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POPSInnocence Undone--Frame By Frame "But I’m pressing on, determined to learn just how much of my life is based on false pretenses. I am dreading what I am going to find in “My Favorite Martian” and “The Addams Family”; highly skeptical that “The Flying Nun” was either really flying or really a nun. But there’s one show, at least, that I’m sure won’t let me down: “Mister Ed,” about the talking horse. I know that was real. Heck, you could see his lips move." :)
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POPSUS Afghan Surge is Really 86,000? During the Iraq and Afghan wars, there were no reports of casualties of contractors added to US Troop casualties and it was a long time before anyone knew what Blackwater, now Xe, was up to until they shot 17 Iraqi's last year. On top of all the other transparency problems, I don't fell very good about US soldiers having to depend on "mercenaries" for safety, transport, food, etc. How about you?
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POPSA Reid too far?
“Reid ducked several national questions. On whether he would ‘opt out’ of the public option if the Senate health-care bill his father has written becomes law, he answered that he has no idea what the eventual health-care law would entail. ‘I’m not going to get into what the law might be.’ Regarding whether he supported President Obama’s troop increase to Afghanistan, Reid replied that he’s running for governor of Nevada, not federal office. ‘That policy is best left to the president.’ He also declined to talk about his father’s Senate race. ‘I think you should ask him to handicap his own race.’” The National Republican Senate Committee quickly jumped on the stories, sending mailings to Nevada journalists. Though Rory Reid said nothing against his father in the press interviews, the GOP mailing was headed, “Not exactly a vote of confidence from Harry Reid’s own son.” And Las Vegas columnist Jon Ralston posted a piece headlined “Reids’ national media misadventures …” that said, “But t
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POPS 30,000 The president seemed in sticker shock, watching his domestic agenda vanishing in front of him. “This is a 10-year, trillion-dollar effort and does not match up with our interests,” he said . Looking around, I haven’t found any reports that say McChrystal was looking for a 10-year, 100,000-plus total troop commitment. I recall he said he needed two years to make a decisive impact, in the counterinsurgency campaign and building up the Afghan military, and that the war could be won or lost in that time. So where’s the explanation of how we get from a 40,000-troop escalation to a 30,000-troop surge, from “10 years” to 18 months? (If the OMB meant that just 2 years at 40,000 on top of the rest of the effort drives the overall cost to $1 trillion, then cutting out six months and 10,000 doesn’t change that substantially.) “If people are having trouble swallowing 40, let’s see if we can make this smaller and easier to swallow and still give the commander what he needs, "
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POPSObama's War Whoop: "Let the bloodbath begin!"
Obama also has a glaring truth-in-advertising problem. He's just not who he pretends to be. He was sold as an avatar of change but, as soon as he was sworn in, he proceeded to reinforce the most regressive policies of the Bush administration. With typical callousness, he has run roughshod over his liberal base who mistook his sweeping proclamations as a sincere commitment to progressive politics. Boy, were they duped. No change, no way. So what exactly is the difference between George Bush and Barack Obama? 3 inches and maybe 20 lbs, beyond that, not a thing. They're carbon copies. Obama will now deploy 30,000 troops to the Afghan hellhole while activating Gen Stanley "death squad" McChrystal's savage counterinsurgency operation which will integrate psyops, special forces, NGOs, psychologists, media, anthropologists, humanitarian agencies, public relations, reconstruction, robotic drones, and conventional forces to assert control over the South and the tribal areas of Pakistan
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POPS 'UK Can’t Back Obama Pledge on Afghan Pullout' His comments reflect dismay at the highest level in the British Armed Forces about Mr Obama’s suggestion this week that US troop withdrawals would start by mid-2011. Britain expects to have substantial forces on the ground in Afghanistan for at least five or six more years. David Cameron, the Conservative leader, also voiced disquiet over “artificial timetables”. “I think it is very important not to send mixed messages. Instead, let’s say we’re here to train up the Afghan National Army and police and as soon as the job is done we can bring our troops home. But don’t let’s set artificial timetables”... Even if some parts of Afghanistan were handed over to local forces next year, he refused to say whether that meant some British soldiers could come home. “I think there’ll still be a job to be done for some time in other parts of the country...You’ve got to provide as many troops as you can to meet the needs of the mission.”
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POPSMarines Launch New Offensive in Afghanistan's Helmand Province So far, Wetterauer said, three insurgents have been killed after he said they were caught placing bombs in a road. The Marine units dropped into two areas -- one just north of the once-bustling city of Now Zad and the small town further north called Kenjake Sofla. Both are places where Marines believe several Taliban insurgents operate. Initially, the Marines have faced little opposition, Wetterauer said. For the last four years, Marines and British forces have battled the Taliban in the area. Because of the fighting, Now Zad, the second-largest city in Helmand Province, which once had a population of 30,000, has been reduced to a ghost town. Only members of the Taliban and their sympathizers remain. In building defenses against the Marines, Taliban fighters have planted thousands of homemade bombs and dug in positions throughout the valley at the foot of the craggy Tangee Mountains.
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POPSObama + Palin Ticket For 2012 Howzzat for "bipartisan". Kinda chokes me up, like Romeo and Juliet. Makes me feel a little like burying a dagger in my breast, as well. ARRRGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!
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POPSLiberation Was Just a Big Lie We're not going to send more combat troops to Afghanistan. We're going to listen to the Afghan people instead and send HELP, not hurt. I hope NATO countries and other allies will choose to do the same. Denmark to change focus in Afghanistan
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POPSBarack W. Bush--Obama's "Preventive War" in Afghanistan, Neocons Applaud Obushma's Afghanistan war policy--the BUSH DOCTRINE CONTINUES. The word "terrorism" was hardly invoked, but "essential for our national interests....and attacks on our HOMELAND" implied the same thing. It's still all about the 9/11, and only the rhetoric has changed slightly. But this war is not about "national interests", but International (Globalist) interests. Obama is a Puppet for the globalist agenda as much as Bush was to the neoconservative agenda for "global hegemony". See Rachel Maddow's MSNBC video analysis about Obama's Nobel Peace Prize and proof that the Bush Doctrine continues. Powerful analysis. The real purpose of Af-Pak war policy is here .
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POPSCreech Air Force Base: A Place of Disbelief, Confusion and Sadness There is a disturbing contrast between aggressor and victim. The aggressor zooming around Las Vegas in a posh automobile, living a luxurious life style and launching missiles onto a target that is far away and the victim located in a village or inside a building on the Afghanistan Pakistan borders. There are over 200,000 people in internally displaced camps (IDP) in Afghanistan because of US bombardment and war. The number one enemy in Afghanistan is poverty. For many of those holding a presence outside of Creech Air Force Base, there is a look of total disbelief, confusion, and sadness. As the US troop presence in Afghanistan increases, the unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) program will ramp up. Read about the actions in the local spotlight here and in the news here.
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POPSnational priorities project lots of charts and graphs / with numbers- these guys are all about the numbers- available at link- hardly seems worth all the cash- as you go to the link- you can watch the dollars being spent on the war as you read the facts- i like this site
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POPSArmed Services Committee Members Haven't Read General McChrystal's Report “I have not read it,” said Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, who is wary of funding another troop increase. Brown would not commit to reading the report before making a decision on supplemental war funding and said he has talked to McChrystal in person. “I’m not going to commit to reading one thing or another.” Leadership aides point out that most of the document had already been leaked to the Washington Post, which posted a redacted version on the Internet. But the classified report includes six additional pages, plus material that was redacted from the leaked version, including the 500,000 troop figure initially reported by NBC’s Andrea Mitchell. “I can’t remember whether I read the classified or the declassified report. I can’t remember,” said Ike Skelton, D-Mo., Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, when I asked him about it last month.
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POPSCode Pinko - just what is it you really want? Just saw Medea Benjamin on Fox denouncing Obama for sending troops and calling for congress to defund Afghanistan war. It is so painful to listen to these hypocrites. Benjamin is a cofounder of both CODEPINK and the international human rights organization Global Exchange went to Afghanistan in Oct this year and she was told by the women of Afghanistan they needed the troops to stay, they were fearful if the troops pulled out. Code Pinko did not like what they heard from the Afghan women. They were hoping they would say it's OK if we are killed, if we can be used as cannon fodder for Code Pink. Bunch of spineless A-holes who believe no war is ever justified. They should be exiled to Iran for a few years, to live as some of the oppressed people they claim to be for.
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POPSThe Arabs Have Stopped Applauding Obama "American arms had won a decent outcome in Iraq, but Mr. Obama would not claim it—it was his predecessor's war. Vigilance had kept the American homeland safe from terrorist attacks for seven long years under his predecessors, but he could never grant Bush policies the honor and credit they deserved. He had declared Afghanistan a war of necessity, but he seems to have his eye on the road out even as he is set to announce a troop increase in an address to be delivered tomorrow."
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POPSObama Sets Stage for surrender to Terrorists: Leaked Afghan Strategy Revealed
additionally… The administration’s plan contains “off-ramps,” points starting next June at which Obama could decide to continue the flow of troops, halt the deployments and adopt a more limited strategy or “begin looking very quickly at exiting” the country, depending on political and military progress, one defense official said. “We have to start showing progress within six months on the political side or military side or that’s it,” the U.S. defense official said. and it goes on to say… The administration’s protracted deliberations have escalated into open warfare between McChrystal and his supporters and advocates of a more limited strategy led by Biden and White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel that often played out in dueling leaks to news organizations. He does not want to fight a war on terror as he promised the Majority of Americans to get himself elected… and he does not want to take responsibility for surrender either.
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POPSLawmakers Propose 'War Surtax' to Pay for Troop Increase in Afghanistan "If we have to pay for the health care bill, we should pay for the war as well ... by having a war surtax," Obey told ABC News in an interview that aired Monday. "The problem in this country with this issue is that the only people that has to sacrifice are military families and they've had to go to the well again and again and again and again, and everybody else is blithely unaffected by the war."
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POPSWH: No Afghan decision before Thanksgiving Absolutely amazing. Why doesn't he just say what he really plans to do instead of dragging this out, waiting for a more opportune time? He's going to undermine our military troops there and send the morale of the rest completely down the drain. Agree with the Afghan war or not...being so "dithering" is inexcusable and makes the efforts of our soldiers there worthless. My Mom had ABC news on last night (it was an accident) and I heard the news caster talk about the poll numbers showing that support for the war against the Taleban in Afghanistan were dropping. Well, YES!!! Because many of us who do support the work being done there are no longer wanting our family members there without the support of this President!!! By failing to give them what they need, requested by their General, the pseudo-CIC is responsible for those who are being killed and maimed right now.
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POPS Advance To The Rear! (Well, in fairness, even if the president did declare back in 2008 this war was a vital national security interest, and he did signal last spring he was on board with counterinsurgency, and even if he did appoint Gen. Stanley McChrystal to get the job done in May, the general’s recommendations only arrived in August, and the president didn’t look at them until, what, late September, and he’s been really busy this whole time letting Congress bollix his health-care initiative, throwing Eastern Europe under the bus and flying to Copenhagen, that kind of thing, so he’s only been able to squeeze in seven high-level national security meetings, or is it eight? Is it so unreasonable to ask for new options on top of the new options that he asked for on top of the new options that McChrystal gave him? Meanwhile, China’s ass wants kissing and then we’re into the holidays … ) OK, I get that the political piece is vitally important, and for Eikenberry, up to his armpits in scheming
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POPSUS Afghan Envoy Urges Caution on Troop Increase And whose side, exactly, is he on??? Undermine and put at risk those who are there by lack of support and back-up or go all out and get the job done. Which has, traditionally, been the American way? Every day that the so-called CIC delays, the more imperiled our loved ones become.
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