skippy the bush kangaroo

...at a private reception held at the white house with newly elected lawmakers shortly after the election, bush asked webb how his son, a marine lance corporal serving in iraq, was doing.

webb responded that he really wanted to see his son brought back home, said a person who heard about the exchange from webb.

"i didn't ask you that, i asked how he's doing," bush retorted according to the source...

While in Vietnam recently, aWol claimed if the United States had stayed in Vietnam, the war would not have been lost.

Many have commented on how it showed Bush didn't learn the lessons from the Vietnam conflict.

But neither has the media nor those arguing against pulling out of Iraq really learned from Vietnam.
The media points to the failure of Vietnamization as a reason against withdrawal. Here's one example in the San Francisco Chronicle:

Comparisons to Vietnam and terms from that era like "quagmire," "hearts and minds" and "body counts" swamped the media the moment the invasion of Iraq began in March 2003, but Vietnamization didn't make it into the mix until November. Then, the White House, which initially shied off anything linked to Vietnam, started a media campaign to roll out what it was calling "Iraqification," perhaps as an answer to critics who doubted the "mission" had actually been "accomplished" and feared there was no "light at the end of the (Iraqi) tunnel." But the term was quickly dropped. Perhaps it resurrected too many Baby Boomer memories of Vietnamese clinging to the skids of choppers fleeing the fruits of Vietnamization.

It seems, however, that there is no way of keeping failed Washington policies in their graves once the dead of night strikes. I was amazed when, in 2005, in Foreign Affairs magazine, Melvin Laird resurrected a claim that his Vietnamization policy had actually worked and plugged for Iraqification of the war there.

When Gen. George William Casey Jr. -- whose father, a major general, died in Vietnam in July 1970 -- announced in June that the Pentagon might soon begin the first American troop withdrawals from Iraq, I couldn't help wondering where the Iraqi version of that sign might eventually go up. In the desert? On the Iranian or the Syrian border? (The withdrawals were rescinded before even being put into effect in the face of an all-out civil war in Baghdad.)

While Judith Coburn may have witnessed much combat on the ground in Vietnam, she misses the big picture.

When the U.S. began to turn the war over to the South Vietnamese, there were considerable problems, not the least of which involved corruption in the South Vietnamese officer corps.

But the biggest problems from the early Vietnamization came from the fact the South Vietnamese still expected in 1969 and 1970 for the U.S. forces still there to do the fighting for them. Why should they risk their lives when they could get the Americans to do the fighting?

However, and this is a big however, by 1972, the ARVN (South Vietnam's Army) did well in fighting against the North Vietnamese Easter offensive.

The eventual collapse of South Vietnam had as much to do with many causes, both political and diplomatic as much as militarily.

Militarily, the U.S. Army had turned over heavy equipment and a style of fighting requiring a large amount of logistical support and materials to the ARVN. This was equipment built to fight a war against the Soviet Union in the fields of Western Europe, not a guerrilla war in the jungles and paddies of Southeast Asia.

That is not as much an issue in Iraq. The equipment and training being provided by the U.S. military followed the lessons learned in the first Gulf War.

The South Vietnamese also could not maintain the heavy equipment - M-48 tanks damaged in South Vietnam had to be shipped to the U.S. for repairs - because the educational system was not in place to produce enough technical expertise to keep the machinery operating. Iraq has a highly educated and technologically advanced population.

The U.S. also failed by providing so much material support to the South Vietnamese that they failed to adapt once they did not have the U.S. military backing them logistically because the Soviet Union and China continued to provide material support to North Vietnam.

However, the opposing parties - whoever they might be - in Iraq will not have that same advantage. They aren't being backed by other superpowers like the North Vietnamese were in the early 1970s. While a withdrawal of the U.S. military from Iraq might leave a vacuum that will be filled by the regional powers such as Iran on one side, Saudi Arabia on another, neither are going to be willing to spend so heavily to fund a prolonged conflict as President Bush. The surrounding regional powers have too much to spend on domestic programs to fund a war indefinitely which will lead to them pressuring their clients inside Iraq to reach a settlement, much quicker than if the United States stays.

One other lesson to point out from Vietnam that isn't as obvious.

Vietnam had a long history of civil wars and disturbances. It was at the end of a long period of civil war that the French were able to conquer and colonize Vietnam in the 19th century. The Vietnamese are actually made up of numerous people: ethnic Chinese; Montagnards; Polynesians; Khmer; as well as other minority groups. Their divisions were deep. Many of those in the south opposed communism, but fought against the United States because they saw the U.S. military as occupiers, according to the Dirty Little Secrets of the Vietnam War. Occupiers have a way of turning local populations against them, even uniting traditional enemies. That is a lesson that should never be forgotten for any war.

• fort mason became the primary port of embarkation for service members shipping out to the pacific theatre of operations.
• the un charter creating the united nations was drafted and signed in san francisco in 1945
• in 1951, the treaty of san francisco officially ended the war with japan.
• the san francisco median household income, at $57,496 in 2005, is the fifth-highest for any large city in the nation
• the federal government utilizes san francisco as the regional hub for many arms of the federal bureaucracy, including the u.s. court of appeals, the federal reserve bank and the united states mint.
• until decommissioning in the early 1990s, the city had three major military installations - the presidio, treasure island and hunters point - a legacy still reflected in the annual celebration of fleet week.
• foreign governments have located in excess of thirty foreign consulates in san francisco
• san francisco attracts the fifth highest number of foreign tourists of any city in the united states pier 39 near fisherman's wharf is the third-most popular tourist attraction in the nation.
• more than 15 million visitors came to san francisco in 2005, injecting nearly $7.5 billion into the economy
• san francisco also is a top-ten north american destination for conventions and conferences
• the small business commission supports local merchants in an effort to keep a larger share of retail dollars in the local economy.
• small businesses with fewer than ten employees and self-employed firms make up 85 percent of city establishments.
• the san francisco metro area is the fifth largest tv market and the fourth largest radio market in the united states.
• founded in 1855, the jesuit-run university of san francisco is one of the oldest universities established west of the mississippi.
• the ucsf medical center is ranked among the top 10 hospitals in the united states.

last year, a group of sea lions took over a newport beach marina and caused a vintage 50-foot yacht to capsize when they boarded it. and a lifeguard in santa barbara was bitten three times while swimming off el capitan state beach.

in alaska, a huge sea lion jumped onto a fisherman's boat in 2004, knocked him overboard and pulled him underwater; he escaped without serious injury. - ap

the united states warned people to stockpile food, water and medicine in venezuela in case a vote on sunday sparks public disorder as anti-s.s. president hugo chavez seeks reelection.

in a warning to americans living in venezuela, which provides about 12 percent of u.s. oil imports, the u.s. embassy said on tuesday it had no information venezuela would slip into lawlessness.

but it warned on its web site that the measures would be a sensible precaution in a polarized nation where politics often stokes violent street protests and strikes. - reuters

wonder if the u.s. embassy had the same sort of warnings when we....uuagh...i mean "they" managed to unseat (a.k.a. kill) democratically elected president allende in chile.

a federal judge struck down president bush's authority to designate groups as terrorists, saying his post-sept. 11 executive order was unconstitutionally vague, according to a ruling released tuesday. - ap

about $400,000 worth of stolen nuts was recovered sunday night from the two suspects. the edible goods apparently were headed for india, china, canada and other destinations in europe and the united states, police said.

the discovery accounts for part of the estimated $2 million of nut crops reported stolen from the heart of california's farmland during the past year and a half. at least 14 large truckloads of almonds and walnuts have gone missing. - sfgate

For two women, so much comes down to this: a fragment of bone and the lick of a love letter.

Military scientists recently compared the bone recovered in a North Vietnamese jungle where an Air Force pilot's plane went down 40 years ago to saliva on letters he had sent his wife. It was a DNA match, they announced. At last, they said, the remains of Col. Charles J. Scharf had been found.
What they couldn't have known, however, was how differently that announcement would affect two women he left behind.

His widow, Patricia Scharf, 72, of Northern Virginia, has never remarried, has never had children and still considers the Vietnam War officer the love of her life. For her, the announcement was the gentle rub across the shoulder she had waited four decades to feel, one that let her know it was all right to let go.

For Barbara Scharf Lowerison, 72, his sister in California, the announcement was a slap. It meant she was losing -- if she had not already lost -- her fight to convince officials that her brother is alive, a prisoner of war.

what makes althouse and reynolds' claim here so particularly dishonest is that their ideological comrade, hugh hewitt, previously made the same argument -- that sullivan's use of the term "christianist" is "deeply offensive." hewitt was just as petulant and hysterical as reynolds was, labelling the term "hate speech." in response, sullivan explained exactly what the term means and what it does not mean:

christianity, in this view, is simply a faith. christianism is an ideology, politics, an ism. the distinction between christian and christianist echoes the distinction we make between muslim and islamist. muslims are those who follow islam. islamists are those who want to wield islam as a political force and conflate state and mosque. not all islamists are violent. only a tiny few are terrorists.

and i should underline that the term christianist is in no way designed to label people on the religious right as favoring any violence at all. i mean merely by the term christianist the view that religious faith is so important that it must also have a precise political agenda. it is the belief that religion dictates politics and that politics should dictate the laws for everyone, christian and non-christian alike.

that is not a complicated distinction. are althouse and reynolds (and their like-minded comrade, hewitt) really incapable of comprehending it? "christians" (like "muslims") are those who believe in the religion. "christianists" (like "islamists") are those who believe that their religious beliefs ought to shape politics and dictate the law. "christian fascists" (like "islamofascists") are those who believe in the use of violence and terrorism to achieve those goals. the term "christianist" has nothing to do with violence, only with a desire to compel others to adhere to christian religious views via the force of politics, state power, and secular law.

what seems to be guiding althouse and reynolds' hatred of the term "christianist" is that it highlights a fact which they both are eager to ignore -- namely, that the political party to which they are so devoted is dominated by individuals who believe that their religious/christian beliefs ought to dictate the american political process, shape secular law, and exploit coercive state power to constrain the choices of their fellow citizens.

"there will be no victory or defeat for the united states in iraq. these terms do not reflect the reality of what is going to happen there. the future of iraq was always going to be determined by the iraqis -- not the americans.

iraq is not a prize to be won or lost. it is part of the ongoing global struggle against instability, brutality, intolerance, extremism and terrorism. there will be no military victory or military solution for iraq. former secretary of state henry kissinger made this point last weekend.

the time for more u.s. troops in iraq has passed. we do not have more troops to send and, even if we did, they would not bring a resolution to iraq. militaries are built to fight and win wars, not bind together failing nations. we are once again learning a very hard lesson in foreign affairs: america cannot impose a democracy on any nation -- regardless of our noble purpose." - chuck hagel in the washington post

Labels: freeway blogger, protest

• doug milliken, the newly elected arapahoe county treasurer who ran on a platform that promised to help families avoid foreclosure, is in the process of losing his house. - rockymountainnews
• milliken said he just found out about the foreclosure on friday and that he fell behind because he was focused on his campaign and taking care of an ailing father, along with other considerations. - cbs4denver
• almost 16,000 real estate foreclosures have been filed in the denver area in the first 10 months of the year, 30 percent more than during the same period last year. and by the end of this month, an 18-year record will be eclipsed, with more homes being lost to lenders than ever before. - rockymountainnews

when political analysts talk about one potential presidential candidate for 2008, former sen. john edwards of north carolina, they often mention his wife -- and her down-to-earth appeal. in an interview, elizabeth edwards talks about the death of her teenage son, living a life of politics, and surviving cancer. - npr

every november, for 24 hours, we remember that no one was born to shop. if you’ve never taken part in buy nothing day, or if you’ve taken part in the past but haven’t really committed to doing it again, consider this: 2006 will go down as the year in which mainstream dialogue about global warming finally reached its critical mass. what better way to bring the year of global warming to a close than to point in the direction of real alternatives to the unbridled consumption that has created this quagmire? - adbusters

"withdrawal? a bad idea. partitioning? won't work. the right approach is one that addresses u.s. interests in the entire region.

...the right approach is a coordinated diplomatic, legal, economic and security campaign drawing upon broader dialogue in the region and intensified political work inside iraq." - general clark in usatoady

joe lieberman is on sean hannity sucking up to him and agreeing that democrats are cut & runners. also, he said democrats showed more partisan politics for not supporting his general election campaign which came straight from the politcal playbook. furthermore, hannity proclaims lieberman as the most powerful man in the senate. then the next segment on the show after lieberman was done went right back to attacking nancy pelosi

general wesley clark: probably less than the american people would like, because i think that short of subpoenas and funding cut-offs and so forth, it's, it's hard for congress to directly shape foreign policy. but clearly this election has been a real shot across the bough for the republican party, and i think that despite the protestations of, of the president and dick cheney, they got the message. they cannot stay the course, because it's not working, and they can't lie about it, or they can't represent it as progress to the american people any longer. it's not progress.

colorado attorney general john suthers flew to saudi arabia this week to reassure government officials there that homaidan al-turki was treated fairly when he was convicted of sexually abusing an indonesian nanny held a virtual captive in his aurora home.

suthers sat knee-to-knee for an hour with king abdullah and also met with crown prince sultan, saudi journalists and relatives of al-turki during his weeklong trip to the capital city of riyadh, deputy attorney general jason dunn said friday.

...at his sentencing, al-turki said he would not apologize for "things i did not do and for crimes i did not commit."

"the state has criminalized these basic muslim behaviors," he told the judge. "attacking traditional muslim behaviors was the focal point of the prosecution."

....the federal government picked up the tab for suthers to spend the week in saudi arabia with owens' chief counsel, jon anderson, dunn said. - rocky mountain news

i know some muslims. sexual abusing and holding nannies hostage is not basic muslim behavior.

american military doctors in iraq have injected more than 1,000 of the war's wounded troops with a potent and largely experimental blood-coagulating drug despite mounting medical evidence linking it to deadly blood clots that lodge in the lungs, heart and brain.

the drug, called recombinant activated factor vii, is approved in the u.s. for treating only rare forms of hemophilia affecting about 2,700 americans. in a warning last december, the food and drug administration said that giving it to patients with normal blood could cause strokes and heart attacks. its researchers published a study in January blaming 43 deaths on clots that developed after injections of factor vii.

the u.s. army medical command considers factor vii to be a medical breakthrough in the war, giving frontline physicians a powerful new means of controlling bleeding that can only be treated otherwise with surgery and transfusions. they have posted guidelines at military field hospitals encouraging its liberal use in casualties with severe bleeding, and doctors in iraq routinely inject it into patients upon the mere anticipation of deadly bleeding to come.

...yet the army's faith in the $6,000-a-dose drug is based almost entirely on anecdotal evidence and persists despite public warnings and published research suggesting that factor vii is not as effective or as safe as military officials say. - baltimore sun (part 1 of 3 articles)

...a 36-year-old lawyer from gurnee, ill., with a wife, two young children and a successful general law practice back home, mahaffee never imagined even eight months earlier that he would be working for the army in iraq. he had finished his stint with the army in 1999, retiring after eight years in the reserves, and he hadn't drilled or worn a uniform since.

but in october of 2005 he came home from vacation to find a fedex package from the pentagon calling him back to service. like many retired soldiers, he was still part of the individual ready reserve, a limbo status that allowed the army to reactivate him. the program is so rarely used that few soldiers give it much thought, but the army, suffering a desperate shortage of junior officers, summoned him out of retirement. - baltimore sun (part 2 of 3 articles)

NEW YORK — News Corp., the parent company of book publisher HarperCollins and the FOX network, has canceled publication of the O.J. Simpson book and television special "If I Did It."

"I and senior management agree with the American public that this was an ill-considered project," said Rupert Murdoch, News Corp. chairman. "We are sorry for any pain that this has caused the families of Ron Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson."

A dozen FOX affiliates had already said they would not air the two-part sweeps month special, planned for next week before the book's publication.

In the book, the one-time football superstar tells how he would have killed his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman if, in fact, he had done it.

A heroin addiction, a federal drug case and a frenzy of negative publicity were not enough to pull popular WSLS (Channel 10) meteorologist Jamey Singleton from the air.

Factor in a mean MySpace prank, though, and the forecast got much gloomier.

After a former friend posted a nude picture of Singleton, 28, on the Internet this week, Channel 10 management called in the weatherman at 1 p.m. Thursday and fired him.

snip

As Singleton stepped out of the shower, his friend barged in with a digital camera and took a picture of him from the front, fully naked, Singleton said.

"At the time I just chuckled, like, 'Oh, my God.' I didn't ever think that he would keep it and if he did keep it, I never would have thought that he would put it on the Internet," he said.

the pension system currently is only 67 percent funded -- a shortfall of about $2 billion, according to kim france, spokesman for the nhrs. and under current law, the only way to make up the difference is to raise the rates employers pay.

the federal agency that insures private pension plans for millions of americans logged a deficit of $18.1 billion this year...

citigroup inc. will stop adding money in 2008 to the traditional pension plan that covers as many as 150,000 u.s. employees and raise matching contributions in 401(k) plans at the nation's biggest bank.

The trial, Mr. Donohue said, is hardly an ideal process. He was asked to swear an oath of silence, which he refused to do, he told the priests, on the principle that the church’s policy of silence is what has allowed priests to abuse young people with impunity for decades. Mr. Donohue chafes against his role as the star witness for the archdiocese, the very institution that he said protected Monsignor Kavanagh for years.....

Secrecy has abounded at the trial. The Vatican moved it from New York at the request of the archdiocese, which said it feared a media circus. No reporters are allowed at canonical tribunals, and the New York Archdiocese has refused to comment on the trial.

Mr. Donohue’s sister Patricia Donohue testified on Thursday, and she said that when she refused to promise not to discuss the case outside the tribunal, the chief judge, who identified himself only as Father Mark, told her that her refusal would be referred to the Vatican for possible “disciplinary action.”

an alarming number of homeless are dying on the streets of santa barbara so today, health care workers are bringing the hospital to the streets.

about 300 people received sidewalk checkups. it's all part of an innovative new program in santa barbara to provide preventive health care for the homeless.

michael steinberg is getting "the works" -- a flu and tetanus shot and a tb and hiv test. all are free of charge.

the healthy neighbors program was started last year with the help of ken williams. the social worker and homeless advocate helped convince hundreds to get themselves checked out. last year, 39 people died on the streets of santa barbara. as the winter approaches -- or "dying season," as williams grimly calls it -- a little preventative medicine is extremely important.

"i got tired of seeing people die," says williams. - ksby

under mccaw, a libertarian, news-press editorials evolved from respectful, cautious, reasonably argued pieces to raucous assaults, sometimes on the paper's own reporters, with attacks on the coastal commission, affordable housing and the local rodeo, an affront to mccaw's animal rights sensibilities. through her executives, mccaw worked her will: "it was always about news content and news reporters," says an insider no longer at the paper. "if one story wasn't the way she wanted it, it was off with their heads," with cole "just doing her bidding."