MucheDumbre

Breaking news: The Surge worked.

Actually it’s not so breaking.  The results have been apparent for several months now.  Civilian casualties are down, military casualties are down, and acts of violence in general are down.  Iraq is no paradise, but on the other hand it’s not quite the hell on earth that could have safely described it in 2006.  It’s hard to argue now that it was the wrong strategy, so let’s take a look down memory lane and see who opposed it eh?

Senator John Kerry:  “The simple fact is that sending in over 20,000 additional troops isn’t the answer–in fact, it’s a tragic mistake. It won’t end the violence; it won’t provide security; …it won’t turn back the clock and avoid the civil war that is already underway; it won’t deter terrorists, who have a completely different agenda; it won’t rein in the militias.”

Kerry’s fellow Democratic Senator from Massachusetts, Ted Kennedy, declared the surge, “an immense new mistake.”  Kennedy actively tried to fight sending any more troops.

Senator Christopher Dodd, former Presidential candidate and onetime threesome partner with the previously mentioned Senator Kennedy:  “We don’t need a surge of troops in Iraq–we need a surge of diplomacy and politics. Every knowledgeable person who has examined the Iraq situation for the past several years–Baker and Hamilton, senior military officials, junior officers–has drawn the same conclusion–there is no military solution in Iraq. To insist upon a surge is wrong.”

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer (really, is that his real name?), when asked is she was worried that the gains of the surge might be lost if the troops were removed too hastily, “There haven’t been gains, Wolf…The gains have not produced the desired effect, which is the reconciliation of Iraq. This is a failure. This is a failure.”

Governor Bill Richardson, former Presidential candidate and yapping Vice Presidential wannabe had this to say on the surge:  “The president is wrong. We don’t need anymore troop surges, we need a diplomatic surge. We must get all our troops out of Iraq as soon as possible.”

Senator Joseph Biden, yet another former Presidential nominee, and currently running for either Obama’s Vice President or his Secretary of State, whichever will put him in front of the cameras the most, told this to Secretary of State Rice on the surge:  “We heard a plan to escalate the war, not only in Iraq but possibly into Syria and Iran as well…I believe the President’s strategy is not a solution, Secretary Rice, I believe it is a tragic mistake.”

And of course Senator Hillary Clinton, who tried to play the man in her ultimately failed Presidential race against Senator Barack Obama:  “Based on the president’s speech tonight, I cannot support his proposed escalation of the war in Iraq…The President simply has not gotten the message sent loudly and clearly by the American people, that we desperately need a new course. The president has not offered a new direction, instead he will continue to take us down the wrong road, only faster.”

There was some Democratic support however.  Senator Lieberman said this in support of the surge:  “it’s just unfair to our troops implementing the surge, to Gen. Petraeus, who helped create this totally different strategy — which is working — to essentially pull the rug out from under them, to take away their reason for fighting before they even have a chance.”

Oh wait, Lieberman is an independent now.  Although he caucuses with the Democrats he is regarded as traitor.  Quite a fall from being the Democratic Vice Presidential candidate 7 plus years ago.  But I don’t want to make it sound like only Democrats opposed the surge.  There was some Republican opposition as well. 

Retiring fence sitter and amateur historian Senator John Warner had this to say, “Young men and women of US forces and coalition forces should not be caught in the crossfire of a civil war prompted by who should have succeeded Mohammed in — what is it? — 650 AD?”

Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel, who teased the country on his decision to think about deciding to consider whether to entertain the notion of running for President, had this to say:  “This is a dangerously wrong-headed strategy that will drive America deeper into an unwinnable swamp at a great cost. We cannot escape the reality that there will be no military solution in Iraq.”

But right now, the opinions of those who matter most are the two Presidential candidates, John McCain and Barack Obama.  Come January of next year, no matter who wins, George Bush will be packing his bags and whatever White House towels he can get away with.  As he leaves, his policies leave with him.

McCain’s views on the surge are well known.  In fact, you could argue that he risked his political career on the surge.  But what did fellow contender, Barack Obama have to say?

Before the surge: “It is clear at this point that we cannot, through putting in more troops or maintaining the presence that we have, expect that somehow the situation is going to improve, and we have to do something significant to break the pattern that we’ve been in right now.”

After the surge was announced:  “I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq are going to solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse.”

Of course you will have to look a little bit for Obama’s earlier comments now.  He scrubbed his website to clear out his previous anti surge comments.  Now, guess what?  The surge worked:  “In the 18 months since President Bush announced the surge, our troops have performed heroically in bringing down the level of violence. New tactics have protected the Iraqi population, and the Sunni tribes have rejected Al Qaeda–greatly weakening its effectiveness.”

Hey, anyone can be wrong.  It’s possible that someday I might be wrong about something.  It’s not likely, but never say never.  But it’s stunning when an entire political party is wrong about something so important.  The Democratic Party and the mainstream media was as one on the idea a year and a half ago that the surge couldn’t work and shouldn’t be tried. 

In this election, Barack Obama isn’t running on the experience card.  McCain has that locked up.  He’s running on his judgment. Because he opposed the war on Iraq, he is somehow supposed to have better judgment?  Sean Penn opposed the war too and he thought it was a good idea to marry Madonna.  His supposedly superior judgment had him opposing the surge too.

It wasn’t judgment that had Obama opposing the war,  it was the reflex of the anti-war left.  The same reflex that had him oppose the surge.  I’m still waiting for an example of his good judgment.

If only they were all like this.

Okla. Dem calls Obama liberal, declines to endorse

Democratic Rep. Dan Boren of Oklahoma said Tuesday Barack Obama is “the most liberal senator” in Congress and he has no intention of endorsing him for the White House.
Boren, the lone Democrat in Oklahoma’s congressional delegation, said that while Obama has talked about working with Republicans, “unfortunately, his record does not reflect working in a bipartisan fashion.”
Boren, a self-described centrist, is seeking a third term this year in a mostly rural district that stretches across eastern Oklahoma.
“We’re much more conservative,” Boren said of district. “I’ve got to reflect my district. No one means more to me than the people who elected me. I have to listen them.” He called Obama “the most liberal senator in the U.S. Senate.”
Hillary Rodham Clinton carried Boren’s district with 66 percent of the vote in the state’s presidential primary in February

I’m not really sure what it means that he won’t endorse him but he will still vote for him. I can only assume that it means he just won’t go out and stump for him, but will vote for BHO because he is the democratic nominee. What I admire is that he is one of almost none who is listening to his constituents that didn’t want Obama as the democratic nominee.

Why hold elections at all if our representatives or electoral colleges aren’t going to follow what we want? Bill Richardson should have been more like this guy. Richardson said in a February interview with The New York Times, when asked how superdelegates should vote.

“It should reflect the vote of my state, it should represent the vote of my constituency,” he told the newspaper at the time.

And then went on to backpedal and endorse Obama.. He excused this backstabbing by saying

First, they say the superdelegates should reflect the will of the people of their states. Well, we have Sen. Kennedy and Sen. Kerry saying they’re going to vote for Obama even though Sen. Clinton won by 13 points in Massachusetts. … The voters of New Mexico chose Sen. Clinton. If we follow the Obama line, Bill Richardson should be for Sen. Clinton.”

“Yes, but, Eddie, by half a percent — come on,” Richardson responded, in a reference to the slight margin by which Clinton won New Mexico.

I guess a one win run in the world series don’t really count… because it’s just one run, right?
Whatever dude, he ain’t going to pick you as VP.. So you can get your lips off his ass now, Hillary’s conceded. But the Clinton memory is long on who is and who isn’t loyal to them

It takes balls to do what Boren’s doing and I applaud him for it. Another one I applaud is Ted Strickland, Ohio Governor and HRC supporter. When asked what he would say if picked for BHO’s Vp his answer was

“If drafted, I will not run; nominated, I will not accept; and if elected, I will not serve,” Strickland said in the interview. “So, I don’t know how more crystal clear I can be.”

He was just too busy to take a Vice President slot this summer doing a Cornhole Tournament Tour

Wow…. That’s kinda funny. “sorry, I can’t be you Veep because have a cornholers tournament to attend” HA!

But of course he will do what is needed to get a democrat elected.

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Katie Couric said that “Sen. Clinton received some of the most unfair, hostile coverage” she’d ever seen. She also went on to say more in her “NoteBook”

If you only had some kind of outlet to say this when you saw it happening….

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Nice…….. Real Nice

Look if the Arabs want to buy what’s left of NYC skyline.. Then who am I to bitch about it…Not my city, not my skyline… but the irony can’t be ignored.. Can it?
But hey look, it won’t be too bad. They can be new neighbors with the Italians, who just bought the Flatiron Building That seems to be the trend these days. The dollar is so bad against the Euro, that investor in the EU and in the rich Arab countries are buying up pieces of America’s landscape piece by piece.

Why couldn’t they have bought this bozo?

We’d have sold him off cheap…Hell we’d have given a great deal “Buy one George W Bush and get a Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld” free.

Oh wait… The House of Saud already did.

Update…

This might piss some people off..

Belgian-Brazilian brewing giant InBev wants to buy Anheuser-Busch. I’m willing to bet this will piss more people off that the Chrysler building, Flatiron Building, and Bush garage sale to the House of Saud combined.