Suburban Guerrilla: SCREWED
Climate Progress: The Washington Post goes tabloid and publishes Palin's second falsehood-filled op-ed in five months - on climate science
TalkLeft: Leaving the cult?
Robert Reich's Blog: The president's jobs initiative doesn't measure up
MAL Contends: Ike the liberal
MN Progressive Project: Michelle Bachman: "Fiscal conservative" You must be kiddin' me!
Nice to know I'm not the only person who feels this way. Because if Obama's serious about health care (or anything else), why continue to pour money down a rat hole? That said, what are the odds the congressional war lovers will vote for it? I'd love to make them explain why:
The powerful chairman of the House Appropriations Committee has a stark message for President Obama about Afghanistan -- sending more troops would be a mistake that could "wipe out every initiative we have to rebuild our own economy."
"There ain't going to be no money for nothing if we pour it all into Afghanistan," House Appropriations Chairman David Obey told ABC News in an exclusive interview. "If they ask for an increased troop commitment in Afghanistan, I am going to ask them to pay for it."
Obey, a Democrat from Wisconsin, made it clear that he is absolutely opposed to sending any more U.S. troops to Afghanistan and says if Obama decides to do that, he'll demand a new tax -- what he calls a "war surtax" -- to pay for it.
"On the merits, I think it is a mistake to deepen our involvement," Obey said. "But if we are going to do that, then at least we ought to pay for it. Because if we don't, if we don't pay for it, the cost of the Afghan war will wipe out every initiative we have to rebuild our own economy."
Obey's opposition to funding a troop increase in Afghanistan without a new tax would pose a significant problem for Obama if he decides to send more troops (a decision the White House says the President could make as early as November 30).
As Appropriations Committee chairman, Obey was a key player in securing money for the war when the last war funding bill narrowly passed the House in June.
His demand for a new war tax echoes a similar call by Senate Armed Services Chairman Carl Levin, also a Democrat, who recently told Bloomberg's Al Hunt that he favors a new tax on Americans earning more than $200,000 a year to pay for sending any additional troops.
Obey argued that the tax should be paid by all taxpayers, with rates ranging from 1 percent for lower wage earners to 5 percent for the wealthy.
(Nancy Wilson - Nat "King" Cole - In a word, magic)
October 4, 1964 - hard to imagine it was 45 years ago this past week, but that particular Sunday night saw an extraordinary group of people assembled on stage at the Hollywood Bowl to raise funds and awareness for defeating a Proposition on the November ballot. Proposition 14, or the attempt by Realtor groups and the John Birch Society to nullify the Rumford Fair Housing Initiative that passed in 1963. A veritable who's who of Hollywood, with orchestra led by none other than Nelson Riddle and emcee's Joey Bishop and Milton Berle introducing a lineup of talent that included Nancy Wilson and Nat "King" Cole.
I've extracted the Wilson and Cole sets out for this segment. I will add the rest over the coming weeks.
This goes under the heading of "previously unknown concert tapes", as I don't believe any commercial (or otherwise) copy of this concert has been available before today.
You get to hear it first.
Why do I feel like I've seen this movie before? I'm hoping against hope for a different ending this time: America having the strength to walk away from something that will drain our resources with no clear goals in sight.
The top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan warns in an urgent, confidential assessment of the war that he needs more forces within the next year and bluntly states that without them, the eight-year conflict "will likely result in failure," according to a copy of the 66-page document obtained by The Washington Post.
Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal says emphatically: "Failure to gain the initiative and reverse insurgent momentum in the near-term (next 12 months) -- while Afghan security capacity matures -- risks an outcome where defeating the insurgency is no longer possible."
His assessment was sent to Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates on Aug. 30 and is now being reviewed by President Obama and his national security team.
McChrystal concludes the document's five-page Commander's Summary on a note of muted optimism: "While the situation is serious, success is still achievable."
But he repeatedly warns that without more forces and the rapid implementation of a genuine counterinsurgency strategy, defeat is likely. McChrystal describes an Afghan government riddled with corruption and an international force undermined by tactics that alienate civilians.
But Obama is trying to figure out whether that's actually the road he wants to take:
Instead of debating whether to give McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, more troops, the discussion in the White House is now focused on whether, after eight years of war, the United States should vastly expand counterinsurgency efforts along the lines he has proposed -- which involve an intensive program to improve security and governance in key population centers -- or whether it should begin shifting its approach away from such initiatives and simply target leaders of terrorist groups who try to return to Afghanistan.
McChrystal's assessment, in the view of two senior administration officials, is just "one input" in the White House's decision-making process. The president, another senior administration official said, "has embarked on a very, very serious review of all options." The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal White House deliberations.
Obama, appearing on several Sunday-morning television news shows, left little doubt that key assumptions in the earlier White House strategy are now on the table. "The first question is: Are we doing the right thing?" the president said on CNN. "Are we pursuing the right strategy?"
"Until I'm satisfied that we've got the right strategy, I'm not going to be sending some young man or woman over there -- beyond what we already have," Obama said on NBC's "Meet the Press." If an expanded counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan contributes to the goal of defeating al-Qaeda, "then we'll move forward," he said. "But, if it doesn't, then I'm not interested in just being in Afghanistan for the sake of being in Afghanistan or saving face or . . . sending a message that America is here for the duration."
