Friday, July 1

Olio

• Afghanistan

What, we're still there? Yes, the information is a bit preliminary, but a helicopter crashes on Tuesday and we don't reach the wreckage until Thursday? And the Pentagon spokesman leaves the story to spokesman speak: "We are conducting search and recovery operations. But we are more into the recovery stage." Meaning we knew everyone was dead (including, reportedly, three troops on the ground) immediately but we're still being cagey about it.

• Fuck You

WASHINGTON, June 30 (Reuters) - Several Senate Republicans denounced other lawmakers and the news media on Thursday for unfavorable depictions of the Iraq war and the Pentagon urged members of Congress to talk up military service to help ease a recruiting shortfall.

Families are discouraging young men and women from enlisting "because of all the negative media that's out there," Sen. James Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican, said at a U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee hearing.

Inhofe also said that other senators' criticism of the war contributed to the propaganda of U.S. enemies. He did not name the senators.


So call for a draft, you chickenshit bastards.

• Bush poll numbers fall after big televised speech

Granted, the administration relies on a moronic public, but maybe this is the signal for the networks to disconnect from that assessment. Was someone expecting a big upturn from that speech? Was the public supposed to slap its collective forehead and say, "Oh, 9/11! That's why I support the war!" ? If Bush has any more sorry-assed PR efforts in him, at least make him call a pretend news conference from now on. With 43% approval and a 50% negative in the Red States, he no longer holds the whip hand.

• Hey, look! It's Iran!

TEHRAN, June 30 - Two Iranian leaders of the seizure of the American Embassy in Tehran in 1979 dismissed allegations on Thursday by former American hostages that Iran's president-elect was one of their captors. The Bush administration, however, said it took the charge seriously and vowed to investigate.

"Obviously his involvement raises many questions," President Bush told reporters on Thursday morning, referring to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the president-elect.


Oh, by all means, let's investigate. While we're at it, let's see if we can round up the missing pages of Bill Casey's dayplanner, and clear up that little mess about the hostages being released in time for Reagan's first inaugural, shall we?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Re that helicopter crash: Before the recovery effort, it was "all 17 on board feared dead" and after it was "all 16 aboard were killed." Where's the other guy?

--adjust shiny hat--

I have a 12-year-old boy. He is Not Going to Iraq/Iran/Syria/North Korea/Afghanistan/France.

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If all was right with this country, his poll numbers would fall every time he opened his mouth.

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So what if it was one of the hostage-taking guys? I mean, it's not like our guys aren't making political hay out of flouting international law.

Anonymous said...

Ahmadinejad: I was watching the "news" on CNN, and I saw a guy comparing the eyebrows on one of the hostage-takers to Ahmadinejad's eyebrows. They were measuring the distance between the eyebrows ... now that's good science right there.

eRobin said...

Yeah, Riley, you're right. I went with digging up who started Iran down its nuclear path way back when, but I like your idea better. Let's find out who was the bagman that delivered the money to Banisadr too. I always heard that Poppy had that job. There certainly is enough to investigate.