A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention.
In the News: (Registration may be required to read some stories)
Congress Passes Deadline-Free War Funding Bill - Congress sent President Bush a new Iraq funding bill yesterday that lacked troop withdrawal deadlines demanded by liberal Democrats, but party leaders vowed it was only a temporary setback in their efforts to bring home American troops. (READ MORE)
Books Paint Critical Portraits of Clinton - Two new books on Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York offer fresh and often critical portraits of the Democratic presidential candidate that depict a tortured relationship with her husband and her past and challenge the image she has presented on the campaign trail. (READ MORE)
Army and Air Force Deny Formal Links To Christian Event - After complaints by a government watchdog group, the Air Force and the Army partially distanced themselves yesterday from a three-day evangelical Christian event this weekend at a Georgia theme park. (READ MORE)
Fallujah Bombing Targets Mourners of Tribal Figure -A lethal suicide car bombing Thursday in the restive city of Fallujah, west of Baghdad, was meant to undermine and intimidate tribal leaders who have aligned against the Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq, local officials said. (READ MORE)
Congress OKs war bill sans timeline - Both chambers of Congress yesterday passed a $120 billion war-funding bill without troop-withdrawal timetables for Iraq, ending a 108-day standoff with the White House as Democrats forfeited demands for a pullout. (READ MORE)
Senate keeps guest-worker program - The Senate yesterday approved a path to citizenship for illegal aliens, beating back an attempt to remove it from the "grand bargain" immigration bill. (READ MORE)
Deadline looms on unsettled oil issue - Iraq's proposed oil law, a key U.S. benchmark for political progress, remains in sharp dispute one week before the government's self-imposed deadline for passage, and some say it could create more divisions in the fractured country. (READ MORE)
Bush seeks harsher sanctions on Iran - President Bush yesterday demanded much tougher sanctions against Iran, which the United Nations' nuclear watchdog agency says will be capable of building an atomic bomb in as little as three years. (READ MORE)
From the Front:
LTC Rich Phillips: Week 18--And the Beat Goes On.... “Well, unless the war ends soon it looks like it will be a long summer. There appears to be no shortage of sick and injured in this part of Afghanistan. The days are long, but morale at the hospital is high. Even with everything that is going on, it is hard to blog every week.” (READ MORE)
Desert Flier: Ramadi all-nighters “1:06AM brings a loud rap on our door ‘11 in-bound. Mikes unknown’. Knocking the fuzz out of my head as we all stumble and hop around the room putting our uniforms back on. Hopping around on one foot, I avoid a collision with D squared just as someone flips the lights on.” (READ MORE)
The Calm Before The Sand: The Desert “117. In the shade. That's Fahrenheit, for those of you just tuning in. It's been murderously hot, and getting hotter. The sun casts its hard eye down on everything, and as I walk around post, I swear I can feel the plant life dying. In heat like this, even your skin feels like a bulky sweater; a hot, oppressive thing you can't wait to pull off. And sometimes, you're just crazy enough to try.” (READ MORE)
Omar: Coup Panic “Fear from coups and implied threats with coups have been a common feature of the political scene in Iraq. After the formation of Maliki's government with all the rifts inside the major political blocs that accompanied that stage, the political map became quite complex that groups within the same bloc were sometimes thought to be conspiring against each other. At the center of most coup rumors was almost always the Iraqi List and its leader Ayad Allawi.” (READ MORE)
Daveed Gartenstein-Ross: Baghdad: Patrolling Yarmouk “On May 23 and 24, I went on a couple of evening patrols in Baghdad's Yarmouk administrative district. I went with a platoon from the U.S. Army's 2nd Brigade, 32nd Field Artillery, with which I am embedded; they are working with the 2nd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division while in Iraq. The battalion of which 2-32 is a part is responsible for a large section of northwest Baghdad, which includes a couple of districts that have been hot lately, Kadamiyah and Mansour. But the districts that 2-32 patrols -- Yarmouk and Hateen -- are relatively quiet. The most dangerous aspect of patrols in those districts is the drive to reach them.” (READ MORE)
On the Web:
Quid Nimis: Xenophobia: As American As Apple Pie “Bob Novak carries the standard this week for the "Come On Down!" Republican crowd. I really like Bob's political analyses, but I am so tired of the disingenuous, tired, half-baked comparisons to the past. Take this quote:” (READ MORE)
Mike Gallagher: Me, A Bigot? “I never enjoy arguing or disagreeing with fellow conservatives, especially someone as smart and likeable as Hugh Hewitt. I figure I’ve got my hands full enough by sparring with pesky liberals than to find fault with a like-minded colleague.” (READ MORE)
Rebecca Hagelin: Ripping the lid off a secret immigration deal “I was seated at a conference table with 31 of the brightest, most analytical and highly principled people I've ever known as we dissected and analyzed various ripple effects of the Senate’s devastating immigration-reform proposal.” (READ MORE)
Burt Prelutsky: What I want to be when I grow up “There are two jobs I often find myself daydreaming about. One of them is being a radio talk show host. The other is being president of the United States.” (READ MORE)
Lorie Byrd: Republicans should follow Elisabeth Hasselbeck's example “Earlier this week on the The View, token conservative Elisabeth Hasselbeck spoke up so forcefully that Rosie O’Donnell resorted to playing the ‘big, fat lesbian’ victim card. There are more than a few Republicans who should take a lesson from Hasselbeck.” (READ MORE)
Diana West: America must not ignore a dangerous percentage “Funny how small 26 percent sounds when it describes, for example, the number of American voters who support the Senate's mass-amnesty, goody-bag bill for illegal aliens.” (READ MORE)
Kathleen Parker: Peering through a glass half-full, darkly “If there are 7 million Muslims in the U.S., 30 percent of whom are young, 31 percent of whom do not forswear suicide bombings, then that could mean that as many as 651,000 young Muslim Americans sympathize with radical Islam and terrorism.” (READ MORE)
Marvin Olasky: Memorial Day, 2007: Why We Fight “Memorial Day is a time to remember soldiers who gave their lives and some non-combatant heroes as well, such as Michael Kelly.” (READ MORE)
Oliver North: Never Forget “Back in the early 1950s, when I was a kid, we called it ‘Decoration Day.’ Early in the morning of May 30, the Boy Scouts placed little American flags on the graves of those who had served in wars past.” (READ MORE)
Patrick J. Buchanan: Why Congress Caved to Bush “The antiwar Democrats are crying betrayal -- and justifiably so. For a Democratic Congress is now voting to fully fund the war in Iraq, as demanded by President Bush, and without any timetable for a U.S. troop withdrawal.” (READ MORE)
Hugh Hewitt: What Will The Jihadists Do? Apply For Their 601(h) Probationary Status, Of Course “In a series of stunning and timely articles for the San Antonio Express News which ought to earn him and his paper a Pulitzer, reporter Todd Bensman has detailed the conclusions of a many months long investigation into the illegal entry across our southern and northern borders by men and women from the 43 "countries of interest" in the world known to harbor terrorist networks.” (READ MORE)
Peter Wehner: John Edwards's irresponsible and revealing address “John Edwards: ‘The core of this presidency has been a political doctrine that George Bush calls the 'Global War on Terror.' He has used this doctrine like a sledgehammer to justify the worst abuses and biggest mistakes of his administration... The war on terror is a slogan designed only for politics, not a strategy to make America safe. It's a bumper sticker, not a plan...’” (READ MORE)
Tawfik Hamid: How to End 'Islamophobia' “Islamic organizations regularly accuse non-Muslims of ‘Islamophobia,’ a fear and disdain for everything Islamic. On May 17, this accusation bubbled up again as foreign ministers from the Organization of the Islamic Conference called Islamophobia ‘the worst form of terrorism.’ These ministers also warned, according to the Arab News, that this form of discrimination would cause millions of Muslims in Western countries, ‘many of whom were already underprivileged,’ to be ‘further alienated.’” (READ MORE)
Peggy Noonan: Slow Down and Absorb “Why do people want to come here? Same reasons as a hundred years ago. For a job. For opportunity. To rise. To be in a place where one generation you can be a bathroom attendant at a Brooklyn store and the next your boy can be the star of ‘Ted Mack's Amateur Hour,’ with everyone in the neighborhood listening on the radio, or, today, ‘American Idol,’ with everyone watching and a million-dollar contract in the wings. To be in a place of weird magic where the lightning strikes. Boom: You got the job in the restaurant. Crack: Now you're the manager. Boom: You've got a mortgage, you have a home.” (READ MORE)
Kimberly A. Strassell: Mission: Possible “If there's a smarter guy in Washington right now than Sen. Chuck Schumer, Republicans haven't noticed. The New York Democrat is doggedly working to dismantle what's left of the Bush presidency, with barely an ounce of pushback from the other side. Mr. Schumer was the instigator of the Democrats' probe into the firing of eight U.S. attorneys, although note that the question of who fired which prosecutor is already yesterday's news.” (READ MORE)
Ian: (Video) Boehner gets emotional during Iraq war funding debate “House minority leader John Boehner was brought to the brink of tears this evening during debate in the House over the Iraq spending bill, which eventually passed, 280-142. CNN reports: ‘I didn’t come here to be a congressman — I came here to do something,’” (READ MORE)
Allahpundit: Lefty embed to Dems: Troops want to fight on; Update: House passes Iraq spending bill, sans timetable; Update: Senate passes bill “It’s Spencer Ackerman, formerly a war supporter and contributor to TNR, now a war opponent and embed in Iraq for The American Prospect. Sectarian killings are on the rise again, the public has further soured on the mission, and according to Ackerman, “nothing in Iraq worth fighting for remains achievable, and nothing achievable in Iraq remains worth fighting for.” (Not even preventing ethnic cleansing?) So he agrees with the Dems that it’s time to stop the war. He just wants them to stop pretending that they’re doing what they’re doing to help the troops, because as it turns out, most of the troops don’t want that kind of ‘help.’” (READ MORE)
Kevin Aylward: Economic Whopper Of The Day “I've long since passed the point when anything that comes out of a congressman's (or congresswoman's) mouth surprises me, but this evening I saw something that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand-up straight. Regarding passage of an increase in the federal minimum wage to $7.25, a committee chairman who allegedly understands this stuff uttered the following: ‘This is a great day for America's middle class,’” (READ MORE)
Jay Tea: Kill Jews, kill each other, but don't kill the job! “Several years ago, I had a friend who was a very devout libertarian. He was also fond of pointing out that the Department of Agriculture produces not one whit of food, much like the Department of Education teaches no children, the Department of Energy produces no power, and the Department of Commerce sells nothing. The essence of any government job can be summed up in four single words: Don't Kill The Job. Do your job, but under no circumstances finish anything, because then there won't be funding for that next year, and once you finish your task, you could be fired -- along with everyone else who works with you.” (READ MORE)
Ron Winter: President Bush Issues Wake Up Call; Will America Listen? “President Bush's commencement speech at the Coast Guard Academy graduation Wednesday revealed a litany of planned terrorist attacks on the US that have been intercepted and defused before they could be executed. Information in the speech included some that is newly declassified that gave a broad and sobering view of the intensity of ongoing Al Qaeda efforts to again breach the defenses of the United States and again unleash horror on our citizens. These include bombings, repeated use of aircraft to attack buildings and people, and efforts to poison the water supplies of our major cities.” (READ MORE)
Stop the ACLU: 16-Year Old Girl Denied Bail for “God Hates Fags” Flyer “Two girls were arrested in McHenry County, Illinois last week for distributing flyers at their school that depicted a male classmate kissing another classmate and had the words ‘God Hates Fags’ on the flyers. The two were charged with disorderly conduct and felony hate crimes. As can be expected, debate has been generated on the wisdom of hate crimes laws, debate that's not confined solely to the right. Even gay sites are not entirely behind the arrest and charging of these girls for a minor stunt. The ACLU, predictably, said it indicates the struggle between protecting targeted groups and free speech, which apparently means hate speech directed at whites, Christians, or men is a-ok in the ACLU's book.” (READ MORE)
ShrinkWrapped: The Vietnam Syndrome Revisited “The New York Sun reminds us today that when the anti-war Democrats, riding into power on the back of Watergate, finally cut off funding for the South Vietnamese, there were no American combat troops remaining in South Vietnam. Nixon's Vietnamization had been successful and the South Vietnamese, allies of the United States, and an imperfect capitalist democracy, were holding their own against the North Vietnamese communists. The Sun editorial lays out the Timeline of Defeat and asks crucial questions:” (READ MORE)
Right Wing Nut House: Obamania! Is He The Liberal Reagan? “Andrew Sullivan went and saw Obama yesterday and reports that this ‘agent of change’ may be the liberal’s answer to Ronald Reagan. Sully may be on to something here. Last Saturday, in one of my more depressing posts, I said that ‘It smelled like 1979’ all over again and that all the political stars seemed to be positioning themselves for an historic re-alignment. This isn’t news to people who follow politics, of course. But in the course of explaining why I thought the prognosticators may be right about the possibility of overturning the established order, I said this:” (READ MORE)
The Redhunter: Edwards Shows His Colors “One thing that amazes me about the anti-war left is that they tend to assume that all of our intelligence findings about the enemy must be made public, and that anything that is not public doesn't exist. The have no understanding that so much happens behind the scenes, things that won't and shouldn't be made public for dozens of years. The public actions officials take are but the tip of the iceberg, and the public sees only a bit of what is going on.” (READ MORE)
Dale Franks: More Dialog “Well, Oliver Willis was quick with a response. It’s nice to see that we can have a civil discussion on things about which we don’t agree. A couple of larger points in your response leap out at me. You repeatedly make statements like ‘Our forces in Iraq are being killed to the tune of about 100 a month’, ‘sticking around in Iraq and getting killed’, ‘not getting killed every day’, and ‘troops shouldn’t be killed’. Well, I hate to sound cruel here, but, speaking as a former career NCO in line units, some troops getting killed is the price of admission to the party. They are—like I was—volunteering to do the job they do. They willingly take the risks required to do it. The thing about serving in a line unit is that not being killed really isn’t on the top of your priorities. Completing the mission of the day is. Not getting killed, admittedly, runs a very, very, very close second, though.” (READ MORE)
Bear Creek Ledger: Al-Qaeda Torture Manual “This should be required reading for all those Senators in D.C. who seem to think putting panties on the heads of Al Qaeda prisoners is torture. Treating these animals as though they are signators of the Geneva Convention is beyond ridiculous or that the US to not use water-boarding as an interrogation tool will prevent these animals from torturing our soldiers if captured is delusional. Amnesty International might also want to take note!” (READ MORE)
The Belmont Club: Torture and the Meaning of Words “The Smoking Gun describes the instructions contained in an al-Qaeda torture manual found by US troops in a raid on a safe house in Iraq. (Warning graphic drawings) In a recent raid on an al-Qaeda safe house in Iraq, U.S. military officials recovered an assortment of crude drawings depicting torture methods like ‘blowtorch to the skin’ and ‘eye removal.’ Along with the images, which you'll find on the following pages, soldiers seized various torture implements, like meat cleavers, whips, and wire cutters. What? No humiliating body searches by women or the disrepectful handling of Korans?” (READ MORE)
Dafydd: Bowing to the Inevitable “Big Lizards -- and a whole lot of other folks -- has said repeatedly that, in the end, the Democrats would have to give President Bush the money he needs to keep fighting the war against global jihad... and give it to him without timetables for surrender, without absurd and bogus ‘readiness rules’ that would prevent fresh units from replacing combat-weary veterans, and without 535 ‘little generals’ issuing tactical commands to the troops in the field. (We tried that last during the Civil War, but it was fewer than 535 back then. Still didn't work.) The Democrats, for their part, swore that they would never, ever pass such funding without a timeline for withdrawal -- a date certain for American defeat. Well...” (READ MORE)
Chickenhawk Express: A Marine Investigation That I Can Support “Every time there is an anti-war rally, march, die-in, puke-in etc. you can find several protesters dressed in official military uniforms. The ones in uniform usually claim to have served in Iraq or Afghanistan. While some are truly vets, others are obvious posers. The uniforms are typically defaced with IVAW slogans or logos done in black marker. The tops are unbuttoned to show off the latest protest t-shirt. Medals and ribbons are usually in plentiful supply as a sign of ‘real service’.” (READ MORE)
Flopping Aces: More Debunking Of The Global Warming Hysteria “A new study released this week by the National Center for Policy Analysis, ‘Climate Science: Climate Change and Its Impacts’, is taking the Environazi's to task once again. Here is an editorial from the WSJ which breaks it down a bit: ‘It concludes that "the science does not support claims of drastic increases in global temperatures over the 21rst century, nor does it support claims of human influence on weather events and other secondary effects of climate change.’” (READ MORE)
Fortress of Solitude: The obscene profits of "Big Oil" “Here we go again. Our legislators in Washington are pandering to the stupidity of the American public. Because our populous is so despicably uneducated about basic economic principles, politicians put forth bills like the one the House passed yesterday. By a vote of 281 to 141 the House of Representatives passed The Federal Price Gouging Protection Act, an anti-price gouging bill targeted at the evil oil companies who are charging “unconscionably excessive” prices. Friends, if you believe that our current gas prices are due to record oil company profits or price fixing at the hands of ‘Big Oil,’ then you have fallen into the trap that politicians have set for you.” (READ MORE)
Bill Roggio: Al Qaeda strikes a funeral in Fallujah “Al Qaeda's war against the Sunni alliance of the Anbar Salvation Council continues in the eastern region of Anbar province. Today, an al Qaeda suicide car bomber successfully attacked the funeral procession of a man killed earlier in the day. "That man was identified as Allawi al-Isawi, a businessman who was reportedly involved in a Sunni Arab alliance working against al-Qaeda fighters in Fallujah," Adnkronos reported. Twenty-seven mourners were killed and over 30 wounded, according to the report.” (READ MORE)
Jules Crittenden: Whither War “Bush is on the air re faceoff with Iran, vote Iraq. Here’s a quick round up of some thinking, reporting on the subject: Dem hopefuls face key vote. This should be entertaining. Joe Klein takes a good news/bad news look at Iraq, notes the successes that so many are loath to acknowledge, and includes the money quote of the year from an American official: ‘How many Srebrenicas do you have a stomach for?’” (READ MORE)
Major Pain: America Doesn't Forget! “As Memorial Day approaches, don’t look back on Tuesday and go “I wish I would have done this or that”. Do something special this Memorial Day that recognizes those who have gone before us to make a difference. Don’t look at it as a chance to have a three day weekend to go camping but a special day to acknowledge those who help America what it is today. Below is a post I wrote a time back. Hope you enjoy it and especially this Memorial Day. Semper Fidelis and God Bless America! This Memorial Day is the first one I have been home at since I deployed to Afghanistan for 8 mos, then Iraq for a year. A lot has happened in that time, to me, my family and my fellow Marines but I haven’t forgotten.” (READ MORE)
John Noonan: Arkin Redux “He's baaaaack. And hitting the milbloggers. Hard. ‘I've been wanting to write about the 2nd Annual MilBlog conference (I wasn't invited), and did write earlier about the brouhaha over the Pentagon's supposed new restrictions regarding blogging.’ FYI, the journalists who covered the conference (NPR, CNN, WaPo, Fox News, etc) attended on their own initiative. No one was ‘invited,’ which makes me wonder why Arkin felt he merited a special invitation.” (READ MORE)
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