March 21, 2007

Web Reconnaissance for 03/21/2007

A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention.


In the News: (Registration may be required to read some stories)
Bush to fight Democratic subpoenas “President Bush yesterday warned congressional Democrats that he would ‘oppose any attempt’ to subpoena White House officials involved in the firing of eight federal prosecutors last year.” (READ MORE)

District faces 3rd lawsuit over jail “The D.C. government has been hit with a third federal lawsuit that says the D.C. Jail was supposed to release an inmate after charges were dropped but instead kept the man incarcerated for weeks.” (READ MORE)

Muslims offer to help 'John Does' sued by imams “Lawyers and a Muslim group say they will defend at no cost airline passengers caught up in a lawsuit between a group of imams and U.S. Airways if the passengers are named as ‘John Does’ and sued for reporting suspicious behavior…” (READ MORE)

E-Mails Reveal Tumult In Firings and Aftermath “On the morning of Feb. 7, the day after a combative Senate hearing over the firings of eight U.S. attorneys, Deputy Attorney General Paul J. McNulty was looking on the bright side.” (READ MORE)

Watching Big Sister “It's the first viral attack ad of the 2008 presidential campaign: a clever idea, visually arresting images, the sound of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's voice and, all too fittingly in this YouTube age, an anonymous filmmaker.” (READ MORE)

U.N. Mediator Calls for Kosovo Independence “UNITED NATIONS, March 20 -- A senior U.N. mediator has proposed that U.N.-administered Kosovo be granted independence, setting the stage for a diplomatic showdown between Russia and the West over the fate of Serbia's troubled ethnic Albanian province.” (READ MORE)

Senate Bill Would Mandate Disclosure of Data Mining “The Justice Department is opposing bipartisan Senate legislation that would require federal agencies to disclose to Congress data-mining programs they use to find patterns of criminal or terrorist activity, saying that it duplicates a reporting requirement mandated in the 2006 renewal of the USA...” (READ MORE)

For Gaza, a Question of Responsibility “GAZA CITY -- The Israeli government is arguing in domestic courts that it no longer occupies the Gaza Strip, a designation that under international law holds the Jewish state responsible for the welfare of Gaza's 1.4 million Palestinians.” (READ MORE)


From the Front:
Acute Politics: Muj Weather “The day we traveled back to Falluja last week was a nice day. The sun was shining, and there was just the slightest wisp of a breeze. The LT gave his mission brief behind the vehicles to a circle of men in tan jumpsuits and blue-grey ACUs. He finished, and asked for comments, questions, or additions.” (READ MORE)

Badger 6: 20 Minutes “It's a beautiful day here in Iraq. It started out cool, but as the sun rose in the sky it warmed up very nicely. I estimate that in the sun, by 1530 it was between 80 and 85 degrees. It's a little warm in ACU's and boots, but would be just perfect in shorts, a t-shirt, and some sandals. My best excuse to put on shorts and a t-shirt? Resuming a physical training regime with a 20 minute run around the FOB.” (READ MORE)

Michael J. Totten: A New Power Rises in Iraq “ERBIL, IRAQ – What a difference a year makes. Fourteen months ago I flew to Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan, from Beirut, Lebanon, on the dubiously named Flying Carpet Airlines. Flying Carpet’s entire fleet is one small noisy plane with propellers, cramped seats, and thin cabin pressure. Only nineteen passengers joined me on that once-a-week flight. Everyone but me was a Lebanese businessman.” (READ MORE)

Bill Ardonlino: Iraq Not (Quite) a Civil War? (UPDATED) “Allahpundit digs into the internals of a poll that reveals ‘49% of [Iraqis] questioned preferred life under Nouri al-Maliki the prime minister, to living under Saddam’, and that ‘only 27% believed they were caught up in a civil war.’ When I was in Baghdad and Fallujah, conversations with Iraqis, as well as exposure to (some) Shiites and Sunnis intermingling without incident (admittedly anecdotal), led me to suspect that while bloody sectarian conflict is now significant, it's not an accurate overall description of Iraqi society.” (READ MORE)

Omar: Tribes and police kill 39 terrorists in Anbar. “The Al-bu Issa tribes in Amiriyat al-Fallujah, backed by local police and the MNF, clashed today with members of the al-Qaeda linked ‘Islamic State in Iraq’ terror organization, according to al-Hurra TV. The battles that are still ongoing have so far left 39 terrorists killed including the ‘ministers of oil and war’ of the terror organization. Six policemen and 11 tribal fighters were also killed during the fighting.” (READ MORE)


On the Web:
Atlas Shrugs: A terrible day for Bloggers “Sandmonkey chatted on me earlier from Egypt. It seems the police kidnapped two Egyptian bloggers off the streets of Cairo earlier today. Just like that. I am sure it doesn't help that the convicted Egyptian blogger’s sentence was upheld yesterday (convicted of insulting Islam.)” (READ MORE)

Sandmonkey: Bunch of monkeys “That's the best description I could give to the Egyptian MP's and their behavior during the sessions to approve the President's constitutional Fiasco amendments. The following examples reported by Egyptian newspapers. I am not making any of this stuff up:” (READ MORE)

The Belmont Club: The Thai Insurgency “Zachary Abuza at the Counterterrorism Blog notes that rather than calming down after recent political developments, the Thai insurgency has flared up with renewed ferocity. ‘More than 2,100 people have been killed in 38 months, and the government has proven completely incapable of responding to the situation and stemming the violence. That has given the insurgents considerable momentum, and caused a greater number of moderate Muslim civilians to be more supportive of the insurgents.’” (READ MORE)

Dafydd: Imperial Congress Summons Its Subjects “Alone among all the issues that divide Congress, there is one that unites them all -- Republican and Democrat, Right and Left, conservative and liberal, good hair and bad hair: They uniformly agree that Congress should be the preeminent branch of government, and the other two branches mere appendages whose only function is to implement the decrees from the Capitol Dome... and be quick about it! Accordingly, Congress demands that close advisors to President George W. Bush scurry over and take their seats for the ‘show trials’ to come:” (READ MORE)

Blue Crab Boulevard: I Have Got To Get A New Dictionary “I keep looking up the word muzzled or stifled or silenced and I never, ever seem to get this definition anywhere I look. A NASA scientist claims he was muzzled because he was only allowed to give 1,400 interviews. On company time, in the past few years. 1,400. In a few years time.” (READ MORE)

Captain Ed: But Will They Stop Taking His Money? “George Soros wrote an article for the New York Review of Books that attacked the US for its pro-Israeli policies. The Democratic Party underwriter made clear that he felt the US should start dealing directly with Hamas, despite its existence as a terrorist organization, and complained about the influence of AIPAC. That created a problem for Barack Obama, who has received support from Soros, as well as many other Democrats:” (READ MORE)

Crazy Politico: Moonbats in Brew Town “Sunday night somewhere between 20 and 30 (depending on who's numbers) folks showed up at a Milwaukee Army recruiting office to ‘peacefully protest the war in Iraq’. Evidently peaceful protests include smashing windows, spray painting graffiti, and smearing human excrement on the building.” (READ MORE)

Don Surber: Bush cleans up the Gonzales mess “President Bush read Congress the riot act in a press conference that just finished. Rather than work on new legislation — fulfill those 100-hour promises of Grandma Pelosi (minimum wage is still $5.15 an hour) — congressional Democrats have decided to spend the next 2 years chasing rabbits down the holes in their quest for the liberal Secular Grail: Watergate. ‘Today’s scandal is that the Bush administration wants to replace 8 assistant attorney generals. Bush appointed them. He can fire them.’” (READ MORE)

Bill Roggio: Red-on-red in Waziristan “A rare case of internecine fighting between the Taliban and 'foreign fighters' has broken out in South Waziristan. On March 6, it was reported that ‘Uzbeks of Tahir Yuldashev's Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan and some local supporters’ attacked a pro-government tribal leader in a bazaar in South Waziristan. Seventeen Uzbeks were said to have been killed in the fight. This initial skirmish has morphed into a full scale battle between the Taliban and the Uzbeks, backed by some local Taliban supporters. Over the past 2 days, 58 have been reported killed during fighting, including 42 Uzbek fighters. Another 27 Uzbeks have been captured.” (READ MORE)

Baron Bodissey: The Effete Versus the Peons “When I was at the Eagles’ gathering last Saturday, I stood for a while with some of the Rolling Thunder guys while they screened people who wanted to enter the walkway that led to the Vietnam War Memorial. The first time I saw one of the vets turn away a protester at the checkpoint, I asked him, 'What are you doing, screening out the moonbats?' 'Well,' he replied, 'let’s just say ‘the college-educated'.'” (READ MORE)

Bryan Preston: NASA Shocker: Climate change might be caused by the Sun “Interesting stuff: ‘Long-term climate records are a key to understanding how Earth’s climate changed in the past and how it may change in the future. Direct measurements of light energy emitted by the sun, taken by satellites and other modern scientific techniques, suggest variations in the sun’s activity influence Earth’s long-term climate. However, there were no measured climate records of this type until the relatively recent scientific past.’” (READ MORE)

Michelle Malkin: Witness to a US soldier effigy burning “Jason at Shock and Blog took a closer look at the flag-burning and US soldier effigy-burning party in Portland. He writes: ‘I haven't seen anyone pointing this out yet. They're brainwashing the next generation of troop-haters:’”(READ MORE)

Kat in MO: Terrorists Use Kidnapped Children In Homicide Car Bombing and A Lesson From Fly Over Country “Two reports came up almost simultaneously that seem unrelated, but should be the next expectation in the terrorists' escalation of heinous war crimes. Via Mudville Gazette, Iraq Slogger points out what appears to be a positive story about Sunni Tribesmen fighting off would be kidnappers of a village child.” (READ MORE)

Neptunus Lex: Leadership “Sh!t hot: ‘Rules of engagement (ROE), highly criticized as being too restrictive and sometimes endangering our troops, have been ‘clarified.’ ‘There were unintended consequences with ROE for too long,’ Petraeus acknowledged. Because of what junior leaders perceived as too harsh punishment meted out to troops acting in the heat of battle, the ROE issued from the top commanders were second-guessed and made more restrictive by some on the ground. The end result was unnecessary - even harmful - restrictions placed on the troops in contact with the enemy.’” (READ MORE)

Greyhawk: Getting Porked '07b “Here's a great example of a story making it's way from the back pages of newspapers to blogs and then back to the mainstream media again - and hopefully it will keep going. Ten days ago I noticed (and shared) an obscure AP story detailing some of the $20 billion in pork Democrats had added to the bill to fund the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.” (READ MORE)

Lt Col P: The Reserves: Their Present and Their Future “This came across my desk the other day-- a CBO report titled, The Effects of Reserve Call-ups on Civilian Employers. It's almost two years old, but the points it raises are still valid, and possibly more so. It made me think of some of the larger reserve issues in this war, and how the reserves and Guard are probably going to have to be re-structured to meet the challenge of a 50- or 100-year war.” (READ MORE)

Patterico: Pat Leahy on Executive Privilege — From the Clinton Years! “Sen. Pat Leahy, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, 2007, wants subpoenas issued relating to a recent action taken by the President of the United States. Sen. Leahy wants witnesses to testify. And he wants it now: But the Pat Leahy of 1999 — when one Bill Clinton was President — was much more cautious about issuing subpoenas and compelling testimony.” (READ MORE)

McQ: The Pending House Iraq Supplemental Spending Bill “The fault lines among the House Democrats is becoming more and more evident as they attempt to form a majority of 218 votes to pass their Iraq bill. Interestingly, opposition is coming from the two extremes of the party. On the one hand the ‘Out of Iraq Now’ caucus led by Maxine Waters is planning to vote ‘no’ and many of the Blue Dog Dems are planning to vote ‘no’ but for vastly different reasons. (If you’re interested in looking at the bill, it’s available here, but be warned, it’s a 6MB pdf.)” (READ MORE)

Tom - The Redhunter: On Target “I'm not typically one to refight old battles. What's done is done. We invaded Iraq and we are there. Whether it was right or not is pretty much irrelevant. I'm interested in what we do next. But today I'll make an exception. I thought that yesterday's piece by Christopher Hitchens in Slate titled ‘So, Mr. Hitchens, Weren't You Wrong About Iraq?’ was dead spot on. As such, I'm simply going to reprint part of it here. When Hitch is on, he's on.” (READ MORE)

Rhymes with Right: Pelosi Seeks To Punish Democrat Dissent On War “It doesn't matter what is good for the country or the belief of their constituents -- Nancy Pelosi is threatening to punish Democrats who don't vote her way on the funding bill for the Iraq War. ‘Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is holding the implied threat of lost committee seats over the heads of Democratic Caucus members who may vote against her $124 billion Iraq war supplemental bill.’” (READ MORE)

ROFA-Six: WWI - Why? “On 22 Feb 2007, America lost her last combat veteran of World War I. He was the last living veteran who had seen combat ‘over there’. Unlike the majority of veterans of WWI, he was not drafted, but volunteered to serve in the Army. Corporal Howard Ramsey arrived in France two months before the war ended. He served as a driver delivering supplies to the front line units and evacuating wounded to the rear. After the Armistice, he spent 7 months recovering the remains of dead Americans from the battlefields in France. The news of his death got me wondering, ‘Why did America enter WWI?’” (READ MORE)

John Hawkins: Gallup: Congress Is Polling As Poorly Now As The Republican Controlled Congress Did In October Of 2006 “It looks like the honeymoon between the American people and the Democratic Party in Congress is most definitely over: ‘The modest uptick in approval of the job being done by Congress has dissipated for the most part after only two months. Congress job approval had risen over the last two months after the Democrats took over control of Congress in early January…’” (READ MORE)

Jay Tea: They don't know Jack “Recently, Hillary Clinton caught a bit of flak after comparing herself to President Kennedy. Other candidates have also made comparisons, and it occurred to me that it might be entertaining to take a look at some aspects of our 35th president -- and which current candidates might best embody them. Of course, I'm no Kennedy scholar (after all, I was born almost four years after he died), but I've read a bit about the man, so I figure why not?” (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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