Rangel starts the countdown clock for ending the Iraqi Debacle.
On Face the Nation.
Rep. Cholly Rangel – always a ball to watch – announces the End of The Iraq Debacle.
Damned right I called for a draft. And I will reintroduce it. I don’t see how anyone can support the war and not support the draft. This President and his Party would NEVER have gone into Iraq on the flimsy evidence they had, with the shitty strategy they had, with the Fortune Cookie post-invasion they knew their own children were going to have to pay the price.
Always so easy for cowards to send others off to die for their Glorious Causes.
Always so easy for other cowards to vote for them, shout for them, stomp for them…so long as they never have to pay any price or bear any burden.
Ah, but when the waiter comes back to the table and says your puling, bullshit, “They volunteered” credit card has been rejected? That now we’re coming for you -- for your daughter AND your ducats? That the Yellow Elephants and Wingnut Welfare queens no long have a bulletproof berth reserved at America’s leading Conservatard think tanks, but now have a seat set aside just for them in a Baghdad Purple Heart Mobile?
On that day, the war ends.
Because on that day, Republican trickle-down “Pro Patria Morti” comes rocketing right back up the pipe and firehosing out of Jenna and Not Jenna’s bidet.
Here are the Actuals via Yahoo News for you reality-bound punctiliants:
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An influential Democratic lawmaker on Sunday called for reinstatement of the draft as a way to boost U.S. troop levels and draw a broader section of the population into the military or public service.
U.S. Rep. Charles Rangel (news, bio, voting record), the incoming chairman of the House of Representatives' tax-writing committee, said he would introduce legislation to reinstate the draft as soon as the new, Democratic-controlled Congress convenes in January.
Asked on CBS' "Face the Nation" if he was still serious about the proposal for a universal draft he raised a couple of years ago, he said, "You bet your life. Underscore serious."
…
And finally, because combing every golf course and whorehouse in the Universe for the “real killers” costs dough, O.J. Simpson needed to squeeze a more few pfennigs out of desecrating the dead again.
And who’s The Juice gonna turn to, to help him pimp his new “Uxoricide for Dummies” how-to manual?
Judith Regan and the Fox Network of course.
All of whom Bob Schieffer takes the time to properly shellac here...
I thought the Congressional Page scandal would surely win the most disgusting story of the year prize — but who knew O.J. Simpson would write a how-to manual describing the way he would have killed his wife, had he chosen to commit the crime.
Or that he would get two prime-time hours on Fox television to promote it?
In our country the law says a citizen who is found not guilty can't be tried again for the same crime.
So along came a publisher named Judith Regan who found a way to funnel millions of dollars to O.J. to write this trash.
And get this: she says one reason she did it was because she was once an abused wife. I'm just guessing here, but I'll bet another reason is she gets a cut of the profits.
She will personally conduct the two one-hour interviews that will air later this month on Fox Television, which — like Ms. Regan's company — is owned by Rupert Murdoch.
I've never been one to criticize competitors — it always sounds cheesy — but may I congratulate the Fox affiliate station owners and managers who have decided NOT to broadcast this dreadful thing being sent out by their network.
…
Way to go, Bob.
On…Meet the Press
Senators-elect Jim Webb and John Tester. In which the American public learns that earmarks are not little nicks left on Tester’s ears when his barber flat-tops him.
Webb and Tester talks about reversing the Two Tiering (Fiefication ™ driftglass) of America. Talking about the massive differences between Free and Fair Trade.
They talk about work and fairness and the middle class.
To which this fake reporter can only add, Halle-Fucking-Lujah.
cieran makes this point in the comments section:
I thought the salient feature of today's MTP was that the political guests (Senators-elect Webb and Tester) could actually form coherent sentences that made grammatical and intellectual sense.
After hearing little more than GOP idjits spewing half-truths and quarter-sentences on these teevee venues for the last few years, it was a breath of fresh air to listen to members of Congress who showed candor, perspective, intellect, and (thank gawd!) actual wit.
Couldn't agree more.
Way to go, Jim and John!
Then up: Ted Koppel and Robin Wright, but not that Robin Wright.
On This Week... Saint McCain continues his neverending campaign to promise to personally fellate every single voter in the country if they will just please, for the Sake of Sweet Baby Jesus let him be President already!!
Queers? Well St. McCain is against them, before he is for them. Says “No” to gay marriage. Civil union? Can’t force his old mouth form those word.
Doesn’t believe it’s a sin, though.
Kind of odd, don’t you think?
Because if it’s not a sin, why the fuck should it be outlawed? If it’s not immoral, whose fucking business is except those involved, Mr. Federalist?
Mr. Small Gummit?
Sorry, those are questions I would have asked. George Stephanopoulos chose not to. I wonder why?
We did learn that St. McCain firmly believe that we don’t need specific laws in the workplace to prevent discrimination…even though we really do. And he is quite sure that the military doesn’t classify homosexuality as abnormal…even though it really does.
So is he now just a doddering, cranky old man incapable of comprehending these basic facts? Or is he just angling for the “Don’t confuse me with Reality” Republican Base?
What he does make clear is that he is a Federalist, apparently in the proud tradition of Jefferson Davis and George Wallace. He supports the overturning of Roe v. Wade because those things should be a matter for each state to decide.
driftglass translation: the basic human rights of women in Alabama and South Dakota are different than the basic human rights of women in Illinois and Washington. The basic human rights of the women in well-off families who will be able to afford to fly to where abortion is perfectly legal are different than basic human rights of poor women who will be stranded in 19th century Red State pest-holes.
You could practically hear him whispering “interposition and nullification” under his breathe as he labored to keep his temper in check.
And considering that he was carefully and obviously reading from prepared text, why don’t they just send McCain’s notes next time and let him sleep in? Maybe hire Fred Thompson to read them for him?
St. McCain was also clear that even though the Commander-in-Chief and his Generals all say we cannot make productive use of more troops in Iraq, he thinks we need ‘em anyway.
And will only advocate getting out “When I’m convinced that every option has been exhausted.” And while some say that this is McCain’s no-lose position, more and more it looks like the cynically empty posturing of an old man playing out his final bid for the Big Chair.
Stephanopoulos drops the friedman card on the table which seems to irritate and flummox the Great Man.
Fareed Zakaria sums it up reasonably well...
(h/t Think Progress…)
ZAKARIA: Senator McCain who I have a lot of respect and like him has been saying for three years we needed more troops. His policy today will not work. We have enough troops to go after Muqtada al-Sadr, the key Shiite religious leader whose militia is causing us this trouble. We can’t do it because the Iraqi government won’t let us. It is causing enormous political pressure. So right now we have an Iraqi government that does not allow us to search for our own soldier. We had to abandon a search, is in cahoots with a shiite militia that has captured americans. The point is not here that you need a military or political solution. Obviously you need both. The point is we have an iraqi government that cannot, will not make any of the decisions that will supplement this military.
STEPHANOPOULOS: Even if we had more troops it wouldn’t work?
ZAKARIA: There is no question that if you had more troops and still can’t go after the militias, can’t offer amnesty to the Sunni insurgents, the core political decisions we have to make do not depend on more troops but political compromises that this government, this ruling coalition can’t make. Sending in more troops in that context is just willing more american deaths.
When Josef Stalin wanted to show his contempt for the empty posturing of the Pope, he famously asked “How many divisions does the Pope have?”
So how many divisions do you have, St. McCain?
The world awaits your answer.
11 comments:
one of the scariest things to come from the "lessons of viet nam" crowd is the whole myth of "we could have won if we only had the will, if we had nuked, if we had invaded the north, if...if..."
the cold facts of the situation are, tet was a military stalemate that took six months of brutal combat to achieve. the invasion of cambodia and the extreme bombing of the north by nixon accomplished nothing at the paris peace table. nothing. in the end the u.s. involvement did not accomplish a single thing that would not have been accomplished by simply never getting involved. the only difference was 50,000 u.s. dead, and a bitter, angry and almost psychoticly implacable northern victory. "peace with honor" was a bullshit lie when nixon spouted it, "we must succeed" (what ever the fuck that means) is a bullshit lie now.
But if they ever should really reinstate the draft, don't you bet their fat asses that they will also reinstate the college deferment? God forbid a rich child should die in combat.
Um, guess I'd better start saving up to send my nephew to college, eh? It's what aunts do. If they can.
Also, the whole OJ Simpson thing is just beyond belief. Really. I couldn't imagine this ever happening, and I'm used to soulless fuckers who would sell their own mother to make a buck. I totally believe OJ would do this, but someone is paying him?!? And trying to claim some sort of moral high ground for doing so?!? Sweet Jesus!
If there is a God/Goddess, he/she must be weeping.
“Uxoricide for Dummies”
Dude, mad props for use of the word 'Uxoricide'
Draft O. J. first. Even before the College Elephascists. :)
McCain plans to run on the wedge issue of abortion and knows the Iraq disaster won't be around as the #1 issue. He's sold out the troops on torture and with his continued case for a futile war. He's selling out women on their rights to their own bodily functions. His campaign finance reform proved to be another easily bypassed shell game.
Selling out and being ineffective is an odd combination to stand on. And this is the best the GOP has?
He was a hero once, 40 years ago. He's a carny now. As a liberal, I respected the maturity Goldwater displayed late in life, but McCain displays nothing but an opportunism that kills.
He is a pitiable man in his moral midgetism.
To follow up on Kevin's comments about McCain, it's clear that the only assets he has going for him these days are (a) a no-longer-deserved reputation as a maverick, and (b) some residual military sensibilities, e.g., commitment to the Geneva conventions.
But after watching Webb on MTP yesterday, it's obvious that here we have a REAL maverick, and his excellent military sensibilities were earned on the ground in Vietnam, instead of in the air.
(i.e., one thing that should be obvious from the prosecution of recent wars e.g, Iraq, Israel's incursion into Lebanon, is that military leadership, including the commander-in-chief, needs an understanding of events on the ground, and that military leaders whose experience is solely in aviation tend to overestimate the utility of air power in fighting modern wars, often to unfortunate ends).
So I think that McCain's remaining advantages as a politician just got usurped by a different Senator, the newly-elected Jim Webb.
So we should thank Webb for his work removing two of the most awful GOP presidential hopefuls, G. Felix Allen in 2006, and McCain in 2008.
Driftglass,
You covered a lot of territory here and for that I am grateful, I couldn't wade through that muck this weekend. Rangel needs to keep at this draft business, but the sad thing is, the neo-con cabal will just say he is a loon, that we have plenty of soldiers for Iraq and that Iran will be fought and won by air. The public will buy it, enough of the Democrats will buy it, and there we will go.
McCain seems like a schizophrenic to me.
OJ is so morally vacant that it really shows how low Fox thinks their viewers want to go. It is a testament to what they think of their "base." I know it is the affiliate stations and not the news, and for that it insults folks who tune in for their Simpsons and Seinfeld fix, but the two stations are one in the same to me, and they think their viewers of either station are one and the same, and this is a huge statement about how this media cabal views the American public. Talk about losing our cultural values, it is not okay for a gay couple to get married, but it is okay for a famous person to kill their ex-wife and her friend and profit from the murders.
It's like Judith and O.J. were doing two-part harmony and singing:
"NO-THING MATTERS EXCEPT MUNNNNNY!"
Not so fast, our hard-slicing, hard-humping friends...there are still a FEW people around who know babyshit-ocher-journalism-marbled-with-human-blood when they see it.
Maybe the two of them can sign up for a "support the troops" tour in Iraq.
First gig: Ramadi. :o)
Well, apparently Americans do draw the line somewhere, and OJ it is! I read that Murdoch backed out of his company's "ill considered" plan to fluff OJ's pocketbook. Finally! Seems that folks were a mite upset and some local stations were refusing to air this "program."
"McCain seems like a schizophreniac to me..."
Well, one of them barking-ass mad words...:o)
He really DOES look crazy, doesn't he? In fairness, it's probably a combination of his age, those years in the Hanoi Hilton, and that god-awful presidential-lust tumor that's devouring him.
I keep thinking, that there's something there...but way back when he was younger, healthier, and presumably, better able to know right from wrong, he rented his asshole to John Keating.
Fuck him.
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