Blue Spot

CNN Political Ticker: All politics, all the time Blog Archive - Gates expected to stay on as Obama’s defense secretary « - Blogs from CNN.com

CHICAGO (CNN) – Several officials close to President-elect Barack Obama's transition told CNN on Tuesday that Defense Secretary Robert Gates is expected to stay on the job for at least the first year of the new administration, with one source calling it "all but a done deal" that the official nomination could be announced as early as next week.

"It's now pointing in that direction," one of the sources close to the transition said of Gates being part of Obama's national security team, which many say also is likely to include Sen. Hillary Clinton as secretary of state.

"It's likely to happen," a second source close to the transition said of Gates staying on. This source noted that Gates could stay longer than a year if he and Obama end up working well together.

Sources close to the transition have said Obama is interested in some continuity at the Pentagon because he is entering office having to deal with two wars — in Iraq and Afghanistan — as well as the international financial crisis.

The president-elect also has made no secret of his interest in having divergent views within his Cabinet.

Labels: Afghanistan, Foreign Policy, Iraq War, Robert Gates, The Pentagon

Democracy Now! | Ex-CIA Officials Tied to Rendition Program and Faulty Iraq Intel Tapped to Head Obama's Intelligence Transition Team

...questions are already being raised about the people heading Obama’s transition efforts on intelligence policy. John Brennan and Jami Miscik, both former intelligence officials under George Tenet, are leading the review of intelligence agencies and helping make recommendations to the new administration. Brennan has supported warrantless wiretapping and extraordinary rendition, and Miscik was involved with the politicized intelligence alleging weapons of mass destruction in the lead-up to the war on Iraq.

MELVIN GOODMAN: OK. John Brennan was deputy executive secretary to George Tenet during the worst violations during the CIA period in the run-up to the Iraq war, so he sat there at Tenet’s knee when they passed judgment on torture and abuse, on extraordinary renditions, on black sites, on secret prisons. He was part of all of that decision making.

Jami Miscik was the Deputy Director for Intelligence during the run-up to the Iraq war. So she went along with the phony intelligence estimate of October 2002, the phony white paper that was prepared by Paul Pillar in October 2002. She helped with the drafting of the speech that Colin Powell gave to the United Nations—[inaudible] 2003, which made the phony case for war to the international community.

So, when George Tenet said, "slam dunk, we can provide all the intelligence you need,” [inaudible] to the President in December of 2002, it was people like Jami Miscik and John Brennan who were part of the team who provided that phony intelligence. So what I think people at the CIA are worried about—and I’ve talked to many of them over the weekend—is that there will never be any accountability for these violations and some of the unconscionable acts committed at the CIA, which essentially amount to war crimes, when you’re talking about torture and abuse and secret prisons. So, where are we, in terms of change? This sounds like more continuity.

Labels: Afghanistan, anti-war movement, Congress, FISA, Foreign Policy, Gitmo, Impeachment, Intelligence, Iran, Iraq War, Liberals, Obama administration, Obama critics, Pakistan, Rahm Emanuel, WMD

CNN Political Ticker: All politics, all the time Blog Archive - Trump: I wanted Bush impeached « - Blogs from CNN.com

(CNN) – Business mogul Donald Trump told CNN Wednesday House Speaker Nancy Pelosi should have sought to impeach President Bush when she had the chance.

In an interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, Trump said the president and his administration deliberately lied about the Iraq war, and congressional Democrats missed an opportunity to impeach him when the party took control of Congress in 2006.

"I was surprised that she didn't do more in terms of Bush and going after Bush," Trump said. "It was almost — it just seemed like she was going to really look to impeach Bush and get him out of office, which personally I think would have been a wonderful thing."

Pressed why he feels Bush deserved the punishment faced by only two other commanders-in-chief, Trump said the president misled the country in the run-up to the Iraq war, and that his actions were considerably more objectionable than those which led to the impeachment of former President Bill Clinton.

"He lied. He got us into the war with lies," Trump said. And I mean — look at the trouble Bill Clinton got into with something that was totally unimportant. And they tried to impeach him, which was nonsense. And yet Bush got us into this horrible war with lies, by lying, by saying they had weapons of mass destruction, by saying all sorts of things that turned out not to be true."

In the wide-ranging interview set to air on CNN's The Situation Room at 4, 5, and 6 p.m. Wednesday, Trump also praised John McCain and said the Arizona senator still has a chance to win the White House despite recent polls showing he is substantially trailing Barack Obama.

Labels: Impeachment, Iraq War, WMD

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said Thursday that Republicans at their national convention are attacking him to avoid talking about the sagging economy and housing problems that voters care about.

Labels: Conservatism, Economy, Education, General Election 2008, Healthcare, Iraq War, Obama

The man who took a "courageous" stance on the Iraq War is now being criticized by the Left-wing of the party for shifting to the middle on the subject.

Labels: Iraq War, Obama critics

Democracy Now! | The Way of the World: Ron Suskind on How the Bush Admin Deliberately Faked an Iraq-al-Qaeda Connection and Undermined Diplomacy, Democracy in Pakistan and Iran

The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Judiciary Committee say they will review allegations the White House ordered the CIA to forge and disseminate false intelligence documents linking al-Qaeda and Iraq. The revelation is among several in Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ron Suskind’s explosive new book, The Way of the World: A Story of Truth and Hope in an Age of Extremism. Suskind joins us for the hour to talk about the letter controversy and the thin denials that have followed its disclosure. He also reveals details of his lengthy conversations with the late Pakistani politician Benazir Bhutto and her frustrations with the Bush administration in the months before her assassination, and discloses the previously unknown case of an interrogation “cell” beneath the White House.

Labels: Intelligence, Iraq War, Terrorism, WMD

"Only On The Web": In an exclusive "CBS Evening News" interview, Katie Couric speaks with Barack Obama about his foreign policy objectives and his position on the war in Iraq.

Labels: Iraq War, Obama

Obama website's opposition to successful surge gets deleted | Top of the Ticket | Los Angeles Times

A funny thing happened over on the Barack Obama campaign website in the last few days.

The parts that stressed his opposition to the 2007 troop surge and his statement that more troops would make no difference in a civil war have somehow disappeared. John McCain and Obama have been going at it heavily in recent days over the benefits of the surge.

The Arizona senator, who advocated the surge for years before the Bush administration employed it, says the resulting reduction in violence is proof it worked with progress on 15 of 18 political benchmarks and Obama's plan to withdraw troops by now would have resulted in surrender.

When President Bush ordered the surge in January, 2007, Obama said, "I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse," a position he maintained throughout 2007. This year he acknowledged progress, but maintained his position that political progress was lacking.

Tuesday, while Obama gave a speech on foreign policy, the New York Daily News was first to notice the removal of parts of Obama's campaign site listing the Iraq troop surge as part of "The Problem." An Obama spokeswoman said it was just part of an "update" to "reflect changes in current events," as our colleague Frank James notes in the Swamp. The update includes a new section on the rise of al-Qaeda violence in Afghanistan.

But some might see the updating as part of Obama's skip to the political center now that he's secured the Democratic nomination. "Today," McCain said Tuesday, "we know Sen. Obama was wrong" to oppose the troop surge.

An old quote of Obama's criticizing the "rash war," which helped him with the left wing of his party and helped differentiate his stand from that of Sen. Hillary Clinton, a primary opponent who voted for the use of force in Iraq, has been replaced on his site by one saying that ending the Iraq war will make America safer. That's more of a general election message.

Labels: Iraq War, McCain, Obama, Surge strategy, Troops

Obama takes show onto global stage | csmonitor.com

Washington - Barack Obama is about to embark on high-profile foreign travel that could have a powerful influence on how US voters judge his ability to act as the nation's commander in chief.

The question is, what sort of presumptive Democratic candidate will his domestic audience see? Will it be someone reminiscent of John F. Kennedy – cool, articulate, and the center of cheering foreign crowds?

Or will it be a traveler more like candidate Jimmy Carter – an inexperienced, provincial politician on a learning tour?

For the Illinois senator, the inherent risks in his travel are intensified by the fact that he will visit the Middle East, a place where, for American politicians, every word counts and the smallest misstep can become a huge gaffe.

"For Obama this trip is essential," says Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. "If anything trips him up, other than race, it is going to be his lack of foreign experience."

Next week, Senator Obama is scheduled to travel to Europe, Israel, and the West Bank. Many details of the trip have been kept secret for security reasons, but he is expected to meet with both Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. In Berlin, he will deliver what his aides are billing as a major address on transatlantic relations.

He is also planning to soon take a separate trip to Iraq and Afghanistan as part of a small congressional delegation.

On July 15, Obama reiterated his vow to withdraw US combat troops from Iraq within 16months of becoming president, and said that if he were elected, Al Qaeda and Afghanistan would be his top foreign-policy priorities.

"By any measure, our single-minded and open-ended focus on Iraq is not a sound strategy for keeping America safe," said Obama in a speech at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Washington.

Labels: Afghanistan, Europe, Foreign Policy, Iraq War, Israel, Obama, World news

Iraq insists on U.S. withdrawal timetable: official | Special Coverage | Reuters

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq will not accept any security agreement with the United States unless it includes dates for the withdrawal of foreign forces, the government's national security adviser said on Tuesday.

The comments by Mowaffaq al-Rubaie underscore the U.S.-backed government's hardening stance toward a deal with Washington that will provide a legal basis for U.S. troops to operate when a U.N. mandate expires at the end of the year.

On Monday, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki appeared to catch Washington off-guard by suggesting for the first time that a timetable be set for the departure of U.S. forces under the deal being negotiated, which he called a memorandum of understanding.

Rubaie said Iraq was waiting "impatiently for the day when the last foreign soldier leaves Iraq". Click here to read full Reuters article

Labels: Iraq War, Iraqi government, World news

After putting up with Rachel Maddow tag teaming with Eugene Robinson and Olbermann to fawn over Obama for over a year, it gives me great pleasure to see her get beat up by three conservatives here. I only hope there's more to come, but I only know from clips like these since I don't watch the network any longer.

Labels: Iraq War, Media bias, Obama

Sen. Obama holds a press conference from North Dakota to clarify his Iraq policy and his "refine" quote from earlier in the day. Politico's Roger Simon and the Chicago Tribune's Jim Warren discuss Obama's statement on Hardball.

Again, I think this is part of Obama's turn to the Right, or at least the middle. These little curves he's taking on this road can begin to take a toll on his image. It shouldn't take long for the term "wishy-washy" or "flip-flopper" comes into play again, like it did against Kerry in 2004.

Labels: Iraq War

"We have lost over 900 dead Americans since the surge. Now if you want to dismiss that as 'success' that would be your interpretation."

Labels: Hagel, Iraq War, McCain, Surge strategy

The Honorable Judge Radhi Hamza al-Radhi in front of the Senate Appropriations Committee on March 11, discusses waste, fraud and corruption.

Labels: corruption, Iraq War, Iraqi government

From americanprogress.org/issues/security/iraq

...But other military leaders who are looking at the larger national security picture need to be consulted. They know well how maintaining an average of 130,000 troops in Iraq over the last five years has not only decimated our ground forces, it also has compromised our security interests around the globe.

"The Army is out of balance," Army Chief of Staff Gen. George W. Casey Jr. told the House Armed Services Committee last fall. That's a polite way of saying it's broken. Casey, who is responsible for the Army's overall health, is rightfully concerned.

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Navy Adm. Michael G. Mullen, echoed Casey's unease. In January, Mullen told the Marine Corps Times that there was reserve capacity in the Navy and Air Force but that ground troops were a different story. "Clearly, if we had to do something with our ground forces, a significant substitute would be a big challenge," he said. Mullen's predecessor, Marine Gen. Peter Pace, also has expressed his discomfort with our ability to respond to other crises. Before leaving his post last October, Pace, stated that the troop commitment to Iraq would "make a large difference in our ability to be prepared for unforeseen contingencies" in the region and elsewhere.

Labels: corruption, Iraq War, Military secrets, Oil, Senate, Troops

The Associated Press: Howard Defeated in Election

SYDNEY, Australia (AP) — Conservative Prime Minister John Howard, one of the Bush administration's staunchest allies, suffered a humiliating election defeat Saturday at the hands of an opposition leader who has vowed to pull troops out of Iraq.

Labor leader Kevin Rudd, a Chinese-speaking former diplomat, has also promised to sign the Kyoto Protocol on capping greenhouse gas emissions, leaving the U.S. as the only industrialized country not to have joined it.

Rudd, speaking Sunday in the northeastern city of Brisbane at his first news conference as incoming prime minister, promised "action, and action now" on climate change. Rudd said Labor lawmakers were due to meet on Thursday, and he hoped that he and his ministers would be sworn in soon after that.

Rudd said he planned to visit Washington next year, and that atop the agenda would be his plan to pull Australia's 550 combat troops out of Iraq. Howard had rejected withdrawal plans for Australia's troops in Iraq, and refused to ratify the pact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Labels: Climate change, Iraq War, World news

Senate approves $150 billion for wars - Politics - MSNBC.com

WASHINGTON - Thwarted in efforts to bring troops home from Iraq, Senate Democrats on Monday helped pass a defense policy bill authorizing another $150 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The 92-3 vote comes as the House planned to approve separate legislation Tuesday that requires President Bush to give Congress a plan for eventual troop withdrawals.

The developments underscored the difficulty facing Democrats in the Iraq debate: They lack the votes to pass legislation ordering troops home and are divided on whether to cut money for combat, despite a mandate by supporters to end the war.

Labels: Iraq War, Senate

Democratic candidate for NY-13th CD, Steve Harrison speaking to several anti-war organizations assembled earlier this week in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. Harrison is running against the only Republican Congressman in NYC, Vito Fossella who is ranked 365th in the nation, with only three congress persons with a lower rank in NY State according to Congress.org.

Labels: Election 2008, Fossella, Iraq War, Steve Harrison

On The Bill Moyers Journal, troops on the ground contradict White House rhetoric regarding success.

Labels: Iraq War, Troops

A look back at Sen. Byrd arguing against the Iraq War resolution.

Labels: Iraq War, Senate

A Thin Green Line Outside Baghdad - Yahoo! News

The dusty farming communities southeast of Baghdad have become a key front in U.S. efforts to pacify the Iraqi capital. As militants search for sanctuaries from which they can stage attacks in the city, American troops are looking for ways to block an elusive enemy. As tens of thousands of additional American soldiers began patrolling Baghdad this summer, Madain, to the southeast of the capital, was an obvious fallback position for Sunni and Shi'ite militants. Until this spring, the U.S. presence there had consisted of only a couple of companies that patrolled in Humvees, but a brigade was assigned to the area in anticipation of a rise in insurgent and militia activity in response to the surge.

"This whole place used to be sanctuary," says Col. Wayne Grigsby, commander of U.S. forces in the area. Now several thousand Americans are spread across several combat outposts, and they patrol Madain for hours each day. Grigsby's men are confronting enemies whose diversity and ingenuity reflect the variety of armed groups that have proliferated in Baghdad since 2003. Their main focus, says Grigsby, is preventing militants and their weapons from entering the capital.

Labels: Intelligence, Iraq War

wcbstv.com - Army Sgt. Becomes First Vet To Receive Bionic Hand

(CBS) NEW YORK Retired U.S. Army Sergeant Juan Arredondo still remembers the devastating sight of his severed left hand still gripping the steering wheel of the vehicle he was driving in Iraq after an IED suddenly exploded through the door.

Little would he know that that devastation would turn into a miracle.

Arredondo, 27, lost his hand on February 28, 2005. Just over two years later he's become one of the first recipients of the world's first bionic hand, called the "i-Limb."

Labels: Healthcare, Iraq War

U.S. and Iran to discuss Iraq only - Yahoo! News

BAGHDAD - The United States said ambassador-level talks with Iran in Baghdad on Tuesday will focus solely on the situation in Iraq despite rising tensions over American-Iranians detained by Tehran and Iranians held in U.S. custody in Iraq.

"This is an opportunity for direct engagement on issues solely related to Iraq," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters in Washington on Monday. "We are going to raise the need for Iran to match its actions with its words in seeking strategic stability in Iraq."

McCormack said Iran has not taken any steps to help bring about a stable Iraq, a goal he said Iran professes to share with the United States.

"We'll see, if, as a result of these engagements, they will change their behavior."

Labels: Iran, Iraq War

Olbermann: Go to Iraq and fight, Mr. President - Countdown with Keith Olbermann - MSNBC.com

Sen. Clinton has been sent — and someone has leaked to The Associated Press — a letter, sent in reply to hers asking if there exists an actual plan for evacuating U.S. troops from Iraq.

This extraordinary document was written by an undersecretary of defense named Eric Edelman.

“Premature and public discussion of the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq,” Edelman writes, “reinforces enemy propaganda that the United States will abandon its allies in Iraq, much as we are perceived to have done in Vietnam, Lebanon and Somalia.”

Edelman adds: “Such talk understandably unnerves the very same Iraqi allies we are asking to assume enormous personal risks.”

A spokesman for the senator says Mr. Edelman’s remarks are “at once both outrageous and dangerous.” Those terms are entirely appropriate and may, in fact, understate the risk the Edelman letter poses to our way of life and all that our fighting men and women are risking, have risked, and have lost, in Iraq.

Labels: Hillary, Iraq War

Today's Progress Report

Today, the Senate debates a bipartisan amendment to the fiscal 2008 defense authorization bill offered by Sens. Carl Levin (D-MI) and Jack Reed (D-RI), which would "require the president to begin reducing the number of American troops in Iraq within four months and to transition the mission of our remaining military forces there to force protection, training of Iraqi Security Forces, and counter-terrorism missions." Currently, the President's "New Way Forward" in Iraq -- the so-called "surge" -- is six months old and has only inflamed Iraq's anarchic civil war. Casualties among U.S. forces have surged, political progress in Iraq has halted, popular support for the war has tanked, and conservative members of Congress are defecting from Bush's failed policies in record numbers. The Levin-Reed amendment provides the long-overdue start of a redeployment and real "strategic reset" of our presence in the Middle East.

Labels: Iraq War, Senate

U.S. troops kill 6 Iraqi police - Conflict in Iraq - MSNBC.com

BAGHDAD - U.S. troops battled Iraqi police suspected of links to Iranian-backed Shiite militiamen, killing six in a rare firefight between American soldiers and their Iraqi partners. Friday’s clash underscored the deep infiltration of militants in the country’s security forces.

The battle came a day after the Bush administration acknowledged that the Iraqi government was making “unsatisfactory” progress in its efforts to purge the police force of Shiite militia — among the elusive benchmarks Washington believes are needed to stabilize the country.

Labels: Iraq War

GOP bill seeks narrowed Iraq mission - Politics - MSNBC.com:

WASHINGTON - Two prominent Senate Republicans have drafted legislation that would require President Bush to come up with a plan by mid-October to dramatically narrow the mission of U.S. troops in Iraq.

The legislation, which represents a sharp challenge to Bush, was put forward Friday by Sens. John Warner and Richard Lugar, and it came as the Pentagon acknowledged that a decreasing number of Iraqi army battalions are able to operate independently of U.S. troops.

"Given continuing high levels of violence in Iraq and few manifestations of political compromise among Iraq's factions, the optimal outcome in Iraq of a unified, pluralist, democratic government that is able to police itself, protect its borders, and achieve economic development is not likely to be achieved in the near future," the Warner-Lugar proposal said.

Labels: Iraq War, Senate

House votes to withdraw troops - Politics - MSNBC.com

WASHINGTON - Iraq has achieved only spotty military and political progress toward a democratic society, the Bush administration conceded Thursday, an unenthusiastic assessment followed quickly by a House vote to withdraw U.S. troops by spring.

The measure passed 223-201 in the Democratic-controlled House despite a veto threat from President Bush, who has ruled out any change in war policy before September.

“The security situation in Iraq remains complex and extremely challenging,” the administration report concluded. The economic picture is uneven, it added, and the government has not yet enacted vital political reconciliation legislation.

Labels: Congress, Iraq War

Michael Moore fires back at Wolf Blitzer after CNN aired an attack piece on Moore's new movie, "Sicko." Moore did a great job of reminding Wolf of what a poor job was done by his network and the rest of the MSM of holding the administration accountable for their WMD claims before the war. BTW, what you don't see at the end is Lou Dobbs putting his two cents in as usual comparing Moore to Hugo Chavez.

Labels: Healthcare, Iraq War, Media, Michael Moore

Official: Iraq gov't misses all targets - Yahoo! News

WASHINGTON - A progress report on Iraq will conclude that the U.S.-backed government in Baghdad has not met any of its targets for political, economic and other reform, speeding up the Bush administration's reckoning on what to do next, a U.S. official said Monday.

One likely result of the report will be a vastly accelerated debate among President Bush's top aides on withdrawing troops and scaling back the U.S. presence in Iraq.

The "pivot point" for addressing the matter will no longer be Sept. 15, as initially envisioned, when a full report on Bush's so-called "surge" plan is due, but instead will come this week when the interim mid-July assessment is released, the official said.

"The facts are not in question," the official told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because the draft is still under discussion. "The real question is how the White House proceeds with a post-surge strategy in light of the report."

The report, required by law, is expected to be delivered to Capitol Hill by Thursday or Friday, as the Senate takes up a $649 billion defense policy bill and votes on a Democratic amendment ordering troop withdrawals to begin in 120 days.

Labels: Iraq War, Iraqi government

A look back at the pre-war media that enabled the administration to go to war.

Labels: Fox propaganda, GOP Hypocrisy, Iraq War, Media

For those who constantly say they don't here the good news coming out of Iraq, Lara Logan reports on US & Iraqi troops that rescued starving orphans who were being neglected at a government run orphanage for children for special needs.

Labels: Iraq War, Media, Poverty

Still illogical on Iraq

See if you can follow this argument: The United States has to be in Iraq to fight the terrorists who are in Iraq because the United States is in Iraq.

If you do follow that familiar argument, you're going in a circle. It's familiar because President Bush has argued it many times before, trying to make the case that Iraq is the "central front in the war on terror." His circular argument didn't persuade Americans before. But that hasn't stopped him from recycling it now.

Labels: Comment, Iraq War

WP: Memorial Day marks grief's journey - washingtonpost.com Highlights - MSNBC.com

Not a waking hour goes by when Judy Adamouski does not think of the son she lost at war. Some nights, she drifts from room to room in her Springfield home -- sleepless, taking in what is left of his life. A framed photograph of a soldier in uniform. A wedding portrait. A diploma from West Point.

"You miss the voice," she said. "You miss seeing him. It's just hard. All we have is our memories and our pictures."

Her son is not a recent casualty but one of the early deaths of the Iraq war: Army Capt. James F. Adamouski, killed April 2, 2003, in a Black Hawk helicopter crash as U.S. troops made their way toward Baghdad two weeks into combat operations.

Labels: Iraq War

U.S. frees 42 al-Qaida captives in raid - Yahoo! News

BAGHDAD - U.S. forces raided an al-Qaida hide-out northeast of Baghdad on Sunday and freed 42 Iraqis imprisoned inside, including some who had been tortured and suffered broken bones, a senior U.S. military official said Sunday.

The raid was part of a 3-month-old security crackdown that included the deployment of 3,000 more U.S. troops to Diyala, a violent province north of the capital that has seen heavy fighting in recent weeks, said Maj. Gen. William Caldwell, the top U.S. military spokesman in Iraq.

Caldwell said Iraqis told U.S. forces about the hide-out: "The people in Diyala are speaking up against al-Qaida."

He said the 42 freed Iraqis marked the largest number of captives ever found in a single al-Qaida prison. Some of those freed were held for as long as four months and some had injuries from torture and were taken to medical facilities for treatment, he said.

Labels: Iraq War

Report says Iraq problems were expected - Yahoo! News

WASHINGTON - Intelligence analysts predicted, in secret papers circulated within the government before the Iraq invasion, that al-Qaida would see U.S. military action as an opportunity to increase its operations and that Iran would try to shape a post-Saddam Iraq.

The top analysts in government also said that establishing a stable democracy in Iraq would be a "long, difficult and probably turbulent process."

Democrats said the newly declassified documents, part of a Senate Intelligence Committee investigation released Friday, make clear that the Bush administration was warned about the very challenges it now faces as it tries to stabilize Iraq.

Labels: Intelligence, Iraq War, Senate

Clinton, Obama vote 'no' on Senate Iraq bill - Politics - MSNBC.com

WASHINGTON - Courting the anti-war constituency, Democratic presidential rivals Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama both voted against legislation that pays for the Iraq war but lacks a timeline for troop withdrawal.

"I fully support our troops" but the measure "fails to compel the president to give our troops a new strategy in Iraq," said Clinton, a New York senator.

"Enough is enough," Obama, an Illinois senator, declared, adding that President Bush should not get "a blank check to continue down this same, disastrous path."

Labels: Election 2008, Hillary, Iraq War, Obama, Senate

Bush selects ‘war czar,’ officials say - Politics - MSNBC.com

WASHINGTON - President Bush has chosen Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute, the Pentagon's director of operations, to oversee the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan as a "war czar" after a long search for new leadership, administration officials said Tuesday.

Labels: Bush appointments, Iraq War

Here's the spin-master at it again on the Charlie Rose Show. Check out the end: so now de-Baathification wasn't Bremer's doing? it was the Iraqi's? I suspect that if there was an Iraqi behind this policy it was probably Chalabi who was the American backed darling at the time. Also, notice how she totally ducked the Tenet accusation.

Labels: GOP Hypocrisy, Iraq War, Rice

Bill Moyers on how the media enabled the Bush administration's case for war.

Labels: 9-11, Dissent, Fox propaganda, Iraq War, Journalists, Media

Tenet: "Slam Dunk" Comment Misused, Ex-CIA Director Explains Phrase He Says Bush Administration Has Dishonorably Clung To - CBS News

(CBS) Ex-CIA Director George Tenet says the way the Bush administration has used his now famous "slam dunk" comment — which he admits saying in reference to making the public case for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq — is both disingenuous and dishonorable.

It also ruined his reputation and his career, he tells 60 Minutes Scott Pelley in his first network television interview. Pelley's report will be broadcast Sunday, April 29, at 7 p.m. ET/PT.

Labels: GOP Hypocrisy, Intelligence, Iraq War

Senate OKs bill with Iraq deadline - Politics - MSNBC.com

WASHINGTON - A defiant Democratic-controlled Senate passed legislation Thursday that would require the start of troop withdrawals from Iraq by Oct. 1, propelling Congress toward a historic veto showdown with President Bush on the war.

The 51-46 vote was largely along party lines, and like House passage of the same bill a day earlier, fell far short of the two-thirds margin needed to overturn the president’s threatened veto. Nevertheless, the legislation is the first binding challenge on the war that Democrats have managed to send to Bush since they reclaimed control of both houses of Congress in January.

“The president has failed in his mission to bring peace and stability to the people of Iraq,” said Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.V., chairman of the Appropriations Committee. He later added: “It’s time to bring our troops home from Iraq.”

Labels: Iraq War, Senate

House panel approves subpoena for Rice - Politics - MSNBC.com

In rapid succession, congressional committees Wednesday ramped up their investigations of the Bush administration by approving a subpoena for Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and granting immunity to a key aide to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

By 21-10, the House oversight committee voted to issue a subpoena to Rice to compel her story on the Bush administration's claim, now discredited, that Iraq was seeking uranium from Africa.

Moments earlier in the committee chamber next door, the House Judiciary Committee voted 32-6 to grant immunity to Monica Goodling, Gonzales' White House liaison, for her testimony on why the administration fired eight federal prosecutors. The panel also unanimously approved — but did not issue — a subpoena to compel her to appear.

Labels: Iraq War, Rice, US Attorney scandal

Discussion about Iraq and Iran

Labels: Election 2008, Iraq War, Oil

Senate backs March '08 pullout - Politics - MSNBC.com

WASHINGTON - Defying a veto threat, the Democratic-controlled Senate narrowly signaled support Tuesday for the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraq by next March.

Republican attempts to scuttle the non-binding timeline failed on a vote of 50-48, largely along party lines. The roll call marked the Senate’s most forceful challenge to date of the administration’s handling of a war that has claimed the lives of more than 3,200 U.S. troops.

Three months after Democrats took power in Congress, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said the moment was at hand to “send a message to President Bush that the time has come to find a new way forward in this intractable war.”

Labels: Iraq War, Senate

House OKs Timetable for Troops in Iraq - washingtonpost.com

The House of Representatives today passed a $124 billion emergency spending bill that sets binding benchmarks for progress in Iraq, establishes tough readiness standards for deploying U.S. troops abroad and requires the withdrawal of American combat forces from Iraq by the end of August 2008.

The bill promptly drew a veto threat from President Bush.

After four hours of floor debate yesterday and today, the House approved the bill by a vote of 218 to 212. One lawmaker voted present and three did not vote.

Labels: Iraq War

Democrats seek 2008 Iraq troop withdrawal - Yahoo! News

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic leaders in the U.S. Congress on Thursday proposed withdrawing all American combat troops from Iraq by mid-2008, saying President George W. Bush's war strategy had failed and that the United States must instead focus on a brewing storm in Afghanistan.

The proposal put Democrats, who took control of Congress in January, on a collision course with Bush, who does not want lawmakers meddling in how he wages a 4-year-old war that has seen escalating violence in Iraq and waning support at home.

"Our troops are out by no later than August of 2008" under the legislation, House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters. That deadline is just three months before presidential elections.

In the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid unveiled a proposal to begin withdrawing soldiers from Iraq within four months and it sets a goal of pulling all combat troops out by March 31, 2008.

Labels: Iraq War

Democracy Now! | Gen. Wesley Clark Weighs Presidential Bid: "I Think About It Everyday" AMY GOODMAN: Do you see a replay in what happened in the lead-up to the war with Iraq -- the allegations of the weapons of mass destruction, the media leaping onto the bandwagon?

GEN. WESLEY CLARK: Well, in a way. But, you know, history doesn’t repeat itself exactly twice. What I did warn about when I testified in front of Congress in 2002, I said if you want to worry about a state, it shouldn’t be Iraq, it should be Iran. But this government, our administration, wanted to worry about Iraq, not Iran.

I knew why, because I had been through the Pentagon right after 9/11. About ten days after 9/11, I went through the Pentagon and I saw Secretary Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz. I went downstairs just to say hello to some of the people on the Joint Staff who used to work for me, and one of the generals called me in. He said, “Sir, you’ve got to come in and talk to me a second.” I said, “Well, you’re too busy.” He said, “No, no.” He says, “We’ve made the decision we’re going to war with Iraq.” This was on or about the 20th of September. I said, “We’re going to war with Iraq? Why?” He said, “I don’t know.” He said, “I guess they don’t know what else to do.” So I said, “Well, did they find some information connecting Saddam to al-Qaeda?” He said, “No, no.” He says, “There’s nothing new that way. They just made the decision to go to war with Iraq.” He said, “I guess it’s like we don’t know what to do about terrorists, but we’ve got a good military and we can take down governments.” And he said, “I guess if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem has to look like a nail.”

So I came back to see him a few weeks later, and by that time we were bombing in Afghanistan. I said, “Are we still going to war with Iraq?” And he said, “Oh, it’s worse than that.” He reached over on his desk. He picked up a piece of paper. And he said, “I just got this down from upstairs” -- meaning the Secretary of Defense’s office -- “today.” And he said, “This is a memo that describes how we’re going to take out seven countries in five years, starting with Iraq, and then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and, finishing off, Iran.” I said, “Is it classified?” He said, “Yes, sir.” I said, “Well, don’t show it to me.” And I saw him a year or so ago, and I said, “You remember that?” He said, “Sir, I didn’t show you that memo! I didn’t show it to you!”

Labels: Iraq War, Wesley Clark