On CNN this morning Barbara Starr has been reporting that EVEN IF THERE IS NO EVIDENCE her sources are suggesting Iran may have been DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY involved in the Trojan horse attack which led to 5 American deaths.

I suggest EVEN IF THERE IS NO EVIDENCE supporting it that the Bush adminstration has been DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY involved in spreading this rumor, in banging the drum for war in Iran. Shoddy journalism like this led us into Iraq; we cannot afford a rerun with Iran.  So I suggest this....

On MSNBC yesterday afternoon Col. Jack Jacobs advanced an intriguing possibility.  He noted that General Patraeus in confirmation hearings said he would need 120,000+ troops to carry out an effective anti-insurgency and that Patraeus was willing to take over with less than that number.  Could it be that the General did not make a big deal about the numbers since the real goal of the surge is to provide cover for a withdrawl and that General Patraeus would be the man to preside over redeployment?  

Politically the Republic Party (If GWB can remove the last two letter of the Democratic Party name's, so can I with the GOP.) would get a boost just before the 2008 election as troops returned.  And they could blame the hapless Iraqis for the failure to secure Bagdad.

This morning CNN said the new US policy with regard to Iranian operatives in Iraq was "shoot to kill".  It replaced "catch and release".  I am puzzled by this.  

In a gun battle how does one identify Iranians?  Do they wear a sign?  Doesn't one shoot to kill under such circumstances anyway?  And if an  Iranian is found in a non-violent situation, like walking down the street, or in a raid where the persons captured were not engaged in violence at the time, is it our intention to shoot them in cold blood on the spot?  Guantanamo isn't bad enough?  We now "shoot to kill" in non-violent situations?  Someone please explain.

The Current Occupant still doesn't get it.  More troops are not the answer; they are, in fact, part of the problem.  Despite our good intentions, we are considered the enemy.  People don't like people who invade and occupy their country.  And when we intervene in a civil war we don't understand, speaking a language they don't understand, it is not surprising we become targets.

There is something strange about expecting violence to bring peace.  Think about northern Ireland.  After decades of violence, the way to peace was through dialog, discussion, and power sharing.

This latest round of hot air about Kerry's clumsy wording of an insult to the President tells me two things.  First, if you're going to insult the President, it would be wise to be precise and direct.  Second, when the GOP seized on clumsy phrasing, converted it to some other thought, and blew it out of proportion, it provided us another example of masterful spin and distorted reality.

Nobody spins better than Karl and George. Nobody. Was Bush's indignation honest?  No. It was pure political manipulation.  It was typical GOP campaign tactics.  And it was one more time George publicly denied reality.

They're talking about our out-of-whack tax system in Kansas.  David Cay Johnston, a Pulitzer Prize winner, will be speaking at the University of Kansas Union in Lawrence, KS on Sunday, October 8th at 6PM.  His appearance is sponsored by the KU School of Business Accounting and Information Systems Department and is open to the public.

Cay's 2003 book title sounds like it came off our recommended diaries list.  "Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich - and Cheat Everybody Else".

Trent Lott has trouble figuring out how the Sunnis and Shia tell one another apart.  Let me help him figure it out.  

Trent, it's a tribal thing where the group to which you belong has a culture and climate all its own.  You share values, experiences, and beliefs.  You protect your own at the expense of the common good of those outside your power base.  You accummulate power so you can promote the good of the members of your group.  It's like the GOP.  When you walk down the halls of Congress you know who is with you and who is against you...except maybe for Lieberman who is on the fringe.

   I am continually amazed at the hubris of the American public.  Those who invoke the "fight them there" plan of action top the list of chuzpah champs.  Nevermind that the NIE says "fighting them there" only creates more terrorists.  Nevermind that Iraq was not the right "there" since its repressive dictator wasn't about to let some religious fanatics take over.  Nevermind.  All that reasoning comes from our side of the ocean.

   Put yourself in the place of an Iraqi.  71% want us to leave within the next year.  37% within six months.  Why?  Because the US is "fighting them there" and "there" happens to be Iraqi's cities, towns, and villages.  Even with our best intentions, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died; they look out their windows to a war zone.  

I am not happy with the lack of zest on the part of Democratic politicians when faced with the torture issue.  We know it's wrong to torture.  We know what the President wants is torture...although he calls it by some euphamism.  We know that the Geneva Convention has helped regulate difficult prisoner of war situations in time of war.  Why doesn't some Democratic politician or Democratic talking head put all this together in an attack format?  

It is not enough to go through the logic and ethics of the situation.  It sounds milquetoast when compared to the combative words of the President.  The public wants some stand up, take charge rhetoric to accompany the logic and ethics.

I have been unsuccessfully searching for an email address for Thomas Kean, the co-chairman of the 9/11 Commission.  I have a few words for Mr. Kean and since I am unable to communicate directly with the man, I am writing a public letter.

To quote a Keith Olbermann quote on a McCarthy era quote: "Sir, have you no shame?"  Have you sold out by placing your party, your son's party, over the short and long term welfare of the nation?  Or are you just foolish enough to think this docudrama is pure entertainment that will revive interest in the Commission's recommendations?

I have strong feelings about The Path to 9/11 and I have submitted two comments to: http://blogs.abc.com/...

Neither has been published.  It makes me wonder just how many comments are not seeing the light of day.  We can figure out a partial answer to this question with the following poll.

Imagery tells a story.  If we use the wrong images, we come up with a wrong story.  

The Bush administration has been promoting this "war on terrorism" behaving as if terrorism itself were a state which attacked America.  That is an incorrect analogy.  A small fanatical group attacked America.  Many in the group came from Saudi Arabia.  All were connected to and motivated by Osama Bin Laden who lived and worked in Afghanistan/Pakistan.

People in the beltway need to realize that they undermine Ned Lamont at their own peril.  If Lieberman and his friends, Cheney, Rove, and Bush, are successful in creating the perception that a candidate who reasonably and rationally evaluates the war in Iraq is not mainstream, the Democrats across the nation will suffer.  They will be tagged similarly in the popular perception wars.

It's not good enough anymore for candidates to be right about issues.  They have to convey the perception they are right to the electorate.  And it's the perception battle in Connecticut that will impact on elections across the nation.

Today's Cal Thomas column, "Taliban Wing Has Captured Democratic Party", is filled with hateful namecalling and specious reasoning.  The column tries to pin the anti-Semite label on the bloggers supporting Lamont.  I find the whole diatribe to be Ann-Coulter-like and I would  be inclined dismiss it as the garbage it is, except for the fact that under all the nastiness is an issue of which we should be aware.

Thomas selects quotes from individual bloggers on  Dailykos and Huffingtonpost and extrapolates them into the consensus position of the blog.  Lanny Davis did this too in interviews leading up to the primary.  Neither acknowledges the complexity, diversity, and open exchange one finds on such sites.

I knew the Kerry campaign was in trouble when I saw the ad of Bush hugging a young girl, a family member of a 9/11 victim.  I waited for a Democratic counter ad that would effectively depict Kerry as a caring compassionate person.  It never came.

When the GOP was pushing privatization of Social Security, the ad in which a house was destroyed, rather than the sink, clarified the Republican approach more than words alone could.

  At a dinner party yesterday I listened to a fellow guest describe his seven week visit to China.  As an academic he had connections with local former students: he traveled widely in the provincial areas.  He kept referring to economic growth in areas we would consider similar to Mississippi as mindboggling. Other tidbits: Cell phones everywhere are changing society. He described an electric bus experiment where the vehicle is recharged on route at passenger stops.  He told us that when a friend picked up a dinner tab with a charge card, the phone rang a couple of minutes later; it was the bank confirming the validity of the charge.  
  But the item that stood out was in regard to the area in which factories that feed Walmart are located. Some factories are being phased out because Walmart is now using cheaper labor in Vietnam. That makes Vietnam, China's "China".

   My dad, bless his soul, used the phrase "You talk like a sausage!" when he wanted to indicate that he thought what you said was stupid.  Coincidentally, my husband's father used the same phrase.  My husband and I grew up in the Chicago area 50 miles apart and didn't meet until college.  Neither of us has been able to figure out the context or derivation of this picturesque comment.  Our best guess is that it relates to the unidentifiable hash of ingredients that go into making a sausage. Has anyone else out there heard the expression?
   "You talk like a sausage!" comes to mind so often when I read the news.  Take the poll to determine the week's most stupid comments.  Or suggest other idiocies you have noticed.

Just watched a CNN clip, with Ed Henry commenting, of luncheon at the G-8 Summit.  Memo to all politicians:  Don't let them photograph you when you're eating; it isn't pretty.  Back to the clip.  Most of it was hard to understand, but you did hear President Bush complaining to Tony Blair that the UN (not specifically named in words, but identified in context) should do more to stop the Syrian involvement "shit".

My first reaction was "Now he wants the UN involved?!" I can't decide if it would be better for the US to take a more active diplomatic role in this war or if our Decider would muck that up too, just has he has Iraq.