Dear television bobbleheads: The Dems are not going to win Mississippi in the general election. It doesn’t matter whether the nominee is Clinton or Obama. Ain’t gonna happen. And Obama did worse among white voters in Mississippi than in other states because of racism. Mississippi has no cosmopolitan areas like Atlanta to lift it from its sodden backwardness. You should have expected that, dear bobbleheads. Stop acting surprised.
Daily Archives: March 11, 2008
While We Were Being Disappointed
In the past few hours, eight U.S. soldiers died in Iraq. This brings the total to just over 3,900, I believe.
Eugene Robinson writes in today’s Washington Post:
Has anyone noticed that Iraq, supposedly transformed into an oasis of peace and tranquility by George W. Bush’s troop surge, is growing less peaceful and tranquil by the day?
The nation’s attention has been riveted by the presidential campaign, with its compelling characters and its edge-of-your-seat story line. Iraq is treated almost as a theoretical issue: What would happen there if Barack Obama became president, as opposed to what would happen if Hillary Clinton became president, as opposed to what would happen if John McCain became president? There has been little debate about what’s happening in Iraq right now.
That seems likely to change.
Wow. And after they celebrated over that damn ugly cake. Be sure to read all of Robinson’s column, which make a good argument that Iraq is still a failure, no matter what the Bushies say.
Warren P. Strobel writes for McClatchy Newspapers:
An exhaustive review of more than 600,000 Iraqi documents that were captured after the 2003 U.S. invasion has found no evidence that Saddam Hussein’s regime had any operational links with Osama bin Laden’s al Qaida terrorist network.
The Pentagon-sponsored study, scheduled for release later this week, did confirm that Saddam’s regime provided some support to other terrorist groups, particularly in the Middle East, U.S. officials told McClatchy. However, his security services were directed primarily against Iraqi exiles, Shiite Muslims, Kurds and others he considered enemies of his regime.
The new study of the Iraqi regime’s archives found no documents indicating a “direct operational link” between Hussein’s Iraq and al Qaida before the invasion, according to a U.S. official familiar with the report.
This is not exactly news to most of us. But just last week I saw Christopher Hitchens on Bill Maher’s HBO show talking about Saddam’s support of al Qaeda. I doubt Hitchens will ever admit to the truth; he’s too emotionally invested in his Glorious Little War. When the report comes out, expect the Right Blogosphere to come up with some reason why the Pentagon couldn’t possibly know what it’s talking about.
Stung
This doesn’t exonerate Gov. Spitzer, but Scott Horton suggests that Spitzer was “stung” because of a Justice Department investigation targeting him. In other words, he didn’t just happen to get caught because of an investigation of a prostitution ring. Rather, the investigation of Spitzer led to his involvement with the prostitution ring.
Quoting ABC:
The federal investigation of a New York prostitution ring was triggered by Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s suspicious money transfers, initially leading agents to believe Spitzer was hiding bribes, according to federal officials. It was only months later that the IRS and the FBI determined that Spitzer wasn’t hiding bribes but payments to a company called QAT, what prosecutors say is a prostitution operation operating under the name of the Emperors Club. …
The suspicious financial activity was initially reported by a bank to the IRS which, under direction from the Justice Department, brought in the FBI’s Public Corruption Squad. “We had no interest at all in the prostitution ring until the thing with Spitzer led us to learn about it,†said one Justice Department official.
As I said, this doesn’t exonerate Spitzer. This episode also brings up the point that just because someone’s been in the public eye for years, as Spitzer has been in New York, doesn’t mean you know him.