Even on Camp Victory, Iraq soldiers are only required one magazine. The big difference between this and VTech is that the soldiers wouldn’t wait in line for thier bullet.

This latest bust further illustrates that AQ is deliberately holding off staging any large-scale, serious attacks in the US.

Freelance and angry, using the autonomous fighter model of the militias in their approach, they were caught mostly by being dumb. Thank goodness.

These guys could have been as deadly, or more so than the Virginia shooter and I take their planned attack very seriously.

Just as I did the right wing militias that I wrote about way back in the day as something of a regional expert on those guys.

Then there is the gentleman with the cyanide bomb and dozens of weapons found not too far from Crawford a few years ago.

It’s not an either or situation. We should take every angry, highly armed, politically motivated group seriously whether it is neo-nazis, anti-abortion nuts, or jihadi’s.

Any way, I know this is not in this blog’s topic but I am very curious to know why for the most part blogs on the Right are keeping mute about the fact that the Iraqi Government is planning to take a two month vacation right in the middle of our surge. This unprecedented event by the way happens right at the time when more than ever our soldiers are paying with their blood to buy them the time to establish a true Democracy.
Or at least that’s the latest talking point by the White House.

Instead blogs on the Right continue to attack the Democratic Congress for tying in the money for this war to the Iraqi Government’s performance. As in we need results, not more promises of results. Sincerely Republicans do you have any idea how this makes you look as a party, supporting the Iraqi Government that’s taking off on vacation while attacking the Democrats for trying to hold the same Iraqi Government accountable?

There is no question that our soldiers will do their duty, and may even quiet down for a while some of the daily caos in Iraq…. But where is the other all important part of the equation here? On vacation for month? Is this thee commitment of the Iraqi Government you support ?

Can any one of you tell me what has been accomplished by this Iraqi Government? And now they go on vacation? Every Republican politician out there is now “Waiting for Gen. Petraeus September report to decide if the surge is working” I can tell you right now that Gen. Petraeus can say that militarly the surge is working (maibe), but that the other and most important part of the equation THE POLITICAL EQUATION is an absolute failure. Unless you Republicans would consider kindly on Democrats abandoning Congress for two months without any bill, or any resolution passed and living stranded over one hundred thousand soldiers in Iraq.

Dear Republicans it is your call. You want to continue to support this madness iy will be the end of your part and by god you will richly deserve it. I for one has lost patience with this entire enterprise. You march like Robots nehind Bush, and the man is an incompetent fool so is your call Republicans.

When Mercury is Direct

Communicate: A good time to write important letters and death threats, sign contracts, express yourself, buy a car, get suckered into a 5 year service contract worth shite, publish and advertise your desire to counteract the steady chlorinization of all large bodies of potable water, make important phone calls, plan or take a trip.

Jeez! First the guy insults me and then he seeks advice on salesmanship!

When Mercury is Retrograde

Use an extra dose of clarity, caution and pet care pertaining to travel and toxic levels of Flexiril in the blood stream, especially when delivered by car, communications of any kind, contracts, sending letters, small bulbs, wax bonnets, and publishing.

If you can avoid the above until the retrograde period ends that’s even better.

Calculated for Eastern time zones, 5 hours and several minutes later, there was a definite effacing of the high sheen porcelain finish as most of the night’s previous bounty of chipped beef didn’t quite make it to the bowl.

A healthy dose of clarity in this consciousness journey for the young at heart and the hard of hearing. Two alternate areas of hysteria: Things I understand and Things I Do Not Understand Too Well Yet.

Captain Jutta is the navigator who charts our living miracle of beauty, love, and floppy sacks: The mind and cosmic energy on bass. The organ called the brain. The brain waves bye-bye, vapid eye movement exercises, jumper cables and spiritual Roto-Rooter.

Any yet virtually no-one answers the call, do they?

What, population of 1.5 billion, total deaths in the US homeland 3000 odd.

If Rev.Phelps called for the murder of all homosexuals because the Bible justified it, how many Christians would respond? Not very damn many. Same with Muslims. Invade their country, yeah, they’ll fight. Otherwise you get a few select nutcases.

This isn’t optimism or hiding my head in the sand, it is observation of the last 5 years.

It simply isn’t the case that Islam is some unitary ideology that commands all believers to go medieval. And the proof of that is the extreme rarity of cases like the Fort Dix episode. There are many, many Muslims in the U.S. and very, very little terrorism. Claiming that every member of a large and heterogenous group harbors the same malevolent essence is pretty much a definition of racist thinking. How does this paranoia make anybody safer? After all, if, as a garden-variety Muslim, I’m going to be despised anyhow, I might as well live up to the stereotype imposed upon me.

“Until this singular fact sinks in on the left and among our elites, we will be fighting the War on Terror with one hand tied behind our backs. I’ve written extensively about the absolute need to get the western left fully engaged in this fight. But as long as they continue to use the War on Terror as a purely political issue or their own stupidity blinds them to the danger, we cannot and will not win.”

This fight is larger than just the Muslims.

I cannot speak for “lefties” everywhere, particularly as I disagree with “lefties” almost as often as I disagree with “righties”. However, I’ll share my perspective on the “War on Terror”.

Since before recorded history, groups of humans have been killing each other for a variety of reasons. In the past few hundred years, the definition of the modern nation-state has meant that the action of killing the civilians in another group has been divided into two categories: war and murder (or genocide). A sub-category of murder is terrorism. When a nation-state declares a war, we can kill civilians and its okay (as long as we pretty much follow the rules). If we don’t declare a war, or if we break the rules too much, then we consider ourselves (people) to have committed murder, genocide, or war-crimes. I like these categories, and find them useful.

My problem with the “War on Terror”, besides the whole “War on [class of phenomenon]” issue, is that we are not seeking to create a world system where the rule of law is supreme and civilians are only killed on a large scale in declared wars. We are actually doing several things at the same time:
1. Occupying central Asia and acquiring control of valuable oil reserves.
2. Attempting nation-building in two (at the moment) violently chaotic areas.
3. Attempting to prevent any Muslims from killing US citizens (or, presumably, citizens of other countries, though I’m not clear on that).

Although I disagree with the necessity and the choice of strategy for 1 and 2, I’m happy to go along with 3. I’d just like to make it more inclusive — attempt to prevent anyone, including Muslims, from killing people on a large scale without first declaring a war. I’m not sure about the best way to do it, although I favor a mix of “global Marshall Plan” to reduce the poverty and related disorder that inspires violent genocide like that of Rwanda or Nazi Germany, and an international treaty organization with criminal enforcement powers (yes, it’s the world government, sorry). Of course, that treaty organization would be completely irrelevant to most of the mass murders in the States in recent years: school shootings, Oklahoma bombings, and our various violent homegrown religious extremists.

You may say I’m not enough of a “lefty” to qualify for your comment, but I have heard similar things from those who consider themselves deeply left wing.

To sum up: IMO, many “lefties” are deeply concerned by large scale killing, whatever inspires it; the fairly smart ones I know regard most activity promoted under the “War on Terror” as a dangerous distraction from the issues that really make us either safe or at risk.