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Al Qaeda in Iraq Said to Be Defeated

Jon Ponder

This appears to be credible:

The U.S. military believes it has dealt devastating and perhaps irreversible blows to al-Qaeda in Iraq [AQI] in recent months, leading some generals to advocate a declaration of victory over the group, which the Bush administration has long described as the most lethal U.S. adversary in Iraq.

Of course, it could be White House propaganda to seed good news into the media, however one of the reporters, Thomas Ricks, is the author of “Fiasco,” a book on the Bush administration’s disastrous war planning.

And while the defeat of bin Laden’s franchise group in Iraq is good news for Iraqis and U.S. troops, it is not necessarily a positive development for war advocates, including Pres. George W. Bush who has used AQI as a bogeyman to prolong the fight — as he did in July, addressing a pro-war group in South Carolina:

“It’s hard to argue that Al Qaeda in Iraq is separate from bin Laden’s Al Qaeda when the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq took an oath of allegiance to Osama bin Laden,” Mr. Bush said, referring to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a leader of the affiliated group in Iraq who was killed last year.

Mr. Bush called the two similarly named groups “an alliance of killers,” and said, “No enemy is more ruthless in Iraq than Al Qaeda”…

“We’ll stay on the hunt, we’ll deny them safe haven, and we will defeat them where they have made their stand,” he said. “However difficult the fight is in Iraq, we must win it. And we can win it.”

It is possible that news about the defeat of AQI is the first step in a strategy by the administration to declare victory in Iraq and get out.

Larry Craig to File Appeal Today

Jon Ponder

Associated Press:

Sen. Larry Craig says he will file an appeal Monday over a judge’s refusal to allow him to withdraw his guilty plea stemming from his arrest in an airport bathroom sex sting.

In an interview Sunday with KTVB-TV, Craig repeated he will not resign his post in the Senate and said he will continue to work his legal options.

“It is my right to do what I’m doing,” said Craig, an Idaho Republican. “I’ve already provided for Idaho certainty that Idaho needed — I’m not running for re-election. I’m no longer in the way. I am pursuing my constitutional rights.”

Limbaugh Had Himself Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize, Now Is in a Snit of Jealousy over Gore’s Win

Jon Ponder

While it may have been common knowledge in the Dittohead universe that Rush Limbaugh was nominated for the Nobel Prize this year, the story went largely unreported out here in the real world.

Rush is so busy smearing 12 year olds and wounded veterans that he probably wouldn’t have had time to go to Norway to accept the award.

Even though Limbaugh had no chance, now that Al Gore is the official winner, Limbaugh is in a snit of jealousy:

LIMBAUGH: My lawyers at the Landmark Legal Foundation are looking into the possibility of filing an objection with the Nobel committee over the unethical tampering for this award that Al Gore is engaging in. This is clearly above and beyond the pale. I mean, this might happen in high school class president elections and so forth, but this is shameless.

Rush’s nomination sounds on the surface like a stunt dreamed up by Sascha Baron Cohen. A deeper dig reinforces the perception that it was a stunt.

For starters, it appears that Limbaugh de facto nominated himself. The nomination went out under the letterhead of “his lawyers” at the Landmark foundation, a rightwing nonprofit for which Limbaugh is an unpaid adviser. (Landmark’s donors include relatives of Richard Melon Scaife, the Pittsburgh heir and newspaper publisher who funded the Arkansas Project, a smear campaign against the Clintons that served as the prototype for what we now know as Swiftboating.)

Landmark’s president, Mark Levin, is a snarling, unappealing ideologue who made his name in the 1990s as a Clinton-basher on cable news. Levin is a Rush acolyte and wannabe who, despite having a voice that would curdle milk, has his own talk show.

Levin and Landmark are Limbaugh’s lapdogs. Even if the idea for the stunt didn’t come from Limbaugh himself, it was done with his approval and, more than likely, guidance.

Here is Levin’s cynical and unintentionally laughable rationale for the nomination, quoting Landmark’s news release:

Limbaugh … was nominated for the prestigious award for his “nearly two decades of tireless efforts to promote liberty, equality and opportunity for all humankind, regardless of race, creed, economic stratum or national origin. These are the only real cornerstones of just and lasting peace throughout the world,” said Landmark President Mark R. Levin.

“Rush Limbaugh is the foremost advocate for freedom and democracy in the world today,” explained Levin. “Everyday he gives voice to the values of democratic governance, individual opportunity and the just, equal application of the rule of law — and it is fitting that the Nobel Committee recognize the power of these ideals to build a truly peaceful world for future generations.”

Only in the “up is down,” “black is white” opposite world of rightwing spin could the nation’s leading pro-war cheerleader be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Of course, the nomination had no official standing from the getgo:

Nominations for the Prize may be made by a broad array of qualified individuals, including former recipients, members of national assemblies and congresses, university professors (in certain disciplines), international judges, and special advisors to the Prize Committee. In some years as many as 199 nominations have been received. The Committee keeps the nominations secret and asks that nominators do the same. Over time many individuals have become known as “Nobel Peace Prize Nominees,” but this designation has no official standing.

Rush is so busy smearing 12 year olds and wounded veterans that it is doubtful he could have found the time to go to Norway to accept the award had he won.

Friday Night Lights: Illuminating and Proselitizing

Trish

The age-old question of which side is God on has taken a decidedly local turn in these parts. Our independent weekly recently ran a couple of stories about a football coach who forces kids not just to pray before games, but to adopt his Christian evangelical POV. Parents, the stories reported, were afraid to protest to school board and administrative authorities, fearing retribution against their sons in winning college football scholarships. The reaction among the independent weekly readers was that the coach, and his supporters, were all wrong.

On prayers before high school football games: “If God is there, could He just take time out from sports to fix the rest of the world?”

But then our local daily, the St. Augustine Record, caught wind of the story, and ran a prayer-friendly version. The reaction among the daily readers — where the story was that all high school football coaches force prayer upon their players and what’s wrong with that? — was that the coach was a hero. Their follow-up story said 74 people wrote in support of the crusading coach and five against.

That’s the background. Here’s a great letter to the editor on the subject in the local daily:

I am against prayer before, after or during a football game.

Players are not praying for welfare of all mankind, for a responsible government, for peace in the demolished land of Iraq. They are praying to win a football game. They should pray that if they are to be hurt, let it be on the football field. They will have some medical coverage.

The Constitution calls for separation of church and state. Whose religion are we talking about? We see plenty of “Jesus” in the arguments for prayer. How about those who want to pray to Adonai or to Allah?

…The Record said it had 74 reactions for school prayer, and five against.

Does that make those five wrong? Does it say something about our city, our community?

My parents came out of World War II convinced there was no God. And if there was a god who let 20 million people die, he is an awful god.

Seeing what is happening today, I do not believe in God either.

If God is there, could He just take time out from sports to fix the rest of the world?

Poll: Intolerance of Gays Drives Up Christianity’s Negatives among Young People

Jon Ponder

Opposition to gay civil rights has become an extremely effective fundraising tool for the Christian right. In 2005, for example, four of the leading organizations focused on institutionalizing homophobia — Focus on the Family, the American Family Association, the Family Research Council and the Traditional Values Coalition (which advocates execution of gays) — raised $169 million.

Overall, 91 percent of 16- to 29-year-old non-Christians and 80 percent of young churchgoers believe Christianity is anti-gay.

But the effectiveness with which these groups have gotten their message out is proving to be a double-edged sword. While it has ginned up antipathy toward gays — which simultaneously stalled progress on gay civil rights and served as a powerful political tool that Republicans used to seize power — a poll released last month by Barna, a Christian research group, suggests that the relentless intolerance has seriously damaged the image of Christianity among young people:

Interestingly, the study discovered a new image that has steadily grown in prominence over the last decade. Today, the most common perception is that present-day Christianity is “anti-homosexual.” Overall, 91 percent of [16- to 29-year-old] non-Christians and 80 percent of young churchgoers say this phrase describes Christianity.

As the research probed this perception, non-Christians and Christians explained that beyond their recognition that Christians oppose homosexuality, they believe that Christians show excessive contempt and unloving attitudes towards gays and lesbians.

One of the most frequent criticisms of young Christians was that they believe the church has made homosexuality a “bigger sin” than anything else. Moreover, they claim that the church has not helped them apply the biblical teaching on homosexuality to their friendships with gays and lesbians.

Attitudes toward Christianity among today’s youth are much more negative than they were a generation ago, says Barna:

[…]

Former Head of Coalition Forces Says Bush War Planners Were ‘Derelict in Their Duties’

Jon Ponder

In remarks to an annual conference of military reporters near Washington on Friday, former Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the leader of coalition forces in Iraq from 2003 to 2004, unloaded on the incompetent planning and management of the Iraq war by his former bosses in the Bush administration and the military:

“The administration has failed.”
– Gen. Ricardo Sanchez (retired)

“From a catastrophically flawed, unrealistically optimistic war plan to the administration’s latest surge strategy, this administration has failed to employ and synchronize its political, economic and military power,” Sanchez said.

He said the mismanagement of the war continues today:

“After more than four years of fighting, America continues its desperate struggle in Iraq without any concerted effort to devise a strategy that will achieve victory in that war-torn country or in the greater conflict against extremism,” Gen. Sanchez said…

“There has been a glaring and unfortunate display of incompetent strategic leadership within our national leaders,” he said, adding that civilian officials have been “derelict in their duties” and guilty of a “lust for power.”

And the future of the occupation looks very grim:

“There is no question America is living a nightmare with no end in sight … There is nothing going on today that would give us hope … The administration has failed.”

Sanchez’ career was derailed as a result of the Abu Grahib prison scandal, which occurred on his watch.

AFA Cranking Up Its Christmas Witch Hunt

Buck Banks

‘Tis the season. Since Halloween is almost upon us, the American Family Association has cranked up its annual witch hunt for companies that don’t include Christian messages or symbols in their marketing and advertising materials. In other words, companies that don’t commercialize Christmas by slapping baby Jesuses all over their packaging and ads are somehow bad, according to the AFA (which, by the way has $32 million in dough it has collected from dumb Christians).

The first victim of this season is that godless dough ho’ Mrs. Fields Cookies.

How did this come to the AFA’s attention? An anonymous call:

When Diane H. of Michigan called Mrs. Fields and asked to speak with a supervisor in customer service about why they banned Christmas, the supervisor told Diane that they do not offer anything with Merry Christmas because they don’t want to offend anyone.

Then Don “Wildman” Wildmon, chair of AFA, called for a boycott of Mrs. Fields products.

But if you go to Mrs. Fields’ Web site, it’s Xmas stuff out the wazoo. Did Mrs. Fields cave in just a day to the AFA’s bullying? Lord no:

So all Mrs. Fields is really guilty of is having the good taste to not start hawking its Xmas goods until after Halloween. Shucks, the AFA bully boys must be disappointed — “Curses! Foiled again!”

Use the AFA’s own mail-out system to send a letter of support to Mrs. Fields by going here.