Saturday, November 26, 2005

Distraction

Sorry for the light posting today, but I'm distracted with other obligations. I'm designing and building a set for an interesting variation of the Charles Dickens' play "A Christmas Carol," and my morning has been consumed doing calculations and drawings for some complex panels that are required for my work today.

Here's a photo of the outside of the Ritz Theater, built in 1898.




























And here's a picture of the rough framing for the "treasure chest" set that I'm building.






















It's too difficult to explain the concept without photos showing more construction progress, so I'll save the description until I have more work completed early this week...

Friday, November 25, 2005

Thanksgiving News From Iraq

Last summer I sent an E-Mail to Sgt. John Paul Furman who was serving in Mosul, Iraq. I received his name from a fellow blogger and responded with my own personal message of appreciation and encouragement.

In my message I also told him to not listen to the media and to ignore how things were portrayed on TV. I told him that there were many, many, Americans that followed "alternative" sources of news and war information and that in fact we did appreciate his efforts on our behalf.

I was thrilled to receive this Thanksgiving E-mail message from Sgt Furman yesterday and thought that I would share it with you:

Hello everybody, this is Sgt. Furman from Mosul, Iraq again. After sending out my thank you letter, many people wrote back and asked that I try to send out updates on my progress in Iraq, some even suggested that I start my own blog. Well, time didn’t allow me to start my own blog, but as my deployment comes to an end, I thought I would write a final letter on my thoughts, and let everybody know that I made it through o.k..

The hot summer days and nights seem to have come to an end, and the days are now growing cooler as fall begins to sweep her hand over Northern Iraq. In a little over a month or so, I will be sitting on a plane headed back to the states, slowly leaving Iraq behind me with only my pictures, thoughts and memories to take with me. Even as I begin to pack it hasn’t set in that I am finally leaving this place that I have come to know with both hate and love so well.

This experience has been, and will no doubt be the most challenging of my life. When I first arrived here, I really wanted to hate this place. Try as I might, I found it impossible to hate Iraq. Although there is no place like the United States, Iraq is as beautiful a country as any. Sometimes you might have to look a little beyond the surface to find the beauty in it, but I assure you, it is there. There is no more an awe inspiring sight than that of an Iraqi night. While in the city of Tall Afar for a few days, I sat outside my “hooch” under the night sky and listened to the sound of 155mm Howitzers keep a thundering cadence on a distant target, and watched as a countless number of shooting stars passed over head. Under that same moon I have contemplated what my loved ones back home were doing at that very time; have had many great conversations with my fellow Soldiers; and let the lingering thoughts from the day pass out of my mind before I would go to sleep. And at times, it seems that Iraq had literally sucked all life from my body. There have been times that I felt that I was little more than a walking zombie.

The history and culture of Iraq has much to give to the world. I have found the Iraqi’s to be kind, loving, gentle and extremely resourceful. I feel that we have as much to gain from their friendship as they have to gain from ours. It seems to me that most Iraqi’s want nothing more than what the average American wishes for. A family to love, a home to come to at the end of the day, and most of all, the freedom that we all enjoy and love. It is my most sincere hope that they all get this and more.

As for the war itself, it is hard to put my thoughts and feelings into words, but will try to do my best. After a year of participation and observation, I can only say that war is horrible. Perhaps the most horrible of all actions. It’s not an adventure, or a right of passage. It’s visceral and evil. Carnage and violence at it’s worst. It is a place where one man willingly dispatches the life of another, lest that fate come to him. It is the only place where the amount of blood shed in the street is the measure by which you can judge success. It is not a movie that you can watch abstractly from the comfort of a theater seat. It is very real. It is a place where people die, and their loved ones are left heartbroken. At times it seems to be a living breathing entity. The most horrible monster you can imagine. It has no rhyme or reason, it just is. There is no point in trying to make sense of it, because there is no sense to be found in it. Yet, even through all of this, we have brave men and women who continue to charge into battle, and fight for all they can so others unknown to them may gain something from it.

Horrible as it is, it is a necessary evil. After a year, I still hold firm in my opinion that we are doing the right thing in Iraq. I don’t want you to mistake me for a warmonger, because that is as far from the truth as could be. I don’t believe there is a Soldier who is currently serving that is happy they are serving in a war. Don’t mistake pride of service for your country and your fellow man for joy of war. It is not the same. Believe me, the battles that are won here every day are not known to any human outside of the borders of this country. I don’t mean the major military victories that you can see on the news, or read in the paper, but the victories of the heart and will of the human. Every day an Iraqi awakes with the realization that they are free. That they can willfully speak their voice, right or wrong. Every day, as shown by the referendum, more and more Iraqi’s begin to place trust in their country, and in the protection that we are here to give to them. As contradictory as it might be, watching a country begin to take shape from this monster is an awesome thing to behold.

It will be hard for me to leave Iraq. Our time is done here, and now the battle is in another’s hands. I know that when I board that C-130 for my flight out of Mosul, and take my last breath of the Mosul air, that I will leave a piece of me in Iraq, and take a little piece of her home. She will be with me forever. The memories of her smiling children’s faces, the hot summer air, the gorgeous Arabian nights, and most assuredly, the thought of all the brave men and women who have fought and died for it all.

We have all followed the headlines of the vote in congress about a possible pullout of troops here. In my opinion (I want to make this clear, this is only my opinion, and I am only a Soldier, not a policy maker), a pullout at this time would be the most detrimental of all actions that our country could make, not to mention irresponsible. Truth be told, I don’t understand why there was ever a need for congress to even push the issue? What’s to debate? I will admit that I wasn’t completely sold on the war in Iraq in the beginning either, but after a year of witnessing the war for myself, I truly believe in what we are doing here. To me it doesn’t matter why we are, I am a Soldier, and go where I am ordered, but on a personal level, at the beginning, I thought hunting terrorists in Afghanistan was a more worth while fight. I was wrong. There are as many terrorists (not “insurgents”) here. I’m most certainly biased, but I’m certain that the U.S. Armed Forces are the best in the world, and I know for a fact that we are doing the best we can over here. Most of the Soldiers I have talked to feel exactly the same way. LET US DO OUR JOB! If we were to pullout now, everything that my unit has fought for this last year will be for nothing. Not to mention all of the men and women who suffer through severe injuries, and who’ve given their lives. It would be the ultimate of injustices to them to pullout now. Let us see this through to the end. If not for all the other reasons that I have mentioned; then for the simple fact, that it is unquestionably the right thing to do, and that all the people of Iraq, especially the children deserve it. I write this knowing full well, that I face the possibility of another deployment.

Many of us are looking to the future with optimism, both for Iraq, and our own lives. Some of us don’t know what the future holds for them, but will no doubt be just as successful as they were here. Unfortunately, for some, this war has taken a greater toll than just a year of life. Some of us have paid almost as much as the ones who will never again breath life, going home to broken lives due to the stress of being so far apart from their significant others. Personally, I will go back to my civilian job, and my family. I have a great girl that is waiting for me, and I just can’t wait to hold her in my arms again. Since I last wrote, I have re-enlisted in the guard for another 6 years (a sure sign I believe in what I preach), and don’t know if I will have to come back here again. If I do return here, I will hold my head high knowing that all of you great Americans back home are supporting me and have my back!

I just want to let all of you know that during the harder times in Iraq I have re-read some of the e-mails that you all have sent to me, and I still check the account for any new ones that might come my way. This has done wonders to lift my spirits at some very challenging times. Thank you! Please continue your support for us, and say thank you to any service member of any conflict that might come your way. They all deserve it. Maybe someday our lives might cross paths. If not, thank you again.

As I sit here and write this on Thanksgiving, although I have a lot to be thankful for this year, I thought I would share a little with you about what I am thankful for today. I am thankful for my family, they have been there for me, and without their guidance, I would be completely lost. I am thankful for God, that he has seen fit to protect me this last year, that he helps my battalion make it safely back home, that he continues to protect the troops that will still be here, and that he has taken into heaven with open arms, the men and women who have given their lives in this war, who he just couldn’t live without in heaven. I am thankful that I was born in America, and not a country like Iraq. As strange as it may seem, I am thankful that Americans still have the right to voice their opinions about this war (whether I agree with them or not), if America still has the right to voice it’s opinion, that means we’re doing our job over here, and doing it well! Most of all, I am thankful for my fiancĂ©, who has braved one of the most ultimate in hardships this last year, and stuck with me throughout it all. For certain, true love does exist. Finally, I am thankful that there are people back home who understand what we are fighting for, and proud of us.

God Bless!
Sincerely,
Sgt, Furman
Mosul, Iraq

More Stupid News People

When Will They Learn?

In Congressional Treason, I have already written about John Murtha’s stance on the immediate pullout of our troops from Iraq. I followed up on the story in Winning The Battle addressing a non-binding Republican resolution, honoring Murtha's demand for an immediate pullout, which was defeated in the House by 403-3.

You do realize that the real story here isn’t really Murtha’s call for a troop withdrawal--that’s the standard line these days from Democrats like John sKerry, Ted Kennedy, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid.

The real story here is that ex-marine John Murtha hasn’t changed his position on troop deployments at all. Murtha actually has a long history of calling for our troops to “cut and run” as soon as we see the first casualties, and with last week’s announcement he is only continuing his long held position.

But that’s not what the mainstream media will tell you, however.

The media wants you to believe that Murtha is a “Hawk” and a warmonger, and because he is an EX-MARINE, his call for the immediate withdrawal of our troops from Iraq is some kind of giant newsworthy epiphany for Murtha—a major shift in his position of which we should all take notice.

They think that President Bush and the American people should listen to Murtha’s revelations.

Bull hockey.

Shailagh Murray’s (I didn’t make that first name up) story in today’s Washington Post continues the lies and insanity, particularly in the headline and the first four paragraphs.

The About-Face of a Hawkish Democrat
Murtha, With Many Military Connections, Moves From Voting for War to Urging Troop Withdrawal
By Shailagh Murray
Washington Post Staff WriterFriday, November 25, 2005; Page A02


Of all the Democrats calling for an end to the Iraq war, Rep. John P. Murtha is an anomaly. Unlike Sens. John F. Kerry (Mass.) and Russell Feingold (Wis.), he doesn't want to be president. He's no liberal, like his House colleagues Dennis J. Kucinich (Ohio) and Maxine Waters (Calif.). He's certainly the only one to call Vice President Cheney a friend.

A man of gruff familiarity -- most colleagues find it more natural to call him "Murtha" than "Jack" -- has been representing his Pennsylvania district for 16 terms, rising to become the senior Democrat on the House Appropriations panel's defense subcommittee. For that perch, he became known for his opposition to defense cuts and his willingness to send troops into battle -- and even to draft them, if necessary. He was the first Vietnam veteran elected to Congress, and has fashioned a reputation as the Democrats' soldier-legislator -- a John McCain type without swagger or upward ambition. He generally prefers the shadows of Capitol Hill to the spotlight -- though that changed dramatically in recent days.

Last week, as Congress was preparing to leave town for a two-week Thanksgiving break, Murtha told a gathering of colleagues and, later, reporters that -- although he had voted in favor of the resolution authorizing the Iraq invasion -- he now wants American troops withdrawn immediately. "The U.S. cannot accomplish anything further in Iraq militarily," Murtha said. "It is time to bring them home."

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) predicted that Murtha's statement would become a "watershed event for our caucus, for our Congress and for our country." The burly 73-year-old lawmaker ignited a news blitz, and Republicans scrambled to respond. House GOP leaders hastily drew up a watered-down version of Murtha's withdrawal resolution, and made Republican lawmakers remain in town for a bitter and emotional Friday night session to vote it down.

This follows an earlier Washington Post story by Liz Sidoti:

Hawkish Democrat Calls for Iraq Pullout
By LIZ SIDOTI
The Associated PressThursday, November 17, 2005; 11:14 PM


WASHINGTON -- One of Congress' most hawkish and influential Democrats called Thursday for an immediate U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, sparking bitter and personal salvos from both sides in a growing Capitol Hill uproar over President Bush's war policies.
"It's time to bring them home," said Rep. John Murtha, a decorated Vietnam combat veteran, choking back tears during remarks to reporters. "Our military has accomplished its mission and done its duty."


Notice anything consistent in the headlines?

All of that sounds wonderful if it were true and it was the ENTIRE story, but it’s not.

Why can’t Miss Murray and Miss Sidoti even bother to Google “John Murtha” and see what information pops up, rather than just accepting the line that he’s some kind of “Hawk?” A line supplied by, of all places, the Democrats?

Apparently they didn't, because they are either lazy, STUPID, or just partisan liars--you decide.

I, your trusty Blogger, did do some “Googling” this morning, and here is what I found out about John Murtha's prior record on supporting military conflicts as a Congressman:

On October 9, 2002, Murtha’s Congressional Website had this statement:

WASHINGTON, DC, October 9, 2002 -- Congressman John Murtha today said he would vote for the resolution authorizing military force against Iraq despite a number of serious reservations.

Murtha said, “Obviously we have reason to be concerned about Saddam Hussein -- there’s no question that he’s a real threat to us and we need to make sure he’s not developing nuclear, chemical or biological weapons to use against us or against other nations in the Middle East. We also need to make sure that Iraq does not resume Afghanistan’s former role as the host nation for terrorist training camps.

I'm SO relieved...John Murtha supported the war, BEFORE it started, but now he doesn’t.

Sound familiar? (can you say John sKerry?)

And this little tidbit, again from a November 17, 2005 press release on his own website:

I said over a year ago, and now the military and the Administration agrees, Iraq can not be won “militarily.” I said two years ago, the key to progress in Iraq is to Iraqitize, Internationalize and Energize. I believe the same today. But I have concluded that the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq is impeding this progress.

Murtha admits that he's been saying for an ENTIRE YEAR that the war in Iraq "can not be won militarily..."

Hummmmmmm...but I thought this was a RECENT revelation...

It seems that Murtha has exhibited a weak stomach for troop deployments previously and has actually done this type of thing before.

In 1993 he took credit for urging President Clinton to pull US troops out of Somolia in an interview on NBC’s Today show:

After terrorists attacked U.S. troops in Mogadishu, Somalia 12 years ago, anti-Iraq war Democrat, Rep. John Murtha urged then-President Clinton to begin a complete pullout of U.S. troops from the region.

Clinton took the advice and ordered the withdrawal - a decision that Osama bin Laden would later credit with emboldening his terrorist fighters and encouraging him to mount further attacks against the U.S.

"Our welcome has been worn out," Rep Murtha told NBC's "Today" show in Sept. 1993, a month after 4 U.S. Military Police had been killed in Somalia by a remote-detonated land mine.

The Pennsylvania Democrat announced that President Clinton had been "listening to our suggestions. And I think you'll see him move those troops out very quickly

So I ask you, what's the big deal here?

With "Hawks" like this, who needs "Doves" and other pacifists?

Isn’t Murtha just continuing along the path of expecting resounding victory and zero casualties from the military actions that he initially supports, but as soon as things go less than perfectly he's all for turning tail and running?

And why does the media continue to hype Murtha as a traditional pro-war “hawk?”

I say that it's because if Murtha made his statements and proposed his resolutions for an immediate pullout from Iraq and IF the truth was known, his calls would just be another example of standard liberal Democratic whining about the war.

I say we just add him to the Democratic Dean's list--Howard Dean's list, that is...

Thursday, November 24, 2005

Wednesday, November 23, 2005

Stupid News People

Oh, The Humanity…

I guess that every single person in the entire world saw the live broadcast of the saga of the Gulfstream G500 jet that had landing gear problems out in Oregon on Monday.

The coverage basically drove me crazy so I turned it off and managed to miss the actual footage of the landing until it was re-broadcast on the news later Monday night.

What a total NON-STORY this event was.

Why?

Because anyone that is involved in commercial aviation or that flies light aircraft knows that things like this happen several times a day, every single day of the year.

Back in 1991, when I was learning to fly, I witnessed a similar event, in person, and FOX News and CNN and the balance of the “lamestream” media missed the story in its entirety.

I had already filed my flight plan, done my preflight calculations on the airplane (a 1968 model Cessna 152, tail number 751B), had completed my preflight inspection, untied the airplane from its moorings on the tarmac, and was climbing into the cockpit with my instructor when we heard a grinding sound and turned around to witness a twin engine turboprop Piper sliding down the middle of runway 27R at McCullum airfield.

The airport was closed for the rest of the day since it only had a single runway, and said runway was blocked with the aforementioned Piper. Practically everyone but me went running out to the scene of the crime as I cursed and re-secured my airplane to the tie-downs and wandered back into the pilots lounge.

It seems that the Piper was being piloted by another student that was practicing single engine emergency procedures and that he had failed to remember to put the landing gear down during final approach. He said that he couldn’t think with all of the alarms going off in the cockpit—one of which was a LANDING GEAR ALARM telling him that the gear was still in the UP position. What a crime, tearing the belly off of a perfectly good airplane.

The flight instructor was a bit red-faced also.

Monday I was embarrassed for the FOX News broadcasters because they were forced to talk over the video footage for several hours and their inane babble made virtually no sense most of the time.

They interviewed everyone from the “spokesperson” for Gulfstream, the Chief Gulfstream Test Pilot, to the Janitor in the men’s room in the Savannah, Georgia Gulfstream fabrication facility, and most of the commentary added nothing to the progress of the story.

At one point a female commentator (I forget who) started talking about “foaming” the runway to “grease the airplane’s slide down the pavement.”

Say What?

They used to foam the runway with FIRE RETARDENT FOAM to limit the spread of a jet fuel fire during a runway incident, not to “grease the airplane’s slide” on the concrete. Now they rarely waste the foam on the runway, they wait and spray it on the wreckage once the airframe stops moving—it takes a lot less foam that way.

Then they started worrying about the environmental impact of foaming the runway and the impact of “dumping fuel” on the environment. Funny thing, but didn’t the jet stay airborne for the extra hours in order to BURN THE FUEL rather than dumping it?

I say that the “officials” should say “screw the Snail Darter fish and the Spotted Owls,” the airplane had SEVEN very worried humans on board and foam and jet fuel in the creeks or oceans is the last of their worries.

One commentator also speculated about the availability of the ocean nearby and wondered aloud why they didn’t just ditch a multi-million-dollar airplane in the freezing salt water.

Can you believe the STUPIDITY of that thought process?

These are the people that we rely on to tell us what is going on in the world. If even FOX News can’t do better than this on such a simple NON-STORY, I’m seriously concerned for our ability to survive as a nation on a long term basis.

DON’T LISTEN TO THEM…THEY’RE ALL IDIOTS.

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

An Intelligent Comment?

Fresh Meat…

As I’ve written many times before, I rarely get comments disagreeing with my writing. All I ever get is either polite comments agreeing with my position or the occasional illogical rantings of some “barking moonbat” featuring insults and name-calling.

You can imagine my surprise tonight when I opened my E-mail and found this fairly lucid comment to my earlier posting called “Winning The War”:

“General Casey of the United States armed forces submitted a timetabled plan for withdrawal to the Pentagon the day before Murtha spoke. You can bet DOD didn't ask them for it.

Murtha is generally and correctly percieved to be a direct dial-up to what the JCOF brass are thinking.

The army itself thinks this war is pointless bleeding. Generals aren't making speeches about it, because they have a job to do, but General Shinsheki tried to tell Rumsfield that we would need 400K troops to do this job and got shitcanned for it. That's because we don't have 400K available troops, regardless of what our active duty stats say. In other words, the message was that this war can't be done, at least not without really shaking up the homeland. Which Bush, from your POV, wimped out on, but again, realism is that he never had a political hope in hell of instituting a draft.

It should also be mentioned that The American people did not write their constitution over 11 years under the saturation presence of troops from a foriegn country. The US hasn't fought a war of that timetable ever in its political life. That may have something to do with its ability to survive as a first-rate power, unlike, say, Imperial Spain or colonial France. Long wars suck countries dry.

Iraq's regional environment and political history dooms it to be a violent, chaotic, repressive regime for the near future. Whatever marginal changes we can make to that dynamic have already been made. We're dying with no victory in sight, and it's not because politicians are holding gloves on the soldiers. This is a fantasy you use to express your hatred and disdain, no more, no less. The US is using exactly as much force as can be used while trying to establish a liberal, stable democratic government. You can't build a western democracy while acting like the Khmer Rouge.

If you were capable of disinterested thought on the real nature of these situations, you'd be able to put forth a civil response to these statements of fact. But I don't think you're up to it, so I expect you'll respond with a wild-eyed bundle of insults.

Do your country a service, and stop letting dumb-ass machismo and thinly veiled bloodlust compensate for some real awareness of America's abilities and limitations.”

I’d say that this is a fairly well written comment. Thank you for so eloquently expressing your opinion, Mr./Mrs./Miss./Ms. commenter

I also must say that this reader has obviously not been reading my blog for very long or they would know that I do not rely on “wild-eyed bundle(s) of insults” to answer my critics—that is the method employed by most liberals and nearly all Democrats.

I believe that this commenter deserves a thoughtful, genuine answer based on something liberals either don’t know or absolutely hate—FACTS. Further, I’m going to answer publicly, on a point by point basis.

Here goes…

“General Casey of the United States armed forces submitted a timetabled plan for withdrawal to the Pentagon the day before Murtha spoke. You can bet DOD didn't ask them for it.

Murtha is generally and correctly percieved to be a direct dial-up to what the JCOF brass are thinking.”


So my reader opens their argument with a statement based on recent news reports that General George Casey had submitted a written plan for troop withdrawal from Iraq. Further, they (my reader) somehow believe that General Casey is sitting around writing such proposals on his own, in his spare time, without instructions from the Department of Defense or the President.

I beg to differ, but I can’t find anything on Google indicating what the exact timeline for Casey’s report was. I would say that it was reasonable to assume that the timing could be coincidental to Murtha’s comments, but it might not be. I think that the Pentagon probably asked him for his opinion, since being a Army General generally means you know a thing or two about troop deployments. Based on a lack of information, I guess that I wouldn’t be willing to bet that the DOD did or didn’t ask for the report, however.

I will also concede my readers point that Murtha, as the senior Democratic member of the House Defense Appropriations subcommittee, might know a thing or two about what the Joint Chiefs of Staff (that’s JCOS, not JCOF, by the way…) might be thinking. Also, Murtha didn’t specifically say that he was basing his demand for an immediate troop withdrawal on any secret knowledge attributed to his position on the subcommittee.

In fact, I heard today that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic leadership planned to have Murtha come out on his own, all by his lonesome, on this topic. Then they would either jump on the bandwagon if the concept took off else distance themselves and yell and scream about critics "questioning a good ex-Marine's patriotism."

Next my reader tells me that the Army thinks that the war is “unnecessary bleeding.” Is my commenter actually in the army in a leadership position? I haven’t heard that slant on things and would appreciate receiving a link to the story if anyone has one.

"The army itself thinks this war is pointless bleeding. Generals aren't making speeches about it, because they have a job to do, but General Shinsheki tried to tell Rumsfield that we would need 400K troops to do this job and got shitcanned for it. That's because we don't have 400K available troops, regardless of what our active duty stats say. In other words, the message was that this war can't be done, at least not without really shaking up the homeland. Which Bush, from your POV, wimped out on, but again, realism is that he never had a political hope in hell of instituting a draft."

If my reader had actually read something besides the Clinton News Network (CNN) or the liberal blogs, they might have found this recent press release from the Department of Defense addressing the recent troop strength issue:

Q: When are US forces pulling out of Iraq?

Rumsfeld: Well, they are going to be drawing down over time as conditions permit and military commanders and the Embassy in Baghdad are working with the Iraqi government to determine what those conditions are and in what case that would be appropriate.

In the meantime, we have put more forces in for the referendum in October and the election coming in December so we are up from 138,000 to 160,000 and we’ll be going down from 160,000 back to 138,000 after the December 15 elections. But reductions beyond that are things the President will decide based on the recommendations from the battlefield commanders.

My guess is we’ll continue to find that the conditions will permit reductions as Iraqi Security Forces continue to grow.

Q: What’s your take on the [inaudible] that military officers requested more troops and been turned down?

Rumsfeld: In fact, no military officer has been turned down needing additional troops at the senior levels. I don’t doubt for a minute that if you have a captain or a major or a lieutenant colonel somewhere in that country that at some moment they need more forces to do this or do that and they ask for them and the senior commanders decide how they want to allocate forces they have and they move the 160,000 forces around depending on the conditions on the ground. So it’s perfectly plausible that colonels have asked from time to time for forces and have gotten them or not gotten them depending on General Casey or General Vines’ decisions. Any implication that there has been a request for additional forces by General Casey or General Abizaid that has been turned down is just flat not true.

Q: Isn’t Iraq in the middle of a civil war and isn’t the US presence exacerbating that by being there?

Rumsfeld: Well, no. Iraq is not in the middle of a civil war at the present time. There are obvious tensions in the various regions between the Sunnis, the Shia, the Kurds and there have been hostilities between them from time to time. But basically you have got insurgents and terrorists that are trying to start a civil war. They are going out and killing people and suicide bombers are blowing up people inside of mosques and trying to [inaudible] but fortunately, it hasn’t happened. The leadership has been measured and balanced and calm and that’s been a big help. People are behaving reasonably well -- the leadership [inaudible].

Then there is the matter of General Shinseki’s pre-war troop strength estimates, addressed in this February 2003 NY Times article.

Mr. Wolfowitz, the deputy defense secretary, opened a two-front war of words on Capitol Hill, calling the recent estimate by Gen. Eric K. Shinseki of the Army that several hundred thousand troops would be needed in postwar Iraq, "wildly off the mark." Pentagon officials have put the figure closer to 100,000 troops. Mr. Wolfowitz then dismissed articles in several newspapers this week asserting that Pentagon budget specialists put the cost of war and reconstruction at $60 billion to $95 billion in this fiscal year. He said it was impossible to predict accurately a war's duration, its destruction and the extent of rebuilding afterward.

How my reader/commenter got to 400,000 troops from “several hundred thousand” troops is a matter of contemplation but, in the interest of brevity, not worthy of detailed discussion here.

I appreciate them pointing out, incorrectly, that we don’t have 400,000 troops to deploy in Iraq without “compromising homeland security.” Last time I checked, troops “deployed” here in the United States are either training for overseas deployment or waiting for deployment. Of course I guess that the liberals would rather leave the troops here at home resting on their laurels, waiting for the terrorists to come driving down main street in Muscatine, Iowa with an explosives laden minivan, but then again--I'm not a liberal so I can only guess what their logic is.

Fortunately, for all of us civilians, President Bush has chosen to take the war on terrorism out of the US, off of our soil, and put it in the homeland of the terrorists. Regarding troop numbers, I’ll add that president CLINTON, in his infinite military hating ignorance, oversaw the reduction of our military forces from over 1,800,000 active duty troops down to around 1,300,000 troops, a reduction in force of ONE HALF MILLON HELMETS AND PAIRS OF BOOTS.

Further, we have about 70,000 troops stationed in Germany—a left over artifact of the cold war with Russia. It would really piss the Germans off losing the US dollars spent by the troops in the local economy, but don’t you think that we could pull one half to two thirds of this crowd out of Europe, into Iraq, if we really wanted to?

And regarding the hated “DRAFT,” Republicans and President Bush have never once publicly mentioned the draft as a solution to the troop strength situation. It was the DEMOCRATS, John sKerry, and the mainstream media that brought up the draft just before the last presidential election as a desperate last minute scare tactic.

Fortunately, it didn’t work.

Moving along…

"It should also be mentioned that The American people did not write their constitution over 11 years under the saturation presence of troops from a foriegn country. The US hasn't fought a war of that timetable ever in its political life. That may have something to do with its ability to survive as a first-rate power, unlike, say, Imperial Spain or colonial France. Long wars suck countries dry. "

Oh boy, can I ever have a good time with this paragraph.

Yes, the US didn’t write our constitution “over 11 years under the saturation presence of troops from a (sic) foreign country…” In fact, if you want to get real technical, we actually took thirteen years from the first meeting of the Continental Congress in 1774 until the constitution was ratified in 1787, and of that time—we were fighting the Revolutionary War for EIGHT of those years.

We fought the Battle of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, we beat Cornwallis at Yorktown October 19, 1781, and Congress declared an end to hostilities April 11, 1783.

History is a bitch, ain’t it, Mr./Mrs./Miss./Ms. Reader? The internet makes EVERYONE an expert, IF you just take the time to check your facts rather than relying on your memory and the crap you learned in government (public) schools, you know?

If you are going to argue with me, please do your homework in the future, mmmkayyyy?

Next my reader continues to state the obvious and then makes my point for me…

“Iraq's regional environment and political history dooms it to be a violent, chaotic, repressive regime for the near future. Whatever marginal changes we can make to that dynamic have already been made. We're dying with no victory in sight, and it's not because politicians are holding gloves on the soldiers. This is a fantasy you use to express your hatred and disdain, no more, no less. The US is using exactly as much force as can be used while trying to establish a liberal, stable democratic government. You can't build a western democracy while acting like the Khmer Rouge.”

My “hatred and disdane”?

Of what?

The Iraqi people?

Freedom?

Liberals?

Democrats?

Or possibly the conditions of peace that could inevitably come as a result of some well placed military force. You know, open up an industrial strength can of “whoop ass” and apply it where needed?

And dear Reader, thank you for saying that “the US is using exactly as much force as can be used while trying to establish a liberal, stable democratic government…”

But who says that a democracy has to be “western”?

This one will obviously be “middle eastern.”

In closing, my gentle Reader resorts to the very acts which they challenge me to not engage in—INSULTS.

“If you were capable of disinterested thought on the real nature of these situations, you'd be able to put forth a civil response to these statements of fact. But I don't think you're up to it, so I expect you'll respond with a wild-eyed bundle of insults.”

Do your country a service, and stop letting dumb-ass machismo and thinly veiled bloodlust compensate for some real awareness of America's abilities and limitations.”

Isn’t inferring that I suffer from “dumb-ass machismo and thinly veiled bloodlust” that prevents me from having “some real awareness of America’s abilities and limitations” an insult in itself?

Well, that's OK.

I’m not insulted, I’m amused.

And finally, I have an admission....GASP...

I am, in fact, “(in)capable of disinterested thought,” Mr./Mrs./Miss./Ms. Reader.

If I think about and bother to actually write about something…I’m INTERESTED in the subject.

Imagine that???

Monday, November 21, 2005

A Total Waste Of Money

Hot Air Should Be Free...

I just learned that the poor little "anti-war activist and mother of a dead soldier" Cindy Sheehan has a new book out. I'm so jealous:

"I never wrote anything more than a note to excuse my kids from school before Casey was killed, so to see something I wrote in print with my name on it is amazing," Sheehan told The Associated Press by phone from her home in Berkeley, Calif.

Sheehan gained national attention during her 26-day vigil on a Texas roadside near President Bush's ranch in August. She refused to move until the president met with her or ended his vacation. That moved Arnie Kotler, the founder of a Hawaii publishing company who saw news coverage and read Sheehan's Internet blog entries from the protest.

"I thought, 'This is already a book. This is incredible,'" said Kotler of Koa Books, which printed about 20,000 copies. "We got it done as quickly as we could, and the deepest reason is to stop the war."

The White House did not return calls seeking comment on the book.

What is the White house expected to say--that Cindy Sheehan is a rocket scientist full of thoughtful insights and advice worth heeding?

I think not...If you can't say anything nice...say nothing at all...

Is there a law or a rule or something that requires that every moron that has the guts to go out and make a fool of themselves in public gets a book deal as a bonus?

I could barely stand to listen to Cindy Sheehan SPEAK on the TV news stories. Can you imagine trying to READ an entire book full of her mindless blitherings? I'm sure that she employed a ghost writer to assist in producing something other than meaningless mush and slogans.

The article closes by saying that Cindy and her band of harry legged anti-war gypsies plan on camping out in Crawford Texas this week in an effort to gain more media coverage and spoil President Bush's Thanksgiving celebration.

Get ready for Camp Casey--Part II.

What total BS...

Sunday, November 20, 2005

Thanksgiving Birds?

We went wandering around the north end of the island today, looking for some photo opportunities.

Since it is coming up on Thanksgiving, I thought that you would enjoy seeing this tree full of big birds--part of a group of Buzzards I found dining on an Armadillo that had been hit by a car:





























Now where is my stuffing and cranberry sauce???

This Just In...

"I'm a Wramblin' Wreck From Georgia Tech..."

Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets.....14

Miami Hurricanes (former #3).............10