My old buddy, The Talking Dog has another in his series of interviews about the travesty of GITMO, this one with a former detainee released in 2004, who was the lead plaintiff in Rasul v Bush. Fascinating reading.
Billmon on the upcoming Rovian Strategery (or how to play the cocktail-weenie press corpse):
To be sure, you know this won't stop the machine from simply making shit up -- kilowatt hours of available electricty conjured out of thin air, paper battalions magically transformed into crack commando units, pins on maps marking pacified villages where insurgents held sway only days before. If there is one thing that any bureaucracy knows how to do, and do well, it's spit out the kind of statistics that can make defeat look like victory, at least for a while.
Look for those talking points to be coming from a major media outlet and any right-wing blog near you very, very soon.
Yeah, I'd have to count Jim Webb's victory in the Virginia primary as a victory of sorts for the netroots community. He was certainly outspent n by Miller, and his best press came from his ability to project what he is: a former Marine Officer, and a leader. In a fair fight, that's a hard image to beat, when you're getting outspent and trashed by "establishment" Democrats the road uphill has to seem longer than a 30 mile forced march with full pack. But he did it.
Miller is a worthy man, and certainly if Webb had not decided to toss his hat into the ring, a man that could have given George Allen a good run for his money. But Allen could have beaten up Miller with all the old republican chestnuts about liberalism ad nauseum, and it might still have worked. I don't know that Allen has that option to play against Webb, although I'm sure he'll try.
Webb's past, and his "conversion" from republican to Democrat make him an interesting paradox in this year's election. I know that the Rovian smear machine will go to any length to dishonor Webb's service in the Marine Corps (how long until they start questioning his service beginning with whether or not he actually graduated from Annapolis), right up through being SECNAV for Reagan (and a really good one, let me add). Webb has some elephant skeletons in his closet, but his willingness to stand up for the people of Virginia against Empty-suit Allen more than makes up for his past, IMHO.
George Allen had to have woken up today with a troublesome feeling. Virginians understand the military, and those who serve. He'll probably wince every time he has to drive by Quantico on his way to work for what will (hopefully) be his last days in the Senate. I don't think that operating from the swift-boat playbook will serve George of the Empty-suit too well in the months ahead. And he certainly can't run on his record of sucking up to that other empty suit who bears his name who has a 29% approval rating and hope for some coattails to ride. But then, this is George Allen, second-dumbest Senator in America we're talking about here so yeah, maybe hope springs eternal in that dim brain of his. You go, boy.
Aww...how cute, those sagging poll numbers (which he never reads) must have driven this trip off to Mess O'Potamia for a (shocker!!) photo-op with the Eye-Racki Gubmint ministers.
All very hush hush, as they didn't want to tip off the bad guys that the worlds biggest living coward and blob of intellectual goo was coming to town.
President Bush assured Iraqis in a surprise visit to Baghdad on Tuesday that the U.S. stands with them and "the future of your country is in your hands."
...
"I've come to not only look you in the eye," Bush told al-Maliki. "I also come to tell you that when America gives its word, it keeps its word."
Someone ought to tell the Iraqi government that whenever Preznit Unfaithful utters those words, the next thing that happens is the big "cut and run", they'll be seeing haul-assery on a scale unprecedented in the human history. Because if past history is any judge, whenever Beloved Leader comes to praise a program, he's really there to toss the first shovel of dirt on it's corpse.
Sorry for the weirdness if you tried to get here earlier today, and couldn't. Apparently some kind of hosting madness. All fixed now (yes, my hosting company is very good) sometimes strange things happen with computers, right?
