Don't Blame Penske For His Throwing Ability
 

Crap. Wrong link. Try "Throwing Like a Girl" on this page.

If I were a Republican, this would really piss me off:

• Mr. Bush acknowledged one major failing of the early occupation of Iraq when he said of disbanding the Saddam Hussein-era military, “The policy was to keep the army intact; didn’t happen.”
  
  But when Mr. Draper pointed out that Mr. Bush’s former Iraq administrator, L. Paul Bremer III, had gone ahead and forced the army’s dissolution and then asked Mr. Bush how he reacted to that, Mr. Bush said, “Yeah, I can’t remember, I’m sure I said, ‘This is the policy, what happened?’ ” But, he added, “Again, Hadley’s got notes on all of this stuff,” referring to Stephen J. Hadley, his national security adviser.

NYT. The President has tied the fortunes of (among other things) his administration and the Republican Party to this war in Iraq, but he can't remember how crucial decisions were made or bothered to try to figure it out.

FWIW, Bremer has already responded with his Nuh UHHHHH! letters, documenting (arguably) that the WH knew and approved of that particular stupid decision. I don't know why Bremer is sacrificing some likely cushy job at AEI in order to avoid being tagged as the goat, but there you are.

How to export democracy.
 

You read this and you think, boy howdy, it's hard to believe that we've been so unsuccessfully in introducing democracy to the Middle East.

• "[Maliki's] learning to be a leader. And one of my jobs as the president and his ally is to help him be that leader without being patronizing. At some point in time, if I come to the conclusion that he can't be the leader—he's unwilling to lead or he's deceptive—then we'll change course. But I haven't come to that conclusion."

link

"As Iraq goes, so goes the GOP" is not the long term rule. "As the economy goes, so goes the party in charge" is the rule.

You may wish this war spells the end of the GOP, but that is not the case. It's the economy, economy, economy.

Placed in order of real importance to the average American, here are the issues:

1. Job security
2. Health care
3. Education costs
4. Retirement
5. Taxes
6. Fuel costs

20. The Iraq war

50. The subprime/ARM driven housing crisis

499. Global warming

People don't care that much about Iraq because they care more about themselves and are working like lunatics to keep their heads above water. Which is exactly how we wound up in the debacle in the first place - nobody cares. They're too strained chasing the more and more elusive and time consuming "American Dream."

To cite my obvious favorite source, "We're all wired in to a speed trip now." Nobody's watching the store, except when it directly impacts their pocketbooks. If the Dems had brains, they'd make cuts in all sorts of programs and blame the shortfall on Iraq spending. That would put the war into the average American's crosshairs.

caption, please
 

Sen. Larry Craig assumes a narrow stance.

In the long term, we'll have two parties in relative equipoise, because whichever party finds itself down will make some adjustments to win back voters, and whichever party finds itself up will piss away its advantage.

But in the short term, a lot of GOP legislators are going to pay the price for Bush's screw-ups. Which is as it should be, since they never acted as any kind of a check on him.

Don't leave your day job to be a pollster. Iraq is at the top of the list. (Don't believe Gallup? Try FOX News.)

Craig
 

So is September Larry Craig month? And does anyone care?

Craig
 

Surely the White House is not happy that Senator Craig is messing with National "The Surge Is Working" Says General Petraeus Week.

Ty -

Ask five friends what keeps them up at night sometimes. You think people are looking at their finances and saying "I'm really concerned about Iraq!"

Stop. Thinking. Like. A. Lawyer. Think like a person. When you consider your life, what do you think about? Iraq? No. You think about what matters to you, and what matters to you is what directly affects you. Iraq does not directly affect most of us.

I'm not going to bother explaining to you why that poll has so many holes in it, or why it is irrelevant because it is geared to determine people's concpetual POLITICAL concerns, which are different than their ACTUAL day to day concerns, upon which they base their voting decisions. You understand that.

It is the economy. It is always the economy. It has always been the economy and that is not going to change. This is a capitalist society.

Best,
SD

Agreed. And throw in about 60-75% of the Dems as well.

Sebby, stop thinking like a DINK. Ask five people who have kids in highschool what keeps them up at night. I bet at least three of them say "Iraq." More specifically, will my kid get sent there to die?

I tend to make voting decisions based not on my biggest day-to-day concerns, over which I have a lot of control, but on conceptual political concerns. I think the day-to-day concerns mainly affect whether I think things in general are suckier than they should be, and associate that with whoever is in office. For the vast majority of people who are getting along and aren't part of massive layoffs or whatever, economic stability/prosperity is something that is perceived as being within their own control for the most part. And, the president and Congress and the Supreme Court is going to have only a muted effect at best -- but on whether or not we are in Iraq, or whether or not the right to abortion is federally protected, who is president/in Congress actually can and does matter.

Therefore, the issues that obsess us most on a day-to-day basis (will I ever find twue wuv???? am I going to advance in my job? will I ever be able to afford to buy a place that is not a hovel here? will that heinous hose-beast bitch ever fucking retire????) are not those that influence us the most when deciding who to vote for.

Very truly yours,

me.

Actually, I suspect that Romney will have a 10-point plan for this problem shortly before the Iowa caucus.

please. I'm 1 who doesn't.