The Whole Delivery

The New York Times has no problem marketing this book You have to love their continued persistence to great journalism integrity and not succumbing to shady advertising ruining their ethics. Especially in regards to promoting the book of one of the war criminals who certainly used their article to go into the illegal war that we need know of. What would Judith Miller think if they did?

It was the typical down the middle stuff from President Obama in his Presidential address tonight, where despite an obvious recognition of the history of events as always, the 44th executive chief continued to protect the previous Administration's screw ups and not tell the full narrative to the America public about our dumb wars. Maybe the most salient moment of the address did not stem from talk about Iraq or relating its cost to how it has contributed greatly to our current pathetic economical situation. Rather, the comments he made on Afghanistan in regards to "conditions on the ground" being the bases on how fast the troop withdrawal will be is the one that should raise the most eyebrows in my mind. It is the typical safe centrist crap answer, where we are beholden to the military complex no matter what. "Conditions on the ground" for withdrawal in Afghanistan could easily mean just a few troops leaving at a very slow pace. This will certainly give a s...

As everyone was certainly more than distracted on their 4th of July weekend, taking a break from the intense 24/7 grind of wondering why our country can't enact just common sense policy for the good of the collective in this nation, we received yet another stunningly and sad reminder of how far our journalism has placed itself in a continuing abyss. It once again came at the hands of Bill Keller, the man responsible for turning the "Old Grey Lady" into the "Ov Vey Shady" with every chance his hack personality gets. And what he uttered this weekend was frankly, as Glenn Greenwald said this weekend , "one of the more demented and reprehensible statements I've seen from a high-level media executive in some time." I would say in all time . Bill Keller, the executive editor of The Times, said the newspaper had written so much about the issue of waterboarding that “ I think this Kennedy School study — by focusing on whether we have embraced the po...

And just moving along back to a stupid war. Nothing else to see in the unsurprising news of the week.

Oh dear : WASHINGTON (AP) -- The top U.S. war commander in Afghanistan apologized Tuesday for an interview in which he said he felt betrayed by the man the White House chose to be his diplomatic partner, Ambassador Karl Eikenberry. The article in this week's issue of Rolling Stone depicts Gen. Stanley McChrystal as a lone wolf on the outs with many important figures in the Obama administration and unable to convince even some of his own soldiers that his strategy can win the war. In Kabul on Tuesday, McChrystal issued a statement saying: ''I extend my sincerest apology for this profile. It was a mistake reflecting poor judgment and should never have happened.'' It's not a good look at all when generals do interviews nowadays, or any military figure that is unless it's the polish and astute Admiral Mullen. McCrystal's reckless mouth makes questions about "Why are we over there?" become even louder and louder in my mind, regardless of th...

Good delivery for Trey and Keri to remember the troops, even if it had nothing to do with the song.

The War Is Making You Poor Act : Next week, there is going to be a "debate" in Congress on yet another war funding bill. The bill is supposed to pass without debate, so no one will notice. What George Orwell wrote about in "1984" has come true. What Eisenhower warned us about concerning the "military-industrial complex" has come true. War is a permanent feature of our societal landscape, so much so that no one notices it anymore. But we’re going to change this. Today, we’re introducing a bill called ‘The War Is Making You Poor Act’. The purpose of this bill is to connect the dots, and to show people in a real and concrete way the cost of these endless wars. Nothing more than you can say.

John McCain and all the bigots may have a hissy fit if they see this video. Especially since it was in Afghanistan where this all went down at. And they may somehow use this video to highlight once again their lovely bigoted position of how gays shouldn't be in the military, even hough Lady Gaga isn't gay. Oh......and if they use that philosophy, then I guess that means that these individuals who participated in this hilarious video must be discharged from their units. More to come in the fun thread folks.

Looks like Centcom can't respond to Wikileaks with their own video The military’s footage of the slaying of two Reuters employees in Iraq may no longer be retrievable, a Centcom spokesperson confirms to me — which may generate further criticism of the handling of the whole affair. As you know, Wikileaks sparked a huge controversy by posting on YouTube a leaked video that shows the Reuters employees being gunned down by Army choppers in a 2007 attack. The video appeared to contradict the military’s earlier claim that the incident had happened during combat operations, and debate has been raging about the vid ever since. Subsequently, a military spokesman told the AP that it has been unable to locate its own copy of this footage. But in an interview with me, a spokesperson for Centcom went considerably farther, acknowledging it may no longer be accessible at all. This is important, because Centcom had hoped to match up its own footage with the leaked video before commenting ...

   It really won't, especially the group that really doesn't want the US in their country right now : After initially denying involvement or any cover-up in the deaths of three Afghan women during a badly bungled American Special Operations assault in February, the American-led military command in Kabul admitted late on Sunday that its forces had, in fact, killed the women during the nighttime raid. The admission immediately raised questions about what really happened during the Feb. 12 operation — and what falsehoods followed — including a new report that Special Operations forces dug bullets out of the bodies of the women to hide the true nature of their deaths. A NATO official also said Sunday in an interview that an Afghan-led team of investigators had found signs of evidence tampering at the scene, including the removal of bullets from walls near where the women were killed. I definitely want to see what else was in that operation, because there is a lot of ugline...

Yeah, because the details, or lack there of last night, aren't going to be facile. At all. Take a look at this: So we don't even know how many Afghan security forces there actually are. Let we know that we will start somehow training these forces not now, but in middle 2011. Those details aren't what we heard last night. Glenn Greenwald said it perfectly here : I've written many times before why, on security grounds alone, I oppose escalation and even ongoing occupation. The greatest cause of Terrorism is our endless wars, invasions, bombings, occupations and other means of interfering in the Muslim world, and our escalation will only fuel the anti-American hatred and resentment that -- as even our own Government has recognized -- is the primary fuel of the threat we're supposedly trying to arrest. For that reason, Obama's escalation is, in my view, more likely to subvert rather than promote the security goals he cites to justify it. And Dan Froomkin points o...

You know, those people who live in the country we are talking about. You know, those people, who really do matter more than me or any other American talking about their country? Look at This More recently, Rashid said emotions on the ground had been aggravated by major mistakes by the Bush administration's failure to honor its promise to reconstruct Afghanistan after the 2001 invasion. "The Afghans thought the US presence meant they would help rebuild the country," Rashid said. "That didn't happen." Rashid also said that Afghani unhappiness with Americans has been increased by Washington's decision to give money and arms to selected warlords. "These warlords morphed into corrupt businessmen, drug dealers, and politicians," he said. "It is now hard to get rid of them." Rashid warned of a potentially serious dilemma within the Afghani army, in which "an anti-American sentiment is growing strong." The worries about more troops...

Photo from Reuters A trio of astute McClatchy reporters reported this on Saturday . President Barack Obama is nearing a decision to send more than 30,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan next year, but he may not announce it until after he consults with key allies and completes a trip to Asia later this month, administration and military officials have told McClatchy. And now, CBS news sources are reporting this as true : Now there still needs to be more seen as to whether this is most definitely the finally decision. But the signs aren't very encouraging at all. AT ALL. The decision is to be made after Thanksgiving . The president is not expected to announce his decision until after he returns from China the week before Thanksgiving Will certainly be something if this report from David Martin is totally opposite from the actual final decision. Update :Then again, I'm should always put "If this is true" and "If it's not" whenever you get sourcing f...