Sunday, April 30, 2006

Ooommmffffff, what was that!!!

Re(1): '$3.5 billion revenue surge could help governor, too', San Diego Union, Ed Mendel
Re(2): 'California Monthly Finance Bulletins', California Department of Finance
Re(3): 'US Treasury, Monthly Treasury Statements', US Treasury
Re(4): 'Budget Deficit Estimation...', BoghieOnYourSix, Me

That was the sound of California’s April 2006 tax receipts coming in 40% over expectations… No word on the Federal Tax Receipts… But, how has that ever stopped me from 'Projecting the Future'!!!

The San Diego Union just reported that April tax receipts in California exceeded expected revenue by $3.5 Billion. That exceeds expectation by over 40%. So that means I get to guess at what that means for the Federal Budget:

Some patterns of note:

  1. We have Repuclican Congresscritters looking like kiddies caught with their hands in the cookie jar - even fiscally conservative Repuclicans.
  2. I can't remember to many silly Libs talking about the deficit the last couple of weeks.
  3. The last noise heard on this topic came from the MediaCrats. They whined that spending was up $15 Billion from last March - and half of that was because Social Security payments for April had to be posted in March this year. Where was the Democratic crying then.

I am assuming that past patterns repeat themselves. Thus the national economy – which is better than California’s – will follow suit. California tax revenues range from about 3.55% to about 5.58% of Federal Revenues. Although difficult to determine, it appears that California’s revenue stream for April will be around $16.3 Billion – up from $12.8 Billion last year.

Best case scenario:
Federal Tax Revenue = $16.3 Billion / 0.0355 = $459 Billion

Most Likely scenarios:
Federal Tax Revenue = $16.3 Billion / 0.0402 = $405 Billion
Federal Tax Revenue = $16.3 Billion / 0.0419 = $389 Billion

Worst case scenario:
Federal Tax Revenue = $16.3 Billion / 0.0558 = $292 Billion

Last year’s April Federal Tax Revenue: $277 Billion
Last year’s April Surplus: $57.711 Billion

Spending is growing by about 8.7% so April expenditures should be about $240 Billion

So, April’s budget SURPLUS will be between $52 Billion and $219 Billion - with a best estimate of between $149 Billion and $165 Billion.

Libs, remember my projection for a $290 Billion annual deficit...

What are you going to talk about now…

Global Health Care…

Vietnam...

Greedy Bastards Got Us into ‘A War For Oil’

Re(1): 'Iraq Index', The Brookings Institute - Pages 29 - 31

The ‘War for Oil’ argument implies a mercantile arrangement where our oil industry coerces resources (oil) and our nation state sells finished products. Additionally, the connotation behind the word mercantilism is that there is an uneven power relationship between empire and colony.

So, let us look at the numbers:


DateOil
Production
Oil
Export
Oil
Internal Use
Electricity
Production
March 2003 (est)2.52.00.5095,000
March 20062.11.320.7896,300



So, if we are rapaciously stealing resources from a subject territory, why has the internal use of those resources grown rapidly?

Why have the colonial western powers permitted Iraqis planes, trains, and automobiles?

Is the internal use by Iraq beneficial to our selfish happiness?

Why are we allowing the Iraqi economy to grow?

Why are we so sluggard in expanding our empire?

I can’t quite figure it out….

* That Iraq Index report is a tremendous resource!!!

Saturday, April 29, 2006

? Iraq is a Major Reason for High Oil Prices ?

Re(1): 'Iraq is a major reason for high oil prices', Global Guerillas, John Robb
Re(2): 'Iraq Index', The Brookings Institute - Pages 29 - 31

John Robb in GlobalGuerillas is making a valid claim that the situation in Iraq is a key component for the increase in the price of oil. Yup, it shore is folks - but will it be forever? Regardless...

I have one question: Why was the ‘Oil For Food’ program permitting Hussein to produce 2 million barrels a day for export?

That is a moral question…

Now, let us look at current Iraqi oil production. They are now producing 2.14 mb/day total. Out of that 1.48 mb/day are produced for export. That means that 0.66 mb/day is used internally for fuel and power generation. Back in the ‘Happy days of Hussein’ internal production mapped to about 0.5 mb/day. Gasoline and diesel production is increasing rapidly. Used and new car salesmen are going gangbusters.

Do we grudge Iraqis the use of their own resource?

That is a moral question…

The production of all fuels seem to be stabilizing. That is more important to process improvement than boom and bust cycles where nothing is in control and nothing is in the norm. Improvements will result in production growth – but more of that growth may be used internally. For example, oil production is in the pre-war range right now, but exported oil is down about a half million barrels a day. However, economic growth and private ownership should offer incentive to grow production for export. Have confidence. Those 5 million barrels a day are reachable.

Last thought…

Can Europe and Russia and China and the UN actually sanction Iran for their defiance of treaty and their international bad behavior without an alternate source of oil? Nope… Watch the Iraqi production numbers over the next six months. If Iraq starts producing 2 or 3 mb/day of oil for export than the game is on. If Iran is smart they will step up their efforts to wreck Iraqi production – but I don’t think that will be very effective. We shall see UN sanctions on Iran by this time next year.

That is a moral statement.

Thursday, April 27, 2006

A Weird Thought on Economics, Taxes, and the Federal Budget…

The tax code was changed by President Bush for tax year 2004 to re-emphasize dividend investment.

During the Clinton era of 'Peace and Prosperity' dividend investment had basically been taxed out of existence – capital gains were tax advantaged. Thus, President Clinton’s tax policy favored stock price growth while President Bush balanced stock price growth and dividend investment – both are taxed identically.

What has that done? Dividends are desired by investors because they are cold, hard cash payouts resulting from stock ownership. Put simply, investors are sent cash every quarter for owning stocks in a dividend producing company. Why does that matter?

Dividends are reliable income for those living on investments

And…

Drum Roll Please…

Dividends are paid out to shareholders in AFTER tax corporate profits. Note the trend:


Revenue SourceFY2000FY2001FY2002FY2003FY2004FY2005
Individual Income Tax1,004,461994,339858,347793,699808,958927,222
Corporate Income Tax271,288151,075148,042131,778189,370278,281


That's right!!!
Bush's Individual Tax cuts increased that revenue stream by 17% in two years
and, Bush's Dividend Tax changes resulted in increasing that revenue stream by 111%
and, now corporations are paying a larger ratio of taxes than anytime in recent history

Investors demand dividends - they are more consistent than praying for Enron style stock price appreciation. They are cold hard cash. Dividends are paid with Corporate AFTER TAX profits. Thus, corporations now jigger their books to show more TAXABLE profit.

So, EXXON now shows an $8.4 Billion profit...
That profit was probably there before CY2004.
That profit will now be taxed as Corporate Income.

So, big spenders, you will now get far more tax revenue to blow...

Has the Electorate Moved…

To the Right of President George ‘W’ Bush

  • Porkbusters
  • Immigration
  • Port Management
  • Supreme Court Nominees

It sure seems as if President Bush is not conservative enough for the general electorate.
That may sound odd, but I am getting that feeling.
Isn’t that where we were at prior to 9/11?

  • Remember the steel tariffs
  • Remember the early immigration debate
  • Remember the stem cell research compromise.
  • Remember the ‘No Child Left Behind’ legislation.

This nation is moving rightward…
This should be very scary for the Liberal Elite…

One Simple Question:

Do you think the next President will be more or less conservative than President Bush?

P.S. Major Mike, I am trying hard to break out of the pyramid thing. I just can’t do it. I need an intervention… This is a cry for help…

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

My Flameouts Gets Updated!!!

Re(1): 'Been there, done that... a Fisking Zbigniew Brzezinski's Op Ed!!!', BoghieOnYourSix, Me
Re(2): 'Brzezinski, Iran, and the Wingnuts', If I Ran the Zoo, Tom Hilton

I was surfing my blogs stats in the TTLB Ecosystem and noted a new blog linking to a a specific post of mine - namely 'Been there, done that... a Fisking Zbigniew Brzezinski's Op Ed!!!'. How exciting!!! How wonderful!!!

But, Tom Hilton - the author - scudded me. Never heard the launch warning, and who cares. So many folks from the Left have launched and missed that one should not really worry. Oh, well. Got a dent in my head. Goes with the territory. Be a man about it, eh...

Even though I had perused the Internet, and Wikipedia entries on the Iran Hostage Crisis, Presidennt Carter and, in fact, Secretary Brzezinski it is apparent that I did not review the documentation close enough.

I think for the umpteenth time in his career, Secretary Brzezinski's doctrine and efforts became intermixed with the conflicted confusion of President Carter, Secretary Cyrus Vance, Secretary James Schlesinger, and the rest of that cabinet. I mixed them all together because it seemed laughable that strength could be found within that mess. I obviously didn't carefully read the biography - and what I read seemed to be the normal 'on the one hand, while on the other hand' thing. Regardless, 'Been there, done that... a Fisking Zbigniew Brzezinski's Op Ed!!!' now populates the first entry in the 'My Flameouts' list. Forever...

From Wikipedia - which seems to have a very fair entry on Zbigniew Brzezinski.
Iran

Facing a revolution, the Shah of Iran sought help from the United States. Iran occupied a strategic place in U.S. foreign policy toward the Middle East, acting as an island of stability, and a buffer against Soviet penetration into the region. He was pro-American, but domestically oppressive. The U.S. ambassador to Iran, William H. Sullivan, recalls that Brzezinski “repeatedly assured Pahlavi that the U.S. backed him fully," however these reassurances would not amount to substantive action on the part of the United States. On November 4th, 1978, Brzezinski called the Shah to tell him that the United States would "back him to the hilt." At the same time, certain high-level officials in the State Department decided that the Shah had to go, regardless of who replaced him. Brzezinski, and Energy Secretary James Schlesinger
(former
Secretary of Defense under Ford), continued to advocate that the U.S. support the Shah militarily. Even in the final days of the revolution, when the Shah was considered doomed no matter what the outcome of the revolution came to be, Brzezinski still advocated a U.S. invasion to stabilize Iran. President Carter could not decide how to appropriately use force, opposed a U.S. coup, ordered the Constellation aircraft carrier to the Indian Ocean, but soon countermanded his order. A deal was worked out with the Iranian generals to shift support to a moderate government, but this plan fell apart when Khomeini and his followers swept the country, taking power 12 February 1979
With feckless and conflicted people all around him - to include the President - it seems as if Secretary Brzezinski did what he could in a bad situation. He even realized that the direction the Democratic Party was taking would lead it to become marginalized in American politics. That is what occurred with me. That is why I speak with this center-right voice.

P.S. I have seen RealPolitik spelled RealPolitic. I have used both spellings. I will use the 'k" variant in memory of this scudding...

General "Maintenance" Eight (8) Steps Up...

Re(1): 'Bush Speaks Out for Rumsfeld', Washington Post, Peter Baker and Josh White
Re(2): 'Remember Millenium Challenge?', Warblogging, March 30 2003
Re(3): 'Headline: Iraq War / Military Campaign / Sandstorm / War Cost', Television News Archive

Apparently the eighth General "Maintenance" is out there...

His name is Marine Lt. General Paul Van Riper. He retired in 1996. I thought I had heard of him - he is a bit of a maverick. He is now hollerin that we should have attacked with more troops. However, the total ground troop strength was cut in half on his watch. He participated in a war game excercise in 2002 where he proved that we would be driven into the sea and a carrier battlefleet would be sunk if we attacked Iraq with Rumsfeld's transformed military:

As Slate's Fred Kaplan pointed out on Friday, however, Wallace's statement simply isn't true. "Militia fighters did play a crucial role in a major war game designed to simulate combat in Iraq," Kaplan says, referring to Millenium Challenge 2002. The thing is that the Pentagon completely ignored the actions of the militia and repeatedly stopped the game and said "that didn't happen" when Red (the side representing Iraqi forces) inflicted massive damage on Blue (Anglo-American) forces.

and,

In one instance, as I reported in September of last year, Riper "sunk" the American invasion fleet before they had a chance to land an amphibious assault force. How did the Pentagon officials managing the exercise respond? They stopped the exercise and ordered the fleet "re-floated". In another example Riper used motorcycle messengers to send messages between Red Force troops — thereby escaping the effects of American eavesdropping technology. Again, the Pentagon ignored the effects of the use of motorcycle messengers.

Uuuuummmm, this article appeared in the March 30, 2003 issue of Warblogging. - ten days into the war. Was the author using this example to predict the failure of the Iraq invasion as a result of the "Great Sandstorm" of March 25/26 2003. Ah, the futility and the failure. The sandstorm crushed us just as the Russian winter destroyed Napoleon’s invading empire...

I would like to remind the ardent few who read this blog - the invasion of Iraq is now considered one of the finest military feats in history. The militia did NOT play a critical role in the invasion and a carrier was not sunk. Lt. General Riper may attempt to use his previous statements to back his current blathering, but that would be disingenuous. The excercise he was involved in dealt with the invasion plan - not post war necessities.

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Moonbats marching off cliff – in need of push…

Re(1): 'Jefferson's Impeachment Gift', The Randi Rhodent Show, 2006/04/25
Re(2): 'California Assemblyman Paul Koretz Submits Impeachment Resolution', Paul Koretz
Re(3): 'Identity Conflict', GovExec, George Cahlink
Re(4): 'The Left's False Assault on President Bush', HumanEventsOnline, Peter Ferrera
Re(5): 'Mercenaries guard homes of the rich in New Orleans', Guardian Unlimited, Jamie Wilson
Re(6): 'Military Response to Katrina Intensifies', American Forces Press Service, Donna Miles

What would you give a Libby Moonbat to draw up Articles of Impeachment on President Bush based on his ‘federalizing the National Guard’? Whatever it is, be prepared to pay up!!!

The Moonbats have found a loophole in the impeachment process. They can use House Rules (rubber stamped every year) to force a special House Session on Impeachment via a joint resolution from a State. Right now, there are three deep blue states leading the way - off the cliff. Run, don't walk...

The following Impeachment Resolutions comes to you from the Left Coast – in particular the honorable Paul Koretz (Moonbat, California’s 42nd District – yup, that’s right, Hollywood and Beverly Hills). Every single idiocy known to Moonbattery is incorporated into this one single document - that is what makes it so perfect. However, we shall pay special attention to the highlighted charge of impeachment:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Paul Michael Neuman
April 22, 2006 District
Office: (310) 285-5490
Weekend: (323) 662-3123

California Assemblyman Paul Koretz Submits Impeachment Resolution

California State Assemblyman Paul Koretz (D-Los Angeles) submitted amendments on Friday, April 21, to Assembly Joint Resolution No. 39, calling for the impeachment of President George W. Bush and Vice President Richard Cheney. The resolution references Section 603 of Jefferson’s Manual of the Rules of the United States House of Representatives, which allows federal impeachment proceedings to be initiated by joint resolution of a state legislature.

The resolution bases the call for impeachment upon the Bush Administration intentionally misleading the Congress and the American people regarding the threat from Iraq in order to justify an unnecessary war that has cost billions of dollars and thousands of lives and casualties; exceeding constitutional authority to wage war by invading Iraq; exceeding constitutional authority by Federalizing the National Guard; conspiring to torture prisoners in violation of the “Federal Torture Act” and indicating intent to continue such actions; spying on American citizens in violation of the 1978 Foreign Agency Surveillance Act; leaking and covering up the leak of the identity of Valerie Plame Wilson, and holding American citizens without charge or trial.

Koretz submitted amendments gutting AJR No. 39, a resolution unrelated to impeachment, to the Assembly Rules Committee. The Rules Committee may take up the bill next week for referral, allowing him to formally introduce the amended resolution.

The Assemblyman hopes his resolution will help promote a public dialogue about the questionable activities and errant judgment of the President and Vice President: “At both the state and national levels, we will be paying for the Bush Administration’s illegal actions and terrible lack of judgment and competence for decades—not only in the billions of dollars wasted on the war and welfare for the rich, but in the worldwide loss of respect for America and Americans. Bush and Cheney must be impeached and removed from office before they undertake even deadlier misdeeds, such as the use of nuclear weapons. There are no bounds to their willingness to ignore the Constitution and world opinion—we can’t afford to wait for the next disaster and hope that we can survive it.”


------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A review of President Bush’s actions regarding the Federalization of the National Guard in his five years of service resulted in:

Apparently Bush did not even Federalize the National Guard after 9/11:

Last fall, President Bush straddled the line, calling on the Guard to provide airport security nationwide. The president asked for 7,000 Guard members to perform airport security duty, but in an unprecedented move, also asked governors to keep the Guard members under their command and promised that the Federal government would pay the bill under Title 32. Bush made the unusual request because federalizing troops for airport security would have placed more
restrictions on how they could operate.

And, after Katrina a plea to allow Federalization of the National Guard resulted in:

President Bush pleaded with Governor Blanco that same day after the storm to get the National Guard into New Orleans. Not much happened. Seeing this, he asked her to give him Federal authority over the state’s Guard. She refused. As a result, the Guard didn’t show up in force in the city until near the end of the week.

Is this were you got your information:

After scenes of looting and lawlessness in the days immediately after Hurricane
Katrina struck, New Orleans has turned into an armed camp, patrolled by
thousands of local, state and federal law enforcement officers, as well as
70,000 national guard troops and active-duty soldiers now based in the region.
Or, this:

Rumsfeld, who traveled to the region Sept. 4 to observe operations firsthand, addressed the "enormous effort going on down there" as 1,800 members of the 82nd Airborne Division and more than 1,600 1st Cavalry Division troops were joining the Hurricane Katrina relief operation.

This brings to 18,000 the number of active-duty forces committed to the mission, in addition to almost 43,000 National Guardsmen, U.S. Northern Command officials rported today.

An additional 5,400 active troops and 1,400 National Guard members are expected to flow into the region within the next 24 to 48 hours, DoD officials said.

Together, these forces are conducting humanitarian, search-and-rescue, evacuation and security missions, officials reported.

So, little man, are you going to claim that President Bush:

  1. Illegally Federalized the National Guard – He has not
  2. Or, possibly acted in conflict with Posse Comitatus – He may have. What else could be done when both city and state leadership absolutely failed the citizenry? The memories of that time are replete with the bold and decisive action of the Armed Forces - and the simultaneous complete failure of all other elements of government.

So, I say ‘Bring it On’.

Impeachment is not purely legal – it is in part political.

All but your little clique will see this for what it is - a silly attempt at a hatchet job.

As Dennis Prager would say: Clarity over Consensus

Monday, April 24, 2006

Ms. McCarthy - A Woman Scorned...

Re(1): 'The McCarthy File', In From the Cold, Spook86
Re(2): 'Mary McCarthy: 'I did not do it'', The Belmont Club, Wretchard T.C.

I was intrigued by Spook86's musings on why Ms. McCarthy leaked highly classified and compartimentalized information to the media. Did she have access to all this information? Was she being fed the information? Could she be acting as a leaker for a group of malcontents - she being chosen because she was to retire soon and would thus be 'dangerous' to prosecute?

However, one area that he found confusing does not appear so. Spook86 queries:
That begs some obvious questions: first of all, when McCarthy left the Clinton White House, what position did she enter at Langley? Normally, for a "returning" senior civil servant, the agency would attempt to place the individual in a slot commensurate with their past duties and experience. For McCarthy, that would mean re-appointment as a NIO, or at least a Deputy NIO. With her White House and Democratic Party connections, such a posting would seem virtually automatic. But apparently, that didn't happen. That fact alone should raise a few eyebrows in the security establishment, because a former NRO with superb political ties should have easily segued to another high-level assignment, despite the change in administrations.
The following quote from Ms. McCarthy’s biography might point to a rather more inauspicious reason for a ‘demotion’.

Until July 2001, she served as special assistant to the president and senior director for intelligence programs on the National Security Council (NSC) Staff, under both Presidents Clinton and Bush.

Apparently, the first reference to reach President Bush regarding an al Qaeda attack inside the United States was the August 6 Presidential Daily Briefing. Why? Could the Administration have been less than enthused with her editing qualities as Special Assistant to the President.

Honestly, I am not familiar with these terms or the command structure in the CIA, NSA, or Executive Branch – the first time I heard of an SESer was a couple of weeks ago…

Sunday, April 23, 2006

Been there, done that – a Fisking Zbigniew Brzezinski's Op Ed!!!

Flamed Out: 'My Flameouts Gets Updated', 2006/04/26
'Brzezinski, Iran, and the Wingnuts', If I Ran the Zoo, Tom Hilton

Re(1): 'Been There, Done That', LA Times, Zbigniew Brzezinski
Re(2): 'Three Conjectures', The Belmont Club, Wretchard

Subtitled: A Fisking in Need is a Fisking Indeed!!!

Been there, done that
Talk of a U.S. strike on Iran is eerily reminiscent of the run-up to the Iraq war.
By Zbigniew Brzezinski, Zbigniew Brzezinski was national security advisor to President Carter from 1977 to 1981.April 23, 2006

Actually, when one reviews Brzezinski in the light of Iran’s recent past this would be the end point of the Fisking. At this point in time (1978) Secretary Brzezinski was promoting ‘Human Rights’ without concern for RealPolitic. That hung Iran, a long term realpolitic ‘ally’, out to dry and directly led to the revolution.
IRAN'S ANNOUNCEMENT that it has enriched a minute amount of uranium has unleashed urgent calls for a preventive U.S. airstrike from the same sources that earlier urged war on Iraq. If there is another terrorist attack in the United States, you can bet your bottom dollar that there also will be immediate charges that Iran was responsible in order to generate public hysteria in favor of military action.

Secretary Brzezinski, if there is another terrorist attack in the United States I would hope that we would use military action. Why else have a military. Maybe the military can be used to cut budget expenditures to pay for social programs – a strategy used in the 1990’s. And, Secretary Brzezinski, if you can process a minute amount of uranium into weapons grade material you can process significant amounts of uranium into weapons grade material. That is a lesson that should have been learned in the Iraq conflict as well – but you ain’t figured it out yet. Also, one should remind the esteemed Secretary Brzezinski that Iran (unlike Iraq) has indigenous sources of uranium within its borders.
But there are four compelling reasons against a preventive air attack on Iranian nuclear facilities:

First, in the absence of an imminent threat (and the Iranians are at least several years away from having a nuclear arsenal), the attack would be a unilateral act of war. If undertaken without a formal congressional declaration of war, an attack would be unconstitutional and merit the impeachment of the president. Similarly, if undertaken without the sanction of the United Nations Security Council, either alone by the United States or in complicity with Israel, it would stamp the perpetrator(s) as an international outlaw(s).

Secretary Brzezinski, do you want to push the problem to the next guy. Oh, that’s right, Clinton the Great did so through the 90’s. That worked well. By the way, the UN will impose sanctions on Iran – with a slight push by the NeoCon Cabal… They will enact some inane, and in their opinion unenforceable, resolutions against Iran. They will believe that ‘America is in a Quagmire’ as they read the NYT. Oh, well… What happens then, Secretary Brzezinski.

Second, likely Iranian reactions would significantly compound ongoing U.S. difficulties in Iraq and Afghanistan, perhaps precipitate new violence by Hezbollah in Lebanon and possibly elsewhere, and in all probability bog down the United States in regional violence for a decade or more. Iran is a country of about 70 million people, and a conflict with it would make the misadventure in Iraq look trivial.

The difficulties in Iraq are now largely sponsored by Iran. We have largely beaten al Qaeda in Iraq. Now, it is the Iranian sponsored militias that are awaiting their turn. Secretary Brzezinski, are you reluctant to deal with Hezbollah. They have been killing Americans since you were their mid-wife in 1978. Kindof like giving birth to Jeffrey Dahmer, eh. Have you been watching the news for the past 28 years? Seems like they have been at war with the ‘Great Satan’ for decades. How long do you want to avoid fighting a war they have declared on us?

Third, oil prices would climb steeply, especially if the Iranians were to cut their production or seek to disrupt the flow of oil from the nearby Saudi oil fields. The world economy would be severely affected, and the United States would be blamed for it. Note that oil prices have already shot above $70 per barrel, in part because of fears of a U.S.-Iran clash.

Oh, so RealPolic of you… Very Kissingerian of you… I remember the effects of your Iranian policy in 1978. If I were you I wouldn’t mention this topic in good company… Oh, that’s right, ‘Been There, Done That’.

Finally, the United States, in the wake of the attack, would become an even more likely target of terrorism while reinforcing global suspicions that U.S. support for Israel is in itself a major cause of the rise of Islamic terrorism. The United States would become more isolated and thus more vulnerable while prospects for an eventual regional accommodation between Israel and its neighbors would be ever more remote.

The Jooos made Hezbollah do it. Get to the root causes. Autocracy. Kleptocracy. Living in the Gap. Economic Malaise (oops, sorry). You did not resolve any of the root causes during your four years of power. Clinton’s valiant team did not resolve any of the root causes during his eight years in power. So, your team has been in power for twelve of the last thirty years and resolved how many of those root causes. Me thinks the answer is Nada…

In short, an attack on Iran would be an act of political folly, setting in motion a progressive upheaval in world affairs. With the U.S. increasingly the object of widespread hostility, the era of American preponderance could even come to a premature end. Although the United States is clearly dominant in the world at the moment, it has neither the power nor the domestic inclination to impose and then to sustain its will in the face of protracted and costly resistance. That certainly is the lesson taught by its experiences in Vietnam and Iraq.

You’ve been watching the Democratic Documentary titled ‘Vietnam: The 40 Year Quagmire’. Great movie and gets high reviews by Liberal Luminaries like Michael Moore and Randi Rhodes (the Err America superstar – often inaccurate, but always ranting). Without a resolution of the root causes of Islamofascist Terror, someone on the Left could direct the sequel: ‘Vietnam: The 100 Year Quagmire’.

Even if the United States is not planning an imminent military strike on Iran, persistent hints by official spokesmen that "the military option is on the table" impede the kind of negotiations that could make that option unnecessary. Such threats are likely to unite Iranian nationalists and Shiite fundamentalists because most Iranians are proud of their nuclear program.

Question Secretary Brzezinski, did you and President Carter negotiate with Iran? Just asking. And, what was the policy you defined after the 1979 mishap? Was it not you and Jimmy Carter that ended relations with Iran (actually a good idea). The twelve years of negotiates made by Carter/Clinton did provide one (1) success story – the treaty between Israel and Egypt. But then again we were dealing with sane individuals (Begin and Sadat) - not terrorists. Minor issue, eh…

Military threats also reinforce growing international suspicions that the U.S. might be deliberately encouraging greater Iranian intransigence. Sadly, one has to wonder whether, in fact, such suspicions may not be partly justified. How else to explain the current U.S. "negotiating" stance: refusing to participate in the ongoing negotiations with Iran and insisting on dealing only through proxies. (That stands in sharp contrast with the simultaneous U.S. negotiations with North Korea.)

Good Lord, get your Tin Foil hat on for that one. Hearing DailyKos commentators in your teeth recently. I bring this up ‘With All Due Respect’, Sir.

The U.S. is already allocating funds for the destabilization of the Iranian regime and reportedly sending Special Forces teams into Iran to stir up non-Iranian ethnic minorities in order to fragment the Iranian state (in the name of democratization!). And there are clearly people in the Bush administration who do not wish for any negotiated solution, abetted by outside drum-beaters for military action and egged on by full-page ads hyping the Iranian threat.

Secretary Brzezinski, what were you doing about Afghanistan – another success story of your reign in power? You initiated the training and supply of the Mujajadeen. Again, do you think ‘frank discussions’ with terrorist states are effective diplomacy? Tell me the success stories – until then I will call this paragraph unsubstantiated blather. You went to college didn’t you?

There is unintended irony in a situation in which the outrageous language of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (whose powers are much more limited than his title implies) helps to justify threats by administration figures, which in turn help Ahmadinejad to exploit his intransigence further, gaining more fervent domestic support for himself as well as for the Iranian nuclear program.

President Ahmadinejad is constrained by Congress and the independent Judiciary. Is that what you are saying? Or, are you saying that he Mullahs are constraining him. Bubba, they put him in power. He is their ‘popular’ voice. By the way, since he is the President of Iran who else would you initiate your ‘frank discussions’ with.

It is therefore high time for the administration to sober up and think strategically, with a historic perspective and the U.S. national interest primarily in mind. It's time to cool the rhetoric. The United States should not be guided by emotions or a sense of a religiously inspired mission. Nor should it lose sight of the fact that deterrence has worked in U.S.-Soviet relations, in U.S.-Chinese relations and in Indo-Pakistani relations.

Deterrence with direct sponsors of suicide bombing??? I don’t place al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the Muslim Brotherhood on par with the states of the Soviet Union, China, India, or even Pakistan. Tear your eyes away from The Democratic Underground site and read Wretchard’s ‘Three Conjectures’.
Moreover, the notion floated by some who favor military action that Tehran might someday just hand over the bomb to some terrorist conveniently ignores the fact that doing so would be tantamount to suicide for all of Iran because it would be a prime suspect, and nuclear forensics would make it difficult to disguise the point of origin.

Just wait for that mushroom cloud, eh… That is your strategy… If all goes as you plan it will occur under the helm of an effective Democrat fighting the ‘War on Poverty’ or something. You will have to take charge and rename the Leftist political party in America if that happens. See your own writing in paragraph one (1).

It is true, however, that an eventual Iranian acquisition of nuclear weapons would heighten tensions in the region and perhaps prompt imitation by such countries as Saudi Arabia or Egypt. Israel, despite its large nuclear arsenal, would feel less secure. Preventing Iranian acquisition of nuclear weapons is, therefore, justified, but in seeking that goal, the U.S. must bear in mind longer-run prospects for Iran's political and social development.

Iran is in the midst of a giant Government Job Creation project. Let them be. Again, the Jooos are the root cause? Shouldn’t the Jooos be confident that when el Presidente Ahmadinejad says one thing, he will actually turn out to be decent and do something else? When someone tells Jooos that they want to incinerate their miserable little existence the Jooos should realize that he is just making small talk or diplospeak. Worked well in the recent past.

Iran has the objective preconditions in terms of education, the place of women in social affairs, and in social aspirations (especially of the youth) to emulate in the foreseeable future the evolution of Turkey. The mullahs are Iran's past, not its future; it is not in our interest to engage in acts that help to reverse that sequence.

I’ve seen the pictures of the Hitler Youth – oops, I mean the Basiji Youth. The youngsters who get all Jihaded up and walk calmly through mine-fields. They now run around as a Mullah Secret Police. And, joy of joys, el Presidente Ahmadinejad was once a member – and he harkens back to those days with warmness and fondness. So cute and cuddly...

Serious negotiations require not only a patient engagement but also a constructive atmosphere. Artificial deadlines, propounded most often by those who do not wish the U.S. to negotiate in earnest, are counterproductive. Name-calling and saber rattling, as well as a refusal to even consider the other side's security concerns, can be useful tactics only if the goal is to derail the negotiating process.

Those deadlines are ‘artificial’, but some odd bailout date of the GWOT is not. By the way, read Wretchard’s ‘Three Conjectures’ posted to the right of this column.

The United States should join Britain, France and Germany, as well as perhaps Russia and China (both veto-casting U.N. Security Council members), in direct negotiations with Iran, using the model of the concurrent multilateral talks with North Korea. As it does with North Korea, the U.S. also should simultaneously engage in bilateral talks with Iran about security and financial issues of mutual concern.

North Korea may be bonkers, but they have yet to kill Americans – at least after the 1950’s era mishap and tragedy. Iran is the major sponsor of American murder – and has been so for almost three decades.

It follows that the U.S. should be a signatory party to any quid pro quo arrangements in the event of a satisfactory resolution of the Iranian nuclear program and of regional security issues. At some point, such talks could lead to a regional agreement for a nuclear weapons-free zone in the Middle East — especially after the conclusion of an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement — endorsed also by all the Arab states of the region. At this stage, however, it would be premature to inject that complicated issue into the negotiating process with Iran.

Uuuuummmmm, Secretary Brzezinski, Iran has been cheating signed documents pertaining to the development of a nuclear capability for three decades – Give Them Another Chance!!! By the way, why are all the regional powers funding, supplying, and organizing terror against Israel if they are endorsing Peace in the Middle East?

For now, our choice is either to be stampeded into a reckless adventure profoundly damaging to long-term U.S. national interests or to become serious about giving negotiations with Iran a genuine chance. The mullahs were on the skids several years ago but were given a new burst of life by the intensifying confrontation with the United States. Our strategic goal, pursued by real negotiations and not by posturing, should be to separate Iranian nationalism from religious fundamentalism.

We should just quit. The Mullahs were on the skids till we decided to fight in the war they declared. Secretary Brzezinski, I would recommend you review a map before telling me how powerful Iran has become in the past five years. Would you want to be in their situation – militarily, sanctions wise, or diplomatically.

Treating Iran with respect and within a historical perspective would help to advance that objective. American policy should not be swayed by the current contrived atmosphere of urgency ominously reminiscent of what preceded the misguided intervention in Iraq.

That ‘misguided intervention in Iraq’ has placed a half million American trained troops on the western border of Iran. Do you, like Congressman Murtha, recommend an amphibious assault if the ‘frank discussions’ do not result in a peaceful Iran taking a positive role in the region? If you cannot answer that, then understand that amphibious assaults are not the favored form of military action. They can be sortof deadly.

Saturday, April 22, 2006

A Public Service Walkback...

Re(1): 'CIA Officer Fired for Leaking Classified Info to Media', SecurityWatchTower, C.S. Scott
Re(2): 'BERGER APPOINTS MCCARTHY SPECIAL ASSISTANT FOR INTELLIGENCE'
Re(3): 'NYU: Center on Law and Security'
Re(4): 'Center for Strategic & International Studies' - Link Removed from site, see here (#21)!!!
Re(5): 'Albright in historic meeting with North Korea's Kim Jong Il', CNN
Re(6): 'Clinton Let Bin Laden Slip Away and Metastasize', LATimes, Mansoor Ijaz
Re(7): 'Mary O. McCarthy - Visiting Fellow, International Security Program ', FreeRepublic
Re(8): 'Clinton & Khobar', National Review, Rich Lowry
Re(9): 'Reconstructing Murtha III: It’s a Somalia Deja Vu', The American Thinker
Re(10): 'Its All About 9/11', Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Andrew McCarthy
Re(11): 'Senate 9/11 Report', United States Senate

and, oh my God - tell me it isn't so
Re(12): 'Colleagues Say C.I.A. Analyst Played by Rules', New York Times, David S. Cloud

To the Media - Goodbye and Good Night

Hat Tip: Drudge at www.DrudgeReport.com
Freepers at www.FreeRepulic.com
Flopping Aces at www.floppingaces.net/?p=1551

As a fellow government servant I feel I should provide both emotional comfort and a public relations service to Mrs. McCarthy that is sadly lacking in the WingNut blogosphere. Certainly this woman was aggrieved. First, neocons and incompetents gained power through duplicitous election fraud. Next, the stupid American public apparently denied valiant Senator John Kerry the position he so deserved. As a result, I have secured permission from Mrs. McCarthy to ‘unpack’ her biography and build a resume. In fact, she appears to be ‘A REAL GO-GETTER’:
Mary McCarthy, a CIA officer, is currently a visiting fellow at The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). Prior to joining CSIS in August 2001, Mary O. McCarthy was a senior policy adviser to the CIA's deputy director for science and technology. Until July 2001, she served as special assistant to the president and senior director for intelligence programs on the National Security Council (NSC) Staff, under both Presidents Clinton and Bush. From 1991 until her appointment to the NSC, McCarthy served on the National Intelligence Council. She began her government service as an analyst, then manager, in CIA's Directorate of Intelligence, holding positions in both African and Latin American analysis. From 1979 to 1984 she was employed by BERI, S.A., conducting financial, operational, and political risk assessments for multinational companies and banks. Previously she had taught at the University of Minnesota and was director of the Social Science Data Archive at Yale University. She is the author of Social Change and the Growth of British Power in the Gold Coast (University Press of America, 1983). McCarthy has a B.A. and M.A. in history from Michigan State University, an M.A. in library science from the University of Minnesota, and a Ph.D. in history from the University of Minnesota.

So, here goes:

___________________________________________________________________




Mary O' McCarthy
1600 Beltway Blvd
Washington D.C.

Objective:

I seek a position in which my extensive ties with President Clinton, Secretary Berger, Secretary Zbigniew Brzezinski, Rand Beers, Richard Clarke, General Wesley Clark, General Anthony Zinni, and Dana Priest could be of benefit to the greater good of democracy. I deeply feel that a position in which I could do good things would fit my skillset and experience. To that end, I am seriously reviewing Err America's advertised position of 'Truth Teller'.

Experience:
August 2001 – Present
Fellow Professor at ‘The Center for Strategic and International Studies’, New York University.

Like many trusted and brilliant illuminati from President Clinton’s Administration I transitioned from government service to the world of academia. As a Fellow Professor at the New York University School of Law’s ‘Center for Strategic and International Studies’, I ensured the dissemination of information that I believed to be critical to the proper functioning of a democracy. Certainly, this includes disseminating the ‘August 6, 2001’ Presidential Daily Brief to media sources which proved beyond a doubt that the current Administration knew dates, times, locations, and methods of attack for the impending al Qaeda criminal action - a report that both I and Richard Clarke worked feverishly on and provided a month before the attacks. Additionally, since fullfilling my government service I have repeatedly ensured the accurate dissemination of information regarding BusHitlers efforts in the Global 'War' on 'Terror'. In concert with other capable luminaries, I have ensured accuracy in the media – much like an impartial Presidential Press Secretary.
June 1998 - July 2001
Special Assistant to the President

Succeeding Rand Beers, who later became a political operative for John Kerry’s 2004 Presidential run, I acted as the right-hand woman for President’s Clinton and Bush. Successes in this term included – but were not limited to:
June 1996 – June 1998
Senior Director for Intelligence Programs on the National Security Council (NSC) Staff

During this period I acted as the right hand woman for NSC Director Sandy
Berger. We successfully:
1994 – 1996
National Intelligence Officer for Warning

1991 – 1994
Deputy National Intelligence officer for Warning

  • I ensured President Clinton waited judiciously before acting on the first bombing of corporate America’s World Trade Center. We cannot prosecute groups for planning and staging attacks, we have to wait till the crime is committed.
  • I played a critical role in warning the Clinton Administration of the dangers of using American armed forces when combating terrorism in Somalia. Ensured an emphasis on resolving root cause issues.
  • After consulting with Congressman Murtha, provided guidance that resulted in the graceful exit from Somalia after the unplanned military invasion of that nation.

1984 – 1991
CIA Directorate of Intelligence – Analyst for Latin America and Africa

  • I worked hand in hand with such future media celebrities as Joeseph Wilson and Valerie Plame to ensure the success of our efforts in these two regions. This was the era of Sandinista Freedom Fighters bravely creating a new society in Latin America. This was the era of Iran/Contragate!!! So soon after Watergate!!! A great time to get involved with super secrets!!!

___________________________________________________________________

To their credit the New York Times wrote a Reference Letter for Mrs. McCarthy. All good employers should write Reference Letters for their good employees - maybe she played a role in the NSA Wiretap story, eh. A summary:

April 23, 2006
Colleagues Say C.I.A. Analyst Played by Rules
By DAVID S. CLOUD

WASHINGTON, April 22 — Mary O. McCarthy, the intelligence officer dismissed on Friday after being accused of leaking information to reporters about the Central Intelligence Agency's overseas prisons, once was responsible for guarding some of the nation's most sensitive secrets.

As a senior National Security Council aide for intelligence from 1996 to 2001, Ms. McCarthy was known as a low-key professional who paid special attention to preventing White House leaks of classified information and covert operations, several current and former government officials said.

When she disagreed with decisions on intelligence operations, they say, she registered her complaints through internal government channels.

But on Thursday she was stripped of her security clearance and escorted out of C.I.A. headquarters, government officials said, after failing a polygraph examination and confessing that she had disclosed classified information to reporters, including material for The Washington Post's Pulitzer Prize-winning articles about secret C.I.A. facilities in Eastern Europe used to interrogate captured Al Qaeda members and other terror suspects.

Ms. McCarthy, who has not been charged with any crime, did not respond to telephone calls and an e-mail message. But former colleagues who worked with her at the C.I.A. and the White House say they had trouble fathoming her as a leaker. Some said they flatly refused to believe the accusations.

"We're talking about a person with great integrity who played by the book and, as far as I know, never deviated from the rules," said Steven Simon, a National Security Council aide in the Clinton administration who worked closely with Ms. McCarthy.

Others said it was possible that Ms. McCarthy, who began attending law school at night several years ago and had announced her intention to retire from the C.I.A., had grown disenchanted with the methods that the Bush administration used for handling Al Qaeda prisoners since the September 2001 terror attacks and felt she had no alternative except to go to the press.

"I have no idea what her motive was, but there is a lot of dissension within the agency and it seems to be a rather unhappy place," said Richard J. Kerr, a former C.I.A. deputy director. Mr. Kerr called Ms. McCarthy "quite a good, substantive person on the issues I dealt with her on."

She also gradually came to have one foot in the secret world of intelligence and another in the public world of policy.

She went from lower-level analyst working in obscurity at C.I.A. headquarters in Langley, Va,. to someone at home "downtown," as Washington is called by agency veterans, where policy is more openly fought over and leaks are far more common.

Though she was a C.I.A. employee for more than 20 years, associates said, her early professional experience was not in the world of spying and covert operations.

After a previous career that one former colleague said included time as a flight attendant, she earned a doctorate in history from the University of Minnesota. She worked for a Swiss company "conducting risk assessments for international businesses and banks," Ms. McCarthy wrote in a brief biography she provided to the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, also called the 9/11 Commission. She testified before the commission in 2003. Her biography notes that she once wrote "a book on the social history of Ghana."

Even after joining the C.I.A. in 1984, Ms. McCarthy, who was hired as intelligence analyst for Africa, was far from a covert operative. In the late 1980's, she was promoted to management, taking over as chief of the Central America and Caribbean section, though she had no previous experience in the region, said a former officer who worked with her.

By 1991, she was working as deputy to one of the agency's most senior analysts, Charles E. Allen, whose job as "National Intelligence Officer for Warning" was to anticipate major national security threats. Ms. McCarthy took over the job from Mr. Allen in 1994 and moved to the Clinton White House two years later.

Rand Beers, who at the time was Mr. Clinton's senior intelligence aide on the National Security Council, said he hired Ms. McCarthy to be his deputy. "Anybody who works for Charlie Allen and then replaces him has got to be good," said Mr. Beers, who went on to serve as an adviser to the 2004 presidential campaign of Senator John Kerry, the Democratic candidate. She took over from Mr. Beers as the senior director for intelligence programs in 1998.

Though she was not among the C.I.A. officials who briefed Mr. Clinton every morning on the latest intelligence, she "worked on some of the most sensitive programs," a former White House aide said, and was responsible for notifying Congress when covert action was being undertaken.

The aide and some others who spoke about Ms. McCarthy were granted anonymity because they did not want to be identified as discussing her official duties because she be under criminal investigation.

When the Bush administration took office in 2001, Ms. McCarthy's career seemed to stall. A former Bush administration official who worked with her said that, although she was a career C.I.A. employee, as a holdover from the Clinton administration she was regarded with suspicion and was gradually eased out of her job as senior director for intelligence programs. She left several months into Mr. Bush's first term.

But she did not return immediately to a new assignment at C.I.A. headquarters. She took an extended sabbatical at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington research organization. In late 2003, she testified publicly before the 9/11 Commission about ways to reorganize the intelligence agencies to prevent another major terror attack.

She served on the Markle Foundation's "Task Force on National Security in the Information Age," a group of academics as well as current and former government officials working on recommendations for sharing classified information more widely within the government, according to a report issued by the group. The report identifies Ms. McCarthy as a "nongovernment" expert.

H. Andrew Schwartz, a spokesman for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that Ms. McCarthy's relationship with the organization lasted from 2001 to 2003. Several associates of Ms. McCarthy say she returned to the C.I.A. in 2004, taking a job in the inspector general's office. That year, public records show, she contributed $2,000 to Mr. Kerry's presidential campaign.

Married with one child, she also began attending law school at night, two former co-workers said, and talked about switching to a career in public interest law.

After an article last November in The Washington Post reported that the C.I.A. was sending terror suspects to clandestine detention centers in several countries, including some in Eastern Europe, Porter J. Goss, the agency's director, ordered polygraphs for intelligence officers who knew about certain "compartmented" programs, including the secret detention centers for terror suspects.

Polygraphs are given routinely to agency employees at least every five years, but special ones can be ordered when a security breach is suspected.

Government officials said that after Ms. McCarthy's polygraph examination showed the possibility of deception, the examiner confronted her and she disclosed having conversations with reporters.

But some former C.I.A. employees who know Ms. McCarthy remain unconvinced, arguing that the pressure from Mr. Goss and others in the Bush administration to plug leaks may have led the agency to focus on an employee on the verge of retirement, whose work at the White House during the Clinton administration had long raised suspicions within the current administration.

"It looks to me like Mary is being used as a sacrificial lamb," said Larry Johnson, a former C.I.A. officer who worked for Ms. McCarthy in the agency's Latin America section.

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Great Opportunities to Cut and Run :-)

Re(1): 'General Amnesia', PoliPundit, Lorie Byrd
Re(2): 'George B. McClellan', Wikipedia
Re(3): 'Copperheads (politics)', Wikipedia
Re(4): 'Democrats Pledge to 'Elimidate' Osama!!!', BoghieOnYourSix, Me

I have been commenting in a very interesting post by Lorie Byrd in PoliPundit - namely, 'General Amnesia'. When the Lefties struck I had to ask a few questions:

General McClellan was a theater commander during the American Civil War. When he retired he was a strident critic of the way the war was being run. When retired General McClellan ran for President in 1864 he ran on a platform that said:
  • The war is immoral
  • We are losing the war
  • The war is being run badly
  • We did not have to fight this war
When did Abraham Lincoln show the proper respect for General McClellan and redeploy Union forces outside the theater of conflict – or, simply pull Union forces back and thus ending the fight with the Confederacy.

Another example,

There were many prominent figures, military and industrial and political and celebrity, who did not believe in the war on Germany (WWII European front). There were many reasons for this. But, our strategy was to fight Germany first and only then turn our priority to Japan. We fought a holding pattern against Japan for years while our priority was Germany.

When did FDR simply stop fighting Hitler in World War II?

Was it after Rommel crushed the Americans in the beginning of Operation Torch?
How about after the mauling we took in Italy?
How about when we could not break through after landing on the beaches of Normandy?

When was it?

Why didn’t FDR listen to all these luminaries?

Was it because he was not confident in Hitler’s overtures of peace?

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Know Thy Enemy…

Re( 1): 'Storm Warning...', MySandmen, Mr. Atos
Re( 2): 'The shadow cabinet speaks', The Belmont Club, Wretchard
Re( 3): 'The Odds Against', The Belmont Club, Wretchard
Re( 4): 'Haifa Street', The Belmont Club, Wretchard
Re( 5): '"Insurgents want their stories told" -- Associated Press', The Belmont Club, Wretchard
Re( 6): 'Corrupting Our Sight 2', The Belmont Club, Wretchard
Re( 7): 'A Street Corner in Ramadi', The Fourth Rail, Bill Roggio
Re( 8): 'AP Admits Relationship with Terrorists', PowerLine, John Hinderaker
Re( 9): '9/9/2004: Bush Guard Documents: Forged', LittleGreenFootballs, Charles Johnson
Re(10): 'The Washington Post & My Embed', The Fourth Rail, Bill Roggio
Re(11): 'Notes, Video & Transcripts from CNN Appearance', The Fourth Rail, Bill Roggio
Re(12): 'Preposterous: Iraqi Females Detained', The Security Watchtower, C.S. Scott

I am thankful adults are in charge…

I am relieved we were adult enough to vote for them…

Mr. Atos defines the internal enemy:
The enemy-within implores us to slice our own throats.The storm converges on all
aspects of civilization simultaneously. Once the impact has undermined the stability of structure and foundations, it can dismantle components with ease. The enemy-without ignores legality altogether; civil relationships among men, being an inconvenient anathema to violent persuasion. Their code consists of one article: "Agree with us or we'll kill you." The enemy-within alters legality by semantic confusion to render a despotic precedent that states: "Agree with us or we'll sue, fine, fire, or jail you." Compulsion being the preferred form of violence, the enemy-within manipulates the system accordingly. It infiltrates our courts and mires due process. It hijacks legislative authority to implement mandate by rogue edict. It destroys justice by substituting the moral concept of liberty with an indefinable abstract called fairness. The enemy-without practices violence with no law. The enemy-within uses the law to justify violence in the form of tyranny.

We see elements of the internal enemy in the media:

The Odds Against
It may have been pure luck, but it was surely the longest of odds that would
have brought an Associated Press cameraman to the site of a surprise attack on
two Iraqi electoral workers.

Haifa Street
Two or three dozen people, at the most, would normally have witnessed these
events. But due to the great good fortune of the killers, a photographer from
the Associated Press was present and pictures of the execution were carried on
newspapers throughout the globe, sending the executioner's message not merely to
a handful of bystanders to hundreds of millions of readers throughout the world.

"Insurgents want their stories told" -- Associated Press

In this regard, one hopes it is not impertinent to ask whether a photographer who does not "swear allegiance or otherwise join up philosophically with them (insurgents)" can take their pictures. Mr. Stokes might like to state whether the Associated Press photographer who took a sequence of pictures of an execution on Haifa Street, Baghdad is one of these "brave Iraqi photographers" to whom the insurgents are willing to entrust their stories. If so, at what point did the "brave Iraqi" photographer become aware that the story of the day was going to be the live execution of two Iraqi election workers?

Just asking.

Corrupting Our Sight 2

Yet the practice of assigning stringers dependent on the indulgence of killers for both their lives and access must run the risk of corrupting the reportage. It is almost tantamount to providing each terrorist cells with their very own Alan-a-Dale; and if the digital troubadour will not sing to their liking then surely the killers will not allow him to sing at all.

Want More…

A Street Corner in Ramadi [Updated with another photo from February of 2005]

Did the media fall for yet another insurgent information operation in Ramadi?

Last weekend, several news sources, including the Associated Press and CNN, reported a major insurgent attack on the provincial government headquarters in the heart of Ramadi. We reported the story on Sunday, with skepticism, noting Insurgents have conducted false propaganda operations in the past, such as the incident in early December where the Associated Press reported a fake uprising based on stringers, so the possibility exists this report is false as well."

AP Admits Relationship with Terrorists

So the terrorists wanted to be photographed carrying out the murder, to sow more
terror in Iraq and to demoralize American voters. That's why they tipped off the photographer, and that's why they dragged the two election workers from their car, so they could be shot in front of the AP's obliging camera. And the AP was happy to cooperate with the terrorists in all respects.
9/9/2004: Bush Guard Documents: Forged

I opened Microsoft Word, set the font to Microsoft’s Times New Roman, tabbed over to the default tab stop to enter the date “18 August 1973,” then typed the rest of the document purportedly from the personal records of the late Lieutenant Colonel Jerry B. Killian.
Even More…

The Washington Post & My Embed

To most of the media, my position on the war automatically makes my reporting and analysis of Iraq suspect, even though they did very little work in looking at exactly what I wrote. But Joe Galloway has been against the war in Iraq from the start and has been very vocal about it, and no one questions his motivations. Note how he is treated in this article, "a legendary military correspondent." Thomas E. Ricks, who is writing a book titled “Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq," is an objective journalist whose credentials should never be questioned. If you are member of the club, there is no attempt to discern you position on the war; journalists are by default objective and unbiased. Bloggers such as myself, who actually follow the day by day operations and developments in Iraq, and perform accurate analysis based on these details the media cannot be bothered to track, are of course "pro-war," "activists" and such. What a sad state of affairs for our media.

Notes, Video & Transcripts from CNN Appearance

Here are some of my brief (and I mean brief) impressions of the appearance. I found it very interesting that a large majority of the CNN audience did not "have confidence" in the news they were receiving from Iraq. It would have been interesting to have explored the reasons for this further. After watching the interview again, it was obvious Barbara Starr and I were talking about two entirely different subjects. Ms. Starr was discussing the administration and "strategic communications, information operations, spin, spin, spin," as well as the difficulties reporters encounter in Iraq. I was discussing how the media has failed to provide the proper context for the war, specifically in military operations, and how their reporting plays into the hands of al-Qaeda.

Preposterous: Iraqi Females Detained

The information on the female detainees was obtained by the ACLU, which apparently believed (1) something illegal or immoral was going on and/or (2) the story would further undermine the war on terror, a war the ACLU has been against since late 2001. There is no other explanation as to why they pushed this information to the media, except their belief this would further damage the credibility of U.S. efforts in the global war on terror.


… Let us end this embarrassment…

...... I can provide far more examples......

......... I have some in mind, do you want more.........


However, Wretchard nails the reason for ultimate victory:
An idea kept nagging me during the whole week of the General's Revolt until David Adesnik's post brought it home. It's this: in a democratic society the most effective way to bring down a "failed policy" is for the opposition party to offer a better alternative. Because in the last analysis, nobody is going to put Generals Zinni, Clark, Batiste or Newman in the White House out of dissatisfaction with President Bush management of the War on Terror. They're not running for office but Hillary Clinton and maybe John Kerry will be. That inescapable fact means there is no substitute in the national security debate for a rational Democratic Party platform on defense. The alternative to President Bush's policies is not what General Batiste proposes but what the Democratic Party promises to implement. As long as it is what Governor Richardson and Donna Brazile say it is, then Donald Rumsfeld is assured of a job. Perhaps it would be more productive for President Bush's opponents to see if they can articulate something that makes sense.

9/11 changed everything. Enough Americans now realize that they were imbiciles sleepwalking through history. Being led by the nose by a corrupt and ignorant Fourth Estate. Sleeping in a mirage of peace and prosperity unearned and undefended.

My own experience on the morning of 9/11 is illustrative:

  1. I wake and do all the preliminaries to head off to work.
  2. At first impact I am listening to Hugh Hewitt and watching Fox News. Hewitt breaks in and states that an aircraft had hit the World Trade Center and that he will get us information as he gets it. Fox News blurbs on it, but has no video so I switch to CNN and turn up the volume
  3. They soon have a live video feed.
  4. Then the next plane hits…
  5. A CNN ‘Journalist’ exclaims “Oh, what are the odds of two planes accidentally crashing into the World Trade Center” (paraphrasing) I thought there were no odds.
  6. Hugh Hewitt declares the obvious: that we appear to be under terrorist attack

I knew at that moment that my place of work was a target of opportunity

From that point on CNN, and the rest of the ignorant media, became nothing more than a sitcom to me. I have no faith in unreferenced and/or unsourced material. I never will.

What else changed.
Look around the blogosphere.
Much of the fire eminates from that hour…

Know thy enemy.
Keep him close.
They are fools
and fools are forever.

LateR

and sorry about the length of this post. A horrific combination of Atos/Wretchard got me on a rant - and the sad thing is, this stuff sticks in my mind like nothing else...


Monday, April 17, 2006

This Should Have Happened Much Earlier…

Re(1): www.MySandmen.BlogSpot.com - Mr. Atos, Major Mike, DUELER88
Re(2): 'Responding to Hugh Hewitt's "Arguments Against Striking Iran" Post', MySandmen, Major Mike
Re(3): 'Mr. Lowry, Ask the Military how to Manage WMD Battlespace', BoghieOnYourSix, Me
Re(4): ' ...against all enemies, foreign and domestic...', MySandmen, Major Mike
Re(5): ‘Bangalore Torpedo...’, MySandmen, Mr. Atos
Re(6): 'Hapless Toads Spotted in... Washington', BoghieOnYourSix, Me

Major Mike is a contributor at http://www.mysandmen.blogspot.com/.

Apparently, he enjoyed a comment left at MySandmen enough to poke around here every once in a while. He mentioned that he would blogroll this site. He is being too nice: My site has had less than 2,500 visitors – including me!!! – in the entire year of its existence. I think Major Mike may have partaken in a bit too many adult libations preparing for ‘...against all enemies, foreign and domestic...’.

But, that does not mean I should not have blogrolled MySandmen as early as October 2005. I mean, since that time I have it in my IE Favorites list – and have frequented it often…

Isn’t that what a blogroll is all about….

Ain’t I setting up my blogroll for the Marines I work with…

And, adding a bit of history to boot…

I got smacked (delicately and with finesse) by Mr. Atos’s ‘Bangalore Torpedo...’ entry in Hugh Hewitt’s ‘Blog of the Week Contest’. My entry was ‘Hapless Toads Spotted In… Washington’. I am not embarrassed by my entry, but his was awesome… I am reading that series again… Was Atos not correct when he stated:

Roberts carried the first section of the torpedo directly into the fortifications, and even managed to gain a firm offensive position. Miers is taking the next section and pushing it further. She may or may not go all the way. And it may or may not be the complete objective. There could be more lengths to the torpedo carried behind by Brown, Jones, Owens, McConnel or Luttig. But, the intent of the President and his team may be to destroy as much of the defensive entanglement as possible in order to gain the actual objective firmly and decisively.

It is arguable that the Miers nomination paved the way a smoother Alito nomination – review Specter’s questioning. And, the Alito nomination – with all the biased and unsubstantiated acrimony the Left still managed to puke out – sets the stage for the next nomination. Now, with Supreme Court decisions that fit with mainstream America behind us it should be much easier to nominate conservative jurists who read the document they base their opinions on. A novel thought, eh.

After studying MySandmen (including that extremely long, but descriptive, sub-title) I have included the site on my BlogRoll as follows:

My Sandmen, Reassembling the Fundamentals

LateR

Going Nuclear!!!

Re(1): Instapundit posted at 08:46 PM, Glenn Reynolds
Re(2): 'Going Nuclear', Washington Post, Patrick Moore

Yup, this proves the point: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/14/AR2006041401209.html

Hat Tip to the Grand Papa of Blogging: http://instapundit.com/archives/029720.php

Yup, this Patrick Moore: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Moore

LateR

Sunday, April 16, 2006

Tinfoil Hat Brigade – Me Too!!!

Re(1): 'Below the Fold', The Belmont Club, Wretchard T.C.
Re(2): 'Jonathan Pollard', Wikipedia
Re(3): 'Rafi Eitan', Wikipedia

Caveat Emptor…

There shall be NO flameout on pure speculation…

So here goes:

Check out Wretchard’s ‘Below the fold’ post in today’s Belmont Club. The most interesting parcel is the speculative trade of Jonathon Pollard for Marwan Barghouti.

Hhhhmmmmm
  • Pollard stating that he will leak stuff very embarrassing to Israel if Rafi Eitan is appointed a minister of the new Israeli government…
  • Israel thinking that Marwan Barghouti is a high enough poker hand to play against the leak – i.e. trade a Terror Turd for a Traitor…

Hhhhhhmmmmmmm….

A few very odd things happened in the 1980s.

  1. Israel flew right through enemy airspace to destroy the Osirak nuclear reactor in Iraq.
  2. And, the United States traded weapons for cold hard cash in the Iran/Contra affair.

Odd, very odd... Israel plans and executes a mission impossible.
Odd, very odd... President Reagan providing arms to Iran to finance part of the Cold War.

Did Pollard provide Israel with American intelligence on Iraqi/Soviet air defense technology, tactics, and logistics? Was that part acceptable to the United States? Eitan was his spymaster and recruiter. Eitan later had business connections in another Soviet client – Cuba. Eitan has a rather odd history…

Was Barghouti a conduit in the Iran/Contra weapons for cash fiasco? Barghouti routinely finds himself at the center of terror against Jews and Infidels, and then escapes to the periphery. Barghouti has a rather odd history…

Pollard will play whatever hand dealt to him – he is in the slammer for life… Barghouti is playing his hand as if he has a wild card in the hole. The real question is why the United States would even sniff at a chance for Barghouti. RealPolitic???

I think Bush will not even consider such a trade. He is playing RealPolitic with the periphery of the GWOT, but not at the schwerpunkte...

Mr. Lowry, Ask the Military how to Manage WMD Battlespace

Re(1): 'Writing The War', National Review (subscriber) April 24 2006, Rich Lowry
Re(2): 'Muscular Multiculturalism', National Review, Rich Lowry

In the ‘National Review’ April 24, 2006, Rich Lowry opines on three books in the ‘books, arts & manners’ section. Namely:
  1. ‘The Assassins Gate’, George Packer
  2. ‘Cobra II’, Michael Gordon and General Trainor
  3. And ‘No True Glory’, by Bing West
In fairness, I will probably read all three – partly as a result of his review. But, and this is a pretty big but

Lowry yanks out the following:
Packer, Gordon, and Trainor are persuasive when they argue that the U.S. effort was harmed by limited forces. The invasion plan had substituted speed for mass – successfully. But as Gordon and Trainor write, ‘Mass, not speed, was requisite for sealing the victory.’ Certainly, if we had it to do over again, we would try the option of sending more forces.
I think Lowry et al. are wrong for at least three reasons:
  1. It is obvious that the original battleplan included about 40,000 seasoned Army troops that spent their time on a Med Cruise as a result of Turkey’s unexpected decision.
  2. If you are referencing Shinseki’s 400,000 (sung to the tune of McNamera’s 100,000) troop requirement, then think of how that would have been accomplished. The total ground force capability of America’s active duty forces was about 600,000 at the time. And Rumsfeld’s water spout was a bit higher in that water barrel back then. Where are you going to get 400,000 grunts when 40% - 50% of the soldiers and Marines at the time were POGs (Personnel Other than Grunts). And the UN dithered for half a year- leaving us about two months of acceptable combat weather. And, don’t forget South Korea, Bosnia, Africa, Asia, etc…
  3. And, actually most importantly, if you expect the battlespace to be marred by the use of WMD you DO NOT mass into a giant herd. Such a herd is a massive target of opportunity for a WMD strike. That is one huge reason to “substitute speed for mass” in the Iraq invasion plan. Oh, how soon we forget.
So, again, tell me that we should have massed up Shinseki’s fictional 400,000 (a number only a bureaucrat could love), attack through an ‘ally’ to get more soldiers to the combat zone, lose any element of tactical surprise, and ignore the threat of WMD..

In conclusion, it is apparent that Gordon, Trainor, and even Lowry are similar in one sense to George Packer
a liberal hawk, which sometimes seems to mean someone whose support of the war was contingent on nothing going wrong.
Actually, I think I am being a bit too hard on Rich Lowry. But it was fun – and I think it made a point. He is a journalist, not a military 3 type… And, I don’t claim to be one either – the above could be bunk, but it seems to make sense; and it made sense in 2001 and 2003…

Saturday, April 15, 2006

Winning Better, Winning Always, Let's Change the coach...

Re(1): 'Remarks by Al Gore, May 26, 2004' MoveOn.org, Al Gore
Re(2): 'Ex-General: Rumsfeld Deserves Criticism', Associated Press
Re(3): 'Bush says Rumsfeld Crucial to Terror War', Associated Press
Re(4): 'Michael Savage has Gone off the Deep End', FreeRepublic.com,
Re(5): 'Failure to Secure Explosives /Misjudgments that Have Made America Less Secure', John Kerry
Re(6): 'Memorandum: The Real Experts on Iraq', Center for American Progress, Robert O. Boorstin
Re(7): 'Iraq Progress Report', Reason.com,
Re(8): 'Cutting and Running', AfterDowningStreet.org, Jonathan Schwarz
Re(9): 'Hawkish Democrat Joins Call For Pullout', WashingtonPost, Charles Babington
Re(10): 'Mawkish Murtha Quits Again...', BoghieOnYourSix, Me
Re(11): 'Pelosi: ‘Stay the Course’ Not a Strategy for Success in Iraq', Nancy Pelosi
Comment: There is more, but referencing fools is more of a job than I thought. This is the weekend...

So we have the lead…

Former managers and scouts are demanding the head of our team’s current manager. We have not scored enough runs, we got beat in the second inning, some of the relief pitching was not perfect, and we did not field more than nine players at a time in this, the game of summer… These managers despise the owner – who never seems to hire enough players or spend enough money quickly enough to guarantee victory in every inning of every game… These scouts despise the manager who did not give all their prospects and game strategy the respect obviously deserved… And, they all despise the manager who replaced them and their staffs after last season’s unexpected debacle; they would have done better if given another chance…

Had the current group of chumps done a bit better we surely would have forced a forfeit in the fifth inning – the skunk rule must be in effect!!! Winning by 11 at the end of an inning ends the game – right??? We don’t even know the score; our chumps in charge cannot even tell us the game score… But we know that we have not won any of the five innings played by 11 or more points. If so, the competition would have quit. They would have walked off the field, ended their season, and gone back to the jobs they held before they were ‘big league’ players. They are chumps, so we must be chumps. Everyone knows this game should have ended in the first inning – didn’t the owner promise that?

This is war..

Strategy baby…

It is time for a change…

We must win all innings and all games…

Losing an inning means losing all the games…

And, we know our competition is goobers and losers…
Some of us never thought we had to play, some of us think we have already won the game. However, there are morons out there that believe we have to play this thing through. Blah, the idiocy of that thought – ‘It is going to be hard work’… ‘Hard Work’… Blech…

We should forfeit this season, send our players back to the minor league, dominate those minor league games, and jump into a future season when we can win quickly… When the rules change… When we can SKUNK em!!!

THAT is a strategy!!!