While looking at Salinger’s Google 2001 “timesuck”, I discovered something that isn’t a timesuck at all. After Googling “Osama Bin Laden Iraq” on Google’s 2001 site and index, I found this article from 2000 in the Guardian about the connections between Al Qaeda and Iraq on the USS Cole bombing.

So let me get this straight.  In 2001, the first page results of a search on the liberal Google search engine for “Osama Bin Laden Iraq” led to the left-wing Guardian’s article about a connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda, all before Bush was President.  The same people who have calling the President a liar for the last eight years?

What’s even better is that the search took about four and a half seconds.   I wonder what a twenty second search would have revealed?  Seems like Google forgot to rewrite their history on this one.

Frank Luntz’s focus group had a number of things to say last night after the first Presidential debate between McCain and Obama.  Here’s the video link.

Most of the group of undecided voters generally liked what Obama had to say more than McCain.  I was put off by their focus on Obama’s style and empty populist promises. 

Some lefty pundits are saying this morning that if the debate was a tie, it goes to Obama.  Others had a different point of view.  I seem to be hearing that if Obama can make himself look like a possible Commander-in-Chief, he comes out ahead. I’m not convinced of that, but on the Debate itself, I don’t think it was a tie at all – Obama nearly looked ready to cry by the end of the night.

Last night I watched John McCain give his acceptance speech to the Republican National Convention; watching along with more people than saw The One, himself, a week earlier, discounting PBS (McCain was on fewer networks, however).  With Pain solidifying the Right, and positioning himself in the “non-ideological center,” McCain set himself up well for garnering wide electoral appeal in the Poppin’ Fresh General Election.

I thought the speech was OK.  It was John McCain being John McCain; he was true to himself.  I was with him 80% of the time and wanted to throw something at the TV 20% of the time.  But, that’s exactly the John McCain we nominated – he’s not fully Conservative, nor a reliable Republican.  The speech dragged in the middle, but ended with a great, passionate crescendo that wooed many of my Democrat colleagues at work today — you know, the people who know nothing about politics but are told by the Union which lever to pull and loyally oblige. 

They were generally impressed.  In fact, one of them was an Obama supporter until she saw Palin’s speech and heard for the first time about McCain’s brutal Vietnam War experience last night after watching the Giants game coverage meld into the RNC speech (the timing of the game actually worked out well!).  I know she’s not alone.  The Kool-Aid Lefties at work were on the defensive today worse than I’ve seen since the testimony of David Petraeus last September indicating the success of the Surge.  It must be serious out there!

One more note: some anti-war fascists disrupted McCain’s speech a few times over a ten-minute period.  Republicans, learning from their 2004 experience with these folks, chanted “U.S.A.” to drown them out. Finally McCain had a great appropriate line: “Americans want us to stop yelling at each other…”, which drew laughs and applause.  In fact if you add up the amount of time disrupted from the 2004 Bush speech and 2008 McCain speech, that’s more speech suppression from these anti-war rubes than any free speech the Patriot Act ever squelched!  At the end of the day these anti-war crazies hurt themselves more than help, but they just might be crazy enough to hurt someone one day, so I don’t condone their self-destructive Black Shirt behavior.

AP photo.

David Petraeus indicated today that a pullout of MNF (Multi-National Forces) around the Baghdad area is probably possible by next summer due to conditions on the ground.  He also said that the area is “’spiraling upwards’ towards normal conditions” and “it gives Iraq new hope.”  What great news from a straight-shooter and American hero who’s shown he would not deceive us for political reasons!

Before the Palin pick, General Petraeus and the increasing dividends of the successful “Surge” strategy were McCain’s best-friend and an issue I hope they return to in earnest once the Convention fever wears out sometime late next week. 

Both O’Biden and Obama were dead wrong on this issue.  And will someone in the McCain campaign please bring up O’Biden’s advocacy of the worst-thought-out foreign policy concept in a generation: splitting Iraq into a weak confederacy of three weak parts?  It wouldn’t take five minutes for civil war, regional conflict with the Kurds, Iran, and al Qaeda to plunge the region into an apocalyptic scorched-earth dead zone.  It would have truly been war without end.  Luckily, Biden wasn’t in a position to see his plan work.  Let’s keep it that way.

In sum: “John McCain called me names, waaah!” 

It’s time to call a “WAH-ambulance” for Barack Obama.  Not only did he whine about McCain’s criticism of him in front of the VFW Convention today, he got his analysis of Iraq totally wrong, and he brought this out:

“But one of the things that we have to change in this country is the idea that people can’t disagree without challenging each other’s character and patriotism. I have never suggested that Senator McCain picks his positions on national security based on politics or personal ambition. I have not suggested it because I believe that he genuinely wants to serve America’s national interest. Now, it’s time for him to acknowledge that I want to do the same.”

Every time a Democrat brings up someone questioning their patriotism, you the listener have to immediately assume that their patriotism is suspect.  The Dems see no difference from questioning the judgment of a candidate and questioning their love of country.  It’s been quite a psychological drama unfolding before us since 2002.  And that unfolding drama continued today!

Obama had a chance to go to the VFW and take control of the agenda, instead he basically responded to McCain’s attacks and looked small and whiny in my opinion. He’s showing himself to be a poor candidate when it comes to outreach.

Jim Pinkerton from “The American Conservative” has a new artcile on the Fox Forum which lays out his idea about why he thinks McCain will win in November.  His thought: because the Dems are slated to sweep Congress, McCain will be elected President so that the “divided government” concept since World War II will be continued.

I have a problem with this thesis:  the numbers don’t look good for Republicans and winning Congress will be a tough slog, but I’ve heard that every election year except 2002 — there were serious tectonic forces at work in 1994, but aside from Michael Barone few people even noticed.  So, this idea that the Republicans have no shot is nothing new and lately has been wrong most of the time.  Plus, if the Republicans actually run against the socialist Democrat agenda (rather than as Democrat-lite) then I believe this year won’t be the apocalypse some think it will be. 

With Congressional approval ratings at historic lows, why wouldn’t there be a possibility for a Republican resurgence, especially in Blue-Dog districts?  Take back those seats and the Reps have the House.  The Senate’s another issue since only 1/3 are up this year, not all in safe states.  Yet, with energy being the #1 issue for voters and the Iraq War turning the corner, Republican ideas on war and the economy are actually and substantively being vindicated less than three months before Election Day. 

In the end, I suppose the moral of this election could be either: if you think you’re going to lose, you will; or win the battle in the arena of ideas and the victory is yours.

Little ”Mullah Atari” himself, Moqtada al Sadr, has signaled that the various factions of Sadr’s Madhi Army will put down their guns and become glorified ”community organizers” who will help rebuild Iraq when (or if) he issues his dictates this Friday.

Something that the above article brings home is the flood of good news out of Iraq lately:  most senior AQI (al Qaeda in Iraq) members have fled to Pakistan, US troop casualties dropped to the lowest level of the war last month, troop deployments have shrank from 15 to 12 months, Iran’s influence in the South is diminishing, and we’ll get a SOF (status-of-forces) agreement before Bush leaves office.  Add the collapse of AQI across Iraq this year and now the potential capitulation of Sadr’s Mahdi Army and at this moment the US, Iraqi Army and Coalition Forces “no longer faces any significant organized military foe in [Iraq].”

It could all change tomorrow, but for now it seems like victory is no longer an illusion, but a certainty in due course.  When looked at another point of view, the Surge has brought about the speediest and most significant tide-turning of any major military conflict since American entry into World War I ninety years ago. 

AP photo.

The latest piece from Times Online editor, American Gerard Baker, first came to my attention about an hour ago and it’s a doozy! 

His latest op-ed is absolutely awesome.  Baker takes the media’s open desire to make Barack Obama the Savior/Messiah and completely pokes fun at those who have this view (he also calls Gordon Brown, Gordon the Leper!) through colorful and biblical-style language.  I don’t think the New Yorker crowd will misunderstand this satire, but one never knows.  Here’s a sample from the beginning:

“And it came to pass, in the eighth year of the reign of the evil Bush the Younger (The Ignorant), when the whole land from the Arabian desert to the shores of the Great Lakes had been laid barren, that a Child appeared in the wilderness.

The Child was blessed in looks and intellect. Scion of a simple family, offspring of a miraculous union, grandson of a typical white person and an African peasant. And yea, as he grew, the Child walked in the path of righteousness, with only the occasional detour into the odd weed and a little blow.”

I wish Obama would have “ventured forth” to the wounded troops at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, but that would have seemed “too political.”  The Pentagon simply told him not to bring his media and campaign troglodytes, but he could go as an elected official, rather than a candidate.  He chose not to go.  However, he made it to the gym though.

AP photo.

One of the major themes of Obama’s trip abroad has been trying to make him look Presidential.  In all the pomp and circumstance surrounding the trip, Obama’s people sometimes forget that he, in fact, is not yet President.  Also, sometimes they have to be reminded of that little detail a second time on the same day.

What I’ve taken from Obama’s trip thus far is that it is just an elaborate campaign event, he openly disagrees with Petraeus which makes Obama on the record being on the wrong side of history, and he’s endorsed President Bush’s and John McCain’s plan to have a phased withdrawal based loosely on benchmarks and that we need to increase US troop presence in Afghanistan.  Of course, that’s not how it’s being spun, since Obama adds the 16 month caveat, which he can rescind the moment he’s in office.  He wants to have it both ways so he doesn’t have to take any real position at all that he’ll need to stand behind — very brave, Barry, but unless you decide to cancel this Fall’s debates, you’re going to be toast.

I certainly hope there’s some kind of noticable backlash to all of this trip’s media bias and Obama’s arrogant, presumptive behavior.  He is naive, just plain wrong or elusive about national security, and isn’t good on his toes.  This man thinks he’s President already.  As they say the more inflated one’s ego, the harder the fall.

There’s this story going around the AP this morning which indicates that some soldiers are longing to go to the “real war” in Afghanistan, as Iraq is becoming the more quiet of the two battlefields lately.  With violence against Coalition troops in Iraq on pace to be the lowest in years and the Dems even having to accept the Surge’s success, this story reveals two major points in my opinion: 

1.  Our soldiers are awesome, ready for a fight wherever they happen to be sent, even longing for a chance to kill the bad guys.  As professional soldiers, soldiering is their job, so I’m very glad they take pride and have enthusiasm for their work. 

2.  The AP and the MSM are essentially embracing the Democrat’s position on Iraq, that the “real” bad guys are in Afghanistan and that the fight there should be escalated quickly.  This has been their narrative for five years, stating that Iraq was a distraction from the real War on Terror, even though Bin Laden himself believes that Iraq was the central front in the War on Terror.  What does he know, right?  Nonetheless, it’s a position designed to attack Bush and the Republicans on their strongest electoral issue historically, dealing with terrorism, and it’s obviously transparent and won’t work with flip-flop Obama as their spokesman.

On the same day that Barack Obama wants to rewrite his Iraq War position while continuing to insist that his position has never fundamentally changed, the McCain campaign seized on the recurrent flip-flop issue by noticing Obama’s changing website, which has suddenly brightened up the picture in Iraq! 

Well, updating one’s website is normal, but updating the basic premise of an issue that garnered countless thousands of kook-fringe voters in the primaries is another thing altogether!  Obama is both insulting the rubes that voted for him, while giving McCain an opening to legitimately harp on the flip-flop motif of which the Republicans have been trying to tag Obama this last month to great effect: abortion, faith-based initiatives, Iraq itself, gun rights, etc. are all part of the evidence!

Furthermore, Obama’s people are making a really dumb political move by allowing this speech without protest.  Insisting that he give an Iraq/Afghanistan speech before he visits the region traps him in a very high-profile political way, making his trip just a lens to justify his preconceptions, not the other way around which would give more political cover to take the exact same positions he lays out today but with more legitimacy.  It’s a ridiculous move and McCain’s already hitting him on it!  Even Christopher Hitchens, a super duper uber leftist, believes that Obama’s “zero-sum” attitude towards the two theaters is unfounded and small-minded. 

CNN photo from Fact Check.

President Bush announced today that he is rescinding his father’s Executive Order which banned off-shore oil drilling.  And it’s about time in my opinion!  What’s interesting about this development is that Congress imposed it’s own separate ban, meaning that if off-shore drilling were to take place, both branches would have to agree.  Now, it’s solely in the hands of Congress.

Come to think of it, President Bush is really gaining a number of important victories over the Dems ever since they took over Congress:  Bush stopped the Dems from cutting-and-running in Iraq, securing Bush’s policy through the end of his term — a huge meaningful victory on the Homefront; Bush got his FISA bill through a hostile Congress with nearly all of his proposals in tact — not an easy task for any lame-duck; and now Bush has successfully outflanked the Dems by taking the drilling issue and put it on the laps of Pelosi and Reid! 

Brilliant maneuvering from an “idiot” who still has the capacity to outflank his opponents on important issues during the last year of his tenure.  This will expose the Dems’ weak and complex rhetoric about how the oil companies ”can already drill”, or the mantra “we can’t drill our way out of this” nonsense.  They can try to blame Bush policies, but they will confuse the public who understands that gas comes from oil and securing domestic oil is a security issue.  Bush has set things up for the Republicans to pound the message home.  Will they take it?

The US Consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, was attacked today by four men in what the American and Turkish authorities are calling an act of terrorism.  Three of the attackers were killed, but not before taking out three policemen, one point blank to the head.  The fourth attacker unfortunately got away in a speeding car, as Turkish authorities are frantically looking for him and are currently reviewing video tape to help. 

No one has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, but this has put everyone in Turkey on high alert, especially Americans in Turkey.  Aside from incursions into Iraqi Kurdistan, one hasn’t heard much from the War on Terror in Turkey — it’s been pretty quiet so to speak.  The attack was small, probably cellular.  That could mean the beginning of a new series of attacks, or that this attack was the best they could pull off.  I hope it’s the latter.

The US Consulate was refitted after al Qaeda’s 2003 bombing of the British Consulate, bank and two synagogues.  Yet, our rules of engagement forbid Americans to fire back at anyone outside the compound, hence, they ducked for cover rather than take out the assailants early.  I think those rules needs to be renegotiated.

AP photo.

A dismal report from the AP suggests that Iraq has slowly, ploddingly, and grudgingly met 15 of 18 important “benchmarks” as of May 2008.  From the tone of the story, one might think that something bad happened!  But no, in fact, slow but measurable progress is being made despite the Left’s efforts to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory with every negatively spun story they can throw at the public.  I wonder if Detroit could meet the same benchmarks in the same timespan?

Also, one can tell that Iraq has turned the corner by simply noticing the media coverage of Afghanistan — as Coalition fatalities in Afghanistan surpassed those in Iraq for the month of June 46 to 31 respectively.  The Taliban’s “resilient insurgency” is a persistent scourge plaguing the war effort.  Sure.  It’s summer.  It’s warm enough to fight, so they fight.  The Taliban did the same thing last summer.  Yet, the MSM drum beat remains turned to defeatism, so without enough defeat in Iraq, they’re focusing more on defeat in Afghanistan.  Whatever it takes to ensure Bush loses something militarily while he was in office!

Finally a journalist who has some sense of historical perspective beyond the contemporary headlines!  Andrew Roberts wrote this article* comparing George W. Bush to another heavily maligned US president in his day, Harry S Truman.

I think the comparison may stand in historical perspective.  Harry Truman was deeply disliked by the American people in 1952, blamed for an unpopular war, and navigating through a tough economic transition after World War II.  Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, Truman was still viewed poorly: aside from the disastrous Korean stalemate, his “Fair Deal” fell flat, Congress kept flipping from Dem to Republican on him, Truman’s administration was constantly dogged for having real communist spies all over it, etc.  But no one remembers much of that through the lens of history, since the basic tenants of Truman’s Cold War policies were used by all subsequent administrations in a truly effective way until 1991.

Today, he’s viewed by members of both parties as a model President, even in the top five to some experts and certainly in the top 10 to others!  Even She Who Must Not Be Named once said that we need another Harry Truman — one who will make good decisions in the face of tough choices or being unpopular. 

In a sense, we do in George W. Bush.  As Roberts’ article explains, a President is usually remembered in history for one or two things.  In 2030, Bush will not be remembered for Valerie Plame or Katrina or the “recession.”  Once the contemporary politics has moved on, he’ll most likely be remembered for Iraq, Afghanistan, and for keeping America safe for the last 7 1/2 years of his Administration following 9/11.  Or at least Bush hopes so.

Pic from MIT.

* — Roberts, writing for a British paper, mixes up Warren Harding with Herbert Hoover initially.  As an historian this kind of bothers me, but his larger point still stands (plus he’s quoting from a left-wing news source, and you know loosely the Left uses history!)