You Gotta Be Kidding Me--McCain Reveals That Obama *Might* Be in Iraq This Weekend

If this is a true wire story, Senator John McCain just seriously compromised the safety and security of Senator Barack Obama and everyone traveling with him--plus any military members or private security personnel assigned to protect him.

This is the lead on a story just out over the Reuters wire ...

Republican presidential candidate John McCain said on Friday that his Democratic opponent, Barack Obama, is likely to be in Iraq over the weekend.

The Obama campaign has tried to cloak the Illinois senator's trip in some measure of secrecy for security reasons. The White House, State Department and Pentagon do not announce senior officials' visits to Iraq in advance.

"I believe that either today or tomorrow -- and I'm not privy to his schedule -- Sen. Obama will be landing in Iraq with some other senators" who make up a congressional delegation, McCain told a campaign fund-raising luncheon.

The Reuters piece hints at it. But if Obama is going to be in Iraq this weekend, this is a major breach on McCain's part. As a knowledgeable insider notes ...

If it is true that Obama is going to Iraq this weekend, it is a very serious mistake for McCain to have disclosed it publically. Even for run-of-the-mill CODELs the military gives guidance like, "Please strongly discourage Congressional offices from issuing press releases prior to their trips which mention their intent to travel to the AOR and/or the dates of that travel or their scheduled meetings. Such releases are a serious compromise to OPSEC." If Obama is going to Iraq this weekend, I can not begin to imagine how much this is complicating the security planning for the trip.

It's known that Obama is leaving on his foreign trip this weekend and the Journal OpEd page this morning said that Obama could arrive in Iraq "as early as this weekend." And with a slew of reporters in tow, it's not exactly highly classified information. But there is a reason definite information about these sorts of trips aren't released in advance.

Unbelievable. Lives are on the line when politicians visit Iraq. Why would McCain do such a thing? Did he leak it on purpose, to force Obama to cancel his visit? There has already been a charge of tampering with regards to Obama's visit to the Brandenburg Gate.

Someone needs to demand some answers from the McCain campaign.

h/t to Talking Points Memo

Here's another story about this exact same thing--from the Politico:

So Josh Marshall is probably right to raise an eyebrow that John McCain -- of all people -- just said, at a fundraiser, that Obama would be in Iraq with other senators this weekend.

Ironically, McCain and the GOP have been demanding for months that Obama go to Iraq; his comment may have made the trip slightly more complicated.

His comment was reported by Reuters.

NOTE: Nobody's suggesting here that McCain was deliberately trying to do harm. And some hints as to the timing of the trip had already leaked out elsewhere in the media -- the Wall Street Journal mentioned a coming trip, and Andrea MItchell said on Morning Joe today that he'd be in Iraq "shortly."

I don't believe McCain wanted any harm to come to Obama or anyone else--I believe McCain wanted to keep Obama from going to Iraq because the visuals of Obama being greeted by raucous troops and of Obama actually speaking extemporaneously and knowing what the hell he's talking about would be a devastating comparison to McCain's Grandpa Simpson routine as of late...

--WS

Max Boot and the Tendencies of Chickenhawks

Over at Talking Points Memo, Josh Marshall points out the idiocy of Max Boot:

It's sad to see articulate and intelligent, if terribly misguided, writers still trying to justify their Iraq catastrophe by claiming its no different from World War II and our decades' long stationing of troops in Germany and Japan.

Today we have the instance of Max Boot ...

I could just imagine an Andrew Sullivan of the 1940's writing something similar about Harry Truman's crazy idea to station troops in Germany and Japan without an exit strategy: "In fifty years' time, the West Germans will not be able to defend themselves against the Soviet Union? Or East Germany? Please." As it happens, the West Germans wouldn't have been able to defend themselves against a broad array of enemies without a long-term American troop presence. That presence has served other important goals too, namely reassuring Germany's neighbors that it would never threaten the peace of Europe again and fostering Germany's internal democratic development. But just because we've had troops in Germany and Japan for 60 years-and in South Korea for more than 50 years-doesn't mean we're occupying those countries. We are there are the request of democratically elected governments.

I wouldn't include Max Boot in the "articulate" or "intelligent" groups because he's clearly just another wingnut trying to tap into that feel-good sentiment about the only war we're allowed to admire. That's why the wingnuts also love comparing everything to the War of Northern Aggression. Max Boot is a wingnut welfare candidate--if it wasn't for the newspaper paying him, some wingnut organization would cobble together a salary for him and simply ask him to put up with smelly guys in cheap suits who sound a lot like Ron Paul. Nothing he says stands up to any kind of informed scrutiny. If you've just watched Saving Private Ryan, you can read what he's said and yell your approval and wait for the next war movie to come on AMC.

What I want to add is this--conservatives are informed by movies and television programs, not by experience. A scarce handful have seen military service while the rest avoided military service when their nation needed them. Those "chickenhawks" are able to squawk because they're in no danger of having to serve. The media is full of chickenhawks--and that amplifies the message of other chickenhawks. If the media actually were "liberal" you'd hear viewpoints that the media was comfortable presenting to people. Instead, you have a social strata of men in this country who control the media who deliver a message to the American people that help absolves them of their inherent chickenhawk tendencies. Fred Hiatt, are you listening? They can comfortably sit on their collective asses and sell their war by the turn of clever marketing--make THIS war just like World War II and, by extension, make THEM the the heroes of the war they feel like they should be because they sat on the dead asses and advocated it.

It's time to restore sanity in this country, and we need to stop listening to men who have never served calling for war. It should be a no-brainer. I won't be satisfied til these men are laughed out of the discussion every time they pipe up.

--WS

Stop With the Endless Bullshit

There are so many "conflicting" stories that are swirling around the assassination yesterday of Benazir Bhutto that it is little wonder that Pakistan is experiencing widespread unrest.

Just a sampling:

-Benazir Bhutto died from hitting her car's sunroof; no bullet or shrapnel found in her, Pakistan’s Interior Ministry says.
[breaking news headline, CNN.com]

-Bhutto was killed after a suicide attacker shot at her and then blew himself up as she left a rally, police and witnesses said. Authorities initially said she died from bullet wounds, but Dr. Mussadiq Khan, a surgeon who treated her, said Friday that she died from shrapnel that hit her on the right side of the skull.
Bhutto had no heart beat or pulse when she arrived at the hospital and doctors failed to resuscitate her, he said.
Interior Ministry spokesman Javed Iqbal Cheema said he saw the medical report, and it, too, said she died from a shrapnel wound and was not shot. "No bullet was found in her body," he said.
Soomro, the prime minister, told the Cabinet on Friday that Bhutto's husband did not allow an autopsy, according to a government statement.
[From the Huffington Post]

-It was initially reported that Bhutto, 54, was killed by the bullets of an assassin who blew himself up after firing the shots following a public rally in Rawalpindi on Thursday.
But government officials said Friday that a medical report confirmed that Bhutto was killed by shrapnel from the blast -- from which at least 28 more people died and at least 100 were wounded.
The shrapnel hit the right side of her skull, Interior Ministry spokesman Brigadier Javed Iqbal Cheema said. The bomber did shoot at Bhutto with a pistol, but she had no bullet injury.
[News story, CNN.com]

-Former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, whose funeral was held today, died from injuries she suffered when hitting her vehicle's sunroof, it has been claimed.
Interior Ministry spokesman said no bullets or shrapnel were found in her body.
It had previously been announced Ms Bhutto died as a result of being hit in the neck and chest by shots fired by an assassin.
The Ministry has also blamed al Qaeda and the Taliban for the 54-year-old's death..
It said its agents had intercepted an al Qaeda phone call about the killing.
It says it also has evidence the international terror group is trying to "destabilise" Pakistan.
[Breaking News from Sky News]

You're going to have to excuse me if I don't believe a Goddamned thing about what happened--it's just not possible for so many people to get something like this so completely and utterly wrong without there being, at least at some level, a behind-the-scenes conspiracy being run by incompetents who can't get their stories straight.

UPDATE: Josh Marshall has also picked up on this, and is asking for medical people to weigh in. Given that Bhutto was quickly buried without autopsy (for religious reasons, most likely), I don't know if it is possible to figure anything out from the scant evidence that exists.

I do know one thing--I'm not buying any of the bullshit being spewed by the Pakistani government, and I doubt anyone is ever going to be able to figure out what really happened.

UPDATE 2: Bhutto associate calls out Pakistani regime--

Brigadier Javed Cheema, a ministry spokesman, said Miss Bhutto had died from a head wound she sustained when she smashed against the sunroof's lever as she tried to shelter inside the car.

"The lever struck near her right ear and fractured her skull," Mr Cheema said.

But the explanation was ridiculed by Farooq Naik, Miss Bhutto's top lawyer and a senior official in her Pakistan People's Party.

"It is baseless. It is a pack of lies," he said.

"Two bullets hit her, one in the abdomen and one in the head. It was a serious security lapse."

How about this scenario--Bhutto was pronounced dead at the hospital because she had been killed in the ambulance on the way there by a severe blow to the head...?

More Praise for Moyers

I have been enthralled with the Bill Moyers Journal series on PBS. Last night I watched the Moyers interview with Josh Marshall.

You know what? We do have a liberal media.

Now.

And it's us.

Thanks Josh, for blazing the trail.