Right Wing Nut House

I’m late to this story on Michael Ware, the CNN reporter who supposedly “heckled” Senators McCain and Graham in Baghdad during their press conference. The Powerline boys have been all over the story, including an interview with Soledad O’Brien where Ware denies the story.

Ware was reported to have laughed and mocked comments being made by Graham and McCain while the press conference was underway. In the O’Brien interview, he denies heckling anyone and, given my understanding of the word, I would be forced to agree with him if all he did was act like an ass, laughing and carrying on during the presser. If he had shouted out from the audience and interrupted the press conference, that would have been considered “heckling.” So it appears that Drudge doesn’t know what the word means - not surprising since it isn’t the first time his headlines have failed to jive with the story being reported.

Ware claims he never got to ask a question and, in fact, just as he raised his hand to do so, the press conference ended. Since Ware knows the tape of the presser is going to be shown and scrutinized, one would have to say at this point that he is telling the truth - at least the truth as he perceives it to be.

But I also believe that the story itself is true; that Ware - an irreverent sort of fellow who tries to project the hard-bitten, world-weary, cynical war reporter image - no doubt laughed and mocked the politicians who were trying to put the best face on what is still a very dicey situation in Baghdad. NBC aired a report that McCain’s claims of being able to walk freely through a Baghdad market - about 3 minutes across the Tigris river from the Green Zone - were something less than honest. He was surrounded by 100 American soldiers and screened by 3 Blackhawk helicopters and 2 Apache gunships. The left and the press is having a field day with this info, never mentioning the fact that John McCain is a serious candidate for President of the United States and that this kind of security is not only necessary but expected.

Beyond that, it’s foolish of McCain or the military to make any sweeping generalizations about the security situation in Baghdad based on westerners being able to walk around without worry or even playing the body count game and pointing to reduced civilian deaths. If this is how we are going to judge the surge, the terrorists and insurgents will make absolutely dead sure that we will fail. They will do this by setting off the biggest bombs in the most crowded areas guaranteeing that even though the number of attacks will go way down, the body count won’t.

And it doesn’t matter if General Petreaus or John McCain or any westerner can saunter around in a market without getting killed. What matters is faith. What matters is whether the surge along with political initiatives by Prime Minister Maliki will begin restoring the people’s faith in the government. Iraq is a mess not just because of the insurgency or the terrorists. There is a sectarian war underway that has smashed the body politic in Iraq, making people who lived side by side in neighborly friendship for decades to look at each other with hate. What the surge is doing is giving the government the breathing room to show that it can work for all Iraqis and that each and every citizen has a stake in Iraq’s future.

There are tiny indications that this, in fact, is occurring. The market where McCain (and Iraqis) are able to walk around for a few minutes without getting blown up is a sign of that restoration of faith. So are the previously shuttered businesses cautiously opening up. So is the trickle of Iraqis moving back into houses where just a few months ago they had fled for their lives in terror from sectarian gangs. There are nearly 750,000 of these internal refugees - a monumental problem that won’t be solved anytime soon. But the government is addressing it. They are giving each of these refugees a $2,000 stipend if they wish to move back in to their houses - looted and gutted some of them. As for houses that are occupied by squatters, they are also offering the squatters funds to move back to their own abode.

In a very real way, Senator McCain was correct when he said that the American people are not getting the full story of what is happening since the surge began in Iraq. But it’s not information about reduced attacks on civilians or fewer sectarian murders that is the real story - although we shouldn’t dismiss them entirely. The real story is what is happening below the surface among the people; a slow, painful, tentative walkback from the abyss of civil war and sectarian conflict. Our military cannot affect this aspect of the struggle directly. But their efforts are having an affect, that much is clear.

And thinking about all this got me to thinking about Michael Ware and his behavior at that presser. Now I know what you’re saying. “Don’t think, Ricky it will only make your head explode. You’re going to overthink this Ware deal and get everyone upset with you.”

If you’re thinking that, you’re probably correct. But I was thinking that Ware has been in Iraq off and on for years, reporting on the absolute worst of it. The death and destruction that one car bomb can generate scars some people for life. Ware has seen dozens of these attacks - the dead and dying, the body parts of children, the screams of anguish from the bereaved and screams of pain from the horribly wounded.

And, by his own admission, he drinks. He drinks to forget. He drinks to anesthetize himself. He drinks out of boredom, or of bravado, or just to drink. Perhaps he was drunk at the press conference. More likely, he is simply weary of seeing politicians - both pro and anti war - who spend their days in safety sitting in Washington D.C., coming to Iraq and making grand pronouncements about “the way things really are.” He may agree with the anti-war position but I’ll bet he holds those Democratic politicians in equal contempt.

No doubt he wears his bias as a badge of honor. But his towering cynicism is actually a defense mechanism that protects him from having to feel for the tens of thousands of innocents who have been slaughtered in this conflict. Perhaps he feels morally superior to the rest of us. But there is little doubt the war has affected his judgement and made him useless as an objective observer.

CNN should recall Mr. Ware and never send him back. He has done an impossible job in an impossible place for far too long. It’s time to bring Michael Ware home.

UPDATE

Allah points to a Raw Story piece with the video from the presser that seems to confirm Ware’s denial.

And the video doesn’t show Ware laughing and mocking McCain and Graham either. Despite this, Paul at Powerline calls Ware an “advocate” and that he should be withdrawn by CNN immediately.

Ware’s hyperbole - normally part of his schtick along with his heavy Australian accent - seems to me to be getting worse. You have to admire the guy’s dedication to get the story. But I still think he’s been there too long and that his cynicism is interfering with his reporting.

Spurned at the UN when they asked for a strong condemnation of Iran for taking British military personnel as hostages and helplessly watching as the European Union denied their plea to enact sanctions, Great Britain finds itself alone - out on a diplomatic limb with nothing to do but grovel before Ahmadinejad and humiliate themselves in asking for the return of their people:

Last night, there were reports ministers are planning a compromise solution to the crisis, which would see a Royal Navy captain, commondore or special government envoy sent to Tehran to publicly assure the Iranians the Royal Navy will never knowingly enter Iranian waters without gaining permission.

Margaret Beckett, the Foreign Secretary, has called on Tehran to negotiate an end to the detention of the 15 British soldiers and Marines Iran claims strayed into its waters nine days ago. She told reporters: “The message I want to send is that I think everyone regrets this position has arisen. What we want is a way out of it.”

President George Bush called yesterday for the release of the sailors, describing their capture as “inexcusable behaviour”. He said: “Iran must give back the hostages, they’re innocent, and they did nothing wrong.”

The Shatt-al-Arab waterway, we are told, has no internationally recognized boundaries. Except the Brits are now going to recognize Iran’s claim to a portion of them by promising not to enter those waters again, clearly acknowledging Iranian sovereignty. At whose expense? The government of Iraq’s expense. By announcing to the world that Iran was correct not only in taking their sailors hostage but in delineating a boundary also claimed by Iraq (unless the Brits want to disavow their dog and pony show last weekend with the charts and GPS coordinates), then their little plan to surrender to the Iranian fanatics has dealt a huge blow to Iraqi claims of ownership of those waters.

“Mistress of the Seas” indeed.

The Blair government won’t come out and say that the Iranians were right in kidnapping their people. But by saying they won’t “tresspass” again, they are implicitly making the Iranian seizure of their people an act of self defense thus justifying the snatch in the eyes of everyone who wants to see it that way. This includes most of the European and American left as well as much of the developing world who always enjoy the opportunity to stick it to a former colonial oppressor.

You can hardly blame Great Britain for taking this line in the crisis. The world has pretty much abandoned them. Where a week ago, the Brits were looking to internationalize the crisis, they have done a complete 180 and are now engaged in bilateral talks - much to the delight of the Iranians:

Des Browne said: “We are anxious that this matter be resolved as quickly as possible and that it be resolved by diplomatic means.

“It’s not my intention to go through the detail of that blow by blow, and it wouldn’t be appropriate to do that, but we are in direct bilateral communication with the Iranians.”

Sky’s Foreign Affairs Editor Tim Marshall said the comments could be significant, as Iran has been angry that Britain has taken the issue to the United Nations.

It has felt “this is only a bilateral disagreement, ie only between the two countries and it didn’t require intermediaries.

“If Mr Browne chose his words very carefully then the word bilateral was a deliberate use to show everybody that we are dealing with it bilaterally.

“It seems they are edging towards each other.”

That may be true. But Ahmadinejad has made it clear that any resolution of the crisis will be spun as a tremendous victory and a humiliation for a “great power:”

Suggesting the diplomatic standoff was not near a solution, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad underlined Iranian displeasure that Britain had turned to the Security Council and the European Union for support over the detentions.

“After the arrest of these people, the British government, instead of apologizing and expressing regret, over the action taken, started to claim that we are in their debt and shouted in different international councils,” Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying by state radio.

“But this is not the legal and logical way for this issue,” he said in a speech to a rally in Khuzestan, a province on the Iraqi border area where the Britons were seized.

And what would an Iranian hostage crisis be without the obligatory demonstrations at the offending nation’s embassy:

Iranian students threw rocks and firecrackers at the British Embassy in central Tehran today during a rowdy protest over 16 detained sailors and Marines.

Witnesses reported hearing up to eight small blasts and seeing smoke rising from inside the Embassy compound but a spokesman for the Foreign Office said that nobody had been hurt and nothing was damaged during the protest.

Reports from the Iranian capital were confused but at least 200 students and hardliners staged a rowdy protest outside the Embassy, throwing rocks and firecrackers, although they were prevented by police from entering the compound. A report that they also threw petrol bombs could not be confirmed.

The student, who were said to belong to the hardline Basij volunteer militia, chanted “Death to Britain” and “Death to America” and demanded punishment for the sailors for alleged illegal entry into Iranian waters nine days ago. Britain insists that the group, who were on routine anti-smuggling patrols, were clearly in Iraqi territorial waters.

All we appear to be missing in order to enjoy a stroll down memory lane is the hostages being paraded blindfolded in front of the cameras.

Clearly military action is out. And for the British government so is, evidently, sticking to their original position of demanding their people’s release without apologizing or acknowledging error. But when the rest of the world refuses to stand behind you, it can get quite lonely standing on principle.

Is it culturally bigoted to compare the Iranian mullahs to Persian rug merchants? (Note: According to this site, referring to an Arab as a rug merchant is considered racist. Since everyone knows that Persians are not Arabs - just ask any Arab who remembers every Persian invasion over the last 1000 years - I think I’m on safe ground with the language Nazis of the left.)

If the shoe fits…

Actually, the entire British hostage episode is turning into something of a rug merchant joke, reminiscent of haggling in a bazaar over the price of a piece of carpet only to have the merchant raise the price after you agree to his final offer. “Ah! But this is a special carpet with magical properties,” says the merchant. “Surely you wouldn’t mind paying a bit more for a carpet that flies, no?”

And that’s just about where the Brits are with the Iranians at this point in the drama, as the mullahs, after saying they would let the female hostage go today, appear to have reneged on that promise and have now upped the price by saying that Tony Blair’s government must grovel before Darius and the mighty Persians:

Iran may delay the release of the female British sailor if Britain takes the issue to the U.N. Security Council or freezes relations, the country’s top negotiator Ali Larijani said Thursday.

Speaking on Iranian state radio, Larijani said: “British leaders have miscalculated this issue.”

If Britain follows through with its policies on the 15 British sailors and marines detained by Iran last week, Larijani said “this case may face a legal path” - a clear reference to Iran’s prosecuting the sailors in court.

How have the Brits “miscalculated?” They actually believed the Iranians when they said they would release the woman. That was mistake number one. Their second mistake was not seeing this coming a mile away; the beginning of the attempt to humiliate Great Britain:

Iran’s foreign minister said Wednesday that Britain must admit that its 15 sailors and marines entered Iranian waters in order to resolve a standoff over their capture by the Mideast nation.

Manouchehr Mottaki’s statement in an interview with The Associated Press came on a day of escalating tensions, highlighted by an Iranian video of the detained Britons that showed the only woman captive saying her group had “trespassed” in Iranian waters. Britain angrily denounced the video as unacceptable and froze most dealings with the Mideast nation.

The Iranian official also backed off a prediction that the female sailor, Faye Turney, could be freed Wednesday or Thursday, but said Tehran agreed to allow British officials to meet with the detainees.

Mottaki said that if the alleged entry into Iranian waters was a mistake “this can be solved. But they have to show that it was a mistake. That will help us to end this issue.”

Please note the escalation of Iranian demands the longer this thing goes on. They apparently are seeking a replay of the American hostage drama from 27 years ago when the students would come out every couple of months with an ever changing, ever shifting set of demands that would have to be met before we got our people back. Then, just as the Carter Administration would buckle, the students would up the ante. How many times did President Carter or one of his aides announce the imminent end to the hostage drama only to have negotiations blow up in their faces when the Iranians shifted gears and add another “condition” to the release of our diplomats?

The question should be asked why the Brits should acknowledge something that isn’t true:

In London, British military officials released new information about the seizure, saying satellite positioning readings showed the vessels were 1.7 nautical miles inside Iraqi waters.

Vice Adm. Charles Style gave the satellite coordinates as 29 degrees 50.36 minutes north latitude and 48 degrees 43.08 minutes east longitude. He said that position had been confirmed by an Indian-flagged merchant ship boarded by the sailors and marines.

He also told reporters the Iranians had provided a geographical position Sunday that he said was in Iraqi waters. By Tuesday, he said, Iranian officials had given a revised position 2 miles to the east, inside Iranian waters.

“It is hard to understand a legitimate reason for this change of coordinates,” Style said.

Wonderful British understatement! The Iranians provide a position that clearly shows the men were in Iraqi waters but when they realize they goofed, they pretend the first set of numbers were never released and simply make sh*t up.

To be completely accurate, the boundaries for the Shatt-al-Arab waterway where the Brits were kidnapped has been in dispute for centuries. The problem for the Iranians is that the Brits were clearly in Iraqi territorial waters under a mandate from the UN (UN SEC RES 1723) and at the invitation of the Iraqi government. The waterway is a bone of contention between Iraq and Iran and was one of numerous issues that led to the Iran-Iraq War in 1980. But the British sailors were in internationally recognized waters belonging to Iraq. Of this, there is no doubt.

But such minor details like what actually happened don’t trouble the Iranians. They have much bigger fish to fry. They have a western nation to humiliate and make an example of and nothing is going to stand in the way of that goal.

So far, the Blair government has been firm but not bellicose. Fat lot of good that did them when the Iranians, sensing weakness, now threaten to put the sailors on trial unless the Brits grovel before them and tell the world what everyone knows to be false; that they were in Iranian waters when they were illegally taken.

I fully expect the UN to issue what passes for ringing denunciations. In UNese, this means calling on “both parties” to exercise restraint while politely suggesting to the Iranian thugs holding the sailors that they be good sports and not be too beastly to the Brit hostages. And if they could see their way clear to letting them go, they would have the eternal gratitude of the UN - something the Iranians might find a little ironic since the Security Council has just slapped a few more sanctions on their heads for trying to build a nuclear bomb.

There are some whispers coming out of western capitals that this latest hostage grab is actually a symptom of a power struggle within the Iranian government. Ahmadinejad may have felt his power ebbing away and decided on carrying out an operation guaranteed to whip the population into a frenzy of patriotic feeling. Meanwhile, the less radical faction (I just can’t bring myself to call some of these galoots “moderates”) led by former presidents Ayatollah Rafsanjani and Mohammad Khatami who favor engaging the west in some kind of dialogue are trapped. If they criticize Ahmadinejad, they risk losing support of the people. If they support him, Ahmadinejad has bought himself some breathing room.

No matter whether this has anything to do with internal Iranian politics, the Brits are up against it. If this thing starts to drag on, Blair may find himself “Carterized” - shown to be impotent in the face of naked aggression. This would only embolden Iran and could lead to other hostage situations involving not only the Brits, but the United States as well.

And what about our response? Two carrier battle groups are launching F-18’s 24 hours a day, roaring off the decks and making a huge show of force. Would George Bush launch a strike against Iranian nuke and oil facilities? Not while the Brits are hostages. And this raises the question of the timing of this grab. I mentioned here that some analysts around the world think that the US is preparing to strike Iran sometime in April of this year. The Iranians can read the papers too which may mean they are hedging their bets. Sure would be awkward if the Iranians placed those Brits in various strategic sites around the country as human shields.

That last was rank speculation but the question is valid; would we attack even without the permission of the Brits? I don’t think George Bush would risk getting Blair mad at him so that option is off the table. For the moment, we wait. And the British sailors also wait to hear if their country sacrifices honor and truth just to get them back or whether Blair stands firm and, with the rest of the world behind him, gets the Iranians to back down and release the hostages.

UPDATE

Allah has an update that Blair will ask the UN to urge the Iranians to release the hostages immediately.

What’s very strange is that there is a “debate” scheduled for today in the Security Council.

It may seem a little forward of me to ask, them being high falutin diplomats and all, but who, praytell, is going to take the position in this “debate” that Iran is within their rights to hold 15 foreign nationals who even the Iranian government admitted on Sunday (later changing the lat/long to reflect the lie that they were picked up in Iranian waters) were in Iraqi territorial waters engaged in activity mandated by the UN and approved by the Iraqi government?

Further, if the debater is going to make the case that the Brits were engaged in “espionage,” they are going to have to explain why the sailors were boarding an Indian-flagged dhou looking for contraband in broad daylight when they were kidnapped and not sneaking around at night watching Iranian military posts and the like.

Sounds like a job for the late Johnny Cochrane or maybe the Monty Python guys could do something with it.

The British hostage “crisis” is proving to be a real eye opener both for London’s allies and any potential adversary. In fact, in some ways the British response to this outrageous and provocative act of war by Iran has been truly frightening - a sense that for a variety of reasons, the British people and their government are sleepwalking through history, living a dream that reality cannot intrude upon.

Reading the British papers, an American is struck by the fact that there is very little outrage among most of the population - at least as it is reported. Daily Mail columnist Melanie Phillips has noticed the same thing:

Yet in its response to these events, Britain seems to be in some kind of dreamworld. There is no sense of urgency or crisis, no outpouring of anger. There seems to be virtually no grasp of what is at stake.

Some commentators have languidly observed that in another age this would have been regarded as an act of war. What on earth are they talking about? It is an act of war. There can hardly be a more blatant act of aggression than the kidnapping of another country’s military personnel.

What clearly does belong to another age is this country’s ability to understand the proper way to respond to an act of war. When his Marines were seized by the Iranians, the commander of HMS Cornwall, Commodore Nick Lambert, did nothing to stop them and later said it was probably all a misunderstanding. If Nelson had been such a diplomat in such circumstances, Trafalgar would surely have been lost.

The reaction brings to mind the London bombings on 7/7/05. I wrote something similar at that time:

From much of the reaction I’ve seen, with the exception of most politicians (who will probably wait until after the funerals to begin their Bush-Blair bashing) the reaction of the average Brit has underwhelmed me and left me with a sense that the Great Britain of today is a far cry from the Great Britain of my father’s day.

Would the British population of today stood up to Hitler? Would they have stuck with Churchill? Or would they have accepted Hitler’s “peace” offer that the Nazi dictator gave prior to the start of the Battle of Britain which guaranteed British sovereignty?

The Brits back then didn’t even bother to respond. In fact, the BBC gave an eloquent response rejecting Hitler’s offer without even consulting the government. Now that was a spirit of resistance.

It’s clear to me that something has gone out of Great Britain in the last decade or so. I am not accusing them of cowardice. Rather it appears to be a disease infecting most of the western world; a curious, debilitating loss of faith in the beliefs and values that animated the west for nearly 4 centuries. Some of those beliefs were pernicious to be sure; a feeling of superiority over the benighted savages in Africa and Asia, a nauseating self righteousness that allowed all sorts of despicable practices like slavery and colonialism to become commonplace, and a moral blindness regarding the effect of many of our policies on the developing world.

But dwelling on the sins of the west ignores the truly remarkable achievements that have accrued to all of humanity as a result of western dominance of the planet. People are living longer and healthier lives despite widespread poverty. Many diseases that scourged the world for centuries - smallpox, malaria, polio, to name a few - have been wiped out or dramatically decreased. Literacy is commonplace. Agriculture has been revolutionized. Communications, travel, education - all have been transformed in third world societies as a direct result of contact with western nations.

But the deadening effect of the guilt ridden western left that so dominates the media and culture in Europe and America have so cowed the leadership, the opinion makers, and ordinary citizens that even when attacked, people sit and wonder if they are at fault for “provoking” such an act.

Ms. Phillips sees an even more immediate and specific cause of Britain’s lack of outrage:

Twenty-five years ago, we re-took the Falklands after the Argentines invaded. Faced with an act of war against our dependency, Mrs Thatcher had no hesitation. Aggression had to be fought and our people defended. It was the right thing to do.

Can anyone imagine Mrs T wringing her hands in this way over Iran’s seizure of our Marines?

True, we are now living in very different times. Personally, I supported the Iraq war, and still do. But the undoubted mistakes and disasters made by the coalition since the fall of Saddam have caused this country to throw up its hands over the whole issue of aggression by the Arab and Muslim world.

As a result, many in Britain are failing to see the big picture. Iraq is merely one theatre in a global war which threatens us and in which Iran is a major player.

And Arthur Herman is even more blunt:

Britain has been an exception. In places like Bosnia and the Persian Gulf, and in operations like Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom, its help has been solid and genuine, as well as important in a symbolic sense. America always looks better when a couple of frigates flying the Royal Navy’s White Ensignare side by side with those flying the Stars and Stripes. U.S. sailors also know that in a real fight, the men of the Royal Navy, which our navy men still call the “Senior Service,” will never let them down.

That contribution has never been vital to America - yet it was a badge of honor for Britain. It had echoes of past glory as an empire, of course, but also of Britain’s historic role as protector of a civilized and stable world order, and specifically the role of the Royal Navy. The British navy had wiped out the slave trade; it had single-handedly defied tyrants from Louis XIV and Napoleon to Hitler; and it served as midwife to the ideas of free trade and the balance of power.

Now those days are gone for good. Yet, if today’s Britons thought that by shedding that historic responsibility they could buy themselves some peace of mind, the current hostage crisis has just proved them wrong

What will it take for Britain and the rest of the western world to wake up? A better question might be is there anything that will accomplish that goal? Have Britain and Europe fallen into a permanent stupor, a languid state of denial and equivocation that will spell the end of the great alliance between America and Europe, allowing the enemies of democracy to simply grow themselves into a majority?

A change of course is desperately needed. Who will lead it and will the people follow are two questions that, at present, cannot be answered with any confidence much less certainty.

The Senate today rejected an amendment that would have stripped all mention of a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq in the emergency funding bill.

The 50-48 vote defeating an amendment by Thad Cochrane of Mississippi was notable if only because it shows how confused the situation in the Senate is. The measure would require our troops start leaving in 120 days but not lay down a specific timetable for the withdrawal, using March 31, 2008 as a non binding date for our bug out to be complete.

The vote came after the White House reiterated President Bush’s threat to veto any bill that sets deadlines for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.

In intensive floor debate before the vote, supporters of the amendment argued that including a deadline for withdrawal from Iraq — even though it is put forth in the Senate bill as a nonbinding “goal” — would hand victory to America’s enemies, while opponents of it said it was time to stop giving President Bush a “blank check” to continue a failed war policy.

Also, the benchmarks that would measure progress by the Iraqi government are also non binding which raises the question of why the hell add them in the first place.

The bill is at odds with the House version that sets actual binding dates for our withdrawal tied to specific benchmarks. But chances are, a House-Senate conference will come up with language that makes either the start or ending of our withdrawal a requirement for the funds to be disbursed with the benchmarks either gone or non binding.

Senator McCain cut short some campaign appearances to show up in the floor of the Senate and give a pretty stirring speech:

In debate on the Senate floor, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) argued strongly against setting a timetable for troop withdrawal, saying a new strategy to secure Baghdad through a “surge” of U.S. combat troops is “succeeding.” He told the Senate, “What we must not do is to give up just at the moment we’re starting to turn things around in Iraq.”

Setting a timetable “risks a catastrophe for American national security interests,” said McCain, who canceled a series of fundraisers in Florida for his presidential campaign to return to Washington for today’s expected close vote.

“This legislation is a plan for failure,” McCain said of the underlying bill. “It demonstrates to the [Iraqi] government that they cannot rely on us. It tells the terrorists that they, not we, will prevail.”

A certain Bush veto will dump the problem right back into the laps of Reid and Pelosi at which point they will have a serious decision to make. Even though the American people support their idea of a timetable for withdrawal, the troops in the field only have enough funding through April 15th. After that, things start to get dicey for the troops and pressure will mount on the Democrats to give in to Bush in order to fund the troops. Do they dare play chicken with the Commander in Chief by refusing to pass a bill he can sign?

A better question might be can Bush work with Congressional Democrats to come up with language that both sides can agree on? Is he even willing to do so?

My guess is no, we won’t see the White House compromising one inch on a binding date for starting or ending the withdrawal. And since this is the Ur issue for most Congressional Democrats, there is a very real chance that April 15th will come and go without an emergency spending bill. Both sides will then concentrate on trying to shift blame for abandoning the troops on to the other - a most unedifying spectacle to be sure not to mention an extraordinarily dangerous game considering the consequences to the troops.

The only way this can be avoided is if Bush gets to work on some of the Blue Dog Democrats, reaching out to them to address some of their concerns. Ronald Reagan was able to do this on a regular basis with the “Boll Weevils” of his time and got much of what he wanted in the way of tax and budget cuts. But Bush has demonstrated a singular inability in the past to reach across the aisle and bring along wavering Democratic moderates on any issue. But with the stakes so high, he really ought to try.

Of course, Reid and Pelosi would crack the whip if they sensed any weakening of resolve on the part of a couple of Blue Dogs. And if there was any weakening of the language regarding the timetable, chances are Pelosi would also lose the support of some of the far left who voted for the measure the first time around even though they believed it didn’t go far enough.

At this point, it is difficult to see how to resolve the differences of the two sides. In the end, the necessity of funding the troops may make all of the political maneuvering moot and the President may get most of what he wants without the binding timetables but with benchmarks for the Iraqi government to meet. That’s the best the Democrats could hope for at this point.

For all the heartening news coming out of Iraq recently, there is a humanitarian crisis that threatens to completely overwhelm the ability of the Iraqis and the world community to deal with it.

I am talking about those Iraqi citizens who have been forced from their homes - usually at gun point - and forced to flee for their lives. Most often, the refugees make their way to a relatives home in another part of the country. The problem is that many of the smaller cities and towns in western Iraq where most of the Sunni refugees have gravitated are being overwhelmed. Social services are breaking down and there is a real danger of a humanitarian catastrophe.

To date, there have been around 730,000 Iraqis internally displaced since our invasion and occupation:

About 730,000 Iraqis have fled their homes since the beginning of 2006 and are facing increasing hardship inside Iraq, the UN refugee agency said on Tuesday.

Ron Redmond, a spokesman for the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), said that most of the displaced were now hemmed inside the conflict-riven country.

“Reaching help and safety in neighbouring countries is becoming increasingly difficult,” Redmond told journalists.

“Many of those who have fled to other parts of Iraq have run out of resources and host communities are also struggling to absorb increasing numbers of displaced,” he added.

The UNHCR estimates that up to 50,000 people are fleeing their homes every month.

An estimated 4.0 million people in Iraq are dependent on food assistance, while the rate of chronic malnutrition among children is 23 percent, Redmond said.

We broke it. It’s our responsibility to fix it.

When 23% of the children are showing signs of chronic malnutrition, it’s time to hit the panic button. At the very least, we should be bending every effort - cajoling, pleading, begging the international community to put aside their distaste for our invasion and occupation and recognize that only with a concerted effort on the part of all can innocent lives be saved.

Of late, Prime Minister Maliki has made getting some of these refugees back into their homes a priority - especially in the formerly mixed neighborhoods of Baghdad. When the Mahdi Army ruled the streets, they routinely moved into neighborhoods and ordered all the Sunnis to leave - usually within 24 hours.

But a new program initiated by Maliki could slowly start to reverse the flood and contribute to the healing and reconciliation process so vital to the re-establishment of Iraqi civil society:

At a time of epic displacement, Fuad Khamis has done something extraordinary: He has moved back home.

“When I arrived, I was overwhelmed and frightened at the same time,” says Khamis, a Sunni Arab taxi driver from Baghdad’s religiously mixed Sadiya neighborhood.

His house was damaged and there wasn’t a piece of furniture left. But the father of five says his Shiite neighbors have welcomed him back with hugs and kisses.

Encouraged by a major security clampdown that began Feb. 13, and reassurances from his neighbors, Khamis is one of the first to test Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki’s recent pledge to reverse the tide of sectarian “cleansing” sweeping Baghdad and move tens of thousands of people back home.

One of the major hurdles is a lack of resources to help the displaced move back in. And there are other problems with Maliki’s program:

Maliki has taken a tough line, labeling as terrorists everyone living in homes that were taken by force and informing parliament they would be arrested.

But the U.S. military, which is to contribute 17,500 troops to the Baghdad crackdown, says its forces won’t help the government evict squatters. U.S. officials believe it is a recipe for further abuses.

“It’s a no-win situation,” says Col. Douglass S. Heckman, senior U.S. advisor to the 9th Iraqi Army Division in east Baghdad.

Acknowledging the complications, Iraq’s Cabinet on Thursday gave occupants an extra two weeks to vacate the homes of the displaced or obtain written permission to remain.

Maliki’s government does not have the means to carry out a major resettlement program. Abdul Samad Sultan, minister of migration and displacement, expects many families will go home on their own once they see it is safe. They are being offered about $200 to help with the cost of the move. Apart from that, Sultan can only offer to issue badges allowing their return to contested areas and ask their erstwhile neighbors to write letters welcoming them back.

“I think that the Iraqi people have big hearts and can forgive the past,” Sultan says. “They have seen the results of violence.”

The more than 700,000 internally displaced people does not include the nearly 2 million refugees who have fled Iraq since the invasion. Coupled with another 2 million who left under Saddam, Iraq’s neighbors - especially Syria and Jordan - are having a difficult time caring for this human flood. Conditions in the Syrian refugee camps are said to be horrible and getting worse. The United Nations is giving what help it can but with these kind of numbers involved, only the western nations working together can alleviate that kind of suffering.

But with a huge problem being barely addressed in Darfur, the idea that the world will do anything to help with the refugee problems in Iraq is a chimera. Only steadfast and bold leadership from the United States can reverse the crisis. And sadly, as in other areas, the US is found wanting in that department.

With less than a day to go before a scheduled vote on funding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan takes place, the House Democratic leadership is scrambling to avoid an embarrassing defeat - largely as a result of a revolt by their far left wing:

One of the Democrats’ chief designated vote counters, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), is actively working against the Iraq war spending bill. The leadership’s senior chief deputy whip, Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), spoke passionately against it on the House floor. And one of the whip organization’s regional representatives, Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.), is implacably opposed.

The disarray in the House whipping operation ahead of tomorrow’s expected vote on the bill is putting a harsh spotlight on House Majority Whip James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.), who has the task of rounding up the 218 votes needed to pass the $124 billion measure, but who has not even kept his organization in line.

“There’s only one test, and that will be whether we get 218 on the board on Thursday,” said House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), who predicted that Clyburn will come through with the votes.

The problem for the far left Democrats is that by their lights, we’re not surrendering fast enough. While the measure calls for all American combat troops out of Iraq by the end of August next year regardless of the situation on the ground, the far left is feeling the pressure from the netnuts who are agitating for an end to the war now, right now, right this minute:

But Lewis has not been silent. In a speech Monday night on the House floor, he made his case as convincingly as he could.

“As a nation, can we hear the words of Gandhi, so simple, so true — that it’s either nonviolence or nonexistence? Can we hear the words of Martin Luther King Jr., saying that we must learn to live together as brothers and sisters or perish as fools?” Lewis asked. “Tonight, I must make it plain and clear, that as a human being, as a citizen of the world, as a citizen of America, as a member of Congress, and as an individual committed to a world at peace with itself, I will not and cannot vote for another dollar or another dime to support this war.”

That’s the spirit, Representative Lewis! Immediate and unconditional surrender. Perhaps we should start calling you “U.S. Lewis?”

The whips not only have problems with their comrades on the left, there are also quite a few Blue Dog Democrats who are uneasy about starting down the road of defunding the war while our troops are in the field:

Tanner, the Blue Dog representative on the chief deputy whip’s team, had been undecided until yesterday morning. Now that he is on board, he hastened to add that he is not about to start leaning on his Blue Dog colleagues. “I don’t ask people to vote on the leadership’s behalf, particularly on a vote like this,” he said.

Kristie Greco, a spokeswoman for Clyburn, said the Democrats’ whip organization is broad and diverse, precisely so that a few defections over policy would not affect the vote-counting operation. The days of lock-step discipline under the threat of retribution went out with the Republican majority, she said.

Spoken like a true loser, Kristie. It appears that the Democrats might try to turn their legislative defeat into a public relations triumph, highlighting their incompetence by comparing their failed efforts to whip the members into line with the Republican’s success on numerous issues. After all, does it really matter how the job gets done just as long as the desired result is achieved? The threats of retribution against recalcitrant Republicans didn’t lead to any of them defecting to the Democrats and until 2006, kept them in the majority. Of course, some of the underhanded parliamentary tricks used by the GOP House leadership helped in that regard. But the fact is, when push came to shove, the GOP whip operation almost always delivered.

Ultimately, competence in leadership is judged by how well the majority functions when confronted with the biggest issues of the day. It’s easy to get a majority for a non-binding resolution expressing opposition to the war. But when the leadership gets down to brass tacks on actually what terms of surrender they wish to offer the insurgents and al-Qaeda in Iraq, their left wing balks because we don’t drop our weapons and flee while the conservatives are wary that voting for any measure that contains a timetable may associate them with the crazies in their party.

If the Republicans were smart (a big “if”), they would allow the Democrats the honor of voting for a date certain to celebrate al-Qaeda’s victory. Otherwise, they may find themselves tarred with the same broad brush used to paint the Democrats as the defeatists they truly are.

UPDATE

According to The Victory Caucus, the Dems are buying the votes they need by spreading around some pork:

Dems’ seem to have decided that their Slow Bleed strategy (v.018) won’t actually have a chance of passing on its own merits, and so they need to play Let’s Make A Deal. In other words: find a bunch of morally confused Congresscritters who think their districts absolutely must have some nice juicy pork projects, and bring ‘em the bacon, baby!

It’s a great plan, really, except for the fact that it assumes that we’re still stuck somewhere in the 1970’s and such deals can be made in secret between chummy confederates wearing disturbingly wide-collared suits made entirely of synthetic fabrics while boogying down to Disco Inferno on the old 8-track. Turns out that here in Two-Thousand-And-Seven, such an approach works: not so much.

Why? Because of you, silly! The empowered citizen, given the ability by these wonderful Internets to actually read the actual words of the actual bills that your elected Representatives are actually planning on actually passing in your name. You can help us point the spotlight on the deals that are being made with this “emergency” spending bill. You can highlight the shady bargains being made by the Democratic leadership to help put lipstick on the pork-laden pig that this vitally important bill to fund our troops in harm’s way has become.

The guys over at VC need your help in identifying every piece of pork going into this supplemental spending bill. Go to the link above and follow their instructions.

History ended yesterday. Or at least one version of it. Or perhaps it didn’t end as much as it was overthrown, trampled by the feet of 30,000 ordinary Americans who gathered on the mall and along the broad avenues in Washington to confront those who have, either wittingly or witlessly, given aid and comfort to the enemies of the United States for more than 40 years.

The rancid ideology that has swaggered across the American landscape since Viet Nam (posturing a moral superiority they never proved nor deserved) as ordinary Americans looked on with a growing sense of outrage was quite simply, shown up - bested by an amalgam of military veterans, conservative activists, and just plain folks whose numbers shocked the media, not to mention the anti-everything protestors from the other side.

I can’t come up with anything similar that has occurred in recent American history. During World Wars I and II there were massive rallies for war bonds but that was something else entirely. This was a protest to counter defeatism and the ideology of self-loathing that has had the national stage pretty much to itself for a generation or more. And it showed that while many Americans have no doubt been disheartened and discouraged by what has been happening in Iraq these last 4 years, there is still a considerable number of us who believe it worthwhile to continue the mission in that bloody country until the Iraqis are able to secure their future free from the threat of terrorists and rogue militias.

God, how I wish I could have been there:

As war protesters marched toward Arlington Memorial Bridge en route to the Pentagon yesterday, they were flanked by long lines of military veterans and others who stood in solidarity with U.S. troops and the Bush administration’s cause in Iraq. Many booed loudly as the protesters passed, turned their backs to them or yelled, “If you don’t like America, get out!”

Several thousand vets, some of whom came by bus from New Jersey, car caravans from California or flights from Seattle or Michigan, lined the route from the bridge and down 23rd Street, waving signs such as “War There Or War Here.” Their lines snaked around the corner and down several blocks of Constitution Avenue in what organizers called the largest gathering of pro-administration counter-demonstrators since the war began four years ago.

The vets turned both sides of Constitution into a bitter, charged gantlet for the war protesters. “Jihadists!” some vets screamed. “You’re brain-dead!” Others chanted, “Workers World traitors must hang!” — a reference to the Communist newspaper. Some broke into “The Star-Spangled Banner” as war protesters sought to hand out pamphlets.

Not very elevating dialogue but the point was made. And taking into consideration what was coming from the other side, the pro troops gathering sounded positively rational:

40 years ago there was a march on the Pentagon and here we are 40 years later with a march on the Pentagon and another illegal and immoral war.

I don’t want to be marching when I’m 90 years old in 2047 in another illegal and immoral war.

Let’s stop this Bullsh*t, now!

Do you know why our countires get into these bullsh*t wars all of the time?
It’s for the corporations!

It’s for the corporations like Halliburton and Exxon and Blackwater and to make them rich.

It’s to line the pockets of George Bush and Dick Cheney and all the war criminals…

That was from Mother Sheehan, Goddess of Peace, Catalyst for the Anti-War Movement, and certifiable loon.

And speaking of the anti-war “movement,” the last couple of gatherings they’ve had have gotten progressively smaller. Is this the best they can do?

Organizers, who had predicted tens of thousands of marchers would demonstrate, gave estimates ranging from 15,000 to 30,000. Police no longer provide official estimates of crowd size but informally put it at 10,000 to 20,000, with a smaller but sizable contingent of counter-protesters.

War protest leaders said a large winter storm that hit the Northeast hurt turnout. More than 60 bus loads of protesters who had been scheduled to come from the region canceled their trips Friday night, according to Brian Becker, national coordinator for the Answer Coalition, the event’s main sponsor.

Oh yeah? I guess the weather only stops you if you’re not committed enough:

It was quickly apparent that the weather had not prevented counter-demonstrators, many in black leather motorcycle jackets, from showing up in force and surrounding all sides of the Wall.

But demonstrating in favor of war? I think that much too simplistic and I believe those who stood in the cold would agree. Showing support for the troops, their mission (which includes reconstruction and training the Iraqi army and police among other non combat elements), and yes, the war policies of the Administration were the main reasons given for the outpouring.

But even more basic than that was a desire to challenge the moral primacy of the “Blame America First” lobby whose unfettered access to and sympathy from the media these many years has made it seem as if passion and commitment were the sole province of the left and those that believe that America is usually on the side of the angels were condemned to silently endure the lies, the distortions, the outright calumnies emanating from the dirty necked galoots who fill up the streets in protest on a regular basis.

As much as it can be said that anti-war protests give aid and comfort to the enemy, the reverse should be true; that by coming out in such huge numbers, the pro troops demonstration should give heart to the Iraqi people and cause the insurgents a bit of discomfort. At the very least, it should prove to the American people that not everyone has lost hope that a positive outcome can be achieved in Iraq. Perhaps giving heart to the American people will be the lasting benefit of this “Gathering of Eagles.”

It’s certainly given me some heart. And made me proud to be an American.

UPDATE

Michelle Malkin is all over this story, of course. She was there snapping pictures and getting reaction from the participants.

But this morning, she points to the way the demonstration was portrayed in the New York Times. In short, there’s no way around it but to say that the Times lied - and not very well at that:

As they gathered before the march, the protesters met what several veterans of the antiwar movement described as an unusually large contingent of several hundred counterdemonstrators. Many were veterans in biker jackets who said they had come to protect the nearby Vietnam Memorial, citing rumors that had circulated among veterans groups that the demonstrators planned to deface it.

Crossing the bridge toward the Pentagon, the marchers met another group of about 50 counterdemonstrators by the Arlington Cemetery, one holding a sign that said: “Go to hell traitors. You dishonor our dead on hallowed ground.”

I linked above to the WaPo article that also undercounts the demonstration but at least acknowledges “several thousand” not several hundred as the Times reports.

And what about the protestors lining the route of the march to the Pentagon? Thousands of people that the New York Times decided not to count.

Non people at a non event if you’re a reader of the New York Times.

And this from John Lilyea, proprietor of the whimsically named This Ain’t Hell:

In my opinion, this Gathering of Eagles rally has done more for the healing of the wounds these veterans have been burdened with for forty years than any wall or memorial could ever. It was if they’d finally been given the opportunity to face their oppressors. There were no sorrowful stares, no sympathetic words. It was all smiles and laughter.

Welcome home, brothers.

Senate Republicans stood united against an attempt by Democrats to undercut General Petraeus in Iraq and set a deadline for withdrawal of American troops by March of 2008 by defeating an amendment to the war appropriations bill sponsored by Majority Leader Harry Reid:

It took weeks for the Senate to agree to hold a formal debate on Democratic calls for a change in war policy, and by the time it occurred, the result was utterly predictable. So much so that Sen. John McCain, the Arizona Republican who is running for the White House in 2008, skipped the vote to campaign in Iowa.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky led the opposition to the measure.

“This is a dangerous piece of legislation. It is constitutionally dubious and it would authorize a scattered band of United States senators to tie the hand” of the commander in chief, he said.

McConnell said it would be “absolutely fatal” to the mission of U.S. troops in Iraq.

Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada disputed that. “Five years of war, the president’s current approach in Iraq is not working. The country is closer to chaos than stability. U.S. troops are policing a civil war, not hunting and killing the terrorists who attacked America on 9/11.”

Someone should tell Harry to read the papers. He may discover that yes indeed, we are fighting al-Qaeda in Iraq (along with Sunni insurgents and Shia radicals) and that we are killing them wholesale. And while I don’t buy into the idea that “fighting them there means we don’t have to fight them here,” I think it is safe to say that killing radical jihadis hell bent on killing Americans is a damn fine thing to do while we’re in Iraq trying to bring order out of chaos and well worth our money, time, and effort.

Hell, Harry! Even Andrew Sullivan is saying good things about Iraq:

This isn’t normality; the carnage is still awful. But it’s less awful than recently. If Petraeus continues to keep this momentum going, the debate about staying in Iraq may change one more time. (Memo to self: I wonder what would have happened if a sane counter-insurgency strategy had been implemented with sufficient troops in 2003?)

Well. . . mostly good things. And Andrew mentions the 800 pound gorilla in the room for Democrats:

What happens if by some miracle (and the brilliant performance of our troops) that the political and the military situation changes dramatically for the better over the next 6-9 months?

The whole point of the surge, of course, is that the two are inexorably linked; that political progress on oil revenue sharing, reconciliation, constitutional changes, and the like is tied directly to restoring hope to the people that the government is competent enough to reasonably protect them and that the shattered body politic can start the rebuilding process only when people feel secure enough to resume some kind of normal living.

With word that the Mahdis may be willing to lay down their arms (most of them anyway) and the continued encouraging news that tribal leaders in Anbar province are fighting against Sunni insurgents and al Qaeda terrorists, at least some of the political benchmarks so beloved of the Democrats in Congress are already being met. In fact, the Democrats are in danger of codifying benchmarks that will be irrelevant by the time any Iraq legislation is passed.

It would make the Democrats look pretty silly if they demand the Iraqi government pass a law that would share the oil revenue as a the price of continued American involvement only to have that law already passed by the time the Democrats get their act together and decide exactly how they want to surrender to the jihadis.

Of course, the House is another story. The Appropriations Committee passed their timetable amendment - even though few are exactly sure how it works or can coherently explain it to the American people. And given their solid majority in the House, Democrats should be able to pass the measure. This is after giving their far left wing the opportunity to weep and wail about how the measure doesn’t go far enough and that if it were up to them, we’d be out of Iraq in 90 days. This is all the loons needed - just a little attention and the opportunity to strike a dramatic pose for their netnut fans.

The fact that any such measure is doomed in the Senate won’t matter. The House Democrats will be on record telling the insurgents and militia members who are currently in hiding to hold on for just a little while longer. Democrats are eventually coming to their rescue.

More evidence that Maliki has decided to bite the bullet and start doing the things necessary to quell the violence:

Iraq’s Interior Ministry has fired or reassigned more than 10,000 employees, including high-ranking police, who were found to have tortured prisoners, accepted bribes or had ties to militias, a ministry spokesman has disclosed.
A soon-to-be-released internal inquiry also details 41 incidents of human rights abuse at the ministry. In one case, four members of the national police hanged prisoners from a ceiling and beat them with sticks in a ministry-run prison known as Site 4, according to the report by the ministry’s inspector general.

The United States has pressured Iraq’s Shiite-led government to clean up its security forces as they undertake a broad plan to reduce sectarian violence. Sunni politicians have accused Iraq’s police of collaborating with Shiite death squads.

More than half of those fired or reassigned since June were found to have militia ties, Jassim Hanoon, the Interior Ministry’s deputy spokesman, said in a weekend interview. The investigation is ongoing.

“We are struggling against this disease,” Hanoon said of militia infiltration at the ministry.

It’s a start.

Interior is lousy with Sadrists and featured the worst of the corrupt bureaucrats. There were also several top officials with direct ties to Tehran. I doubt whether even purging or reassigning 10,000 employees is going to solve the problem. But by any measure, it is a positive sign.

But Maliki is not stopping at Interior. It looks like he’s going whole hog and is going to take on members of his own coalition as well:

The Interior Ministry employs about 270,000 people, including police, emergency response units and administrative staff.

“Maybe we aren’t 100% cured,” Hanoon said. “But we’re getting better day by day.” Some ministry employees were fired for arresting innocent people, while others had past criminal records, he said.

Investigators are using information gathered within the ministry to probe political leaders and members of parliament, something not previously done, Hanoon said. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has vowed to pursue criminal charges against political figures — including members of parliament — linked to extremist groups.

The cases of human rights abuse were detailed in a 250-page annual report that will be released this week, Akeel Saeed, the Interior Ministry’s inspector general, said in an interview.

It appears that Maliki realizes that the end of massive American involvement in Iraq is on the horizon and is afraid that unless concrete steps are taken to get his own house in order before the bulk of US combat troops leave, being Prime Minister of Iraq won’t mean very much in the larger scheme of things.

My guess would be that the next ministry in the cross hairs is Sadr’s power base, the Ministry of Health. The anti-American cleric has used that ministry the way Dick Daley uses City Hall in Chicago - as patronage center for his followers that cements their loyalty to him after he gives them a job. Iraq’s economy is still tight with unemployment hovering around 25% (down from 40% before the invasion) so a plumb ministry job goes a long way in increasing Sadr’s popularity.

But Sadr apparently is not going to sit still during this effort to kick he and his followers out of power:

The Shiite Mahdi Army militia has so far resisted full-scale retaliation through a combination of self-interest and intense government pressure. But the militia’s leader, the radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, is now being cornered in new ways that have put him on the defensive.

An expected Cabinet reshuffle could take a serious bite out of al-Sadr’s voice in government — a move strongly encouraged by Washington.

Al-Sadr also opened the door for U.S. and Iraqi troops to enter the Mahdi stronghold of Sadr City in Baghdad — under a painstaking deal with authorities — but his loyalists are still being hunted outside the capital.

“Al-Sadr and his forces could be feeling under siege,” said Alireza Nourizadeh, chief researcher at the London-based Center for Arab-Iranian Studies. “That makes them less predictable. That means they are more dangerous.”

Slowly, Sadr is being marginalized. First by causing his militia to hunker down during the surge. Second, by kicking his ministers out of the government thus neutering his influence in the cabinet. And the last step logically would be to go after his power base in the ministry of health.

If Maliki can take on the powerful forces in the Interior Ministry, when will the other shoe drop and a purge take place that would oust the Sadrists from the Ministry of Health?

Faster please…