This is just so sad…
Concern mounts over rising troop suicides (5 try every day)
Every day, five U.S. soldiers try to kill themselves. Before the Iraq war began, that figure was less than one suicide attempt a day. The dramatic increase is revealed in new U.S. Army figures, which show 2,100 soldiers tried to commit suicide in 2007. “Suicide attempts are [...]
Tags: Military Suicides, Iraq War
Categories: Iraq War
Think everything is rosy in Baghdad? Violence MAY be down, but..
Iraqi Official: Baghdad Is Drowning In Sewage
Baghdad is drowning in sewage, thirsty for water and largely powerless, an Iraqi official said on Sunday in a grim assessment of services in the capital five years after the US-led invasion. One of three sewage treatment plants is out of commission, one is working at stuttering capacity while a pipe blockage in the third means sewage is forming a foul lake so large it can [...]
All of that’s not anything WE can fix, and the Iraqi government seems far from able to do much. There just may be no solution…
Tags: Iraq War
Categories: Iraq War
Super Bowl is, as I type this, getting exciting in the fourth quarter. I’m tempering my nervousness by glancing through Bloglines. A piece from the McClatchy newspaper group caught my eye, because they have tended to be very critical of the Bush administration. So, I was somewhat surprised to see a piece that was quite negative on Hillary Clinton. It’s quite accurate, to the best of my knowledge and memory, but is focused on minutia of political-speak…
Clinton’s “35 Years Of Change” Omits Most Of Her Career
To hear Hillary Clinton talk, she’s spent her entire career putting her Yale Law School degree to work for the common good. She routinely tells voters that she’s “been working to bring positive change to people’s lives for 35 years.” She told a voter in New Hampshire: “I’ve spent so much of my life in the nonprofit sector.” Speaking in South Carolina, Bill Clinton said his wife “could have taken a job with a firm . . . . Instead she went to work with Marian Wright Edelman at the Children’s Defense Fund.” The overall portrait is of a lifelong, selfless do-gooder. The whole story is more complicated — and less flattering. Clinton worked at [...]
Tags: 2008 Elections, Hillary Clinton
Categories: 2008 Election · Clinton
If the numbers in the Super Bowl aren’t keeping your attention, here are some more, from the political scene.
More on the Washington Post/ABC Poll
Joe had posted a link last night to the Washington Post/ABC poll. Yes, it’s a national poll and that isn’t really relevant for the primaries, but, there were some interesting nuggets in the poll (also important is to look at the trends in the polls, whether a particular candidate is going up or down as compared to where they were weeks and months ago): [...]
Three polls from Reuters/CSPAN/Zogby this morning have to have the Clinton Team pulling out their hair: [...]
Tags: 2008 Elections, Polls
Categories: 2008 Election · Politics
Can cause problems for politicians. Except among those who follow loyally and blindly.
McCain Claims Iraq ‘Casualties Are Coming Down,’ But Casualties Actually Increased In January
On Fox News Sunday today, when Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) was asked about his claim that 100 years in Iraq “would be fine” with him, he said “it’s not a matter of how long Americans stay, it’s a matter of American casualties.” “And those casualties are coming down,” added McCain. McCain then declared that “we don’t [...]
Tags: 2008 Elections, Iraq War, McCain
Categories: 2008 Election · Iraq War · McCain
Patrick Ruffini has some thoughts on what likely will NOT happen Tuesday. All I can say is “it’s gonna be interesting”. And, I agree, the Romney scenario probably isn’t what’s on the horizon.
The Romney campaign’s February 5th math is simple: move all the voters from the Huckabee pile onto theirs and claim a majority of conservatives. Unfortunately, it’s just not that simple. In the South — still more delegate-rich per capita than NY, CA, NJ, IL, etc. — the “conservative” vote, defined as Romney + Huckabee, [...]
Tags: Mike Huckabee, Romney
Categories: 2008 Election · Huckabee · Romney
This is a post about age. And Politics. And Political Campaigns. It’s also likely one of a very few posts today, on this Super Bowl Sunday. Hot Wings and 7-Layer dip are calling!
We were on our way to dinner last night, stopped for a traffic light at one of our city’s busiest intersections. We noticed a young man, maybe all of 20 years of age, carrying a couple of signs and darting in and out of the stopped traffic. As he worked his way closer, we realized the signs were Obama signs and he carried a roll of stickers in his hand. Enthusiastic, certainly. Overly-enthusiastic, perhaps. It was very much the same feeling you get when a panhandler approaches your car. I appreciate the enthusiasm, but (just perhaps) the campaign needs to explain good campaigning technique to these young folks. Or, maybe, we’re just turning into old foggies.
At any rate, there is a smart commercial for Obama getting some play. Here’s one suggestion on how to make it better, via Brilliant at Breakfast:
Throw a couple more older people in this and you’ve got a damn near perfect campaign video
This is really, really good. And I know that the people most energized by Barack Obama’s candidacy are the young. But historically, young voters, largely because they’re more mobile and sometimes less likely to register, don’t always show up at the polls at crunch time. Hopefully this year will be different, assuming [...]
Categories: 2008 Election · Obama
Tagged: Obama Campaign
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