Rumsfeld always trumpeted the competence of the Iraq forces and how effectively and how fast we could hand over power to them. The Bush Administration lied to us about the Iraqi's ability to secure their own country for four disastrous years. The "Surge" strategy was the realization that we had to do their jobs for them and provide the security that the Iraqi government could not. If Obama goes back to the old plan, he had better be prepared to withdraw FAST because Iraq will almost certainly return to the same condition Iraq was in when we were handing power off to the Iraqis the first time.

We put the training wheels back on with the Surge plan, if we take them off then the natural power vacuum that follows will be settled with a test of arms. I feel that we should let it be settled with a test of arms and only the strong and violent can lead in Mesopotamia. A test of arms would settle once and for all who runs Iraq and give that leader a legitimacy that no amount of American accolades could ever provide.

Obama has stated he only takes non ideological solutions. Or doesn't consider ideology. Or something like that. The way he judges what "works" has so far been whatever the conventional wisdom in DC suggest. FISA, SecDef, SecState, SecTreasury, VP. All those decisions, entirely conventional wisdom Washingtonpost editorial board stuff. Let's pretend he actually governs in the same way he has made decisions in the past. That means mocking the "left" and taking opposite positions of the "left" to appear post partisan. Well ... The "left" solutions are the ones that will actually help, while the conventional wisdom solutions are the ones that got us where we are today. What does this imply? Obama will run us down a conventional wisdom train wreck and get blamed for the new Great Depression when all his plans fail because they were cowardly and couldn't take any suggestions from the left. I am predicting now, Obama pusses out in every major decision and goes with conventional wisdom, and kills the Democratic majorities in the Senate and House fast with failure. Legislature votes are votes made on results. Obama will keep his seat, thanks to his ample political gifts, but the Senators and COngressmen and State Politicos are going to go deep red when Obama fails to fix any of our problems by listening to conventional wisdom.

Always the strategist, he sees an opportunity to screw us up and takes it. If he can bind Obama, can block Obama's "Love America Again" world tour. Brilliant. I just have to wonder, with KSM's interests and the interests of the Neo Con Lawyers running Guantanamo so closely aligned, is there collusion going on? The Neo Cons are desperate to keep the commissions going because they fear the federal court system so much. And they also fear Obama winning over the world with his liberalism and justice and what not. A big Obama federal court case propaganda win would be devastating to the Bush legacy. And devastating to the legacy of KSM and ALQ.

There has to be more to this. They all decided, man, time to get martyred quick, enter these guilty pleas before the new president can shut down these kangaroo courts. The timing suggests that interpretation. KSM decided it was time to plead guilty for death AFTER the election of Obama. It can't just be a cooincidence.

My guild leader is a man in real life. He changed from a female tauren to male tauren the first day it was available. I think you will see a lot of "gender normalization" where male players go back to playing male characters. The incongruity of looking female but sounding male over the mic gets to people after a while.

They had Hamas officials, PLO officials, Israel officials, citizens from both sides, and the half black guy stuck everyone that came on his show with hard questions from the other side. No one got favoritism, EVEN THE ISRAELI SPOKESPERSON. The Sderot resident got challenged about whether they thought the ground invasion would make them safer. It was excellent. Last night changed my opinion of CNN.

Dean even said we should be even handed in the Israel Palestine conflict. Just for that he had to go. Obama is trying to run a centrist government, too bad it will hit him one day that there are no centrist policy positions, only people who claim to centrists.

Shooting across the border is kind of an act of war. They got off way to easy. The guy was fleeing, you can't shoot people in the back just because you can't catch them.

The Republicans are abusing his every offer to listen to them. Obama has lost every encounter because he thought he could negotiate. Better than Obama learn these lessons now than keep trying.

If we walks around the settlements too much saying that stuff he is going to get "Rabin"ed. The walls are numerous in Israel, and ever expanding. Not a good place to be an egg.

Steele is a black. On a black guy's show. And he just dissed the angry white man's race hero, Rush Limbaugh. This has the makings for a republican Civil war. I love it.

Boo FreeRepublic Doesn't have anything up yet.

CNBC not see the financial collapse of 2008-2009 before it his is the equivalent of the weather channel not seeing Katrina coming. CNBC utterly failed at the one thing it should be good at, telling its listeners what is on the horizon.

Allow investors to bring regulatory lawsuits with private attorneys. Then allow the investors bringing such lawsuits to collect a portion of the damages due to the state for regulatory malfeasance. That will bring 100% regulatory compliance within 5 minutes of the bill being signed.

Thanks for summing up my feelings on the subject.