Biden sends off son’s National Guard unit October 3, 2008
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From CNN Political Producer Alexander Marquardt
DOVER, Delaware (CNN) – Joe Biden spoke briefly but emotionally Friday morning at the deployment ceremony for his son Beau’s Iraq-bound National Guard unit.
“I’ve come here many times before,” Biden told the 261st Signal Brigade as they stood in formation. “As a Delawarean, as a United States senator. But today I come as you prepare to deploy as a father. A father who got some sage advice from his son this morning. “Dad, keep it short, we’re in formation. Source Article
Biden’s appearance at son’s deployment not political, aides say October 2, 2008
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Posted by Foon Rhee, deputy national political editor October 2, 2008 12:38 PM
Sarah Palin took some heat for, in critics’ eyes, injecting politics into the deployment ceremony of her eldest son Track, headed to Iraq.
Now, her Democratic counterpart Joe Biden is treading carefully not to open himself to the same questioning, the Washington Post reports.
Biden plans to speak Friday at the deployment ceremony of his son, Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden, 39, a member of the Army’s Judge Advocate General Corps. He might serve as an army prosecutor in Iraq. Biden aides said that the event was not political and that he was speaking as a father and senator, not a candidate, the Post reports. Source Article
Unearthed Video: McCain Pushed Bush Iraq War Agenda Two Months After 9/11 September 30, 2008
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September 30, 2008 04:58 PM
Recently unearthed video shows that just two months after 9/11, John McCain was not only fully aware of the Bush Administration’s Iraq War Agenda, but also that he actively helped make the argument for war.
In an interview broadcast November 28, 2001 on ABC News Nightline, McCain:
* Said that the Bush Administration would build a case for military conflict with Iraq, and expressed his support for such action Source Article
Our Troops Don’t Get a Time-Out for the Financial Crisis September 24, 2008
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Posted September 24, 2008 | 05:56 PM (EST)
So, because there’s a financial crisis, Senator McCain cannot take 90 minutes to address how he will face challenges around the world, including how and when he will send American troops to fight, and possibly die.
Wow. Troops would sure love that luxury.
Unfortunately, though, insurgents in Iraq don’t stop shooting at us, or setting IEDs, because our Commander in Chief needs a breather to figure out Wall Street.
Al Qaeda in the Afghanistan/Pakistan border region don’t send our troops notes that read, “Hey, I hear you guys are tied up with Wall Street. Your President needs to concentrate on other things, so we’ll give you a break. So, to make things easier on you, here’s our coordinates.”
Nor do our troops get a few days to figure out how to hold onto an area we’ve secured, if there’s an unexpected attack. Sometimes we need to deal with multiple flare-ups at once in any warzone. We’d sure love a time-out, but sadly, the world isn’t such a nice place that it gives us that kind of pity. Source Article
Giant Gaffe: McCain Confuses National Guard and Army — and Palin’s Son September 20, 2008
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Posted September 20, 2008 | 08:28 AM (EST)
If you don’t already do it, you really should be checking out the Anchorage Daily News site regularly, for local Palin news, editorials and op-eds, and its excellent Alaska Politics blog (special bonus Ted Stevens coverage there). Today, for example, the paper hits Palin hard in an editorial for abdicating to the McCain campaign on Troopergate.
And here’s a brand-new gem on a stunning, overlooked McCain gaffe from David Hulen at the Alaska Politics blog:
Candidates spend a lot of time talking, and they all misspeak sometimes. But did anyone else notice this, from Wednesday’s much-covered McCain-Palin Town Hall event in Grand Rapids, Mich., where Palin answered questions from people in the audience? McCain said this near the end of the clip below, as he’s talking up Palin’s foreign policy/national security credentials:
“I also know, if I might remind you, that she is commander of the Alaska National Guard. In fact, you may know that on Sept. 11 a large contingent of the Alaska Guard deployed to Iraq and her son happened to be one of them. So I think she understands our national security challenges…”
Obama Slams Bush, McCain Over Redeployment Plan September 9, 2008
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AFP | September 9, 2008 12:33 PM
AFP reports on Barack Obama’s harsh words for President Bush and Senator McCain today regarding foreign policy:
Speaking to reporters here, Obama accused Bush of “tinkering around the edges” and “kicking the can down the road to the next president” with his plans to remove 8,000 US troops from Iraq in the coming months and send 4,500 to Afghanistan by January.
“At this point what it appears is that the next president will inherit a status quo that is still unstable,” Obama said, adding that his Republican White House rival John McCain was bent on the same course as Bush…
Palin: Surge? What Surge? August 31, 2008
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Andrew Sullivan/The Daily Dish
31 Aug 2008 01:21 pm
Among the tiny number of occasions on which Sarah Palin has expressed even an opinion on foreign policy, one of the most recent bears putting out there one more time. It’s from a critical moment in the war in Iraq, December 2006, which John McCain has made the centerpiece of his campaign. In fact, his support for a double-down strategy in Iraq in the winter of 2006 and early 2007 is one central argument he has made for his candidacy. He has now chosen as the person who would replace him instantly if, at any time bgetween the ages of 72 and 76, he might be incapacitated or die, a person whose view of the situation was as follows: Source Article
John McCain Needs to Lay Off the POW Talk August 21, 2008
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Posted August 21, 2008 | 07:05 PM (EST)
When John McCain revealed that he didn’t know how many houses he and his wife currently own (they have at least eight properties), the Obama campaign pounced. They accused him of being elitist and disconnected and launched an ad within hours. The McCain campaign–realizing this was trouble–retorted the only way they knew how: With a truly stupefying response from McCain spokesman Brian Rogers:
“This is a guy who lived in one house for five and a half years — in prison,” referring to the prisoner of war camp that McCain was in during the Vietnam War.
Yes, you read that right. McCain justified not knowing how many houses he has by saying he was a POW in Vietnam, four decades ago. I have some things to say about this:
Did McCain “Agree” On Draft Reinstatement? Not Exactly. August 21, 2008
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August 21, 2008 11:29 AM
Yesterday afternoon, the news that John McCain, at a town hall meeting, had agreed that he was amenable to reinstating the draft blasted into my inbox. Naturally, it piqued my interest, so I thought I’d check it out for myself. Throughout the blogosphere, the quote was being reported thusly:
QUESTIONER: If we don’t re-enact the draft, I don’t think we’ll have anyone to chase Bin Laden to the gates of Hell.MCCAIN: Ma’am let me say that I don’t disagree with anything you have said, and thank you.
Of course, seeing the draft tied to McCain’s nonsensical “Gates Of Hell” rhetoric was enough to set my teeth on edge. Military service is a serious matter for those who volunteer for the job and their families – the fact that McCain would ask for more sacrifice to support his rivetingly unserious approach to the War on Terror, is something of an insult. Source Article
John McCain: War Hero or North Vietnam’s Go-To Collaborator? August 19, 2008
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From Glory Boy to PW Songbird
By DOUGLAS VALENTINE
June 13-15, 2008
If you have no idea what war is about, thank your gods. It is not what you see in Mel Gibson movies, nor is it hidden within the Big Lie Big Brother tells you about Pat Tillman’s heroic “Army of One” in Iraq and Afghanistan.
When my father was in New Guinea with the 32nd Division in 1942, his fellow American soldiers would point their long Springfield rifles skywards and shoot at American pilots flying overhead.
“Glory Boys,” the long-suffering ground troops called them.
The pilots had comfortable quarters beside the airstrip in Port Moresby. When orders for a mission came down, they’d climb in their planes, rattle down the runway, and soar over the Owen Stanley Mountains with the clouds in spotless uniforms, breathing fresh clean air. The Glory Boys weren’t trapped in the broiling jungle, in the mud and pouring rain, their skin rotting away, chewed by ghastly insects, bitten by poisonous snakes, stricken with cerebral malaria, yellow fever, dysentery, and a host of unknown diseases delivered by unknown parasites.
If the Fly Boys perished, it was in a blaze of glory, not from a landmine, or a misdirected American mortar, or a Japanese bayonet in the brain.
One day my father and his last remaining friend, Charlie Ferguson, were walking through the jungle up to the front line. One the way they passed a group of bare-chested Aussies in khaki shorts sitting round a grindstone sharpening their knives. Every once in a while one of the Aussies would hoist his rife and casually put a bullet into a Japanese sniper who had tied himself into the top of a nearby tree. Not in any place that would outright kill him, but some place painful enough to make the point.
A little further toward the front line, my father and Charlie came upon Master Sergeant Harry Blackman, an adult man in his forties, regular army, a grizzled combat veteran. A few days earlier in a fight with the Japanese, a young lieutenant, a “90-Day Wonder,” had curled up in a fetal position when he should have been directing mortar fire. As a result, US mortar rounds landed on several US soldiers. Blackman, in front of everyone, took the lieutenant behind a tree and blew his brains out. Source Article
The Central Tabulator 