A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention.
In the News: (Registration may be required to read some stories)
4 Marines Charged In Haditha Killings “Four U.S. Marines were charged with multiple counts of murder yesterday for their alleged roles in the deaths of two dozen civilians in the Iraqi town of Haditha last year. The accusations set up what could be the highest-profile atrocity prosecution to arise from the Iraq war.” (READ MORE)
Report Says TSA Violated Privacy Law “Secure Flight, the U.S. government's stalled program to screen domestic air passengers against terrorism watch lists, violated federal law during a crucial test phase, according to a report to be issued today by the Homeland Security Department's privacy office.” (READ MORE)
U.S., EU urge vote on Iran ban “The United States and European Union yesterday pushed for a U.N. Security Council vote as early as today on Iran sanctions, a diluted version that drops a U.S.-backed travel ban on Iranian nuclear officials in a bid to win Russian support.” (READ MORE)
Bush caved to pressure on troops “President Bush only acceded to a jump in the number of U.S. Army and Marine Corps ground troops after intense pressure from senior officers, active and retired, including the Joint Chiefs, defense sources said.” (READ MORE)
News From the Front:
David Ignatius writes Their Christmas At War “If you read soldiers' blogs you see a recurring anger that the media aren't telling their story. So I'll let a few of the military bloggers speak for themselves.” (READ MORE)
Bill Roggio writes Anbar Province and the Iraq Study Group Report - Iraqi Politicians and Tribal Sheihks are concerned about the implications of the Iraq Study Group report “The release of the Iraq Study Group report, a 79 point plan to address Iraq, created by a blue ribbon panel lead by former Secretary of State James Baker and Representative Lee Hamilton, has implications far beyond domestic U.S. politics. I've been asked numerous times how this report has effected the U.S. troops serving in Iraq. The answer is very little.” (READ MORE)
Acute Politics writes Iraqi Knickknacks “My platoon has a new ashtray: the remnants of an IED that someone tried to kill us with. The truck made it through a lot better than the IED did. It's the bottom half of a large shell, about six inches in diameter and maybe twelve or so high, with a jagged edge on top.” (READ MORE)
Half A World Away writes Christmas Poem “You may have seen this already, but thought I would post it on here in case you haven't. Merry Christmas! ‘Different Christmas Poem’” (READ MORE)
On the Web:
4 Mile Creek writes Stolen Valor “What is it with Lefties claiming military service that they don't have? Here's another one from Niagara Falls, I guess. He joins the hallowed ranks of Micah Wright, Jessie MacDeath and the many others who claim veteran status with no reason whatsoever to do so. Look at the photos from a march at any of the current batch of anti-Iraq War veterans groups, and you'll see at least a handful of marchers in DCUs who have the uniform so dicked up you know they can't possibly be veterans.” (READ MORE)
Burt Prelutsky writing at Townhall.com writes Will Jimmy Carter please just go away? “How is it that Jimmy Carter, that sanctimonious phony who was a disaster during his four years in the White House and a disgrace in the quarter of a century since, can pass himself off as equal parts statesman and saint?” (READ MORE)
Kathleen Parker writing at Townhall.com writes They call it 'Semper Fi' “It all started with a Marine major general's widow, who wanted to donate her wheelchair to a Marine who needed it.” (READ MORE)
Oliver North writing at Townhall.com writes Notes from a war diary: Part four “Our FOX News Team is aboard a U.S. Marine C-130 aircraft, departing Iraq, headed for Kuwait -- the eighth time we have left war-torn Mesopotamia this way.” (READ MORE)
Ed Feulner writing at Townhall.com writes U.N.der strain “Instead of reaffirming ‘fundamental human rights,’ the United Nations shelters the worst human-rights abusers. Faced with rape, pillage and nearly 200,000 deaths in Darfur, for example, the Security Council hasn’t acted to stop the violence.” (READ MORE)
Don Surber writes What a draft without loopholes might look like “The NY Sun reported that Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson said ‘our society would benefit from’ a military draft. He later clarified his remarks to say, well, he does not support a draft. But what he told the Sun was interesting ‘A military draft does bring people from all quarters of our society together.’” (READ MORE)
ShrinkWrapped writes Changing A Mind: Mission (Near) Impossible “For those of us who consider ourselves at war with Islamic fascism it is often extremely difficult to understand how our political opponents can fail to see what is so clear to us. At the same time, those who think that our invasion of Iraq was a terrible blunder in no way related to the war on terror are unable to understand why we don't see such obvious ‘facts’ as that Bush lied, and the war is all about oil, and terrorism is essentially a police problem to which a military response is inappropriate at best, and down right dangerous to us (by creating many more enemies than we can possibly kill) at worst.” (READ MORE)
Jules Crittenden writes Once Quite Chatty “AP Executive Editor Kathleen Carroll is now silent on the subject of Iraqi Police Capt. Jamil Hussein, Michelle Malkin has more on the apparent non-existence of Jamil/Jamail/Jamayl.” (READ MORE)
Chickenhawk Express writes The REAL Haditha - Reposted from June 2006 “In light of the travesty of justice committed against the Marines, I am reposting a piece about the REAL Haditha that I did back in June 2006. I can promise you the MSM will only present Haditha as a "restive" paradise prior to our Marines barging in...” (READ MORE)
Dan Riehl writes What Sandy Berger Tried To Hide “While all the details around the Sandy Berger document theft may not be known for years, thanks to the Internet, by re-visiting 2004, it is possible to draw some fairly strong conclusions as to what he was most likely trying to conceal. The central document in the controversy is The NSC's Millennium After Action Review.” (READ MORE)
Neptunus Lex writes Alan Dershowitz Picks on Decrepit Old Bigots “Jimmy Carter - who really should have stuck to building habitats for humanity - stuck his foot in the door recently, when he published the bizarrely titled, ‘Palestine Peace Not Apartheid.’ He claimed the book was intended to be deliberately provocative, in order to spur debate. Harvard law prof Alan Dershowitz threw the door wide open to accept the challenge. Carter told him, ‘No thanks.’” (READ MORE)
Greyhawk writes February, 2006 (Part I) “February, 2006 began with some relatively good news: ‘The death toll among U.S. troops in Iraq dropped back to average levels in December and January after a bloody autumn, and U.S. officials said on Tuesday insurgent attacks have been waning since October.’” (READ MORE)
Captain Ed writes Trusting Jezebel “The New York Times takes the extraordinary step today of offering its readers an op-ed column about an op-ed column. Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann wrote the original column about the Bush administration's failure to engage Iran after 9/11 when it appeared that the mullahcracy might be open to a general improvement in relations. However, when the two submitted the column to the CIA for national-security review, it came back with a heavy treatment of black ink:” (READ MORE)
Uncle Jimbo writing at Blackfive writes Dems consider votes against reinforcement “Some Democrats are looking at President Bush's likely plan to increase troop levels in Iraq as a good place to start being the opposition. ‘Mrs. Clinton said that she was disinclined to support an increase in troops to Iraq, even short-term. ‘I'm not going to believe this President again,’ she said.’” (READ MORE)
Dafydd writes Solvalogging: Jamil Hussein... Baghdad's Own Lieutenant Kije “…In a 1927 short story by Yury Tynyanov, a Russian general is reading a report to Czar Paul I; the czar mishears a word and thinks the general is talking about a "Lieutenant Kije," who sounds like a brave and brilliant fellow. Czar Paul demands to hear more about him.
As it is death to contradict the czar, the general makes up several wonderful missions and adventures of the entirely fictitious Lieutenant Kije.” (READ MORE)
Huntress writes TARGET DESTROYED: SHOCK IS KILLED “According to Keith Kelly of The NY Post: SHOCK IS OVER AND OUT. GONE. DEAD. ‘HFM has pulled the plug on that piece of trash SHOCK magazine that stole Mike Yon's iconic photo and then reneged on a settlement even before the ink was dry!’” (READ MORE)
DJ Drummond writing at Wizbang writes Debating a Dinosaur - Why George Will Doesn't Understand the Blogosphere “Every now and then, I make the mistake of reading one of George Will's columns. This is because George has a knack for finding interesting topics, which gets me to read, but he constantly proves his own bias and error in his columns, which causes the regret. On this occasion, Will started by taking on TIME magazine, for its narcissist trick to sell covers by appealing to the readers well-fed egos (link Courtesy of Real Clear Politics).” (READ MORE)
Rightwing Guy writes The IRA vs. Hezbollah/Hamas “Those of you who know me, know that I am extremely proud of my Irish heritage and wanted to talk about the IRA or the Irish Republican Army. For those of you who have no idea what the IRA is let me give you a little back round.” (READ MORE)
Celestial Junk writes A New Cold War? “The Left's favorite whipping boy on the ‘War on Terror,’ a term he dislikes: Set aside World War I and set aside World War II. Think more of the Cold War. At any given moment during the Cold War, which lasted 50 years, you couldn’t say if you were winning or losing. The Civil War, as well. There aren’t straight and smooth paths. There are bumpy roads. It’s difficult. (READ MORE)
Blonde Sagacity writes Imagine This... “...Right before the 9/11 Commission is about to commence, Condoleezza Rice goes and pulls classified documents. He sneaks them out in his socks and underpants. She stashes them under a construction trailer, then retrieves them and tries to light them on fire. She is unaware that people are watching her every move. When she is caught she tells the 9/11 Commission and the American people that they were only ‘copies’ and she didn't really destroy any...they're all there. And the left takes her at her word?” (READ MORE)
Tom the Redhunter writes New Plan for Iraq II “In a post earlier this week I predicted that there would be a shake-up in CENTCOM, that both Generals Abizaid and Casey would be replaced. It was reported yesterday in the LA Times that Abizaid would retire in March. However, the storys says that Abizaid made his decision a few months ago, so it was apparently not the result of any recent decisions to change strategy.” (READ MORE)
Have an interesting post or know of a "must read?" Then send a trackback here and let us all know about it. Or you can send me an email with a link to the post and I'll update the Recon.
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