News from Fallujah, the

On Sunday we lost 8 more marines in Fallujah and we dropped 10 "precision" bombs on insurgent positions.

Its pretty obvious we've broken their will to fight.

One soldier was killed today and a number were injured.

According to the AP:

"In the northern city of Mosul, a car bomb blast struck a U.S. Stryker brigade patrol Monday, wounding two American soldiers. U.S. troops and gunmen fought gun battles after the blast.

In Tarmiyah, on Baghdad's northern outskirts, three more U.S. troops were wounded in a car bombing that wrecked two Humvees, pieces of which were raised into the air by jubilant Iraqi men who danced around their charred hulks and a large crater blown into the road."

McCain on Rummy:

PHOENEX- U.S. Sen. John McCain said Monday that he has "no confidence" in Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, citing Rumsfeld's handling of the war in Iraq and the failure to send more troops.

McCain, speaking to The Associated Press in an hourlong interview, said his comments were not a call for Rumsfeld's resignation, explaining that President Bush "can have the team that he wants around him."

Like Bernard Kerlik?

The WaPo reports beside the nanny issue there were about a zillion other problems with this nomination:

And although Kerik's nanny problems are what officially sunk him, it turns out there were several other controversies erupting -- or about to erupt -- that the White House either missed or wasn't concerned about.

"Newsday reported that Kerik just last week was forced to testify in a civil lawsuit about an alleged affair with a subordinate. The New York Daily News reported Sunday that Kerik accepted thousands of dollars in cash and gifts without making proper public disclosures.

Newsweek on Friday Web-posted a story that a New Jersey judge had issued a warrant for Kerik's arrest in 1998 in a civil dispute over unpaid condominium fees.

And this morning, the New York Times describes a "web of relationships Mr. Kerik developed with officials of a New Jersey construction company long suspected by New York authorities of connections to organized crime."

Democracy Now adds this is just the tip of the iceberg.:

"The Washington Post reports that nine employees of the hospital Kerik worked at providing security in Saudi Arabia accused him of using his policing powers to pursue the personal agenda of his immediate boss.

Questions have also been raised about Kerik's misuse of police power while the head of the New York police department. In one example, he was fined for using the services of three police officers to help research his autobiography "The Lost Son." He was also accused of sending homicide police officers to question Fox News journalists after the book's publisher, Judith Regan, lost a mobile phone after an interview at the Fox studios. It turned out to have just been misplaced.

Kerik has also coming under close scrutiny for his windfall profit from stock options in stun-gun manufacturer, Taser International. He netted over $5.5 million on the options, without ever having invested any of his own money.

Questions have also raised about his failure in Iraq to train a new Iraqi police force. Kerik went to Iraq for a six month tour of duty to help rebuild the Iraqi police force but he abruptly left after just three months.

On Thursday, the day before he withdrew his name from contention, Kerik was forced to testify in a civil lawsuit about an alleged affair with a subordinate.

Former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, a close friend of Kerik who reportedly pressed hard for his nomination, apologized to the President Bush Sunday for the problems with his nomination.

Do these guys read the newspapers?

The NYT reports:

WASHINGTON, Dec. 12 - Senior administration officials on Sunday defended the White House review of Bernard B. Kerik's background before his nomination as secretary of homeland security. One official said that even "controversial" material uncovered in a weeklong review had not appeared to endanger Mr. Kerik's confirmation. [Ha!]

In interviews, the officials denied that the White House review of Mr. Kerik's background had been rushed. Scott McClellan, President Bush's press secretary, called it "a very thorough vetting process" that "looked at all the issues relating to his public, financial and personal background."

The review of Mr. Kerik's record was centered in the office of the White House counsel, Alberto R. Gonzales, who is himself in the midst of the preconfirmation process as the president's nominee to succeed John Ashcroft as attorney general."

Nice work Alberto! Lets hope he has better luck with Bin Laden.