"As
nightfall does not come all at once, neither does oppression. In both
instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged.
And it is in such a twilight that we all must be most aware of change in the
air--however slight--lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness."
Justice William Douglas
For those
that have read the Book of Mormon: Ether Ch. 8 "...IF YOU AWAKEN TO YOUR
AWFUL SITUATION...(watch for the secret combinations that seek for power and
gain, and to take away this country's freedom.. and the other countries of
the world, by the shedding of the blood of the saints)..." Have
you watched the 911 news tapes carefully? See them all at "911 in Plane
Sight."
Have I got
your attention yet? Has Republican Rep. Ron Paul got your attention yet?
Don't listen to the biased and controlled media, but watch and listen
directly on CSpan daily!! Ever hear of "hear it from the horse's mouth?"
Report:
Iraq contracts have cost U.S. billions USA Today
Tue, 12 Aug 2008 9:27 AM PDT
The United States has paid $85 billion to contractors in the Iraq
theater for work ranging from food service to guarding diplomats, according
to a report released Tuesday.
Paper Ballots and Audits in
Time for Election Day 2008!
Tell Your Congressional Rep. to Vote for
HR 5036 "The Emergency Election Assistance for Secure Elections Act"
Americans need to be able to trust the counting of the vote on Election
Day. Paperless electronic voting is rife with computer mistakes and
security problems. Only 17 states have a voter verified paper record and
require an audit. With no paper record it is impossible to audit the
vote and we cannot be sure the vote was counted accurately.
Peace voters can only have an impact if we are sure our votes are
counted as they are cast.
On Tuesday, April 15, the U.S. House of Representatives will vote on a
bill that will help ensure election integrity in time for the November
2008 by providing funds to states for voter-verified paper records and
audits of the vote on Election Day.
Please send the letter below to your member of Congress IMMEDIATELY.
CLICK HERE to send the letter from the website of an allied
organization TrueVote. The U.S. House of Representatives needs to show
overwhelming bi-partisan support for this bill so the Senate will
quickly act and President Bush will sign the bill.
- - - - - - - - -
Dear Representative:
I am writing to urge you to support H.R. 5036 when it comes to the House
Floor this Tuesday. The 'Emergency Election Assistance for Secure
Elections Act' - the "EASY" bill - is needed to secure the November 2008
elections. Broad support in the House will ensure passage by the Senate
and approval by the president in time for the November election.
H.R. 5036 will provide states with funding for paper-based voting
systems and audits of the vote count. The bill will assure election
integrity nationally by making sure that votes are counted in a
transparent and audit-able way.
Thank you for your attention to this important matter.
- - - - - - - - -
CLICK HERE to send the letter. (You can edit the letter when you do
so.) Thank you for taking the time to help improve the election
integrity of elections in the United States.
PLEASE FORWARD THIS
EMAIL TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW.
05/16/08
The tide is turning.
Last night, the Senate voted almost
unanimously to throw out the FCC's flawed rules that would allow for more
media consolidation.This is a tremendous victory, and it
wouldn't have happened without the tens of thousands of activists like you
contacting your Senators and saying "Enough is enough."
Now it's time to take that momentum to the fight in the House of
Representatives. We need the House to act fast to join the Senate in passing
a Resolution of Disapproval of the media consolidation rules. Please take
action right now.
To remind you why this is so important, I'm forwarding one of the first
messages we sent to you about the effort to rollback the FCC's giveaway to
Big Media. Please take a moment to re-read it, and then contact
your Representative.
Jim Cramer CNBC: "Bear Stearns is Fine!" Tues, 3/11/08 and then 6
days later MSNBC "160 dollar a share Bear sold at $2 a share, other banks
also hurting"
LIsten to
the only Candidate telling the CHairman of the Federal Reserve as he did his
predecessor, how printing money or "capital" instead of backing it up with
Gold devalues the Dollar and giving him an economic lesson: Feb. 27,
2008 "Our Economy, Recession, Depression measures, what is not working and
why!!
Why
did the Only Chief of Staff that said "We will not go to war with Iran on my
watch" get forced to resign and now not being allowed to testify for
Congress? Read more
Mar. 2, 2008 Nobel Prize Economist says
about The Iraq War: ""To offset
that depressing effect, the Fed has
flooded the economy with liquidity and the regulators looked the other way
when very imprudent lending was going up," Stiglitz said. "We
were living on borrowed money and borrowed time and eventually a
day of reckoning had to come, and it has now
come." (just like the
Economy lesson Ron Paul gave the Federal Reserve Director the
other day!!)"
LIsten to
the only Candidate telling Americans the truth of what needs to change: Ron
Paul for our Constitution
http://www.c-spanarchives.org/library/index.php?main_page=product_video_info&products_id=201810-1&showVid=true for all of FLoor Session or just His
speech
http://www.c-spanarchives.org/congress/?q=node/77531&id=8128538 Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT) speaks on the Senate floor about his
efforts to stop the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA)
reform legislation.
10/26/2007: WASHINGTON, DC:
This is really good to get the truth about all the
facts!! This administration has violated the "The Rule of Law. To
violate the civil liberties of US Citizens. No more trampling on our
Constitution. If you wait until the end, it may be too late. Pres. Bush
believes you have to give up certain rights for security. When you start
dimishing our rights, you compound the affects of 9/11. We must stand up
for the Constitution and the Rule of Law. Words of Supreme Court
Judge Sandra Day Oconnor...."
Come read more
about Rule of Law and our Constitutional Rights. 03/05/08 Sen. Dodd
again warning Congress that we need to do something about the housing
bubble burst. That those in charge were warned last Summer by him
and others and they just turned on the snooze button, and we must
prevent this housing crisis with financing solutions to preserve home
ownership. IF we are not already in the middle of recession, we
need to stop the downward spiral of our housing crisis. FHA Reform
passed, and working with the House to help people keep their homes. Bill
2636 would start to address this and hearings with Banking
Leaders. THe fact that we are doing nothing at all is
reprehensive. We need to do more to bring liquidity to our property
values. We need to do something. AS we go on our 2
week vacation, some AMericans will be loosing their homes because we
could not take the time to do something. ( look for this great wake up
call 03/05/08
http://www.c-spanarchives.org/congress/?q=node/77531&id=8128538
03/05/08 Oversight
function by Senator Chuck Grassley R-Iowa: Govt. stonewalling..."I am
tired of it...talk about what we are entitled to until we get it under
Constitution...Congressional Check of govt documents AMericans are
entitled to by Dept of HOmeland SEcurity, FBI, STate Dept...jets used
for travel by Senior FBI officials instead of counter intelligence it
was designed for, wont give flight logs ...Michael German case, for 2
years despite requests by Judiciary committes, FBI fails, to
respond, trying to hide evidence from public about evidence of
terrorists plots...letters of false statements of subpeonas that never
existed...emails....what could they be trying to hide?....Anthrax
attacks...leaking info to press...."
Another Candidate not getting covered by
mainstream media that tells facts and truth: Rep. Cynthia McKinney:
http://www.runcynthiarun.org/
or www.gp.org The Green Party.
Find out about "Cross-Over Voting"
happening in US!!!
04/01/08 A Sustainable
Anti-Nuclear Movement Starts with Students
Think Outside the Bomb is a nuclear abolition
conference lead by (and free to) students and young professionals.
Students, generally, are engaged in issues like Iraq, the environment
and human rights. For activists born after the Cold War, a nuclear arms
race is abstract and distant.
Each year the conference narrows this gap by
providing students with the background and tools to work on nuclear
issues in a variety of personal and professional ways. Through
workshops, panels and strategy planning sessions the conference connects
nuclear issues to attendees’ communities. Anxiety still looms over the
American public because of North Korea’s nuclear program; and yet there
is a lack of interest in the fact that the U.S. is currently trying to
rejuvenate our own stockpile.
Last year a SPAN delegation attended Think Outside
the Bomb in Santa Barbara and came back with innovative strategies for
organizing, educating and lobbying. This year SPAN and other student
organizations will converge twice for Think Outside the Bomb: first, in
Washington on April 12th at American University; and then again, in
August at Tuffs University in Boston.
It is critical to engage students and young
professionals against “Bombplex Transformation” and new threats as they
emerge. In the coming years the generation of leaders who lived through
the Cold War will be gone – it is our duty to build on our successes and
pass our experiences with nuclear abolition work to the next generation
while we still can.
03/20/08
"In 2003,
men and women in the Armed Forces stepped in to Iraq under the
impression that liberation would be quick and easy.
Five years later,
the war - and the physical and emotional wounds they suffered in
Iraq or Afghanistan - continue to rage on for thousands of
people.
Men and women who
served abroad are coming home to long waits for medical care in
overcrowded, mismanaged and underfunded VA facilities. That's just not
right!
We have a moral
obligation to care for the newest generation of war wounded - and all
Americans alike.
Sign the
petition today >> "
03/12/08
House votes in support of ethics enforcement
The House of Representatives tonight passed a monumentally important
resolution to create an independent, bipartisan panel of non-lawmakers
to help review and
investigate possible ethics violations by
House members.
“The House finally firmly responded to the message the American public
sent in the last election,” said Common Cause President Bob Edgar. “This
kind of independent body has a long track record of success at the state
level. If House members make a good faith effort to let it work, the
Office of Congressional Ethics will be a tremendous improvement to the
current system.”
By a vote of 229-182, the House created the six-member Office of
Congressional Ethics (OCE), which will have the power to initiate and
conduct ethics investigations and issue reports and recommendations to
the House Ethics Committee. The resolution does not affect the Senate,
which has done nothing to improve the enforcement of ethics rules.
For years, Common Cause has advocated for an independent body in
Congress to help enforce ethics rules modeled on the independent
commissions that exist in many state legislatures. Common Cause has
worked closely with the leadership of both parties to shape the changes
in the ethics rules and enforcement procedures made in response to the
scandals of lobbyist Jack Abramoff and former Rep. Randy “Duke”
Cunningham (R-CA).
“You have to give credit to Speaker Pelosi for making this happen,”
said Edgar. “The Republican conference and some members of the
Democratic caucus fought this thing from the very beginning, but Speaker
Pelosi kept her word and saw it through to the end.”
The leadership of each party will jointly appoint the six members of the
OCE. The OCE will be the most successful if the appointees are people of
high character, have a background in jurisprudence and are not partisan.
“Now we just have to make sure the OCE doesn’t get torpedoed by the same
folks who fought against it,” said Edgar. “This will work like it is
supposed to if the OCE can independently and objectively enforce the
rules of conduct in the House – something that has been missing for more
than a decade.”
02/26/08 Latest update: "McCain is now breaking the law
by ignoring the campaign spending restrictions for the Republican
primary that came when he asked for federal matching funds -- funds he
used as collateral on a loan that helped keep his campaign going.
But now that the lobbyist and special interest money has started
pouring into his campaign, he's trying to back out of the promise he
made just a few months ago. They're feeding so much cash into his bank
account, this "reformer" wants nothing to do with
federal campaign finance laws anymore.
That's why today, we're filing a formal complaint with the
Federal Election Commission demanding that
John McCain be held to the
campaign finance laws. Trying to back out shows a total lack of
integrity and honesty -- he made a deal with the American people to to
abide by the law, and in return, he was guaranteed taxpayer money that
he used to back a loan.
I'd like you to add your name in support of our complaint, and
ask as many people as you can to sign on. American taxpayers made a deal
with
John McCain -- now that he's flush with lobbyist cash, he wants
to pretend that it never happened.
A few months ago,
John McCain applied for and was approved to receive federal
matching funds. Because he couldn't find enough people to fund his
campaign, he was also forced to apply for a $4 million line of credit,
which he secured by using the federal matching funds as collateral.
By taking the federal funding, he agreed to spend no more than $57
million until the
Republican convention. But so far, his campaign has spent at
least $49 million -- leaving him with less than $10 million to campaign
with through September.
Now that he's won the nomination and has the support of the
Republican lobbyist and special interest machine, he's trying to ignore
that the whole thing ever happened. He recently wrote a letter to the
FEC telling them that he was backing out, even though the FEC is very
clear that any request to withdraw from the agreement must be approved;
you can't just change your mind and take it back -- legally, you have to
be given permission.
McCain isn't asking because he knows he'll never be granted
permission, and he doesn't want to have to accept the funding
restrictions he agreed to when he used the money as collateral for a
loan. He's ripping a page right from
George Bush's playbook: ignoring the laws when they aren't
convenient and hoping no one will notice.
Stand up and show him that hundreds of thousands of people have
noticed -- he can't change the rules in the middle of the game because
he doesn't like how things are going for him:
Using government programs when it's politically convenient and
breaking the rules when it's not ... remind you of anyone?
Just like
George Bush,
John McCain thinks he's above the law. McCain poses as a
reformer, but seems to think reforms apply to everyone but him.
Time to send him a message." (what did he get a Senate
Reprimand for ?)
Howard Dean
Do you believe that Congress
can police itself?
Let's look at the facts:
• Under the current rules, only a member of Congress can file an ethics
complaint against another member.
• When former Reps. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-CA) and Bob Ney (R-OH)
were arrested, convicted and sentenced for bribery, the House
Ethics Committee was silent.
• When federal agents found $90,000 in cash in Rep. William Jefferson's
(D-LA) freezer and he was indicted on corruption charges, no
ethics complaints were filed.
• When the details of Rep. Rick Renzi's shady land deal were making
headlines, the Ethics Committee waited until three days after the
35-count indictment to announce that it will look into Renzi's behavior.
CallRep. Chris Cannontoday
at (202) 225-7751and demand that Congress
appoint an independent ethics panel! After you make the call, please
report back to us so that we can track our progress.
Last week, a handful of Representatives killed a planned vote on the
resolution (House Resolution 895) to create an independent Office of
Congressional Ethics. These members like the status quo of "anything
goes" when it comes to personal and professional ethics.
One member of Congress was even quoted as saying that she couldn't
understand why an independent panel "would have more ethics, more
intelligence, more judgment than we have." They just don't get it!
We deserve better from our members of Congress. It's clear that
the House is not going to vote for strong ethics enforcement unless they
are afraid not to. That's where you come in. With the help of
Common Cause activists like you, we fought for and passed a major ethics
reform bill in 2007. But that law can only be effective if it is
enforced. Congress has proven that it is unable to police itself. It's
time for a change.
Please call Rep. Cannon today and tell
that you expect them to support the resolution to
create an independent Office of Congressional Ethics. The phone number
is (202) 225-7751.
Please let us know that you've made the call, so we know
where to turn up the heat! Even if you made a call last week,
we need you to make your voice heard again today!
Thanks for all you do,
Sarah Dufendach
Vice President for Legislative Affairs, Common Cause
Last week, on the 5th anniversary of the
Iraq War, hundreds of people stood with Oil Change International in the
streets in front of the American Petroleum Institute demanding a
Separation of Oil & State. They know, just as you do, that oil was the
central motivation of the war in Iraq and that oil money in politics is
helping to keep us there. We also know that oil money is working hard to
prevent a transition to a clean energy future.
Now, for the first time ever, we can see
exactly how members of Congress who accept more oil money also vote in
favor of Big Oil.
Follow the Oil Money is an exciting new
tool that tracks which companies are pumping their dirty oil money into
politics, who is receiving it, and how it correlates to key climate,
energy and war votes. This helps you find out just how oily your
members of Congress are and how they have voted on the issues that mean
the most to you.
A few weeks ago, the House passed a bill that would fund clean energy
and end some oil subsidies. Did you know that those who voted against
this bill received on average
more than 5 times more oil money than those who supported it? The
effort is now stalled in the Senate, so please make sure to
take action and tell your Senator to support clean energy, not oil.
Overall, we found that members of Congress who voted for Big Oil took
almost
four times more oil money than those who voted in the public
interest. This is not coincidence-- the oil industry knows the leverage
of their dollars. This is why we have to fight back by exposing the
undue influence of the oil industry and demanding a Separation of Oil &
State.
Follow the Oil Money isn't just a cool new tool. It's proof that there
is a striking connection between oil dollars and bad votes. We hope
that you will use it to contact your members of Congress and organize in
your community.
Tell your friends about it and if you like what you see, please
consider
supporting us at Oil Change International.
Don't forget to pass this important message onto your friends. By
simply fowarding this email you are taking a step toward a better
democracy.
So many times we vote for a candidate without researching where that
candidate stands on the issues that are most important. Peace Action has
created a Peace Voter <
McCain crashed 5 jets, plus he was
responsible for the horrible USS Forrestal fire In 1967.
Surviving crewmen and those who investigated the Forrestal fire case
reported that McCain deliberately 'wet-started' his A-4E Skyhawk to
shake up the guy in the F-4 Phantom behind his A-4. 'Wet-starts', done
either deliberately (the starter motor switch allowed kerosene to pool
in the engine and give a wet start) or accidentally, shoot a large flame
from the tail of the aircraft. In McCain's case, the 'wet-start' 'cooked
off' and launched the M34 Zuni rocket from the rear F-4 that punctured
the Skyhawk's fuel tank, knocked the M-65 1000 lb. bomb off it's 500 lb.
rated mount, and touched off the explosions and massive fire.
The F-4 pilot was reportedly killed in
the conflagration, along with 167 of his fellow Forrestal shipmates
(including those who died later from wounds suffered).
'Wet starting' was a common practice among young
'hot-dog' pilots. McCain was quickly (they were still counting the
Forrestal dead) transferred to the USS Oriskany (the only Forrestal
crewman to be immediately transferred).
Description: XA4D-1 Skyhawk BuNo 137812 experiencing a wet start
(note the pool of JP4 on the ground and the tongue of flame from the
tailpipe). Do you need more - This is only a tip of the Iceberg!!!
Congressman Ron Paul slammed Federal Reserve chairman
Ben Bernanke during a House Financial Services Committee
meeting today for following a policy of deliberately
destroying the dollar and wiping out the American middle
class. Can you say "Amero?""Inflation comes from the
unwise increase in the supply of money credit....to
argue that we can continue to debase the currency, which
is really the policy of that you're following, purposely
debasing value of currency - which to me seems so
destructive....it just puts more pressure on the federal
reserve to create capital out of thin air in order to
stimulate the economy and usually that just goes into
mal-investment," said Paul.
Feb. 19, 2009
British
Iraq Dossier Surfaces, Without Crucial Weapons Claim New York Times
Mon, 18 Feb
2008 4:55 PM PST
An early version of a British dossier of prewar intelligence on Iraq
did not include a claim about unconventional weapons that became key to
Prime Minister Tony Blair?s case for war.
Today
Russian Press Secretary for Putin said that "As we close military bases,
the US opens more, as we get rid of weapons, the US is forcing us
into another Arms Race." Feb. 20, 2008
"Thanks to you, in just a month, over 11,000 Peace Action members
submitted <
By Charlie Savage, Globe Staff |
February 28, 2006
WASHINGTON -- Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, a
leading Republican critic of President Bush's domestic spying program,
has drafted a bill that would exempt the once-secret surveillance
program from a 1978 statute that requires warrants.
Everyday I read the
news, I wonder if we will live in a world like "I AM LEGEND," "Escape
from New York," "Soilent Green," and "Sleeper." Why do humans want to
change the human race? IS is for power and control? In the name of
"advancing medical research for the greater good?"
"LONDON - British scientists say
they have created human embryos containing DNA from two women and a man
in a procedure that researchers hope might be used one day to produce
embryos free of inherited diseases.
Though the preliminary research has raised
concerns about the possibility of genetically
modified babies, the scientists say that the
embryos are still only primarily the product of
one man and one woman.
"We are not trying to
alter genes, we're just trying to swap a small
proportion of the bad ones for some good ones,"
said Patrick Chinnery, a professor of
neurogenetics at
Newcastle University involved in the
research."
Thu Jan 17, 3:30 PM
ET
"LONDON (AFP) -
Britain's fertility
regulator said Thursday
it would allow
scientists to create
human-animal hybrid
embryos for
research.Scientists
argue the research could
pave the way for
therapies for diseases
such as Parkinson's and
Alzheimer's, although
opponents condemned the
HFEA's decision Thursday
as a 'disastrous setback
for human
dignity'.Researchers
want to produce hybrids
that are 99.9 percent
human and 0.1 percent
animal.
Stem cells, which can grow into different kinds of tissue, are then formed.
Once their own nuclear DNA is removed and replaced with DNA from a human cell, they become effectively human. The only "animal" element left is the tiny amount of DNA housed in the mitochondria, rod-like power plants outside the cell nucleus that generate energy.
"Of those embryos
with a smaller
proportion of human
material, greater
uncertainty arises... as
to whether such an
embryo is a human being
with due rights," he
said. US
President George W. Bush
has twice vetoed a bill
seeking to allow federal
funds for stem cell
research as it would
involve human embryo
destruction."
Want to
learn more:
Genetic
Engineering and Its
Dangers
FOR PET OWNERS REMINDER: IF you want to write Red Cross to allow our
pets to go with us to shelters sign: Are you a pet owner? Then
you should take a look at this petition which speaks on their behalf.
http://petitiononline.com/LittleMe/
Feb. 17, 2008
The Pet Safety and Protection Act is in
jeopardy! This act prohibits experimentation
facilities from buying dogs and cats from
Class B animal dealers. The Pet Safety and
Protection Act was passed as an amendment to
the Farm Bill by both the Senate and House.
However, as the Senate and House work out
differences between the two versions of the
Farm Bill, animal experimenters are
pressuring Congress to drop the pet safety
provisions altogether.
How you can help:
Forward this e-mail to your friends
and family and ask them to take action
as well.
Class B animal dealers, also known as
"random source dealers," often acquire
animals through theft and deception and are
known to sell lost and stolen cats and dogs
to laboratories. The abuse of dogs and cats
by Class B dealers is a serious problem and
was documented in the
HBO documentary
Dealing Dogs.
Dear Utah Animal Advocates,
Last year, Utah State Senator Gene
Davis sponsored a felony-level animal torture bill that failed in the final
minutes of the 2007 legislative session. Undaunted, last week Senator Davis
reintroduced the bill, now known as SB 102. The ASPCA supports SB 102, and
we hope that you’ll help ensure its passage—especially over a seemingly
similar but far weaker bill, SB 117, that’s not good for Utah’s animals.
Thank you for your support, Utah—let’s
make 2008 the best year yet for legislation that protects your state’s
animals. 02/14/08
Senate narrowly approves animal-cruelty bill
A bill that would make some cases of animal cruelty a felony cleared the
Utah Senate by one vote.
There were several attempts to change Senate Bill 117 before it passed,
15-14, Thursday.
A first offense of animal cruelty would still be a misdemeanor. But a
second offense within five years would be a third-degree felony.
The bill's sponsor, Republican Sen. Allen Christensen of North Ogden,
says it represents a good compromise between voices calling for a tougher
law and those who wanted to leave the law unchanged.
The bill now heads to the House.
The Tracking Animal Cruelty Crimes Act (S. 2439), recently introduced by Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), directs the U.S. Attorney General to modify the FBI's crime data reporting systems to list cruelty to animals as a separate offense category.
Research clearly demonstrates that there is a close association between animal abuse and family violence, as well as other crimes. In addition, animal abuse frequently is one of the first signals of a child, and family, at risk. Without accurate tracking, there is no way to access important information such as trends or the relationship to demographic and geographic data, on which to base policy development and resource allocation.
TAKE ACTION Please make brief, polite phone calls right away to your two U.S. Senators -- Hillary Clinton at (202) 224-4451 and Charles Schumer at (202) 224-6542 -- and ask them to co-sponsor this critical piece of legislation.
Making a call is easy. A staff member will take your message and pass it to your legislator. You can say:
"Hello, this is [your name]. I am a constituent from [your town]. I'm calling to ask the senator to support the Tracking Animal Cruelty Crimes Act (S. 2439), and ask that the senator push for this bill to get a vote. This issue is important to me. Thank you for your consideration."
Then, send a follow-up email to reiterate your support for having animal cruelty added as a separate category in the FBI's crime database.
Finally, please be sure to tell your friends and family about this important measure and how they can help, too.
Thank you for all you do for animals!
As soon as tomorrow, Interior Secretary Kempthorne is expected to announce the elimination of federal protections for hundreds of endangered wolves in Greater Yellowstone and the Northern Rockies.
Please take a moment right now to call the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service at 1-800-344-WILD (9453) and deliver this simple message:
“My name is Dand I’m calling from Orem, Utah. I understand that the federal government may remove wolves in the Greater Yellowstone and Central Idaho regions tomorrow from the list of federally protected threatened and endangered species.
I want your department to know that I strongly oppose the weakening of protections for these wolves and expect you to fulfill your obligation to secure a lasting future in the Northern Rockies for these amazing animals.”
The lives of hundreds of wolves are at stake. Please call tonight before 8 PM Eastern Time or first thing tomorrow morning.
In a matter of hours, newspapers across the country could be reporting on the Bush/Cheney Administration's expected announcement … and its potentially devastating impact on some of America’s most beloved wolves.
But today I need your help to let these federal officials know that Americans love our wolves and want to see them protected.
Please call the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service at 1-800-344-WILD (9453) and speak out for our wolves. Leave a message if you can, and remember to let us know that you called.
According to FEMA
The Red Cross will not allow your pets to come with you to shelters:
http://www.fema.gov/kids/evacuat.htm :
you need to evacuate (leave your home for safer ground) the most
important thing is to TAKE YOUR PET WITH YOU. Leaving pets behind,
even if you try to create a safe place for them, is not the best
action. BUT, pets cannot go with you to a Red Cross emergency
shelter (unless they are service animals, like dogs for the visually
impaired.) Since your pet cannot go to the shelter, you need to plan
ahead.
hotels or motels
outside your immediate area and ask about their policies on
accepting pets during an emergency. Keep a list of "pet friendly"
places in your emergency kit so you"ll know where to go. If you get
advance notice that you will need to evacuate, call and make a
reservation at the "pet friendly" places right away!
You can also ask friends or relatives outside the area if they
could keep your pets in an emergency.
repare a list of
boarding facilities and veterinarians who could shelter your animals
in an emergency. Keep the list in your emergency kit.
If you have more than one pet, they may be more comfortable if
they are kept together, but in an emergency that might not be
possible.
If you are under a disaster warning, keep your pets inside with
you so you don’t have to look for them if you have to evacuate. Make
sure they are wearing collars and identification tags.
Judge says Corps of Engineers is responsible for the New
Orleans flooding!
February 20, 2008
A federal judge has
determined that the US Army Corps of Engineers "squandered
millions of dollars in building a levee system ... which was
known to be inadequate by the Corps' own calculations."
But an 80-year old law
tied Federal District Judge Stanwood Duval's hands and
compelled him to release the Corps of Engineers from all
financial liability for their shoddy
workmanship. Says Duval, the law created an
environment where "gross incompetence receives the same
treatment as a simple mistake."
Judge Duval in the
final page of his statement says "It is not within this
Court's power to address the wrongs committed. It is
hopefully within the citizens of the United States' power to
address the failures of our laws and agencies. If not, it is
certain that another tragedy such as this will occur again"
The 8/29 Investigation
Act is the way for the citizens to exercise their power!
It happened today -
the Bush administration has just eliminated federal
protections for hundreds of endangered wolves in Greater
Yellowstone and the Northern Rockies.
This decision leaves wolves in Greater Yellowstone
and the Northern Rockies at the mercy of outrageous
state management plans that allow for the killing of
as many as 1,200 wolves - 80% of all the region's
wild wolves!
Idaho officials want to use aerial gunning to
kill wolves in their state. Wyoming agencies have left
the door open to the use of traps and poison to
eliminate wolves. And officials in both states - and
Montana - have proposed wolf hunts.
That's not responsible wildlife management. It's a
recipe for disaster.
Jan. 30, 2008 "Last week, the Bush Cheney Administration
changed the rules, taking another step toward the slaughter of
hundreds of wolves in the Greater Yellowstone and Northern Rockies region --
even while these animals remain protected under the Endangered Species
Act.
But thanks to the generousity of supporters like you, we were
prepared for the announcement: On Monday, Defenders and our
conservation partners immediately filed suit to stop these rule changes.
Last week’s change to the so-called “10j” rule will have devastating
consequences. Up to 900 wolves -- over half of the region’s wolf
population -- could be killed, even though they remain protected by the
Endangered Species Act.
The killing could begin as early as March.
With your monthly support, we can keep fighting in the courts and on the
ground to protect these magnificent animals.
As a Wildlife Guardian, your ongoing monthly donation -- just pennies per
day -- will provide crucial and reliable support for our battles in the
months ahead.
Unfortunately, last week’s rule change is only the beginning:
In just a few weeks, the Bush/Cheney Administration is expected to announce
the removal of Greater Yellowstone wolves from the federal list of
endangered species -- opening the door to the killing of as many as
two-thirds of the wolves in Wyoming and all but around 100 wolves in Idaho.
Defenders’ seasoned legal team has a proven track record of success when it
comes to defending our wolves. When the American Farm Bureau -- a
powerful industry lobby group -- wanted to kill all the Yellowstone wolves,
we took them on and won. Westopped then-Interior
Secretary Gale Norton from lifting critical wolf protections in 2005. And
last year in Alaska, we halted a bloody wolf bounty program.
With your help, we can win for wolves again. "
From DEfenders of Wildlife
May 18, 2007 AVMA PET FOOD RECALL LIST. WATCH OUT FOR TREATS, AND
CHEAP PET FOOD. GO TO COSTCO AND GET NUTRA NUGGETS, KIRKLAND WITH NO FILLERS
LIKE CORN OR WHEAT DOGS AND CATS ARE HIGHLY ALLERGIC TO.
http://www.avma.org/aa/menufoodsrecall/products.asp
We need your voice more than ever to protect quality healthcare for those
who need it most: families, the elderly and infants. Thank you for speaking
up on their behalf today!
While polar bear mothers and cubs were nestled in their dens, the
Bush/Cheney Administration auctioned off key habitat for these struggling
animals to Big Oil --despite the opposition of tens of thousands of
activists like you.
As a warming climate takes its toll on polar bear habitat, federal
officials are selling off the very places these great white bears depend on
for hunting, denning and survival.
America’s polar bears will likely be extinct in fewer than 50 years,
according to U.S. Geological Survey scientists. Yet federal officials have
once again delayed action to protect these struggling animals as
“threatened” under the Endangered Species Act.
Instead, officials auctioned off millions of acres of vital habitat
in Alaska’s Chukchi Sea to Shell and other Big Oil companies
earlier this month -- and yet again, President Bush has included
dangerous drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in his budget.
Increased drilling in these critical habitats could devastate
America’s polar bears. But ExxonMobil, Shell and other Big Oil
companies continue to use their billions in profits to press for harmful
drilling in the places polar bears need to survive -- and continue our
dependence on the fuels that spur the rising temperatures that are causing
the bears’ demise.
Here's a hint of what our polar bears are up against: Royal Dutch Shell
bid more than $105 million for a single tract of drilling acreage in the
Chukchi Sea. [1]
Our polar bears need allies if they are going to survive.
That's why Defenders and our conservation partners have filed suit to stop
the Chukchi oil leases.
Defenders of Wildlife is doing all we can to protect our polar bears --
right now, we're...
...fighting in court to block the sale of millions of acres
of vital polar bear habitat to Big Oil.
...working to prevent Arctic Refuge drilling language
from entering the federal budget.
...working to pass the Udall-Eisenhower Arctic Wilderness
Act, a bill to permanently protect the Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge and continuing to battle efforts to open this special place to
Big Oil’s dirty rigs.
...working to pass the Global Warming Wildlife Survival Act
-- already passed by the House of Representatives, this
legislation is a vital first step to ensure that polar bears and other
wildlife can cope with a changing climate.
...working to pass the Polar Bear Protection Act,
legislation to stop wealthy U.S. trophy hunters from killing polar bears
in Canada and returning with their quarry.
...working with Congressional staff to find sensible energy
solutions to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, help combat
global warming and protect our wildlife.
Even in their final months in office, officials in the Bush/Cheney
Administration have made their intentions crystal clear: they’ll
fight for Big Oil’s profit -- and leave our polar bears out in the cold.
While most Americans have been celebrating the holidays,
officials in the Bush/Cheney Administration have
been working behind the scenes to pave the way for the
killing of hundreds of wolves in the Greater
Yellowstone area.
Over the last several weeks, the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service has been quietly moving forward with
rule changes that would allow officials in Idaho and
Wyoming to begin killing wolves even before
gray wolves are removed from the list of federally
protected threatened and endangered species.
This latest proposal would jump start plans
to use fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters and other means
to kill hundreds of wolves in Idaho, leaving only a few
more than 200 wolves in the state. In fact,
three-quarters of the wolves in the Lolo District of the
Clearwater National Forest could be removed… even before
they are de-listed.
And, unfortunately, it’s not just Idaho’s wolves that
are threatened by the proposal. Hundreds of wolves in
Wyoming could be shot and trapped under the new rules --
whether wolves are removed from the endangered and
threatened species list or not.
And the outlook for Wyoming wolves won’t improve any
if, as expected, the Bush/Cheney Administration
eliminates Endangered Species Act protections for gray
wolves in the Northern Rockies early next year.
On December 14th, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
officially approved the State of Wyoming’s wolf
management plan, allowing state officials to use
aerial gunning and snares to shoot and trap as many as
two-thirds of the wolves in the state.
Just last week, Congressman Nick Rahall (D-WV), Wayne
Gilchrest (R-MD), George Miller (D-CA), Jim Saxton
(R-NJ) and Norm Dicks (D-WA) warned in a letter to
Secretary Kempthorne that de-listing wolves in the
Northern Rockies now is a mistake.
In the letter, this bipartisan group of lawmakers
cited grave concerns with the state wolf management
plans approved by the Bush/Cheney Administration and
their potential impact on the future of wolves in the
region.
Defenders is mustering our resources to fight these
terrible proposals in the weeks ahead. But right now, we
need you to
speak out for wolves with your message.
January 11, 2008
Dear D:
Thank you for contacting me about the Protect America's
Wildlife (PAW) Act. Your concerns and opinions are
important to me.
Hunting is a popular game sport in which many citizens
participate, and I support their right to do so.
However, a new trend of "aerial hunting" has emerged,
where hunters shoot wildlife from the air. This practice
is seen by some as a from of cruelty towards animals.
Certainly, inhumane treatment of animals is
unacceptable.
The PAW Act seeks to hold those accountable for shooting
wildlife from an aircraft. In addition to banning aerial
hunting, the bill also outlines provisions for a state's
to shoot animals from the air only if there is a
biological emergency. Finally, the act provides an
avenue for lawsuits against those who engage in this
activity.
While I understand this is an emotional issue for some,
the bill will impose unnecessary regulations on state
fish and wildlife agencies. States should have the
freedom to outline and implement their own rules and
regulations as pertaining to their state's wildlife
populations. Some states are more susceptible for aerial
hunting than others, and accordingly, the decisions
should be left to individual states to decide. The
language in the legislation stipulating what a
biological emergency is overly restrictive in my
opinion. States should be able to prevent a biological
emergency but this legislation only allows them to react
to one. Therefore, I am opposed to HR 3663 in its
current form.
The legislation of the PAW Act (HR 3663) is currently
under revision in the Fisheries, Wildlife, and Oceans
Subcommittee. As this bill comes closer to a vote, I
will be sure to take your opinion into consideration.
Sincerely,
Chris Cannon
Member of Congress
Come see how DRug Companies and
PHarmacies are marking up Prescription Drugs up 600,000%!! SHop at
COSTCO for best discounts!!
CLICK HERE!
With
millions of Americans losing their homes in the worst
foreclosure crisis in memory, Senate Democrats are
springing into action.
Republicans, on the other hand are starting
another filibuster.
We have new legislation designed to rush federal
assistance to people devastated by the mortgage crisis,
but our opponents are once again standing in the way of
progress. Now, I need your help to tell the Republicans
that it's time to do the right thing.
We need to help hard-working American homeowners, who
are watching their home values fall with every
foreclosure - for many of them, that's their children's
college tuition and their retirement savings
disappearing before their eyes.
Republican economic failures caused this crisis
in the first place. They did away with
government oversight and removed any accountability from
the private sector, and then they acted surprised when
Countrywide became this year's Enron.
Now our economy is on the very brink of
recession and foreclosure rates have nearly doubled in
the last year. Over 2 million Americans are at
risk for losing their home and losing their grip on the
American Dream. We can't afford to sit around and wait
for these issues to sort themselves out.
Democrats have a plan to address this crisis.
We would immediately authorize an additional
$200 million for housing counselors who can help
keep a half-million at-risk families in their
homes.
Our plan would $4 billion to help local
communities hardest hit by foreclosures buy back and
rehab empty houses, so that property values in the
surrounding neighborhoods don't plummet further.
We would also let homeowners who are forced into
bankruptcy get their mortgages modified to reflect
their lower home value, just like bankruptcy courts
can modify loans for vacation homes and yachts.
Finally, Senate Democrats would amend the Truth
in Lending Act to require simplified disclosures of
interest rates and payments, helping working
families avoid foreclosures in the future.
Republicans are planning to filibuster this
vital legislation as early as 2:30 PM today, so we need
to act fast. Join the DSCC today as we tell
our opponents it's time to stand up for the middle
class.
These foreclosures hurt all of us. They damage the
economy in a downward spiral of falling home values and
decreased tax bases.
Worse, they put our friends and neighbors out of their
homes. It's not right, so Senate Democrats are standing
up against it. Republicans are standing in our way.
Please take action today.
Sincerely,
Chuck Schumer
**********************************updates
on the War in IRaq
How is killing so many of our best
soldiers "protecting us from terrorists (that would otherwise come here to
fight us? Not according to latest NYC report that shows most terrorists are
"home grown right here." Watch embedded video with soldiers
during The Surge April 1st http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/badvoodoo/:
"07/25/07 "1,5 million Iraq War Veterans filed a suit today for being
denied medical care."NBC news.
5 more soldiers killed in last 24 hrs. 07/19/07
and past 17 days communications were stopped because "we were loosing so
many."
30 US soldiers were killed the last week of June 23rd! 20
Soldiers have died in July so far as of 07/07/07. ONe
hundred fifteen
soldiers have been killed in May and
As
of Wednesday July 30, 2008, at least
4,210 US Soldiers have diedaccording to an AFP tally based on
independent website
icasualties.org.
since
the U.S. invasion began. " Senator Orin Hatch told us at a
Memorial Service Last year that the "Terrorist are here." So should we
not be fortifying our country and military here? ( My best
friend's buddy that has gone to Iraq with him 3 times was just hit by a rocket and
flown to Germany, it is getting so dangerous out there and they "keep
loosing more guys lately" and overworking our guys left behind because it
takes so long to get replacements. And they are all so
stressed from repeat deployments that they are giving them Anti Anxiety and
Depression drugs. Many soldiers are never identified that have PTSD.
Read Time Magazine article "The Military's SEcret Weapon: thousands of
troops being given antidepressant drugs to deal with battlefield stress."
June 16, 2008. Endangering our guys even more and
preventing them from leave to rest.) 03/19/08 ON 5th Anniversary of War: "Bush
defends
Iraq war in speech
LOOK AT THIS JOKE OF AN ARMY THE IRAQI ARMY IS:
Standing up'
Iraq army looks open-ended AP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 29 Mar 2008
11:49 AM PDT READ THE WHOLE
ARTICLE HERE Iraq's new army is "developing steadily," with "strong Iraqi leaders
out front," the
chief U.S. trainer assured the American
people. That was
three-plus years ago, the U.S. Army
general was David H. Petraeus, and some of
those Iraqi officials at the time were busy embezzling more than $1 billion
allotted for the new army's weapons,
according to investigators.jUST
LIKE THIS WEEK WITH BASRA FIGHTING, SUPPOSEDLY IRAQI GOVT AND ARMY WERE
SUPPOSSED TO DEAL WITH IT THEMSELVES, SO WHY DID OUR AIRFORCE HAVE TO GO IN?
LIKE THE IRAQI, DESERTING, CORRUPT, SHIITE TRAITOR INFESTED ARMY WILL EVER
FIGHT AS ONE? JUST ASK ANY OR OUR MILITARY AND THEY WILL TELL YOU THEY ARE
SHADY, UNTRUSTWORTHY AND UNRELIABLE!
International Herald Tribune
Wed, 19 Mar 2008
9:48 AM PDT
In an address Wednesday marking the fifth anniversary of the beginning of
the war in Iraq, President George W. Bush defended the conflict as
one that was necessary and is succeeding."
The Associated Press
"When the 1,000th American soldier died in September 2004, the
insurgency was just gaining steam. The 2,000th death came as Iraq held
its first elections in decades, in October 2005.
The U.S. announced its 3,000th loss on the last day
of 2006, at the end of a year rocked by sectarian violence.
The 4,000th death will come with the war further out
of the public eye, and replaced by other topics on the front burner of the
U.S. presidential campaigns.
The number killed in Iraq is far less than in other
modern American wars. In Vietnam, the U.S. lost on average about 4,850
troops a year from 1963-75. In the Korean war, from 1950-53, the U.S. lost
about 12,300 soldiers a year.
However, 2008 will mark the deadliest year for
American troops in Iraq. Nearly 900 troops were killed in 2007."
October 2007: 170,000
January 2007: 137,000
CASUALTIES:
3,891 Confirmed
U.S. military deaths as of Oct.
31, 2007: 28,385.Confirmed U.S.
military wounded as of Oct. 31, 2007: U.S.
Out of 3,891military deaths for October 2007: 39, lowest monthly
toll since March 2006.
WE are approaching a tragic
milestone in the U.S. occupation of Iraq. According
to the Department of Defense 3,945 soldiers have
died since the initial invasion nearly 5 years ago.
Without doubt, before the March 18th anniversary of
the occupation <http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=Jmke9crxvhq9nPQ6kj16vzeSFs7CLpKh>
4,000 mothers, fathers, sons & daughters - 4,000
self sacrificing men & women - will meet a violent
end in a foreign country.
Those who do return home
face overwhelming challenges which, for some, are
fatal. The rate of amputations for the occupation
is 2 times that of previous wars. Soldiers wounded
in action have 20% likelihood they will suffer a
traumatic brain injury capable of debilitating them
for life.
Almost
40,000 troops are in treatment for post traumatic
stress disorder. Many more are left untreated and
at risk to commit violent uncharacteristic
behavior. U.S. Veterans make up 25% of suicides in
our country and almost 200,000 Veterans are
homeless. The New York Times
Deaths of civilian employees of U.S. government
contractors as of Oct. 30, 2007: 1,073.Iraqi
civilian deaths from war-related violence: Estimated
at more than 75,000, with one controversial study
last year contending there were as many as 655,000.
According to Associated Press figures, there were at
least 905 total Iraqi deaths in October 2007, the
lowest monthly toll since June 2006.
Assassinated Iraqi academics: 336. Journalists
killed on assignment: 122.
COST:
Stepped-up military operations are costing about
$12 billion a month, with Iraq accounting for $10
billion per month, according to congressional
analysis.Total cost to the U.S. government so far is
more than $464 billion. A January 2007 study by
Linda Bilmes of Harvard University's Kennedy School
of Government put the total projected cost of
providing medical care and disability benefits to
veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan at $350 billion to
$700 billion.
OIL PRODUCTION:
Prewar: 2.58 million barrels per day.Oct. 21,
2007: 2.36 million barrels per day.
ELECTRICITY:
Prewar nationwide: 3,958 megawatts. Hours per day
(estimated): four to eight. Oct. 23, 2007,
nationwide: 4,790 megawatts. Hours per day: 13.1.
Prewar
Baghdad: 2,500 megawatts. Hours per day
(estimated): 16-24. Oct. 23, 2007, Baghdad:
Megawatts not available. Hours per day: 8.9.
• Note: Current Baghdad megawatt figures are no
longer reported by the U.S. State Department's Iraq
Weekly Status Report.
TELEPHONES:
Prewar land lines: 833,000. March 13, 2007:
1,111,000. Prewar
cell phones: 80,000. March 13, 2007:
8,720,038.
WATER:
Prewar: 12.9 million people had potable water.
Oct. 18, 2007: 19.6 million people have potable
water.
SEWERAGE:
Prewar: 6.2 million people served. Oct. 18, 2007:
11.3 million people served.
INTERNAL REFUGEES:
Oct. 23, 2007: At least 2.3 million people have
been displaced inside Iraq; over 800,000 alone are
in northern Iraq. Iraqis have made some 19,800
asylum claims during the first six months of 2007 —
a 45 percent increase compared to the previous six
months, when 13,600 applications were received.
EMIGRANTS:
Prewar: 500,000 Iraqis living abroad. Oct. 23,
2007: More than 2.2 million in neighboring
countries.
Fair Elections Now Act:
It comes as no
surprise then, that 72 percent of Americans justifiably feel that those who
contribute large amounts to campaigns have undue access to lawmakers and
shady influence on legislation.*
We have seen this already with the 2008 presidential candidates, who have
raked in $63,078 every hour of every day all through 2007.
Every time
you turn around, there's another political scandal -- this week, the
lobbyist who bribed Rep. Duke Cunningham was convicted. Open the
newspaper today, and you're likely to find stories of giveaways to
special interests like the prescription drug industry or Blackwater
USA instead of policies that favor regular folks like us.
The
influence of big money seems to be everywhere, and I get as
discouraged as anyone.
But I don't stay discouraged long. Thats because we've
got an answer: change how we finance elections in this
country, top to bottom. Common Cause and our coalition partners
have declared that next week is a call to do just that: Fair
Elections Action Week!
"Fair Elections" means that public funding goes to qualified
candidates who agree to spending limits and stop taking special
interest money. With public funding of campaigns, we can expect:
A level playing field where anyone can run for office;
Candidates who are not consumed with daily fundraising
activities and instead can focus on ideas and interacting with
voters; and
Government that is accountable to the rest of us, instead of
wealthy donors
We'll also be issuing timely reports alerting the media and the public to
special interest efforts to influence the outcome of the 2008 elections.
Nov 27,2007
"Dear Denise,
The lack of independent, accurate assessments about our progress in Iraq
has stymied our efforts to secure the country and assist in its
reconstruction. We have the world's most powerful military. If military
might alone could succeed in Iraq, our mission would be complete by now.
We need more than a military strategy for Iraq--we need a plan for
political, diplomatic and economic success. The President received such
a strategy a year ago in the form of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group
(ISG) report. Unfortunately, he did not adopt it.
Going forward, in trying to establish a new Iraq strategy, I am
guided by a set of principles that 14 Democrats and 14 Republicans
support, including:
We need a clearly defined and measurable mission for military
involvement
The government of Iraq must now be responsible for Iraq's future
and must make progress on political, security and economic
benchmarks
Our soldiers, including Guard and Reserves, must have adequate
rest and recuperation time between deployments
A safe and responsible redeployment of our Armed Forces is
necessary to transfer the combat mission to the Iraqi forces
Any ongoing mission must involve counterterrorism operations,
force protection, equipping Iraqis, helping refugees and preventing
genocide
It is immoral to play politics with the needs of the men and women
who protect the ideals we hold so dear. Our troops have performed
heroically. We owe them a new approach and a thoughtful approach to the
situation in Iraq. We owe them a comprehensive strategy for success.
Our intelligence community tells us Al Qaeda--the number one threat
to Americans--is strengthening. We must not weaken our capability to
combat that threat. I will continue to look for responsible ways to
change course in Iraq without engaging in political games that would
compromise the safety of our soldiers.
Sincerely,
U.S. Representative
2nd District of Utah
Dec. 7, 2007 STill think our Veteran SEnators are
not paid off by big interests?
Yesterday, the House of Representatives voted
235 to 181 to pass a strong, clean energy bill!
But today, the Senate fell just 7 votes short of what
they needed to push the bill forward.
Now is a critical time as the Senate plans to
bring the energy bill back for another vote next week.
We must make sure that the bill they vote on includes
better fuel efficiency and more renewable energy.
Continue Iraq Oil
Investigations - Start Clean Energy at Home!
It's been a
rough winter. We're heading into a recession,
and oil prices keep going up and up.
$103 per barrel
and nearly $4 a gallon as of today.
So why wouldn't our Senators end oil subsidies
and increase funding for clean energy?
As the old saying goes, "money talks". That's
why it was so encouraging last week when the
House of Representatives passed a bill that
would put
an end to $17 billion in subsidies given to the
oil industry over 10 years.
Instead, the money would be used for tax credits
for renewable energy sources and energy
efficient technologies. This bill is an
important step towards fighting global warming
and creating a clean energy-independent America,
but it still faces heavy opposition in the
Senate.
The Senate has killed a bill like this before-
and they might do it again unless we stop them.
Please take
a stand by passing HR 969 which would greatly
increase our nation's commitment to clean
energy, and by rejecting the Bush
administration’s proposed oil law for Iraq and
demanding that its passage be removed from the
President’s official benchmarks for Iraq.
A new oil law set to go
before the Iraqi Parliament
soon would, if passed, go a long way towards
helping US & European oil companies control and
profit from Iraq's oil.
Two months after the benchmark deadline
for the Iraq oil law, the law has so far
been successfully resisted. While we
should be encouraged by this success,
the fight is far
from over. As long as US
troops are in Iraq, the Bush
administration will do all it can to
influence Iraq’s oil industry.
Please use the form below to demand that
Congress continue investigations
into US interference with the oil law
and cease supporting a war that is
illegal, immoral and unjust.
We have succeeded in the first phase
of this fight—let’s not give up now.
Support Iraqi citizens in saying no to
Big Oil! Support US citizens in saying
yes to clean energy!
Excerpt: 'Moment of Truth in
Iraq'
by Michael Yon
Author Michael Yon with the 278th Tennessee National Guard in Iraq's
Diyala Province in
2005.
Courtesy of Michael
Yon
NPR.org,February 12, 2008
· Baqubah, Iraq June 19, 2007
Thoughts flow on the eve of a
great battle. By the time you read
these words, we will be in combat.
Few ears have heard even rumors of
this battle, and fewer still are the
eyes that will see its full scope.
Even now — for the battle has
already begun for some — little news
of it reaches home. I have known of
the plans for a month, but have
remained silent.
Al Qaeda and associates had
little or no presence in Iraq before
the war. But we made huge mistakes
early on and now we pump blood and
gold into the desert to pay for
those blunders. We failed to secure
the streets and we sowed doubt and
mistrust. We disbanded the
government and the army, and we
created a vacuum. We tolerated
corruption and ineptitude and at
first mostly local talent filled the
ranks of an insurgency. But when we
flattened parts of Fallujah not once
but twice in response to the murders
of four of our people, we helped
create a spectacle of injustice and
chaos and Al Qaeda thrived.
In a place where everything that
is not desert is tinder, sparks make
fire.
Today Al Qaeda is strong, but
their welcome grows cold. Iraqis
love to say "America put a man on
the moon but cannot turn on our
lights," and the implication was we
really didn't care. We lost the
moral high ground.
But Al Qaeda has raped too many
women and boys, and cut off too many
heads, brought drugs into too many
neighborhoods. And they don't even
try to get the power going or keep
the markets open or build schools,
or playgrounds, or clinics for the
children. As we ineptly tried to
rebuild, they destroyed, and
murdered Iraqis who dared to work in
such places or patronize them.
Finally, those few who were
paying very close attention could
feel it. A barely perceptible shift
in the atmosphere. A moment of
truth, a chance for change. But to
make the change we had to change.
Remarkably we did. But that story is
for later.
Just as this sentence was
written, we began dropping bombs
south of Baghdad and our troops are
in contact.
More than one thousand Al Qaeda
fighters are said to be in Baqubah.
They are ready for us. Giant bombs
that can toss a tank into the air
are buried in the roads. Snipers
have chiseled holes in walls so that
they can shoot from deep inside
buildings, where we cannot see the
flash or hear the shots. They will
shoot for our faces and necks. Car
bombs are already assembled. Suicide
vests are prepared. Entire buildings
are rigged with explosives. They are
blowing up bridges to restrict our
movements and herd us into their
traps.
By the time this dispatch is
published we will be inside Baqubah,
and we will be killing them.
The idea this time is not to
chase Al Qaeda out, but to trap and
kill them head-on, or in ambushes,
or while they sleep. Wounded, they
will be unable to go to hospitals
without being captured, and so their
wounds will fester and some will die
painfully. It will be horrible for
Al Qaeda. Horror and terror they
sowed, and tonight they will reap
their harvest.
We are in trouble, but we have a
great general in David Petraeus.
Iraq is not hopeless. Iraq can stand
again, but first it must cast out
these demons. Or kill them.
Excerpted from Moment
of Truth in Iraq by Michael Yon
by permission of the publisher,
Richard Vigilante Books
07/29/08 US, Iraqi forces
launch new operation in Diyala
BAGHDAD - U.S. and Iraqi forces
launched a new operation Tuesday
aimed at clearing al-Qaida in Iraq
from the volatile
Diyala province, considered
the last major insurgent safe haven
near the capital.
New checkpoints went up
across the province — one of
the hardest areas to control
since the U.S.-led war began
in March 2003 — and
authorities banned
unofficial traffic as troops
searched for insurgents
around the provincial
capital of Baqouba,
according to witnesses. Many
residents said they were
afraid to leave their
houses.
The U.S.-backed
Iraqi military is hoping to
build on recent security
gains from similar
offensives against Sunni
insurgents in the northern
city of
Mosul and Shiite
militiamen in Baghdad and
the southern cities of Basra
and
Amarah.
The religiously mixed
area contains key supply
routes to Baghdad and
northern cities and has been
plagued not only by attacks
against U.S. and Iraqi
forces, but also by the
kidnappings and sectarian
killings that have left many
of its residents — both
Sunni and Shiite — living in
fear.
"It is a dream for
residents of this province
to live in peace, away from
killings and kidnappings,"
Fadhil Hussein, a
48-year-old man, said from
central Baqouba. Khayria
Hussein, a 50-year old
resident, said her family
was praying to "God to make
this operation successful."
But Ahmed Kadim, a
35-year-old businessman in
the city, criticized the
decision to announce the
operation in advance.
"I think this allowed
armed groups to flee outside
the province," Kadim said.
The troops were focusing
on chasing al-Qaida and
other insurgents, who have
sought refuge in Diyala to
escape earlier crackdowns,
said Gen. Ali Ghaidan, the
commander of Iraqi
ground forces in the
province, who announced the
start of the operation.
Ghaidan said the
operation's goal is "to
clear Diyala from al-Qaida."
"We have a list of wanted
persons that the troops will
arrest during the
operation," Ghaidan said.
The province sits to the
north of the capital and
borders
Iran. Baqouba, the
provincial capital, was hit
by twin
suicide bombings that
killed at least 28 people on
July 15 and has seen a
number of
suicide attacks
carried out by women.
"The goal of the
operation is to seek out and
destroy criminal elements
and
terrorist threats in
Diyala and eliminate
smuggling corridors in the
surrounding area," the U.S.
military said in a
statement.
The military said it was
an Iraqi-led operation,
stressing the point as the
Iraqi government is seeking
to assert more control over
military operations.
Similar offensives
against Shiite militiamen in
Baghdad and southern cities
have contributed to a sharp
decline in attacks. But
violence has been slower to
decline in Diyala and
elsewhere in northern Iraq
despite several military
operations in recent years.
Maj. Gen. Mark Hertling,
who commands U.S. forces in
northern Iraq, said
Iraqi security forces
are better prepared this
time.
In Baghdad, hundreds of
thousands of Shiite pilgrims
gathered around a golden
domed shrine in a massive
religious assembly on
Tuesday, a day after three
female suicide bombers
struck their procession and
killed 32 people.
The black-clad pilgrims
were streaming toward the
shrine of Imam Moussa al-Kadhim
in the northern neighborhood
of Kazimiyah where police
imposed a tight security
ring, setting up checkpoints
and searching pilgrims.
Authorities have also
imposed a vehicle ban in
Baghdad and deployed tens of
thousands of policemen in
the streets in fear of
further violence during
Tuesday's pilgrimage.
Another suicide bombing
on Monday killed 25 people
during a rally in Kirkuk,
180 miles to the north,
where
Kurds were protesting
a draft provincial elections
law that would give them
less power in Kirkuk.
An estimated 10,000 Kurds
demonstrated in the nearby
city of Irbil on Tuesday,
protesting the elections
law.
The
U.S. military on
Tuesday blamed al-Qaida in
Iraq for Monday's bombings.
May 4, 2008
Who's telling the truth?
Iraq
says to probe claims of Iran meddling Reuters via Yahoo! News
Sun, 04 May 2008 7:19 AM PDT Iraq on Sunday appeared to distance itself
from U.S. accusations of Iranian meddling in Iraqi
affairs, saying it would not be pushed into conflict
with its neighbor and wanted its own inquiry into
the evidence.
Iraq
says no hard evidence of Iran support for militia AFP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 04 May 2008 7:43 AM PDT Iraq said on Sunday it has no evidence that
Iran was supplying militias engaged in fierce street
fighting with security forces in Baghdad.
Four US marines
killed in
Iraq blast AFP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 04 May 2008 5:01 AM PDT
Insurgents blew up four US marines in Iraq's
Anbar province, marking one of the deadliest attacks
against US troops in the former Sunni rebel bastion
in months, the military said on Sunday.
Iraq's
first lady survives bomb attack USA Today
Sun, 04 May 2008 9:58 AM PDT
A bomb hit a motorcade carrying Iraq's first
lady through Baghdad on Sunday, while the U.S.
military said a roadside explosion killed four
Marines in the deadliest attack in western Anbar
province in months.
April 27, 2008 Iraq's
Green Zone attacked during sandstorm USA Today
Sun, 27 Apr 2008 11:10 AM PDT Iraq's prime minister met Sunday with the
Sunni Arab vice president to discuss reintegrating
Sunni political parties into the Shiite-dominated
government as militants fired a salvo of rockets or
motars at the heavily guarded Green Zone.
Iran says
Iraq situation makes U.S. attack unlikely Reuters via Yahoo! News
Sun, 27 Apr 2008 1:25 AM PDT
Iran said on Sunday a "disastrous situation" facing
the United States in Iraq and Afghanistan
coupled with Washington's domestic issues made any
U.S. attack on the Islamic Republic unlikely.
Iraq's
Sunni vice president wants return to government AP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 26 Apr 2008 9:27 PM PDT Iraq's Sunni Arab vice president on Saturday
called the return of his boycotting political bloc
to the Shiite-led Cabinet a priority, saying the
government needs to reconcile quickly to "save
Iraq."
Army staff sergeant killed
in
Iraq Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Sun, 27 Apr 2008 9:29 AM PDT
Three Fort Campbell-based soldiers, including one
from Georgia, have been killed in two days in
Iraq in separate incidents, according to the
Department of Defense.
Hundreds mourn Ohio soldier
captured in
Iraq 4 years ago AP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 26 Apr 2008 3:52 PM PDT
The remains of an Ohio soldier missing since he was
captured in Iraq almost four years ago were
returned to his home state on Saturday, and hundreds
of mourners lined the streets with American flags as
a police procession led his casket to a memorial
service.
April 23, 2008
Insider:
Iraq Attack Was Preemptive CBS News
Wed, 23 Apr 2008 11:00 AM PDT
In the first Pentagon insider?s account of the
run-up to war, Douglas Feith, the former
undersecretary of defense for policy, tells Steve
Kroft the
U.S. attack on Iraq was "anticipatory
self-defense;" not about 9/11 retaliation.
April 15, 2008
Iraq
bombings, clashes kill 62 AFP via Yahoo! News
Tue, 15 Apr 2008 9:33 AM PDT
A spate of bombings across Iraq which the US
military blamed on Al-Qaeda and a fresh surge of
fighting between Shiite militiamen and US forces in
Baghdad killed at least 62 people on Tuesday.
In pictures:
Iraq bombings BBC News
Tue, 15 Apr 2008 9:51 AM PDT
Images from the aftermath of one of the deadliest
days in Iraq for many weeks.
April 14, 2008
Iraq invites
35 companies to bid for oil contracts International Herald Tribune
Mon, 14 Apr
2008 11:26 AM PDT Iraq holds major oil reserves and needs billions of dollars of
investment to overhaul energy infrastructure and increase oil and gas
output after years of sanctions and war.
April 10, 2008 After General Patreaus and
AMbassador Crocker testified at hearings with SEnate and Congress, we
STill have no idea when IRaq will stand alone without our Troops.
"Pause in redeployment of Surge Troops" and supposedly Iraq Govt met 12
of 18 benchmarks, and IRan causing problems in IRaq. So why is US
still paying 95% of the bill of reconstruction and jobs for Iraqis
though IRaqis have surplus from OIl sales? Why are our Troops paying
double for gas there and $100 a barrel here?
Gates withdraws
Iraq prediction AP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 10 Apr
2008 11:56 AM PDT
Defense Secretary Robert Gates says he has
abandoned hope
that troop levels in Iraq will drop to 100,000 by the end of the year.
Bush suspends summer troop pullouts from
Iraq Reuters via Yahoo! News
Thu, 10 Apr
2008 11:50 AM PDT
President George W. Bush on Thursday announced a suspension of U.S.
troop withdrawals from Iraq this summer to allow the military to
reassess the security situation.
US shifts enemy in
Iraq USA Today
Thu, 10 Apr
2008 11:42 AM PDT
The top U.S. commander has shifted the
focus
from al-Qaeda to Iranian-backed "special groups" as the main threat
to a
democratic Iraq a significant change that reflects both the
complexity of the war and its changing nature.
No Congress approval needed for
Iraq troop deal: US official AFP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 10 Apr
2008 10:19 AM PDT
A senior State Department official Thursday ruled out fresh demands from
top Democrats for any deal with Iraq on future US troop
operations to be submitted to Congress for approval.
April 6, 2008
Report: US no closer to
Iraq goals AP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 06 Apr
2008 11:55 AM PDT
The United States is no closer to achieving its goals in Iraq
than it was a year ago but a quick military withdrawal could lead to
massive chaos and even genocide, according to a report released Sunday
by a U.S. think tank.
Pentagon caught between exhausted US military,
security in
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 06 Apr
2008 9:57 AM PDT
The Pentagon is caught between the fragile security gains made in
Iraq over the past few months and the need to give US soldiers weary
of combat duty time to rest.
April 3, 2008
Iraq to expand crackdown AP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 03 Apr
2008 12:04 PM PDT Iraq's prime minister pledged Thursday to expand his crackdown on
Shiite militias to Baghdad, despite
a mixed
performance so far against militants in the southern city of Basra.
USA Today yesterday "Iraqi,
al-Sader showdown a test of loyalties"
Hundreds
of sympathetic security forces defied orders to fight the Shiite
militiamen.
"He told us not to shoot back enen if we get shot at by the Mahdi army."
said Shnawa, a soldier in Iraq's paramilitary police force that is
commanded by the Iraqi Army.
U.S. troops in
Iraq pay twice what Iraqis do for gas CNN.com
Thu, 03 Apr 2008 11:05 AM PDT
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Think you're being gouged by Big Oil? U.S. forces in
Iraq are paying almost as much as Americans back home, despite
burning fuel at staggering rates in a war to stabilize a country known
for its oil reserves.
UN appeals for help to rid
Iraq of landmines AFP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 03 Apr
2008 6:07 AM PDT
The United Nations on Thursday urged more efforts to clear Iraq
of landmines, which it said threaten the population and complicate
reconstruction and development projects.
Iraq vets suffer mental health woes Politico via Yahoo! News
Thu, 03 Apr
2008 2:43 AM PDT
A week before Army Gen. David Petraeus updates Congress on the war in
Iraq, two new studies have found that soldiers in Iraq and
Afghanistan are suffering from
especially high rates of post-combat
psychological problems, exacerbated by an unusually high rate of repeat
deployments.
Mar. 29, 2008
Campaign Notebook:
Iraq Violence Puts Focus on War Bloomberg via Yahoo! News
Sat, 29 Mar
2008 7:30 AM PDT
March 29 (Bloomberg) --
The Iraq War's
return to front pages may be a setback for presidential candidate John
McCain and other Republicans.
Iraq clashes spread as death toll soars AFP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 29 Mar
2008 2:57 AM PDT Fierce
clashes between Shiite gunmen and troops spread to new Shiite areas of
Iraq on Saturday as the overall death toll from five days of bloodshed
surged to nearly 230.
Austrian kidnapped in
Iraq found dead: foreign minister AFP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 29 Mar
2008 3:05 AM PDT
An Austrian security contractor kidnapped in Iraq in late 2006
alongside four Americans has been found dead, Austrian Foreign Minister
Ursula Plassnik said in a statement Saturday.
Mar. 26, 2008
Iraq PM gives
Shiite fighters 72-hour deadline AFP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 26 Mar
2008 11:37 AM PDT Iraq's premier on Wednesday gave militia battling Iraqi forces in
Basra 72 hours to lay down their arms, as firefights in several Shiite
strongholds across the country killed almost 50 people.
Bush consults advisers on
Iraq AP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 26 Mar
2008 10:28 AM PDT
Wrapping up a series of consultations on Iraq, President Bush met
at the Pentagon on Wednesday with the military's top leaders to hear
their views on prospects for further troop reductions.
Ultimatum in
Iraq 'outlaw' showdown CNN.com
Wed, 26 Mar 2008 9:25 AM PDT
Fighting across Iraq's Shiite heartland erupted for a second day
on Wednesday, with troops continuing a major operation against "outlaws"
in the key oil city of Basra, conducting forays against militants in
flashpoint Baghdad neighborhoods, and clamping down on violence in key
provincial capitals.
US says Iran behind violence in
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 26 Mar
2008 9:16 AM PDT
Iran is linked to violence in Iraq by providing training to those
firing rockets in Baghdad and not doing enough to rein in lawless gunmen
in Basra, the US military charged on Wednesday.
Heavy fighting enters 2nd day in
Iraq; long-term truce threatened
(British Troops Left this area, why?) International Herald Tribune
Wed, 26 Mar
2008 6:03 AM PDT
The fighting in Baghdad and Basra threatened to destabilize a long-term
truce with the Mahdi army militia that had helped reduce the level of
violence in the five-year-old Iraq war.
Mar. 22, 2008 Three
U.S. soldiers die in
Iraq, toll nears 4,000 Reuters via Yahoo! News
Sat, 22 Mar
2008 8:06 AM PDT
A roadside bomb killed three U.S. soldiers in Iraq on Saturday,
pushing the U.S. death toll closer to the 4,000 mark at the start of the
sixth year of the war for U.S. troops.
Menendez assails Bush on Iraq
(why is no one going after Cheney for planning the Iraq attack for years
before 911, for having the Patriot Act written before 911 and how much
more has been uncovered?)
WASHINGTON, March 22 (UPI) -- Sen. Bob
Menendez, D-N.J., Saturday rebuked President George Bush, saying he's
failed to be honest with Americans since taking the country to war in
Iraq.
Delivering the Democrats' weekly radio address the week the war reached
its fifth anniversary, Menendez charged the Republican president "took
us to war on the wings of a lie."
"With each passing year, we've heard the same false promises of victory,
the same excuses for failures from the Iraqi government and the same
refusal from President Bush to admit his mistakes," Menendez said in
transcript provided by the Democratic National Committee.
"Now, as this war enters its sixth year, the American people are still
waiting to hear the straight talk we deserve."
While noting the mounting death and injury toll among U.S. troops, who
he called "the best America has to offer and who have "answered every
call and met every goal with a valor that will never be forgotten,"
Menendez said Bush "should tell us the truth -- that after thousands of
lives lost and perhaps trillions of American taxpayer dollars, Iraq
remains crippled by violence and corruption, still light years from
building a stable government or a lasting peace."
He said the troops should be brought home and U.S. resources redirected
to help the ailing economy.
Mar. 20, 2008
Panel probes troops' electrocution deaths in
Iraq CNN.com
Thu, 20 Mar 2008 8:48 AM PDT
PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania (AP) -- A U.S. House committee chairman has
begun an investigation into the electrocutions of
at least 12
service members in Iraq, including that of a Pittsburgh soldier killed
in January by a jolt of electricity while showering.
U.S. kills 7 believed to be planting IED in
Iraq USA Today
Thu, 20 Mar
2008 10:12 AM PDT
The U.S. military says it has killed seven suspected insurgents trying
to plant a roadside bomb in northern Iraq. But Iraqi police in
Samarra say those killed Wednesday were civilians who were trying to
repair their car.
Obama says
Iraq war drag on economy Reuters via Yahoo! News
Thu, 20 Mar
2008 11:46 AM PDT
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Thursday said the
$500
billion cost of the Iraq war is a drag on the U.S. economy and
attempted to lay some of the blame for it on Republican rival John
McCain.
Mar. 19, 2008
Five years on, White House campaigns spar over
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 19 Mar
2008 10:12 AM PDT
Five years into the deeply unpopular Iraq war,
Democrat Barack Obama Wednesday lambasted his
White House rivals as he condemned the steep, bloody and growing costs
of the invasion.
Cspan
report that Iraq Tribal "real" leaders ask US to leave peace keeping to
them. Would violence drop if US left?
Mar. 17, 2008McCain,
Cheney: US in
Iraq long-term AP via Yahoo! News
Mon, 17 Mar
2008 9:08 AM PDT
Vice President Dick Cheney and Sen.
John McCain vowed in meetings with Iraq's
prime minister Monday that the
U.S. would
maintain a long-term military presence in Iraq until al-Qaida is
defeated there.
Cheney says
Iraq invasion "successful endeavor"
( Yeah successful for Halliburton and other sub companies with
majority of contracts in Iraq, but not for our troops, worn out ARmy,
nor the 100,000s of Iraq children and families) Reuters via Yahoo! News
Mon, 17 Mar
2008 8:13 AM PDT
U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney on Monday declared the 2003 U.S.-led
invasion of Iraq a "successful endeavor," pointing to security
and political progress on a visit ahead of the fifth anniversary of the
war.Suicide
Bomb Kills 32 in
Iraq
( you call this a success?) Time Magazine
Mon, 17 Mar
2008 10:52 AM PDT
There's been a deadly suicide bomb attack today on a group of Shiite
worshippers in Iraq
Mar. 16, 2008
McCain in Baghdad;
8th
Iraq Trip Time Magazine
Sun, 16 Mar
2008 10:52 AM PDT
Sen. John McCain, the likely Republican presidential nominee who has
linked his political future to U.S. success in Iraq, was in
Baghdad on Sunday for meetings with Iraqi and U.S. diplomatic and
military officials
US military growing weary in Iraq
WASHINGTON (AFP) - Five years after the US-led invasion of Iraq, the
US military is flagging under long and repeated deployments that have
taken a toll on troops and hurt its readiness to deal with other crises.
"People are
tired," is the way Admiral
Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, summed it up at a congressional
hearing last month.
The third
longest war in US history -- after the
Revolutionary War and
Vietnam -- has forged a battle-hardened
ground force with bitterly won experience in
counter-insurgency warfare.
But military leaders and experts say it also
has left the US Army in particular, but also the
marines, with major equipment shortfalls,
inadequate training in conventional warfare, and
not enough troops.
Shot through it all is the human fallout from
combat and the stress of repeated deployments:
record suicide rates, rising divorces and mental
health problems, according to army health
reports.
Some troops are in their third and fourth
combat deployments.
"What it
means is that the army coming out of
Iraq will be a shadow of its former
self," said
Lawrence Korb, a former Pentagon official and
senior analyst at the Center for American
Progress.
Korb said it will take at least a decade for
the army to recover, assuming that the United
States continues to draw down its "surge" force
in Iraq, which currently number 162,000.
Estimates of the cost of resetting the army's
forces and replacing or repairing war damaged
equipment runs to 240 billion dollars, according
to congressional leaders.
And Korb said the army could face personnel
problems in coming years from having lowered
quality standards to meet its recruiting goals.
"On the other hand we've got the most
experienced military we've had in many a
decade," said Bernard Rostker, a former
undersecretary of defense for readiness in the
Clinton administration.
"Soldiers who are back in Iraq three or four
times, believe me they have learned. That stands
us very well. So that on the readiness scale
would have to be very high," he said.
Rostker said the all-volunteer force has been
surprisingly resilient.
Many had thought it would break after the
second or third rotation in Iraq, he said. "But
that wasn't the case."
"All in all, Yes, the army is tired; yes, the
army has comported itself extremely well," he
said.
"Nobody expected a volunteer force to do what
it has done. It has learned over time and I
think you see that in the surge, and hopefully
we'll be able to bring some troops home," he
said.
Troop levels in Iraq are supposed to fall to
140,000 by July, offering hope of relief.
But the
security situation in Iraq, while
dramatically improved over last year, remains
fragile and commanders are calling for a pause
in the drawdown after July.
The question facing military leaders is how
long the army can withstand the current pace of
deployments.
"Our soldiers are deploying too frequently.
We can't sustain that," General George Casey,
the army's chief of staff told Congress
recently. "It's impacting on their families,
it's impacting on their mental health. We just
can't keep going at the rate that we're going."
Casey's immediate goal is to reduce tour
lengths from 15 months to 12 to ease the strain
on the force, which he expects to be able to do
in July when the "surge" troops are out of Iraq.
Eventually, as the army expands in size or if
more troops come out of Iraq, the army hopes to
increase the time soldiers have at home between
deployments from 12 months to 15.
But, as Army
Secretary Pete Geren warned recently,
"We are consuming readiness as fast as we build
it."
The almost exclusive focus on
counter-insurgency warfare in Iraq and
Afghanistan, coupled with the short
turnaround between deployments, has meant that
most military units have no time to train for
conventional warfare.
Mullen told Congress last month there is
"significant risk" in the US military's
readiness to respond to a crisis elsewhere in
the world.
Concerns about the situation appear to be
widespread within the military as well, even
though morale remains high.
A recent
survey of 3,437 current and retired officers of
the rank of major or above found that 60 percent
believe the US military is weaker today than it
was five years ago.
Eighty-eight percent
thought the war has stretched it "dangerously
thin", according to the survey by the Center for
a New American Security and Foreign Policy
magazine. (I watched that presentation
with Active Duty and Former GEnerals and they
also found high percentage of officers did not
want to sign up again for more deployments)
2003: INVASION.
_March
17:
President Bush
gives
Saddam Hussein
48-hour deadline to give
up power.
_March 20: The
U.S.-led invasion is
launched.
_May 1: On an
aircraft carrier under a
"Mission Accomplished"
banner, Bush declares
"major combat operations
in Iraq have ended."
_July 13: Governing
Council of U.S.-selected
Iraqi officials takes
office.
_Dec. 13: Saddam
captured in underground
hideout near Tikrit.
2004: RISE OF
INSURGENCY.
_April: Photographs
surface of prisoner
abuse at
Abu Ghraib prison.
_March 31: Four
private security
employees ambushed and
killed in Fallujah, and
their bodies hung on a
bridge. U.S. forces
later attack the city in
some of the first major
urban battles against
Sunni insurgents.
_June 28: U.S.-led
occupation authority
turns over formal power
to interim government.
_September:
U.S. military
deaths reach 1,000.
_Oct. 6: Top U.S.
arms inspector in Iraq
finds no evidence that
Saddam's regime produced
weapons of mass
destruction after
1991, discounting a main
justification of the
war.
_November: Deadliest
month to date for U.S.
forces: 137 deaths.
2005: ELECTIONS.
_Jan. 30: Iraqis
elect 275-seat National
Assembly in the
country's first national
elections since Saddam's
fall. Shiite
Muslim-dominated
coalition wins 48
percent, Kurdish
alliance 26 percent.
Most Sunni Arabs boycott
voting.
_April 6: National
Assembly elects Kurdish
leader
Jalal Talabani as
president.
_Aug. 31: At least
1,000 Shiite pilgrims
killed in a bridge
stampede caused by
rumors of a suicide
bomber in Baghdad.
_Oct. 15: Iraqi
voters approve
constitution in
referendum, with strong
Shiite and Kurdish
support. Sunni Arabs
largely opposed and win
a promise that the next
parliament will consider
amendments.
_October: U.S.
military deaths reach
2,000.
_Dec. 15: Iraqis
elect new parliament
with Shiite parties
winning biggest bloc.
2006: VIOLENCE
SPREADS.
_Feb. 22: In Samarra,
suspected Sunni
insurgents detonate two
bombs inside the revered
Shiite Askariya shrine,
blowing the top off its
landmark golden dome.
The attack sharply
escalates sectarian
bloodshed and increases
fears of a civil war.
_June 8: American
airstrike outside
Baqouba kills
al-Qaida-linked
insurgent leader
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi
and his spiritual
adviser, Sheik Abdul-Rahman.
"A significant victory
in the war on terror,"
says Bush.
_Nov. 5: Saddam
sentenced to death by
Iraqi court.
_Dec. 6: The
Iraq Study Group
calls for a change in
U.S. policies in Iraq,
saying conditions are
"grave and
deteriorating" and
recommends gradual
transition of combat
role to Iraqi forces.
_Dec. 30: Saddam is
hanged.
_Dec. 31: U.S. troop
deaths reach 3,000.
2007: TROOP BUILDUP.
_Jan. 10: Bush
announces that more than
20,000 additional U.S.
troops will be sent to
Baghdad and Anbar
province in a mission
dubbed "the surge."
_Jan. 16:
United Nations
reports that 34,452
Iraqi civilians were
slain in 2006, nearly
three times more than
the government reported.
_June 24: Saddam's
cousin, known as
"Chemical Ali," and two
other former regime
officials are sentenced
to hang for atrocities
against Kurds in the
1980s.
_July 12: White House
report required by
Congress says Iraq has
made satisfactory
progress on eight of 18
political and security
"benchmarks,"
unsatisfactory progress
on eight others and that
it is too early to judge
progress on two.
_Aug. 14: Four
suicide bombers hit a
Kurdish
Yazidi community
in northwest Iraq,
killing at least 520
people and wounding 350
others.
_Sept. 10:
Gen. David Petraeus
tells Congress he
envisions the withdrawal
of roughly 30,000 troops
from Iraq by mid-2008.
_Oct. 23: U.N.
refugee agency says
nearly 2.3 million
people are displaced
inside Iraq, and more
than 2.2 million have
fled to neighboring
countries.
2008: DRAWDOWN?
_Jan. 9: The World
Health Organization and
the Iraqi government
estimates that about
151,000 Iraqis died from
violence in three years
after the U.S. invasion.
_Jan. 25: Iraqi Prime
Minister
Nouri al-Maliki
announces plans for
"decisive" offensive
against
al-Qaida in Iraq
in northern city of
Mosul after two days of
bombings kill nearly 40
people.
_Feb. 1: Two woman
carrying explosives
enter pet markets in
Baghdad, killing nearly
100 people in the
blasts.
_Feb. 25:
The Pentagon says
140,000 U.S. troop
levels in Iraq will be
about 140,000 — higher
than the 132,000 before
the surge.
Mar. 13, 2008
Source: U.S. sent severed fingers of
Iraq kidnap victims CNN.com
Thu, 13 Mar 2008 11:31 AM PDT
The U.S. military in Iraq recently received the severed fingers
of five men kidnapped in Iraq more than a year ago, a law
enforcement source told CNN.
US calls
Iraq archbishop's death 'murder' AFP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 13 Mar
2008 11:23 AM PDT
The United States on Thursday branded as "murder" and a "tragic act of
terrorism" the death of a kidnapped Chaldean Catholic archbishop in
Iraq despite uncertainty about how he died.
Opposition to
Iraq war is divided after 5 years USA Today
Thu, 13 Mar
2008 10:42 AM PDT
As the fifth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq approaches next
week, a roundtable of a dozen Delaware residents of various political
bents mirrors a new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll that finds attitudes toward
the war threaded with crosscurrents particularly among those who want to
set a firm timetable to pull out U.S. troops.
Mar. 12, 2008
"There was an indirect
fire incident that killed three coalition force
service members and wounded two,"
Lieutenant Michael Street told AFP.
An Iraqi
civilian was wounded in the attack which
according to another spokesman occurred early
Wednesday on a military base in the city of
Nasiriyah.
The US military usually uses the term
"indirect fire" to indicate rocket attacks.
The latest deaths bring the
military's losses in
Iraq since the March 2003 invasion to
3,987, according to an AFP tally
based on independent website
icasualties.org.
The US military has lost 11 personnel in the
past three days.
On Monday,
eight were killed in the deadliest day for the
US military since August.
"There was an indirect
fire incident that
killed three coalition
force service members
and wounded two,"
Lieutenant Michael
Street told AFP.
An
Iraqi civilian was
wounded in the attack
which according to
another spokesman
occurred early Wednesday
on a military base in
the city of
Nasiriyah.
The US military
usually uses the term
"indirect fire" to
indicate rocket attacks.
The latest deaths
bring the military's
losses in
Iraq since the
March 2003 invasion to
3,987, according to an
AFP tally based on
independent website
icasualties.org.
The US military has
lost 11 personnel in the
past three days.
On Monday, eight were
killed in the deadliest
day for the US military
since August.
Pentagon:
Iraq's improvements threatened by
corruption CNN.com
Wed, 12 Mar 2008 10:27 AM PDT Iraq has made "limited but important"
political, diplomatic and economic gains in the
past three months, but improvements in security
remain "fragile," the Pentagon reported Tuesday.
Mar. 11, 2008Bush warns that gains in
Iraq fragile and reversible Reuters via Yahoo! News
Tue, 11 Mar
2008 11:58 AM PDT
President George W. Bush warned on Tuesday that security gains in
Iraq were "fragile" and "reversible" as he appealed to skeptical
Americans for patience nearly five years after the U.S.-led invasion.
Blast kills 16 in Iraq; 3 more U.S. soldiers die
BAGHDAD (AP) — A roadside bomb hit a bus traveling in southern Iraq
on Tuesday, killing at least 16 civilians, while other violence
killed at least 26 people around Iraq, police said.
The U.S. military reported three American
soldiers killed Monday by a roadside bomb north of Baghdad, bringing to
eight the number of troops who died that day. It was the deadliest day
for American forces in Iraq since Sept. 10, when 10 troops died.
At least 22 other people were wounded in the
attack on the bus traveling from Najaf to Basra, a policeman said on
condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to release the
information.
Gunmen also sprayed another bus with machine-gun
fire shortly after it hit a roadside bomb in eastern Baghdad. One person
was killed and four others were wounded, police said. The bomb was
apparently targeting a nearby police patrol.
The U.S. military also said an interpreter was
killed Monday along with three soldiers when they were hit by the bomb
in eastern Diyala province. Another soldier was wounded.
Auditors:
Iraq faces budget surplus AP via Yahoo! News
Tue, 11 Mar
2008 11:12 AM PDT Iraq
isn't spending much of its own money, despite soaring oil revenues
that are pushing the country toward a massive budget surplus, auditors
told Congress on Tuesday.
Mar. 9, 2008Iraq
veteran says McCain policy is wrong AP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 09 Mar
2008 1:16 AM PST
Speaking on behalf of the Democratic Party, an Iraq combat
veteran said Saturday that apparent
GOP nominee John McCain should not win the presidential
election because he would continue the war in Iraq.
AP:
Troops
sickened at
Iraq bases using KBR water CNN.com
Sun, 09 Mar 2008 9:28 AM PDT
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Dozens of U.S. troops in Iraq fell sick at
bases using "unmonitored and potentially
unsafe" water supplied by the military and a contractor once owned by
Vice President Dick Cheney's former company, the Pentagon's
internal watchdog says.
Senate committee seeks audit of
Iraq oil money International Herald Tribune
Sun, 09 Mar
2008 1:33 AM PST
Two senior members of the Senate Armed Services Committee have requested
a full accounting of how Iraq is spending its soaring oil
revenues
Mar. 5, 2008Jobs
needed or
Iraq troop pullout at risk:
U.S. general Reuters via Yahoo! News
Wed, 05 Mar
2008 9:51 AM PST
The United States
may be forced
to halt planned troop withdrawals from Iraq
unless Iraqi authorities move
faster to create jobs and improve basic services, a top U.S. general
said on Wednesday.
Iraq Security Agreement Proves to Be Nettlesome Washington Post
Wed, 05 Mar
2008 6:21 AM PST
The
Bush administration intends to negotiate
a long-term security agreement with the Iraqi government, but has said
it will not need Senate approval
because it will not be providing security commitments to Iraq as
part of a formal treaty. Rep. Gary L. Ackerman (D-N.Y.) probed this
issue in a pointed...
Mar. 3, 2008
U.S.: Troops find 14 bodies shot in the head in
Iraq CNN.com
Mon, 03 Mar 2008 10:30 AM PST
American soldiers in northern Iraq found a mass grave containing
14 bodies,
all believed to be Iraqi security forces or anti-insurgent Iraqis,
the U.S. military said Monday.
Ahmadinejad calls for US-led forces to quit
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Mon, 03 Mar
2008 8:55 AM PST
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on a landmark visit to Iraq,
on Monday urged US-led foreign forces to leave the war-ravaged nation,
saying without them the region will "live in peace."
Mar. 2, 2008NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Iraq
war has contributed to the U.S. economic slowdown and is impeding an
economic recovery, Nobel-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz says.
Meanwhile, the U.S. government is severely
underestimating the cost of the war, Stiglitz
and co-author Linda Bilmes write in their book,
"The Three Trillion Dollar War" (W.W. Norton),
due to be published on Monday.
The nearly
5-year-old war, once billed as virtually paying
for itself through increased
Iraqi oil exports, has cost the U.S.
Treasury $845 billion directly.
"It used to
be thought that wars are good for the economy.
No economist really believes that anymore,"
Stiglitz said in an interview.
Stiglitz and Bilmes argue the true costs are
at least $3 trillion under what they call an
ultraconservative estimate, and could surpass
the cost of
World War Two, which they put at $5
trillion after adjusting for inflation.
The direct costs exclude interest on the debt
raised to fund the war, health care costs for
veterans coming home, and replacing the
destroyed hardware and degraded operational
capacity caused by the war.
In addition, there are costs not accounted
for in the budget such as rising oil prices and
social and macroeconomic costs, which the book
details.
To illustrate how the money could be spent
elsewhere, Bilmes cited the annual U.S. budget
for autism research -- $108 million -- which is
spent every four hours in
Iraq. A trillion dollars could have hired
15 million additional
public school teachers for a year or
provided 43 million students with four-year
scholarships to public universities, the book
says.
Stiglitz and Bilmes say they were excessively
conservative in calculating the $3 trillion
figure, overcompensating for their bias in
having opposed the war.
'FLOODING THE ECONOMY'
Asked if
the war has contributed to the U.S. slowdown,
Stiglitz said, "Very much so."
"To offset
that depressing effect,
the Fed has
flooded the economy with liquidity and the
regulators looked the other way
when very imprudent lending was going up,"
Stiglitz said. "We were living on borrowed money
and borrowed time and eventually a day of
reckoning had to come, and it has now come."
(just like the
Economy lesson Ron Paul gave the Federal Reserve
Director the other day!!)
The war has also altered how the United
States has reacted to its current economic
troubles, he said.
"When America's financial institutions had a
problem, they had to turn to the sovereign
wealth funds in the Middle East for
recapitalization, for the bailout," he said.
"The reason was obvious. The war had led to
high oil prices. The war had meant that America
had to borrow more money.
There weren't
sources of liquid funds in the United States.
The sources of the liquid funds were in the
Middle East," he said.
Bilmes, a former assistant secretary and
chief financial officer of the
U.S. Customs Department, said the war
also limited options for the $168 billion
stimulus package signed into law by
President George W. Bush on February 13.
"We really had very little wiggle room in
order to pass this because of the fact that
we're spending $16 billion a month on
Iraq and
Afghanistan," Bilmes said. "Actually the
country could have used a larger fiscal stimulus
but there is (no) cash to accommodate it."
The authors said they were surprised by the
hidden costs their research found, citing, for
example, what they called the underreporting of
casualty figures by the
Pentagon.
The
official Pentagon figure of nearly 30,000
wounded in action fails to account for an
addition 40,000 service members who have
required medical attention for non-combat
injuries or illness, Bilmes said. She
based her conclusion on official Defense
Department data from a restricted Web site.
Iraq does not like America, says Iran's Ahmadinejad AFP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 02 Mar
2008 8:33 AM PST Iranian
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Sunday that Iraq "does not want"
the United States and dismissed President George W. Bush's charge that
Tehran supports militants in Iraq.
Most senior US military official visits
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 02 Mar
2008 10:25 AM PST
Admiral Mike Mullen, head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, is in Baghdad
on an unannounced visit to meet with commanders and Iraqi officials, a
spokesman for the US-led forces in Iraq said Sunday.
Feb. 28, 2008Pentagon
to probe delays of gear to
Iraq AP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 27 Feb
2008 11:30 AM PST
An investigation into allegations the
Marine Corps
delayed sending blast-resistant trucks to Iraq
also will examine whether the
Marines were negligent in delivering a laser to
divert drivers and people from checkpoints and convoys,
according to a memo obtained by The Associated Press.
McCain, Obama tilt over al-Qaida in
Iraq AP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 27 Feb
2008 10:59 AM PST
Republican presidential hopeful John McCain mocked Barack Obama's view
of al-Qaida in Iraq, and Democratic contender responded that GOP
policies brought the terrorist group there.
Gates to tell Turks to quickly end incursion in
northern
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 27 Feb
2008 10:48 AM PST
US Defense Secretary Robert Gates arrived here Wednesday to press
Turkish leaders to quickly end a six-day-old military incursion in
northern Iraq even as Turkish leaders refused to set a timetable.
BAGHDAD, Feb 27, 2008 (AFP) - Iraq's
three-member presidency council has rejected a
draft law to hold provincial elections and
returned it to parliament, the president's
office said on Wednesday.
The presidency approved two laws concerning the
2008 federal budget and a general amnesty, but
"the law to hold provincial elections has not
been approved and has been sent back to the
parliament," the statement said.
The three
bills formed a flagship package of legislation
seen as crucial to reconciliation efforts but
which had been held up for months amid sectarian
feuding in parliament.
The elections law had been championed by the
Shiite majority while the budget in its current
form had been strongly backed by the Kurds and
the amnesty law by the Sunnis.
Nasir al-Ani, the spokesman of the presidency
council, said the provincial election bill was
rejected as some aspects were in contradiction
with the constitution.
The White House played down the rejection of
the bill.
"We believe that the Iraqis will be able to
work it out," spokeswoman
Dana Perino said told reporters in
Washington.
"While we would have liked to have it go
forward without any complications, this is
democracy at work in Iraq."
The bill is expected to boost the powers of
the provinces to launch their own economic
projects with the money allocated by the central
government.
Adoption of the three bills had been among 18
"benchmarks" set by Washington to measure the
pace of political reconciliation in
Iraq, which is still plagued by a deadly
insurgency and sectarian conflict.
Feb 24, 2008
Kurdish rebels say kill 47 Turkish troops in N.Iraq Reuters via Yahoo! News
Sun, 24 Feb
2008 7:25 AM PST
Kurdish PKK guerrillas said on Sunday they had killed 47 Turkish troops
since Turkey launched an offensive against their positions in northern
Iraq.
Baghdad urges talks as Turkey, PKK clash in N.Iraq Reuters via Yahoo! News
Sun, 24 Feb
2008 9:16 AM PST
Turkish troops engaged Kurdish PKK rebels in close combat on Sunday that
left scores dead in a major ground offensive into northern Iraq.
FEb. 22, 2008
Sadr Keeps
Iraq Guessing Time Magazine
Fri, 22 Feb
2008 10:58 AM PST
The radical Shi'ite leader extends the cease-fire that has helped reduce
violence in Iraq, but he could simply be keeping his powder dry
Gates, Aussies play down
Iraq positions AP via Yahoo! News
Fri, 22 Feb
2008 10:17 AM PST
Defense Secretary Robert Gates and the Australian defense minister are
playing down the potential for friction between the two allies over the
new Australian government's pledge to withdraw combat troops from
Iraq.
Feb. 21, 2008
Interview: US
Iraq envoy Ryan Crocker BBC News
Thu, 21 Feb
2008 7:15 AM PST
BBC Baghdad correspondent Jim Muir interviewed the US ambassador in
Iraq Ryan Crocker. This is the full transcript of the interview."I
don't think there's anything that's not reversible. This could all go
bad again, in a lot of different ways, if we lose focus, if we lose
commitment, if the unknown or the unthought-of intrude their way into
the scene." "The president made decisions in September that will take us
down basically to pre-surge levels by July. I believe that we will
continue to draw down, but at this stage, I can't really say yet what
the pace and the timing of the further drawdown should be." "there
are still strong sectarian tensions, there's still an al-Qaeda presence,
there is still foreign interference especially from Iran. All of these
things could spark a new cycle of instability..." "The
quality of forces and their training are key;
their sustainability is key. The emphasis that we and the
Iraqis have had has correctly been on the operational end. Now what they
have to do is make progress on sustainability - the ability to sustain
their forces independently in combat conditions, something they're
working on, something that they clearly have a
long way to go with." "the Iraqis have also been very
definite that they want this agreement to be a broader construct that
defines our relationship in non-security terms
in the political and the economic in the cultural in the
educational fields. "there will be nothing
in that agreement that would commit this or a
future American president to a given set of troop levels or a fixed
mission or set of missions for those troops while they're in
country..""...Iraq has been a source of difficulty and instability in
this region for a good 45 years and Iran has often borne the brunt of
that." (Didn't the US empower Hussein to go after Iran?)"The Iranians
keep finding an excuse not to sit down." "no rational person could
expect a near-term solution." |"Right now they're running pretty high.
So we see some pretty solid evidence that munitions, arms and training
from Iran continue to be a negative factor with these extremist militia
groups. "|"It wasn't just Saddam, it was Iraqi Shia Arabs who died by
the tens of thousands during the Iran-Iraq War protecting their nation."
"the Sunnis of Anbar, who made the incredibly courageous decision with
our support, but they were the ones who had to stand up and do it, to
say to al-Qaeda we are going to fight you. To do it, to do it
successfully to the extent that if you'd been up to Falluja or Ramadi,
they are as normal as any city could possibly be, both of them. Perhaps
it is only through the process that they went through that you get to
the point where you develop the resolve and the courage to take these
kind of steps, and it augers well for the long-term future. "
Feb. 20, 2008
61% Want Troops Home from
Iraq Within a Year Rasmussen Reports via Yahoo! News
Wed, 20 Feb
2008 9:11 AM PST
A Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 61% of
Americans would like to see U.S. troops brought home from Iraq
within a year. That's up a point from a week ago and two points from two
weeks ago. Over the last eighteen weeks, the number wanting troops home
within a year has ranged from a low of 57% to a high of 64%.
Iraq and torture gatecrash Oscars party AFP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 20 Feb
2008 0:02 AM PST
Documentaries about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are set to
take center stage at the Academy Awards on Sunday, giving Oscar guests a
grim reminder of the uncertain world beyond the red carpet.
U.S. commander:
Iraq tours of duty may be cut 3 months CNN.com
Tue, 19 Feb 2008 11:15 PM PST
Tours of duty for U.S. soldiers in Iraq may be cut from 15 months
to 12 if current improvements in security hold up, the U.S. commander in
Iraq said Tuesday.
Sadr likely to address
Iraq truce on Friday: spokesman AFP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 20 Feb
2008 6:01 AM PST Iraq's radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr is likely on
Friday to announce whether his Mahdi Army militia
renews a ceasefire, set to expire at the end of February, his
spokesman said Wednesday. Powerful, anti-U.S. Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr
may unleash his militia on Iraq again this weekend, ending a
six-month cease-fire. Al-Sadr is under pressure from his commanders who
say continued U.S. and Iraqi raids are hurting their numbers.
Feb. 19, 2009
British
Iraq Dossier Surfaces, Without Crucial Weapons Claim New York Times
Mon, 18 Feb
2008 4:55 PM PST
An early version of a British dossier of prewar intelligence on Iraq
did not include a claim about unconventional weapons that became key to
Prime Minister Tony Blair?s case for war.
Feb. 17, 2008
Two US soldiers killed in
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 17 Feb
2008 5:36 AM PST
Two US soldiers were killed on Sunday in a firefight with insurgents in
the restive central province of Diyala province in Iraq, the US
military announced.
US admits it fired on anti-Qaeda fighters in
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 17 Feb
2008 0:23 AM PST
The US military acknowledged on Sunday that it fired on a group of its
anti-Qaeda allies in Iraq in an attack the leader of the group
said killed three people and sparked angry protests.
Fantam Armies? (Blackwater?
Who started Blackwater and for what reason? They were supposedly down in
New Orleans after Levees broke)
Foreign guards in
Iraq work in legal grey area Reuters via Yahoo! UK & Ireland News
Sun, 17 Feb
2008 10:37 AM PST
Foreign private security companies in Iraq are operating in a
legal grey area that means their victims have little recourse to justice
despite U.S. steps to increase supervision, contractors and lawyers say.
US 'surge' likely to end with more troops in
Iraq than before: general AFP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 16 Feb
2008 2:59 PM PST
The US "surge" is likely to end in July with more troops in Iraq
than the 132,000 that were there before five extra combat brigades were
sent in more than a year ago, a senior Pentagon official said.
Feb. 15, 2008
As you know, we have been working - with your help -
to get states to withdraw public funds from
companies that help fund genocide in Darfur.
The
campaign is gathering steam every day! 22 states
have already divested for Darfur and now
it's Utah's turn!
Representative David Litvack has introduced a new
divestment bill in the Utah House of Representatives
that is waiting for a committee hearing.
Feb. 10, 2008
Roadside blasts kill 5 U.S. soldiers in
Iraq Reuters via Yahoo! News
Sat, 09 Feb
2008 9:08 AM PST
Five American soldiers were killed in roadside bombings in Iraq
on Friday, the U.S. military said on Saturday, while U.S. and Iraqi
forces seized 37 suspects in raids against al Qaeda fighters and Shi'ite
militiamen.
Iraq-bound Marine faces home-front troubles in "Son" Reuters via Yahoo! News
Sat, 09 Feb
2008 11:17 AM PST
No fortunate son, the U.S. Marine at the center of this film is one of
the unheralded grunts soon to be sent to Iraq. Stirringly told,
"American Son"
dramatizes a harsh social reality and pays tribute to this nation's
fighting force. It's a sobering depiction of
the hard reality that many of our front-line soldiers shoulder.
AP Poll: Exiting
Iraq would boost economy more than stimulus USA Today
Fri, 08 Feb
2008 9:21 PM PST
The heck with Congress' big stimulus bill. The way to get the country
out of recession and most people think we're in one is to get the
country out of Iraq, according to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll.
Maligned aircraft finds redemption in
Iraq, military says CNN.com
Sat, 09 Feb 2008 5:08 AM PST
Once derided as a white elephant, the U.S. Marine Corps' tilt-rotor
aircraft, the V-22 Osprey, is proving its mettle in Iraq,
military officials said.
Feb. 7, 2008
Today the SEnate voted on the Fiengold/Dodd Amendment to the FISA
surveillance measure to put limits on using information obtained
illegally. Bennett and Hatch voted against this ammendment. Are they not
opposed to illegal surveillance? Hagel, Spectre and other
Republicans are for illegal surveillance. This Amendment was rejected 57
to 38. Between the 500 page Patriot
Act passed unanimously less than 30 days after 9/11 and "enemy
combatant" power to the President allowing him to arrest any US citizen
without evidence and imprisoning them, I wonder if we will have any more
constitutional rights!!!
Feb. 7, 2008 In the National Security Assessment today, Mike
McConnell, Director National Intelligence claimed "that
Hezbella is biggest world threat, but
it could be a threat to US, but
wasn't," well let's put China, No. Korea, Iran, as would be threats too.
"The
Protect AMerica Act," has allowed us by conducting surveillance on
foreign countries, by being flexible in other countries and move with
greater speed. 98% of services to surveil is owned by private sector.
Suits against these companies has impacted their cooperation."
"Iran can have a missile nuclear warhead in 2 years." "Theoritacally
they could by 2009 or 2015." "Differences of opinion by different
analysts." "China has and continues to operate enrich uranium, and No.
Korea can sell them missiles."
President Bush admits
to secret interogation sites, ...GEn. Michael Hayden CIA Director
claimed "that waterboarding of 3 detainees was warranted by fear of
further attacks," "all the techniques we have used have been lawful...inherant
law permit of the activity...I admit that the legal landscape has
changed with Military Commissions Act.... I believe that private
contractors can also practice these techniques...it is not included in
the current program...not certain that that technique would be lawful
under current statutes."
Feb. 5, 2008
Super Tuesday:
Yesterday the White House submitted its
2009 military budget request of $515.4 billion. It represents a 5%
increase to an already over bloated Pentagon budget from last year and a
37% increase since Bush took office. This figure does not include
the approved supplemental spending for the occupations of Iraq and
Afghanistan.
A poll by the Program for International
Alternatives, shows that 65% of the American public believes the
federal government should transfer tax dollars out of several areas of
the defense budget that have nothing to do with our occupations in Iraq
and Afghanistan. The mean response by Democrats favored cutting
$39 billion; the mean response by Republicans $30 billion.
According to the Center for American Progress the following are outdated
and wasteful Pentagon programs we could cut from the budget:
*
The F-22 Raptor fighter jet and Virginia Class submarines,
designed to achieve superiority over Soviet jets and submarines that
were never built;
* The V-22 Osprey, a poorly design aircraft which
in testing phases has already caused the deaths of 30 American
soldiers;
* Missile defense (star wars), proposed when
terrorists were not our primary enemy;
* Bases in Asia, Europe and here at home, now
irrelevant to today's geopolitical reality.
You can take direct action today against
this waste.
Check out Peace Voter and pick a candidate whose values
reflect your own. Then,
contact your Representative and tell them you unequivocally
reject Bush's budget.
The cuts in domestic programs would reduce expenditures for domestic
appropriations and entitlements by $23 billion in 2009 and $474 billion
over five
years.
What's being cut?
* Funding for the Low Income
Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) would be cut $570
million or 22%. This would require cutting more than one million
low-income families and elderly people off the program entirely.
* The budget would reduce funding for the Environmental
Protection Agency by $330 million.
* The budget would cut funding for the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention by $433 million.
* 200,000 fewer children in low-income families
would receive federal child care assistance in 2009 than in 2007,
under the President's budget.
* Total funding for K-12 education is less than
is needed simply to keep pace with inflation.
* Cut federal Medicaid expenditures by $18.2 billion
over five years
Feb. 1, 2008
Senator KEnnedy in So CA talking for Obama to EAst LA Mexican adn
African AMericans said that the SEnate "paralized the President's Spy
Bill" today.He said that
with Senator Obama worked with him on IMigration issue.
Crocker:
Iraq needs US troops until 2009
AP via Yahoo! News
Fri, 01 Feb
2008 9:57 AM PST
American combat troops will be needed in Iraq at least into 2009 to
battle a resilient al-Qaida and still vibrant insurgency, the
top U.S. diplomat to Iraq told The Associated Press on Friday.
54% -
Iraq War: Bring Troops Home? Pew via Yahoo! News
Thu, 31 Jan
2008 9:00 PM PST
Support for withdrawing U.S. forces from Iraq as soon as possible
remains strong; in a recent Pew survey, 54% favor bringing U.S. troops
home from Iraq as soon as possible, which is consistent with
measures for the past year.
April Briefing Set on U.S. Troops in
Iraq NPR
Fri, 01 Feb 2008 5:58 AM PST
How long will U.S. troops occupy Iraq? The Pentagon plans to
withdraw some troops between now and mid-summer. A clearer picture will
emerge when Gen. David Petraeus briefs lawmakers in April.
Women bombers in
Iraq AP via Yahoo! News
Fri, 01 Feb
2008 11:28 AM PST
Attacks by female suicide bombers in Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led
invasion:
Jan. 30, 2008
Bush hinting that
Iraq troop cuts won't continue International Herald Tribune
Wed, 30 Jan
2008 5:50 AM PST
Four months after announcing a force reduction in Iraq,
President George W. Bush is now sending signals that the cuts may not
continue past this summer.
Allies fall short on
Iraq aid pledges USA Today
Wed, 30 Jan
2008 4:29 AM PST
Nearly five years after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq,
allied countries
have paid 16% of what they pledged to help rebuild the war-torn country,
according to a report scheduled for release today.
Permanent U.S. bases in
Iraq unlikely The Christian Science Monitor
Wed, 30 Jan
2008 12:02 PM PST
A US-Iraq security pact won't set troop levels now, but it could
set the stage for long-term strategy.
Concussion Raises PTSD Risk for
Iraq Vets HealthDay via Yahoo! News
Wed, 30 Jan
2008 6:02 AM PST
WEDNESDAY, Jan. 30 (HealthDay News) -- Researchers report that soldiers
who have suffered concussions during their time in Iraq are more
likely to experience post-traumatic stress disorder and other physical
health problems.
Lack of policy behind snub of
Iraq veterans at airport CNN.com
Wed, 30 Jan 2008 11:33 AM PST
Miscommunication was one of the factors that led to an incident in which
U.S. troops returning from Iraq were not
allowed to enter an airport passenger terminal, according to
a report released Wednesday.
Iraq security guards getting new rules AP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 30 Jan
2008 9:52 AM PST
Under continued pressure to exercise greater control over private
security contractors in Iraq, Bush
administration officials will outline stricter rules for these armed
guards during a three-hour meeting Wednesday afternoon at the Pentagon.
Mosul to be "cleansed" of al Qaeda:
Iraq Reuters via Yahoo! News
Wed, 30 Jan
2008 10:22 AM PST Iraq said on Wednesday it was determined to "cleanse" its
northern city of Mosul of al Qaeda fighters but its U.S. backers said a
planned operation might not deal the decisive blow that Baghdad wanted.
Jan. 28, 2008
5 US soldiers killed in northern
Iraq AP via Yahoo! News
Mon, 28 Jan
2008 10:30 AM PST
Five American soldiers were killed Monday by a roadside bomb in the
northern city of Mosul,
described as one of al-Qaida in Iraq's last strongholds, just
days after a house explosion and suicide attack killed as many as 60
people there.U.S.
war costs in
Iraq up: report Washington Post
Mon, 28 Jan
2008 8:53 AM PST
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Iraq war may not dominate U.S. news
reports as the carnage drops, but a new report underscores the financial
burden of persistent combat that is helping run up the government's
credit card.
Australia
Iraq departure not aimed at US AP via Yahoo! News
Mon, 28 Jan
2008 11:35 AM PST
Australia's new foreign minister said Monday that his government's
pledge to pull combat troops out of Iraq will not hurt its
relationship with the United States, which he called indispensable to
Australian security.
Jan 27, 2008
Officials Decline to Give Date for
Iraq Troop Withdrawal Washington Post
Sat, 26 Jan
2008 9:24 AM PST
Two senior defense officials told a House committee today
that
Iraq's growing security forces should be able to take full
responsibility for internal security sometime between early 2009 and
2012, but they
declined to predict when U.S. military personnel could withdraw from the
country. (Watch 2012 according to Nostradamus, The MAyan Calendar...)
McCain: Romney favored
Iraq withdrawal
(not true Romney not only believes in "preemptive war" but also leaves
"all cards on the table about attacking IRan" he keeps saying) AP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 26 Jan
2008 12:13 PM PST
John McCain accused Mitt Romney of wanting to withdraw troops from
Iraq, drawing immediate protest from his Republican presidential
rival who said: "That's simply wrong and it's dishonest, and he should
apologize."
Gadhafi's son said tied to
Iraq attack(REagan
was not affraid to just drop bombs over Gadhafi's country when they were
a threat, why didn't Bush just do that with IRan if they were a threat,
which they weren't, why did he have to start WWWIII?) AP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 26 Jan
2008 10:13 AM PST
A son of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi is behind a group of foreign and
Iraqi fighters responsible for this week's devastating explosion in
northern Iraq, a security chief for Sunni tribesmen who rose up
against al-Qaida said Saturday.
Armored Vehicles for
Iraq May Be Delayed Washington Post
Sat, 26 Jan
2008 11:27 AM PST
CAMP FALLUJAH, Iraq -- The armored
carrier has a grim black slash across its side, burn marks on the door
and a web of cracks along the window.
Jan. 25, 2008
Iraq ready for "final" battle with al Qaeda: PM Reuters via Yahoo! News
Fri, 25 Jan
2008 6:23 AM PST
Iraqi security forces have begun a "decisive" final offensive against al
Qaeda in Iraq to push the Sunni Islamist militants out of their
last major stronghold in the north, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said
on Friday. Iraq is sending troops for a "decisive" battle with al
Qaeda in Iraq militants in Mosul -- one of the cities where the
fighters remain strong -- Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said Friday.
Jan. 24, 2008Govt
ordered to publish early draft of 2002
Iraq dossier AFP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 24 Jan
2008 1:58 AM PST
The government has been ordered to publish an
early draft of a controversial dossier on Iraq's weapons of mass
destruction which helped justify the 2003 invasion, officials
said Wednesday.
Iraq Press
Roundup
Published: Jan. 24, 2008 at 1:57 PM
Font size:
By HIBA DAWOOD
UPI Correspondent The London-based
Azzaman newspaper ran an editorial Thursday
with the headline, "Iraqi planners hadn't
realized powers relations between Iraq,
U.S."
The paper said that in strategic planning,
there is a chance of a calculated risk being
taken when the strategic interests of a
country are at stake.
"Thus, the United States insisted it was
keen on containing Iraq," the paper said.
"Saddam's regime has failed in realizing the
consequences of a calculated risk based on a
deceptive strategy that made simple as well
as high-ranking people think Saddam owned
enough weapons of mass destruction to
respond to U.S. attacks," the paper said.
It said the United
States used this strategy to present to the
Security Council intelligence reports to
"prove" that Saddam had WMD. The paper said
it was unclear if the United States would
have attacked Iraq even if Saddam had
responded to its demands.
The paper said Saddam's strategy provided an
answer to many governments -- especially
those that were dictatorships that fail to
get out of crises with their people, their
region or with global powers. It said the
invasion of Iraq served not only U.S.
interests but also the interests of other
regional countries.
It said Saddam predicted that global power
had retreated once the Soviet Union fell.
It said the U.S. invasion of Iraq was the
central point Washington used as an excuse
for its plans to contain Iraq.
"Although the U.S.
evicted Iraq by military force from Kuwait,
it gave Iraq's government the light to stay
in power," the paper said.
It also said Saddam's government failed in
14 out of 198 provinces.
"The other four provinces feared Saddam's
previous power containing the Shiites cities
in the south and the north as well as the
Kurds," it said.
The paper said that
Saddam's full control and suppression of the
south and north of Iraq granted the United
States another excuse to target the regime
in Iraq.
"Reaching the target," the paper commented,
"the U.S. used the same Iraqi figures
affected during 1991 to fulfill its goal."
Army Chief May
Shorten Tours In
Iraq,
Afghanistan by Summer Washington Post
Thu, 24 Jan
2008 2:00 AM PST
Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the Army's chief of staff, said yesterday he
hopes to
shorten the 15-month tours in Iraq
and Afghanistan this summer. The
move would end a policy, required by the buildup of nearly 30,000 U.S.
troops in Iraq last year, that has placed significant stress on
soldiers and their families.
US unlikely to cut
Iraq forces below pre-surge levels: analysts AFP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 24 Jan
2008 7:27 AM PST
President George W. Bush is unlikely to reduce
US forces in Iraq to less than levels just before the surge
this year for fear of putting at risk security gains, US analysts said
Wednesday.
Bomber kills
Iraq police chief as he visits blast scene AFP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 24 Jan
2008 5:48 AM PST A
suicide bomber disguised as a policeman
killed the provincial police
chief for Iraq's main northern city of Mosul on Thursday as he
visited the scene of an earlier blast in which 34 people died, police
said.
If President Bush has his way, some of the most spectacular areas in
Utah will be irreversibly degraded by oil rigs and off-road vehicles (ORVs).
Eleven million acres in Utah's red rock canyon country are at
immediate risk, and we have until Feb. 8 to speak out. This
precious land is filled with breathtaking vistas, ancient cultural
artifacts and dinosaur fossils, and a wide range of wildlife.
Concerned people like you can put a stop to the sprawling oil and gas
development and ORV use. There is no time to waste.
Your comment today is so important. Unless the public speaks out now,
President Bush's land management team will forge ahead aggressively,
with little thought to the permanent impact on a fragile, irreplaceable
ecosystem.
As the New York Times editorialized, "some
of the trails would crisscross about 2.5 million acres of breathtakingly
beautiful country that the Clinton administration thought worthy of
permanent wilderness protection."
So many iconic national treasures are at stake:
In Vernal, northeastern Utah, ancient cultural artifacts and dinosaur
fossils mingle with a range of wildlife and recreational
opportunities.
Nine Mile Canyon, in the San Rafael Swell, offers hiking, serenity
and rock carvings over 1,000 years old.
In the Moab region, you'll find spectacular overlooks into nearby
Canyonlands and Arches National Parks.
The damage caused by irresponsible exploration and resource
exploitation would be irreversible. Once an area is
riddled with roads, it will never be designated as Wilderness. We are
working with members of Congress to permanently protect these areas as
part of America's Red Rock Wilderness Act, but in the meantime, we need
you to help us amplify our campaign.
Jan. 23, 2008
Truth was first US casualty in Iraq war: study
Wed Jan 23, 1:09 PM ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) - US
President George W. Bush and his top
officials ran roughshod over the truth in the
run-up to the Iraq war lying a total of 935
times, a study released Wednesday found.
Bush and his then
secretary of state Colin Powell made the
most false statements as they sought to drum up
support for the March 2003 invasion to topple
Iraqi dictator
Saddam Hussein, the study alleged.
In a
damning report, the Center for Public Integrity
found "935 false statements by eight top
administration officials that mentioned Iraq's
possession of
weapons of mass destruction, or links to
Al-Qaeda, on at least 532 separate
occasions."
"Bush and seven of his administration's top
officials methodically propagated erroneous
information over the two years beginning on
September 11, 2001," the center said.
"These false statements dramatically
increased in August 2002, just prior to
congressional consideration of a war resolution
and during the critical weeks in early 2003 when
the president delivered his State of the Union
address and Powell delivered his memorable
presentation to the UN Security Council," the
CPI added.
The study calls into question "the repeated
assertions of Bush administration officials that
they were merely the unwitting victims of bad
intelligence," it added in a statement.
The US president was found to have made the
most false statements referring a total of 260
times to Iraq's supposed weapons of mass
destruction and Al-Qaeda alleged links to the
Baghdad regime.
But then-secretary of state Powell only just
lagged behind with 254 false communications,
said the study by the center's founder Charles
Lewis and researchers.
Charges that late Iraqi dictator Saddam
Hussein had stockpiled an arsenal of weapons of
mass destruction were the main argument used
publicy in parliaments around the world and in
the
United Nations to justify the US-led
invasion.
But after the invasion they turned out to be
untrue, when no weapons of mass destruction were
found by the invading forces.
Former national security advisor
Condoleezza Rice, then defense secretary
Donald Rumsfeld, and ex-deputy defense
secretary
Paul Wolfowitz were also fingered in the
study, along with former
White House press secretaries Ari
Fleisher and
Scott McClellan.
"This is a report like no other, which calls
into question more than 900 false statements
that were the underpinnings of the
administration's case for war," argued the CPI's
Executive Director Bill Buzenberg.
Cheney, for example, on August 26, 2002, in
an address to the Veterans of Foreign Wars
national convention, asserted: "Simply stated,
there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has
weapons of mass destruction.
"There is no doubt he is amassing them to use
against our friends, against our allies, and
against us."
Former CIA chief
George Tenet later noted Cheney's
assertions exceeded his agency's assessments at
the time, the report said.
In late September 2002, Bush with a
congressional vote approaching on authorizing
the use of military force in
Iraq, insisted in a radio address that
the Baghdad regime posed a global threat.
"The Iraqi regime possesses biological and
chemical weapons, is rebuilding the facilities
to make more and, according to the British
government, could launch a biological or
chemical attack in as little as 45 minutes after
the order is given," Bush said.
"This regime is seeking a nuclear bomb, and
with fissile material could build one within a
year."
Other administration officials muddied the
waters on the alleged relationship between Iraq
and the
Al-Qaeda terror network, the CPI said.
Asked in July 2002 if Iraq had relationships
with Al-Qaeda terrorists, Rumsfeld said: "Sure."
Still, an assessment the same month by the
Defense Intelligence Agency, confirmed by
later by CIA chief Tenet, found an absence of
any "compelling evidence demonstrating direct
cooperation between the government of Iraq and
Al-Qaeda."
Jan. 22, 2008
"An American soldier
was killed in an improvised explosive device
attack on a MRAP vehicle in Arab
Jabour" on the southern outskirts of Baghdad on
Saturday,
US military spokesman Major Winfield
Danielson said on Tuesday.
"This was the first
fatality involving an IED (roadside bomb) attack
on a Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP)
anywhere," he added.
"There were three other soldiers who
sustained non life-threatening injuries as a
result of the attack," Danielson said.
"The incident is still under investigation
and no other details are available."
Some 1,500 MRAP vehicles, most of them with
V-shaped hulls specially designed to deflect the
blast from a roadside bomb, have been deployed
in
Iraq since May last year, said Danielson.
Roadside bombs are the main choice of weapon
of the numerous insurgent groups operating in
Iraq and primary cause of US troop casualties.
A US military source who would not be named
said the soldier killed was a gunner, who sits
on top of the vehicle rather than in its
specially protected belly.
The incident occured in a rural belt about 50
kilometres (30 miles) southeast of Baghdad where
US and Iraqi forces have launched a major
assault on suspected
Al-Qaeda in Iraq safe havens.
MRAPs are being used in the area by troops of
the US 6th Squadron, 8th Cavalry Regiment to
edge forwards through territory littered with
roadside bombs, according to an AFP photographer
travelling with the unit.
Ground forces are moving in on the mainly
Sunni area that was heavily bombed by US
warplanes in three separate air strikes,
including overnight Sunday when, according to
the US military, a total of 19,000 pounds (9,000
kilos) of bombs were dropped.
The vehicle hit by the roadside bomb was
driving beside an irrigation ditch, supporting
soldiers of the Second
Brigade Combat Team, Third Infantry
Division, who had been clearing
farmhouses and villages after a dawn air raid,
according to the
New York Times on Tuesday.
The report said the vehicle was thrown into
the air and spun 180 degrees before smashing
down with its nose shattered beside the ditch.
The report said three of the four people
aboard suffered only broken feet and cuts. It
was unclear if the gunner was killed by the
blast or when the vehicle rolled over.
The newspaper quoted US military commander
Captain Michael Fritz as saying the force of the
blast would have been enough to "take out" a
heavily armoured Bradley tank -- the other main
armoured vehicle being used in
Iraq along with the Humvee.
"The crew compartment is intact," said Fritz.
Danielson said deployment of the MRAP
vehicles "aimed to provide improved protection
for our forces."
"The MRAP has proven to be a much improved
vehicle in terms of protecting troops from the
effects of improvised explosive devices. However
no vehicle is 100 percent invulnerable to
attack," he said.
The Pentagon last year decided that the
deployment of the MRAP
was a priority and ordered 15,400 of them at a
cost of 22.4 billion dollars.
Some 500 have also been deployed in
Afghanistan.
Standing about 3.6 metres (12 feet) high and
weighing around 18 tons, the vehicles can carry
six to 10 soldiers, depending on the model.
Iraq,
Afghanistan loom large as Oscars nominees unveiled AFP via Yahoo! News
Tue, 22 Jan
2008 9:27 AM PST Iraq and Afghanistan will loom large at this year's Oscars after
films about the wars in each country dominated nominations for best
documentary here Tuesday.
General says al-Qaida on the run in
Iraq AP via Yahoo! News
Tue, 22 Jan
2008 8:17 AM PST
A top U.S. military commander in Iraq said Tuesday that troops
have al-Qaida on the run but will never
completely be finished chasing them "because
they may always come back."
Iraq Extends Oil Registration AP via Yahoo! Finance
Tue, 22 Jan
2008 9:16 AM PST Iraq has extended until Feb. 18 a deadline for
international companies to register to
bid for a role in developing some of the nation's
prized oil fields, the Oil Ministry said Tuesday.
Friday's Washington Post reports that the coal industry is
launching a $35 million ad campaign in primary and
caucus states to "fuel opposition to legislation that Congress is
crafting to slow climate change."
Their billboard, radio and TV ads, and street teams are
spreading propaganda about coal-fired electricity and
attempting to block our efforts to pass strong global warming
legislation this year.
Please donate now to support our emergency plan to
combat their negative efforts.
to:
-- Run radio ads in 25 key Congressional
Districts to support fast action on global warming;
-- Continue running our "Governors" TV ad in
targeted media markets;
-- Generate thousands of calls and tens of thousands of
emails into Congressional offices to urge action THIS YEAR!
Fighting industry efforts to kill global warming action will take
everything we've got.
-- $50 will buy 30-60 seconds of air time for our radio ads.
-- $500 will buy about 2 seconds of our tv ads on Sunday morning
talk shows.
-- $5000 will recruit 5000 new online activists to our campaign.
We're up against powerful forces in this fight, but with
your support we will keep up intense pressure to pass strong global
warming bills in both houses of Congress this year.
National Call-In Day for
Horses is Tuesday, January 22nd!
Even though
the last horse slaughterhouses in the U.S. have been shut down,
thousands of horses are still sent to Mexico and Canada every year to be
killed for meat. Only the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act (H.R.
503/S. 311) can end the export of American horses for slaughter over the
border.
The vast majority of Americans strongly oppose the
slaughter and consumption of horses, and our laws should reflect their
humane values. Please join millions of others across the nation in
sending Congress a message that voters want them to take action to help
horses now!
On Tuesday, January 22nd, please call your two U.S.
Senators and your U.S. Representative and politely urge them to support
the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act.
Get phone numbers for your elected officials.
Please also forward this email to your friends and
family and ask them to help end horse slaughter.
Jan 21, 2008 Martin Luther King Jr. DAy:
Pentagon considers moving 'surge' architect out of
Iraq: report AFP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 20 Jan
2008 9:45 PM PST
The US Department of Defense is considering
moving the
main architect of a troop "surge" strategy, General David Petraeus, out
of Iraq and giving him a top NATO command job,
The New York Times reported on
its website late Sunday.
Report: Most
Iraq insurgents foreign-born UPI
Mon, 21 Jan 2008 8:28 AM PST
Al-Qaida documents seized by the U.S. military in northern Iraq
last year show almost 90 percent of suicide bombers came from countries
other than Iraq.
Iraq official:
3 suicide bombers at large in Anbar after blast CNN.com
Mon, 21 Jan 2008 1:15 AM PST
U.S. planes bombarded al Qaeda in Iraq safe havens on the
southern outskirts of Baghdad on Sunday, hours after a suicide bomber
carrying explosives in a candy box killed six people in Anbar province.
"If American women would increase
their voting turnout by ten percent, I think we would see an end to
all of the budget cuts in programs benefiting women and children."
Coretta Scott King
Peace Action Advisory Board Member, Activist, Writer,
Wife of Dr. Martin Luther King
Today, Dr. Martin Luther King Day, we are mindful of how one person can
change the course of history armed only with conviction and
persistence. Instead, we should be mindful that no one person can
actually change history. Movements change history, and movements are
made of many individuals, like you, working toward a common cause.
The Kings asked us to be conscious, everyday, of injustice. They
compelled us to not only bear witness but to rout out the root causes of
injustice. They implored us to build a Peaceful Majority to unseat the
tyrants who perpetuate their hate through policy.
At Peace Action we believe: that war is not a suitable response to
conflict, that every person has the right to live without the threat
from nuclear weapons; and, that America has the resources to both
protect and provide for its citizens. This is the rallying call for the
Peace Majority. It is our mission to embed these words into the minds
of policy makers and citizens alike.
In honor of Dr. King & his recently deceased partner, Coretta, Peace
Action is asking you to do one thing today for peace. A small donation
of your time, your expertise, or your resources does make a difference,
if only in a small way, to building the Peace Majority. Be a part of
our movement, and be a part of changing the course of history, again.
Be an Activist: Volunteer your time at a local
Peace Action Affiliate for the upcoming elections or to help around
the office.
Be a Peaceful Voice: Take part in our online
actions against nuclear weapons, the Iraqi occupation, and
preventing war with Iran.
Be an Organizer: Find someone from you place of
worship, your neighborhood, your job and tell them about your work
with Peace Action. Explain your dedication to peace and ask them to
join you in the movement. It's as simple as emailing an online
action or sharing a meal together.
Be a Friend: 1 in 4 homeless persons is a veteran.
Thousands of veterans return from Iraq with debilitating mental and
physical ailments. Volunteer one day out of the week to work with
veterans at your local VA hospital.
Be a Patron: Support those who dedicate their lives to
our mission of a peaceful and nuclear free world.Be a Leader: Use
our online resources to bring your community together around issues
of peace and justice.
Be the change you want to see in this
country. Together, with the perseverance the Kings embodied, we can
take back our democracy and change the course of our country for the
next generation.
Sincerely,
Kevin M. Martin
Executive Director
Peace Action
P.S. We're gearing up
for '08 - look out for our Peace Voter site launch next week.
After the third police checkpoint -- manned by a motley collection of
scarf-draped Iraqis wearing blurry array of camouflage duds -- we veered
around a right hand bend in the street.
"That's the Panda restaurant over there on the corner," said Staff
Sgt. David Heath, a platoon sergeant with the 56th Military Police
Company, an Army Reserve unit comprised of Soldiers from primarily the
Southwest."But we call it the Jihad Cafe. It's like the bar where they
found Han Solo in Star Wars."
This is a very different place.
Two days ago I made the flight from al Asad air base in Anbar
province to Camp Speicher in Tikrit. It turned out the bulk of the unit
I was set to link up with was moving to the camp from Baqubah for
operations in in another part of Multi-National Division North's AO. So
I took a couple C-130 flights up here to see what was going on.
There's no better type of unit to see the sights than with an MP
unit. They have street beat experience anywhere they're based, and here
in Tikrit, they've got their fingers on the pulse of the security
situation through the eyes of the local police. Here they work closely
with local police forces to make sure the stations and outposts are
being run efficiently and without unreasonable (by Iraqi standards)
corruption.
So I piled into a Humvee the morning after I arrived with Staff Sgt.
Heath, a 39 year-old Phoenix, Ariz., resident with a background in
nonprofit work, Spec. Cheryl Tanis, a 19 year-old student from Hughson,
Calif. and Spec. Sadie Hagemann, a 21 year-old Sheridan, Calif., native
with dreams of becoming a veterinarian.
We thundered down the dusty road into Tikrit to visit a couple police
stations and get a look see on how things were going in town.
From the moment we rolled out, I knew the security environment here
was radically different than the one I'd left in Anbar. Where patrols in
Karmah or Ramadi meander down the road in the open, allowing traffic to
go by at will, here in Tikrit -- the hometown of Saddam Hussein -- the
troops are on high alert. A police officer was shot and killed the day
before, an IED went off a few days before that, small arms fire,
grenades, rockets, mortars -- you name it, it's still going on here.
But these MPs seem to be on the right track, though they still have a
long way to go convincing the local IPs (the military acronym for Iraqi
Police) to stay disciplined, alert and organized for the
counterinsurgency fight. The first station we visited failed to respond
to the shooting of the IP the day before since it was an officer from
another division of the force -- even though the killing took place only
a few blocks away.
Despite the hard work and daily frustrations -- never mind the
violent threats against them -- the "Rock Stars" of the 56th still
manage to keep their spirits up and their humor intact.
They're four months into a 15 month rotation -- for many their first
to Iraq -- and from the looks of it, they still have their work cut out
for them.
-- Christian"
Jan 19, 2008
Injured Troops Sent Back to Iraq Amid
Soldier Shortage
Saturday, January 19, 2008
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. —
Seventy-nine injured soldiers were pressed into war duty last month as
the U.S. Army struggled to fill its ranks, but most were assigned to
light-duty jobs within limits set by doctors, two Army leaders said.
The Denver Post, quoting internal Army e-mails and a
Fort Carson soldier, reported that troops had been deployed to Kuwait en
route to Iraq while they were still receiving medical treatment for
various conditions.
Fort Carson's top general, Maj. Gen. Mark Graham,
said most of the 79 soldiers remain in Iraq, while about a dozen are in
Kuwait, the newspaper reported in Friday editions. A few returned to the
United States because of inadequate rehabilitation available in theater,
Graham said.
Graham said he has asked Fort Carson's inspector
general to investigate whether proper procedures were followed in
sending the soldiers into war zones.
Congressional investigators also are reviewing
allegations that medically unfit soldiers have been deployed to Iraq and
Afghanistan to shore up lagging troop numbers.
"My personal opinion is, is that as the war goes on,
you'll see more and more soldiers with (limitations)," Graham said.
Master Sgt. Denny Nelson was sent overseas last
month for a third tour in the Middle East though doctor's orders said he
should not run, jump or carry more than 20 pounds because of a serious
foot injury, The Denver Post reported.
Nelson was sent back to the U.S. after a doctor in
Kuwait told Fort Carson officials he should never have left the United
States.
Col. John Hort, commander of Fort Carson's 3rd
Brigade Combat Team, said the 79 soldiers were among 130 who had been
judged temporarily unfit for war duty, The Gazette reported.
The 79 were deemed able to perform limited duties
such as straightening out paperwork at bases in Kuwait because their
conditions, including sleep disorders and broken bones, could be treated
by doctors in the Middle East as easily as in Colorado, he said.
Hort needed the troops so he could send other
soldiers into the streets of Baghdad's suburbs.
"Those soldiers could perform limited duty that
could allow healthy soldiers to perform more strenuous tasks," Hort told
The Gazette from Iraq.
No soldiers with diagnosed mental illnesses were
sent, he said.
Graham said commanders do not put any injured
soldier in harm's way.
Sending an unfit soldier back to war means "you are
not mission capable, and the soldier becomes a risk to himself and
others in the unit," said U.S. Rep. Mark Udall, a Colorado Democrat. He
is a member of the House Armed Services Committee, which requested an
investigation by the Government Accountability Office last summer.
GAO investigators have identified other cases of
unfit soldiers being deployed from Fort Drum in New York and Fort
Stewart and Fort Benning in Georgia, said Brenda Farrell, director of
defense capabilities and management investigations for the GAO, a
nonpartisan congressional agency that audits federal programs.
"We don't have any confirmation that commanders are
under pressure to fill their units," Farrell said.
The 3rd Brigade Combat Team deployed in December for
the third time. The unit has been under strength, partly because of the
number of soldiers who are injured.
"Almost a battalion of soldiers have had medical
conditions that prevent them from coming back to Iraq with the 3rd
Brigade Combat Team," Hort said.
White House
missing CIA, Iraq e-mails WASHINGTON -
Apparent gaps in
White House e-mail archives coincide with dates in late 2003 and
early 2004 when the administration was struggling to deal with the
CIA leak investigation and the possibility of a congressional
probe into
Iraq intelligence failures.
The gaps — 473 days over a period of 20 months —
are cited in a chart prepared by White House
computer technicians and shared in September
with the House Reform and
Government Oversight Committee, which has
been looking into reports of missing e-mail.
Among the times for which e-mail may not have
been archived from
Vice President Dick Cheney's office are
four days in early October 2003, just as a
federal probe was beginning into the leak of
Valerie Plame's CIA identity, an inquiry
that eventually ensnared Cheney's chief of
staff.
Contents of the chart — which the White House
now disputes — were disclosed Thursday by
Rep. Henry Waxman, a California Democrat
who chairs the House committee, as he announced
plans for a Feb. 15 hearing.
Waxman said he decided to release details
from the White House-prepared chart after
presidential spokesman Tony Fratto declared "we
have absolutely no reason to believe that any
e-mails are missing."
Among the periods of time for which the chart
indicates e-mail is missing is a five-day span
starting on Jan. 29, 2004, when the White House
was dealing with the possibility of an
election-year probe by Congress into Iraq
intelligence failures.
Not archived by the office of the vice
president is e-mail for Jan. 29-31, 2004,
according to chart information released by
Waxman. In addition, all e-mail from the White
House Office in the Executive Office of the
President was listed as missing for one of those
days.
The chart indicates that e-mail also was not
archived by the White House on the following
Monday — Feb. 2, 2004 — the day
President Bush took a big step in
averting what could have been a politically
troublesome congressional inquiry. He ordered an
independent investigation into intelligence
failures in Iraq.
The president conferred that day with former
chief weapons inspector David Kay,
declaring, "I want to know all the facts."
The commission named by Bush reached a harsh
verdict about the U.S. intelligence community's
performance, but the panel stopped short of
addressing the White House's use of the
intelligence data to support the idea of war
with Iraq.
The White House says computer back-up tapes
should contain substantially all e-mails between
2003 and 2005. However, the White House recycled
backup tapes until sometime in October 2003,
taping over existing data. That could mean some
e-mail is gone forever if it is also missing
from archives.
An example might be any missing e-mail from
Cheney's office in the early days of the CIA
leak probe. The White House has not said when in
October 2003 it halted the recycling of backup
tapes.
E-mails in early October 2003 could reveal
key discussions between
White House personnel in the week after
the Justice Department opened a criminal
investigation into the leak of Plame's CIA
identity. The White House denied that Cheney
chief of staff I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby or top
presidential adviser
Karl Rove were involved in the leak, an
assertion that turned out to be false.
"Can it be a mere coincidence that some of
the missing e-mail correspond to a key period
during the
Valerie Plame investigation?" asked
Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens
for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.
"Given everything else we know, that is nearly
impossible to believe."
Her organization is one of two private
advocacy groups suing the White House in the
e-mail controversy.
At issue on Oct. 1, 2003, was the push by
congressional Democrats for
Attorney General John Ashcroft to step
aside and appoint an independent prosecutor to
investigate the White House.
Ashcroft eventually recused himself, and at
the end of 2003 U.S. Attorney
Patrick Fitzgerald was appointed by a
Justice Department official to head the
probe. Two years later, Libby was indicted, and
he was later convicted of obstructing the
investigation. His 30-month prison sentence was
commuted by Bush. Rove was questioned by a
federal grand jury five times but was never
charged.
In January 2006, shortly after Libby was
indicted, a letter from Fitzgerald to Libby's
lawyers was the first public disclosure that the
White House was having a problem with its e-mail
system.
Fitzgerald wrote: "We have learned that not
all e-mail of the Office of Vice President and
the Executive Office of the President for
certain time periods in 2003 was preserved
through the normal archiving process on the
White House computer system."
The White House says the e-mail matter arose
in October 2005 in connection with the Justice
Department's CIA leak probe, in which Fitzgerald
later that month obtained a grand jury
indictment against Libby for perjury,
obstruction and lying to the
FBI.
Mosque raid 'ends southern
Iraq bloodshed' during religious festival AFP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 19 Jan 2008 5:03 AM PST
Security forces on Saturday overran a mosque in
southern Iraq where Shiite doomsday
cultists were holed up, ending two days of
clashes in two cities that killed at least 70
people, police said.
Blood and violence as millions mark Ashura in
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 19 Jan 2008 11:24 AM PST
Millions of Shiites across Iraq on
Saturday joined ceremonies marking the climax of
annual Ashura rituals, marred by attacks that
killed 17 people and a bloody uprising by
doomsday cultists.
Jan 18, 2008US military chiefs weigh
Iraq deployments' strain on force AFP via Yahoo! News
Fri, 18 Jan
2008 11:07 AM PST
US military chiefs will weigh the strain on US forces and other global
commitments in assessing whether troop levels in Iraq should
continue to come down in the second half of 2008, the top US military
officer said Friday.
"The
Joint Chiefs of Staff reserve the right
to give that regional and global piece to say,
are we willing to recommend that we take more
risk, or in fact that he is asking too much,"
Mullen said as he flew here from
Colombia.
The strain on the US force
"clearly will be part of this assessment," he
said, adding, "I consider that a principle
responsibility that I have."
Currently, there are about 160,000 troops,
including 14 combat brigades, in Iraq. Four
brigades are supposed to come out by July,
leaving about 130,000 to 140,000 troops in the
country.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates has said
he would like to see another five brigades come
out by the end of the year, reducing US force
levels to around 100,000.
But US commanders have indicated that they
prefer to move slowly on further reductions for
fear of losing the hard fought gains made over
the course of a year-long surge in US forces.
As chairman, Mullen has
emphasized the need to
get back to more
manageable rotations of
US ground forces.
The army, in particular,
is now so stretched that
soldiers are being
deployed for 15 months,
with only a year at home
between combat tours.
Mullen said he
informally samples the
stress on the force
during visits with
troops at military
installations around the
world.
"I think the biggest
immediate lever is to
get the 15 month
deployments down to 12
months, to get back in
balance on a one to one
rotation. And then based
on the overall
requirement to move
ahead to get that from
12 to 15 months (at
home)," he said.
"There are other
pieces to that balance,
but that is probably the
single biggest lever we
have to ease the strain
on the force," he said.
About 60 rebel targets destroyed in Turkish air strike in
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Fri, 18 Jan
2008 5:17 AM PST
Turkish warplanes destroyed about 60 Kurdish rebel positions in
neighbouring Iraq in a bombing raid earlier this week, the
military said Friday.
AECOM to supply support services in
Iraq UPI
Fri, 18 Jan 2008 8:50 AM PST
The U.S. Department of Defense announced it has contracted
California-based AECOM Technology Corp. for maintenance support services
in Iraq.
Fifteen die in
Iraq cult clashes BBC News
Fri, 18 Jan
2008 5:19 AM PST
At least 15 people are killed in clashes between police and members of
an Shia cult in southern Iraq, officials say.
Joint Chiefs to give view on
Iraq cuts MSNBC
Fri, 18 Jan 2008 9:36 AM PST The
Pentagon's top generals and admirals will make their own assessment for
President Bush on whether to continue pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq in
the second half of the year.
Matheson talks about energy issues in the House
Science and Technology Committee
Dear D,
Increasing fuel economy is an excellent step toward cutting our
dependence on foreign oil. It will deliver fast results. It has
been proven to work from experience--we roughly doubled the fuel
economy of our cars between the 1970s and the late 1980s. We can do
this right now--with on-the-shelf technology.
By a large,
bipartisan vote, Congress passed--and the President signed
--legislation that will require that our vehicles--cars, light
trucks and SUVs--get an average of 35 miles per gallon (mpg) by
2020. The
current standard for passenger cars is 27.5 mpg. The standard
for light trucks (including SUVs) is 22.5 mpg. That amounts to a 40
percent increase in the fuel economy of our vehicles.
A scientific analysis looked at the benefits of implementing the
new mileage standard. It shows that a 35 mpg vehicle fleet will
create as many as 170,800 jobs in the year 2020,
including 22,300 in the auto industry. It will
save consumers nearly $25 billion on gasoline
(assuming gas at $2.55 per gallon in 2005 dollars). Utahns will save
$175 million per year, in 2020.
Our cars, trucks and SUVs account for about 40 percent of all
U.S. oil consumption. Much of that is imported. Achieving 35 mpg by
2020 will save 1.2 million barrels of oil per day
in 2020--over half the oil the U.S. currently imports from the
Persian Gulf.
Investments in technology create economic growth--driving job
growth, creating efficient products that save consumers money and
helping the U.S. maintain its global leadership.
Please respond to the following short survey to let me know what
you think about this important issue.
Sincerely, Jim Matheson
U.S. says
Iraq forces could control provinces this year Reuters via Yahoo! News
Thu, 17 Jan
2008 8:42 PM PST Iraq's
army and police could be ready to take over security in all 18 provinces
by the end of this year as the U.S. military moves toward a less
prominent role in the country, U.S. officials said on Thursday.
Hands-On General Is Next No. 2 in
Iraq Washington Post
Thu, 17 Jan
2008 4:37 PM PST
Most U.S. Army generals wear pistols on the battlefield. Lt. Gen. Lloyd
J. Austin III, a decorated paratrooper who next month takes over as the
No. 2 U.S. commander in Iraq, packs an M4 rifle.
Despite dropping violence,
Gates calls for extended U.S. presence in
Iraq McClatchy Newspapers via Yahoo! News
Thu, 17 Jan
2008 4:10 PM PST
WASHINGTON— Against the backdrop of the improved security situation in
Iraq, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates announced Thursday a
shift in U.S. strategy that will require an extended U.S. presence in
Iraq, although with fewer troops.
Jan.17, 2008 (CBS/AP) A
senior military commander told a House panel on Thursday that Iraq's
security forces are on track to add another 80,000 personnel by the end
of the year, but it's a long way from becoming self-sufficient.
Lt. Gen. James Dubik, head of the Multi-National Security Transition
Command, said the Iraqi defense minister has stressed to him that the
country could not assume responsibility
for internal security until as late as 2012. Also, it would be unable to
defend its borders until at least 2018. Rep. Ike Skelton, the
Democratic chairman of the panel, said he is
worried that U.S. troops will be worn out in the meantime.
"Security in Iraq has improved over the past year, due to the heroic
efforts of our troops. ... But the question now
is how do we sustain it?"
There are "positive signs, indeed, and steps forward, but the truth is
that they simply cannot fix, supply, arm or fuel themselves completely
enough at this point," Dubik told the House Armed Services Committee.
**************************
Negative views of the decision to take military
action against
Iraq are at their highest point since the
war began almost five years ago. Slightly more
than a third of Americans (36%) say the decision
to use military force was right while
56% see it as
wrong. In September 2007, 42% said
the war was the right decision, compared with
50% who said it was wrong. Views on the decision
to go to war in Iraq remain deeply polarized
along party lines. By 70%-26%, Republicans say
the war was the right decision; by an even wider
margin (76%-14%), Democrats believe the war was
wrong.
************************************8
Iran
president says Bush confrontational
CAIRO, Egypt -
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Thursday that
President Bush sent a "message of confrontation" during his
recent Mideast trip. Bush spent much of his visit to the region, which
he wrapped up on Wednesday, rallying support among Arab allies for a
strong stance against
Iran — calling the country the world's top sponsor of terrorism.
CAIRO, Egypt -
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Thursday that
President Bush sent a "message of confrontation" during his
recent Mideast trip. Bush spent much of his visit to the region, which
he wrapped up on Wednesday, rallying support among Arab allies for a
strong stance against
Iran — calling the country the world's top sponsor of terrorism.
"President
George Bush sent a message to the Iranian
people and all the nations worldwide," said
Ahmadinejad during an interview in Farsi with
Al-Jazeera television. "This message
reflects his own conceptions and it is a message
of rift, a message of sowing the seeds of
division. It is a message of confrontation
demeaning the dignity of mankind."
The Iranian
president said Bush's statements were made for
domestic political reasons.
"They are in need of these statements for
their presidential race," said Ahmadinejad.
"However, these statements increase the
sentiment of resentment of the Iranian people
against the U.S. officials."
Ahmadinejad also lashed out at
Israel, a key U.S. ally in the Mideast,
saying the country was "rapidly doomed to
collapse."
"All these nations believe they (the
Israelis) are a murderous group carrying arms
and trying through threats to change their
image," said Ahmadinejad.
Israel on Thursday successfully tested a new
long-range missile, said senior defense
officials speaking on condition of anonymity due
to the sensitivity of the project. Israeli radio
reports indicated the missiles are capable of
being armed with nuclear warheads.
Ahmadinejad dismissed the missile test,
saying Israel "lacks the courage to launch any
attack against the Iranian state."
"They are aware that any attempt or strike
will be confronted by a very strong response,"
added the Iranian president.
Tensions between Iran and both Israel and the
U.S. have remained high over Tehran's
controversial nuclear activities. The U.S. and
Israel claim Iran's program could be a pathway
to nuclear weapons development, but Tehran
insists its intentions are peaceful.
"They would like to deceive our people
alleging that the nuclear capability would
amount to a nuclear weapon," said Ahmadinejad on
Thursday.
U.S. attempts to keep up international
pressure against Iran were complicated by a
December intelligence report saying Iran
suspended its weapons development program in
2003 and has not restarted it.
Bush used his first major Mideast trip to
stress to Arab allies that Iran's continued
uranium enrichment — a process that can produce
fuel for a nuclear reactor or fissile material
for a bomb — still posed a threat to the region.
The
U.N. Security Council has passed two sets
of sanctions against Iran for its refusal to
suspend enrichment.
Germany and the five permanent Security
Council members plan to meet Tuesday in
Berlin for talks that diplomats say will
include attempts to finalize a third set of
sanctions.
Ahmadinejad said the U.N. Security Council
had no legal justification for focusing on
Iran's nuclear program, claiming their sanctions
were based on false information.
"If we pay close attention today, it is
opportune time for the U.N. Security Council to
rectify their false statements," he said.
The Iranian president said his country's
cooperation with the
International Atomic Energy Agency meant
that the IAEA should be the only U.N. body with
jurisdiction over the nuclear issue.
In November, an IAEA report said Iran had
been generally truthful about key aspects of its
nuclear history, but warned that its knowledge
of Tehran's present nuclear work was shrinking
(CBS/AP) Three
Army soldiers who were gunned down during a
three-hour firefight in the Salahuddin province
north of Baghdad last week may have died from
friendly fire, military officials said Tuesday.
The three 101st Airborne Division soldiers were
part of an Army company that was attacked by as
many as 15 insurgents on Jan. 8 after the
soldiers discovered several large caches of
explosives.
Military officials said the incident is being
investigated to determine whether the soldiers
were killed by shots from the enemy or by U.S.
troops, including members of their unit and
aircraft called in for backup later in the
battle.
Jan. 14, 2008
Iraq's 'Battlefield of the Mind'
By Walter Pincus
Monday, December 10, 2007; Page A17
Marine Maj. Gen. Douglas M. Stone, commanding
general of detainee operations in
Iraq, is fighting what he has called "the
battlefield of the mind." He has instituted
extensive screening of incoming prisoners and has
made available about 30 training and education
courses, including religion and civics, to the
25,188 prisoners under his control.
At a news conference last week, he said that once
a person is in custody at his facilities,
Camp Cropper near
Baghdad and Camp Bucca in southern Iraq, "we
spend a lot of time learning about them now,
studying their motivations . . . why they're
fighting, who they fight for -- more so than we've
ever known before."
At Cropper and Bucca(where some of our Utah Ntl.
Guard are stationed), he said, there is "an
assessment phase, and we take 72 hours and then
we work really hard on categorizations." Based
on those assessments, which include having imams
evaluate prisoners on their religious beliefs, a
decision is made about where to house them in
the detention facility.
As Stone was describing his program, the
Multi-National Force-Iraq Joint Contracting
Command was advertising for 12 contract
intelligence analysts to work for Stone at
Cropper and Bucca for six to 18 months,
beginning in March.
Their jobs will be mainly to "conduct
in-processing assessment of new detainees coming
into the theater internment facilities,"
according to the statement of work. They will
screen the circumstances of each detainee's
capture and any sworn statements or intelligence
about the person contained in an accompanying
packet.
After that, the work statement says, the
contracted analysts will "determine what
category a detainee is assigned to based on age,
religion, threat level and insurgent group
affiliation." They will also decide "where to
place the detainee in the segregation plan."
Stone said the compounds are not organized by
geographical areas, so most prisoners "don't
really know each other." Because extremists are
"generally the guys that know each other . . .
and they come in to set up kind of a gang
court," people from the same areas are spread
out across the prison.
The courses they take, almost all of which
are voluntary, include basic education,
vocational training and religion. The religion
course, run by one of 43 imams working on the
program, lasts four days.
The civics course, which each detainee must
take before he is released, covers "why you
should try to get an education -- why you should
try to have a job," Stone said. Other courses
touch "on how you control anger, the oath of
peace, the sacredness of life and property and
references back to the Koran," he added. The
demand for classes has "stripped" the 150
teachers he has available.
"I don't change people," Stone said. "Those
people or God changes them, not me, but we do
set in motion the ability to have that change
take place."
Stone sees the overall program as working
with detainees so that "they cannot conduct an
insurgency inside the wire." He added that he
hopes that detainees "someday maybe even work
with us and, of course, by telling us who the
bad guys are."
One result already seen, he said, is that
moderates in the prisons are identifying
extremists, thus facilitating their segregation
from the rest of the population. At Camp Bucca,
about 1,000 extremists were identified and
pulled from among the 21,000 prisoners, and
"that made a big difference," he said.
Another task for the contract employees is to
"track and analyze activity" within each
detention compound to enhance force protection,
as well as work with counterintelligence agents
in vetting informants inside the prison
population.
A must for prospective contract employees is
a "secret" security clearance. According to the
statement of work, they should at a minimum
"have an Associate's Degree though a Bachelor's
degree is desired." Individuals with at least
four years of analytical intelligence experience
are "Highly desired."
BAQUBA, Iraq (AFP) - Six people were killed in a massive blast in an
explosives-rigged house in central Iraq on Monday during an
operation by US and Iraqi forces against
Al-Qaeda fighters, police said.
In other violence, two policemen were killed in
a roadside bomb attack just north of
Baghdad while a senior Iraqi judge died
in a drive-by shooting in the capital while on
his way to work, Iraqi officials said.
The
house blast occurred in the village of Al-Abarra
village near Baquba, provincial capital of the
restive Diyala province, during operations by
US-Iraqi forces, said police Lieutenant-Colonel
Ismail al-Jaburi
Among the dead so far identified are one
policeman and two members of an "Awakening"
group of local Iraqis recruited to fight
Al-Qaeda, Jaburi said. Seven policemen were also
wounded.
"Three bodies were found under the rubble.
They were badly mutilated and we have not yet
been able to identify them," he said.
Another officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Najim al-Soumaidaie,
had said two policemen were missing.
Monday's operations in Al-Abarra were part of
Iron Harvest, a major sweep in Diyala launched
last Tuesday by US-Iraqi forces targeting
Al-Qaeda in Iraq jihadists, in which, according
to the US military on Monday, at least 60
suspected militants have so far been killed.
In separate raids in the nearby village of
Muradiyah on Monday, three booby-trapped houses
and four car bombs were discovered, Soumaidaie
said. Seven people were arrested.
*****************************
Main
Iraq Sunni Arab bloc says ready to return to
government Reuters via Yahoo! News
Mon, 14 Jan 2008 4:34 AM PST Iraq's main Sunni Arab bloc said on
Monday it was ready to return to Prime Minister
Nuri al-Maliki's Shi'ite-led administration in
an effort to revive the national unity
government that collapsed last year.
**********************************
NYTimes: "It’s undeniable – with record-breaking turnout for
2008 primary elections, unparalleled participation in the political
process and extraordinary conviction that America will move in a new
direction – a wave of change is sweeping over our country at a non-stop
pace.
Yet still some people are doing everything they can to break that wave
of change before it reaches shore. How? By refusing to fix the
equipment that enables our democracy – our voting machines.
That’s why Common Cause needs your help right now, to make sure all
voting machines produce a paper ballot or paper record that voters can
verify. You can begin by adding yourself to our map, letting us know if
you trust the voting machines in this country. Yes, it’s that simple.
A number of states still allow citizens to cast votes on
paperless, touch-screen machines which are prone to failure and
miscounts. Worse, because these machines are paperless, recounts simply
can’t occur on these machines. There literally is nothing to recount.*
As a strong supporter of Common Cause, you know that if the election
results in just one city, or in one state are off, the election results
in our entire country could be thrown off. That’s exactly why Common
Cause wants you to stand up and be counted. Every state matters because
every vote matters. "
Jan.13, 2008
Iraq veterans leave a trail of death and heartbreak in U.S.
Town by town across the United States, headlines
have been telling similar stories. Lakewood,
Washington: "Family Blames Iraq After Son Kills
Wife." Pierre, South Dakota: "Soldier Charged With
Murder Testifies About Postwar Stress." Colorado
Springs: "Iraq War Vets Suspected in Two Slayings,
Crime Ring."
Individually, these are stories of
local crimes, gut-wrenching postscripts to the war
for the military men, their victims and their
communities. Taken together, they paint the
patchwork picture of a quiet phenomenon, tracing a
cross-country trail of death and heartbreak.
The New York Times found 121 cases in which
veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan committed a killing
in the United States, or were charged with one,
after their return from war. In many of those cases,
combat trauma and the stress of deployment - along
with alcohol abuse, family discord and other
attendant problems - appear to have set the stage
for a tragedy that was part destruction, part
self-destruction.
Three-quarters of these veterans were still in
the military at the time of the killing. More than
half the killings involved guns, and the rest were
stabbings, beatings, strangulations and bathtub
drownings. Twenty-five offenders faced charges for
murder, manslaughter or homicide for fatal car
crashes resulting from drunken, reckless or suicidal
driving.
This reporting most likely
uncovered only the minimum
number of such cases, given that
not all killings, especially in
big cities and on military
bases, are reported publicly or
in detail. Also, it was often
not possible to determine the
deployment history of other
service members arrested on
homicide charges.
The Times
used the same methods to
research homicides involving all
active-duty military personnel
and new veterans for the six
years before and after the
present wartime period began
with the invasion of Afghanistan
in October 2001.
This showed an 89 percent
increase during the present
wartime period, from 184 to 349
cases, about three-quarters of
which involved Iraq and
Afghanistan war veterans. The
increase occurred even though
there have been fewer troops
stationed in the United States
in the last six years and the
homicide rate in America has
been, on average, lower.
The Pentagon was given The
Times's roster of homicides. It
declined to comment because,
according to a spokesman,
Lieutenant Colonel Les Melnyk,
the Department of Defense could
not duplicate the newspaper's
research.
Few of these 121 war veterans
received more than a cursory
mental health screening at the
end of their deployments,
according to interviews with the
veterans, lawyers, relatives and
prosecutors. Many displayed
symptoms of combat trauma after
their return, those interviews
show, but they were not
evaluated for or given a
diagnosis of post-traumatic
stress disorder until after they
were arrested for homicides.
"He came back different" is the shared refrain of
the defendants' family members, who mention
irritability, detachment, volatility, sleeplessness,
excessive drinking or drug use, and keeping a gun at
hand.
The nature of the counterinsurgency war in Iraq,
where there is no traditional front line, has
amplified the stresses of combat, and multiple tours
of duty - a third of the troops involved in Iraq and
Afghanistan have deployed more than once - ratchet
up those stresses.
Jan. 12, 2008 As
President Bush Visits ARab countries: "
Chiding U.S. allies who have withheld civil
liberties,
Bush said governments will never build trust by
harassing or imprisoning candidates and
protesters. But his rebuke was
general, and he did not single out any U.S.
partner in the region for oppressive practices.
"You cannot
expect people to believe in the promise of a
better future when they are jailed for
peacefully petitioning their government," Bush
said. "And you cannot stand up a modern,
confident nation when you do not allow people to
voice their legitimate criticisms." (How
ironic when the US has arrested the first
internet Blogger recently for exercising his
right to free speech on the internet)
Gulf allies are jittery after the Jan. 6
confrontation between U.S. and Iranian naval
vessels off their shores, but seek assurance
that Bush doesn't want war. Any attack on Iran
could bring retaliation against military bases
on Arab soil or choke the lucrative oil trade
through the Strait of Hormuz.Earlier Sunday in
Bahrain, U.S. Vice Adm. Kevin Cosgriff,
commander of the
U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, which patrols the
Gulf, told Bush that he took it "deadly
seriously" when an Iranian fleet of high-speed
boats charged at and threatened to blow up a
three-ship
U.S. Navy convoy passing near Iranian
waters. The Iranian naval forces vanished as the
American ship commanders were preparing to open
fire.
In renewing
his "Freedom Agenda"
— Bush's grand ambition
to seed democracy around
the globe — the
president declared: "We
know from experience
that democracy is the
only system of
government that yields
lasting peace and
stability."
Yet he was speaking
about democracy in a
deeply undemocratic
country, the Emirates,
where an elite of royal
rulers makes virtually
all the decisions. Large
numbers of foreign
resident workers have
few legal or human
rights, including no
right to citizenship and
no right to protest
working conditions.
Some human rights
groups have accused the
Emirates of tolerating
virtual indentured
servitude, where workers
from poor countries like
Sri Lanka are
forced to work to pay
off debts to employers,
and have their passports
seized so they can't
leave
***********************
TIME By MASSIMO
CALABRESI/RAMALLAH
Thu
Jan 10, 5:50 PM ET
"The
big-talk, little-action
approach takes place
against a backdrop of
continuing tension.
Rocket attacks from Gaza
into Israel continued
right up to Bush's
arrival in
Jerusalem. And
Israeli forces raided
Nablus in the
West Bank earlier
this month.
Bush dismissed questions
about the sluggish
diplomacy, saying that
it was up to the
Palestinian and Israeli
leaders to take the
tough steps.When the
hope and hoopla of
Bush's trip to the
region fades in coming
days, the U.S. will need
to come up with more
realistic goals for the
next twelve months of
diplomacy. Otherwise it
risks undermining the
very regional leaders it
says stand the best
chance of making
progress in coming
years.
The realistic
approach for the U.S. is
to ratchet back the
rhetoric to match both
sides' low expectations,
and at the same time
start applying real
pressure to get some
progress on day-to-day
confidence building
measures. That pace may
mean a long, slow effort
that will stretch into
the next administration,
but the alternative is
to undermine the
credibility of Abbas and
Olmert with unachievable
goals."
Jan 11, 2008 Bush: US may be in
Iraq for decade AFP via Yahoo! News
Fri, 11 Jan
2008 11:07 AM PST
US President George W. Bush said Friday that US-led forces "could
easily" stay in Iraq ten years or more and that he was "not
really" surprised that Osama bin Laden was still at large.
Family united by
Iraq tragedy, divided by politics Reuters via Yahoo! News
Fri, 11 Jan
2008 6:06 AM PST
When U.S. Marine Raul Bravo Jr. died in Iraq last year, his
family joined thousands of other Americans who have suffered the tragedy
of seeing a loved one killed in the war.
What
Iraq will cost the U.S. Fortune via Yahoo! Finance
Fri, 11 Jan
2008 9:11 AM PST
The Iraq war has already cost the lives of nearly 4,000 U.S.
troops, but there is another cost that is not so readily quantifiable:
the economic toll. Forecasts of the cost to the U.S. have reached into
the trillions of dollars, fueling a controversy over the impact on the
budget and the economy. "As it turns out, I was partly right. The
war has not been economically ruinous. The bill for Iraq over the past
five years is now approaching a cumulative $500 billion, or about $100
billion per year on average. My hypothetical estimate got the annual
cost about right, but I misjudged an important factor: how long we would
be involved. As we approach the fifth anniversary of the start of the
war, it's worth making a new appraisal of where we are going with this
investment. Is the war's total cost going to run into the trillions of
dollars, as some economists have asserted? Are those numbers meaningful
in terms of what to do next? If we stick around to finish the job, are
we throwing good money after bad?,"In this exclusive essay adapted from
his new book, What a President Should Know ... but Most Learn Too Late (Rowman
& Littlefield, 246 pages), Lindsey reveals.
Jan 10, 2008
US warplanes rain bombs on Al-Qaeda in
Iraq: military AFP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 10 Jan
2008 11:19 AM PST
US warplanes rained bombs on a rural area just south of Baghdad on
Thursday, with the American military saying Al-Qaeda in Iraq safe
havens were destroyed in
"one of the largest airstrikes" since
2003. 40,000
pounds of explosives during a 10-minute airstrike Thursday, flattening
what the military called al-Qaeda in Iraq safe havens on the
southern outskirts of the capital
Electricity needed to cement
Iraq gains: US military AFP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 10 Jan
2008 5:33 AM PST
Al-Qaeda is beaten in its former stronghold of Ramadi but now the
electricity supply is key to keeping the peace, a US military commander
in the western Iraq city said on Thursday.
US authorities in
Iraq probe phone contracts FT.com via Yahoo! News
Thu, 10 Jan
2008 3:35 AM PST
US authorities in Iraq have put on hold hundreds of millions of
dollars worth of mobile telephone contracts, while they investigate
allegations that the bidding process was hijacked by associates of the
new Iraqi governing council.
Jan8, 2008Survey:
Diplomats oppose Iraq policy AP via Yahoo! News
Tue, 08 Jan 2008 11:55 AM PST Nearly half of
U.S. diplomats unwilling to volunteer to work in Iraq say one reason for
their refusal is they don't agree with Bush administration's policies in
the country,
according to a survey released Tuesday.
As violence ebbs, the next hurdle for
Iraq is political progress The Christian Science Monitor via Yahoo! News
Tue, 08 Jan
2008 0:00 AM PST
This will be a pivotal year in Iraq. Nine provinces are now under
Iraqi Army control.
This year, the
US plans to hand over responsibility for security in the remaining nine
provinces. American military officials say that if current security
trends hold up, it will withdraw four more brigades from Iraq by the end
of July, bringing the number of troops back to its presurge level of
around 130,000.
U.S. forces in
Iraq on offensive against Qaeda Reuters via Yahoo! News
Tue, 08 Jan
2008 7:29 AM PST
U.S. and Iraqi forces launched a series of operations on Tuesday
targeting al Qaeda in Iraq after an upsurge in suicide bombings
which U.S. commanders say are an attempt by the militant group to
reignite sectarian violence.
UN refugee agency seeks 261 million dollars for
Iraq appeal AFP via Yahoo! News
Tue, 08 Jan
2008 5:01 AM PST
The United Nations refugee agency said on Tuesday it was seeking 261
million dollars (177 million euros) this year to help
more than 4 million people uprooted by the
conflict in Iraq.
BAGHDAD, Dec. 29 -- The top U.S. commander in
Iraq, Gen. David H. Petraeus, delivered a
positive but cautious assessment Saturday of
progress in the country in 2007, citing the
drop-off in violence over the latter half of the
year but warning that the insurgent group
al-Qaeda in Iraq remains the country's
preeminent threat.
Petraeus said the number of weekly attacks
in Iraq -- such as roadside bombings, mortar
attacks and sniper fire -- has fallen by
about 60 percent since June,
to about 500 a week by late this month.
The number of Iraqi civilians killed in
December through the 22nd appeared to be
about 600, according to a graph of the past
two years provided by Petraeus that uses
combined Iraqi and U.S. figures.
The highest death toll
during this period came last December, when
about 3,000 civilians were killed.
"The positive security trends and the
factors that produced them are changing the
context in many parts of Iraq. While
progress in many areas remains fragile,
security has improved," Petraeus said during
a briefing for reporters at the U.S. Embassy
in Baghdad. He added that success "will
emerge slowly and fitfully, with reverses as
well as advances, accumulating fewer bad
days and gradually more good days. There
will inevitably be more tough fighting."
The downturn in violence is generally
attributed to three factors that emerged
over the year: the arrival of 30,000
additional U.S. troops, the emergence of
tens of thousands of
Sunni fighters who aligned with American
troops against al-Qaeda in Iraq,
and the decision by Shiite cleric
Moqtada al-Sadr to
call for a six-month cease-fire by his
militia. Petraeus also cited a
drop-off in fighters
coming to Iraq from Syria and
Saudi Arabia,
and a decline in recent months in the use of
weapons believed to have been made in
Iran.
Iraqi Interior Ministry officials, in a
separate briefing Saturday, singled out the
rise of the Sunni groups, known often as the
Sahawa, or Awakening, as a main reason for
improvement in 2007, a rare public
endorsement from the Shiite-led government,
which has been wary of, and sometimes
opposed to, those groups. Maj. Gen. Ayden
Khaled Qadir, deputy interior minister for
security affairs, said there are plans to
include 12,641 people from those groups into
the police force in Baghdad by the end of
April. The Iraqi government has been slow to
do that, fearing that many such people are
former insurgents with an anti-Shiite
outlook.
For a time this year, U.S. officials in
Iraq described Shiite militias as the most
damaging and destabilizing force in the
country, but Petraeus identified al-Qaeda in
Iraq as the top threat.
"We call it sometimes
'the wolf closest to the sled.'
It is the most significant enemy that Iraq
faces precisely because it is the enemy that
carries out the most horrific attacks, that
causes the greatest damage to infrastructure
and that seems most intent on reigniting
ethno-sectarian violence," he said.
He said that al-Qaeda in Iraq has been
diminished by aggressive military operations
and by the rise of the Awakening groups and
that the insurgents have responded by
attacking those forces. In an audiotape
released Saturday purported to be by
Osama bin Laden,
the leader of al-Qaeda warned Iraq's Sunnis
against joining such tribal councils or
participating in any unity government.
"The most evil
traitors are those who trade away their
religion for the sake of their mortal life,"
bin Laden said, according to a translation
by the Associated Press.
Petraeus said the
al-Qaeda in
Iraq network and its affiliates have
moved into northern
Iraqi provinces such as Nineveh, Diyala and
Salahuddin after coming under
pressure from U.S. and Iraqi forces in
Baghdad and Anbar provinces. The one Iraqi
province that has not had a reduction in
attacks is Nineveh, where insurgents operate
in and around the provincial capital of
Mosul.
In recent days there have been two major
bombings in northern provinces, one in the
oil refinery town of Baiji and another in
Baqubah, the capital of Diyala province.
Together, they killed at least 26 people.
Contrary to other trends, the number of
suicide car bombings and suicide-vest
attacks has risen in each of the past three
months, though the frequency is still below
peak levels this year. There were about 50
"high-profile" explosions in the first three
weeks of December, according to U.S.
military figures.
"There will be bombs" in Iraq, Petraeus
predicted. "If the metric is that there are
no car bombs or no suicide-vest bombs, I
think that would just be an unrealistic
metric."
Also Saturday, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri
al-Maliki was flown to London for a medical
examination after suffering from what his
aides described as fatigue. The Reuters news
service quoted an unnamed official as saying
Maliki, 57, would undergo cardiac tests.
Earlier in the week, Maliki was examined
at a U.S. military hospital in Baghdad's
Green Zone, said Col. Steven A. Boylan, a
U.S. military spokesman. His doctors and
advisers recommended a checkup in London,
said Sami al-Askiri, an adviser to the prime
minister. A statement from the Iraqi
government described Maliki as "fully
healthy" but suffering from exhaustion.
Bomb blasts mar
Iraq Army Day holiday Reuters via Yahoo! News
Sun, 06 Jan 2008 8:55 AM PST
A suicide bomber blew himself up among
soldiers and civilians celebrating Iraq's
national Army Day holiday in central Baghdad
on Sunday, killing 11 people in the latest
in an upsurge of suicide attacks
Republican Party Jumps on Clinton's
Iraq Statement The New York Observer
Sun, 06 Jan 2008 11:57 AM PST
From R.N.C. spokesman Danny Diaz: “Senator
Clinton said her vote on Iraq was one
of ‘conviction’ and the ‘right decision.’
Candidate Clinton says just the opposite on
the stump. Clearly, voters in New Hampshire
cannot trust Senator Clinton or Candidate
Clinton as neither is willing to be honest
with them.”
Jan. 5, 2008 Iraq
vet brings military skills to Lawrence High in drug campaign The Daily Comet
Sat, 05 Jan
2008 10:45 AM PST
TRINITY, Ala. After serving two tours of duty in Iraq, East
Lawrence High Principal and Army Reserve Lt. Col. Ricky Nichols said he
knows what it takes to combat terrorists.
Father Mourns Son Killed In
Iraq WCCO Minneapolis/St. Paul
Sat, 05 Jan
2008 12:15 PM PST
Another Minnesota family is mourning the loss of a son on the
battlefield. An explosion in Iraq killed Pvt. 1st Class Joshua
Anderson Wednesday.
Roadside bombs kill seven in
Iraq's Diyala: officials AFP via Yahoo! News
Sat, 05 Jan
2008 4:15 AM PST
A spate of roadside bombs killed seven people and wounded three in
Iraq's volatile Diyala province on Saturday, Iraqi security
officials said.
Jan. 4, 2007
Economy trumps
Iraq in election Reuters via Yahoo! News
Sat, 05 Jan
2008 9:20 AM PST
The Iraq war, once the key issue in the presidential election, is
taking a back seat to the economy as voters fret over a possible
recession and consider the improving security situation in Baghdad.
Iran no longer aids
Iraq militants The Washington Times
Fri, 04 Jan
2008 9:37 AM PST
Iran's leaders are no longer supplying weapons or training to Islamic
militants in Iraq, the spokesman for the top U.S. commander in
Iraq told The Washington Times.
Key Al Qaeda-in-Iraq
Leader Killed, 40 Suspected Terrorists Captured In
Iraq Nasdaq
Fri, 04 Jan 2008 9:14 AM PST
(RTTNews) - U.S. forces have killed an Al Qaeda-in-Iraq leader
who was suspected of helping to plan a large scale attack against
coalition forces in the near future and arrested dozens of suspected
extremists connected to the terrorist group in two days of mopping up
operations, the U.S. military revealed a week after the incident
occurred south of Baghdad.
US military deaths in
Iraq at 3,907 AP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 03 Jan
2008 4:19 PM PST
As of Thursday, Jan. 3, 2008, at least 3,907 members of the U.S.
military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March
2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes eight
military civilians. At least 3,178 died as a result of hostile action,
according to the military's numbers.
Three US soldiers killed in Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Thu, 03 Jan
2008 11:25 AM PST
Three US soldiers have been killed in Iraq, the US military
announced on Thursday, making them the first American casualties of the
new year.
Iraq thanks Bush for vetoing defense bill Reuters via Yahoo! News
Thu, 03 Jan
2008 8:56 AM PST Iraq thanked U.S. President George W. Bush on Thursday for
vetoing a defense bill that would have let companies and people win
compensation from the new Iraqi government for actions by ousted leader
Saddam Hussein.
"The Army has had to suspend reenlistment bonuses for more than 20
job specialties because Congress has not passed legislation to fund the
programs. Or, put another way, President Bush thinks
Soldiers make enough money.
President Bush, to the surprise of Congress and the Defense
Department, vetoed the fiscal 2008 Defense Authorization Act on Dec. 29
after months bargaining with House and Senate leaders.
In announcing the pocket veto, White House spokesman Scott Stanzel
said the president objected to a single provision of the
legislation that would delay the reconstruction of Iraq, and expose the
Iraqi government to unwarranted law suits in U.S. courts.
Now, I'm not a politician and maybe this SINGLE PROVISION has serious
implications that I'm not aware of. Here's where the problem lies:
Section 1083 would establish unprecedented legal burdens on the
allocation of Iraq's funds to where they are most needed. Since the fall
of Saddam Hussein, I have issued Executive Orders to shield from
entanglement in lawsuits the assets of the DFI and the CBI. I have taken
these steps both to uphold international legal obligations of the United
States and to remove obstacles to the orderly reconstruction of Iraq.
Section 1083 potentially would place these crucial protections of Iraq's
core assets in immediate peril, by including a provision that might be
misconstrued to supersede the protections I have put in place and to
permit the judicial attachment of these funds. Iraq must not have its
crucial reconstruction funds on judicial hold while lawyers argue and
courts decide such legal assertions.
Until a new version of the legislation is enacted, all new bonus
agreements signed on, or after, Jan. 1 must include an addendum that
stipulates the soldier’s eligibility for a future bonus.
However, the addendum also stipulates that the bonus is not
guaranteed. Payments will not be made if the affected bonus program is
not authorized in the final budget compromise.
If Congress fails to authorize a bonus, the soldier — officer or
enlisted — still must meet the re-enlistment or service extension
requirements of the contract.
Here's some irony for you: the officers' bonuses
don't seem to be affected by this "shortage" of money. As a matter
of fact, they've INCREASED.
Who are all these Captains going to lead when the troops decide not to
reenlist?"
Jan 2, 2007
US general says 60 percent of attacks in north
Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Wed, 02 Jan
2008 8:54 AM PST
Almost two-thirds of insurgent attacks in Iraq occur in the north
of the war-ravaged country, although overall levels of violence have
dropped, a US said on Wednesday.
Senator John McCain said in
an interview that the buildup of U.S. forces in Iraq represented
the only viable option to avoid failure.
Does a safer
Iraq mean more US troops can exit? The Christian Science Monitor via Yahoo! News
Wed, 02 Jan
2008 0:00 AM PST
Security in Iraq has improved dramatically in the past four
months, including much lower casualty rates among American service
members. But there is little consensus yet if a safer Iraq can
translate to an Iraq with fewer US troops.
Jan. 1, 2007
2007 deadliest year
for US troops in Iraq AFP via Yahoo! News
Mon, 31 Dec 2007 11:41 PM PST
Despite a drop in US casualties in the past six months, 2007 has proved
the deadliest year for American forces in Iraq since the
invasion, with at least 896 soldiers killed, according to an AFP tally
based on Pentagon figures.
Crunch year ahead for
Iraq BBC News
Tue, 01 Jan
2008 7:13 AM PST
As 2007 ends with a dramatic improvement in security,
2008 is likely
to be a make-or-break year for Iraq.
Dec. 30, 20072007
deadliest for US troops in
Iraq AP via Yahoo! News
Sun, 30 Dec
2007 12:03 PM PST
The second half of 2007 saw violence drop dramatically in Iraq,
but the progress came at a high price: The year was the deadliest for
the U.S. military since the 2003 invasion, with
899 troops killed. At least 3,902 members of the
U.S. military have died since the beginning of the war. Of those,
at least 3,175 died as a result of hostile action, according to the
military's numbers.
NAUDERO, Pakistan -
Benazir Bhutto's 19-year-old son was chosen Sunday to succeed her
as chairman of her opposition party, extending
Pakistan's most famous political dynasty but leaving the real
power to her husband, who will serve as co-chairman.
BAGHDAD - Iraqi security forces were on high alert Sunday around
Baghdad and in the Sunni heartland north of the capital as the
country marked the one-year anniversary of
Saddam Hussein's execution. Children chanted "with our blood,
with our souls, we sacrifice for you Saddam," AP Television News footage
showed. The tomb was covered in Iraqi flags and flowers and flanked by
large pictures of a smiling Saddam.In Saddam's hometown of Tikrit,
hundreds of people and school children visited his burial site to pay
homage and lay flowers. Some gave fiery speeches while others just stood
quietly by the tomb, located in a large mausoleum in the
Tigris River village of Ouja — the small hamlet just outside
Tikrit where Saddam was born.Jamal Salman, a 35-year-old Sunni in
Baghdad, said that "we had wished that
Saddam's death would be part of the solution but it became part of a
problem."
But a year later, al-Sadr's decision to declare
a cease-fire, the influx of thousands of U.S.
troops and a decision by tens of thousands of
predominantly Sunni tribesmen to back America
instead of
al-Qaida has managed to turn the tide.
Violence in the past six months has dropped by
60 percent, the
U.S. military has said.
But tensions
are still rife and the anniversary of Saddam's
execution reminded many Iraqis that violence is
never far away.A leaflet scattered in the Sunni
north Baghdad neighborhood of Azamiyah and
issued in the name of the outlawed
Baath party once led by Saddam said that
Sunday marked "the first anniversary of the
remembrance of the crime of Saddam's
assassination committed by the Americans and the
Iranian agents they have collaborated with to
carry out a fake trial."A year after the
execution, Iraq remains to a great degree
divided along sectarian lines, although the U.S.
military has said the increased security should
help efforts at national reconciliation.
Dec24, 2007War
strain in Iraq may speed troop cuts The Christian Science Monitor via Yahoo! News
Mon, 24 Dec
2007 0:00 AM PST
The strain of the war in Iraq is increasingly forcing senior
Pentagon leaders to be blunter about the military's inability to sustain
war operations indefinitely, a shift in tone that may mean more troops
come home sooner.
welcomed candor from his commanders. As a
result, senior leaders have taken advantage of
the situation to make a more public case that
the military, especially the Army, can no longer
afford the luxury of sustained military
operations in Iraq.
The Pentagon is already taking steps to
draw down forces. Currently, there are about
165,000 American troops in Iraq, which includes
about 20 combat brigades.
By next summer, the plan
is to return five combat brigades, or about
20,000 troops.
But a push is under way to bring home even
more by the end of next year. Last Friday,
Secretary Gates reiterated his hope that five
additional combat brigades could be sent home by
December 2008.
Army
Gen. David Petraeus, the top commander in
Iraq, is expected to return to Washington in
March to give his assessment of US military
operations, which will inform the debate about
the drawdown for next year.
"My hope has been that the circumstances on
the ground will continue to improve in a way
that would, when
General Petraeus and the chiefs and
Central Command do their analysis in March, will
allow a continuation of the drawdown at roughly
the same pace as the first half of the year,"
Gates told reporters at the
Pentagon last Friday.
Since Gates assumed his job a year ago, he
has been an advocate of both improving security
in Iraq while also lessening the strain on US
forces. But increasingly, the Pentagon's war
policy appears to be driven by the reality that
the Defense Department, especially the Army,
simply can't continue to deploy soldiers at the
current pace.
Gen. George Casey, the Army's chief of
staff and the former senior commander in Iraq,
has been particularly frank about the state of
the Army.
"We're deploying at unsustainable rates,"
General Casey said three weeks ago during
remarks to an audience at the Brookings
Institution in Washington. The Army agreed to a
buildup of troops a year ago with the
understanding that it was temporary, he said.
"We can't sustain that. We have to come off of
that, and we're working that very hard."
The strains on the Army are nothing new. When
President Bush announced a new approach
for Iraq last year, the thinking was that,
despite the problems the Army was facing, it was
more important to try to get it right in Iraq.
And so another 30,000 troops were moved into
combat. Top officials say drawing down troops is
still "conditions-based." But there is also
recognition that the Army can't go on this way
much longer, deploying troops multiple times for
15-month tours.
One retired general who remains close to the
situation sees a shift in which the impact of
operations in Iraq is beginning to dictate the
policy, not the other way around.
The retired general, who asked not to be
identified because of the political sensitivity
of the situation, said a decision to give the
Army some relief could go a long way to
alleviate stress on the service.
"If we can reduce the frequency and length of
deployments to Iraq, and therefore let some of
this air out of the balloon, in the short term
you may restore a degree of morale and optimism
and sustain readiness and recruiting in ways
that can help," he says.
Critics of the war have been saying the Army
is at or near its breaking point for years, yet
few believe it's actually happened. One of their
concerns is that the strain of multiple
deployments will discourage good individuals
from
joining the Army – or "re-upping" and
staying in.
Barry McCaffrey, a retired Army general who
works as a consultant and makes frequent trips
to Iraq, returned in mid-December from a
week-long trip to Iraq and
Kuwait. He was critical of the execution
of the war under Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld but sees positive signs now, despite
strains on the force. He has repeatedly called
for a larger Army,
which he says should be 800,000-strong.
The Army is expected to grow to 547,000
soldiers by 2010, and Casey has left the door
open for an even bigger increase beyond that.
But time is running short for the Army now, Mr.
McCaffrey says. "We can probably sustain a force
in Iraq indefinitely (given adequate funding) of
some 10-plus brigades," McCaffrey wrote in a
post-trip report. "However,
the US Army is
starting to unravel."
The Marine Corps, the other ground service
largely engaged in Iraq, is smaller and has been
able to manage the war's impact differently. Its
recruiting and retention has remained strong
without falling short of its standards so far.
While there is reasonable consensus that a
significant drawdown must occur to relieve the
Army – from Gates to Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to the service
chiefs and many combatant commanders – Petraeus
may not see things the same way. An expert in
counterinsurgency, Petraeus believes such
campaigns can last a decade or more if done
right. While he is mindful of the strains on the
force, he is considered to be more focused on
maintaining the security momentum there,
analysts say.
Casey insists the Army
is not "hollow" or "broken" – terms often
used by concerned observers – but "out
of balance." In his remarks at Brookings
earlier this month, he said there is an almost
indiscernible line. "There's a thin red line out
there that you don't know when you cross it
until after you've crossed it," he said.
But Casey may be willing to go only so far in
publicly acknowledging the problem, says the
retired general. "Brutal honesty," he says,
about the true morale within the Army and the
challenges the institution faces could actually
create a bigger problem
within the ranks as officers and
enlisted soldiers become discouraged, and
even more could get out. It would
become a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy,
according to the retired general.
Still, Casey is "doing
all the right things," he says. "He is sticking
his neck out and forcing people to think about
the problem."
Death toll eases but
Iraq awaits its full 'Awakening' AFP via Yahoo! News
Tue, 25 Dec
2007 10:45 AM PST
A controversial surge in US troop numbers has cut the death toll in
Iraq
but prospects for reconciliation between
its divided communities remain a
distant dream as the conflict enters a New Year.
Truck bomb hits crowd in
Iraq International Herald Tribune
Tue, 25 Dec
2007 11:37 AM PST
At least 25 people were killed and dozens were wounded in an attack near
an oil refinery in Iraq. Later nine people were killed and 14
injured by a suicide bomber in Mualmeen, west of Baquba.
Dec. 20, 2007 "Apparently, I wasn't the only one
who got a kick out of putting McConnell on Santa's naughty list because
the response from DSCC supporters around the country has been
tremendous.
Mitch McConnell is the living, breathing embodiment of why we need more
than 51 Democratic seats in the Senate. Unless we can expand our
majority, he still controls enough votes to block nearly everything we
want to accomplish: health care for kids, an end to the war, even
attempts to address global warming.
The good news is that it's not too late for you to show your displeasure
by adding your own lump of coal to his stocking.
James Carville made an important observation this week: we're sending
our message with lumps of coal now, but next November, we're going to
send a clear message with our votes. The DSCC is doing everything
possible to make sure of it.
I hope I can count on your continued support.
Sincerely,"
J.B. Poersch
Dec. 19, 2007
Army plans on 7more Brigades by 2010 and will shorten tours from 15 mos
to 12.
*******************************
EPA's decision to deny California's waiver request is an outrage.
Environmental Protection Agency denied California's waiver
request to cut global warming pollution from automobiles.
Seventeen other states plan to implement similar programs. EPA's
action today is nothing more than a heavy handed stroke
to limit the authority of states to fight global warming and protect our
environment.
Send an email to EPA administrator Stephen Johnson
right now and join me in condemning this decision.
This is the first time EPA has ever denied a waiver request under the
Clean Air Act. It is a major blow to our efforts to cut global warming
pollution from cars.
The administration is putting the brakes on state action to address
the global warming crisis.
Doing nothing about global warming is bad enough -- but going out of
your way to block the leaders who are trying to solve this is an
outrage.
Three landmark court rulings earlier this year offered a clear legal
path for EPA to grant the waiver. In April, the Supreme Court ruled that
carbon dioxide is a pollutant covered under the Clean Air Act and that
the EPA has the clear obligation to protect Americans from global
warming.
More recently, in separate cases, a federal judge in Vermont and
another in California rejected efforts by automakers to repeal the state
emissions laws. In these decisions, the judges made clear that states
can pass laws under the Clean Air Act to limit pollution from tailpipes,
but left it to EPA to grant a waiver allowing states to proceed.
The federal courts also dismissed automakers' claims that they did
not have the technology to meet such standards.
In his December ruling, California Judge Anthony Ishii wrote:
Given the level of impairment of human health and welfare that
current climate science indicates may occur if human-generated
greenhouse gas emissions continue unabated, it would be the very
definition of folly if EPA were precluded from action.
We have been waiting two years for EPA to decide on this waiver
request. Until today, EPA had granted all 50 previous waiver requests
over the last 40 years.
I will be working with my Environmental Defense colleagues and with
the rest of the environmental community to explore all legal avenues to
fight this decision. We will make sure to update you on those
developments.
In the meantime, please
send an email today to EPA administrator Johnson
expressing your outrage over today's decision.
Dec.16, 2007BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Cuts in
U.S. troop levels in Iraq will not derail recent security gains, but the
Iraqi government must move quicker to take advantage of the falls in
violence, a senior U.S. general said on Sunday.
Lieutenant-General Raymond Odierno, the number
two commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, urged the
government to move faster on national
reconciliation and improving basic services.
Underscoring the improved security in Iraq,
Odierno said attacks last week in Anbar
province, once the heart of the Sunni Arab
insurgency, were the lowest ever recorded by the
U.S. military. Overall
violence in Iraq was at a level not seen
since the spring of 2005, he told a briefing for
foreign reporters.
"I am very confident that we will be fine at
15 combat brigade teams," Odierno said,
referring to the number of U.S. combat brigades
that will be stationed in Iraq from the middle
of 2008 once more than 20,000 soldiers have
left.
Troop levels have already begun to fall under
a plan by the U.S. commander in Iraq,
General David Petraeus, to reverse a
troop buildup this year that was ordered partly
to pull the country back from the brink of
all-out sectarian civil war.
The extra American troops, increased Iraqi
security forces and the use of largely Sunni
Arab neighborhood security patrols have all
combined to bring down violence in recent
months.
One key aim of the U.S. buildup was also to
give breathing space to the Shi'ite-led
government of Prime Minister
Nuri al-Maliki to become reconciled with
Sunni Arabs and Kurds.
But
progress at the national level has been slow,
with no key laws passed that would bridge the
deep sectarian divide.
Odierno said it was vital the government
became more responsive to the needs of Iraqis.
"There is a window (of opportunity) because
of the security to really move forward and
Iraqis want to move forward. So it's a matter
now of can we get the policies in place by the
central government to do that," he said.
"We are seeing it at the local level ... but
to take full advantage of it you need to have
the connect to the central government. We are
seeing movement, but we need to see more."
Odierno said it was hard to make predictions
about further U.S. troop cuts beyond mid-2008.
Force levels were at 154,000, from a peak of
165,000, he said. Numbers are expected to drop
to somewhere above 130,000 under the current
drawdown plan.
"It's hard to predict what we will do in the
summer. I think as we move forward over the next
few months we will get a better read on it based
on how we see the conditions," he said.
Petraeus is
expected to make recommendations in March on any
further troop cuts. Odierno said the
drawdown would not affect security, with
existing forces moved to where they were needed.
"When we reduce brigades you will not see
holes where they were ... We will take pieces
from many different parts of Iraq and we will
build and organize our combat forces to make
sure we still have capability in the key areas,"
he said.
He said while the first six months of 2007
was probably the most violent period since the
U.S.-led invasion in 2003, the last six months
had probably seen some of the lowest levels of
violence during the nearly five-year-old
conflict
you need to evacuate (leave your home for safer ground) the most
important thing is to TAKE YOUR PET WITH YOU. Leaving pets behind,
even if you try to create a safe place for them, is not the best
action. BUT, pets cannot go with you to a Red Cross emergency
shelter (unless they are service animals, like dogs for the visually
impaired.) Since your pet cannot go to the shelter, you need to plan
ahead.
hotels or motels
outside your immediate area and ask about their policies on
accepting pets during an emergency. Keep a list of "pet friendly"
places in your emergency kit so you"ll know where to go. If you get
advance notice that you will need to evacuate, call and make a
reservation at the "pet friendly" places right away! 
repare a list of
boarding facilities and veterinarians who could shelter your animals
in an emergency. Keep the list in your emergency kit. 
from over. As long as US
troops are in Iraq, the Bush
administration will do all it can to
influence Iraq’s oil industry. 
