Insult To Injury

By Cernig

This is called adding insult to injury - to the myth that the Surge has brought victory in Iraq around its last corner:

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A spokesman for the Baghdad security plan, designed to make the Iraqi capital safer, was kidnapped from his home by armed gunmen on Thursday, police said.

Armed men stormed the home of Tahseen al-Sheikhli in the al-Amin neighborhood of southwestern Baghdad, set the building on fire, disarmed his bodyguards and took him away, a police source said. No one was reported hurt in the raid.

Sheikhli, a university professor, is one of two main spokesmen for the security plan, launched by the government more than a year ago to reduce bombings and ethnic attacks by flooding the streets with U.S. and Iraqi troops.

The idea that Maliki's push against the Sadrists is because Iraq is so much safer after the Surge that he's decided to go after all the Shiite militias by beginning with the biggest (and most able to mount a political challenge) one is ludicrous, but it's the official Bush administration spin so it is being swallowed whole by the Lovelace's of the cheerleading Right. I know they have no gag reflex, but this one should stick in even their capacious throats.

Rush Abetts Multiple Felonies (Updated - Rush's Defense)

By Cernig

Remember Rush Limbaugh calling for Republicans to change sides for a day and vote for Clinton in Texas and Ohio just to keep the Dem primary bloodfest going a while longer?

He has a wee problem:

While this all makes for great talk radio and sounds like fun, there is one catch: What Limbaugh encouraged Republican voters to do in Ohio was a fifth-degree felony in that state, punishable with a $2,500 fine and six to 12 months in jail. That is because in order to change party affiliation in Ohio, voters have to fill out a form swearing allegiance to that party’s principles “under penalty of election falsification.”

I assume that encouraging others to commit a felony is itself illegal - aiding and abetting, isn't it?

Hat tip to Mike at CFLF)

Update Rush's defense? Even if you voted McCain, you'd be voting for Democratic principles.

CALLER: Hey, I just wanted to put your mind as ease as it pertains to the potential indictment that might come down against you and other Republican crossover voters who voted in the Democrat primary in Ohio and now potentially Texas. If the basis of the charges would be that the crossover voter has to attest that they'll vote with Democrat values in the fall, then if they vote for John McCain, aren't they still within the confines of the law?

RUSH: Well, you're giving away some secrets, should we have to go to court here. But a very, very, very insightful deduction on your part.

CALLER: Sorry about that, Rush.

RUSH: How in the world -- that's okay. (laughing)

CALLER: It appears to me that you can vote for Obama, Clinton, or McCain and you're pretty much voting within --

RUSH: Democrat Party principles.

CALLER: -- Democrat, correct.

RUSH: Exactly right. (laughing) Arthur, you're a very insightful man.

His other defense is that Obama and Clinton have also called for Republicans to re-register as Dems, although he conveniently forgets that the difference is they're asking for those moderate conservatives sick of the GOP's movement to the wingnut extreme Right to consider switching sides on a permamnent basis, not just for a day.

But after this one - - go on John, throw the bum under the bus. Call for his indictment.

Five Years After

By Cernig

John Cole issues the kind of mea culpa you won't be seeing from highly-paid Very Serious Pundits who need to parse their wrongness so that they remain highly-paid Very Serious Pundits.

And Jim Henley lives in an alternate universe where those same highly-paid VSP's get their just desserts.

Go read both.

Sound Of Wind And Blowing Tumbleweed

By Cernig

Via John Cole comes this CNN headline - Army general: 'No reason to doubt' Obama's story.

Army chief of staff Gen. George Casey, testifying on troop strain before the Senate Armed Forces Committee Tuesday, said there is "no reason to doubt" Sen. Barack Obama's military shortage story during CNN's debate in Austin, Texas, last week.

..."We acknowledged and we all worked together to correct the deficiencies with equipment that we saw during that period, not only Afghanistan but in Iraq," he said in response to the question posed by Republican Sen. Lindsay Graham, a longtime supporter of GOP presidential candidate Sen. John McCain.

And ABC adds:

Casey said the Army has purposefully not tried to seek out the captain individually. But he did contact the platoon's brigade commander, which belonged to the 10th Mountain Division, and reviewed the division's readiness reports.

Casey said the brigade was manned at 100 percent during its entire deployment, but that it is possible a particular platoon within the brigade was not manned at the desired level.

"There may have been some spot shortages in spare parts and ammunition," he said. "But the commander said that there were never a shortage of ammunition that impacted the units ability to accomplish its mission."

So Obama's story checks out - but even so, the military are maintaining it 'didn't impact the mission"? If so, then that's a testimony to the adaptability and resilience of soldiers who weren't properly supported by the Bush administration, surely.

And the retractions of allegations that Obama was flat-out lying from wingnuttery so far? Nada. Just the sound of (blowhard) wind and blowing tumbleweed.

Who lost the debate?

By Libby

When I realized that Tim Russert was going to moderate the debate last night, I decided not to watch it. What's the point? Obviously it was going to be all about Tim looking to score some points as a clueless gasbag "hard hitting" journalist. On quick review of the reactions, I see the general consensus is that it was a draw. The real losers are the voters who depend on these farcical encounters for information on the issues. Digby nails it.

Judging by their silly questions tonight, Russert and Williams obviously know nothing about health care policy, Iraq, Islamic terrorism, economics, global trade or any other subject that requires more than five minutes study to come up with some gotcha question or a stupid Jack Bauer fantasy. It's embarrassing.

These people guide the way citizens perceive politics even if the citizens don't know it. It's hard for me to see how anything can truly change until this is dealt with.

I agree wholeheartedly. If we could somehow get rid of Russert and Chris Matthews the intelligence level of our political discourse would rise by about a million percent.

David Brooks' Gentle Knives

by shamanic

David Brooks, in a move that sets him apart from most commentators on the right, has a way of gently inserting a knife into subjects when the mood strikes. Most of the men and women of the right wing blather brigade use blunt objects, throw bricks, chase down their opponents with torches and pitchforks held high, and swarm with berserker abandon, tearing their prey from limb to limb.

Most of those people don't think much of David Brooks, and I suspect the feeling is quite mutual, whereas I have complicated feelings on the subject of his columns. For instance, during the 2004 race, he penned a column tying El Salvador's 1982 elections, and the later end to a leftist "insurgency" in that country, to the scheduled January 2005 election in Iraq. This was picked up and run with, with even Dick Cheney commenting about the (non-existent) parallels between Iraq's young democracy and El Salvador's civil war during a veep debate that season.

So today, when Brooks slides his knife into Hillary Clinton, I read it and think, "Yes, this aligns with much that I know about Hillary Clinton. But much that I know about Hillary Clinton comes from the right wing thug brigade's paranoid screechings of the last two decades." And that circle of thought is the larger share of why I won't be voting for Hillary Clinton today. It's why a candidate calling for a new politics, who looks like he just might be able to pull off that miracle more often than not, is so appealing.

In short: I'm really frigging tired of it all, and would like to not spend the next five years listening to ranters and reading crazy ramblings about the latest Clinton scandal, trying always to decipher whether it is or is not a scandal at all. Spare me.