This well worth reading and I think is very complementary to Glenn's article.

http://www.alternet.org/story/15778

Fact-checking our fine general from yesterday's testimony revealed that his BIG points declared yesterday and dutifully reported by our national media today reveals bad arithmetic.

http://democrats.senate.gov/journal/entry.cfm?id=282187

“The intelligence community has its own problems with military calculations. Intelligence analysts computing aggregate levels of violence against civilians for the NIE puzzled over how the military designated attacks as combat, sectarian or criminal, according to one senior intelligence official in Washington. ‘If a bullet went through the back of the head, it's sectarian,’ the official said. ‘If it went through the front, it's criminal.’”

“On trends in sectarian violence, we could not determine if sectarian violence had declined since the start of the Baghdad Security Plan. The administration’s July 2007 report stated that MNF-I trend data demonstrated a decrease in sectarian violence since the start of the Baghdad Security Plan in mid-February 2007. The report acknowledged that precise measurements vary, and that it was too early to determine if the decrease would be sustainable.”

Perhaps we will get an acknowledgement from Petraeus as to whether or not he knew and understood the 18 goals against which his plan was to be measured? Then item by item ask his opinion of progress thereof cross-examination style?

Sorry. That would require a spine AND gonads. Thank goodness a patriot like Larry Flynt is showing congress how to fight a political pissing contest with dignity across town.

Is our congress learning?

Fox News' performance is deplorable, and typical, but unsurprising. And, I think, not terribly influential with Congress.

Compare Fox's take with a majority of the opinion pieces this morning, and there can be some hope that legislators have been largely unswayed by yesterday's performance. Take a look at George Will's piece, for example. There is quite strong condemnation of the president's Iraq Occupation coming from a pretty good political spectrum--mediawise.

The question in my mind this morning is: will Congress dither and falter and pick some falsely "moderate" course (ref. Biddle) which leaves tens of thousands of troops in Iraq, achieves absolutely nothing except allowing congress not to have to make a decision.

Fox News' performance is deplorable, and typical, but unsurprising. And, I think, not terribly influential with Congress.

Whether this specific interview ends up being influential or not is a different point. The point is that this is how our media functions in general - it is how they treat claims from government officials. It was really a revolting spectacle - and it's the only interview allowed with Gen. Petraeus. Yet it isn't really all that notable. That's the point.

The question in my mind this morning is: will Congress dither and falter and pick some falsely "moderate" course (ref. Biddle) which leaves tens of thousands of troops in Iraq, achieves absolutely nothing except allowing congress not to have to make a decision.

I don't think there's any doubt that Congress will not enact any bill which forces the president to withdraw troops from Iraq or limit his troop deployment powers in any way. The best that can be hoped for is that they pass a non-binding bill, with more benchmarks, suggesting but not requiring that there be a draw-down.

Here we have yet another example of exactly why someone like Petraeus ignores the anti-war blogoshpere... immaturity. Perhaps if you folks acted like adults you might be treated like one. But like the "Betray Us" ad, you just can't help yourselves. Keep up the good work. Heh.

It was Jefferson who said:

Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.

When our lapdog "press" has led us into nuclear war with Iran,

when hospitals collapse and close their doors because they are unable to deal with the victims of radiation poisoning dying in screaming agony,

when a thousand new Guantanamos have sprung up across the nation,

when every adult between 18 and 60 has to choose between ground combat in the radioactive Middle East or domestic duty torturing their neighbors and friends -

THEN we'll know what Jefferson meant, and just what we've sacrificed through apathy and credulity.

Shooter, can you please elaborate? I can't figure out what you're trying to say. Who's being immature? Greenwald? The commenters? And this somehow leads to Petraeus' decision not to take blogs seriously?"

How's this for immaturity - the top general and diplomat in Iraq appear before congress to testify on the greatest strategic foreign policy disaster in our history and the two top ranking republicans could do nothing but whine about the poor general's tender feelings in the wake of the MoveOn.org ad. Forget the hundreds of thousands of innocent dead, the record levels of U.S. military and Iraqi civilian fatalities. Forget discussing how we get out of this unholy mess. All the top 'pubs wanted to talk about was the potential for Petraeus's hurt feelings.

As a wingnut might observe, if you can't take a few shots from MoveOn, how you gonna take on Osama? Is that your idea of maturity, shooter242?

would apprecviate shooter calling him immature but it is appropriate. It does take a certain amount of courage to allow your viewpoint to be subject to the scrutiny that an actual interview with an actual journalist would entail. To instead arrange for an additional unquestioning platform for your prepared powerpoint presentation, represents either a weakness of character or more simply, the knowlege that you're engaging in brazen dishonesty and can't afford to be called on it.

Shooter doesn't even bother with the semblance of an argument or a point anymore. It's pure name-calling with the intent to provoke a response, and really should be ignored.

Vos tentatio per haud sententia

Blanks... as usual... bother... bother...

...Saddam was in the cockpit of the first hijacked jetliner on 9/11. In his world the world's greatest military power is on the abyss of being toppled by boxcutters and IED's, and in danger of being absorbed into a 21st century "caliphate" formed by many of the world's poorest and weakest nations. In Shooter242's world, if Iran isn't developing a nuke fast enough - or even at all - then you merely fabricate a quote from ElBaradei.

Maturity would seem to dictate that we all focus on how to fix bush's epochal blunder. But all Shooter242 can do is troll. How mature.