I haven't really seen any of the analysis of the speech. After watching Cokie Roberts saying she thought the thing everyone would remember most about Bush's speech was the mother of Marine Sgt. Byron Norwood of Pflugerville, Texas and Safia Taleb al-Suhail a leader of the Iraqi Women's Political Council, hugging; I turned it off.
Some things I did want to comment on were: Bush says...
"...And tonight that is a privilege we share with newly elected leaders of Afghanistan, the Palestinian territories, Ukraine and a free and sovereign Iraq."
A free and sovereign Iraq? You mean our troops can go home now? It seems to me a sovereign country doesn't usually have 170,000 foreign troops occupying it and most can actually govern their territory. The current Iraqi interim government's writ doesn't extend much beyond the so called "green zone."
Never mind all the laws and rules L. Paul Bremer left behind that have nothing to do with a sovereign country.
Yeah, right. Making tax cuts permanent, spending a billion dollars a month in Iraq and borrowing 2 trillion dollars for private Social Security accounts doesn't pass the "spending discipline" smell test.
This is my favorite line though. Here's an issue the American people can really sink thier teeth into:
"Justice is distorted and our economy is held back by irresponsible class actions and frivolous asbestos claims."
If there was any clearer sign that the Bush family's business always comes before the American people's this is it.
Remember, Bush's grand daddy owned the comapny that is now costing Halliburton so much grief over asbestos. This is a not so veiled attempt to get us to bail out Cheney's mess.
From an article in the Cinncinnati Enquirer
"Analysts...are far more worried about Halliburton's potential liability for more than 300,000 pending claims by people who blame the company for their exposure to asbestos, a heat-resistant material with fibers that can cause lung disease if inhaled.
The burgeoning asbestos problem has caused critics to question the hallmark of Cheney's five years at the helm of Halliburton: the $7.7 billion acquisition of rival Dresser Industries Inc. in 1998.
The deal doubled Halliburton's size overnight and allowed it to claim it was the world's leading oilfield-services company. But most of Halliburton's current asbestos claims were inherited from Dresser.
Lesar said Halliburton investigated Dresser's asbestos liability before the acquisition. The company just didn't count on a surge in asbestos claims, which he blamed on the bankruptcy of other asbestos defendants, leaving Halliburton as a tempting target.
"It's easy to second-guess everything about the asbestos issue now," he said." [Yeah right. Cheney is a genius.]
Another day in the neighborhood.
Funny, I thought the insurgency was pretty much over after the big elections.
Not so, apparently.
From Reuters:
"BAGHDAD- Iraqi insurgents staged a major ambush on a road near Baghdad Thursday, killing two policemen, wounding 14 and leaving at least 16 missing on the worst day of violence since last Sunday's election.
The attack came a day after guerrillas in the north dragged Iraqi soldiers off a bus and shot 12 of them dead, and suggests the country's 22-month-long insurgency is far from over, despite its failure to stop last weekend's vote.
Police said insurgents attacked a police convoy Thursday between Diwaniya, 180 km (112 miles) south of Baghdad, and the capital. Police initially feared 36 were missing but reduced the number as some began returning to Diwaniya.
At least a dozen civilians were also killed in Thursday's bloodshed, the worst this week."
In the 'coming back to bite us dept.'
In recent weeks we've had stories of Marines, who had seen fighting in Fallujah coming back and taking it out on American civilians.
There was the former Marine in Texas who kidnapped a woman in a Walmart parkinglot and left her dead body 200 miles away and this story of a marine who was apparently upset about having to go back...in both cases the mothers of these men said they "came back different."
"(CNN) -- A 19-year-old Marine from Ceres, California, shot and killed a police officer and wounded another before dying in a weekend gunbattle.
Investigators said he may have been driven by a desire to avoid returning to Iraq.
Andres Raya was scheduled to report back to Camp Pendleton, near San Diego, on Sunday after a weekend leave.
Instead, police said, he went out with a semiautomatic rifle and drew officers into an ambush outside a liquor store in Ceres, a town of about 35,000 next door to his hometown of Modesto.
Raya's mother told the Modesto Bee that her son "came back different" from his last assignment, which included service in western Iraq's insurgent hotbed of Falluja.
"In speaking with family, they conveyed to us that their son did not desire to return to Iraq," said Lt. Bill Heyne, a spokesman for the Stanislaus County Sheriff's Department."
The military, aprticulary the marines, allways tyalk about the trigger they plant in recruits head. They have to be trained to kill without thinking in combat situations in order to prevent them and their comrades from getting killed themselves.
The problem is there isn't any sure fire way of turning the trigger off once they get back. It is estimated 1 and five are coming back with mental problems but only a quarter seek out assistance.
Comments like this from high ranking members of the military aren't helpful, especially considering the stories above.
"Lt. Gen. James Mattis, who led troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, made the comments at a conference Tuesday in San Diego.
"Actually it's quite fun to fight 'em, you know. It's a hell of a hoot. It's fun to shoot some people. I'll be right up front with you, I like brawling," said Mattis.
"You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil," Mattis said during a panel discussion.
"You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them."
Like for example these Special Forces soldiers from 2003? I can see a lot has changed.
"An Army Special Forces soldier charged with killing his wife after returning from Afghanistan nine months ago hanged himself in a jail cell Sunday, officials said.
Master Sgt. William Wright was one of four soldiers at Fort Bragg suspected of killing their spouses in a six-week stretch last summer. The deadly spree forced the Army to re-evaluate how it provided support for soldiers with strained marriages and those readjusting after combat service.
Sgt. 1st Class Rigoberto Nieves, 32, a Special Forces soldier, fatally shot his wife and himself June 11, two days after he had returned from Afghanistan.
Sgt. 1st Class Brandon Floyd, reportedly a member of the secret Delta Force, shot his wife and then killed himself July 19.
Still facing charges is former Army sergeant Cedric Griffin, who is accused of stabbing his wife, Marilyn, 50 times and setting her on fire July 9. He faces death if convicted."
Posted by bushmeister0
at 4:21 PM EST
