***Operation Iraqi Freedom - Situation Room - Day 6 - LIVE THREAD***

Multiple ^ | 25 March 2003 | Various

[An.American.Expatriate]

Good Morning.

This is the Daily Thread of Operation Iraqi Freedom - LIVE THREAD.

It is designed for general conversation about the events of the day. In depth discussion of events should be left to individual threads - but links to the threads or other articles is highly encouraged. This allows us to stay abreast of the situation in general, while also providing a means of obtaining specific information.

Please have mercy on us dial up limited FReepers! Limit the big graphics, post links instead. A breif description of what the graphic is would help:

Special thanks to null and void for keeping these running over the weekend and Monday, to all of you for keeping these threads alive, the AdminMods for their tolerance, mhking for the video links, and, of course, Belly Girl...

[johnb838]

Drudge has a headline that the Senate has cut tax cut in half. Not story attached. Info?

[retrokitten]

You know, the more I see (or hear since I'm cube bound) I am convinced that putting them on TV is a wonderful move. I know I am preaching to the choir when I say that they are liberal idiots- BUT putting them on TV shows EVERYONE in the WHOLE US exactly how liberal and idiotic these reporters are.

[BulletBobCo]

I keep waiting for the day he walks in and places a hand gun on the podium and says who has a question.

I like the one where there's a hand grenade mounted on the wall with a tag on the pin that says "TAKE A NUMBER".

[Carolina]

Tehran-based Shiites confirming a popular uprising in Basra per Sky.

[Fledermaus]

"Both moderate Sen. Lincoln Chafee, R-R.I., and deficit hawk Sen. Ernest Hollings, D-S.C., had voted against making the tax cut smaller on that day.

But both voted Tuesday to shrink the size of the proposed tax cut. Tuesday's successful amendment was slightly different, saying it would take some funds that Bush wanted to use for the tax cut and use that money to either to overhaul Social Security or put toward deficit reduction."

Bush needs to send a few Tomahawks into Rhode Island!!!!

[babaloo]

Market down 70 points on that news

[Lauratealeaf]

I told my hubby after last week's "Why is the president going to Camp David" question is that the press must think the President has to hike 10-12 miles out of the Catoctin Mountains to the nearest pay phone, roll of quarters clutched in his sweaty hand, to call Rummy and Colin.

I think they are trying to imply that President Bush is goofing off or something. Unbelievable!

[babaloo]

Down 70 points from high on that news is a better description.

[Robert A Cook PE]

Not exactly.

The RADIATION from the dust particles is low-energy alpha (He++ nuclei) and low energy gamma rays (think dental x-rays). (The alpha rays are the part that can't go through paper, or your skin even is thick enough that nothing would hit your tummy if you poured the dust in your bare belly button. The gamma goes a bit further - say it takes a magazine to stop 95% of it. Or a bullet casing's metal sheath.)

What few particles are emitted come form the dust after the tank burns up. If that "DUST" is breathed in, some of it has a chance of staying in your lungs. (Generally, anything eaten just passes through and you don't notice any effects unless you keep eating your own waste products.)

IF some of the dust breated in stays in your lungs, then all of its energy is deposited inside the lungs and CAN (under certain conditions) cause SOME localized cancers in the lungs where it has accumulated. Unlike smoking where the dangerous particles accumulate all over the lung's surface over a preiod of many dozen years - and even then, only a few smoking users get cancer - the DU "breathers" might get a few minutes exposure ONLY when they climbing through a destroyed tank.

Or playing in the rocks IMMEDIATELY outside it.

[johnb838]

That sucks. J-Damn.

[epluribus_2]

I am not so deeply saddened as before... in fact, I'm feeling better already! Dashole.

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

UK Observer, July 2002...even a lefty knows Saddam's evil:

---

The dead babies are blamed by Saddam's regime on cancers and birth defects which first appeared in 1991 and were, it says, caused by depleted uranium weapons. While no one should underestimate the lethality of these weapons and the stupidity of the US military machine, the claim does not make radiological sense. According to Dr Nick Plowman, head of clinical oncology at St Bartholomew's Hospital, London, the claim 'is ridiculous. It flies in the face of everything learnt from Hiroshima and Nagasaki.'

Cancers do not develop overnight. Bombs that fell in 1991 could not have caused cancers or birth defects in that year. Fast leukaemias might occur in four or five years, heavy tumours around now, said Plowman.

Richard Guthrie, a chemical weapons researcher at Sussex University, said: 'It's much more likely to be chemical weapons. There are serious clusters of cancers in the south of Iraq near Basra. In the late Eighties, Basra was almost taken by Iranian human-wave offensives, and Saddam stopped these by dropping chemical weapons on them and, by accident, on his own people.

How Saddam Staged Baby Funerals

---

[MarMema]

Firing on their own, BBC says. This could be a great beginning....

[TomGuy]

FoxNews: Basra. Iraqi Rep Guard/Saddam Loyals dressed in Coalition uniforms accept surrender of Iraqi's, then execute them.

[Wphile]

Yep. 51-48. The GOP moderates caved.

This is not good for W's prospects in 2004. Of course it still goes to conference with the House which passed it intact so perhaps it will end up in decent shape.

I guess the supplemental request for $75 billion for Iraq worried the moderates. Haven't seen a roll call but I'm sure it's the usual suspects.

[Anomaly in Illinois]

See #2880 @ 1:52, pitinkie heard it too. I have MSNBC up too, it took me a couple of minutes to post. I was explaining about the sirens to my 11 year old daughter.

Check your volume, the volume goes down on mine periodically for no apparent reason.

[Solson]

Thanks! I learned something :)

[Dog]

Fox is reporting that the fedyeen are dressing as US troops and shooting other Iraqi troops who want to give up...

We need to confirm this story..

[Wild Irish Rogue]

" Good grief! Not another question about the President adequately preparing the people!!!! "

Unbelievable!! Whining that " no one told us it was going to be like this!!" I give up, can't take these utter morons anymore-someone with a stronger stomach will have to monitor this. This was not one of the White House Press Corps finer days.It's obvious that they have already written their copy for the nightly news and just want to get Ari to answer questions fitting their scripts.Expect the alphabet news to dwell on the fly covered Basra skeletons hanging onto the pants of GIs, begging for food.

[MinuteGal]

Breaking.....Intelligence reports....Basra......Saddam's gestapo dressing in American uniforms, accepting surrender of other Iraqi troops.....and then EXECUTING THEM!

Leni