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Five current and former leaders of this suburban Los Angeles city were charged Thursday with the misappropriation of more than $100,000 in public funds. Mayor Louis Byrd, Mayor Pro-Tem Fernando Pedroza and former City Council members Armando Rea, Arturo Reyes and Ricardo Sanchez were scheduled to be arraigned Friday, the Los Angeles County district attorney's office said in a statement. Authorities allege the five collected thousands of dollars in taxpayer money by charging personal expenses to city credit cards and other schemes. In one case, prosecutors said Pedroza charged $1,500 on a city credit card to pay for an exotic...

Retired General Ricardo Sanchez’s sudden withdrawal from the Texas Senate race leaves the Democratic Party without a big-name candidate to compete against whoever emerges from the Republicans’ heavyweight primary fight among Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, former state Solicitor General and Tea Party favorite Ted Cruz, and former Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert. Sanchez announced Friday that he’s ending his campaign to replace retiring Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison. In a statement issued by his campaign to supporters, Sanchez said anemic fundraising and the loss of his house to a fire had led him to conclude that a statewide campaign was “impractical for...

Retired Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez of San Antonio, an Iraq commander under President George W. Bush who later became an administration critic, will file papers today to seek the U.S. Senate seat held by Kay Bailey Hutchison. The second Democratic candidate to announce as Hutchison retires, Sanchez said he aims to bridge the partisan gap in Texas, one of the most Republican of red states. “Here in Texas, too many families are struggling to get ahead. Jobs are hard to find, our schools simply aren't good enough, and increasing food and gas prices are breaking household budgets. We need...

It looks like the left has found someone to run for the senate in Texas. Maybe they think that a Hispanic can win in Texas because of his ethnic heritage. That would be the only way he could get elected since those who served under him in Iraq did not value his style of leadership. As part of my doctoral dissertation, I surveyed several hundred field grade officers who served under LTG Ricardo Sanchez Here are some of the results of my study: The Army Leadership doctrine is compiled in FM 6-22, published in 2006. The primary leadership style...

ur Democrat friends think they may have found a strong candidate to compete for the U.S.Senate seat to be vacated by Kay Bailey Hutchison, who is retiring at the end of her term next year. According to the Star-Telegram, He’s retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez of Rio Grande City. A graduate of what was then Texas A&I (now Texas A&M University, Kingsville), Sanchez has been earning his living as business consultant and speaker since his 33-year career in the U.S. Army ended in 2006. The man has impressive credentials, but he carries some heavy baggage. Maria Recio reports: Former Texas...

On his segment of today's CNN Newsroom, anchor Rick Sanchez went for the hat trick, likening Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio to the infamous Theophilus “Bull” Connor, Birmingham, Alabama’s late segregationist police commissioner who ruthlessly used police attack dogs and fire hoses to thwart 1963 civil rights demonstrators, no fewer than three times. Sanchez prefaced his interview with the Arizona sheriff: Well, perhaps not since Bull Connor whose aggressive police tactics against blacks in the South sparked civil rights legislation in 1964 has our country seen a showdown like the one going on right now between Maricopa County sheriff Joe...

<p>WASHINGTON — To hear retired Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez explain it, the mistakes of the Iraq war that happened while he was in command there weren't his fault. Not Abu Ghraib, not the birth of the insurgency, not the decision to let rebel cleric Muqtada al-Sadr survive.</p>

The Talk Shows Sunday, May 11th, 2008 Guests to be interviewed today on major television talk shows: FOX NEWS SUNDAY (Fox Network): David Axelrod, campaign adviser for Obama; Howard Wolfson, campaign adviser for Clinton; actor Ben Stein. MEET THE PRESS (NBC): Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn.; Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe. FACE THE NATION (CBS): Former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C.; Terry McAuliffe, campaign chairman for Hillary Rodham Clinton. THIS WEEK (ABC): Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev.; Carly Fiorina, adviser to John McCain's campaign. LATE EDITION (CNN) : Reps. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., and Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.; Retired Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez,...

HIDALGO — Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez is set to headline BorderFest 2008 as Border Texan of the Year. Organizers of the annual cultural festival in Hidalgo announced their choice Tuesday morning alongside Sanchez, a retired three-star Army general who commanded U.S. forces in Iraq in 2003 and 2004. Sanchez was born in Rio Grande City and is a favorite son of the Rio Grande Valley. “This man from Starr County was put on the international stage, and he made us proud. He performed well,” said John David Franz, the mayor of Hidalgo and a member of the committee that chose...

Iraq: Democrats can't seem to handle America winning the war, having invested so much in losing. But why enlist as party spokesman a discredited — and disingenuous — general, whom they themselves used to attack?House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had the former commander of coalition forces in Iraq, retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, give the Democrats' radio address last weekend. That's beyond puzzling. Back in 2004, during the investigation into the Abu Ghraib prison abuse flap, Pelosi and other prominent Democrats wanted to see Sanchez's head on a platter. Abu Ghraib was a big reason Sanchez was forced to retire. Not...

In his weekly radio address, President Bush gave thanks for American servicemen "who risk their own lives to keep us safe." Democrats chose retired Army Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez to deliver a rebuttal. "I saw firsthand the consequences of the administration's failure to devise a strategy for victory in Iraq that employed, in a coordinated manner, the political, economic, diplomatic and military power of the United States. That failure continues today," he said. LtGen. Sanchez endorsed the Democratic measure pending in Congress to condition continued funding for the war on a timetable for troop withdrawal. "Although we cannot withdraw precipitously...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The general who led U.S. forces in Iraq after the invasion launched by Republican President George W. Bush spoke out for Democrats on Saturday, backing legislation aimed at withdrawing American troops. Retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, in the Democratic weekly radio address, acknowledged that Bush's escalation strategy this year had improved security in Iraq. But he said Iraqi political leaders had failed to make "hard choices necessary to bring peace to their country." "There is no evidence that the Iraqis will choose to do so in the near future or that we have an ability to force...

Retired Lt. Gen. Sanchez blasts failure of U.S. to commit to victory in Iraq By: RET. LT. GEN. RICARDO S. SANCHEZ - Commentary <Editor's note: The following is a transcript of the second half of an Oct. 12 speech give by U.S. Army Ret. Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, who commanded U.S. forces in Iraq from June 2003 to July 2004. It was the keynote speech of the fifth annual conference of the Military Reporters and Editors, titled "Long Exposure ---- Covering the War and Home Front," at the Doubletree Hotel Crystal City in Arlington, Va., near the Pentagon....

Iraq War: The former commander of coalition forces in Iraq has falsely characterized the Iraq War as an endless "nightmare" and blames politicians. Is this the sour grapes of a failed McClellan shown up by a U.S. Grant? Retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, who headed forces in Iraq in 2003 and 2004, was scathing in a speech to military journalists last Friday. He called the Iraq War "a nightmare with no end in sight." The politicians in charge of our strategy were "incompetent," "inept" and so "derelict in the performance of their duty" as to deserve a court martial had...

WASHINGTON — The former top commander of coalition forces in Iraq may have called U.S. efforts there catastrophically flawed and unrealistically optimistic, but much of the criticism of the media by Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez has been left unreported. In his speech to the Military Reporters and Editors Association in Washington, D.C., on Friday, Sanchez accused reporters of "unscrupulous reporting, solely focused on supporting an agenda and preconceived notions of the U.S. military." Without naming a specific company, Sanchez said "parent media organizations" have political agendas that direct the news coverage of the war and in some cases put U.S....

Retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, who led U.S. forces in Iraq for a year after the March 2003 invasion, accused the Bush administration yesterday of going to war with a "catastrophically flawed" plan and said the United States is "living a nightmare with no end in sight." Sanchez also bluntly criticized the current troop increase in Iraq, describing it as "a desperate attempt by the administration that has not accepted the political and economic realities of this war." "The administration, Congress and the entire interagency, especially the State Department, must shoulder the responsibility for this catastrophic failure, and the...

If the Bush administration gets attacked, the press will report it. But what if someone attacks the press? If the attack goes unreported, did it ever really happen? Today General Ricardo Sanchez gave a speech to the Military Reporters and Editors' annual conference, in which he criticized just about everyone associated with our effort in Iraq. The Washington Post's headline was typical: "Former Iraq Commander Faults Bush." Actually, I don't believe Sanchez ever mentioned Bush by name, although, as I say, he was critical of just about everybody. But it would be hard to tell from press accounts of Sanchez's...

MILITARY REPORTERS AND EDITORS LUNCHEON ADDRESS WASHINGTON D.C. LTG (RET) RICARDO S. SANCHEZ 12 OCTOBER 2007 MILITARY REPORTERS AND EDITORS ADDRESS WASHINGTON D.C. 12 OCTOBER 2007 GOOD AFTERNOON LADIES AND GENTLEMEN SOME OF YOU MAY NOT BELIEVE THIS BUT I AM GLAD TO BE HERE. WHEN SIG ASKED ME IF I WOULD CONSIDER ADDRESSING YOU THERE WAS NO DOUBT THAT I SHOULD COME INTO THE LION'S DEN. THIS WAS IMPORTANT BECAUSE I HAVE FIRMLY BELIEVED SINCE DESERT SHIELD THAT IT IS NECESSARY FOR THE STRENGTH OF OUR DEMOCRACY THAT THE MILITARY AND THE PRESS CORPS MAINTAIN A STRONG, MUTUALLY RESPECTFUL...

If ever there was a clearer example of selective reporting and bias by the media, here is the best example to date. The left is translating and selectively quoting LTG (Ret) Ricardo Sanchez' comments during the October 12 Military Reporters and Editors Luncheon in Washington D.C. "Former top general rips Bush’s Iraq policy" is not exactly what happened here, yet if you were to accept their editorializing, that's what many are going to come away with. See a pattern? So what did General Sanchez say, and what did he mean by it? Let me take a stab at it....

It seems that half of the message retired General Richard Sanchez intended to deliver missed the cut at most newsrooms, and with most bloggers. Typical among the reports of his blistering oration is the front-page treatment given by the Washington Post's Josh White, the entire first half of Sanchez's speech -- found in its entirety here -- gets reduced to a single paragraph at the end of the story. Why? Well, it turns out that Sanchez considered his first target the media itself, which he blames for a large part of the problems he sees in Iraq (via Power Line,...