Sunday Morning Talk Show Thread 26 August 2007

Bill = $36.72
hand clerk $100.00
Change= 36.75,37.00 40.00 60,80,100.—thank you sir! come back again!

Plus "and may I have your name and address for our mailing list?"

I ran Radio Shack stores for about five years around 1980 in the SF area.

Why we don't have capabilities to put a half million troops in without strain now, is a huge question mark to me.

There are two answers to that:

"Peace dividend" (blame that one on Papa Bush)

and

Clinton 1

Perky Katie mentioned Obama’s big ears and oh did she ever catch it, from him and the drive bys.

Great stuff here really terrific explanation of the surge and what it has done and can do.

Same here, I started giving change in 62’ at a retail drive through food store and continued later in my own store.

I didn’t hear the exact wording you heard, and I would hope that he was referring to Byron York making his first appearance on FNS. If Byron is a permanent new person, who would he replace? Hope it’s not Britt.

Sad commentary on where our values are today.

Why we don't have capabilities to put a half million troops in without strain now, is a huge question mark to me.

Clinton happened.

Dan Quayla was a surprise, because the Republicans had bench strength in 1977 and everybody was wondering why Vice-President Bush picked Senator Quayle as his running mate.

Today, the Democrats have no bench strength, and Barack Obama had to run this time around. 1) if he didn't, he would be old news in 2012 or 2016, like John Edwards is now. 2) If he had to wait to build an actual record of accomplishment, where would he go and what would he do to have accomplishments?

The Senate is not a place to build a track-record; just a place to take up space and brag about small victories. I'd say moral victories, but he is a Democrat....

I really enjoyed seeing that again.

In fact, I played it twice.

However, McGruff was, I think, referring to something Chris Matthews did, rather than Chris Wallace. Anyway, I hope so since Matthews is so much more likely to (ugh) do something like that.

What you say has much merit. I hate all the armchair generals .. and the real credible ones, Odierno, CNN’s Grange, Lynch .. are almost begging to let this operation play out through the end of ‘07 .. and better to spring of ‘08 .. to give it the best possible shot. We’re just seeing the consequences of these actions starting to really pay off.

And I simply cannot fathom telegraphing our wartime options, actions and WITHDRAWAL DATES FOR GOD’S SAKE, publicy to the enemy .. as so many talking heads, politicians .. and even the military are doing these days. Whattheheck are they thinking?

And I just can’t imagine how the newly trusting Iraqis, with their history of so many previous betrayals, would react if they were left just marginally ready by Christmas, and the terrorists come in to destroy, pillage and take power.

I agree .. I think the next 2-3 weeks will likely be deadly .. Tehran and Sadr will see to that. God bless and protect our troops, allies and Iraqi partners.

~~~~~~~~

Gen. Lynch’s briefing opening remarks and a pertinent NBC question - 8-24-07

http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/transcript.aspx?transcriptid=4028

GEN. LYNCH: Thanks, Gary. I appreciate that. And, hey, folks. Good to be with you. We’ve got about a two-year history of working these things together. There’s a lot I want to talk to you about today. I want to cover several important topics.

I want to talk about the enemy. Remember, I talked about before, the enemy here is really three sets: It’s Sunni extremists, it’s Shi’a extremists and it’s Iranian influence. I want to emphasize the Iranian influence piece as part of this briefing.

I want to talk to you about the effects of the surge operation we’ve been doing now since the 15th of June and give you a sense of what’s happened over the 60-plus days we’ve been working this.

We got a great operation going on right now we call Marne Husky; I want to highlight that for you. And then I got to spend some time to talk to you about the concerned citizens program; you know, we got concerned citizens that are stepping up throughout the battlespace. And then I’ll take whatever questions you want, and we’ll talk about whatever you want to talk about.

First let me focus on Iranian influence inside my area of responsibility. As you all know, I’m the commander for Multinational Division-Center, and it’s an area equivalent in size to the state of West Virginia.

Our headquarters stood up as part of the troop surge, and we’ve been executing this important mission for more than four months now. Since June the 15th, we’ve expanded our presence throughout areas that had been previously insurgent strongholds.

General Odierno has charged Task Force Marne with securing the areas south and east of Baghdad and stopping the flow of weapons and violence through those areas. We’re committing troops to these neighborhoods, and with the help of the Iraqi army and the police, demonstrating to the Iraqi people that we’re not leaving until they have security and they’re capable of maintaining it through their own efforts.

And that’s what’s happening as we work these surge operations. We get to an area, the locals there, the first question they ask is, “Are you staying?”

And once they’re convinced we’re staying, the question then becomes, “How can we help?” What we see as a result of that commitment is Iraqi citizens are coming forward and they’re indeed saying, “What can we do to help?”

Over the last four months, we’ve seen an interesting shift. Iraqi citizens are coming to us to provide information. These citizens are speaking up about what they’ve seen, they’re talking about what they’ve heard and about any activity that jeopardizes the rebuilding of their country.

From that, we’re now having concerned citizens programs operating in both Sunni and Shi’a areas alike, with local Iraqis manning checkpoints and giving us important information on insurgents and weapons caches, and that’s led to a dramatic turnaround in the security situation in some areas; not all the areas, but in some areas.

This upswell of almost 10,000 concerned citizens

has enabled our soldiers to go in and restore normalcy as much as possible to these communities.

With our help, the Iraqis are starting to realize that they can establish order and accountability in their lives.

But unfortunately, at the same time we’ve got some who want to see the Iraqi people fail, and we believe there are elements from Iran who are doing whatever they can to undermine our collective efforts.

We see Iranian activity through our area in three levels.

First, U.S. soldiers are coming under attack from deadly weapons originating from Iran; specifically, Iranian rockets and Iranian-manufactured components for explosively formed projectiles. Second, we believe some, not all, Shi’a militants are being trained by Iran to use these weapons and then they’re passing that training on to others inside of Iraq.

And third, we believe that members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps are facilitating training as well as transfer of weapons and munitions.

We assess that there are 50 or so Iranian and Iraqi operatives working for Iran in our area, about 20 of which who we are actively targeting. These operatives fall in the same group that helped militants carry out the January 2007 attack against the Karbala Provincial Joint Coordination Center, resulting in the death of five of our soldiers.

Now, one way or another, Sunni militants are also getting their hand on this Iranian technology. Whether that’s a direct hand-off or black-market activity, we don’t know, but both sides — the Sunni extremists and the Shi’a extremists — have it and are using that technology to kill Americans and Iraqis, and that’s got to stop. And we’re using every means available as to monitor and take down these networks.

The scale of the Iranian problem is especially troubling when you look at the numbers of weapons we found and destroyed since the start of the surge.

We have captured more than 117 Iranian-made munitions since April the 4th. Let me tell you about some specific instances.

Just over two weeks ago, soldiers from our 3rd Brigade Combat Team conducted a raid on a militant house in the town of Nahrawan, which is about 20 miles east of Baghdad on the east side of the Tigris River.

They arrested one of our division’s most valued targets, high-value targets, and he acted as a link between Iran and the Jaish al- Mahdi militia. He was the main Shi’a conduit in that region for getting Iranian EFPs and rockets into Baghdad, and his capture was a big blow to that network.

When we found him, we also discovered an insurgent video they were making that showed 46 Iranian rockets lined up to be fired at one of our U.S. forward operating bases.

In fact, some of those rockets shown in the video actually fired and hit some of our bases on the 11th of July, killed one of my soldiers and wounded 15 others.

Just last weekend Iraqi army scouts recovered a cache of Iranian mines in the Wasat province after receiving a tip from an Iraqi civilian. We believe these mines were meant to kill coalition and Iraqi security forces due to the proximity of this weapons cache to one of our camps.

We are finding Iranian-made munitions and weapons systems throughout our area. But the fact remains we have a 125-mile border with Iran in the Wasat province, and that continues to be a concern.

We are up against a new wave of lethality sponsored by the enemies of the people of Iraq and its government. There have been 48 EFP attacks directed against my troops since the operation began in April, killing eight of my soldiers. We’ve also seen an increase in the use of precision and rocket attacks, and there have been 66 of those attacks since April, killing five of my soldiers.

There are several significant features associated with the 48 EFPs we found in NMD-C (sic; MND-C) which are unique to Iranian design, manufacture and distribution methods.

We’re doing things like looking at tool marks on these EFPs and the source of the explosives and the manufacturing capability, and those EFP components are coming to Iran — coming from Iran into Iraq, and they’re killing Iraqis, and they’re killing the coalition soldiers.

The good news is that we’re having some success in bringing down these networks and countering these weapons’ effectiveness.

We’ve found and cleared 728 IEDs, to include EFPs, since the surge began. And in that same period, we’ve located and destroyed 248 weapons caches.

We’re also bolstering the government of Iraq’s efforts along the Iranian border. My soldiers are working with the Iraqi border security force, training them and helping them.

There is one point of entry into Iraq from the Wasat province — into the Wasat province, and Iraqi border forces check trucks making that crossing.

In the near future, 2,000 Republic of Georgia soldiers will secure six checkpoints, allowing us to thoroughly inspect every truck crossing along the main westbound route towards Baghdad. So every truck that comes into the Wasat province, from Iran into Iraq, will be stopped and searched in total by these great soldiers from Georgia.

In the meantime, we’re continuing to take the fight to the enemy throughout our area.

On August the 15th, we’ve launched — we launched Operation Marne Husky to disrupt extremists who fled our earlier offensive and moved into the Tigris River Valley south of Baghdad. This is an area that hasn’t seen coalition troops in over two years. Think about that. And this is a result of the surge.

We did Marne Torch starting on the 15th of June, shifted to Marne Avalanche on the 15th of July, and now we’re doing Marne Husky, so the enemy’s got no place to hide and he’s continuing to be on the run. The area we’re fighting in now was an extremist safe haven, and we indeed have the enemy on the run in those areas.

All those previous operations I talked about — Marne Torch, Marne Avalanche — drove these bad guys out of areas like Arab Jabour and Iskandariyah. And now we’re pursuing them, not letting them resettle and regroup.

Because if they don’t have the time to breathe, they don’t have time to attack the Iraqi people or our troops. This is tactical momentum and it’s in our favor. And we’re pressing our advantage around Baghdad, and that’s a good position to be in.

And that brings me to another topic: the effect of the troop surge in my area of responsibility.

As I said before, we assumed this mission about four-and-a-half months ago. My last brigade combat team closed in as part of the surge into Iraq in early June. Since we arrived, we’ve been implementing the plan, and what’s been accomplished so far has been surprising in its implications.

Residents of former al Qaeda safe havens have flipped to the side with the coalition forces against the enemy. And with the security that’s resulted, we’ve seen the Iraqi people benefit from a window for reconstruction and the growth of local leadership.

Overall attacks are down by 26 percent in Multinational Division-Center. Civilian casualties have decreased by 36 percent.

Since the 15th of June, we have killed or captured 16 high-value individuals throughout our battlespace. Removing these leaders not only weakens the enemy network but also keeps pressure on the remaining elements and shows them we will continue to hunt them down if they continue their activities.

In addition to that, we have either killed or captured now 1,000 of the enemy insurgents.

In the absence of violence, growth has taken place at the local level. And with the nurturing of the concerned citizens groups, the Iraqi people are helping us consolidate our gains in security by stepping up and taking responsibility for securing their own town.

We’ll work with the government of Iraq to give it a lasting legitimacy by gradually working these citizens into Iraqi security forces.

This is what’s most important. When you talk to the concerned citizens and you ask them what do they want, what they want is recognition. They want to be legitimate members of the Iraqi security forces, and there’s momentum in that direction.

There are concerns in some sectors that by encouraging the growth of security at the local level, we are undermining the authority of the Iraqi government. I don’t see that to be true at all.

Local and provincial leaders are implementing grassroots governance and with our help are improving their lives and the lives and the lives of their citizens by resolving the problems they can solve locally.

And that doesn’t weaken the Iraqi government; it strengthens it. Because of this, the will of the people in action, when the politicians in Baghdad actually come together, they’re going to find out they got a stable base from which to build on.

So there really is a groundswell of enthusiasm at the local level, 10,000 concerned citizens helping to secure the area. With that security, there is an opportunity for reconstruction, there’s an opportunity for mature and local governance, and that’s what we’re seeing.

That’s really the effect of the surge in a nutshell. We’re buying time and space for the Iraqi people to come together and determine their future. It’s reconciliation from the ground up, by helping the Iraqis see that they have something worth fighting for and protecting.

Some days are better than others, but we continue to make progress. Slowly but surely, we’re driving out the bad guys and enabling families and communities to return to normal lives.

Some final thoughts before I take your questions. I’m proud of the contributions our soldiers have made helping Iraqi citizens have a future filled with hope and opportunity and not with oppression and despair. This is not easy and not for certain, but it is possible.

And working together, it could all be a reality. Our soldiers continually rise to the occasion, putting their heart and their soul on the line for their brothers in arms and for freedom. Every day, they commit extraordinary acts of valor, and you should be so very proud of them.

Finally, the enemies of Iraq, while having sustained severe loss in the past several months, have not gone away, and I fully expect them to try to launch spectacular attacks that exact a terrible toll on the Iraqi people.

We will continue taking the fight to the enemy, and we are proud of the fact that the Iraqis will stop — we’ll be able to work with the Iraqis to stop violence because they now have a high degree of determination and resolve at the local level.

And they’re showing magnificent courage. They’re showing a will to continue to make their future, a safe future, a reality. If we have faith in them, they will have faith in us and their future.

*snip*

Q General, Jim Miklaszewski with NBC.

After his visit to Iraq last weekend, Senator John Warner said yesterday that he’s recommending to the president that the U.S. begin to withdraw its forces from Iraq as early as December.

From somebody who’s conducting combat operations on the ground there, what’s your reaction to that? How do you think that would affect your ability to conduct those operations?

GEN. LYNCH: Yeah, thanks for that question, Jim. You know, what I find now — as you all know, I was in Iraq, went away for 10 months, came back again — and really the difference that’s happening right now is twofold.

One is, we’re not commuting to work. In my battlespace there are 29 patrol bases that we have occupied, and we’re out there with the local citizens. Being out with the local citizens allows us to let them know they’re going to be secure, and as a result of that, they come to us with all sorts of actionable intelligence. And that’s what happens.

And the other piece is the ability of the surge forces. You know, we now have units; we can take the fight to the enemy.

If we were to lose that capability, I believe the enemy would just come back. What I’ve found studying the enemy is, he’s got amazing ability to fill the void. And it takes him about 48 hours. If it’s an area that’s no longer secure, he’s going to fill that void in about 48 hours.

And any of the locals who are helping the coalition secure — they’re now subject to atrocious acts of violence, and we can’t let that happen.

This is going to take some time. You know, we’ve always said the level of coalition forces is a function of three things. It’s the level of the insurgency, it’s the capability of Iraqi security forces, and it’s the capacity of the Iraqi government at the national, provincial and local levels.

And in my battlespace right now, if soldiers were to leave, coalition soldiers were to leave, having fought hard for that terrain, having denied the enemy their sanctuaries, what happens is, the enemy would come back.

He’d start building the bombs again, he’d start attacking the locals again, and he’d start exporting that violence into Baghdad, and we would take a giant step backwards.

So in my battlespace, in Multinational Division-Center battlespace, I need the forces I have until I can transition to sustained security presence by the Iraqi security forces.

And that’s going to take some time.

Quayle was also meant to represent a generational change from the WW2 generation to the post WW2 crowd.

On paper Quayle was quite good, he just didn't have the ability to get out of his own way in public appearances and gave the DBM way too many opportunities to take him out of context and ridicule him. I mean, technically he was correct on the whole "Potatoes" thing and the card he'd been given by the teacher spelled it that way, but it fit the template and the DBM was going to crucify him for anything they could, real or not.

I think your analysis on "bench strength" is spot on. What about the Republicans? How are they set for 2012 and 2016? Will the Bush name be sufficiently redeemed for Jeb to run? Or George P? This is the only time through, IMHO, for Rudy, Romney and Fred, but what about the rest? Are there any "up and comers" on our side of the fence that you see waiting in the wings?

That’s the way I’ve always counted change back. Of course, I’m 67 so that explains it!

Come on over to the Texas DMV office where I work and you’ll see me doing it all day long.

And I often get comments from other old people about how that is the “right way to do it” and “you don’t see that much anymore”.

I’m thinking you must know I agree with you. Although I’m not sure of anything McConnell (maybe you can enlighten) said on the subject of a “small redeployment”, I know what Warner said.

I think he was encouraged by the WH to float the balloon because hey, Warner’s not running for anything, he’s as solid a DC Gop type as there is (not that this is necessarily a good thing) and he’s the Repub chair of the armed forces committee, I think, so there’s that.

As to why, if this speculation is correct, this is so, I can only think that the WH maybe WANTS to send Maliki a warning, as Warner hints would be the intent. Bringing home 25K troops is really not a big deal and by the time it would propose to happen they’d likely be coming home anyway.

Iraq’s leadership has all sorts of problems but they are understandable as I see it.

First, all they hear out of America is that we need to get out of Iraq. Well Maliki needs to keep his hand in the pie with Sadr as the local militias might be all he’ll have if the US bails out. And it’s not like we haven’t done this before, much to my shame.

Second, damn, it’s got to be one hell of a job to get the three main factions in Iraq to get along. Many of the Shia have lived for years under the nastiness of the Sunni Saddam followers. I’d be leery of making nice with these people. Frankly I don’t know if we’ve given this fellow enough time or if it’s just a difficult job and takes time.

I do remember reading an article about Vietnam, WSJ I think. One of the lessons, as the article explained, that we should have learned from Vietnam was NOT to go willy-nilly changing leaders. It then went on to say how angry and impatient American leaders were with Diem...I think was the name. So they replaced him and they got something worse even with two more tries.

Yet Krauthammer, a fellow I respect, is rabidly anti-Maliki and says he has to go.

All I know is damn it, THIS time let’s not tuck our tail between our legs and march off in defeat.

Notice how the Dems are all changing their anti-victory chant. Levin...Hillary....I find that very telling.

I hope this is the last election cycle that includes a Clinton or Bush, at least for the next 50 years or so. It's time to give those dynasties a rest.

As far as bench strength on the Republican side, I don't see much out there. This is where the party needs to concentrate on governor races, because that's where Presidents should come from. The Democrats have let the Senators hijack the nomination process, and as a result the three top Democrats have ZERO practical experience to brag about. The media would like to forget that, but the voters won't.

One thing for sure; if a Democrat is elected in 2008, hopefully we won't repeat the Bob Dole mistake of 1996. It's time to start over, and everybody in the top 5 this time around should be not considered next time.

Do not worry STARWISE. We will win this war before President Bush leaves office.

Thanks so much Star! This was a great post, much appreciated.

I know exactly what you mean!

Warner was talking about 5,000 troops withdrawn and home for Christmas .. and he put syrupy adjectives (like he was campaigning) in front of the mention of the troops.

(I take NOTHING away nor detract in any way from their heroism and how magnificent they are .. but I thought it was overdone and theatric pandering).

~~~~~~~~~

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&ie=UTF-8&q=sen.+john+warner&btnG=Search

NPR - 28 minutes ago
But Senator John Warner of Virginia recommended that President Bush start bringing home troops in time for Christmas. Five thousand was the number expressed

~~~~~~~~~

What would 5,000 troops less really accomplish?

It’s all so complicated and tough, but one thing I am clear on:

If we leave prematurely, just when we’re finally getting increasing Iraqi cooperation and really top class actionable intelligence on the ground .. because they finally believe our words .. that we’re not going to abandon them .. and then if we do abandon them too early on the cusp of real victory:

God help us all.

McConnell’s comments

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,294657,00.html