Nothing New under the Sun

Harry Reid gets bitch-slapped...again:

Reid and the Democrats did their head-counting this afternoon, and thought they finally had a window of opportunity in order to declare rhetorical defeat in Iraq in the Webb troop rotation bill. The Democrats moved up the vote, tried to spring the anti-war trap, had one extra vote going in with the appearance of Tim Johnson, and got 56 votes, four short of what he needed. Reid got beat again. Instead of marching through the Carl Levin defeat bill, or any of the myriad of defeat bills he had hinted was coming earlier in the day, Reid retreated. As Joe Lieberman said to the media outside of the Senate chamber, the Webb amendment was the last chance of victory for the anti-Iraq crowd, and they lost.

Mitch McConnell is making a habit out of kicking Harry Reid's teeth in on the Senate floor. If it were a boxing match or even a staged wrestling event, they'd stop it.

Choose Victory

Not likely but NY Guardsman Jeff Nuding implores Congress in this withering piece:

Back in 2003, you — including both of my senators, Charles Schumer and Hillary Clinton — voted to authorize the President to take military action. You voted, and by virtue of your authority, that means the U.S. government went to war.

You approved the appointment of Gen. David Petraeus, who last week sat in front of your committees and explained the progress of the war and the difficulties of the way ahead. It was an honest and forthright assessment from a soldier who thinks the military can achieve our objectives and that the military can create the environment for real change in Iraq.

Critics seemed to tune him out even before he began. They seem to believe that this war has already been too long and too painful to continue. Sen. Clinton, you rejected Gen. Petraeus' testimony as a "positive view of a grim situation," stating that accepting his testimony at face value required a "willing suspension of disbelief."

I wonder if being a politician means knowing how to call your opponent an opportunist and a liar to his face, without ever stating it plain.

I voted for you in 2000. Could I take that vote back, the way you seem to want to take back your vote to authorize force?

My soldiers know about the long and painful costs of war. All of us left our civilian jobs for a year and a half, and left our families and loved ones behind. Some lost their families or their marriages, and some lost their grip on home or health.

Yet none of us in the military serve under any illusion. We know what we signed up for. That's why so many of us reenlist.

Wars take time. They require steady will and determination. They compel commitment.

If fighting Saddam Hussein, and later Al Qaeda, in Iraq was important when earlier in this mission, they should still be important today. Al Qaeda is badly wounded there and elsewhere, but they aren't dead yet. Iraq is making gains as a democratic nation, but they still need help.
They still need time.

Dear Senators and Representatives, you criticize President Bush relentlessly — picking apart the speech he gave last week with withering words, looking for any and every chance to bring him down.

But at least he maintains steady attention to this war. At least he seems to grasp the stakes of losing and the danger of giving up. Not so Congress.

Leaders influence the morale of their people, for good or bad. I wish you wanted to lead your constituents toward victory rather than defeat.

Bravo!

Speaking of video, Rudy scores a 10 with this web-ad.

Imagine, another Clinton acting out of political expediency. Who would have thought!?

Stupid Office Tricks

I presume that this video made the email circuit a few years back and so is not necessarily new and exciting. But it's funny and makes for a nice test of the new Video feature.

Buyer Beware

Did MoveOn.org get screwed? Maybe:

Discount explained:

The disastrous MoveOn ad in the New York Time calling General Petraeus "Betray Us":

Cooking the Books for the White House

New York Times editorial board:

...Pentagon numbers so obviously cooked...

But I think the real lesson here is for MoveOn: sure, you got a great discount, but if you'd waited a day you could have gotten the same message out for free.

My Senator in Action

Embarrassing...

You Voted for It

You wanted these clowns in control of Congress, so enjoy.

Irish Coffee

Liquor, coffee and whipped cream...what's not to love!?

Timing is Everything

Just as successes on the ground in Iraq are beginning to sink in with some of the Democratic hard-heads in Congress, Republican Senator John Warner shows us just how much you can accomplish by not paying attention.

From Newsweek: ...eyewitness reports from individual Democratic lawmakers who've recently visited Iraq appear to have changed the dynamic in the debate over the war. The Kansas City Star's "The Buzz," for example, reports Democratic Rep. Brian Baird "saw enough progress on the ground that he will no longer vote for binding withdrawal timelines." Rep. Jerry McNerney "suggested that his trip to Iraq made him more flexible in his search for a bipartisan accord on the war." Also changing his tune is Rep. Tim Mahoney of Florida, who says the troop increase 'has really made a difference and really has gotten al-Qaida on their heels.'" As the Washington Post says this morning, "Democratic leaders in Congress had planned to use August recess to raise the heat on Republicans to break with...Bush on the Iraq war." Instead, "Democrats have been forced to recalibrate their own message in the face of recent positive signs on the security front, increasingly focusing their criticisms on what those military gains have not achieved: reconciliation among Iraq's diverse political factions."

And here comes Warner: Sen. John Warner said Thursday President Bush should start bringing home some troops by Christmas to show the Baghdad government that the U.S. commitment in Iraq is not open-ended.

The move puts the prominent Republican at odds with the president, who says conditions on the ground should dictate deployments.

Warner, R-Va., said the troop withdrawals are needed because Iraqi leaders have failed to make substantial political progress, despite an influx of U.S. troops initiated by Bush earlier this year.

You're going the wrong-way Senator. Events on the ground are passing you by or have you not been reading the papers?

Retire already...

Break out the Asterisk

*Barry Bonds has done it. The Giants slugger hit his 756th career home run, setting the new all-time major league record.

Ick.

A Blown Opportunity

Barry Bonds left LA without tying Henry Aaron's home-run record. Under anything resembling normal circumstances I'd call that 'Mission Accomplished.'

The inherent irony of the whole thing was just too good...what a marvelous setting the Dodgers provided Barroid last night. Shamefully, he didn't deliver.

Commitment to Mediocrity

I'm not normally very big on sloganeering. But sometimes a good slogan just works.

I've reserved this in the past for the worst franchise in football. Today, however, I've been forced to conclude that the Minnesota Timberwolves have devised a new and exciting strategy to render themselves hopelessly mediocre for years to come.

Odd Duck

Scott Thomas has a real name.

For a guy who fancies himself some sort of creative genius, he didn't do a great job in creating a nome de guerre. It turns out that Scott is more accurately known as Scott Thomas Beauchamp, a private currently serving in Iraq.

He has a blog--one it seems that was only ever updated sporadically--and dreams of literary fame. He's also a bit odd, least as I can tell based on the digging of some others:

Michelle Malkin's thoughts on Scott are here, Dean Barnett's are here.

Bigger questions remain however, primarily awaiting answers from TNR. At least one blogger is reporting that our would-be Kerouac is married or about to marry a TNR staffer.

Which of course goes to exactly how Mr. Beauchamp got his gig. It still however, does not explain how TNR managed to publish three diaries with seemingly no (public anyway) corroboration of any of the supposed facts 'reported' from Baghdad.

Whatever becomes of it, as many point out, Mr. Beauchamp and his comrades may see some hard time(s). Were I a betting man, I'd wager a dishonorable discharge may be his best hope for how all this ends.

Rolling Deep

No fear of drowning in the depths of this 'Get out of Iraq' editorial.

Making Idiots Everywhere look Smart

This Democratic Congress is all about stunts. It's latest comes courtesy of Wisconsin's Russ Feingold who will introduce a resolution to censure the President for, among other things, assaulting the Constitution of the United States.

My first thought was, would it be possible to censure Feingold for assaulting our intelligence?

Shades of Rather

The New Republic published a pseudonymous piece this week that has caused quite a stir in the blogosphere. It appears that author "Scott Thomas" may have taken a page from our good friends at CBS with a tale that appears fake and inaccurate.

Michael Goldfarb at The Weekly Standard has done yeoman's work in compiling and asking questions about Thomas' story. His work, in turn, has led to numerous contributions from many in positions to know of what they speak.

Some of my favorite responses include but are not limited to the following:

Military units don't blatantly disregard orders- So, it's not just a story of one soldier dancing around with human remains. Rather, it's a story of an entire military unit and its command structure defying orders and forgetting one of the main reasons why they were there.

The author doesn't know the military- This came home to me in particular with the description of the alleged soldiers mocking a female burn victim. This might happen in a high school cafeteria, but not in a war zone where men risk this same fate on a daily basis, and have seen their buddies maimed and killed. I have never heard of service people making sport of the combat wounded.

Timing is everything- This was supposedly a Saddam-era mass grave, buried underground in a desert climate for years or even decades. The human remains purportedly included "bones" that were anatomically identifiable even in fragment form — tibias, shoulder blades, pieces of hands and fingers. And then the platoon discovered "the top part of a human skull, which was almost perfectly preserved."

Now imagine what that looks like — a "perfectly preserved" piece of human skull that has been buried for no fewer than five years and perhaps many more, deep in the ground in a desert climate and surrounded by bare bone fragments. Form a mental image.

As for me--like the active duty CO writes at the Worldwide Standard--it's almost something straight out of the movies. My initial reaction when I read it was that it easily could have been something adapted from the "Deleted Scenes" feature on the 20th Anniversary edition of Oliver Stone's autobiography.

Thomas' tales are just too much in lock-step with everything bad you've already ever heard about the US Military. Not to mention, it sounds like he doesn't know a thing about driving a Bradley...

Stupidity on Parade

It is Keith Olbermann after all...why would you expect anything different?

Taking Incompetence to new Heights

Mitch McConnell beat the hell out of Harry Reid this week; if it were a fight, they'd have stopped it.

Harry Reid: Ignorer-in-Chief

What does Harry Reid ignore when he tries to force-feed America the Levin-Reed amendment?

For starters, there's this which is perhaps the best hour of participatory radio ever. Then there's this and this.

Let's not forget this or this and this. And wanting to make as complete an argument as possible, let's absolutely not forget this:

Fifty-one percent (51%) of American voters say that the United States should wait for the September progress report before making major policy changes in Iraq. A Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 38% disagree.

Benchmarks are not Reality

Another note from yesteday's FNS telecast. Bill Kristol is right and Congress and Liberal pundits ignore the fluid nature of things in Iraq when the Levin's and Juan Williams' of the world tout their short-sided commitment to 'benchmarks' and time-tables:

KRISTOL: But you know, benchmarks are not reality. Reality is reality. And I do believe, despite the media, if reality continues to progress in Iraq itself, in the real war we're fighting in a real country called Iraq, with real provinces like Anbar, with real American troops going after Al Qaida -- if progress continues at the rate it has for the last two months or three months, I think that changes the political dynamics here, first of all.

And secondly, the Democrats have overreached. Mara is absolutely right. It's one thing to say, "Oh, we're tired of it. It's difficult. Let's get out." Really concretely, what are you going to do?

Are you going to let Al Qaida establish safe havens or not? How are we going to get out? Are we going to watch slaughter go on 10 miles away as we pull American troops into bases?

So I think the politics here, as people focus on what's happening on the ground and on the real choices in Iraq, could well change over the next two months.