Still, no one is addressing our arming (and paying) the Sunni tribesment to fight "al-Qaeda" over Maliki's objections and -- as far as I can tell -- without anyone else's blessing.

Funny how this is Petraeus' baby ... and that old Dave is the person unon whose watch all those thousands of weapons were disbursed never to be seen again ....

but, yeah, let's blame the iraqis.

this new going-after-the-employers "illegal immigrant" program.

The "Ethanol" created corn shortage and the "high gas prices" have already dented grocery budgets considerably ... When /if supermarkets, restaurant and assorted other business have to deal with a genuine labor shortage, having to pay higher wages AND deal with this greater "enforcement" ... it's may be a camel-back-breaking since most everyone uses those facilities (supermarkets and fastfood).

Well managed and "honorable" businesses will take less of a hit ... but I fear the impact will be seismic on the "look-the-other-way" employers who will get the triple-whammy of losing trained workers and trying to hire only the verifiably genuinely documented and then finally, for some, dealing with prosecution.

The lawyers will do very well.

and for all that I'm bored to death with the subject ... that vote merely confirmed for me the extreme of her ambition ... yes, she didn't "do the right thing" ... it never occurred to me for a moment she was "fooled" by GWB and company -- and she keeps up this pathetic pretense ... it's somehow Bush's fault....

If she'd just admit the truth, I might look at her with fresher eyes. I never believed she couldn't get her hands on the travel office documents either, but I also didn't believe that she "believed" Bill when he said nothing happened with Monica. Her simple credibility sucks with me. I don't like people who look me in the eye and lie ... I wasn't crazy about Bill Clinton either, for just that reason (along with nafta, Kyoto, welfare reform, Bosnia/Kosovo, Iraqi sanctions ... )

It also worries me that Clinton, like the incoming Bush, has an enormous kitchen cabinet which has been busily mapping her first 100 days or whatever .... She has HER agenda ... it's not mine and it's not necessarily "ours" ... and I think all the "preparation" is likely a liability... along with her scolding school-marm persona wrt those who disagree with her, like Obama.

I can't wait for the no-child-left-behind reauthorization battle .... these "candidates" have to stop hiding behind George Bush ... really, it's not substantive, it's dead horse beating.

If I were the child of a gay union, I'd be disgusted ... I haven't been following this issue much but realized that the daughters of two gay childhood friends are now about to graduate high school.... Oh, and my childhood friends are now fast approaching or have passed age 50 ...

for god's sake, if civil unions are the "stop gap" measure until society catches up, why is even THAT so spottily available? .... and antidiscrimination provisions and ....

Given what's at stake and the bruhaha surrounding this issue .... it's amazing how LITTLE progress has been made universally and how recent (I suspect after years of two steps forward/one step back) so much of it is.

from Wikipedia ...

=========================================================

Civil unions or some other form of relationship recognition such as domestic partnerships or reciprocal benefits are legal in seven states. Same-sex marriage is legal in one state, Massachusetts.

1 Same-sex marriage

1.1 Massachusetts - May 17, 2004

2 Civil unions

2.1 Vermont - July 1, 2000

2.2 Connecticut - October 1, 2005

2.3 New Jersey - February 19, 2007

2.4 New Hampshire - January 1, 2008

3 Domestic partnerships

3.1 District of Columbia - June 11, 1992

3.2 California - September 22, 1999

3.3 Maine - July 30, 2004

3.4 Washington - July 22, 2007

3.5 Oregon - January 1, 2008

4 Reciprocal benefits

4.1 Hawaii - January 1, 1997

5 Under consideration

5.1 Illinois

5.2 Maryland

5.3 New Mexico

5.4 New York

5.5 Rhode Island

"where seldom is heard a discouraging word,

and the skies are not cloudy all day"

People forget (or never comprehended in the first place) that "denial" is an invisible mindset ... it's not the same as "rationalization" or "blaming others"

damn it, the sun will come out tomorrow .... bet your bottom dollar ... there is light at the end of EVERY tunnel ...(not so much pits and wells and others dead-end affairs)

As "professionals," it sounds as if these "reporters" allowed themselves to see what they wanted to see ... it appears it never occured to them to look behind the curtain or deviate from the scheduled "dog and pony show."

I suspect both army training manuals and "management" programs and JOURNALISM 101 warn about embracing the news one wants to hear in favor of "objective reality"...

There's gotta be a pony somewhere ... or as a CEO I worked under used to say ... "with all these bright, intelligent, hardworking, well-meaning people, success is assured" ... not so fast... but it created an environment where "seldom was heard a discouraging word" as management became more and more of an ivory tower and the day-to-day running the business problems were shunned and considered to reflect poorly on a manager -- rather than being the everyday normal challenges of working with people and doing business.

Impressions are great for essays and paintings ... for reporting ... give me metrics.

but then again, I've been wrong before.

I think people will begin to wake up to the false hopes they have pinned on the next (democratic) president ... see today's NYT front page.

Regardless of what anyone wants or is willing to settle for, it sounds as if we're going to run out of cannon fodder next spring (still on Bush's watch) ... and if we have a bad hurricaine season ... all hell may break loose ...

It certainly appears that our "all voluntary miltary" is enduring cruel and unusual punishment to hold onto their careers, benefits and the rest. I'm not certain they even have the option of quitting. It's way past time to demand an end to this war of attrition (ours, we're the one's who are "running out" of time, money, personnel).... but by most measures there's no light ... there may not even be a tunnel.