Carl Levin ( D-MI ) What An Idiot!

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin ( D-MI )

"We're very strong in supporting the troops, but we're also strong on putting pressure on the Iraqi leaders to live up to their own commitments. Without that political settlement on their part, there is no military solution. We can keep the benchmarks part of the bill without saying that the troops must begin to come back within four months."

"And what we will leave will be benchmarks, for instance, which would require the president to certify to the American people if the Iraqis are meeting the benchmarks for political settlement, which they, the Iraqi leaders, have set for themselves."   FoxNews

...and he's calling me in despair, wanting to know what the Democrats are doing to end this bloodbath and get his buddies out of that meat grinder.  Fathers conversation with son in Iraq

   I sometimes wonder if Carl Levin and a few other of the Democrats that we hired to get the troops out of the Iraq war are really Republicans in disguise. Why do I continue to get the feeling that the Democrats don't want to end this war any more than Bush does?

   One more time! If Congress would just go ahead and cut the fucking funds then the U.S. involvement is over, period! That would be showing our troops that you support them. Not giving Bush certain dates to begin withdrawing them, but making this punk begin taking them out now would be showing support for our troops!

   Cutting the war funds would be supporting the troops, it would not be supporting the war. There is a difference!

   And if Carl Levin is stupid enough to believe that Bush would be honest when it comes time to certify that the Iraqis are holding up to their benchmarks, then he needs another career! I also have some beach front property I'll sell him cheap, in Baghdad.

Tags: Carl Levin Iraq Bush benchmarks Congress Senate

This Is Not Civil War?

     Part of a DoD March 2007 quarterly report to Congress concerning the outlook for Iraq.

The conflict in Iraq has changed from a predominantly Sunni-led insurgency against foreign occupation to a struggle for the division of political and economic influence among sectarian groups and organized criminal activity. The level of violence in Iraq continued to rise during this reporting period as ethnic,tribal, sectarian,and political factions seek power over political and economic resources.

  Let's see how two different sect's live, while we're here.

Reporting out of Baghdad also began to note the diference between the security and availability of basic services between Sunni and Shi’ite areas. In the poor Shi’ite area of Sadr City, markets were open most of the day, there was no nightly curfew, and citizens had access to at least one generator for power. Residents in Sadr City credited the Mahdi Army with the security and Moqtada al-Sadr for providing aid and political progress.

In contrast, markets in Sunni neighborhoods were al but deserted, residents were lucky to receive two hours of power a day, and Sunnis were continualy threatened into cooperating with insurgents. Insurgents would kil US or Shi’ite security forces working on reconstruction projects as well as Sunni workers who were seen as colaborating with the enemy. Increasingly, Iraqi government workers refused to enter Sunni neighborhoods, leaving piles of trash on the street and water and electricity lines unrepaired. Many residents even had dificulty colecting their daily food rations.      

Pressure was also mounting within mixed families throughout the country. Approximately one-third of Iraqi marriages were mixed, but increasingly, family members from both sects were urging couples to divorce or flee the country. In many cases, family members were forced to live in separate neighborhoods and rarely saw each other for fear of reprisal atacks. In the past, mixed mariages were seen as the unifying factor that would spare Iraq from civil war.

CSIS Full Report  in downloaded PDF

   CSIS has many various studies concerning Iraq and the way of life their since Bush came to town. Good reading when you have the time as many of these reports are quite lengthy.

Tags: Iraq civil war Sunni Shiite U.S.