Went down in flames
Cheering the illegal war.
"VOTE INSANE! VOTE JOHN MCCAIN!" went over about as well as declaring, "Well again, I disagree with what the majority of the American people want." What a way to campaign to be the voice of the people, the president of the United States: "Well again, I disagree with what the majority of the American people want." Imagine it on a bumper sticker!
But if things were bad for the wanna be, they were worse for the Bully Boy. He went into song and dance mode before, during and after the Thursday release of the [PDF format warning] "Initial Benchmark Assessment Report" which would tell how well (or, in this case, not well) the puppet government in Iraq had met the US administration's set benchmarks. Apparently, refusing to release information on the spinning of Pat Tillman's death while serving in Afghanistan and the continuous circus/cesspool that is Attorney General Alberto Gonzales took up a great deal of time because Howard La Franchi (Christian Science Monitor) reported that the White House was "caught off guard" and "scrambling" to get control on the issue of Iraq.
So Bully Boy headed to Cleveland, Ohio on Tuesday to sell the continuation of his illegal war and declare, as Carolyn Lochhead (San Francisco Chronicle) reported that the escalation "is only beginning" (which led Lochhead to remind readers that in December of 2006, Bully Boy had stood beside Tony Blair and bragged that withdrawal is "not going to face this government. . . . We've made that part clear. It'll face future governments."). Michael Abramowitz (Washington Post) noted the "friendly audience" Bully Boy elected to speak to (business 'leaders') as he attempted to stall for time by begging Americans to wait until September. Apparently, in two months time, Bully Boy expects either a miracle or that everyone will have forgotten?
That would be the same Tuesday that Tony Snow invaded CBS' The Early Show to declare that Americans needed to be patient ("patience" was the talking point of the day, Bully Boy used it in Cleveland). Wednesday, the report/assessment was leaked to the press allowing Thursday morning papers to tell you what was in the report scheduled to be released that day. David S. Cloud and John F. Burns (New York Times) explained this morning that the report would "qualify some verdicts by saying that even when the political performance of the Iraqi government has been unsatisfactory, it is too early to make final judgements" and that this qualification "will enable it [the White House] to present a more optimistic assessment than if it had provided the pass-fail judgement sought by Congress." Even with the fudging, as William Douglas (McClatchy Newspapers) noted, the assessment revealed that "only eight of 18 benchmarks" had been slightly addressed. Not met, mind you. Which meant that not only was a pass/fail judgement not being utilized, no known grading system was being used. Standard letter grading would result in the puppet government FLUNKING the test even if you gave them full credit meeting eight benchmarks (which they did not do). Well, possibly a lifetime of coasting led Bully Boy to expect his usual grade of F to be upgraded to a "gentleman's C"?
Good question is how do you fail a test when you write up the answer key? That's what happened. Paul Richter (Los Angeles Times) rightly noted who came up with benchmarks: "The Bush administration's decision to set benchmarks . . . When they began publicizing the benchmarks a year ago, administration officials . . . President Bush turned to benchmarks amid intensifying criticism from Congress and plummeting public support. Benchmarks offered a way to counter congressional demands for timetables and to dampen the midterm election rage that ultimately cost his party control of Congress." So these were not outside goals the US administration had to admit failing, these were the own goals.
Stephen Hadley and Condi Rice were sent to Congress to strong arm wayward Republicans. (And probably, for fun, a few DC tourists.) On CNN, Ed Henry could point out that the talking point for Tuesday was the talking point for the week: "The president is pleading for more patience. He's not really offering a new prescription to deal with the violence on the ground in Iraq. Instead he's urging lawmakers to give him until September to see if the current troop increase will work -- but a growing number of his fellow Republicans are telling him time is running out and they want a course change sooner than September."
It could have been the perfect time for the Democrats in Congress to make the big move and end the illegal war (as approximately 70% of Americans want them to do). CBS and AP were reporting that the cost of the illegal war had risen to "an estimated $10 billion a month."
Nancy A. Youssef (McClatchy Newspapers) was reporting the deaths of 429 Iraqis "killed or wounded . . . at checkpoints or near patrols and convoys during the past year" and that warning shots account for "more than" one death per day. Youssef and Jonathan S. Landay (McClatchy Newspapers) were noting the conclusions "of all 16 U.S. intelligence agencies" in a new report (Global Security Assessment, delivered by the National Intelligence Council to Congress) which found, among other things, that "Even if the bloodletting can be contained, Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish leaders will be 'hard pressed' to reach lasting political reconciliation". Reuters reported the deaths of their own Namir Noor-Eldeen (22-year-old photographer) and Saeed Chmagh (40-year-old driver and camera assistant) "in what police said was American military action and witnesses described as a helicopter attack" -- the victims of what is euphemistically dubbed "random American bombardment" in Baghdad.
In what was a non-stop stream of reality coming out in reports, Friday saw many revelations.
Joshua Partlow and Sudarsan Raghavan (Washington Post) reported that Iraqi leaders were saying, "the deadlock between warring Sunni and Shiite factions makes major political progress unlikely in coming months." On the subject of the alleged readiness of Iraqi troops, Karen DeYoung (Washington Post) observed, "Despite stepped-up training, the readiness of the Iraqi military to operate independently of U.S. forces has decreased since President Bush's new strategy was launched in January, according to the White House progress report released yesterday." If that wasn't an indictment of the 'security' in Iraq, Gregg Zoroya (USA Today) revealed the findings of an internal army investigation into the January 20th Karbala attack that left 5 US soldiers dead (1 immediately, 4 were kidnapped and later found dead, in addition 3 more soldiers were wounded):
*Iraqi police suddenly vanished from the government compound before the shooting started.
*Attackers, evidently briefed on how U.S. forces would defend themselves, bottled up more than three dozen soldiers in a barracks and headquarters complex using a combination of smoke and fragment grenades and satchel charges to blow up Humvees.
*Gunmen knew exactly where to find and abduct U.S. officers.
*Iraqi vendors operating a PX and barbershop went home early.
*A back gate was left unlocked and unguarded.
While Condi Rice was insisting war takes time, all of the above and more was coming out. Mike Drummond and Hussein Khalifa (McClatchy Newspapers) were telling the story of Nawal Na'eem Karin's child, eighteen-months-old, who'd already began talking and had a phrase to shout: "Talaq inana! Talaq inana!" ("Bullets here! Bullets here!") -- just one of the benefits of the year-plus 'crackdown' in Baghdad that's produced no peace and had Nawal Na'eem Karin expressing her desire that US troops leave Iraq. Meanwhile, Robert Burns (AP) was addressing a little noted aspect of the "assessment" put out on Thursday by the White House, it "strongly implies that the administration believes its military strategy will take many more months to meet its goals."
Instead of building upon all the above and more to meet the withdrawal that American people want, US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was back to pushing the shell game she trotted out last March. "Troops home" -- in the measure -- just meant those classified as "combat troops." Those classified as "military police" or "terrorist hunters" could continue to stay and, of course, Bully Boy could toss all troops (all 160,000 currently in Iraq) into either or both two categories which would allow no reduction in the number of troops brought home. As Amy Goodman (Democracy Now!) noted on Friday, "The measure would remove most combat troops by April of next year but still leave tens of thousands soldiers behind." (Goodman also noted Dennis Kucinich stood alone in calling the nonsense out.)
Once again, Democrats in Congress blew it. Why they blew it may be worth considering. Two Thursdays ago, on KPFT's Progressive Forum, the host Wally James asked Matthew Rothschild (The Progressive) about the Democrats desire to run in 2008 not only on a platform against Bully Boy but on one that claims Democrats will end the war leading to no action being taken to seriously address the illegal war in the current Congress.
Rothschild: Well this is kind of pragmatic politics at its worst, it seems to me. Because I think the same thing happened with the Iraq war vote. They want the Iraq war to go on so they can go against Bush and the Iraq war in 2008. But look at how callous that is. They want a hundred more US soldiers to die every month and 500, 600 to be wounded and what, you know, a couple of thousand Iraqis to die every month just because it's politically expedient and it might help them win the White House? I mean, come on, talk about immorality if that's what they're doing that's disgraceful on the war issue.
And that says it all. (Just don't expect to read about it in The Nation.)
[*See Wally's "THIS JUST IN! RACISTS MOURN SENATOR CRAZY'S IMPLOSION" and Cedric's "Racists loved Senator Crazy McCain" for more on this topic.]