Small Town Politics

I live in a town of about 25,000 in the southwestern corner of Connecticut. Although, larger than many of the true American small towns, it is still small enough to be considered quaint, however, this is Connecticut, so it's more of a quaint chic.

Monday the town will be holding a Memorial Day parade, which will play host to the usual girl scout troop and baseball teams. However, there is one group that caught my attention, the Veterans for Peace, which will march in the parade in protest of the Iraq War. I am not very fond of parades or protests of any kind, however, I understand their purpose. I may just have to bite the bullet on this one though, and figure out what's going down. As such, I may upload a little photo essay documenting the event, and the response to it.

On a side note, I was invited to a counter-protest of the event, however, I do not believe I will be attending, for number one, I dislike protesting. Number two, they are veterans and I would feel somewhat arrogant in asserting to their face that they are wrong, when I have never been to war myself. That does not mean they are right, or that their opinion is not without its ability to be denied, it just means that they are entitled to their opinion and I am not going to directly challenge it.

The best way to take on a protester with out directly confronting him is to just keep on citing the evidence and working behind the scenes. It is my belief that those on the forefront are generally less informed then those who work the curtains.

Stay tuned...

Veto in the Mist

The much talked about Iraq spending bill, which was recently approved by Congress, is now on its way to the White House where it will be greeted by the Veto stamp of President Bush. Mr. Bush rarely exercises his veto power the last time being in September of 2006 when he shot down the embryonic stem-cell bill.

The bill in question allocates 124 billion dollars to war spending however, the killer caveat which is the basis of Mr. Bush's veto is the October 1st pull-out date.

Nancy Pelosi: Get Back to Work!

Members of the Republican Party in both the House and the Senate are formally requesting that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-NY) "get back to work" after her controversial diplomatic excursion to the Middle East. The interesting thing about this request, aside from its overall hilarity in the grand scheme of things, is the use of the phase "Global War on Terror" which the Democrats have been phasing out. However, regardless of semantics, you have to realize the partisan nature of this development. Republicans want the American People to remember that while Nancy Pelosi was out playing Secretary of State, she was ignoring her post where a critical bill to fund the troops sat idle.

For more developing coverage, visit the fine folks at the Drudge Report.

Dear Speaker Pelosi:

We are writing to urge you to call the House back into session immediately so that Congress can finish its work on the emergency legislation to fund the Global War on Terrorism. This funding request has been pending since February 5, but your leadership team chose to leave town for more than two weeks rather than completing this bill. As a result, our troops have been put at risk.

We are especially troubled by the House's failure to appoint conferees. The Senate appointed conferees on March 29, moments after passing its bill, but the House never did so despite passing the bill a week earlier. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told the Senate that he hoped the House-Senate conference would begin on March 30. That hoped-for progress has been thwarted by your failure to act.

It should go without saying that our military leaders are in the best position to know the needs of our troops, and they have left no doubt that this funding is needed urgently. General Peter Schoomaker, United States Army Chief of Staff, has written that, "without approval of the supplemental funds in April, we will be forced to take increasingly draconian measures which will impact Army readiness and impose hardships on our Soldiers and their families." Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has also emphasized the dangers of delay: "This kind of disruption to key programs will have a genuinely adverse effect on the readiness of the Army and the quality of life for soldiers and their families."

Our troops need this funding, and they need it soon. The Senate is in session and ready to work. We respectfully request that you cancel the remainder of your break, call the House back into session, appoint conferees promptly, and work in good faith to pass a clean supplemental funding bill that the President can sign as soon as possible. Every day we don't fund our troops is a day their ability to fight this war is weakened.

Credit for this story goes to the Drudge Report.

Interview With Fallujan Police Officer

A very interesting interview with an Iraqi from the "In Iraq Journal" I invite you all to take a read, it is really interesting stuff.

Link

Cleaning House

Last night President George W. Bush announced to a weary nation a plan for victory in Iraq. However, the nation looks on this plan with a skepticism fueled by the barrage of bad press and scandal that has surrounded both the Bush administration and the war itself. In what some would consider the most important speech of his career, the president let fall the blame of past failures upon himself in the hopes that this nation could move on and in doing so secure Iraq and allow it to prosper under the flag of democracy and liberty for all. His speech outlined a plan to send around 20,000 more troops to Iraq mainly to Baghdad. Where upon those troops would be embedded with Iraqi battalions already in the region. They would begin the difficult process of clearing and holding parts of the key 30 mile region. This surge of troops allows for a 1 to 50 task ratio which in military terms is just what you want as opposed to the vastly outnumbered troops in Iraq prior to this plan. However, the greatest obstacle this plan faces is not the lack of man power, we have plenty of that, but rather a lack of will. The country is not yet ready to sacrifice more young men and women with the mindset that more of those will be returning back in body bags. With most Democrats and some Republicans in opposition to this we will see a non-binding resolution spring up to declare their opposition to this plan. We will not yet see the removal of funding, for the Democrats do not yet have enough public support to embark on such an endeavor. However, if they do, Iraq may well be another Cambodia. Most Democrats claim that in order for the Iraqis to stand up we must stand down. However, they cannot stand up until the constant threat, and devastation of the insurgency is removed. We must secure the future of Iraq for the ink that writes the future of Iraq also writes the future of the United States.

Cheers.

Good Reference Material

Yahoo News has a good time line of our involvement in Iraq. Click the link below to go right to it.

Cheers.

Troops in Iraq till 2010

According to Army chief of staff, Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker there are plans for U.S. troops to remain in Iraq to at least 2010. Schoomaker cautions that this is not a sign of things getting progressively worse, or better but that he wants to make sure that if needed they are able to stay as long as necessary He used the analogy of having enough rounds of ammo in a magazine to be able to shoot as long as he needs. Without a doubt this release will have major play in the upcoming midterm election in which we can see a change of power in both the House and Senate.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The U.S. Army has plans that would keep the current
level of troops in Iraq - about 15 brigades - through 2010, the top Army officer
said Wednesday.
The Army chief of staff, Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, cautioned
that people not read too much into the planning, because it is easier to pull
back forces than to get units prepared and deployed at the last minute.
"This
is not a prediction that things are going poorly or better," Schoomaker told
reporters. "It's just that I have to have enough ammo in the magazine that I can
continue to shoot as long as they want us to shoot."