First Draft of History, Revised Version

From the Associated Press today:

Obama's balancing act on Iraq withdrawal strategy

By JENNIFER LOVEN – 1 hour ago
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama leaned heavily toward field commanders' preferences in setting a time frame for an Iraq pullout, as he weighed the fervent desires of anti-war supporters who propelled him into office and the equally strong worries of war generals. . . .

At stake was the promise that most defined Obama's presidential bid: to bring all combat troops home — effectively, to end one of the nation's longest and most controversial wars — 16 months after taking office.

This isn’t the way I remember it. It wasn’t the anti-war activists who propelled President Obama into office. Propulsion was provided by the much more prosaic means of organized labor, the Democratic machines in urban America, a locked-down black vote, the mainstream media taking an active role in campaigning for him, and a poorly-run campaign by Senator John McCain that had nothing to attract swing voters drifting into the Obama current.

Nor was ending the Iraq war the promise that most defined Obam's campaign. The promise that most defined Obama’s presidential bid--if we exclude the slogan “hope & change” from the definition of “promise”--was that he would dramatically increase the government’s taxation and regulatory role in American lives.

For the most part Obama avoided talking about the war, especially as the news from Iraq got better and better as the campaign progressed. He also avoided the biggest mouths of the anti-war movement, and we know he dumped his friendship with people like antiwar icon Bill Ayres. Obama wanted to win bad and he knew those folks would turn him into Eugene McCarthy if they could.

I am relieved that Obama is listening to his commanders, and did not initiate the kind of hell-for-leather rout that some of us feared he might. I can’t quite give him credit for being smart about the Middle East, though: I still think he’s a foreign-policy disaster. But he’s too much a political animal to want to lose a major war during the first few weeks of his presidency.

But as I discussed in another post, the media giving him credit for ending the war is pure BS. As far back as a year ago January Bush’s successes in Iraq were pushing the war off the list of top campaign issues. “Instead,” reported the New York Times on January 3, 2008, “candidates are being asked about, and are increasingly talking about, the mortgage crisis, rising gas costs, health care, immigration, the environment and taxes.” (“Domestic Issues Now Outweigh Iraq”).

Weeks before the election, commentators were already discussing post-war Iraq and redeployment of Iraqi troops to Afghanistan, like this from October: "'On Iraq, no matter who wins, the arrows are clear,' said Richard N. Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations. 'The U.S. presence is coming down.'” ("Iran & Iraq: No Longer Hot-Button Issues in Campaign 2008").

I know we were already discussing the war in Iraq as nearly over in October, too, here, and here.

In January 2008 Newsweek’s Michael Hirsh reported that the status of forces agreement Bush was starting to negotiate with the Iraqi government was going to be what determined the future of American forces there. The SOFA “would then replace the existing Security Council mandate authorizing the presence of the U.S.-led multinational forces in Iraq, [and] will become a sworn obligation for the next president.” The upshot of that agreement, Hirsh pointed out, was that “the next president, Democrat or Republican, is likely to be handed a fait accompli that could well render moot his or her own elaborate withdrawal plans, especially the ones being considered by the two leading Democratic contenders, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.” (“Sorry, Barack, You’ve Lost Iraq./Bush's efforts to negotiate a long-term U.S-Iraq pact may remove troops as an '08 election issue for Obama, Clinton.”)

Just something to keep in mind as Obama supporters fan out across the airwaves to trumpet Obama's principled and heroic decision to end the war in Iraq that Bush and Petraeus had already won.

Health Care in a Right-to-Work State

This inspiring story from the Associated Press:

Nail-in-skull survivor: 'It never really hurt'

SHAWNEE, Kan. (AP) — George Chandler says he didn't know a 2 1/2-inch nail was driven into his skull until his buddy spotted it stuck through his cap.

Chandler said he felt only a sting.

"It never did really what you call hurt," the Shawnee man said Wednesday on NBC's "Today."
Chandler said his friend Phil Kern was using a nail gun to mount lattice on Chandler's deck when a hose on the powerful tool became caught.

Chandler said he stood up just as Kern tried to free the gun and it discharged. At first, they couldn't locate the nail. But then Kern saw it, he ordered Chandler to sit down while he called 911.

An emergency room doctor tried unsuccessfully to remove the nail with a pair of pliers.

"He looked at me and said, 'I need a claw hammer,'" Chandler recalled. "I thought, 'Ah, he's just teasing.'"

So the doctor borrowed a claw hammer from a worker to finish the job and sent Chandler home with a few stitches.

"He got a screwdriver at the same time, and he took the screwdriver and pried the nail up a little bit and got the claw hammer," Chandler said.
#


A similar case was heard of a few years back at Detroit Receiving. It seems that doctors were on the verge of removing the nail, when the ER was forcibly closed down by representatives from 5 city unions, descending to thrash out whose skilled tradesmen (and how many) were entitled to go get a hammer and remove the nail.

The resulting agreement was later praised as a model by labor experts. Unfortunately, the patient died during talks.

Carter Lies, Gazans Die

In the same Associated Press article where His Holiness, (I mean the other one), Jimmy Carter, explains his moral rectitude in honoring murderers of schoolchildren and ignoring the reasonable and lawful prohibitions of US citizens treating with terrorist organizations with an audacious claim that he is "immune from such restrictions," ("Carter slams Israeli actions in Gaza Strip"), the AP reports that

As Carter was meeting with Hamas officials, Israeli troops fended off Palestinian gunmen who assaulted a crossing on the Gaza Strip border Thursday, thwarting the third attempt by militants to infiltrate into Israel in a week.

One Palestinian was reported killed in the clash, which followed a day of fighting between Israeli forces and Gaza militants.

When the AP says "Palestinian gunmen," they mean "Hamas gunmen," that is, the people Carter went over their to cuddle with. Hamas is in complete control of Gaza, directs all its military operations against Israel launched from Gaza, and killed or otherwise removed from the equation any rival Fatah gunmen during their bloody coup last year.

Today, by way of divine confirmation of Carter's mission, Hamas staged a suicide bombing at a border crossing where food and humanitarian supplies come through from Israel, in order "to create a humanitarian crisis in Gaza that would lead to international pressure on Israel." The strategy will come at the direct expense of Gazans, of course. ("Palestinian Suicide Bombers Attack Gaza Crossing").

Carter has blamed all recent problems on the "apartheid" policies of Israel.

He is such a toad. Hamas hasn't blown up Egypt's humanitarian border crossing with Gaza, because Egypt shut their border with Gaza rather than let these creeps into their country, and they don't send humanitarian aid into Gaza! But will Jimmy accuse Egypt of gencoide and call them an apartheid state?

Hamas has also very publicly announced their refusal of Carter's pretty-pleases to stop firing rockets into Israel or to release Israeli soldier Cpl. Gilad Shalit, held hostage--or worse--since June 2006.

I shudder to think how, having tired of making a fool of Carter--for whom I can't imagine they have a sliver of respect--Hamas's thugs may feel inclined to turn to humiliating Carter's poor wife Rosalynn just to see if there is anything they can do to make that damned peanut farmer evince some semblance of manly self-respect.

AP Writer Bullish on Al Qaeda

The Associated Press’s Kathy Gannon has written a rave review of Al Qaeda’s efforts to “go modern” in its recruitment and technology campaign. (“Al Qaeda courting tech-savvy geeks/Flashy productions help in recruiting”):

In the Internet age, Al Qaeda prizes geeks committed to jihad as much as would-be suicide bombers and gunmen.

The terrorist network is recruiting computer-savvy technicians to produce sophisticated Web documentaries and multimedia products aimed at Muslim audiences in the United States, Britain and other Western countries.

Ms. Gannon has been covering Pakistan and Afghanistan since 1988, and presently lives in Pakistan with her husband and daughter. According to her bio, she “was in Kabul when the Taliban regime took power in 1996 and was the only western journalist allowed to return to Kabul by the Taliban, three weeks before their collapse in November 2001.”

Being married to a Pakistani and pals with the Taliban doesn’t make her biased. But in an excerpt from her 2005 book, “I Is for Infidel,” she had this to say:

The West has to own up to the mistakes it has made such as with Abu Ghraib and the torture in Afghan prisons, in the errant attacks on civilians and in its disregard for the basic precept of a civilized legal system, which maintains that an accused person is innocent until proven guilty.

The nature of the torture at Abu Ghraib reflected the West's perception of Muslims, hence the women soldiers who seemed to take such delight in the outrages and the especially humiliating use of dogs - considered abhorrent to Muslims - and the practice of making prisoners perform demeaning sexual acts. The torture was based on a phobic perception of Islam. Had Saddam Hussein's soldiers carried out these abuses on American soldiers, the outrage would have been global and the retribution violent. But because it was American and British soldiers who committed the torture, the blame was attached only to a few, to soldiers we were told were an aberration.

So clearly no bias there.

Still, what really caught my attention in this small AP story in the Detroit Free Press was Ms. Gannon’s gee-whiz coverage of Al Qaeda’s modernizing strategy. Ms. Gannon writes about Al Qaeda’s high-tech call for suicide bombers like a Fortune editor going oogly-googly over a new hot startup with a green product and an uptrending youth share.

The terrorist network is recruiting computer-savvy technicians to produce sophisticated Web documentaries and multimedia products aimed at Muslim audiences in the United States, Britain and other Western countries.

Already, the movement's al-Sahab production company is turning out high-quality material. The documentaries appear regularly on Islamist Web sites, which Al Qaeda uses to recruit followers and rally supporters.

That requires people whose skills go beyond planting bombs and ambushing U.S. patrols in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"The Al Qaeda men who are coming today are not farmers, illiterate people," said Qari Mohammed Yusuf, an Afghan who claims to be an al-Sahab cameraman. "They are PhDs, professors who know about this technology. ... Al Qaeda has asked them to come."

Try an experiment and substitute the phrase, “the auto supplier” or the “software developer” every place Ms. Gannon mentions “Al Qaeda” or “the terrorist network” or “the movement.” She does everything but include quotes from Wall Street money managers geeked on the terrorist video market, or comments from IT grads from Lawrence seriously weighing AQ’s competetive health plan and onsite day-care. You won't see one syllable consciously critical of Al Qaeda’s determined purpose to kill more people than ever. Ms. Gannon's too impressed with how slick and savvy these murderers' production values are getting.

A speech by deputy Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri issued to mark last year's 9/11 anniversary included U.S. television interviews with wounded soldiers, CIA analysts and talking-head journalists and experts, excerpts from a news conference with President George W. Bush, audiotape of Malcolm X and World War II footage -- all edited in to back al-Zawahri's case that the United States is losing the war on terrorism.

Internet use enables Al Qaeda to reach a broad audience within the worldwide Muslim community, rather than having to rely on Arabic-language satellite stations, whose audiences are limited to the Middle East and who exercise editorial control.

"What is really amazing to me is watching how would-be terrorists living in the West are drawn in and captivated by al-Sahab videos," said Evan Kohlmann, a terrorism consultant for Globalterroralert.com.

Gee! Golly! Western marketers can really learn a lesson from the way would-be terrorists are drawn in, captivated, and then launched out on an unsuspecting world to go Allah-BOOOM! Or, as the technicians term it, being de-captivated.

And I'll bet those stupid Americans will try everything in their corrupt national-security toolbox to compete. But Al Qaeda's shrewd managers even cover that.

Al Qaeda technicians have become skilled at evading U.S. detection techniques. Katz said they often use proxy servers to disguise the point of origin. Documentaries are sent in multiple files to improve security.

"The al-Sahab people know and study technology, the latest law enforcement techniques," Katz said.

Yusuf said Al Qaeda maintains its own cyberspace library, storing material in a secret server or servers so al-Sahab members do not have to keep incriminating material on laptops.

"There is a plan to make al-Sahab very big," Yusuf said. "It is part of the strategy. There are two parts. One is the fighting and the other part of the war is the media. We should carry out the media war because it inspires our people to come and fight."

Ms. Gannon’s is a member of the media. And she's doing her part.

AP News Flash: They Aren’t Mad About Abu Ghraib After All

Speaking of alleged terror plots, AP writer Paul Haven has this light to shed on the equally significant terrorist bust in Denmark this week:

A pair of alleged Islamic terror plots uncovered this week in Germany and Denmark share some disturbing hallmarks: Officials link both to al-Qaida and have found tentacles stretching all the way to Pakistan, the likely hiding place of Osama bin Laden. (“Foiled Terror Plots Share Hallmarks”).

As I complained elsewhere about the use of the term "alleged," everything in this paragraph makes some sense except Haven’s eccentric use of the phrase “alleged Islamic terror plots,” which I find confusing.

Which element is it that is supposed to be only alleged? Is it allegedly Islamic? Is it allegedly terrorist? Allegedly a plot? Or perhaps, (and it isn’t so far-fetched), is it only an allegation that the territories in which the plots were discovered are still going to be known as “Germany” and “Denmark”?

Meanwhile, David McHugh, Haven’s colleague at AP, wrote his report on the German (alleged) terror plot , (“Germans Arrest 3 in Alleged Terror Plot”), with a bit more common sense:

Security experts said the two purported plots are a reminder that Muslim extremists are not driven just by anger at the United States and its policies.

Islamic radicals "treat the whole Western world as their enemy," said Tadeusz Wrobel, an analyst of military and security issues in Warsaw.

I’d like to hear more from Taduesz, but that’s all the AP had room for.

But why exactly do we all need a reminder that Muslim extremists are not driven just by anger at the United States and its policies, and that they treat the whole Western world as their enemy?

Could it be because of all the ink that’s been spilled by the Western press endlessly repeating that the only reason for the anger of Islamic radicals has been the US and its policies?

If you read through Haven’s account from Denmark you see he’s still sticking with the "classic" anti-American viewpoint on the plots:

The schemes - which could have caused massive loss of life - have been a chilling reminder to Europeans of the threat they still face due to porous borders, restive minorities and perceived allegiance to the United States.

Now doesn't that make more sense than simply tarring an entire religion of peace as enemies of the West? "Bad Europeans. Not only are you friends with the USA (I thought the whole world hated us?), but your porous borders also suck in millions of us from Turkey, Pakistan, Egypt, and elsewhere in the Middle East, after which our refusal either to assimilate or go home again makes us unhappy--in fact, it makes us positively restive. I’m so restive right now I could spit! Or blow up some Europeans."

Haven keeps trying to make sense of this:

While Europe and the United States have diverged - often sharply - on issues such as Iraq, the creation of the U.S. holding facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and the CIA's use of secret prisons for terror suspects, it is Europe that has found itself the victim of more terror attacks since Sept. 11.

Journalists like Haven still seem puzzled that the facts don't fit the theory, even when their profession puts them in the way of security experts and analysts who point out the obvious to them all the time: the obvious being that Islam doesn’t hate us because of Abu Ghraib, but because of who we are.

As Richard Thompson of the Thomas More Law Center said recently, “the political goal of radical Islam is to destroy our Judeo-Christian culture…That the Quran calls for Muslims to subjugate the world, especially Christians and Jews, is a fact that anyone can look up.”