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Michael Ramirez parodies General David Petreaus’ testimony in the Senate today

Iraq Is Improving, But Gains ‘Fragile,’ Gen. Petraeus Says

Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker spoke directly to the next U.S. president Tuesday, giving a cautiously optimistic assessment of the situation in Iraq.

They just weren’t certain when they talked to the president.

Was it in the morning before a congressional panel that included Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y.?
Or that afternoon when they spoke to another that included Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.

In either case, the two top U.S. officials in Iraq said the military is making progress, with Petraeus calling for a halt in troop withdrawals to consolidate the surge’s gains. If carried out, the next president could enter office with more than 140,000 U.S. troops still in Iraq.

Actually, the decorum of the Senate and the Senate gallery was better than when General Petraeus testified last September. Remember when Moveon.org placed the General Betray US ad in the New York Times?

But, conditions on the ground are better in Iraq and Petraeus has done a remarkable job. Now, who will voters believe in November?

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United States Senate Condemns MoveOn.org Betray Us Ad

Rudy Giuliani Watch: Hillary Clinton Smeared General Petraeus

New York Times = Left Wing Fringe Rag

Senator John Ensign Calls on All Democrats to Return MoveOn.org Contributions

*****UPDATE*****

McCain calls on Obama to repudiate Rockefeller immediately

Tells Fox News Channel: “If Senator Obama is going to maintain the type of campaign that he says that he is–a respectful campaign–and this is one of his closest and strongest supporters, than I think he should repudiate Senator Rockefeller. Immediately.”

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US Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) speaks at a Veterans for Rockefeller event in Beckley, WV Friday, Jan. 18, 2008

Today, Senator Jay Rockefeller has apologized to Senator and presumptive GOP nominee for President John McCain for remarks he made about McCain’s military service and character.

Rockefeller criticized Sen. John McCain, the presumed Republican nominee for president. “Senator McCain does have a temper. But today, he speaks in a monotone on the campaign trail.”

Rockefeller believes McCain has become insensitive to many human issues. “McCain was a fighter pilot, who dropped laser-guided missiles from 35,000 feet. He was long gone when they hit.

“What happened when they [the missiles] get to the ground? He doesn’t know. You have to care about the lives of people. McCain never gets into those issues.”

Rockefeller, who is running for re-election, also talked about a range of major problems confronting the country.

The Apology:

“I have deep respect for John McCain’s honorable and noble service to our country. I made an inaccurate and wrong analogy and I have extended my sincere apology to him…. I regret my very poor choice of words.”

And, Barack Obama who Rockefeller has endorsed for President has already distanced himself from the remarks.

“Senator Obama has a deep respect for Senator McCain’s service to this country and doesn’t agree with what Senator Rockefeller said.”

But, the fact is this is NOT the first shot at McCain for his military service and it won’t be the last. Senator Lyndsey Graham has it RIGHT:

“John didn’t drop bombs at 35,000 feet in Vietnam. The bombs were not laser-guided,” he said. “I’m glad Senator Rockefeller apologized, but at the end of the day behavior like this basically comes from wanting to win too badly. We don’t need to manufacture issues in this race.”

Stay tuned as more Democrat surrogates take shots at the McCain military gravitas.

Reverend Michael Pfleger defends Farrakhan and Rev. Wright

Who is Reverend Michael Pfleger, the Catholic pastor at St. Sabina on the south side of Chicago?

Another Barack Obama spiritual mentor and/or counselor. The other two are James Meeks and Jeremiah Wright.

Christopher Hitchens’ latest column in Slate states: “In April 2004, Barack Obama told a reporter from the Chicago Sun-Times that he had three spiritual mentors or counselors: Jeremiah Wright, James Meeks, and Father Michael Pfleger–for a change of pace, a white Catholic preacher who has a close personal feeling for the man he calls (as does Obama) Minister Farrakhan.”

Pfleger is the Pastor at St. Sabina’s Catholic Church, on the South Side of Chicago. So I searched Westlaw’s ALLNEWS database for “Obama and Pfleger.”

According to the April 5, 2004 Chicago Sun-Times article cited by Hitchens:

• Friends and advisers, such as the Rev. Michael Pfleger, pastor of St. Sabina Roman Catholic Church in the Auburn–Gresham community on the South Side, who has known Obama for the better part of 20 years, help him keep that compass set, he says.

• “I always have felt in him this consciousness that, at the end of the day, with all of us, you’ve got to face God,” Pfleger says of Obama. “Faith is key to his life, no question about it. [It is] central to who he is, and not just in his work in the political field, but as a man, as a black man, as a husband, as a father…. I don’t think he could easily divorce his faith from who he is.”

As Hitchens wrote, Rev. Pfleger is indeed an admirer of “Minister Farrakhan.” Ambushed by a Bill O’Reilly camera crew, Pfleger stated: “He has–first of all, he has not called Judaism a gutter religion of blood suckers. That is not what he has said because I have heard that talk. I stick up for Louis Farrakhan because he is another person that the media has chosen to define how they want to do it. And they demonize how they want to demonize somebody. I know the man, Louis Farrakhan. He is a great man. I have great respect for him, ho has done an awful lot for people and this country, black, white, and brown. He’s a friend of mine.” (The O’Reilly Factor, Apr. 3, 2008.) Farrakhan spoke at St. Sabina’s on May 25, 2007. (Chicago Sun Times, May 10, 2007.)

Please Democrats nominate Barack Obama. If you think the Willie Horton ads were BRUTAL just wait until the GOP media machine ramps up Jeremiah Wright and Michael Pfleger after Labor Day.

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Barack Obama Watch: Jeremiah Wright Flap Contained?

Barack Obama Watch: Maybe I Would Have Left Jeremiah Wright’s Church

Barack Obama Watch: Defending Jeremiah Wright on “The View”

Hillary Clinton Plays Obama – Jeremiah Wright Card – The Obama Response

Hillary Clinton Plays Obama – Jeremiah Wright Card

Barack Obama Watch: A More Perfect Union

Barack Obama Watch: Quelling the Jeremiah Wright Flap

Michael Ramirez on Rip Van Obama

Barack Obama Continues His 100 Years Of War Attack

In a great catch from MKH, Barack Obama is caught in a LIE about John McCain’s 100 year war comment (H/T Allah over at Hot Air).

Here is Obama’s comment from the other day:

• Barack Obama misstates John McCain’s position on the Iraq War again.

In a back and forth at today’s press conference, Obama insisted he was not taking out of context McCain’s comments about keeping troops in Iraq for 100 years. Asked if his attack was disingenous, Obama had the following to say:

“I don’t think it’s unfair at all,” Obama said. “John McCain, I mean, we can run the YouTube spot, has said that we will stay there as long as it takes. And if it takes another 100 years, he’s up for that commitment and that implies that there is some criteria by which we would understand how long it takes.

“John McCain has not been clear about what exactly would lead him to decide it’s time to pull out. And so, you know, the problem that we’ve had both with John McCain and George Bush is that there’s no clear definition of success. There never was, and that’s why this has been such a profound strategic error. And you know, I think it is entirely fair to suggest that unless he’s got some criteria where by, at some point, we would be able to pull out our troops. For him to argue that, which he has repeatedly, that any suggestion that we withdraw troops is surrender. That implies that we will be there as long as he thinks it’s necessary for us to be there.”

Ok, let’s look at the Meet the Press interview where John McCain was asked about his 100 year Iraq War comment with the video clip of McCain.

There is more:

“He (McCain) says that he is willing to send our troops into another 100 years of war in Iraq” (Barack Obama, Feb. 19).

“We are bogged down in a war that John McCain now suggests might go on for another 100 years” (Obama, Feb. 26).

Now, Barack Obama is either stupid, disingenuous or LYING for political expedience and advantage.

Take your pick…….

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John McCain Watch: The 100 Year Iraq War?

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad speaks with photographers while waiting for a meeting at the presidential palace in Tehran. Iran is starting work to install 6,000 new uranium-enriching centrifuges at its nuclear plant in Natanz, Ahmadinejad announced on Tuesday, according to state media.

Years of negotiations with Iran and three sets of United Nations Security Council sanctions later, Iran President Ahmadinejad announced today that Iran will be installing 6,000 new uranium enrichment centrifuges at Natanz.

Iran has begun installing 6,000 new centrifuges at its uranium enrichment plant in Natanz, state television quoted President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as saying Tuesday.

Iran already has about 3,000 centrifuges operating in Natanz, and the new announcement is seen as a show of defiance of international demands to halt a nuclear program the United States and its allies say is aimed at building nuclear weapons.

“The president announced the start of the phase of installing 6,000 new centrifuges in Natanz,” state television reported.

Centrifuges are machines that can enrich uranium to a low level to produce nuclear fuel or a high level for use in a weapon. Iran insists its nuclear program is peaceful and solely focused on the production of energy.

Ahmadinejad made Tuesday’s announcement as he toured the Natanz facility in central Iran. State television also quoted Ahmadinejad as saying that “other activities have been carried out” in Natanz that he would announce later Tuesday.

The president’s trip was scheduled to coincide with Iran’s National Day of Nuclear Technology, marking the second anniversary of Iran’s first enrichment of uranium.

Ahmadinejad is widely expected to confirm for the first time that Iran has installed hundreds of more sophisticated centrifuges that can enrich uranium faster.

The workhorse of Iran’s enrichment program is the P-1 centrifuge, which is run in cascades of 164 machines. But Iranian officials confirmed in February that they had started using the IR-2 centrifuge that can churn out enriched uranium at more than double the rate.

So, you have many more Iran nuclear centrifuges and more sophisticated ones that enrich uranium faster despite the United Nations, the European Union and the United States.

Here are the United Nations Security Council resolutions that Iran has defied (in pdf format):

UNSC Resolution 1803 (2008)

UNSC Resolution 1747 (2007)

UNSC Resolution 1737 (2006)

UNSC Resolution 1696 (2006)

It looks to Flap that the Bush administration, woefully unsuccessful in convincing China, and Russia to stop Iran’s development of nuclear weapons has decided to punt the issue to the next President while bolstering missile defense to protect America from ICBM’s launched from Iran. A Cold War containment strategy is the holding pattern for now.

Is this why Europe is now interested in an American deployed anti-missile defense, particularly in Poland and the Czech Republic?

You bet……

Previous:

Iran Nuclear Watch: United Nations Security Council Sanctions Round 3

Iran Nuclear Watch: Ahmadinejad – Iran is Number One

Iran Nuclear Watch: IAEA’s ElBaradei’s Agenda Criticized

Iran Nuclear Watch: IAEA Report – Iran Continues Uranium Enrichment

Iran Nuclear Watch: Iran Pursuing a Secret Nuclear Program

Iran Nuclear Watch: Cancerous Israel to Vanish Soon

Iran Nuclear Watch: U.S. Intel – Iran Directly Engaged in Manufacture of a Nuclear Weapon

Iran Nuclear Watch: Uranium Gas Goes Into Iran’s Centrifuges

Iran Nuclear Watch: Israel – Iran Moving Forward with Nuclear Weapons

The Iran Nuclear Files

Tony Strickland for California State Senate, 19th District

As Flap said last week:

Tony Strickland, the presumed GOP nominee for the California State Senate – 19 (Strickland is running unopposed in the June GOP primary election) will be holding a precinct walk on Saturday, April 12, 2008.

Time: 9:30 – 1 PM Saturday April 12, 2008
Location: 2219 E. Thousand Oaks Blvd. Thousand Oaks, California 91362 across from the Civic Arts Plaza
Contact: Ashley Nicole Ingram – 805-778-1588

All Ventura and Santa Barbara County voters this is a SHOUT-OUT to help elect Tony Strickland your new California State Senator.

Tony’s website is here (under construction, but sign-up anyway). And, if you are a member of Facebook, his profile is here.

From the press release:

Everything will be provided from maps to walk boards. If there is anything else that you would like as you join Tony in the precinct walks, please do not hesitate to mention it so that it will be provided. In addition to snacks I will personally be giving FOUR TICKETS TO THE SPORTING EVENT OF YOUR CHOICE, DODGERS, ANGELS, KINGS, AND LAKERS, to the supporter who brings the most volunteers to join them. Please respond as soon as available, so that I know how many maps are necessary as well as snacks

Coffee & Refreshments from 9:30am – 10am

Precinct walk starts at 10 am

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Tony Strickland Watch: Precinct Walk Saturday April 12, 2008

Tony Strickland Watch: Strickland Endorsed by ENTIRE Senate GOP Caucus and by Ventura County GOP

Day By Day by Chris Muir

How about his travel and passport records? Tax information?

Will anything NOT be public and revealed on TMZ or The Smoking gun?

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The Day By Day Archive