So what about Obama now?
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Once again, Jay Smooth of illdoctrine.com says it best… Really, there is not much more to say on the subject of Obama's election, and except that I don't pledge to "sit at home and make more videos" (because the one time I tried it, oh lordy did I suck!), I would just like to say "me too":
Center-left democrat my ass. As I have said before, the US has two parties, the conservative party and the lunatic fascist theocracy party. Obama is somewhere in between those two stances.
Liberals don't have faith-based initiatives, vote for insane bailouts or protect telecoms and government officials from prosecution for illegal surveillance and war crimes, respectively.
Obama is not, in any sense, left-wing.
2nd December 2008 at 5:31 pm | permalink |@Kavan: As Democrats go, yes, he is a center-left Democrat. Which may well say pathetic things about the seriously limited range of viable political expression in the US, but it doesn't change facts. ;-)
On a global scale? Fuck no, a left-wing politician won't get anywhere near the White House in my lifetime. Our political parties are roughly "Slightly Left of the Tories" vs. UKIP, to use UK analogues (which happens to be the only other country who's politics I'm familiar enough with to make any comparisons to).
2nd December 2008 at 6:10 pm | permalink |Well, are you Obama supporters feeling sufficiently duped yet? So much for all that change, eh? Hillary, Robert Gates as defense sec - you know, the one who set some of the interrogation policies at Gitmo that Obama and his ilk abhorred? And then his pick (who's name escapes me) who was the architect of "Reaganomics."
And don't get me started on how he will have to rattle sabers around the world - possibly on a level greater than Bush. And deploy troops, bombs, etc., etc. Don't get me wrong, if he can fix shit, have at it but I'm glad I saw through all that "change" happy horseshit.
3rd December 2008 at 9:09 am | permalink |And just who did you vote for, Watson?
3rd December 2008 at 1:10 pm | permalink |I wrote in a redneck friend. Sadly, he didn't win.
3rd December 2008 at 4:07 pm | permalink |@D. Watson: He hasn't even taken office yet … I'll give him a few months before I start crying foul.
3rd December 2008 at 5:32 pm | permalink |When it really comes down to it - whether or not you believe in that change happening - the really important thing is that Sarah Palin is nowhere fucking near the red phone.
Besides, the people who're already whining: have you ever heard of practicality? If he'd just named a bunch of nobodies with no experience you'd probably be bitching about such an inexperienced government. Grow the fuck up, whiners.
3rd December 2008 at 5:42 pm | permalink |@ D.Watson: Reality check, dipshit—Gates didn't set the interrogation policies at Gitmo. Interrogation policies at Gitmo were set by the White House, specifically in meetings between Dick "Dick" Cheney, Alberto "Fredo" Gonzales, other White House officials, and signed off by Bush himself.
To paraphrase Gates' predecessor, Gates got the interrogation policies he had at the time, not the interrogation policies he wished he could have.
But hey, don't dislocate a shoulder patting yourself on the back because you were so clever to see through Obama's smokescreen of competence, leadership, and sober judgment. Of course, it might help for Obama to actually take office before you go about trashing what he's supposedly fucked up.
4th December 2008 at 4:18 am | permalink |We’ll see won’t we?
4th December 2008 at 6:55 am | permalink |@Becca I love it. George Bush said repeatedly that he never condoned torture of POW's and he's summarily dismissed as a liar. Now that Gates is part of the Obama team, he's a fucking pillar of the highest esteem at the Pentagon. You can't have it both ways, you either hated everything that came before Obama because it was the antithesis of "change" or you really did not. Good for Obama for reaching across the aisle, as it were, but it's really more about the old guard than new change. Get over it.
And it wasn't me who rolled Obama out in November standing behind the podium under the aegis of, "The Office of the President Elect" - an office that doesn't exist with any authority prior to his inauguration. He certainly acts as if he is in office. And again, if he can bring about a fix for the myriad problems I'll sing his praises right here on this forum. I have a significant stake in the outcome.
4th December 2008 at 7:03 am | permalink |Well given that Bush is doing exactly fuck all, it's probably a good thing Obama's doing more than he 'should' before taking office.
Gates isn't Bush. One of them being a liar doesn't make the other one too. Aside from anything else, the guy that's running the country, who's calling the shots *is* new. He's getting advice from people with lots of experience, yes, but he's the one with the power at the end of the day, real or symbolic.
4th December 2008 at 3:55 pm | permalink |Damn, they even have Grimbles snookered. And I thought he was more asute than that. Ok, Obamen and women, you're on your own. Hang on, it's going to get good.
4th December 2008 at 5:21 pm | permalink |@D. Watson: "You can't have it both ways, you either hated everything that came before Obama because it was the antithesis of "change" or you really did not."
Um, to put this bluntly: Horseshit. Although if you're really enamored of that level of black and white thinking, it does pretty much explain all of your comments up to now.
4th December 2008 at 5:24 pm | permalink |@D. W.
What are you going to contest about my comment? You think Bush *is* actually doing something? Or you think what the US needs in the middle of a financial crisis is no leadership at all?
Maybe Gates is a liar, maybe he isn't. Likely he is, being a politician. But being associated with Bush does not necessarily make him any more of a liar than he would be otherwise. That's called a logical fallacy.
Maybe you're contesting that the president of the united states - particularly with what looks to be a very friendly congress - isn't actually the one that calls the shots?
You're an idiot if you're contesting any of those points. None of them is me saying "OMG I love Obama, he is the second coming, he's perfect." It's me stating a few pretty undeniable truths. And generally, as with most of the people that aren't being whiners, I'm going to wait to see if Obama actually screws up before I call him a screw-up. For now, I can recognise political expediency, and practical government for what it is: practical.
4th December 2008 at 7:34 pm | permalink |@ D.Watson: "George Bush said repeatedly that he never condoned torture of POW's and he's summarily dismissed as a liar. Now that Gates is part of the Obama team, he's a fucking pillar of the highest esteem at the Pentagon."
Well, here's the difference:
Bush said that he did not condone torture, but then he did two things—(a) he redefined torture to not include waterboarding, and (b) he held meetings in the fucking White House to plan out the torture sessions and how far to go on an individual-by-individual basis. If that doesn't reek of hypocrisy (if not bald-faced lying) then you're not a conscious, breathing human being.
Gates isn't quite what I would consider a "pillar of high esteem." However he has done a good job of de-politicizing the Defense Dept., generally respecting the troops, and trying to clean up Rumsfeld's anal leakage. It's also necessary to have some sort of continuity for the military while the presidency transitions from Chimpy McDipshit to someone who is actually qualified to do the job.
Gates is good for at least a year, maybe 18 months. But I'm not certain that he's in for much more than that.
4th December 2008 at 10:08 pm | permalink |@Alpha et al.: No, this is not my view, I'm simply pointing out what I've heard from Bush haters everywhere since 2003. It was nearly always, "this administration", "Bush and his ilk" (lumping any and all associates) when spewing the nastiest vitriol I can ever remember hearing about a sitting president. It seemed to be VERY black and white with the left. Anything and anyone associated with the Bush Admin had to go!
Grimbles comment about, "being associated with Bush doesn't necessarily make him any more of a liar…" is exactly what I'm talking about. The entire Obama campaign mantra was "change, ridding the status quo, McCain = four more years of the same", etc., etc. It just seems you've all gone all doey-eyed at the mere sight of this Obama man.
I can't emphasize enough that I want working solutions to our problems as much as anyone but at the same time feel compelled to point out this loving, newfound embrace of Bush people. And I suppose in some way choosing someone like Gates is a change of pace. I'll give you that.
5th December 2008 at 8:12 am | permalink |Oh, and waterboarding is to torture what shaving is to beheading, imo. I'm fairly certain the dead Jews in Mumbai would have preferred that method over what they actually received from their Muslim captors…prior to their deaths, of course.
5th December 2008 at 8:24 am | permalink |@ D.W.
Ok, we'll organise for you to be waterboarded, since you seem to think its about equal to shaving. What part of "emulates drowning" doesn't fall under "any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person." Besides masochists with a thing for water, drowning tends to be high on the list of primal human fears, and being stuck underwater is utterly terrifying - and I know from experience.
"what I've heard from Bush haters everywhere since 2003", "It seemed to be VERY black and white with the left. Anything and anyone associated with the Bush Admin had to go!" That seems to be a very black and white statement…. which kind of undermines your point. Personally, I had issue with Bush and the PNAC crowd long before 2003.
"It just seems you've all gone all doey-eyed at the mere sight of this Obama man"
So, disliking the employment of an association fallacy means i've gone 'doey-eyed'? The bit of the 'campaign mantra' that you seem to be forgetting is 'bipartisanship'. As for change, have you noticed that there's not going to be a pentecostal lunatic hanging around the oval office after Jan 20? The fact that Palin isn't a heartbeat from launch codes is enough change for me to think Obama's election was worth it. Anything more is gravy.
Also, suggesting that our acknowledgment of Gates' selection as politically expedient, and practical, is in fact "loving, newfound embrace of Bush people", that's called a straw man. And while fallacies may work in the rest of the internet, you're really quite naive if you think they'll get past the regular posters here.
5th December 2008 at 5:29 pm | permalink |@ D.Watson: Considering that prior to the Bush administration, waterboarding was universally considered to constitute torture by the signatories of the Geneva Conventions (and pretty much any civilized country), I'd say that it a fairly settled matter. However, to emphasize the point we can refer to Christopher Hitchens, cheerleader for the war, who willingly underwent waterboarding and came away unambiguously convinced that it constituted torture. Or we could refer to DoJ personnel, military personnel who teach SERE school and the laws of warfare, the interrogators themselves, … all of whom have said that it's torture.
You see, "simulated drowning" isn't something as simple as putting a wet rag over someone's nose/mouth. Waterboarding involves flooding a subject's mouth/nose and lungs with water … to the point where the subject literally blacks out–or drowns. Only to be revived and put through it again. And yes, people have died from being waterboarded.
While your post on the recent events in Mumbai uses hyperbolic invective to make your point, you carefully avoid the point that no degree of waterboarding of detainees would have made one iota of difference in preventing or resolving what happened. HOWEVER, waterboarding of detainees is a lit match indry tinder of religious extremism.
Stopping torture won't necessarily stop terrorist attacks. But if you want to deliberately encourage more attacks like Mumbai, then keep torturing Gitmo detainees.
5th December 2008 at 11:23 pm | permalink |This notion that Gitmo, torture and Iraq have so much to do with terrorism is what's being lost on the world due to very short memories. To wit: Beirut- April 1983, 63 dead, October 1983, Beirut, 241 US servicemen dead, LaBelle discotheque in West Berlin, 1986, Dhahran, 2 dead 150 wounded, Dec. 21, 1988 - Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, 259 dead, Saudi Arabia, 1996 - and this is a very short list of all of the incidents that went mostly unanswered by the U.S. and the world. But when WE finally did something, IT suddenly became the reason for global terrorism.
If waterboarding elicits one piece of information that prevents the murder of innocents in the name of Allah, so be it. I am sick and tired of playing by the rules with an enemy that, a) Has no rules and b) Wants to die anyway - a beautiful philosophy for the advancement of the species, no? Our holier than thou approach will simply bury us. Do you think the average jihadist gives two shits about Geneva Conventions? Seriously? And I thank God (yes, the one in the clouds) that behind the scenes whatever method necessary to get information is being employed, even if it means *gasp* putting dirty panties on their heads. And yes, I'm familiar with the notion that you'll say what the captor wants to hear under extreme interrogation but again, the one time it works, how ever it works, the program is a success, in my mind.
I know it's the stuff of TV…for now…but imagine the ultimate - extracting the right piece of information to thwart a nuke attack in the New York harbor. Is one waterboarding casualty worth a few millions lives? I know they're completely expendable American lives, but it's somehow worth it to me. And if you think terrorism isn't headed for the ultimate nuclear showdown, you're wrong. And in the end, all of our dutiful circumspection and sanctimonious handwringing will not save our asses in a battle with radical Islam. That is, unless we think - and act, just like our enemy combatant. After his defeat, then we can return to our regular pietistical programming. And I hope Mr. Obama also tumbles to that conclusion…sooner than later.
6th December 2008 at 11:18 am | permalink |@D. Watson: The way you take someone's nuanced assertion and replace it with a black-and-white version before you can refute it kind of undermines any even halfway valid points you might have to make.
You really ought to learn to quote people, and debate based on what they actually said, rather than perverting their words to make your halfassed refutations easier.
6th December 2008 at 12:15 pm | permalink |But see, I'd like to think my thoughts approach something original. If I wanted to refry someone else's tortured logic I'd just cut and paste some adjectives & shit in and around their musings.
I'm hoping maybe my "halfassed" (there, how's that?) refutations might make sense to some lost soul who comes across this -Unholier than thou- blog because heaven knows the "regular posters here" are waaaay to savvy for the likes of me.
6th December 2008 at 1:46 pm | permalink |The question isn't whether you're being "original" (because you're really not) … my point was that you are attempting to refute assertions that were never made in the first place.
Or, to put it a bit more simply, you're putting words in other people's mouths.
And while it's far easier, I'm sure, to topple your own strawmen than it is to actually address a coherent, nuanced argument, your masturbatory debate style doesn't actually score any points against the original arguments you consistently choose to ignore.
6th December 2008 at 3:24 pm | permalink |@ D.Watson: "But see, I'd like to think my thoughts approach something original. If I wanted to refry someone else's tortured logic I'd just cut and paste some adjectives & shit in and around their musings."
I'm hoping maybe my 'halfassed' (there, how's that?) refutations might make sense to some lost soul who comes across this -Unholier than thou- blog because heaven knows the 'regular posters here' are waaaay to savvy for the likes of me.
Ahh … I see. So your points aren't about making an intelligent, defensible argument, so much as they are about "elevating" the discourse to some sort of simplistic, crude mentality which utterly avoids anything resembling rational debate. Unfortunately, real life doesn't exist in simple black and white terms—and that is a critical failing of either side of this argument.
If you're interested in real counter-terrorism measures, there is a whole laundry list of things that can be done—very little of which has been undertaken by the current administration—and which do not require torturing anyone.
You want to be "original"? Then make an intelligent, defensible argument for the policies of the Bush administration. Because thus far, no one has been able to articulate one.
6th December 2008 at 3:28 pm | permalink |Honestly, I'm sick of the 'they play dirty, so we should too' mentality. It's so far beyond counterproductive it's not funny. Sure, there will always be people like bin Laden who probably don't even give a fuck about Islam, viewing it as just a tool in their war for more personal power. Just like Bush, Palin and their ilk are doing with Christianity.
*But*
The people doing the dirty work aren't really the dangerous ones. Someone with the drive to launch a terrorist campaign on one of the most powerful entities on earth isn't going to throw it away by strapping on a bomb. They get other people to do it for them. And when American troops roll into (or fly over) town and shoot up a wedding, when the neighbourhood cobbler is dragged off to be tortured, that pisses people off, for some odd reason. Just as thousands of Americans signed up for the military post 9-11, Muslims the world over who get caught up by the propaganda of the global religious war (a narrative which the Christian right has, if anything, perpetuated). They get angry, and they sign up to fight back.
The extreme fundamntalists would be much less dangerous without their new recruits doing the dirty work. An army without soldiers. And when the US locks people up, indefinitely, ignoring its own laws, tortures, abuses and atop it all is incredibly culturally insensitive, it plays right into the hands of A'Q recruiters.
You're right, terrorism existed before Gitmo. But pre-Gitmo, there was still American Imperialism. Giving chemical and biological weapons to unstable dictators, assassinating democratically elected leaders, supporting coups in favour of fundamentalists. Yeah, everyone was doing it (and everyone was getting hit) but the US was the biggest target with the most thumbs-in-pies. No, blowing people up because you're pissed about their government isn't right. But neither is kidnapping someone on hearsay and torturing them indefinitely. Both those acts piss people off, both pour fuel on the fire.
If you want to use a very isolated metric of one life against a million, that's easy. But the real world isn't like that. In the real world, hundreds, if not thousands of innocents before that 'one life' were ruined or snuffed out in pursuit of that intel. Tens - if not hundreds - of thousands more killed by the US occupations in the Middle East. And each one of *those* people has family and friends. And if only one of those family and friends gets mad and joins the bad guys, that's tens of thousands more people with nothing to lose. And odds are, it's those people who'll make it possible for a nuke to be acquired. It's one of them who'll place it. And it's one of those people who - but for US intervention - would be sitting at home with their family, who would be grinning manically as a mushroom cloud erupts, finally having got their revenge.
That's what this is all about: revenge. And revenge is one of those things that tends to escalate. I call you a dick. You piss in my cheerios. I smash your TV. You punch me. I break your arm. You shoot me. One of my family wants revenge, so they shoot your family. And so on. Granted, that's an extreme, time compressed scenario. But this isn't a conventional war where you keep fighting back, capture Berlin and move on to the cold war. The only way you can hope to win through violence is to kill every single terrorist, and every person that enlists when their family gets caught in the crossfire. America couldn't win a guerrilla war that was contained to a small region. What makes you think America can win a global guerrilla war?
6th December 2008 at 5:28 pm | permalink |C'mon people, work with me here. It's really not that hard to hearken back to my stream of conscientious and find a tie-in. How was talking about Gitmo not addressing Becca's earlier comments? ("Gates didn't set the interrogation policies at Gitmo. Interrogation policies at Gitmo were set by the White House…") Because I don't give a shit that they "torture" enemy combatants? That makes the argument completely unintelligent, incoherent and irrelevant? Unpopular maybe, but not all of those things. I even referenced her comments on the Geneva Convention. Hello?
The rant about past terrorist attacks, in part, was pointing out the fact that since we have engaged in this war, taken prisoners and interrogated some of them, gotten useful information - and probably still do, (hence, no Mumbai's in the USA since 2001) that maybe some form of extracting intel actually works…among other points apparently lost here.
So, try real hard to read into all of this that I am now in fact addressing a previous comment. ("make an intelligent, defensible argument for the policies of the Bush administration") That maybe, just maybe, Bush policy might have done s o m e good.
Look, if you all are going to need Cliff Notes for every post then I'm going to grow weary of the effort.
6th December 2008 at 5:35 pm | permalink |There also weren't any Mumbai's in America pre-9-11 so saying that none since '01 is because of torture makes about as much sense as… well, the rest of what you've been saying.
But, I guess all that torturing of foreign nationals did stop those terrorist attacks in London and Madrid… oh, wait.
Also, what is a 'stream of conscientious'?
6th December 2008 at 6:19 pm | permalink |Now, I can work with grimbles, here. The rest of you try to keep up.
P1: If we were talking about isolated incidents where playing dirty constituted an eye for an eye, I'd agree. We're talking about a twisted ideology, a 2000+ year old way of doing business bolstered by a pretext from the Koran that has them killing infidels for fun and other worldly delights. I agree with you about bin Laden. I disagree that Bush used Christianity, solely, as rationalization for Iraq. Other dubious reasons? Probably.
P2: The trouble with this argument is one of your last comments regarding "guerrilla war." In many cases - whether he or she volunteered or not, the local cobbler was sometimes in on the jihad hence, guerrilla, or urban warfare. When the mujahedeen took over a province, it was join the fight or be branded a sympathiser and be executed. I get that Bush said something similar…"you're with us or with the terrorists…"
But C'mon, the times where a totally innocent civilian wedding was shelled - if EVER, were few. It's like Gulf War I when Saddam posted those hand-written "baby food factory" signs outside known military complexes. And CNN ate it up. That's pure media bullshit and you know it. As for at least the early detainees at Gitmo, they were pulled off an Afghan battle field. I cannot speak to where and how any current ones are apprehended.
I'm not sure where your devil-dog perception of U.S. soldiers comes from but I can assure you that outside of a few bad apples, we're just not wired that way. In fact, it's probably a good reason so much has been spent in Iraq. If we'd have went in willy nilly and leveled the place and left in 2004, it would've cost a lot less. Flying 10 sorties just to make certain a target was legit costs so much more.
P3&4: There's an old proverb that says in so many words, "No permanent friends, no permanent enemies." Arming someone who appears sympathetic to your cause is risky business and no doubt comes home to roost on occasion. Guilty as charged.
P4: I remain skeptical of the large number of dead attributed to our "occupation." Was there fallout to the invasion and subsequent conflict? No doubt.
Lastly, yes, we and the west have sucked at guerrilla war. The French tried to warn us about Vietnam. We didn't listen. We lost but…it's been revealed recently by former VC leaders that we were so close to having them surrender. We just didn't know that at the time. But remember, a great asset to that type of war is engaging the citizenry at large - the "innocent" if you will. Up to this point they know most Americans don't have the stomach for it. But we're learning. I'm not sure just how you win a global guerrilla war. But I am certain how you lose one. It's simply a fight that has to be fought.
6th December 2008 at 7:23 pm | permalink |"2000+ year old way of doing business" Christianity is the 2000 year old one. Islam is c1300 y/o. Yes, A'Q's brand of Islam is seriously fucked up. Nothing anyone does is going to change that. But eye for an eye policies *will* push people who would otherwise be uninvolved or even have western sympathies into the angry fundamentalist camp.
Also, I wasn't talking specifically about Christianity as an excuse for the Iraq war, but generally in terms of how it has been abused (and twisted) for political gain, and the wide-spread application of fundamentalist morals on the population at large. All using the 'with us or against us', 'clash of religions' rhetoric to muffle dissent.
Yes, Joe the Cobbler may have been cowed into some semblance of co-operation out of fear. But suggesting that that makes him a viable target for kidnap and torture - which is the only conclusion I can see from your comment - is tacit approval of terrorism. "Joe the cobbler didn't oppose our enemy, so we'll kidnap, torture, maybe kill him." Swap sides, and that becomes "Joe Sixpack didn't oppose…" etc. Or maybe "The people working in the TWC didn't oppose…". All three of those positions are bullshit, and with us or against us rhetoric only legitimises that kind of violence being used against innocents on both sides.
"Few" weddings being bombed is still more than zero. Try some empathy on for size: if someone bombed your sister's wedding and killed dozens of people, wouldn't you want to rip the fuckers balls off? Doesn't it follow that when a USAF bomb lands in the middle of the a wedding in Iraq - and lacking a name to go with that bomb - people become increasingly hostile to the entity that delivered the bomb - the US?
Hardly any of the Gitmo detainees were actually captured in battle. Those that were are *soldiers* not terrorists. As much as you might not like it, when you invade a country, people shoot back. That doesn't make them terrorists. Most of the detainees from the Afghanistan era, however, were handed over the the warlords for bounties. And given that only a handful have ever actually been charged, the US military got seriously stiffed on those bounty payments.
I don't have a 'devil-dog' perception of US troops. I know quite a few marines who're good blokes. I'm playing devils advocate. Just as the western media tends to only report the 'worst' news, the worst acts of the bad apples are used by fundamentalists to tar the entirety of the western world. Again, not right, but real.
You're right, engaging the citizenry is the best way to win a guerrilla war. 'Winning hearts and minds.' But it's not being employed. There's more blowing up of hearts and minds than winning of them.
I wasn't suggesting that there be no fighting back at all. I'd love to live in a world where absolute pacifism was actually viable, but we don't. It's about *how* the fight is fought. Straight up, torture is wrong. It is of limited use on an intelligence gathering (tactical) level, and is counterproductive on a strategic level. The only thing that sets the west apart from whack-jobs like bin Laden is a respect for human rights, a respect for life. If we give that up to defend our way of life, then there's nothing left of our way of life worth defending.
"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety"
6th December 2008 at 8:22 pm | permalink |I stand corrected on the age of Islam. Suffice it to say that at the end of the day, we'd probably agree more than disagree on many issues.
The whole wedding / media distortion of events is the great tragedy here. You've seen and heard the propaganda - from both sides - how the media is played for effect. I suspect there are Middle East news sources you can watch on Australian TV. I remember watching a program called, "Mosaic" shortly after our invasion of Iraq. It included feeds from Iran, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, etc. Many blatantly called it, "The War for Oil" daily. Obviously, that was the perspective being fed to the Middle East viewers. And I'm certain every botched wedding-like event was splashed across the screen in spades. I eventually had to quit watching.
The truth in all of this is what proves so elusive. I try to listen and read actual soldier accounts of their experiences "over there" but am not blind to the fact that they too may have an agenda.
And yes, I agree that the sanctity of life is what sets us apart and am hopeful that tenet wins out in the end. I just worry that in a war with an enemy who has such a polar opposite view, it'll make it difficult to maintain such an inviolable position throughout the conflict. But certainly worth the effort.
7th December 2008 at 9:00 am | permalink |Its probably worth noting that, historically, Christianity has just as - if not more - fucked up and twisted than Islam. It's only really in the 2nd half of the 20th century that fundamentalism became a major power.
I get my new from various sources. Murdoch-owned media as well as more liberal sources. But when the USAF announces it destroyed a gathering of terrorists, and the photos show the tatters of decorations and wedding dresses… well, i have a hard time believing it was a jihadist tea-party.
7th December 2008 at 4:57 pm | permalink |Hello??????? Hello??????? Don't forget about your little 'ol blog.
17th December 2008 at 12:07 am | permalink |