler plans to open an office in Baghdad and build trucks there in the future — 18 years after Saddam Hussein’s invasion of neighboring Kuwait.
Building Confidence with a Fiasco
King Abdullah II of Jordan, who was opposed to the US invasion and then voiced his fears of a “Shiite Crescent” developing in Iraq, recently said something astonishing in an interview with the US magazine Newsweek: “I am actually optimistic for the first time on Iraq. It’s the first time that I have felt that Iraqis have, as much as they can, bound themselves together into a unity.”
The unexpected change of mood benefits Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. He was long considered weak and was extremely controversial, viewed as a friend of Iran by the Sunnis and as America’s lackey by the militant Shiites. But today even the Arab ultra-nationalist and opinion leader Abd al-Bari Atwan, editor-in-chief of the London-based Arabic daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi, concedes that Maliki has shown an “amazing ability to survive in a turbulent country.”
Paradoxically, this new confidence in Maliki began with a fiasco. In March, he ordered 30,000 men to march into the southern Iraqi port city of Basra to oust the militias, especially the Mahdi Army of Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr. The outcome was depressing at first. One thousand Iraqi soldiers deserted, and it was only after the Americans and the British intervened in the fighting and additional Iraqi divisions arrived that calm return to the city.
Nevertheless, these assaults on the Shiite militias in Basra and in eastern Baghdad, dubbed Saulat al-Fursan, or Operation Charge of the Knights, eventually paid off, especially when Maliki followed them with similar offensives against Sunni militias in Mosul and later in the Shiite-dominated province of Meisan. And he recently announced plans to clamp down on Sunni militias in Diyala. These efforts are evidence of the Baghdad central government’s new approach of building a monopoly on power in the provinces.
Because of his determination, Shiites accuse Maliki of being as brutal as Saddam. But Iraq’s Sunnis see his changed behavior as evidence of his strength as a leader.
It is a deep irony that moderate Sunnis now refer to Maliki, a Shiite, as “batal” — “a hero.” He appears, at least for the time being, to have shed the stigma of religious partisanship.
The prime minister has recognized that the internal war on two fronts provides a strategic opportunity. At first, his activism irritated General David Petraeus, the commander of US forces in Iraq, but now Petraeus supports Maliki’s operations. The general is even allowing it to seem as if, in fact, it is the prime minister and not Petraeus who is calling the shots in Iraq.
Maliki has also shown surprising skill on the foreign policy front. Instead of bemoaning the fate of being dependent on both Tehran and Washington, currently two of the world’s bitterest enemies, he is using his trumps on both sides. In Washington, he is campaigning for moderation in the nuclear dispute with Tehran, arguing that Iran could otherwise invade southern Iraq. In Tehran, he has promised to do everything in his power to ensure that the upcoming security treaty with the United States will not infringe on Iran’s sphere of influence.
Splitting up the Mahdi Army
Iraq and the United States have been negotiating this security pact for months. It is essentially a military agreement meant to stipulate how many American soldiers will remain in Iraq, and for how long. Time is short, because the United Nations mandate for the presence of the coalition troops, established in June 2004, will expire at the end of this year.
But there is one very significant element of uncertainty in the Iraqi power struggle: Maliki’s rival Muqtada al-Sadr. It is difficult to tell whether he withdrew his forces to spare them a defeat against Petraeus’ troops or whether he is waiting until after a partial US withdrawal to settle scores with the Sunnis and the government.
Two weeks ago Sadr issued a statement, presumably from his Iranian exile, which revealed much of his worldview but little of his intentions. The statement begins with the following florid introduction: “A message from the humblest servant Muqtada al-Sadr to his loved ones in the army of the Imam al-Mahdi, and to all honorable Iraqis who reject the occupation.”
The Mahdi Army has not ended its resistance, Sadr writes, but it will be split in two from now on. Some of the faithful members of his militia, “men of experience, organization, knowledge and the willingness to make sacrifices,” are authorized to continue to carry weapons and use them “against the occupation, and no one else,” and must do so in “absolute secrecy,” writes the militia leader. The others, he continues, “thousands, rather millions,” are obligated to fight in “cultural, social and religious” ways against “secular thoughts, against Western hegemony and globalization.”
Sadr’s sermon ends with a threat: “Those who refuse to abide by this assignment of duties are no longer with me, because they seek only worldly politics and are addicted to hypocrisy. I, however, am a peacemaker, and you are my brothers.”
From a sectarian warrior to a foe of globalization — it would be an astonishing about-face. For the first time since he stepped onto the political stage five years ago, the grim Shiite leader elicited amused response. Perhaps it was premature, perhaps it was a misunderstanding, or perhaps it was simply a good sign of things to come.
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About Me: Fashion Design and Merchandising student. I have nothing against women who are materialistic, superficial and vain: They are my role models. I love anything that glitters like the sun and looks pretty. I attended private Catholic schools my whole life, so you know I'm pretty evil! (Ha-ha!)
I am pro-Bush, pro-life, pro-freedom and I support the Global War on Terror.
Video of the Week:
JDAM Takes out Sniper Hiding in Mosque's Minaret.
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Paint
Must-have! Dior Vernis
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