All good, Jesse. May be time to take stock.
My "read": Bush is clearly determined to sustain this, so as to avoid having catastrophic reality completely wash the crap veneer off the shitmire while he's still in office and unspinnably responsible for it, and to preserve whatever micron of "mission bein' accomplished" nonsense there is left, from his bloody idiocy.
He's gotten rid of most of the generals who would stand up and say:
"Fuck it. We're not covering your, and the GOP's asses for your Jupiter-sized fuckup, any longer"
As the shittaree spins down into utter chaos, Petraeus and Odierno seem very willing to keep feeding our troops and our treasure into the hopper, in the great quest to save the warpimps from being held accountable for what they've done.
If bush can keep it going;
prop up the "Iraqi government"...
hold our casualties at around 80-100 per month...
keep enough repubs on board to stave off any meaningful drawdown moves...
(The HARD part, with the elections bearing down on them...)
Somehow convince Gordon Brown and the brits to help save his ass by killing more of THEIR troops and staying until the election...(another hard part, but maybe doable, Bollox?)
Then he and his warpimp mouthbreathers just might be able to slip out of town and start ass-raping Ma Truth with the:
"Hey! We were winning when WE left office!" bullshit.
Or: He can prey on the democrats conscience, to the point that THEY committ ritual political seppuku, and yank the funding, all by themselves, while the pig-fuckers who started this shit, whistle, look at their fingernails, and sharpen up the "stab in the back" chainsaws; delighted with their 25% bounce in the polls from the dems taking the rap for what's coming in Iraq.
SOMEONE in the democratic camp, preferably, a candidate, has to start describing this truth, to the american people.
We are screwed. No way out. No "good" ending, no matter how long we stay. To get one, you'd have to get at least 20 million Iraqis to utterly reverse their entire life belief-set. How many voters will buy into that happening, if the democrats start now, to point out the sheer idiocy of it?
I'm not sure when the point of no return, when the implosion is completely unspinnable, will be reached, but it's almost certain to happen within a year. As the voters continue to bail on bush and the repubs, it's going to become a Nixon-in-the-bunker situation, with bush trying to fend off the GOP's Goldwater swat team.
His "Alpine Redoubt" is, or course, the Supremes.
But even they might abandon him, although it's unlikely, since this is going to put the right in the country, back under the troll-bridge for a decade or two.
Of course, a serious "terrist" hit on us, would be a godsend to the base, or what's left of it. It might, in fact, re-create the base, except, they'd have to stop the bullshit about:
"It's making us safer."
A NEW war, with Iran and/or Syria, seems to be out of the question, with enough of our military, and the congress, and Wall St., and the old republicans, wanting to refrain from voluntary insanity, to scotch THAT lunacy.
The whole thing is like the tide coming in; waves of anger and outrage against bush and his shitmire, and then each wave recedes, as bush and his crew alternatley whine, beg,lie, and bluster, to try gain a little more time to try to get to the bus station. And then another wave comes in; higher and more damaging than the last. And the cycle repeats, but each time, the water's higher, and when it temporarily goes out, it washes away a few more of what's left of the know-nothings.
Will the democrats hold still while bush dumps the fuckmire in their laps?
Stay tuned...gonna be a HELL of a 16 months.
Tanbark, old buddy, if you keep writing stuff like this I'm not gonna lay off until your name is on the bloggers list on the front page of this site. Keep it coming.
Doc- have a great trip with your kids, you are a great role model!
be back by september, i have a feeling that things may start coming to a head real soon...lots of excited jitteryness, happy faces amongst "Joles army" types recently....then an al quidia tape about a "big suprise"...I think the religious fanatic types fell on top of the world right now (just as their power startes to wain) and are preping for their big end game....not sure what it is goign to be, but if its truly successfull this country will be ripped apart or turned into their thocracy 
so we are all registered, checked in, and sitting waiting for our first Seminar. A roundtable called HOLDING THEM ACCOUNTABLE... what we can do about congress!
I am sitting here with Hubris, and Terri in Tokyo. Mrs. Robinson is at a different seminar "The Pundit Project" we are hoping to get a full report from her later about what that is all about.
And Hubris Sonic will be putting up a post soon I hope!
Enjoy your time off. You folks are doign a marvelous job here. Steve would rightly be proud and also telling you to take a break with your families.
Though looking at the posts above, I'm reminded of discussions regarding WWI. Apparently the months before August were gorgeous and everyone ran to enjoy it. It was almost as if nature knew something horrible was coming (Probably read it in Tuchman's book "The Guns of August." Apologies if I cited the wrong book.)
Blues, you're too kind. :o)
One of the tricky aspects of this, is that george bush, and his "policies", are so breathtakingly stupid, and so rife with lavish barbarity, that looking at them, we all feel like some combination of Abe Lincoln's humanity, and Albert Einstein's brilliance. How not to?:o)
(I've got a mad hunch that Lincoln (whom Gore Vidal accurately called "This cool, aloof, genius...") had an I.Q. that was about off the scale, too.)
And I think Moonglum is right; push is coming to shove. Every time repubs like Lugar tap-dance over to the gangplank; talk the "we-really-ought-to-bail-but-gosharootie-it's it's-so-hard-to-be-the-first-rattus-norvegicus-to-
talk-the-specific-withdrawal-date stuff", and then tapdance away from it, they're one day closer to the primaries and to the meat of the campaign, when the gloves will come off of the democratic candidates, and when george bush and the GOP will be dangling like some foul, helpless, pinata in front of the machete-wielding american voters. :o)
doc, can you put up an open thread for Newsblog and Groupnewsblog people who are here at Yearly Kos so we can post up our seminar impressions
Hubris! Terri! TLG! And a shout-out to Mrs. R in the other room!
Goddamn it, how I wish I was there! Although...it is gonna be about 93 degrees here in NYC, (I have my little spray bottle filled with a mix of water and scented alcohol—Rubbing...not Drinking) and I can only imagine how hot it must be in Chi-Town.
Lord a' mercy! 
Hope you all are well as hell!
Best to ya,
LM
And Tanbark...you are a treasure!
Tanbark: yoo gotme wrong...its not the dems makeign the move that I see...the dominists hight of power is right now, they are starting to slip...they will make their move sooner then later and that move will not be for the best of the nation. my gut tells me that we may be looking at 1932 germany...so when our brown shirts finaly take to the streets (and they can between the militias and blackwater they have the manpower and firepower)...so do we run, cower, or fight for our nation????
hell mabey we take the wind out of their sails before its too late, but any way you look the dominionists are bad news.
Cath, the weather going into August is lousy. Northern Europe is chilly and feeling robbed of a summer. Southwestern Europe is way too hot. The Canary Islands, Italy and Serbia are on fire.
Nbody's in any mood to start anything here.
:p
Moonglum, sorry about the misunderstanding.
Call me a cockeyed optimist, but I don't think we're headed for '33 munich.
Too many americans will man-up, face the truth, and willingly hang bush out to dry.
It's already started. That's what the mid-terms were about. You think the warpimps' position and support has improved since then?
I know you don't think that. :o)
And not enough of our military is interested in playing "7 Days in May" to help bush dump the Bill of Rights, even temporarily.
The 2008 election is already a famished T-rex for the GOP. They can't put him back in the cage. And he's got a dietary preference that won't whoa, for right wing ass-protein.
The point is, it's all hanging by a thread. A month from now, Petreaus can play Mary-Poppins-in-the-Desert until the cows come home, but the truth is, without our military there, the "Iraqi Government" wouldn't last 48 hours. The only "security" that doesn't have a direct axe to grind in Baghdad, are the Peshmerga. (The Sunnis in Fallujah, on the other hand, have lots of beef with THEM.) And there are still those 140,000 troops parked on the Turkish border with what used to be northern Iraq. If they cross, the dust rising from the Kurdish units heading north will look like the Afrika Korps heading for Cairo.
(Speaking of what used to be northern Iraq; I'm sure you remember that place, where flying the Iraqi flag in Kirkuk now will get the shit beat out of you, if not worse.)
Bush can't do the Iranian reactors. What's he gonna give the Chinese to sign off on THAT; Taiwan? And don't forget all those T-bills. :o)
Moon', the chits that bush and Cheyney have left to pass out, all have
Jeff Davis's picture on them. Non-negotiable anywhere north of Stone Mountain, Georgia. :o)
Gordon Brown did the obligatory "we stand together" Britspeak, but 500 more troops are leaving by the end of this year, and that's the minimum figure. Don't be surprised if it actually turns out to be three times that number.
You won't read it anywhere but on AW.Com, but there is a lot of tension between Centcom and the Brit commanders, because they don't want to go out and mix it up with the Shiite militia who are taking over Basra, as we speak. (It's the Kerry phenomenon: "who wants to be the last man to die for a mistake.") The Brits are calling it a "handover", but the next thing to watch for are the militias down there starting to crank down on the oil faucet, at least as it relates to the petro-dollars going up to the "Iraqi government".
The Iraqi oil-workers, whom the govermnent refuses to recognize as a union or formal entity, are already threatening to go out, over the sweetheart oil-for-coalition-partners deal that is in that "important compromise legislation" that bush is so desperate for the parliament (the one that just farted in his face as they adjourned for a month), to pass.
No. The conditions for bush and the jingo's to pull off some kind of coup, just aren't present. A small percentage of americans would buy into the Hitlerian "external demons" tactic, but too many of them are already regurgitating the koolaid-and-snakebite-medicine they swallowed 5 years ago.
All we need to do is stay alert, keep finding out the truth, keep posting it, keep raising hell to ensure that Reid and Pelosi, etc., don't weaken and cave; keep threatening EVERYONE in congress with the "We're-watching-your-asses-and-we-vote!" stuff, and keep reminding them every day, that the election is one day closer.
Time is on our side. If you doubt it, watch the republicans as they continues to morph into a rodent Donner-party and start chowing down on each other with a vengeance. :o)
No butter on my popcorn, please. :o)
:o)
I hope your rigth....and honestly im not much of a half glas empty type of guy normaly...im more of a who the fuck has been drinking from my glass type of guy....
remember the dominioist types have been pushing for lobbing nukes at iran to start armogedn for a looong time.
LM; kind words, from a man whose perceptions are laser sharp...and as pellucid as the Gulf Stream descriptions of John D. McDonald, RIP, who wrote some of the best crime fiction ever. :o)
So a left wing socalist scuzzball attends a collection of even further left wing socialist scuzzball event, and postings slow down.
yawn.....
you guys are soooooooooooo not steve.
anymouse; leftwing socialist scuzballs we may be, but we were ACCURATE leftwing socialist scuzballs, 'cause we NAILED your patriotic asses when we told you not to try to cornhole the rabid mesopotamian rottweiller.
What's on your resume'? :o)
Bloomie! If that's you, come on back; all is forgiven. :o)
(Speaking of pounding the pooch, we haven't had a good dogpile in ages...)
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