The left is so heavily invested in defeat that it is a shibboleth/mantra in their campaign rhetoric. As in Vietnam, they may play an active role in bringing about American defeat, even though Petraeus’s strategy is beginning to get results.

I don’t know how others play this particular game, Rick, but I will tell you the truth about BitsBlog; it’s very seldom indeed, then I have tried to promote one of my posts by emailing other bloggers. perhaps this explains why my hit rates are not nearly what I think they should be. The reason I haven’t done it, is it has always struck me as seeking approval from people you’re competing with.

For my part, I speak my mind, and let it go at that. I am active on other people’s Blogs for the same reason. If somebody else is going my way, that’s just fine. If not, see ya. But I notice a certain talk show host who shall remain nameless, within the studios of WSB has taken note of your efforts. That’s not a bad thing. What that notice suggests is, people are starting to take this medium seriously. But perhaps you need to study a little more closely why it is they do so… And perhaps the best way to do that, is to examine what would happen without power being here. Believe me when I tell you, there are those in government who are hitting the prayer mats every night for just such an occurrence. imagine with me, the results of taking Beauchamp at his word with no resistance. what kind of image would be sent into the minds of the average American? What kind of image would be sent into the minds of our military in the rest of the world? Trust me what I tell you that’s precisely why the article was written and printed. Make no mistake; these people are working for the other side.

It is precisely because of the incidents like this Beauchamp affair that we in Blogdom are being taken seriously. Far from such Blog Swarms being a BAD thing, I will guarantee you that going forward for the least a little while the media will take fact checking very seriously indeed. TNR got caught with their pants down on this one. Again. To the extent that my adding on my little voice to that particular pig pile help that process along, I consider it a good thing. Certainly, it is better than the absence of that kind of pressure. Glenn would call it an Army of Davids.

TNR’s editorial process is badly flawed, and in running this series, they not only got more than they bargained for, but besmirched the US Army based on the fabrications of a soldier who was provided an unfettered outlet for his fictionalized account….

he WH and the Pentagon put out the first reports about Lynch “fighting until she was out of bullets.”

No they didn’t. Take a look at the record, not your memory. There are no press releases by either the White House or the Pentagon to that effect. It was all based on Schmidt and Loeb’s fairy tale. There was nothing from the White House and the Pentagon kept saying “the facts weren’t yet known” and there were “rumors.”

The WH and the Pentagon put out the first reports about Lynch “fighting until she was out of bullets.” There was susequent hyping by the press, but good God, don’t give the Pentagon a pass. They waited weeks to refute the hero story officially - just like with Tillman, only uglier becauser they lied to his family - and the WaPo was one of the papers questioning the story before they came clean.

Take for instance the story about the March 23, 2003, capture in Iraq of Pvt. Jessica Lynch. Henry Waxman’s House Oversight Committee recently investigated this story (along with the Pat Tilman episode) concentrating on Ms. Lynch and the Pentagon and White House PR surrounding the “legend” status of Ms. Lynch.

The basis of Ms. Lynch’s legend came from an unknown “official” used by Susan Schmidt and Vernon Loeb of the Washington Post. “Several” other “officials” cautioned that the facts weren’t yet known, and “Pentagon officials” said reports of Lynch’s gun-firing heroics were only “rumors.”

House Oversight skipped over the fact that there was no hyping press from either the White House or Pentagon, as Rep. Waxman left the “urban legend” of their propaganda remain intact. As to the sloppy reporting by The Washington Post, Schmidt and Loeb were never called to talk about their ‘heroic adventure’ story that got all the other inaccurate reports going.