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WH reassures necons: ‘We’re staying with the surge.’

By Amanda Terkel on Jul 15, 2007 at 10:30 pm

Today on The Chris Matthews Show, BBC correspondent Katty Kay reported:

Hawks have been calling the White House all week saying: “We hope you’re not going to wobble on Iraq.” And I understand they’ve been getting reassurance from the White House: “No, the policy is not changing.” Bill Kristol wrote a very condemning article saying that the White House must not change policy, must stick with the surge. The White House called back, said: “Why are you giving us such a hit; we’re staying with the surge.”

Politics

‘Bush is not going to leave office with Iran still in limbo.’

By Faiz Shakir on Jul 15, 2007 at 8:30 pm

In a story entitled “Cheney pushes Bush to act on Iran,” The Guardian writes that Cheney may be winning the debate inside the White House over how to confront Iran:

The balance in the internal White House debate over Iran has shifted back in favour of military action before President George Bush leaves office in 18 months, the Guardian has learned.

The shift follows an internal review involving the White House, the Pentagon and the state department over the last month. Although the Bush administration is in deep trouble over Iraq, it remains focused on Iran. A well-placed source in Washington said: “Bush is not going to leave office with Iran still in limbo.”

Security

On Heels Of Senate’s Iran Vote, Brownback Declared I’m Ready To Strike Iran

By Faiz Shakir on Jul 15, 2007 at 6:45 pm

On Wednesday, the Senate voted 97-0 to pass a resolution sponsored by Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) to censure Iran “for what it said was complicity in the killing of U.S. soldiers in Iraq.” The resolution required the Bush administration to regularly report to Congress on Iran’s role in Iraq.

While the resolution explicitly rejected authorization for immediate military action, the gist of the resolution declared Iran is participating in acts of war against the United States, thereby laying the foundation for a confrontation with Iran. Newshoggers wrote that the resolution may provide the “political cover for launching a war.”

Validating the concern many felt, Sen. Sam Brownback appeared on Fox News shortly after the vote and declared he was ready to preemptively strike Iran. Host Sean Hannity asked Brownback, “There’s probably going to come a point for the next president that they’re going to have to determine whether to go out and have that preemptive strike. And you’re ready and would be ready to do that?”

“Yes, I am, and I think we have to be,” Brownback answered. “Sean, if we’re going to be serious about this fight, and we’re in this fight, and probably for a generation. We’re probably in this fight for a generation.” Watch it:

When the Congress vote to authorize force against Iraq in 2002, it cited as justification the fact that Congress had passed a law in 1998 sponsored by Sen. Trent Lott (R-MS) and co-sponsored by Lieberman that concluded Iraq posed a serious threat. From the 2002 resolution:

Whereas in Public Law 105-235 (August 14, 1998), Congress concluded that Iraq’s continuing weapons of mass destruction programs threatened vital United States interests and international peace and security, declared Iraq to be in ‘material and unacceptable breach of its international obligations’ and urged the President ‘to take appropriate action, in accordance with the Constitution and relevant laws of the United States, to bring Iraq into compliance with its international obligations’

UPDATE: Hullabaloo has more.

UPDATE II: The LA Times reports the greatest number of foreign militants come from Saudi Arabia.

Politics

Inexperience

By ThinkProgress on Jul 15, 2007 at 5:54 pm

“Obama,” writes Matt Bai in The New York Times Magazine, “would set a new precedent for inexperience in the White House; he was a state senator only three years ago, when he delivered the keynote address at the Democratic convention, and before that he was a community organizer.”

Really?

If Obama is elected to the White House, he will have served eight years in the Illinois State Senate and four years in the United States Senate. In the twentieth century, I count Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Herbert Hoover, Jimmy Carter, and Ronald Reagan as all having served fewer than 12 years in public office before assuming the Presidency and I count exactly twelve for Warren Harding. To find a President with as few as six years of public office under his belt before becoming President, you need to go all the way back to . . . the current President of the United States so it’s not like you need to be a historian to figure this out.

Now arguably some of these people were “more experienced” than Obama along other metrics than a raw count of years would indicate, but there’s still no obvious sense in which Obama is a precedent-shattering figure. At a minimum, Carter and Abraham Lincoln were unambiguously less experienced.

Media

Bill Kristol

By ThinkProgress on Jul 15, 2007 at 5:30 pm

There’s been some call for me to remark on Bill Kristol’s op-ed in today’s Post. Here’s what you need to know:

What it comes down to is this: If Petraeus succeeds in Iraq, and a Republican wins in 2008, Bush will be viewed as a successful president.

I like the odds.

Ha ha. If you read it, there turns out to be no clever “counterintuitive” argument here at all; it’s just some baseless assertions. David Corn will write a rebuttal piece for the much-less-important Wednesday edition of the paper. Since Kristol brought up the gambling metaphor, it would be interesting to make this more precise. First, Kristol would need to explain what “achieving a real, though messy, victory in Iraq” would mean. Then we would need to hear from Kristol how much money he would wager on an even-odds bet that his predictions come true. Participants in Monday’s Q&A with Kristol could be invited to cover his gamble if so inclined.

I bring it up not because Kristol’s unique among pundits in offering bad predictions (I’ve made some myself), but because the article reads as so transparently written in bad faith — it’s utterly half-hearted and vacuous, clearly not intended to persuade anyone of anything.

Yglesias

Go Clean Cold for Jeanne

By ThinkProgress on Jul 15, 2007 at 5:07 pm

Jeanneshaheen.jpg

Intriguing new poll results from the Concord Monitor which sees Mitt Romney and Hillary Clinton winning their respective primaries, even though they both fare worse than the competition in the general election. It’s an intriguing dynamic, and I’d like to see a poll that ads a question about how much weight voters are putting on “electability” and get a sense of how much cognitive dissonance there is out there.

That’s all sort of old news, however. What I hadn’t seen previously is that polls show former governor Jeanne Shaheen absolutely crushing John Sununu by a 56 to 34 percent margin. I froze my ass off knocking on doors and holding signs for Shaheen’s failed 2002 Senate campaign against Sununu, so I’d certainly like to see that work retroactively vindicated. Even more to the point, given the big-picture trends, this is the kind of Senate seat that would probably be pretty safe in the hands of a Democratic incumbent, but might also be extremely hard to win in 2014 unless another massively unpopular Republican president is in office at that time.

The only problem for Democrats is that Shaheen hasn’t decided to run and the people who are in the race don’t poll nearly as well. Her record is, to me, totally uninspiring but they like her in New Hampshire so I hope she decides to run.

Politics

Bush intelligence oversight board silent for 5 1/2 yrs.

By Amanda Terkel on Jul 15, 2007 at 1:29 pm

“An independent oversight board created to identify intelligence abuses after the CIA scandals of the 1970s did not send any reports to the attorney general of legal violations during the first 5 1/2 years of the Bush administration’s counterterrorism effort,” and was vacant for the first two years of the administration. “Although the FBI told the board of a few hundred legal or rules violations by its agents after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the board did not identify which of them were indeed legal violations.”

Yglesias

Location, Location, Location

By ThinkProgress on Jul 15, 2007 at 12:51 pm

dupont.png

This house across the street from me looks nice and all, and I like this location very much, but it’s by no means Dupont Circle.

I wouldn’t mention it at all, but as it happens my house was listed — by a different property management agency — as also being in Dupont Circle, so I guess this is now a common tactic in real estate circles. Obviously, as with any neighborhood, the boundary lines get a bit fuzzy, but we’re a little bit Shaw and a little bit Columbia Heights — not Dupont Circle at all.

UPDATE: Incidentally, it’s not that I’m unaware of the fact that it’s common practice for real estate people to offer misleading neighborhood labels, I just think it’s a bad thing. Bloggers push back against bogus White House spin and we should push back against bogus real estate spin as well. Nothing this far east or this far north could possibly be in Dupont Circle.

Security

Webb Rips Graham As ‘Politician Trying To Put His Political Views Into The Mouths Of Soldiers’

By Faiz Shakir on Jul 15, 2007 at 11:52 am

This morning on Meet the Press, Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) took Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) to task for spouting “support the troops” rhetoric while failing to take action to safeguard the long-term health of the military.

This week, Graham was among a handful of right-wing Senators who prevented the passage of an amendment sponsored by Webb that would have required soldiers to be given more rest at home after being deployed overseas. During the vote, Graham disingenuously claimed that if Webb’s bill passed, it would be “the greatest politicization of military action in the history of the country.”

This morning, Webb fought back. “The traditional operational policy has been if you’re gone for a year, you get two years back. We’re now in a situation where the soldiers and the Marines are having less than a 1 to 1 ratio.” Webb said. Turning to Graham, he added, “And somebody needs to speak up for them rather than defending what this President has been doing.”

“May I speak!” Webb said, as Graham tried to interrupt him. “This is one thing I really take objection to,” he said, “is politicians who try to put their political views into the mouths of soldiers.” Watch it:

Webb’s amendment would have required the Bush administration to provide at least a year of rest for every year that a member of the Armed Forces was deployed overseas. The amendment provided three years of rest for National Guard soldiers. In the vote to end the filibuster, 56 bipartisan members supported Webb’s amendment, less than the 60 needed to end debate.

This morning, when Graham tried to claim that he’s a qualified voice to speak on behalf of all soldiers because he has been to Iraq, Webb countered, “You go and see the dog-and-pony shows.” Webb scolded Graham, “Don’t put political words into [the soldier's] mouth.”

Digg It!

UPDATE: Commenters Ann and Katy note Webb’s son has served in Iraq, but he refused to bring that into the debate this morning.

Yglesias

That’s Why People Like Money

By ThinkProgress on Jul 15, 2007 at 11:43 am

The Washington Post, taking a wide-lens look at the global warming debate, notes that “Wealthier Americans might be better able than poor Americans to afford new equipment — more efficient air conditioners, better insulated windows, solar panels — to cut energy costs.”

This is a convenient all-purpose reason to never do anything at all that imposes costs of any sort. The way money works is that people who have more money will be better able than poor people to afford things. Like, if catastrophic climate change forces substantial alterations in lifestyle, wealthier Americans will be better able than poor Americans to afford that, too.

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