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POPSJohn McCain's revolutionary foreign policy proposal In his speech McCain proposed that the United States expel Russia from the G8, the group of advanced industrial countries. Moscow was included in this body in the 1990s to recognize and reward it for peacefully ending the cold war on Western terms, dismantling the Soviet empire and withdrawing from large chunks of the old Russian Empire as well. McCain also proposed that the United States should expand the G8 by taking in India and Brazil—but pointedly excluded China from the councils of power. Via Laura Rozen
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POPSIn defense of William Ayers But to call Ayers a "terrorist" and throw him in the Osama bin Laden pile is a reach for the moral high ground by the very people and political establishment that secretly carpet bombed Cambodia, murdering hundreds of thousands of civilians. ...Ayers is no martyr, and he's no role model. But he doesn't deserve to be the punching bag of the moral cretins who still celebrate lying wars of aggression and the pointless slaughter of untold thousands.
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POPSUS made deal with devil to stabilize Iraq Chris Hedges is the author of this editorial. ...those who support the continuation of the war insist that "the surge" has been successful. But the surge...did little to thwart attacks. "The big news of the past year, the smashing up of al-Qaeda in Iraq and the stabilization of a lot of Sunni Arab areas, has virtually nothing to do with the surge," said Wayne White, former deputy director of the State Department's Middle East Intelligence unit. "What we have done, in effect, is we have made a deal with the devil in order to get rid of al-Qaeda. We have allowed nearly 100,000 tough Sunni Arab fighters to organize and arm themselves as they never could before when they had to operate underground. We have destroyed a nasty insurgency and replaced it with a more deeply rooted and broad-based potential insurgency."
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POPSAn Icelandic woman's experience visiting the US What is wrong with the United States of America? Is it the stimulus-response mechanism of experiencing terror → making war on terror → terrorizing ? Are the United States of America a hysteric or paranoid nation? I wonder if Erla Ósk Arnardóttir Lilliendahl (that's her correct name) will experience any excuse on the part of the U.S. administration, and I wonder if those responsible will be removed from office. If not, I would be inclined to declare the U.S.A. a closed mental hospital.
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POPSA War We Just Might Win Can you believe this?? This article was published by the New York Times!! It is obvious the democrats have stuck their necks way out, predicted and often enabling our defeat. Now that we are winning, they are backed into a corner. If we do win, their lies will be exposed. Even the NYT, their propaganda arm, seems to be covering all the bases.
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POPSMark Twain's "The War Prayer" In 1904, disgusted by the aftermath of the Spanish-American War and the subsequent Philippine-American War, Mark Twain wrote a short anti-war prose poem called "The War Prayer." His family begged him not to publish it, his friends advised him to bury it, and his publisher rejected it, thinking it too inflammatory for the times. Twain agreed, but instructed that it be published after his death, saying famously: None but the dead are permitted to tell the truth. "The War Prayer" was eventually published after World War I, when its message was more in tune with the times. Now, Washington Monthly's publisher, Markos Kounalakis, who was affected by Twain's words when he covered the war in Yugoslavia in the early 90s, has made "The War Prayer" into a short video for release this Memorial Day weekend. It features stunning illustrations by Akis Dimitrakopoulos and is narrated by Peter Coyote, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and Erik Bauersfeld. *
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POPSAn on-the-ground endictment of our Iraq strategey...
I don't want to abandon the Iraqi people. But I am a realist, not some day-dreaming jingoist who thinks this is all just one more rosy Rambo movie. The truth is that we have had a critical failure of leadership, and no one is stepping forward to fill that void. Right now we don't know who we're fighting, and we don't know why they are fighting us. Until we can understand these two questions, there is no way we can begin to answer the question of how to eventually end this war. Unfortunately, no presidential candidate is even asking these questions, which to me signifies that they do not have an Iraq strategy and are not interested in developing one. That's a shame. The Democrats who compare this war to Vietnam should remember another part of that analogy: Nixon took and held his office on promises to get us out of Vietnam, but with no new ideas about the conflict, he only got us in deeper. This could happen to the Democrats as well if they aren't careful.
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POPSBETRAYED I am sickened by those elected officials who ignore their constituents. Especially Clinton & Obama who cast their "nay" votes by the time it made no difference.
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POPSLooks Like Dr. Laura's Glass House Is Cracked The other day, Dr. Laura told us milspouses that we needed to STFU about whining about our husbands serving in the illegal war in Iraq. In the article I linked, it did mention that her son was in the military but she refused to state where he was serving. Maybe this explains her lack of comment.
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POPSAmericans more likely than Muslims to support attacks on civilians Perhaps people should be reminded that "terroism" according to the U.S. is: ...any activity that (A) involves a violent act or and act dangerous to human life that is violation of the criminal law of the United States or any State, or that would be a criminal violation if committed within the jurisdiction of the United States or of any State; and (B) appears to be intended (i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by assassination or kidnapping. -- From the United States Code Congressional and Administrative News, 98th Congress, Second Session, 1984, Oct. 19, volume 2; par. 3077, 98 STAT. 2707 (West Publishing Co., 1984) ----- Now, what is the US doing through force?
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POPSDid informant spur on aspiring Ft. Dix attackers? Are all of the "terrorists" we catch just a bunch of losers egged on by a charismatic FBI informant? The complaint indicates that in October 2006, seven months after the informer first entered the ranks of the men, it might have been the informer who helped jump-start another suspect, Serdar Tatar, who still had not followed through on his promise to get a map of the base from his father’s pizzeria near Fort Dix. The two men were discussing Fort Dix, the complaint said, when the informer “expressed anger at the United States.” “You want to make them pay for something that they did,” Mr. Tatar said to the informer, according to the complaint. “O.K., you need maps?” Soon, Mr. Tatar provided the map, the complaint says. In November, it was the informer who volunteered that he might have a source who could provide the machine guns and heavier arms the men had long been talking about. “Shnewer expressed interest,” the complaint says.
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POPSBush endangering troops by not planning for withdrawal Mark Thoma reproduces part of a National Journal article that points out that troop withdrawal can be very dangerous for the troops, and by failing to plan for it the Bush administration is increasing the odds for a chaotic, difficult, and dangerous withdrawal for the US troops when withdrawal does come.
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POPSFormer CIA Officers: Tenet is the Alberto Gonzales of the CIA The letter described Tenet as "one of the bullies." "You helped set the bar very low for reporting that supported favored White House positions, while raising the bar astronomically high when it came to raw intelligence that did not support the case for war being hawked by the president and vice president. "It now turns out that you were the Alberto Gonzales of the intelligence community -- a grotesque mixture of incompetence and sycophancy shielded by a genial personality." ... "You betrayed the CIA officers who collected the intelligence that made it clear that Saddam did not pose an imminent threat. You betrayed the analysts who tried to withstand the pressure applied by Cheney and Rumsfeld.
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POPSRiverbend is leaving Iraq Riverbend, a young woman blogger from Iraq, and her family are going to leave Iraq. They will first go to either Syria or Jordan (the only two countries that Iraqis can go to without a visa) and then somewhere else. There are moments when the injustice of having to leave your country, simply because an imbecile got it into his head to invade it, is overwhelming. It is unfair that in order to survive and live normally, we have to leave our home and what remains of family and friends… And to what?
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POPSEmbarrassing Michelle Malkin video Michelle Malkin dons a cheerleader outfit to chant L-O-S-E-R to describe Democratic opposition to the Iraq war. If this is the best argument she can muster for the Iraq war, then the cause truly is dead.
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POPS Lynch, Tillman's brother: U.S. military lied Just a reminder how corrupt this whole war has been from start to finish. Bush started it with lies, lied about how soldiers died, and continues to lie today about the way to end this thing. Enough is enough isn't it?
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POPSWashington Post, Dick Cheney, and War Crimes Since this editorial appeared, the evidentiary trail has led straight to Vice President Richard Cheney as the author of the administration’s torture policy. Indeed, Cheney openly advocated the need for torture before the Republican Senate Caucus in his efforts to block the McCain Detainee Treatment Act of 2005, and in his advocacy of the initial version of the Military Commissions Act of 2006.
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POPSCivil War history: Battle of Fort Pillow, 4/12/1864 "d" pointed out that today is the anniversary of the Battle of Fort Pillow at Lawyers, Guns, and Money . He notes that the commander of the Confederates was Nathan Bedford Forrest (who would go on to found the KKK). Forrest remains perhaps the most famous Tennesseeans of the 19th century. More than 30 monuments and state markers have been cast in his honor, including a statue at the state capitol building in Nashville. A state park bears his name, as did a World War II-era Army base in Tullahoma; the ROTC building at Middle Tennessee State University is named for the Klan leader and war criminal, as are two public high schools in the Volunteer State.
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POPSJournalist: Republican Senators believe surge won't work Journalist Andrea Mitchell says that Republican senators are telling her they don't believe the surge will work, and have told Petraeus that if they don't see real progress by August 2007, they will "pull the plug" on the war in Iraq. Personally, I wish both the Republicans and Democrats would stop fooling around and pull the plug NOW. Via hilzoy at Obsidian Wings
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