if we "really were" fighting al Qaeda.

I was kidding. I know you weren't referring to Iranians goat herders---I meant to suggest that our F-22s were for killing Iranians, not Baluchi and Pashtun tribesmen.

Hope that's cleared up. The title of my post, I can't explain. But wouldn't they be useful if we were really fighting al Qaeda?

I just listened to the interview with Brown. He comes off as fairly reasonable, and kudos to you for setting this up. But I think you need work as an interviewer.

If I were Glenn...

1. I would see if I could get Bill Moyers (I was going to say "someone like Bill Moyers" but he is sui generis, IMO) to critique my style. Bill has a way of asking the toughest of questions in the nicest of ways. Bill starts out by establishing a rapport with his interviewee and works inward from there.

2. For example, you might have started by asking Brown a bit about his current job and move from that to get him to talk about his views of what a journalist should do and what journalim is. His answers on this could guide you in building up to questions about the ways in which wartime journalism differs from other types of journalism - you get the idea.

3. I would have made notes when I read through the transcripts of Brown's shows and counted the number of pro-invasion vs. anti-invasion guests. Numbers tell the story of balance or imbalance.

4. And don't let him squirm out of tough questions. He essentially changed the subject when he started talking about how the anti-war movement didn't have the kind of focus you need to make it "easy" (Brown's word) to cover. So what - Brown and his producers should have known about Scott Ritter, Noam Chomsky and others who would have provided balance. The issue was not whether it was easier to show bombs going off than demonstrations in the park. The issue was why they were using almost exclusively pro-invasion people to spout government propaganda.

I got Glenn's latest book, read it and loved it - great job. I think Glenn is on the cusp of very big things.

But I sure hope Glenn gets some professional feedback on interviewing. I am sure it is tough to do, tough to focus on what the other person is saying, and also focus on the questions you want to explore.

But it can be done.

Somebody or somebodies are going to get fired, not for lying or malfeasance, but because they didn’t destroy the emails as required in the Busheviks’ SOPs.

http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=166729&title=exit-strategy&to=2

"In 2001, there was a memo -- Bin Laden determined to attack United States from a safe haven in Afghanistan. . .

Now 7 years and $700 billion later, we get a new memo saying Bin Landen determined to attack United States from a safe haven somewhere around Afghanistan. . .

We are right back where we started. We could have gotten here by doing nothing."

- - Rob Riggle, senior military analyst, on TDS

Senator: VA lying about number of veteran suicides

WASHINGTON — The Veterans Administration has lied about the number of veterans who've attempted suicide, a senator charged Wednesday, citing internal e-mails that put the number at 12,000 a year when the department was publicly saying it was fewer than 800.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/100/story/34718.html

They couldn't tell the truth if their life depended on it. Their lying keeps us from preventing more vets' deaths. Right Johnny McSame? Sure wouldn't want to give vets real help like a decent GI bill. Aren't we glad oh great war veteran that we have you in the Senate to "help" our vets just like junior has.

Without redactions, it's harder to talk nonsense. I love to watch Rachel Maddow on MSNBC, but it's getting harder and harder to watch because unless she is on Countdown, because I have to listen to too much nonsense.

http://youtube.com?v=QOdlnzkeoyQ

Matthews and crew culled the bites from the Moyers interview...but really, really redacted...

Wright is going to be on Bill Moyer's show tomorrow night. It will be nice to have enough time to view the real, not snippets and distortions, Wright.

More on Wright. The discussion turns to Wright's statement which seems to imply that Obama may agree with Wright on some level, but because he is a politician, he cannot speak in the same way a pastor can.

Matthews leads the panel through a round and dismayed critique of the logic, rejecting the idea that the role of politicians is to subvert their own opinions in favor of pandering centrism. Just a few minutes later, the panel is squealing with glee and honoring Hillary Clinton's apparently succesful attempt to re-create herself as a populist. Matthews says that she has brilliantly managed to re-create herself as a working class woman with a GED from Scranton. Everyone commends Hillary on being such a great--and they actually use this word, incredibly--a POLITICIAN!!!!

Hardball today. Reverend Wright, the issue.

In a conversation about Rev. Wright/Obama, Matthews wonders whether the decision to stand by Wright is in fact, Michelle Obama's (I'm guessing, because of her one supposedly anti-American public statement). A guest counters that Wright is instead Obama's surrogate father and Obama is clinging to him because he lost his father so early in life.

This is otherwise known as fiddling while Rome burns.

It was a fun ride while it lasted.

Now it's the Persian empire's turn to ride the tiger again.

;-)

My kid wanted to go for AFSOC but they don't take green recruits. The Coasties you literally need to know an admiral and have him reccomend you and so he ended up in the Army with the Rangers, 1/75th.

What, no 'round the world? Schade. Next time, take omooex. He likes to watch. Maybe somebody'll give him an Obama button while he's ogling. >:0

One cannot read but a few pages into the Art of War, Musashi, The Iliad, and such without the sinking feeling we are doomed to be led by men for whom such wisdom is deemed to be superseded by childlike belief in technology and statistics. It is a tragedy to lose one's civilization, one's treasure, and one's honor and not gain the wisdom of the synthesis of actually engaging the enemy face to face. History teaches two things, as far back as one celled organisms: to be an empire is to become a mixture with the culture controlled, right down to our DNA, and war is one of three inevitable consequences of overpopulation, nothing more.