Contributing Blogger

This is not the news Democrats need if they are to win the White House in 2008.  Army LT GEN Ray Odierno told reporters today that U.S. troop deaths have declined sharply in July.  (chart)

This is the fewest U.S. military deaths in Iraq since July 2006, despite the fact that the surge has increased troop presence. The highest U.S. casualty months were in November and April of 2004.

Cross-posted @: Bottom Line Up Front

Cross-posted@: Bottom Line Up Front

Bottom Line Up Front (PDF): Iraqis know that terrorists are not martyrs when they die for their “faith” in acts of terrorism and and we can win the war on terror when we understand this concept, too.

Bassim al-Jabouri, brother of the fallen Iraqi police officer in Iraq who bravely gave his life to stop a suicide bomber, said this in the video:

I think my brother is a martyr, but the insurgents are not martyrs. They will go to hell; they are evil in this world.

That statement is absolutely true and most of us know it. What we don’t know, however, is that we do a disservice the war on terrorism when we refer to acts of terrorism as Jihad. It is not and in order to isolate the terrorists, we need to refer to what it is: Hirabah.

Jihad (PDF) means to make an effort to overcome difficulty or to struggle. It includes an internal or personal, social and institutional struggle for justice and against oppression and sin. Jihad can not be used to force people to convert or kill non-Muslims. This is contrary to Islamic law.

Hirabah on the other hand is rebellion and terrorism, considered heresy within Islam. Acts of hirabah are capital crimes in Islam. It contains the principle of Jihad but carries out acts of “persuasion” to meet its objective.

(continue reading post »)

Bottom Line Up Front: Marines are kicking up the efforts in Ramadi, bringing “some good counterinsurgency” to Iraq.

GEN Petraeus would say, “That’s some good counterinsurgency going on there!” And the Marines in Ramadi are rising to the occasion.

Marine CPT Marcus Mainz is taking his men in Ramadi, Iraq, out from the FOB (Forward Operating Base) and into the community. The focus shift from making contact with the enemy to making contact with the people is the highly successful counterinsurgency doctrine that works. And it is working.

Meanwhile, in one Marine battalion, 200 soldiers of the 2nd Battalion, 5th Regiment opted to extend their enlistments in Ramadi, for no bonus money. The L.A. Times tells the story, which goes like this:

Lt. Col. Craig Kozeniesky, the battalion commander, and Sgt. Maj. William Jordan, the senior enlisted man, assembled Marines whose enlistments were running short. Marines who were there don’t remember that Kozeniesky or Jordan spent much time speaking of the complexities of U.S. foreign policy in the 21st century. Instead, the two asked the Marines to help the battalion’s younger members.

“I just told them: ‘We’ve been together this long. We need you — the young Marines need you,’ ” Jordan said.

In an infantry battalion, a sergeant major serves as the embodiment of institutional values to younger “grunts.” At 44, Jordan has been in the Marine Corps for 27 years.
“Finally I just told them, ‘Everybody who is with us, move to the right side of the room,’ ” Jordan said. Only a handful stayed put. About 175 moved immediately to the right side.

“I was blown away,” Jordan said. “In all my years in the Marine Corps, I never saw anything like it.”

Officials say extensions are not uncommon among the Marine Corps’ 24 battalions, even as some return to Iraq for their third combat tour. In fact, they say, few records are kept because they are so common.

Unlike a reenlistment, the move earns the Marines no bonus money, no promotion and no promise of a job shift or posting to a favored duty station.

Marines say that residents (of Ramadi), encouraged by tribal sheiks and imams, have turned against the extremists and, among other things, are pointing out the location of hidden roadside bombs.

“The last time, it was like the people didn’t want to do anything to help their neighborhoods,” Mellado said. “Now it’s a big change. I want to be here to help with that, to help my Marines.”

OORAH! Two things that make for a successful counterinsurgency effort are 1) living with the people/security/police forces of that nation; not remaining in the FOB and 2) longevity; the same soldiers, same faces remaining in the area, creating familiarity and trust to win over the hearts and minds of the locals. These Marines are good men doing it right.

Cross-posted @: Bottom Line Up Front

Congressman Ron Paul of Texas was one of the few Republicans to vote against the authorization for war bill in 2002 and was the 1988 Libertarian candidate for president. He is staunchly anti-war. His comments at the debate included:

Have you ever read the reasons they attacked us? They attack us because we’ve been over there; we’ve been bombing Iraq for 10 years. We’ve been in the Middle East — I think Reagan was right. We don’t understand the irrationality of Middle Eastern politics.

So right now we’re building an embassy in Iraq that’s bigger than the Vatican. We’re building 14 permanent bases. What would we say here if China was doing this in our country or in the Gulf of Mexico? We would be objecting. We need to look at what we do from the perspective of what would happen if somebody else did it to us.

They don’t come here to attack us because we’re rich and we’re free. They come and they attack us because we’re over there. I mean, what would we think if we were — if other foreign countries were doing that to us?

The premise that the United States was attacked on 9/11 because we had bombed Iraq’s WMD sites and monitored the No Fly Zone doesn’t begin to make sense. Sadly, Congressman Paul does not know America. He asked how we would like it if what we did to Iraq was done to us by China or another country, making a moral equivalence between the United States of America, arguably the most benevolent country on the face of the earth, and those involved in human rights abuses. The fact is we are not a Saddam Hussein, threatening the world with self-serving domination or torturing our own people (unless you count the unborn victims of abortion). We are not an Iran, sponsoring terrorism and trying to usher in a religious fanaticism as legitimate foreign policy. We are not a China, persecuting religious citizens to the point of death or forcing family size, stripping the essence of freedom away from it’s people. (continue reading post »)

Bottom Line Up Front: John McCain was unable to define torture at the Republican Debate last night.

At the second Republican Presidential Debate last night in Columbia, SC, John McCain discussed torture as a means of stopping terrorist attacks (debate transcript):

The law in question is the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 supported by President Bush, which Republican Senators McCain, John Warner and Lindsey Graham opposed. The Act states:

No person in the custody or under the effective control of the Department of Defense or under detention in a Department of Defense facility shall be subject to any treatment or technique of interrogation not authorized by and listed in the United States Army Field Manual on Intelligence Interrogation.

In General- No individual in the custody or under the physical control of the United States Government, regardless of nationality or physical location, shall be subject to cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment.

In 2005, Time Magainze obtained an “interrogation log” for detainee 063 which they thought would be damning evidence of torture at Gitmo. “Torture” includes:

• MPs (military police) wrestled thrashing, spitting detainee to the ground after he head butted an MP.
• Detainee was told no one loved, cared for or remembered him.
• smiley-face mask made from MRE box was placed over detainees face for few moments after telling detainee how ungrateful and grumpy he was.
• interrogators made puppet show satirizing detainee’s involvement with Al-Qaeda.
• waking detainee with Christina Aguilera music
• making him stand for the playing of American national anthem

  (continue reading post »)

On CNN’s Situation Room Monday, D-Sen. Harry Reid said in an interview that he knows better than GEN Petraeus about what’s going on in Iraq and made no pretense in hiding his arrogance:

REID: General Petraeus has said that only 20 percent of the war can be won militarily. He’s the man on the ground there now. He said 80 percent of the war has to be won diplomatically, economically and politically. I agree with General Petraeus. Now, that is clear and I certainly believe that.

Q: But, sir, General Petraeus has not said the war is lost.

REID: General — General Petraeus has said the war cannot be won militarily. He said that. And President Bush is doing nothing economically. He is doing nothing diplomatically. He is not doing even the minimal requested by the Iraq Study Group.

So I — I stick with General Petraeus. I have no doubt that the war cannot be won militarily, and that’s what I said last Thursday and I stick with that.

Q: Arlen Specter said: “For men and women who are over in Iraq to have somebody of Senator Reid’s stature say that the war is lost, it is just very, very demoralizing and not necessary.” Is there something to that, an 18- and 19-year-old person in the service in Iraq who is serving, risking their lives, in some cases losing their life, hearing somebody like you back in Washington saying that they’re fighting for a lost cause?

REID: General Petraeus has told them that.

Q: How has he said that?

REID: He said the war can’t be won militarily. He said that. I mean he said it. He’s the commander on the ground there. Are they critical of him?

Q: But, sir, there’s a difference between that and saying the war is lost, don’t you think?

REID: Well, I — as I said, maybe it’s a choice of words. I mean General Petraeus has said the war cannot be won militarily. Doesn’t every soldier going there know that he’s said that? I think so.

Q: ..(The President) also said that General Petraeus is going to….make it clear to you that there is progress going on in Iraq, that the so-called surge is working. Will you believe him when he says that?

REID: (laugh) No! I don’t believe him, because it’s not happening. All you have to do is look at the facts. The factors are this has been going on for three months. American deaths are at the highest they’ve been in two years.

To say a war is lost because it is violent is as blind as saying Iraqis don’t want democracy badly enough because they’re being targeted by terrorists. If anything, the war has been prolonged because of big mouthed ignoramuses like Reid, Ted Kennedy and John Kerry telling Iraqis to “take off their training wheels” and that its’ time for “Iraqis to start spilling some of their own blood.” A soldier collecting lessons learned from the successful mission in Anbar Province, Iraq wrote me and said this: (continue reading post »)

Bottom Line Up Front: Joe Biden is guilty of treason. That’s the bottom line.

Yesterday on the floor of the Senate, Democrat Joe Biden from Delaware gave this inflammatory speech insulting the President and the mission in Iraq.

As an Army wife, I’m moved to not only a state of disbelief that this sort of damaging rhetoric could possibly be coming from the United States Senate rather than an al-Qaeda propaganda tape, but a deep sadness that the Democratic Party has become another enemy of this great nation.

This surpasses anything I’ve heard Harry Reid publicly say and I cannot recall any speech with more venom and recklessness towards America except coming from former al-Qaeda in Iraq leader Musab al-Zarqawi when he was threatening to cut off the heads of all infidels. Biden has become America’s infidel.

He referred to the surge, the reinforcement of troops as a “siege”. He couldn’t pronounce the name of the Iraqi Prime Minister. He embarrassed his position as Senator and as far as I’m concerned, he is not fit to serve in any capacity of public service.

Jesus said anyone who calls his brother a fool is in danger of hell fire, but Joe Biden is a fool. He is no brother, no friend of America, no friend of mine or my husband’s, or any of our military comrades. But King Solomon, one of the wisest men who ever lived, wrote “The wise inherit honor, but God holds fools up to shame.”

Fool.

Keep the “It’s time to support the troops” speech to yourself. You are the enemy of our troops, Senator Biden.

Make no mistake about it: this is a full throttled propaganda campaign by the Democrats that is as deceitful, as disgraceful and as dangerous as al-Qaeda’s

Cross-posted @: Bottom Line Up Front

Bottom Line Up Front:  Sen. Harry Reid is bitterly hunkering down demanding defeat in Iraq whether victory is inevitable or not.

Democrat and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid gave a speech at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, DC, yesterday, co-hosted by Third Way  and Lee Hamilton of the Iraq Study Group and 9/11 Commission introduced Harry Reid after a brief opening. (transcript of speech)  View video/excerpts of the speech HERE.

**Hot Air has video of Sen. Reid in an interview on CNN asserting arrogantly that GEN Petraeus has said the war is lost/cannot be won militarily and that Reid will not believe Petraeus if he gives testimony to the contrary tomorrow before the Congress.

What does a collaborative effort between the likes of Third Way, Lee Hamilton and Harry Reid tell you? That the Iraq Study Group and 9/11 Commission weren’t exactly bi-partisan nor unbiased.

In this unbelievably depressing speech, Reid referred to the our global effort to combat terrorism as the “so-called war on terror” and went on to mock the President’s use of the word “progress” at a briefing on Iraq. He quoted Bush as saying that the “direction of the fight is beginning to shift” and that “so far the operation (surge) is meeting expectations.”

GEN Petraeus has been saying for months that he expected a spike in violence after the announcement of the surge. Tactically this is totally predictable. There is no doubt that things are difficult in Iraq, but to paint the entire country as a loss is erroneous.   In fact, GEN Petraeus said about the expected rise of violence due to the surge: 

“Regrettably, some of these groups are still carrying out their barbaric acts.  In fact, we believe that they have sought to intensify their sensational attacks in recent weeks to provoke renewed sectarian violence and derail [the operation] before it can be fully implemented.”

Petraeus also described why we shouldn’t be surprised by the violence in Iraq:

In this environment, Iraq’s new government, its fourth in three and a half years, has found it difficult to gain traction. Though disappointing, this should not be a surprise. We should recall that after the liberation of Iraq in 2003, every governmental institution in the country collapsed. A society already traumatized by decades of Saddam’s brutal rule was thrown into complete turmoil, and the effects are still evident throughout the country and in Iraqi society.

Reid went on to say that 70% of Iraqi children are traumatized, experiencing nightmares and bedwetting, “could paralyze an entire generation that we’ve been counting on to harvest the seeds of democracy.”  How those statistics were arrived at or where they originated from, Reid did not say, but Reid’s credibility on caring about the next generation of Iraqi children is implausible at best.  His plan to withdraw troops, leaving the region open to ethnic cleansing and mass murder makes him a less than believable spokesman for the Iraqi children. 

Not only this, but his repeated insistence that the war should never have happened indicates he presumes Iraqi children would be more psychologically healthy under an Iraq run by Uday and Quasay Hussein. 

Reid went to in his speech to criticize the Iraqi people for not taking responsibility by now but admitted that:

“It is unquestioned that we have long term interest in seeing Iraq become stabilized, peaceful, and yes, one day a functioning democracy.”

He, along with the rest of the Democratic Party, have been unable to explain how the U.S. would contribute to this “stabilized, peaceful and democratic” Iraq by leaving within a year and allow al-Qaeda hold the country hostage through violence and extremist religious beliefs.

Reids “solution” includes a “surge” in diplomacy, bringing “waring factions to the negotiating table”, “training and equipping Iraqi security forces and conducting counter terrorism operations” (which is what the U.S. is ALREADY DOING), and insists on a “phased redeployment of troops beginning no later than Oct. 1 2007, with all troops out of Iraq by by April 1, 2008” with a few exceptions.

Reid ridiculed Vice President Cheney asserting he was wrong about WMD, the U.S. being greeted as liberators and an al-Qaeda/Saddam link.   We know that Saddam had the capability to make WMD, although he didn’t possess stockpiles, that the U.S. was greeted as a liberating force and that the Defense Department’s Inspector General reported before the Senate Armed Services committee that  the Bush Administration did not exaggerate intelligence to make a case for war.  The Inspector General also showed that while Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein’s relationship was not symbiotic, there was indeed a relationship. 

“No one in my office ever claimed there was an operational relationship. There was a relationship.”

On the question of leaving Iraq to chaos and genocidal war, Reid’s reply is what has become the standard regurgitated deflection:

“We already have a civil war and there’s already violence.” Gulp.

Instead of blaming the terrorists for disrupting basic services and rallying around the good guys (perhaps because he doesn’t know who the good guys are), Reid blames the good guys for the easiest of attacks: suicide bombings.

WHAT REID DIDN’T SAY

Senator Reid did not mention in his speech that:

The White House already corrected Reid’s record of errors about the war in Iraq.

SOLDIERS FROM HIS OWN STATE OF NEVADA REJECT HIS ASSERTION THAT THE WAR IS ‘LOST’

THAT SOLDIERS IN THE FIELD SOUNDLY REJECT REID’S ASSERTION AND CONDEMN HIS DEFEATIST LANGUAGE

GEN Petraeus has called Operation Iraqi Freedom an “honorable mission” , not a lost cause.

GEN Petraeus praised entrepreneurialism in Iraq.

GEN Pace said our enemies see the “debate in the Congress as a sign of weakness as opposed to a sign of strength.”

(continue reading post »)

Bottom Line Up Front: In another “shut up and sing” moment for the recording industry, singer Sheryl Crow weighs in on ideas to save the earth from pesky human intrusions into Mother Earth’s personal space and stopping global warming. This is not a parody.

Her self-titled ecoblog is chalked full of GREAT ideas, including saving the earth by saving the toilet paper:

I have spent the better part of this tour trying to come up with easy ways for us all to become a part of the solution to global warming. Although my ideas are in the earliest stages of development, they are, in my mind, worth investigating. One of my favorites is in the area of conserving trees which we heavily rely on for oxygen. I propose a limitation be put on how many sqares of toilet paper can be used in any one sitting. Now, I don’t want to rob any law-abiding American of his or her God-given rights, but I think we are an industrious enough people that we can make it work with only one square per restroom visit, except, of course, on those pesky occasions where 2 to 3 could be required. When presenting this idea to my younger brother, who’s judgement I trust implicitly, he proposed taking it one step further. I believe his quote was, “how bout just washing the one square out.”

OMG. And she’s serious. I can only assume her blog provider doesn’t have spell check. Obvious observations about hygiene will saved for the comment section!

She goes on excitedly to share another explosion of brilliance as long as no one steals her idea…. AS IF!

This next idea I have been saving but I will share it with you if you promise not to steal it. It is my latest, very exciting idea for creating incentive for us all to minimize our own personal carbon footprints. It’s a reality show. (I feel pretty certain NO ONE has thought of this yet!). Here is the premise: the contest consists of 10 people who are competing for the top spot as the person who lives the “greenest” life. This will be reflected in the contestant’s home, his business, and his own personal living style. The winner of this challenging, prestigious, contest would receive what??…. a recording contract!!!!!

Is anyone else blushing for her? Poor thing. In Hollywood, narcissism is a terrible thing to waste.

Cross-posted @: Bottom Line Up Front