A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day...so check back often.
In the News: (Registration may be required to read some stories)
Jose Padilla Makes Bad Law - The apparently conventional ending to Jose Padilla's trial last week -- conviction on charges of conspiring to commit violence abroad and providing material assistance to a terrorist organization -- gives only the coldest of comfort to anyone concerned about how our legal system deals with the threat he and his co-conspirators represent. (READ MORE)
Over the Wall - Beijing's Communist Party isn't keen on giving up power over its citizens. So Monday's announcement that Chinese investors can now buy foreign stocks is a big vote of confidence in individual freedom. If Senators Chuck Schumer and Lindsey Graham and other China-bashers really care about creating a stable, healthy global economy -- and a freer China -- they will cheer this move. (READ MORE)
Brits on Venezuelan Dole - Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has found a British business partner in the mayor of London, Ken Livingstone. Mr. Chávez is doling out $32 million, which is supposed to allow a 50% cut in bus ... (READ MORE)
GOP Immigration Meltdown - Are Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani competing for the Republican Presidential nomination, or for the job of vacation replacement for Lou Dobbs? It's hard to tell these days as the candidates attempt to one-up each other's anti-immigration rhetoric. (READ MORE)
Tenet's Pre-9/11 Efforts Faulted - Former central intelligence director George J. Tenet and his top lieutenants failed to marshal sufficient resources and provide the strategic planning needed to counter the threat of terrorism in the years before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, according to a long-secret CIA report... (READ MORE)
Bush Vows Anti-Drug Aid for Mexico - President Bush on Tuesday pledged to develop a robust aid package to help Mexico battle that country's murderous drug cartels, saying that the two neighbors must join forces to confront "a common problem," the illegal drug trade. (READ MORE)
Bush Turns Up Heat on Maliki - President Bush pointedly declined Tuesday to offer a public endorsement of embattled Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, expressing his disappointment at the lack of political progress in Iraq ... (READ MORE)
Al-Qaeda Suspect Released by Pakistan - An al-Qaeda operative suspected of involvement in plots targeting the United States and Britain spent more than two years in a secret prison run by Pakistan's spy agencies before he was released, a human rights group said Tuesday. (READ MORE)
14 U.S. Troops Die in Helicopter Crash in Iraq - A U.S. Army helicopter crashed north of Baghdad early Wednesday morning, killing all 14 soldiers onboard, the military said. A statement from the U.S. military said initial evidence indicates the UH-60 Blackhawk experienced mechanical failure and that it did not come under enemy fire. However, the cause of the crash is under investigation, the military said. (READ MORE)
Democrats Refocus Message on Iraq After Military Gains - Democratic leaders in Congress had planned to use August recess to raise the heat on Republicans to break with President 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. (READ MORE)
Bush Denies Superstate Rumours - President Bush and the leaders of Canada and Mexico yesterday ridiculed the notion that their countries are conspiring to create a regional supergovernment similar to the European Union. (READ MORE)
Sunni Leaders Gain by Working with U.S. - Iraq's Sunni tribal leaders, marginalized after the fall of Saddam Hussein, are enjoying a resurgence of power and influence, Iraqis and U.S. military commanders say. (READ MORE)
CAIR Concedes Membership Down - The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) says it's suffering a decline in membership and fundraising and blames the Justice Department for listing it as an unindicted co-conspirator in a Texas case against a charity accused of ties to terrorists. (READ MORE)
Fears of Bird Flu Pandemic Subside - Researchers have discovered numerous changes a flu virus likely would have to make in order to spread as a human pandemic, but so far it seems the avian-flu virus has made just a few of those changes. (READ MORE)
Obama: No Military Solution in Iraq - Democrat Barack Obama said Tuesday the recent increase in American troops in Iraq may well have helped tamp down violence, but he insisted there is no military solution to the country's problems and U.S. forces should be redeployed soon. (READ MORE)
From the Front:
Northern Disclosure: Imagine how he will treat us! - First I need to open with the news of a new Bad Voo Doo Dependant. Micheal Francis Gabriel Ranada was born last week. He is the first child of our Ranada and all of us within the Bad Voo Doo Family wish him and his wife Megan the best. Micheal stayed here with us so his wife has been alone during this time so we also want to recognize her for being an amazing woman and wife to congratulate her on everything. Speaking of wives....... (READ MORE)
Jason's Iraq Vacation: More, Please - I'm starting to notice that my time in between posts is slowly drifting apart. This isn't intentional; I have just been extremely frustrated and I am trying to take a step back before blasting my frustration into the blog and turning it into a wordy bitch session. That being said, I need to write about a conversation I had with my Iraqi counterpart this past morning. (READ MORE)
SGT Dan Mills: Shrapnel Tore Through Enemy - The Mehdi Army launched their attack at midday on the dot — just as the August sun burned the hottest — with sniper fire from a dozen different old town rooftops first, swiftly followed by a heavy mortar barrage. I legged it up the stairs to the roof — manned by my sniper platoon. Just as I reached the roof door, the steady thumping of Top Sangar’s General Purpose Machine Gun above me opened up. I burst out on to the roof to feel the crack and snaps in the air as bullets zipped past splitting the atmosphere around them. (READ MORE)
Michael Yon: The Ghosts of Anbar Part One: The Paradox of Counterinsurgency - (Anbar Province June, 2007) Iraq and this part of the world are complicated in the way, and by the way, that dysfunction always is “complicated.” Worse, in this labyrinth of history, where recent rumors have as much cache as ancient myths, facts fade quickly into mirage, granting mistakes and missteps a kind of perverse permanence. Fertile ground for paradoxes. Our Anbar-war can be said to have begun after the invasion in 2003, and for most of its duration, Fallujah has been the crucible Anbar city. (READ MORE)
On the Web:
Jon Sanders: Goldilocks and the Three Dems - John Edwards, fresh from admitting he didn't know Cuba's healthcare system was government-run, was featured in an Aug. 19 interview by Liz Halloran in U.S. News & World Report. Among other questions, Halloran asked Edwards if his campaign had moved from an emotional appeal to a "more cerebral, issues-oriented approach." (READ MORE)
John Stossel: Why the U.S. Ranks Low on WHO's Health-Care Study - The New York Times recently declared "the disturbing truth ... that ... the United States is a laggard not a leader in providing good medical care." (READ MORE)
Walter E. Williams: Liberal Views, Black Victims - Last year, among the nation's 10 largest cities, Philadelphia had the highest murder rate with 406 victims. This year could easily top last year's with 240 murders so far. (READ MORE)
Ben Shapiro: What Goes Around Comes Around, Hillary - Michelle Obama's statements made her the second Democratic candidate's wife to act as attack dog during this election cycle. (READ MORE)
Michelle Malkin: Beltway-itis: When Politicians Attack - Everything you hate about the culture of Washington is symbolized in two recent altercations involving two obnoxious Beltway buttinskis, one Democrat and one Republican. (READ MORE)
Ken Blackwell: Democrats Bet on Losing - Democrats are now playing with fire when it comes to Iraq. The Iraq War may have helped the Democrats win Congress in 2006, but now developments both in Iraq and here at home are putting the Democrats -- and especially Hillary Clinton -- in a position where they might try to redefine "victory" and "defeat" to help their political fortunes at the expense of our national interest, to our nation's shame. (READ MORE)
Austin Bay: Preparing for the Hard Facts of Hurricanes - For decades, states in America's hurricane belt have run hurricane response exercises, so the Debbie exercise isn't a direct result of Katrina's disaster. (READ MORE)
Jacob Sullum: Jose Padilla's Trial Was Not So Swift, and Neither Was He. - People who knew Jose Padilla before he was sent to a Navy brig in 2002 say he emerged a different man after three and a half years of isolation and interrogation. (READ MORE)
Jerry Bowyer: Harry Potter and the Great Relearning - "Harry Potter books are really, really cool. I really like them; they're just so neat." So, says, Susan Bowyer (age 44) as she sits next to me reading Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. It's a long train ride, but she doesn't mind, because she's searching for buried treasure. As we glide along the trails towards Pittsburgh, she periodically looks up from her book to make an observation. (READ MORE)
Rich Lowry: The lamentable Edwards campaign - Francois de La Rochefoucauld had a point when he said, in his frequently quoted formulation, that hypocrisy is the tribute that vice pays to virtue. In the case of John Edwards, however, hypocrisy is simply a way of life. (READ MORE)
Caroline B. Glick: Our World: Israel's reeducation minister - Education Minister Yuli Tamir has been much in the news. Two weeks ago she went on a well-publicized visit to authoritarian Singapore to learn the secret of its school system's success. (READ MORE)
WSJ Opinion & Review: The Partisan Worldview - Last week I wrote an essay analyzing the legacy of Karl Rove. My argument was that one of Mr. Rove's biggest problems--and indeed a major failure of this White House--was the failure to do all that could be down to control his and his boss' image. I received more than a few emails in response to the essay. Many of them echoed the thoughts of this emailer: (READ MORE)
Bill Ardolino: Stringers and Scarce Reporters - A Mother Jones article indicates that there's still a reporting shortage in Iraq: “No official tally of reporters on the ground exists, but a head count of American print correspondents, not including wire service scribes or freelancers, caps out at around 20.” Why? “Borzou Daragahi, the former Los Angeles Times Baghdad bureau chief, says he can easily count 20 times when he thought he was going to die. And every reporter who's spent time in Iraq has had close calls with ieds or insurgents.” It's important to note that there are varying degrees of risk. Embeds take calculated, manageable risks, whereas foreign journalists who operate independently outside the wire assume unacceptable risks. (READ MORE)
Baron Bodissey: The Criminalization of Peaceful Protest - Yesterday the Brussels Journal posted translated excerpts from an op-ed piece by Freddy Thielemans, the mayor of Brussels. “I decided to forbid the September 11 demonstration “against the islamicisation of Europe.” […] Since 2001 I have allowed over 3,500 demonstrations. This is only the sixth one which I forbid. […] The right to demonstrate exists only inasmuch as it does not cause a disturbance of the public peace and order. […] First and foremost the organizers have chosen the symbolic date of 9/11. The intention is obviously to [conflate] the terrorist activities of Muslim extremists on the one hand and Islam as a religion and all Muslims on the other hand…” (READ MORE)
Jules Crittenden: Heaven vs. Hell - Thomas Sowell at RCP on progressives vs. progress: “Progress in general seems to hold little interest for people who call themselves ‘progressives.’ What arouses them are denunciations of social failures and accusations of wrong-doing. One wonders what they would do in heaven.” (READ MORE)
Allahpundit: Paramount, Hasbro wonder: Is it time for G.I. Joe to go AWOL? - They’ve got a movie to make and merchandise to move, and global audiences aren’t in the mood for a hero from the U.S. military. A hero from an American paramilitary organization, though, dedicated to fighting the evil nonexistent scourge of Cobra? That’s a little more palatable. They’re weighing their options as we speak. (READ MORE)
Don Surber: Surge-ery - On Feb. 17th, every single Democratic senator (except the hospitalized Tim Johnson) voted for cloture on S. 574 which stated: “Congress disapproves of the decision of President George W. Bush announced on January 10, 2007, to deploy more than 20,000 additional United States combat troops to Iraq.” (READ MORE)
Cassy Fiano: Have you seen these men? - The FBI is asking for your help in locating either of these two men: They were last seen in Washington, acting strangely on a ferry: “The FBI is asking for the public's help to identify two men who have been seen acting strangely aboard Washington State ferries recently. According to federal agents, passengers have seen the men on several occasions exhibiting unusual behavior. The FBI did not say precisely what that unusual behavior entailed.” (READ MORE)
Ed Morrissey: Democrats Miscalculate On Iraq - Democrats figured that the August recess would give them plenty of opportunity to raise the heat on Republicans to force a withdrawal date from Iraq. They could return to their home districts, stoke some demonstrations, and return with new momentum after Labor Day to push for retreat. Unfortunately, events have intervened, and now Democrats have to regroup to avoid looking like defeatists while the military effort has started producing successes: (READ MORE)
Big Dog: Liberals Read While Conservatives Work to Support Them - Extreme liberal and former member of Congress Pat Schroeder responded to a poll that indicated those who consider themselves liberal read more books than those who consider themselves conservative. I can not comment on that poll because I do not know anything about the methodology or how scientific the study was. I can say that I read a great number of books every year as does my wife and neither of us are liberal. Schroeder though, chimed in that the reason for this is that people like Karl Rove have made conservatives only live for slogans and that slogans do not make great books. (READ MORE)
Dafydd: Actual News, For a Change: France to Mediate in Iraq? - One serendipitous benefit of the recent regime change in la Belle France is that LBF no longer reflexively launches a "Chirac attack" against anything American. Until former French President "Crock" Jacques Chirac departed, making way for Nicolas Sarkozy -- who is not America-phobic -- France refused to have anything to do with post-invasion Iraq. Under Chirac, France was a close friend and partner in corruption with Saddam Hussein, protecting him from American sanctions and invasions and such in exchange for billions in oil leases. (READ MORE)
The Counterterrorism Blog: HLF Overseas Speakers Dominated by Hamas - Officials at the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) have long maintained that they have no relationship with Hamas, a specially designated terrorist group. But HLF’s own list of speakers from abroad, seized by federal agents in 2001, is a veritable roster of Hamas leaders and activists. In a Dallas courtroom Tuesday, FBI Special Agent Robert Miranda told jurors in HLF’s terror support trial how he used telephone records and other information to cement more than three dozen HLF “overseas speakers” to Hamas. “This is an organization that’s all about money,” Miranda said of HLF. “Who’s raising it for them?” (READ MORE)
Flopping Aces: A Further Indictment Against The Clinton Administration - Lots of noise being made about this long awaited report released today by the CIA. It's a 19 page summary from the Inspector General in which the many mistakes by the CIA are outlined. Mistakes which ultimately led to al-Qaeda being successful on 9/11. Much of the blame is heaped on the former CIA director George Tenet: “Former CIA Director George Tenet did not marshal his agency's resources to respond to the recognized threat posed by al-Qaeda before the Sept. 11 attacks, the agency's inspector general concluded in a long-classified report released today.” (READ MORE)
Bill Roggio: Iraq Report: Sadr's Denial - Muqtada al Sadr, the leader of the Mahdi Army militia, has been on the defensive over two recent reports in the media. Just one day after Britain's Independent published excerpts of an interview with Sadr, Sheikh Ahmed al-Shibani, Sadr's spokesman in Najaf, claimed the interview never happened. "The interview published by the paper was fabricated and groundless. His Eminence (Sadr) has never granted this paper any interviews," (READ MORE)
Jihad Watch: "Radical Islam’s war with the West is not finite and limited to political grievances — real or imagined — but is existential, transcending time and space and deeply rooted in faith” - Here is a review of an essential new book that lays bare the jihadists' motivations and goals in their own words: Raymond Ibrahim's The Al-Qaeda Reader. There is no way we can resist and contain the jihadists, and stave off the Islamization of the West, without understanding how they recruit, the power of their appeal in the Islamic world, and the ways they explain what they are doing and why. This books cuts through the PC nonsense that still dominates the public discourse in the West and illuminates all that like no other book ever has. (READ MORE)
Neocon Express: Save us from Christiane Amanpour and her “God’s Warriors” - So I caught Christiane Amanpour’s ‘God’s Warriors’ on CNN. Tonight was “Jewish Warrior” night and it was one of the most pathetic pieces of biased ‘journalism” that I have ever witness, with the possible exception of the kind of stuff you will find on Al Jazeera on a bad day. Amanpour seemed extremely desperate to prove a moral equivalency between a few hundred Israeli kooks who live on the far fringes of Israeli society, and the international Muslim Jihad of the 9/11 sort. She delved into every incident of “Jews-behaving-badly” since the beginning of time. It was such a stretch that at one point I literally burst out in laughing. At other points I truly felt embarrassed for pour Amanpour. With all of the “bad Jews” incidents cited over the decades, it amounted to the equivalent of about 30 seconds of the International Muslim Jihad. I suspect that she will try to pull the same moral equivalency stunt on “Christian Warriors” in the next few episodes of this sorry TV epic. (READ MORE)
Neptunus Lex: There are three kinds of lies - Lies, damned lies and statistics. I do not know who predicted this NYT headline, come Judgement Day, “World to End Tomorrow, Poor to Suffer Most,” but their faith in the Gray Lady must once again have been restored. In an article purporting to show that the average US income for most people had dropped in the first five years of the Bush presidency (as contrasted to the final throes of the dot com bubble) in an article whose headline had to be later softened up, Times journalist David Cay Johnson Johnston managed to choose his data points rather carefully. (READ MORE)
PSYOP COP @ OPFOR: Iranian PSYOP?? - I’ve been keeping an eye on the news concerning Iran and the Kurdish region in northern Iraq. It seems that the Iranians are trying to take care of some business on their side of the border reference the Kurds. It only reinforces my opinion that we should give the Kurds their nation and help them foment trouble in northern Iran and Syria, while leveraging them hard to lay off of claims in Turkey. I believe it can be done. As Crapgame said in “Kelly’s Heroes,”: “Make him a deal… a DEAL deal. Who knows… maybe the guy’s a Republican.”. (READ MORE)
Political Pistachio: Yet another reason not to watch FOX's "24" - and yet another mid-week Political Pistachio Radio! - Do you remember when "24", FOX's hit show starring Kiefer Sutherland as Jack Bauer, went green? In short, "24" decided to do whatever it could to offset it's carbon footprint. Apparently, the mind-control advocates of Global Warming shoved a hybrid up. . . anyway. Some folks believe that the current warming trend of our planet is destroying the world. Many actually believe that we are causing this change in the climate, as well. I suppose they wish us to believe that if we change enough lightbulbs into compact flourescent bulbs, drive hybrids, and pray to Al Gore and Michael Moore, we might just be able to avert the climate tragedy on the sun-drenched horizon. (READ MORE)
Scott Johnson: UnCAIRing - The ongoing federal prosecution of the Holy Land Foundation is receiving almost no coverage in the mainstream media, though it has been full of newsworthy revelations. Among the intensely interesting items to come out of the trial is the brief filed by CAIR seeking to strike the government's list of unindicted co-conspirators in the case. This morning NRO has posted "Coming clean about CAIR," a column collecting my thoughts on CAIR's brief. Having read the brief, I was struck, among other things, by how comletely the New York Times missed its newsworthy elements in Neil MacFarquhar's pathetic story on the subject. In any event, please check out the column. (READ MORE)
Right Truth: Sadr's Interview, the Brits, Secret US plot to kill Al-Sadr, and Iraqi Biometric Database - Today the Independent is reporting that Muqtada al-Sadr says "The British are retreating from Basra." "The British have given-up and they know they will be leaving Iraq soon," Mr Sadr said. "They are retreating because of the resistance they have faced. Without that, they would have stayed for much longer, there is no doubt." Sadr's comments came during "two separate meetings with The Independent at the Sadr movement's headquarters in Kufa." (READ MORE)
ROFASix: President to Use "Killing Fields" Rationale for Iraq - Later today President Bush will address the Veterans of Foreign Wars annual convention in Kansas City, Mo. Excerpts of his speech have been released that remind listeners that if the troops leave Iraq, it will turn into a bloodbath there. It probably will. The problem with this rationale is that in terms of US national security it probably doesn't matter if Iraq turns into a bloodbath or not. Will the US be complicit in all the deaths that follow - absolutely. It's what happens when a superpower engages in imperialistic attempt at imposing democracy. But that is the wrong question. What we should be asking is whether the US has a national security interest in how Iraq turns out? (READ MORE)
John Hawkins: The HuffPo Post Of The Day: Is Jenna Bush's Marriage A Bush Family Evil Empire Scheme? - It's no big surprise anymore when liberals politicize funerals, but who knew that they looked at weddings through exactly the sames lens? From the Huffington Post, here's Peggy Drexler on Jenna Bush's upcoming marriage, “Here's to the Happy Couple -- and a 10 Point Bump: Jenna Bush and Henry Hager plan to marry. And there is already buzz of a spectacular White House wedding that will gather society, power and politics around these two cute kids.” (READ MORE)
Orin Kerr: A Possible Way to Get a Supreme Court Ruling on the Constitutionality of FISA: - One frustrating aspect of debates on Presidential power and Article II is that it's so hard to get such questions squarely answered by the courts. The executive is normally in the position of choosing whether to make an Article II argument, and it can simply decline to make the argument. But I wonder — does the Protect America Act change that? I may be way off, but it seems to me that the Protect America act just might give private parties a way to raise the constitutionality of FISA all the way up to the Supreme Court. (READ MORE)
Little Green Footballs: Let's Give Them More Training - The “moderate” terrorists of Fatah boast openly that training provided by the US has helped them enormously in their goal of murdering Israelis: Fatah Militant: U.S. Training Was Key to Intifada’s Success. So, of course, we’re going to provide them with more training. "American-run programs that train Fatah militias were instrumental in the 'success' of the Palestinian intifada that began in 2000, a senior Fatah militant told The New York Sun." (READ MORE)
Dadmanly: A Little Exaggeration? - Sarah at Trying to Grok links to a Newsweek/MSNBC article on a soldier’s homecoming. Sarah picks up on a highly suspect factual statement (Fabulism ala Beauchamp) hidden in the reunion piece. But I found something else that seemed a bit exaggerated, too. Allison Samuels writes of her 24 year old cousin returning from a tour in Iraq, her family’s anxieties in her absence, and relief with her safe return home. Here’s how she introduces us to her ordeal – not her cousin’s, but Samuels: (READ MORE)
Confederate Yankee: A Sorry State of Affairs - I don't normally read Jonathan Chait and know little about him. I don't know what role he normally plays at The New Republic, or what role he may or may not have played in the magazine's latest fabulism scandal. What I do know of Chait is that his attack on William Kristol this morning is written with the obvious intent of distracting TNR readers from the editors' compromised ethics by attacking an ideological opposite. (READ MORE)
The Tygrrr Express: For liberalism, success requires failure - One of the many conundrums about liberalism is that it requires failure to be successful. This goes beyond the War in Iraq, although that can be a starting point. It goes to the core of what liberalism is, that being a philosophy that requires problems and misery to survive. Starting with the War in Iraq, liberals need the USA to lose in Iraq. I am not going to question the patriotism of American liberals. I am sure many of them truly believe that their solutions are noble. However, their view on Iraq is destructive. (READ MORE)
Dan Riehl: You Cannot "Desperately" Support The Troops - All I could think after reading the quote below from Armed Services Committee member Rep. Ellen O. Tauscher (D-Calif.) via the WaPo , was how terrifically sad it is that such a person serves on said committee at all. She could have used many words - intensely, incredibly, immensely, etc. But she didn't. She chose desperately and without going through the various definitions of the word, if you believe that language is an important indicator of the way we view and think about the world, you're all but forced to conclude she and her liberal colleagues like Speaker Pelosi don't genuinely support the troops at all. They are simply desperate to appear supportive because of their fear of having their genuine sentiments exposed. (READ MORE)
Joe Talley: The Surge: Gunners on Patrol - Forward Operating Base Loyalty, Baghdad, Iraq: The signs of war are never far from the men and women of the 2nd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, currently stationed at Forward Operating Base Loyalty in eastern Baghdad. Yesterday at lunch, a sergeant entered the building yelling, "ATTENTION IN THE CHOW HALL! ATTENTION IN THE CHOW HALL!" This is usually a command given when a high profile visitor such as a General or someone of similar distinction arrives in the building. Instantly, everyone seated stops eating, and everyone standing moves to the position of attention in military precision. (READ MORE)
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