http://www.kxmb.com/getARticle.asp?ArticleId=98148

WTF. Congressional democrats trying to set the rules of engagement for troops on the ground.
“You can attack these people who are trying to kill you, but not these people who are trying to kill you.”
I understand they vehemently hate bush and his policies, but dictating the rules of engagement for men on the ground from their posh washington offices will not bring them home any faster. It will only accomplish one thing: more dead American servicemen. This is an abomination!

and some of you people support these assholes?

I'm a form of liberal, so maybe this won't reach you. As unfortunate as it is that politicians set the rules of engagement miles and miles away from the situation. This is not a democrat only policy. Rules of engagement have been set up by political standards for a very long time. I guess it's the way that we feel under control and take some of the pressure off of the troops. Sort of like a fail safe button or something. Honestly, I don't like it, but I know it's not without reasonable precedent.

The rules of engagement that the troops are under currently were set by the republican legislation, specifically by the president. Admittedly, they are less restrictive. For better or worse. What this proposal is actually doing is challenging the power of the adminstration. Democrats are in power, so they are realizing what decisions the president has made that they can undermine. This is, sadly, bullshit political posturing that will doubtfully get anywhere.


Oh, and apparently there were already rumors of certain generals complaining that the current rules of engagement handed down from the president were overly restrictive.

By the way, I've been trying to find a non-partisan link to put up here. But unshockingly, I find nothing but right-bent or left-bent whinings.

BBC.com is close, but it doesn't go into detail.


I wish I could actually find our current rules of engagement.

Fucking internet and it's lack of primary sources.

I guess it is unfair of me to brand this problem on the demoncats who are drafting the latest conditions on which to fire upon the enemy. I also have heard horror stories of from men and women over there not being to fire when fired upon under a republican congress. My cousin is in Ramadi and the ROE are significantly less restrictive than they are in Baghdad because just about everyone in Ramadi is a bad guy - all the civilians left long ago. The ROE are different all over Iraq. How is anyone going to be able to determine "huh, that guy is from the Islamic Army of Iraq" - or - "that guy is Al Qaeda, light him up!" Arm chair generals and empty suit politicians get soldiers killed. period. And those assholes come from all across the political spectrum.

Ramadi's population numbers around 400,000.

so just about all of those 400K people are bad guys?

Exactly, I definitely agree with that. There is so much legislation that goes on based anything other than the truly important issues and more on the way it can be used later for electoral politics. What pisses me off about this whole situation is that democrats are doing this just to test George Bush/be able to say that they tried to do something about Iraq for their campaigns in 2008.

I don't "definitely agree with" what Rev said...just for the record.

Ramadi population was 400,000

Across Iraq, there have been over 2 - 3 million refugees who have fled the country since the inception of the war.
When asshole jihadist set up shop, like they did 2 years ago in Falluja, innocent people hit the fucking road so they didn't get caught in the cross fire. I'd take my cousin's word for it on the fact that "just about everyone there is a bad guy" before I assumed that there was no way that the 400,000 population number you can find on Wiki meant that there is still 400,000 people there and that they are all now magically became bad. He said "Every now and then, you will see someone walking around with a white flag"

brian_dc said:

bingo.
this is exactly what "non-binding" resolutions are set to accomplish. They're just to get on the record to say "see, I voted this way this time!"
Anyone who isn't over there, has never been over there, and/or isn't going over there has NO FUCKING RIGHT to judge the actions/situation on the ground.

he said, on the issue of the mean streets of the Milaad district of ar Ramadi and the lack of civilians and media, "no one wants to come here, this place is a fucking wild west shootout"
fuck anyone up the ass with a red-hot coat hanger who thinks its a good idea to tell him who he can't shoot back at.

the latest figures I can find for Ramadi are from nov 06 and they still say around 400K

and wikipedia says 400K.
if it's on wiki, it's true.
that's wikiality.

I cannot imagine who is taking this census. There isn't anyone in any sort of authoritative position that is in control of that place. You should see some of the pictures I've seen of that place, the place looks completely uninhabitable - it kind of reminds me of WWII pictures where everything (and I mean everything) is bombed out beyond recognition.

are you going against wiki?
you seriously got to be fucking kidding me...

hahaha
I think I am going to go on there now and change it myself.

I had a hippie liberal college professor from Amsterdam who would drop 1 complete grade for students who cited Wiki. For a Socialist, I actually liked him because his teachings never crossed that threshold where it became indoctrination rather than education.

I've been trying to listen to 96.9 a lot more lately to make you righty nutjorbs happy. I try, but their programing is so friggen terrible. they have so little so say that they spend 5 minutes repeating the same story over and over. They talk in circles so it seems that they are right and they repeat the same things over and over to implant it in your mind. The worst is the long pauses where they are waiting for a response of something. O'Riely is the only one that doesn't do this on that channel. granted o'riely does a show called the "no spin zone" which is nothing but spin. but that's a different story for another day.
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=O'riely+researchers

hungtableed said:

nope. theyre like chickens with their heads cut off right now, not really having ideas of their own and too ready to just listen to the people, sad thing the people who are screaming the loudest have no idea what theyre talking about.

dems, reps.........who cares same asshole, different day.

O'Reilly, Rev. Damn.

the_reverend said:

the only tolerable host on 96.9 (in my opinion that is) is Jay Severin. Personally, I listen to WRKO. I listen to Rush, but that doesn't mean I don't think he is a blowhard. He is no different than at least 80% of the people he trashes on, esp. on the issue of drug usage. I can't stand the morning people on 96.9 and more often than not O'riely makes me cuss out loud at the radio like there is chance that he'll actually hear me. Other than Michael Savage, most the guys I listen to are local like Howie Carr and the new morning guy Tod Fienberg.
btw, the 'no spin zone' as a theme is a joke. I usually only like radicals, kind of like if I were liberal I'd probably be into Al Frankin.

w3 is pretty much dead on, I agree. I love the congressional speeches some of these asshole give. They stand up with charts and graphs and shit and speak like they have any idea what it's like to be riding shot-gun in a humvee in downtown Ramadi or Sadr City. They're all empty suits and they don't have a clue what's going on there.
Ever hear the saying: "the king has no clothes"? - that's where we are at.

Michael Savage talked in circles just like all the others. I don't like Jay Severin either. the morning person (michael graham?) sucks big dong.

rush is funny cause I have a song where they clipped him into saying anal sex.. me so horny!

hungtableed said:

naw man the sad thing is we've been there for so long, it's not that were realizing it. it's more of a sensation of real people waking up to realize were getting fucked like we only thought they did in other countries.

im watching a hank williams doc. from pbs right now, fuck rome.

hungtableed said:

i'm a leftist and even i don't listen to Al Frankin. he stopped being funny ten years ago.

btw, the term 'radical' implies somone who is on the far left.

i'll even throw in a nice little political spectrum to illustrate my point:

radical - - - liberal - - - moderate - - - conservative - - - reactionary

Drew, you're right about the spectrum, but I'm pretty sure that we've been misusing "radical" for long enough now that it's safe to say we know what people mean based on the context.

brian_dc said:

i'll give you that, but it really grinds my gears to have someone like michael savage be refered to as a radical.

DrewBlood@Work said:

OH HE SAID IT!!!!

what about libertarian and that other l word that bridge L/C to the top and bottom of moderate (aka centralist)

DrewBlood@Work said:

jeez, enough with the mental masturbation (which is exercised when someone is a stickler for using only what they believe is the text-book defined terminology). What I meant by referring to Savage as radical was that he is 'radical' right - as in being about as far right as you can possibly get . I'm sorry I got your panties in a knot for not referring to him as 'revolutionary'. It must kill you to read 90% of the news out there that would commonly refer to guys like Savage as coming from the 'radical right'.
btw, my gripe with Rush is that he is a republican water-boy. At least Savage will call out anyone across the isle for being an empty suit.

*reactionary not revolutionary
too bad I ain't signed in, I could fix it so you don't have a brain hemorrhage.

I've always liked Severin because he rides the line between conservative and libertarian

Dankill said:

That he does, and he is by no means a water carrier for the Rep. Does he call out Dems more than Rep? Absolutely. But he will also slams Rep. idiocy when/where ever he sees it.

he's not in this week.. it's michael graham. if I have to hear about governor patrick and his car one more f'n time...

the_reverend said:

hahaha
I was honestly getting pretty damn sick of that myself. I mean, the guy is a dick for spending combined 27K to decorate his office (12K of which on curtains), but what politician doesn't abuse tax payer $? It's the whole "come down off your high horse" comment he made about Kerry-Healy (whom I should add like Romney didn't even take her salary) that got him in this mess.

ok, I should have come up with something I would do cause I could have done whatever it is to you right now. and the curtains were $10K. Then again, I live in NH and DON'T FUCKING CARE.

I live in mass I don't care either and I have probably been just as annoyed by it as you - just like hearing about that dead drug addict and where to bury her. I think the point that everyone (including his posse at the boston globe) was harping about is that the "together we can" deval was supposed to be above that type of non sense. Like last Thurs and Fri - if this is what I hear about on the radio Mon morning, I'm putting on the NH classic rock station.

I listen to 89.1 NPR, 90.9 WBUR, 91.3FM WUNH, and then 96.9 when I want to get frustrated. sometimes I also hit 90.3 WZBC and 91.5fm, WUML (ex-WJUL). I think classic rock is for old fags so I probably wouldn't turn that on.

I use to like 'the bone' when I was in Maine
I'm going to check out them other stations you listed. I've heard enough NPR before, but it is good to hear an opposition point of view. If anything, it reinforces your ideals to hear someone that doesn't spew the same mantra that you're use to.

I only listen to news stories on NPR, not comentary.

anyhow, I turn on 96.9 and jay was talking abut deval patrick and the drapes/car. lame.

I don't think Al Franken is "radical" at all. Someone like Randy Rhodes...totally, but Franken is a really reasonable dude that gets a shit rap by people that don't listen to him. I'm bummed he's off the air now, I don't really like the other Air America shows. NPR is ok. I like their book reviews because I'm a nerd.

The story in question is from a righty nutjob blog. Say Anything says a lot of stupid shit.