Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, who retired in 2006 after being replaced in Iraq after the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal, blamed the Bush administration for a "catastrophically flawed, unrealistically optimistic war plan" and denounced the current addition of American forces as a "desperate" move that would not achieve long-term stability.
"After more than four years of fighting, America continues its desperate struggle in Iraq without any concerted effort to devise a strategy that will achieve victory in that war-torn country or in the greater conflict against extremism," General Sanchez said at a gathering of military reporters and editors in Arlington, Va.
It will be amusing to see how the Limbaughs, Coulters, Malkins, and Foxies of the world spin this one.
The Times' feeble effort -- to imply that Sanchez was responsible for Abu Ghraib and was somehow punished for it by being replaced -- is bush league (no pun intended) compared to what the real pros are capable of.
Just when you thought our beloved president, a k a The Decider, a k a Commander Guy, couldn't sink any further into complete blithering idiothood, he surprises you.
With the apparent approval of his handlers, Bush seems to have decided that the only way to rally support for his policy of doing precisely the wrong thing and doing it with unprecedented incompetence is to tell us all that he has been a miserable failure at what should be his main job -- keeping us safe.
To hear Bush tell it, we are no safer now than we were on September 12, 2001. If anything, we are in even deeper doo-doo, unable to protect ourselves from a rag tag bunch of smelly little [insert favorite racist epithet here].
We should be scared shi spitless, according to Bush, which according to his logic just proves that he's on the right track.
Given his tendency to botch familiar old sayings, it's probably just as well that he didn't try to channel another great "War President," It probably would have come out, "All we got to fear is fear itself. So let's get busy and fear it. I mean, it's all we got."
And who in the White House thought it was a good idea to toss in a little hurricane imagery? We're in the eye of the storm, Bush says. And as anyone who watches TV weather reports knows, that means that the whirlwind is mere hours away. But don't worry! We know that the government will leap to our aid when the hurricane destroys our community. Oh... Wait a minute...
For lagniappe, we were also treated to the profoundly depressing spectacle of seeing how the despicable Ayman al-Zawahiri is able to play our clueless president like Br'er Rabbit played the Wolf.
It's all put me into a decidedly Brechtian mood. Show me the way to the next whisky bar.
Joe Lieberman apparently won't be satisfied until everyone in Washington hates his guts. His latest effort to carve out a niche that only he can occupy is to propose a war tax.
Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut proposed a "war on terrorism tax" at a Senate hearing during which he said the Pentagon's $622 billion defense budget proposal for fiscal 2008 threatened to crowd out funds for domestic programs.
The lawmaker, a former Democrat turned independent, favors a U.S. troop buildup in Iraq.
Bush traveled to Manassas, Virginia, to deliver the opposite message about the budget he submitted to the Democrat-controlled Congress on Monday.
Give the man some credit. At least he is drawing attention to something other politicians have been loathe to mention: the fact that Bush's wanton military spending spree is having disastrous consequences for the nation's financial security.
Of course, there were no specifics forthcoming and heaven forfend that he should suggest taxing the super rich and the war profiteers (which would be the logical, not to mention the morally correct place to start).
It will be amusing to see how long it takes Bush to ask for his Class Ring back from his favorite Democrat. or ex-Democrat as the article cited and an increasing number of news outlets are pointing out. And how eager will Republicans be to wrap their arms around Holy Joe now that he has offended their true God -- Mammon?
On a more practical level, it might just be that the one thing that can shake the enthusiasm of the radical right for the neocon tragedy unfolding in the Middle East is the specter that it could cost them a few pennies that could otherwise be spent on yet more luxuries. If Lieberman's suggestion helps that notion sink in, we may have something to thank him for.
PRESIDENT BUSH: Well, there's a lot of strong opinions about it. My attitude is - my feeling to the Senate echoes what Joe Lieberman said the other day - Senator Joe Lieberman - and that is it is ironic that the Senate would vote 81 to nothing to send a general into Iraq who believes he needs more troops to do the job and then send a contradictory message.
You war junkies in the New Haven area may want to check out a conference at Yale called "War, Documentary and Iraq" running from Feb 1 to 4.
During the conference, we will screen a number of groundbreaking and award winning documentary works, including Deborah Scranton's The War Tapes (2006), Bassam Haddad's About Baghdad (2004), Andrew Berends' The Blood of My Brother (2005), Jon Alpert and Matthew O'Neill's Baghdad ER (2006), and producer Kerry Cadaele's Iraq for Sale (2006). These filmmakers will introduce their films and participant in post-screening Q&As and panel sessions.
As far as I can tell, the conference and the screenings are open to the public and free.
No great surprises here, but it's nice to see that Ned is keeping his hand in.
Lamont, in his first public speech since his defeat in the November general election to U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman, took issue with President Bush's decision to embark on this "new strategy" in Iraq. He spoke to hundreds of members of Yale's Political Union.
"It's the same strategy, just with a few more troops," he said in regard to President Bush's proposed "surge" in troop levels. "It's more of the same, and it's not working."
Other interesting tidbits:
Lamont also declared that he still might have more to do in the public arena, possibly as consultant for an independent policy institute with the means to contribute to policy discussions at the state level, where he has found innovations occurring. Citing the examples of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California and Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, he said, "States are the labs of creative thinking."
With 2008's presidential election not too distant, Lamont voiced his support for Sen. Chris Dodd, whose announcement ceremony he attended.
Americans did not hear the words they most wanted from President Bush in his State of the Union speech to Congress and the nation last night: some sort of assurance by the commander in chief that U.S. forces would come home from the unraveling conflict in Iraq sooner rather than later.
Instead, we were given, as expected, another sales pitch on behalf of the increasingly isolated and unpopular president's plan to escalate U.S. involvement in the Iraqi civil war.
The Jewish Daily Forward reveals that Ariel Sharon had some sage advice for George Bush in the run up to the Iraq war, advice that was totally ignored, which is not too surprising. Sharon might have done better had he buttonholed Joe Lieberman and tried to talk some sense into him.
There has been a spate of excellent Diaries concerning Bush's urge to surge, the cost of war, and some ways in which we can act, at the local level, to protest in a dignified, democratic, yet forceful manner.
Connecticut Man1 alerts us to a Dodd bill to cap U.S. trooop levels at 132,000. A good start? Wimpery at its finest? We link, you decide.
Wayne speaks of the cost of the war at the local level. For The Coalition for Peace and Justice he has created a series of eloquent flyers in handy PDF form that spell out the cost of the war, town by town. Here's the one for my home town of Branford, a cool $89.5 million! Check out your town via the CPJ link above, print up a batch and hand them out to your local politicos.
Finally, joesaho points us to an interesting initiative for a nationwide grassroots response to the madness of George W.
The Progressive States Network is offering a draft Resolution that can be introduced in state legislatures across the land. My suggestion: copy and paste, edit it to insert "Connecticut" where appropriate, and send it to your state senator and assemblyperson along with a stern note urging them to introduce it on the floor of their respective chambers.
To make it even easier, I have provided such an edited version below the fold.
Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, who said Sunday that he hoped President Bush "wouldn't abide by" any congressional decision to cut off funding for new Iraqi troops, clarified his view Monday by saying that if such a law were adopted, the president should go along with it.
"I believe it would be a dangerous mistake to cut off funds to our troops while they are fighting to achieve their mission," Lieberman, an independent, said in a statement Monday. "I strongly support the President's new strategy for success and hope he will resist a cutoff of funds, including a veto of legislation that might be passed blocking funding to implement that strategy."
"However, if a law was adopted blocking funding over his veto objection, which I hope and believe will not happen - of course, the President would be obligated to comply with it," he said.
"New strategy for success"?? He's not angling for a cabinet post. He wants Rove's job.
Finally someone calls out George Bush's favorite Democrat senator on his nonsense.
I almost threw a brick into my television this morning listening to the junior seantor as he puckered his lips and make Presidefnt Bush proud.
Good ol' Holy Joe went back to the "Dick Cheney well of scare tactics" by ONCE AGAIN linking 9/11 and Iraq (who's STILL buying that line), criticizing anyone who disagrees with the President (which would be a majority of the public), and claiming the other Iraq proposals "retreat" and "defeat" (a.k.a. cut and run).
Ironically, it took a Republican to do something that the Democrats should've done a long time ago...put the former DINOboy in his place.
New Haven Register columnist Randall Beach has a good idea about how the will of the people regarding Bush's disastrous course of action in Iraq can be carried forward.
Since Lieberman is still smooching it up with Bush, I thought of another New Haven-based legislator who might fight for the wishes of New Haven area people on this issue.
I thought about her after reading New York Times columnist Bob Herbert declare: "There must be a leader somewhere who can shake the U.S. out of this tragic hypnotic state, who can see that it is beyond crazy to continue our involvement in this war indefinitely, to sacrifice another 1,000 young lives, and then another thousand after that."
And I thought of her again when I recently read that she entered this into the Congressional Record after the death last year of her predecessor in the 3rd District, U.S. Rep. Robert Giaimo: "Serving during a time of great upheaval in this country, it was Bob Giaimo who led the first successful effort to end funds for the fighting in Southeast Asia."
Yes, now it's time for U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-3, to step up. She should help lead the charge to cut off funds for continued fighting by U.S. troops in Iraq.
Hear! Hear! C'mon Rosa, you know you're everyone's favorite to become the next senator from Connecticut. ('Bout time we had an Italian in the upper house!) Here's your chance to show you've got the right stuff.
And while I'm at it, let me renew my request that you become the first Connecticut legislator to introduce legislation stripping FERC of its dictatorial powers thus returning to the people of Connecticut their inalienable right to make their own decisions about their environmental future.
mcjoan at DailyKos has a neat dissection of Joe Lieberman's recent bloviating on Iraq, including the full text of his recent statement and this intriguing parenthetical comment...
Yes, never forget that in Joe's world with his tortured vision of bipartisanship (which one suspects consists primarily of seeing himself as John McCain's running mate in '08) supporting The Escalater and all of his harebrained schemes is paramount.
Perhaps trying to live down his recent Wanker of the Day award, Brian Lockhart has an article in today's Stamford Advocate detailing Joe Lieberman's lies about Iraq.
In a July 6 debate with Lamont, Lieberman said he was "confident that the situation is improving enough on the ground that by the end of this year, we will begin to draw down significant numbers of American troops."
In the same debate, he said he expected more than half of the troops in Iraq would be home by the end of 2007.
After losing the Democratic primary to Lamont and forming his own party running as an independent Democrat, Lieberman outlined a 10-point plan for Iraq in which he called for increasing the number of U.S. troops embedded in Iraqi units two- or three-fold. But he said this should be done by redeploying existing troops "not adding new troops to the region."
A supporter of the Iraq war, Lieberman and U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., after a December trip to the Middle East, began calling for an increase of about 24,000 troops.
In an interview Sunday with The Advocate, Lieberman said, "There should not be any shock about the position I'm taking now," saying he had been consistent throughout the campaign.
The "last honest man" has spoken. The reality-based community can now sit down and shut up.
With even some of its most ardent proponents telling us that Bush's Nixonian escalation "surge" in Iraq will result in an immediate upswing in U.S. casualties, Joe Lieberman is saying, "Oh what the heck. Let us have some fun. What's the worst that could happen? A few more thousand dead? BFD. None of them will be my kids."
Over the weekend, I caught a snippet of CSPAN's coverage of the McCain/Lieberman "surge" party at the American Enterprise Institute. . . .Lieberman was praising Bush as a "great leader" for bucking American opinion, as expressed in the 2006 election, in his determination to double down in Iraq. Lieberman then said something incredible:
Even those opposed to the surge, he said, "ought to at least let us try it."
"The worst that could happen," he continued, is that this policy could become another partisan flashpoint in Washington.
The man's callous disregard for the price other people's families will have to pay for his warmongering leaves me gobsmacked. Anyone else want to have a go?
In less than four years, the war in Iraq has cost the lives of at least 3,000 American troops. With the military's announcement Sunday of the deaths of two soldiers in recent days, the tally blurred past like a highway milepost, a true statistic for only a moment in time. The war goes on, and deaths continue.
FULL DISCLOSURE: No Liebermans were harmed in the prosecution of this war.
There will be no victory or defeat for the United States in Iraq. These terms do not reflect the reality of what is going to happen there. The future of Iraq was always going to be determined by the Iraqis -- not the Americans.
Iraq is not a prize to be won or lost. It is part of the ongoing global struggle against instability, brutality, intolerance, extremism and terrorism. There will be no military victory or military solution for Iraq. Former secretary of state Henry Kissinger made this point last weekend.
The time for more U.S. troops in Iraq has passed. We do not have more troops to send and, even if we did, they would not bring a resolution to Iraq. Militaries are built to fight and win wars, not bind together failing nations. We are once again learning a very hard lesson in foreign affairs: America cannot impose a democracy on any nation -- regardless of our noble purpose.
We have misunderstood, misread, misplanned and mismanaged our honorable intentions in Iraq with an arrogant self-delusion reminiscent of Vietnam. Honorable intentions are not policies and plans. Iraq belongs to the 25 million Iraqis who live there. They will decide their fate and form of government.
Looks like it's time for Joe Lieberman (CFL-CT) to reach across party lines and bitch slap that cut and runner.
LIEBERMAN: First, let me say that the capture of -- overthrow and then capture of Saddam Hussein has made America safer and made the world safer. It has not ended all of our problems or all the threats to our security, but a president has to deal with more than one threat at a time.
The Middle East is directly related, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict directly related. We have to stay the course in Iraq now and continue to build a stable, modernizing, democratizing country there.
So did the Times just decide to review statements in which Lieberman didn't utter those fateful words? Nah, probably just an innocent oversight. After all, it's perfectly understandable that two ace reporters from the Newspaper of Record would never think to look at the transcript of a Presidential Debate from as far back as 2004.
Update:Media Matters dug up a bunch more examples. Seems Joe couldn't shut up about "staying the course." Now he's switched to just staying coarse.
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