fast and loose

the man who wants to be the new Edward Murrow, Keith Oberman, tears Bush a new corn shute after yet another state of the union riddled with complete bullshit. If only the press were as vigilant, as opposed to a pack of low rent dilettantes like scuzzy whore judith miller, before he invaded Iraq. Or maybe if our wedgeman, Pm Howard could exert a little of his unique brand of honesty into the debate (well, ok thats how we got into the schmozzel in the first place), using his very special relationship to temper the Cheney inspired crap which just prolongs the agony for all.

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/01/30/olbermann-special-comment-fact-checking-the-president/

for a different account of the US presidents "success" in Najaf. Why does success always seem to involve pools of Iraqi blood, followed by a radical renegotiation of the "facts".

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2201103.ece

http://www.azzaman.com/english/index.asp?fname=news\2007-01-31\kurd.htm

On the surge:

last year the US drew down the troops from 166,000 to 128,000.
this year, they draw up the troops by 21,000.
next year...watch for the slightly embarresing declaration "we have won" followed by a general retreat to the borders of all coalition troops. Or else wait for the bombing of Iran to calm the whole situation down.

The Brits did it in 1936, the then Iraqi governmant lasted less than 6 months.

The brits talked about doing it two months ago, declaring that they could start to withdraw their 10,000 from the basra area as it was "stable and progressing", three days after that announcement, their troops attacked and demolished one of the local police stations, killed 7 Iraqi police and arresting the rest after finding that the station was filled with Iraqi civilians being tortured and murdered. Mission accomplished.

One day we may get the idea that the iraqis are already a bit to good at defending themselves, just not so keen on defending the US oil interests.