The Weekend Preview Thread is up
If you would like on or off my ping list please Freepmail me
The most interesting guest to me is Mike Pence. Will he become a major player (I hope)?
The dominant meme appears to be that Bush is so over, let's look to his replacement and ignore everything he says and does from now on.
HOW ARE YOU DOING!!????
Thanks for the post too!!
Damn, If I'd have posted that ports thread a few weeks ago, this ports-crap would have had a short period of discomfort, eh?
If the United Nations doesn't agree to major reforms of its Human Rights Commission, the U.S. should stick to its principles and withdraw from the body.
U.S. should recoil from UN rogues (Bill Frist Op-Ed)
(FR Thread discussing Chicago Tribune op-ed by Frist)
Now he chooses to grow a pair!
Thanks for the thread. Your descriptions cracked me up!
Glad you're doing well - rest your eyes and take care of yourself. We'll miss you if you can't spend much time here and on the Sun thread, but, it will only be for 1 or 2 times and then we'll get to spend LOTS of time together :-)
The common theme this weekend seems to be President Bush is a lame duck president. His reign is over and we can now prepare ourselves for the eventual Democrat congress and president in 2008. All the shows are jockeying to be considered the first to proclaim Bush over and identify the next president.
From my perspective, the Republican control of congress and President Bush's obituary is a little premature. Old media and the Democrats are running on wishes, not fossil fuel. They are beginning, again, to overplay their hand of assumptions and it will come back to haunt them.
As for Dubai Ports World, I hope nobody thinks this is over and forgotten. It will be off the front pages but the Bush Administration is certainly working behind the scenes to work with UAE and other Arab countries. Democrats will use this as a claim they are security conscious but time will show it was all about politics and Democrat supporters and donors. I'm guessing all the Q&A over DPW will be a showcase of Democrats somehow proving they care more about security than Republicans do. I doubt this will work in the long run as union fears and Democrat party donors are exposed in the future. It's kind of like Abramoff, they are starting out talking tough but will temper themselves as more becomes known.
Nor is there any mention of the Hillary/Harold Ickies creation of a new database to mine voter information, apart from the DNC. There is a real split in Democrat party ranks but it seems to be ignored, so far.
I wouldn't put it past him.
This is the FR thread about this Weekly Standard article.
Pretty good guess that this is what he's on the Journal Editorial Report for tonight. Should be good. Ping your friends who are interested in the topic. This could be the breakout news event
Nah, there's at least two layers yet to go before the MSM acknowledges that the issue exists, and only then if they can spin it against Bush... of course, this article does give them that hook...
Phsstpok, thank you for your hard work and research.
For anyone reading the thread, I'd like to make a suggestion that we get back to activism on FR and try to drive the agenda rather than responding to the agenda-driven media.
Some freepers may remember that House Impeachment Managers gave a party to freepers (which was shown on C-Span) to thank us for our activism.
It is clear that amid all the noise the democrats and media make about primarily silly and made up complaints about the Bush administration, they are trying to deflect attention from more serious topics.
For example, ABC aired a synopsis of 12 hours of the Saddam tapes. It is clear the tapes will provide evidence that WMD were moved to Syria and that Saddam had a decade's long relationship with Al Qaeda. Both of those things are enough to defeat the Democrats in the November '06 election and the November '08 election. They have successfully, so far, deflected all attention away from the importance of the tapes.
As well, the President has ordered Negroponte to see to it that the tapes are translated and released. Negroponte has ignored a direct order from the President of the United States.
I'd like to suggest that freepers who are interested read the link below and make phone calls to their legislators, Condi Rice, John McCain (who will be interested in seeing to the defeat of Democrats) and any other interested parties. Perhaps the Chairmen of the Intelligence Committees and Armed Services Committees.
If any one has suggestions on how to best spread the word and how freepers can take effective action, I welcome all comments.
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1594192/posts
Who's on the Sunday Morning Talk Shows By: Mark Kilmer · Section: Other Politics
For Sunday, March 12, 2006Meet the Press (NBC): Host Tim Russert leads with Senate Foreign Relations Committee members George Allen and... yes, Joe Biden. This one has early portents of 2008 for both candidates, and they will discuss Iraq and political stuff. Then General Bernard Trainor (retired) and Michael Gordon will be hawking their new book, which they claim will be the "inside story" of the occupation and invasion of Iraq.
FOX News Sunday (FNS): Host Chris Wallace had Dunc Hunter and Mike Pence on to discuss what was done to the DP World deal. Pence opposed the deal, but Hunter did it with a dangerous passion.
Face the Nation (CBS): Host Bob Schieffer talks to Barack Obama, a.k.a. simply Obama. He'll discuss ethics reform legislation, 'cos he's the Dems' point man, US port security, and his 1-2-3-4, we don't need no stupid war in Iraq stance.
This Week (ABC): Host George Stephanopoulos chats with Bill Frist and Russ Feingold, another pair of 2008 possibilities, about port security and national security.
Late Edition (CNN): Host Wolf Blitzer will talk to Senators John Warner and Carl Levin about the death of the DP World deal. He'll speak with Howard Dean, maybe about Howard Stern, I don't know. I hope he leads with Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, and he'll also jump on the Kemp & Edwards bandwagon.
-----Allen and Biden (MTP) will be interesting just to see how Allen handles Biden. Both Hunter and Pence opposed the A-rabs on the ports, so we'll get nothing there. Obama's Obama. Warner (for) and Levin (grumpy) could offer some post-mortem insight on the ramifications of Congress' behavior.
and here's the link for Comments >>
So far the first headline only links back to Drudge's main page, but the other links to the International Herald Tribune. It does appear to credit the NY Times. The two headlines are:
SADDAM'S WAR STRATEGY REVEALED IN NEW BOOK... DEVELOPING...
SADDAM'S ESCAPE ROUTE... DEVELOPING...
The cozy relationship between MTP and the NY Times when it comes time to promote one of their bash Bush books is getting a bit suspect, don't you think? I'm surprised they haven't had Kitty Kelly on recently.
I just listened to nearly an hour of a Russert interview with the author of Jawbreaker, Bernsten.
Most important:
1) Bernsten said the president is a good man, strong president and doing the right things to win the WOT.
2) Bernsten defended Rumsfeld and Peter Goss.
3) He is going to run for the House in NY as a Republican.
Russert asks Bernsten if Kerry was right that the operation to find OBL was outsourced in 2001 and 2002, the author says it was not outsourced and Kerry is wrong about that.
He also made a complimentary remark about Pete Goss and says he trusts him.
He just said he thinks the president is a good man and wants to win the war and he's strong and that's good because we have to face the Iranians. He wrote the WH to give them the heads up that we could have caught OBL but someone (he doesn't know who) turned down the operation.
He also says a lot of what the president has done has worked.
He's convinced that Mushareff wants to capture OBL, even if it's in Pakistan.
Bernsten: The war in Iraq did not distract us from capturing OBL. Mentions another book written by someone in the military and you could come to that decision, but he doesn't believe that we were distracted from Tora Bora in any way.
Bernsten went back to Afghanistan on behalf of Cofer Black in 2000. Bernsten had been learning Persian. This was pre 9/11 in order to gain intel on AQ. The plan was to identify the location of key AQ leaders.
Russert: AQ blew up stuff in the 90's and so they were on the radar of the CIA pre 9/11?
Bernsten: There was a report in 2000 or 2001 (I couldn't capture it) that OBL was aware that CIA was in the region and the operation was aborted. None of the agents were concerned about the reports and begged Washington to let them stay in the region and DC didn't permit it.
Russert: Ports question about UAE. There's a report that princes from UAE were hunting with OBL and attempt to kill OBL was called off.
Bernsten: Wasn't in charge of that operation but he's heard of it. Lack of recognition of how dangerous OBL was. Names the terrorist attacks in the 90's and how we didn't respond. We were given lots of signals of impending catastrophe and we didn't respond. The Iranians interpret that as weakness now. Iran believes we aren't strong enough to deal with them. We have to demonstrate we mean business.
Russert: Cole. Neither Clinton nor Bush dealt with it.
Bernstein: Stunned me.
Bernstein: Republicans and Democrats have to stand together against Iran. People in the world believe that this president says what he means and means what he says.
Iran needs to see leaders of the Democrat party standing with the president on this.
We have the ability to deal with Iran. 2000 pound bunker busters.
Bernsten: We need Muslim Americans who have distinguished themselves in the WOT to help with translations.
We have 1,000 FBI officers in NYC. We probably don't have that many in the entire Middle East!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Russert: Everything I've read says you are the most valuable CIA agent but that this is the book the CIA doesn't want you to read.
Bernsten: The CIA has lost their minds. A lot of the info they tried to take out of my book, they'd briefed already for Woodward's book Bush's War. Many former directors have written books and I wonder if they'll give Tenet the same treatment they've given me. The paperback edition may be able to be written without the redactions. They took out open source information.
I didn't reveal sources or methods. The director of operation is the most important body in defending us in the WOT. I want people to recognize how important this is and to step up and join us in the CIA. I plan to get involved in politics. As a Republican. In the House. Not the Senate.
BERNSTEN PLANS TO RUN FOR CONGRESS AS A REPUBLICAN!!
Bernsten: We need national unity and we're in the fight for our lives. We have to recognize that a small group of people can cause catastrophic results.