Mission Statement
Organize, train, equip, and mentor Iraqi Security Forces, in order to support Iraq's ultimate goal of a unified, stable and democratic Iraq, which provides a representative government for the Iraqi people; is underpinned by new and protected freedoms for all Iraqis and a growing market economy; and is able to defend itself and not pose a threat to the region.
In all fairness they may have thought this was some suicide bomber, but I had to laugh.
ReplyDeleteSure no Redney King, those fellows need better training.
ReplyDeleteCan't beat a guy worth a damn.
Meanwhile, back at home we have our own Muslim problems ...
ReplyDeleteBush goes Anti-American with appointment of Radical Wahabbist
Tuesday, 19 June 2007
ReplyDeleteTask Force Lightning strikes al-Qaeda - 22 killed
Six IED cell members arrested
8 extremists killed, 2 detained during operations in Baqouba
1-15 Infantry detains five suspected insurgents
3-1 Cav. seizes multiple caches near Jisr Diyala - 4 detaineed
Coalition raids target al-Qaeda; one terrorist killed, 15 suspects detained
A good day for the MNF
31 Insurgents killed
32 detained
Two day total
31 killed
72 detained
Took out a platoon of terrorists, to bad we had to engage an addidtional 28,000 US soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines to do it, at a combined cost of $300 million USD per day or aprox. $10 million USD per enemy killed on Tuesday, 19 June 2007.
$20 million per dead terrorist on a two day running average from Monday and Tuesday.
The push is on.
Rocky Mountain News
ReplyDeleteDenver, CO 80202
If you need more evidence that the enforcement side of federal immigration law isn't measuring up, just look at the information that has come to light from Senate Bill 90, one piece of the package of immigration reforms that passed the legislature last year.
The bill, which received bipartisan support, requires Colorado's local law enforcement agencies to report to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency any illegal immigrants who are arrested or cited for most offenses that are more serious than a traffic citation. It also instructs agencies to tally how many people they had referred to ICE in the previous year.
In many cases, these people would be subject to deportation. They've been jailed or ordered to jail for serious misdemeanors and felonies.
But the Rocky's Burt Hubbard found that the lion's share of these illegal immigrants - 37 of every 38 reported to ICE - were never issued a hold or detention order. The feds were notified, and nothing happened.
Episcopal Church Appoints First Openly-Muslim Bishop
ReplyDeleteShortly after noon on Fridays, the Rev. Ann Holmes Redding ties on a black headscarf, preparing to pray with her Muslim group on First Hill.
On Sunday mornings, Redding puts on the white collar of an Episcopal priest.
She does both, she says, because she's Christian and Muslim.
Redding, who until recently was director of faith formation at St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral, has been a priest for more than 20 years. Now she's ready to tell people that, for the last 15 months, she's also been a Muslim — drawn to the faith after an introduction to Islamic prayers left her profoundly moved.
Her announcement has provoked surprise and bewilderment in many, raising an obvious question: How can someone be both a Christian and a Muslim..?
She says she felt an inexplicable call to become Muslim, and to surrender to God — the meaning of the word "Islam."
"It wasn't about intellect," she said. "All I know is the calling of my heart to Islam was very much something about my identity and who I am supposed to be.
"I could not not be a Muslim..."
Redding's bishop, the Rt. Rev. Vincent Warner, says he accepts Redding as an Episcopal priest and a Muslim, and that he finds the interfaith possibilities exciting.
Ryan C. Crocker, the new U.S. ambassador to Iraq, bluntly told Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in a cable dated May 31 that the embassy in Baghdad -- the largest and most expensive U.S. embassy -- lacks enough well-qualified staff members and that its security rules are too restrictive for Foreign Service officers to do their jobs.
ReplyDelete"Simply put, we cannot do the nation's most important work if we do not have the Department's best people," Crocker said in the memo.
The unclassified cable underscores the State Department's struggle to find its role in the turmoil in Iraq. With a 2007 budget of more than $1 billion and a staff that has expanded to more than 1,000 Americans and 4,000 third-country nationals, the embassy has become the center of a bureaucratic battle between Crocker, who wants to strengthen the staff, and some members of Congress, who are increasingly skeptical about the diplomatic mission's rising costs.
"In essence, the issue is whether we are a Department and a Service at war," Crocker wrote. "If we are, we need to organize and prioritize in a way that reflects this, something we have not done thus far." In the memo, Crocker drew upon the recommendations of a management review he requested for the embassy shortly after arriving in Baghdad two months ago.
"He's panicking," said one government official who recently returned from Baghdad, adding that Crocker is carrying a heavy workload as the United States presses the Iraqi government to meet political benchmarks.
ReplyDelete"You could use a well-managed political section of 50 people" who know what they are doing, the official said, but Crocker does not have it because many staffers assigned to the embassy are "too young for the job," or are not qualified and are "trying to save their careers" by taking an urgent assignment in Iraq.
"They need a cohesive, coherent effort on all fronts," the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. "It's just overwhelming."
But some lawmakers have balked at what they consider the unbridled expansion of the embassy. "Having said over and over again that we don't want to be seen as an occupying force in Iraq, we're building the largest embassy that we have. . . . And it just seems to grow and grow and grow," Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) said to Rice during a hearing last month. "Can we just review who we really need and send the rest of the people home?"
The State Department said that as of last week, 99 percent of the positions in the embassy and in regional reconstruction teams had been filled. But State officials privately concede that in the rush to fill slots -- each person serves only one year -- not enough attention has been paid to the management of the flux of people.
"In terms of Iraq and Afghanistan, the secretary has put the department on a war footing," said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack. "If one of her ambassadors says he needs something, she will get it for him."
...
"The big issue for me, in my estimation, was simply not having enough people," Crocker said. "The people here are heroic. I need more people, and that's the thing, not that the people who are here shouldn't be here or couldn't do it."
Is the united States of America at War in Iraq?
ReplyDelete"If we are, we need to organize and prioritize in a way that reflects this, something we have not done thus far."
What year is this?
We've have been in Iraq for over four yyears, have we not?
What is the Goal?
"... something we have not done thus far."
BAGHDAD (Associated Press) -- A truck bomb struck a Shiite mosque Tuesday in central Baghdad, killing 75 people and wounding more than 200, even as about 10,000 U.S. soldiers northeast of the capital used heavily armored Stryker and Bradley fighting vehicles to battle their way into an al-Qaida sanctuary.
ReplyDelete...
Police and hospital officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they feared retribution, said at least 75 people were killed and 204 were wounded, adding that the toll could rise as bodies were pulled from the debris.
The US offensive kills 22 insurgents, while the insurgents kill 75 civilians, on the other side of town.
The bodies of four suspected undocumented immigrants were found in the Arizona desert over the weekend.
ReplyDeleteThe first discovery was made at about 9:30 a.m. Friday, when a U.S. Customs and Border Protection helicopter spotted skeletal remains on the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, said Richard DeWitt, a spokesman for the U.S. Border Patrol's busy Tucson sector.
He said the gender nor the identification of the person had yet been determined.
At about 2 p.m. the same day, agents found the body of a 24-year-old Mexican woman south of the village of Topawa on the Tohono O'odham Reservation. They found her body after a man told O'odham police that she had been left behind by a group of border crossers.
DeWitt said the woman had an identification card from Naucalpan, Mexico.
Later that night, agents found the body of a man in his 20s south of Cowlic, also on the O'odham reservation.
Agents learned of the body after three people found walking on a dirt road told an agent that someone from their group had died. The dead man had not been carrying identification.
The most recent body was found at about 12:30 p.m. Sunday. Agents found the body of a 42-year-old Mexican man near Kaka, also on the O'odham reservation.
Agents were led to the body by directions from an illegal immigrant who said he had left two people passed out in the desert. Agents never found the other person.
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ReplyDeleteTeresita:
ReplyDeleteThat is mind blowing news but it shouldn't be. It just goes to show how far the Episcopalian Church has fallen. I have posted the story with a hattip to you over at Observanda.
Sidebar: Western religious institutions are failing at a time when Islamic "militants" are making their move. Seems to me the religious nuts will prevail over the merely corrupt. Case in point, the Palestinians. I would almost be willing to give two-to-one that Hamas will rule Gaza and the West Bank. The current Diplomatic attempts to prop up the PLA (the other terrorist organization) are destined to be futile.
The Episcopalians threw the Bible out with the bath water and are now free to make up a new religion out of whole cloth. On a wing and a prayer, so to speak.
ReplyDelete"How convenient."
I wonder if the "Rev. Ann Holmes Redding" became a Wahabbi Muslim?
ReplyDeleteHow peace-loving she is, how tolerant of her fellow man's religious insanity.
She wants to make the Religion of Peace and the religion of peace one and the same?
Tiger:
ReplyDeleteShe wants to make the Religion of Peace and the religion of peace one and the same?
There's a death penalty/fatwa for any Muslim who leaves the faith to become Christian, presumably she is a dead chick walking as long as she remains both. Roman Catholics do not consider anyone who rejects the dogma of the trinity to be Christian, and Muslims fall under this category. And God holds spiritual teachers to a higher standard, which is what a bishop certainly is supposed to be.
"T"
ReplyDeletePope Benny has already shown much weakness in his "relations" with Muslims.
Here's his web site
Around here, some Catholic churches are traditional while some are about as loopy radical leftist as they come. The Vatican is not the "whole" of the church, it's the governmental body if anything else. Of course, coming from a Protestant like me ... : )