Vice President David Petraeus

PETRAEUS FOR VICE PRESIDENT

US Makes Deal to Withdraw from Iraq

2011 is U.S. target date for troops' pullout from Iraq
11:54 PM CDT on Thursday, August 21, 2008

From Wire Reports
BAGHDAD – The United States has agreed to remove combat troops from Iraqi cities by next June and from the rest of the country by the end of 2011 if conditions in Iraq remain relatively stable, according to Iraqi and American officials involved in negotiating a security accord.

The withdrawal timetable, which Bush administration officials called "aspirational goals" rather than fixed dates, are contained in the draft of an agreement that still must be approved by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and other Iraqi leaders before it goes before Iraq's Parliament. It has the support of the Bush administration, American and Iraqi officials said.

Obama Brings a Knife to a Gun Fight

You want to talk real estate? You sure?

Is Barack an American Patriot?

The word patriot comes down from the Greek, patrios 'of one's fathers,' Latin, patriota 'fellow countryman,' and from patris, 'fatherland.' It means a person who vigorously defends his country from enemies and detractors.

Hattip:apfte

Dear Friends:

My name is Joe Porter.

I live in Champaign , Illinois . I'm 46 years old, a born-again Christian, a husband, a father, a small business owner, a veteran, and a homeowner. I don't consider myself to be either conservative or liberal, and I vote for the person, not Republican or Democrat. I don't believe there are "two Americas " - but that every person in this country can be whomever and what ever they want to be if they'll just work to get there - and nowhere else on earth can they find such opportunities. I believe our government should help those who are legitimately downtrodden, and should always put the interests of America first.

The purpose of this message is that I'm concerned about the future of this great nation. I'm worried that the silent majority of honest, hard-working, tax-paying people in this country have been passive for too long. Most folks I know choose not to involve themselves in politics. They go about their daily lives, paying their bills, raising their kids, and doing what they can to maintain the good life. They vote and consider doing so to be a sacred trust. They shake their heads at the political pundits and so-called "news", thinking that what they hear is always spun by whomever is reporting it. They can't understand how elected officials can regularly violate the public trust with pork barrel spending. They don't want government handouts. They want the government to protect them, not raise their taxes for more government programs.

We are in the unique position in this country of electing our leaders. It's a privilege to do so. I've never found a candidate in any election with whom I agreed on everything. I'll wager that most of us don't even agree with our families or spouses 100% of the time. So when I step into that voting booth, I always try to look at the big picture and cast my vote for the man or woman who is best qualified for the job. I've hired a lot of people in my lifetime, and essentially that's what an election is - a hiring process. Who has the credentials? Whom do I want working for me? Whom can I trust to do the job right?

I'm concerned that a growing number of voters in this country simply don't get it. They are caught up in a fervor they can't explain, and calling it "change".

Change what?, I ask.

Well, we're going to change America , they say.

In what way?, I query.

We want someone new and fresh in the White House, they exclaim.

So, someone who's not a politician?, I press.

Uh, well, no, we just want a lot of stuff changed, so we're voting for Obama, they state.

So the current system, the system of freedom and democracy that has enabled a man to grow up in this great country, get a fine education, raise incredible amounts of money and dominate the news and win his party's nomination for the White House - that system's all wrong?

No, no, that part of the system's okay - we just need a lot of change.

And so it goes. "Change we can believe in." Quite frankly, I don't believe that vague proclamations of change hold any promise for me. In recent months, I've been asking virtually everyone I encounter how they're voting. I live in Illinois , so most folks tell me they're voting for Barack Obama. But no one can really tell me why - only that he's going to change a lot of stuff. Change, change, change.

I have yet to find one single person who can tell me distinctly and convincingly why this man is qualified to be President and Commander-in-Chief of the most powerful nation on earth - other than the fact that he claims he's going to implement a lot of change.

We've all seen the emails about Obama's genealogy, his upbringing, his Muslim background, and his church affiliations. Let's ignore this for a moment. Put it all aside. Then ask yourself, what qualifies this man to be my president? That he's a brilliant orator and talks about change?

CHANGE WHAT?

Friends, I'll be forthright with you - I believe the American voters who are supporting Barack Obama don't have a clue what they're doing, as evidenced by the fact that not one of them - NOT ONE of them I've spoken to can spell out his qualifications. Not even the most liberal media can explain why he should be elected. Political experience? Negligible. Foreign relations? Non-existent. Achievements? Name one. Someone who wants to unite the country? If you haven't read his wife's thesis from Princeton , look it up on the web. This is who's lining up to be our next First Lady? The only thing I can glean from Obama's constant harping about change is that we're in for a lot of new taxes.

For me, the choice is clear. I've looked carefully at the two leading applicants for the job, and I've made my choice.

Here's a question - where were you five and a half years ago? Around Christmas, 2002. You've had five or six birthdays in that time. My son has grown from a sixth grade child to a high school graduate. Five and a half years is a good chunk of time. About 2,000 days. 2,000 nights of sleep. 6, 000 meals, give or take.

John McCain spent that amount of time, from 1967 to 1973, in a North Vietnamese prisoner-of-war camp.

When offered early release, he refused it. He considered this offer to be a public relations stunt by his captors, and insisted that those held longer than he should be released first. Did you get that part? He was offered his freedom, and he turned it down. A regimen of beatings and torture began.

Do you possess such strength of character? Locked in a filthy cell in a foreign country, would you turn down your own freedom in favor of your fellow man? I submit that's a quality of character that is rarely found, and for me, this singular act defines John McCain.

Unlike several presidential candidates in recent years whose military service is questionable or non-existent, you will not find anyone to denigrate the integrity and moral courage of this man. A graduate of Annapolis , during his Naval service he received the Silver Star, Bronze Star, Purple Heart and Distinguished Flying Cross. His own son is now serving in the Marine Corps in Iraq . Barack Obama is fond of saying "We honor John McCain's service...BUT...", which to me is condescending and offensive - because what I hear is, "Let's forget this man's sacrifice for his country and his proven leadership abilities, and talk some more about change."

I don't agree with John McCain on everything - but I am utterly convinced that he is qualified to be our next President, and I trust him to do what's right. I know in my heart that he has the best interests of our country in mind. He doesn't simply want to be President - he wants to lead America , and there's a huge difference. Factually, there is simply no comparison between the two candidates. A man of questionable background and motives who prattles on about change can't hold a candle to a man who has devoted his life in public service to this nation, retiring from the Navy in 1981 and elected to the Senate in 1982.

Perhaps Obama's supporters are taking a stance between old and new. Maybe they don't care about McCain's service or his strength of character, or his unblemished qualifications to be President. Maybe "likeability" is a higher priority for them than "trust". Being a prisoner of war is not what qualifies John McCain to be President of the United States of America - but his demonstrated leadership certainly DOES.

Dear friends, it is time for us to stand. It is time for thinking Americans to say, "Enough." It is time for people of all parties to stop following the party line. It is time for anyone who wants to keep America first, who wants the right man leading their nation, to start a dialogue with all their friends and neighbors and ask who they're voting for, and why.

There's a lot of evil in this world. That should be readily apparent to all of us by now. And when faced with that evil as we are now, I want a man who knows the cost of war on his troops and on his citizens. I want a man who puts my family's interests before any foreign country.

I want a President who's qualified to lead.

I want my country back, and I'm voting for John McCain.

Another point of view.

A day at the beach

Man dies when bluff collapses at San Diego beach

Thu Aug 21, 1:28 AM ET

A tourist from Nevada was killed Wednesday when a stretch of oceanside bluff at the Torrey Pines State Beach collapses, authorities said.

The 57-year-old, whose identity was not released, was at the beach with his brother and nephew when rocks the size of basketballs came down, officials said.

"He was just spending a day at the beach with his family," said Maurice Luque, spokesman for the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department. "He'd gone to the foot of the cliff to take off his shoes, and a small section of the bluffs just gave way and came down."

The section of collapsed cliff — about 30 feet wide — was several hundred feet below the Torrey Pines Golf Course, which hosted the U.S. Open in June.

The beach and parts of the bluff surrounding the collapse were closed.

"John McCain's President" and Barack Hussein Obama

Anyone running for the presidency of the United States has to accept the rules and traditions of US law and the procedures established for change and transition of power. It is the culture and it is mandatory. It is the law. It is a sensible law, necessary for a civil society.

Any military man knows that a salute is a recognition of the uniform and the office. It is mandatory and not reserved for an officer that you like. It is part of military culture and vital to discipline and cohesion.

Barack Hussein Obama, by association, deed and mouth has demonstrated contempt for America. He does not have African slave roots, yet has taken up with the most radical of the left-wing black agenda. That is fine for the ghetto and race-hustling industry, but not for the real America. Yes, there is a real America as there is right and wrong, good and evil, patriotic and unpatriotic.

An educated fool is still a fool, and slick smooth cool Barack, with the thinest and weakest of real American roots, talks the jive of the radical left when he states that George Bush is "John McCain's president." The American people should make sure that Barack Hussein Obama is never president of anything.

In case you need to be reminded about what is a real American:

Nato's Straw House

The quick take on NATO is not promising. Since the false ending of the Cold War the most important NATO undertaking has been in Afghanistan, but other than the Germans fascinated by skulls the war has not been conducted with any fire in the NATO belly. The odds of NATO lasting in Afghanistan, till a win, are not good.

Georgia is another matter. Do not hold your breath waiting for Georgia to get into NATO. NATO is not what we hoped it would be. Whether NATO has built a straw house or one of sticks, it sure ain't brick.

The charade may as well stop here. Expansion to Soviet borders is pointless.
We have returned to “spheres of influence” and "balance of power." Get used to it.

___________________

If Nato won't fight, what's it for?
Tuesday, August 19, 2008, 10:33 AM GMT [General]

NATO is meeting in summit at Brussels. Sixty years after the alliance was signed, can anyone tell me what it's for?

The revival of Russian revanchism might seem to answer that question. Except that NATO has been conspicuous by its absence from the Georgian conflict. Let's conjecture that Russia tried something similar in a NATO state. Say it moved troops into Latvia following inter-communal rioting. (It wouldn't declare war, of course. No one ever declares war these days.) Say that, as in Georgia, it agreed to remove its forces but somehow didn't quite get round to pulling them out. Does anyone really believe that this would trigger an all-out NATO counter-offensive? That Turkish troops would surge up through Georgia to harry Russia's south? That the Norwegian and Icelandic navies would blockade Archangel? That American and Canadian and British and Belgian forces would be dispatched to relieve the Baltic States?

It seems likely that that a Soviet attack on West Germany during the Cold War would indeed have triggered a military response. Certainly the possibility was strong enough that the USSR never took the risk. In that sense, NATO was a triumphant success. But is it still the best possible vehicle for the advancement of its members' collective interests?

I ask the question with genuine regret. In the days when NATO had an obvious purpose, I was one of its biggest supporters. As a teenager, I was a member of an organisation called Peace Through NATO, which used to hold debates against CND supporters. Our side would always begin by smugly reminding the CNDers that it was thanks to the nuclear deterrent that we were free to hold such debates at all. How tiresome they must have found us.

The end of the Cold War removed NATO's foundational rationale. In order to find itself a new role, the alliance took to expanding rapidly. But, in doing so, there is a danger that it has made a fiction of Article V: the clause that treats an attack on one member as an attack on all.

I hope I'm wrong. I'd certainly be in favour of fighting for the freedom of the Baltics. Britain did so once before. The only direct clash between our Armed Services and the Red Army was in Estonia in 1918. We lost a number of sailors, who were buried locally. When the Soviets annexed Estonia, they dynamited every monument that dated from the independence period. But the graves of the British sailors were kept hidden and tended by local patriots. They are still there. I hope the British would fight again. But would the rest?

Ten French Troops Killed in Afghan Fighting

PART TWO OF VIDEO ( Previous military engagements)



Ten French troops killed in Afghanistan
Reuters
Tuesday, 19 August 2008

Ten French soldiers have been killed in fighting with Taliban insurgents east of the Afghan capital, an Afghan military official said today.

The soldiers, part of NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), were killed in a major battle with insurgents that began on Monday about 30 miles east of Kabul, he said.

It was the biggest single loss of French troops in Afghanistan since US-led and Afghan forces toppled the Taliban after the 11 September 2001 attacks in New York.

France has 1,670 troops in Afghanistan having sent an extra 700 soldiers this year, responding to a US call for its NATO allies to send more forces to check a surge in violence.

ISAF said its troops were engaged in a "major battle" with insurgents in Kabul province that began on Monday, but spokesmen declined to comment on the French casualties.


The Afghan Defence Ministry said 27 insurgents have been killed or wounded in the clashes in Ouzbin area to the east of Kabul and at least two Afghan soldiers have been wounded.

The Taliban said on its Web site that 20 US soldiers had been killed in the fighting, which they said erupted after militants ambushed a convoy of Afghan and foreign forces late on Monday. That claim could not be immediately verified.