The Begining of the End of the Iraq Occupation

The NY Times and CNN are reporting that the Iraqi Cabinet has approved a timeline for withdrawal:

The agreement sets June 30, 2009, as the deadline for U.S. troops to withdraw from all Iraqi cities and towns, Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said.

The date for all troops to leave Iraq will be December 31, 2011, he said.

These dates are "set and fixed" and are "not subject to the circumstances on the ground," he said.

It has yet to be voted on in the Iraqi Parliament:

The decision of the 37-member cabinet, essentially a microcosm of the Parliament, is expected to be a good indicator of whether the agreement will pass. The assembly has not yet announced the date of its vote, but it is scheduled to go into recess on Nov. 24.

The draft approved Sunday requires coalition forces to withdraw from Iraqi cities and towns by the summer of 2009 and from the country by the end of 2011. An earlier version had language giving some flexibility to that deadline, with both sides discussing timetables and timelines for withdrawal, but the Iraqis managed to have the deadline set in stone, a significant negotiating victory. The United States has around 150,000 troops in Iraq.

This timeline pretty much mirrors Barack Obama's statements concerning the direction he had hoped to take the occupation during the presidential campaign. Though, Obama had stated that his policy would have been contingent to conditions on the ground - something that the Iraqis, obviously, disagree with.

The reality is that as we get closer to pulling out there is a huge potential for all hell to break loose. But it would be the same problem five, ten or even fifteen years from now. No matter when the power vacuum presents itself there will be, very likely, a power struggle to fill that vacuum by the Iraqis. We can only hope that they struggle for that power through political means and not with bullets and bombs.

Most of the people of Iraq that are still standing after the illegal invasion and occupation have already seen enough of the bullets and bombs through no fault of their own.

Hate Crimes at Quinnipiac

Via Joe Peltier from the Quinnipiac Times, a few students got stupid:

A third arrest has been made surrounding the hate speech incidents that have occurred on the Quinnipiac campus, according to associate vice president for public relations John Morgan.

Freshman Charles Merritt of Clifton, Maine was arrested today in connection with the hate speech, and is currently being held by the Hamden Police Department on a $100,000 bond.

According to Morgan, he has been dismissed from the university.

Merritt, known as Chuck by many Quinnipiac students, was charged with three counts of intimidation based on bigotry and bias, three counts of first-degree harassment, and three counts of disorderly conduct.

Two girls had already been arrested in the morning and the President of the university stated that there is no tolerance for actions like this. Merrit Had been harassing some university Basketball players, and one of the players is being charged for similar actions.

As for the two girls, they are being charged in a seperate incident:

In a separate incident, police just before midnight Tuesday arrested Emily Loschiavo, 19, of West Newbury, Vt., and Courtney Stellwag, 19, of Newburgh, N.Y. They were both charged with first-degree harassment, conspiracy to commit first-degree harassment and disorderly conduct.

According to Smith, Loschiavo and Stellwag called the dorm room of a resident assistant. The RA was not in, but the phone was answered by two female friends of the RA, who were both threatened with bodily harm.

Sources said the two women who took the calls in the RA’s room are black and members of the Quinnipiac women’s basketball team, and neither was the intended victim of the alleged threats. Smith said he did not know the race of the RA.

The phone calls followed the discovery of racially bigoted words written outside dorm rooms and on a board outside a dorm.

While University President Lahey states that there is no tolerance there are, obviously, still issues to be resolved:

"I cannot state strongly enough that this university has absolutely no tolerance for acts of this kind and will do everything in its power to prevent them."

Local president of the NAACP in New Haven, James E. Rawlings, has met with university officials and plans to meet with them again, recognizing the fact that things that university are trying to accomplish, concerning racial diversity issues, are not working.

As for the player that is being charged, he had originally claimed to be a victim of harrassment:

Harold Washington, an 18 year old student from Maryland, is accused of leaving threatening and racial comments on a Facebook page.

Washington is also one of three African American Quinnipiac basketball players who told police last month they received threatening and harassing telephone calls. Washington's roommate, Charles Merritt, was arrested for those calls.

Now police say Harold Washington also committed part of the crime, leaving racist messages on the Facebook page of one of his two teammates. Facebook is a social networking website.

This whole saga began Friday, October 24th when a racial epithet and a swastika were found on the door of a basketball player's room.

The following day, threats and more racial slurs were found written on a room door at Dana Hall. And it was soon after that, the three players said they received the threatening calls.

Washington is the fourth arrest and faces similar charges as Merrit and has been expelled , as well. This should be a mess to sort out in court...

There has been a rash of what should be considered hate crimes across the country, mostly centered around the election and resulting in other lesser charges. This appears to be one of the rare times that the police have actually treated it as the hate crime that it is.

Kudos to the Hamden police for taking this seriously, the university for taking action at all in something that is typically swept under the carpets too many times, and the students that publicly condemned these acts.

Senator Pat Leahy Makes Me Miss Vermont

Only because if I still lived there I would not have a Neoconservative piece of Lieberjunk as a Senator:

Today, Daily Kos diarist terjeanderson caught an interview on Vermont Public Radio with Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT), during which the senator broke from the pack and said that Lieberman deserved to lose his chairmanship of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee:

I’m one who does not feel that somebody should be rewarded with a major chairmanship after doing what he did. … I felt that some of the attacks that he was involved in against Sen. Obama, whom I did support — I was one of the first in the Congress to support him — I thought they went way beyond the pale. I thought that they were not fair. I thought they were not legitimate. I thought that they perpetuated some of these horrible myths that were being run about Sen. Obama.

I would feel that, had I done something similar, I would not be chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee in the next Congress.

Listen here:

A new Research 2000/DailyKos poll shows that Lieberman is increasingly unpopular among his constituents. Sixty-one percent disapprove of his Senate performance. Among his Democratic constituents, Lieberman’s approval rating stands at just 22 percent.

It seems like Senator Bernie Sanders agrees:

"Appointing someone to a major post who led the opposition to everything we are fighting for is not 'change we can believe in,'" Sanders continued. "I very much hope that Senator Lieberman stays in the Democratic caucus and is successful in regaining the confidence of those whom he has disappointed. This is not a time, however, in which he should be rewarded with a major committee chairmanship."

Nutmeggers seem to agree with this, as evidenced by the most recent poll numbers:

Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 11/11-13. Likely voters. MoE 4% (6/30-7/2 results)

Do you approve or disapprove of the job Joe Lieberman is doing as U.S. senator?

Approve 36 (45)
Disapprove 61 (43)

If the 2012 election for U.S. Senate were held today would you to reelect Joe Lieberman would you consider voting for another candidate or would you vote to replace Lieberman?

Reelect 35
Consider Someone Else 18
Replace 48

Brutal. It seems that the people of Connecticut don't like the Republican version of Lieberman, the one that trashed Democrats on the campaign trail with John McCain, the one that spoke at the RNC convention, the one that failed to hold the Bush Administration accountable in Congress, and the one that pretended Katrina never happened.

Are you getting that, Joe? Et tu, Chris Dodd? Connecticut overwhelmingly disapproves of Joe Lieberman's warmongering and Neoconservative ways.

85,000 Homes Foreclosed Last Month

Are you beginning to grasp the scope of this issue? I am watching CNN and they are reporting 85,000 homes had the padlocks put on the front doors of the homes in the final act of foreclosure.

That is almost 2742 homes per day.

That isn't even the high watermark as the flood of foreclosures are killing American families:

A total of 936,439 homes have been lost to foreclosure since the housing crisis hit in August, 2007.

Foreclosures hit a record high in August when 304,000 homes were in default and 91,000 families lost their houses. Since then, a number of states have adopted legislation to freeze foreclosures and give homeowners a chance to modify their mortgages. These laws have helped slowed the rate of foreclosures.

"The really sobering reality for us is that despite these various state programs that are artificially keeping the numbers down, we are still up 25% from a year ago," said Rick Sharga, senior vice president of RealtyTrac.

Making matters worse is the rapidly deteriorating economy, says Global Insight economist Pat Newport.

And their answer?

Help 1.7% of the homeowners that are struggling. Nothing for the millions of people in the families that have already gone under. And nothing for 98.3% of the homeowners that are struggling, on the edge or already slipping through the cracks.

Yeah... That is some great plan! Another plan that helps less than 2% of the people that are struggling.

Bullshit solutions from the asswipes that put us in this mess. You can thank Bush and the GOP for their whole perverted ownership society that started this national disaster.

[update] Not one single home has been saved as Paulsen has dumped Billions into the banking assholes that profited from this mess:


In The Know: Should The Government Stop Dumping Money Into A Giant Hole?

Cindy McCain Busted With Another Man?

We laugh... You decide:

"I couldn't believe I was watching Cindy McCain passionately kissing and hugging another man!"

That's the stunned reaction of an eyewitness who says he watched in shock - and snapped photos - as the former presidential candidate's wife romantically kissed a long-haired man who resembles "a washed-up '80s rock musician."

Sources told The ENQUIRER investigative team the pair have been seen at concerts and sporting events acting very lovey-dovey

The wealthy blonde heiress and her secret pal have been spotted together around her hometown of Phoenix, Arizona over the past several years, say sources.

All I can say is BWAHAHAHAHAHA!

[update] According to the HuffPo:

A reader notes that this story is particularly dubious because Cindy McCain was on a trip to Kosovo at the time of the festival where the photos were supposedly taken.

One grainy photo accompanies the online article -- more are promised in the print edition.

I'll wait and see if they are rope-a-doping Cindy McCain like they did with John Edwards... Releasing really crappy proof at fist and then waiting for denials before printing the real thing.

Today is the day for Marriage Equality in CT

Again, good luck to those of you that choose to go out and start the rest of your lives together while exercising your newly minted rights to marriage equality:

Today, Connecticut joins Massachusetts as the only states to allow same-sex couples to marry. This comes one week after California voters banned gay marriage. WNPR's Lucy Nalpathanchil spoke to two couples who've been waiting a long time for this day to come.

This morning town halls across the state will begin issuing marriage licenses to same sex couples. Barb and Robin Levine Ritterman will be at the front of the line at New Haven city hall. Last week, I met with them in Barb's office on Chapel Street to hear about their plans. She smiles at Robin, her partner of seventeen years, as she talks about planning for the big day.

For those of you that are still against same sex marriage... The answer really isn't that complicated: Just don't choose to have one for your self.

Many people will be celebrating this today:

Love Makes a Family and GLAD will be coordinating festivities at two locations in Connecticut--New Haven and West Hartford. Bring your cameras, balloons, bubbles and flowers to New Haven City Hall (we'll gather on the sidewalk at 165 Church Street) at 10am on Wednesday, November 12th to celebrate with the first same-sex couples getting their marriage licenses!

Then, at 2:30pm at West Hartford Town Hall (gather outside at 50 South Main Street), the celebration continues as plaintiff couple Beth Kerrigan and Jody Mock get their marriage license there. We expect both of these locations to be major media events--be part of the crowd that witneses history! You won't want to miss it--plan on taking the day off!

You can find pertinent information to getting your marriage licenses here...

Hang this Albatross Around Shays' and the GOP's Necks...

Now I'm looking for the correct bird simile for Shays. It can't be the dodo, that gawky, waddling, flightless, 40-pound joke of an animal that was killed off by the late 1600s on their Indian Ocean island.

Shays' defenses -- particularly in recent years as the demographics of the 4th Congressional District were changing -- were always formidable, and the 17-town district was surgically redrawn by state lawmakers back in 2001 for a Republican.

No need for a comedic double take there. In a district that was redrawn, Tom DeLay Texas style, to make it easier for a Republican to win... And Jim Himes won it. Handily.

Dixon is a dodo...

Proving once again what an out-of-touch right-wing rag Connecticut Post really is, its columnist Ken Dixon published this snarky cheap shot at congressman-elect Jim Himes in his Sunday column:

Himes is essentially a 42-year-old blank slate, a Greenwich millionaire who was in the right place at the right time.

The entire Republican party is a political albatross if the right place and right time for a communist/socialist/liberal/progressive is a district that was redrawn for Republicans.

I already celebrated Veterans Day on Nov 5th

Actually, I started celebrating as the results started coming in on Nov. 4th. As did many other Veterans I have come to know through various political actions. And, as did many of the soldiers I know that still serve, today. Of course, the soldiers that still serve today were not given access to the media to share their reactions to the election results.

On a night like no other when America’s open and democratic virtues were put on worldwide display, an ill-advised policy within the Department of Defense proclaimed to servicemembers and the news media alike: “No you can’t.” What a servicemember and a journalist couldn’t do, the policy drafters ordered, was engage in conversation on a military base as the returns from a momentous election rolled in.

Stars and Stripes’ plans for providing news of Tuesday’s election started out with a new and seemingly innocent twist, tied to the opportunities of the new media. Reporters were to go to the common areas of bases and observe the reaction of servicemembers as the voting was tallied and shown on TV and the Internet. They were then to file to Stripes’ Web site, via “twitter,” an electronic form for sending brief, staccato messages.

Can't have the soldiers be seen celebrating a very liberal change in direction for America on their own personal time, can we? That might embarrass and shame the elitist, Neoconservative warmongering class that were seriously smacked around at the ballot boxes.

January 20th, 2009, can not come soon enough!