Racine Native - The Next Winter Soldier?

Her name is "Jen" and now lives in St. Paul.

Little Green Footballs excerpts heavily from the source.

“It didn’t truly dawn on me until pretty recently that those guys probably died and it’s my fault,” says Jen, who moved to St. Paul from Racine, Wisconsin, in January.

The small, 125-pound brunette says she broke open the flameless heater from her Army Meals Ready to Eat packet and spliced its magnesium, iron, and salt-based contents into a cigarette, offering the toxic treat to the unwitting prisoners. ...

Charles Johnson doubts the veracity of the story from the beginning. I don't know about that in any event it sounds like yet another attempt to use a tactic that has been tried over & over to no avail.

Theodore Dalyrymple in National Review once wrote a story about his work inside one of Britain's prisons. The theme was how tempting it was to lord over and maltreat prisoners because they were prisoners, convicted of a crime and he was not a prisoner guilty of no crime.

Tales of Baghdad Cabbies

According to reporters who've been to Iraq, they say the "true barometer" of the success of the surge will be measured by Baghdad's taxi drivers.

From today's Washington Post:

Cabbies gripe that the improved security situation also makes it harder to eke out a living. A growing number of Baghdad residents now feel comfortable driving their own cars around the city, obviating the need for taxis. The skyrocketing cost of fuel has made it harder to make ends meet. And high unemployment has led many young men to plop a yellow "TAXI" sign atop their vehicles, adding to the competition for passengers.

For taxi drivers who used to take passengers from Baghdad to Syria, the increased sense of security -- combined with strict new visa rules in Syria -- has stopped the exodus to the border, ending their source of income.

Muntasir Rasheed, 24, who worked for two years driving Iraqis to Damascus, said he is now unemployed. Almost no one is going to Syria anymore. The demand is so high in the reverse direction that $500 taxi rides from Damascus to Baghdad now cost $1,000, he said

It's not all happy news for cabbies on those rides through Al Anbar province. The Post reports Sunni insurgents who US Marines haven't taken care of, have been known to cut off the fingers of drivers who are spotted smoking, and ears of drivers caught listening to music.

This article's on A1. God it's going to be fun to see Harry Reid explain this one. Maybe he can do it during one of those 30-second "Special Sessions of the Senate" he's holding this week with Jim Webb (D) of Virginia?

That's Our Dave!

(HT Michelle Malkin)

I've got to meet and talk to Amanda Carpenter out here in DC a couple of times. She's not the "make up a story" type.

The man who controls the House purse strings to fund the war in Iraq said the President’s “surge” was showing recent signs of success because U.S. soldiers have “run out of people to kill.”

“One of the reason we’ve had incidents of violence, sectarian violence go down is because they are running out of people to kill,” said the Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee Rep. David Obey (D.-Wisc.) at a National Press Club luncheon Monday afternoon.

“They’ve killed so many in so many areas, that there are fewer opportunity targets, if you want to put it that way, for each side,” Obey said. “I welcome any reduction in the level in violence for whatever reasons it occurs, but I don’t think that tells us much for what the future is going to be.”

Obey’s remarks were prompted by a question that asked, “Some Republicans say the casualties are going down in Iraq, there seems to be signs the surge is working. Do you think that is true?”

See for yourself. The video is posted below.

Northern Wisconsin, thanks for the continual embarrassment.

Um, Dave...who's "they?"

Fun With Numbers

On Friday November 2nd, two interesting numbers were introduced to the public. The first, was from the Washington Post on U.S. Military deaths in Iraq for October.

The number of attacks against U.S. soldiers has fallen to levels not seen since before the February 2006 bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra that touched off waves of sectarian killing, according to U.S. military statistics released Thursday. The death toll for American troops in October fell to 39, the lowest level since March 2006, and the eighth-lowest total in 56 months of fighting, according to the Web site icasualties.org, which tracks military fatalities.

An unofficial Health Ministry tally showed that civilian deaths across Iraq rose last month compared with September, but the U.S. military found that such deaths fell from a high this year of about 2,800 in January to about 800 in October.

Then there was the number of highway deaths in October from the Wisconsin DOT.

In October, 59 people died in 51 Wisconsin traffic crashes, according to preliminary statistics from the Wisconsin Department of Transportation. In terms of traffic deaths, last month was the fourth safest month of October since World War II. The lowest total occurred in 1997 with 53 traffic fatalities. The deadliest month of October was in 1971 with 127 fatalities

The 59 deaths in October were eight fewer than in October 2006 when 67 people died in 60 crashes and 10 fewer than the five-year average for the month of October of 69 fatalities in 65 crashes.

As of Oct. 31, a total of 634 people have died in Wisconsin traffic crashes during 2007, including 105 motorcycle drivers, five motorcycle passengers, eight bicyclists and 48 pedestrians. Traffic deaths through October were 41 more than during the same period in 2006 but 23 fewer than the five-year average.

Going by the logic of anti-war liberals, the media, and Democrats; there is just one conclusion to draw here: THE DOT'S SURGE HAS FAILED.

It is time we admit that we are trapped; engaged in a civil war on Wisconsin's roads. That all the manpower, marketing, and effort is wasted that will only lead to more dead drivers.

DOT Secretary Frank Busalacci is no doubt a fine man with years of transportation experience behind him; but he is incorporating the same failed "Stay the Course" philosophy of those before him. His ways will only lead to more dead drivers.

Yeah, no wonder folks like Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Steve Kagen, and countless other liberals sound like fools when they talk about statistics in Iraq.

Only idiots see failure in progress.

RE: Feingold wants a terrorist safe haven?

The kicker of hypocrisy here is that Russ's one of the biggest voices in the Senate about what's happening in Somalia; which on many levels is slipping into becoming a haven of terrorists.

So much for Feingold's vaunted "consistency."

Bucky Badger in Iraq?

Basra is beset by giant badgers!

"I believe this animal appeared following a raid to the region by the British forces," said Ali Mohsen, a farmer in his 40s from Karmat Ali, near the air base used by the multinational force.

"As we are close to the airport, they probably released this animal into the area," he reasoned.

Amid such tales, there is little experts like Dr Ghazi Yaqub Azzam, deputy dean of the veterinary college, can do to reassure his neighbours.

"Its nature is to eat small animals like hens and rats. It has powerful senses of hearing and smell. It gets aggressive if senses danger, but it doesn't attack man unless threatened," he said.

Azzam speculated that the badgers were being driven towards the city because Iraq is trying to re-flood marshland north of Basra that was drained by Saddam in order to persecute local Marsh Arab tribes.

For all that, the British army thinks Basrawis have little to fear.

"If you cornered it and poked it with a stick, then the smart money would be on the badger," warned Gell, who has faced many rumours like this one in his tour in Iraq.

"We have not released giant badgers in Basra," he said, "and nor have we been collecting eggs and releasing serpents [emphasis added] into the Shatt al-Arab river."

BADGER BADGER BADGER BADGER BADGER BADGER BADGER
SNAKE! SNAKE!
BADGER BADGER BADGER BADGER BADGER BADGER BADGER

Hey Sean how about posting that one in honor of the fierce people eating Basra Badger!

Dr. Kagen Disappoints the Loons

For a man who ranted and raved all throughout last year on the campaign trail about Iraq being a mess, declaring he'd never back Bush policy on the War, and most importantly stating he'd never vote for straight blank checks on the War in Iraq; the 'Good Doctor' did just that this evening.

Makes you wonder what that Fox Cities Peace Group he told the Rove-Bush story to now feels when they discover he voted to save his political backside from NRCC attack and not his principles.

What a guy!

Don't hold your breath for the press release on this one.

UPDATE: Further proof I did indeed get under Kagen's office's skin. In what appears to be both an effort to spite conservative commentators like myself, and to hold off liberal attacks before they come aplenty during the Memorial Day recess, both Kagen and Kind -- the two Democratic members in the Wisconsin Delegation to vote for the Iraq War funding -- issued press releases on their votes.

What makes Kagen's truly impressive is the thing comes off like he's a raving lunatic. What else explains the thing being completely in UPPER CASE!

Odd Civics Lesson

This is just pathetic. Why doesn't Dave Obey (D-WI) just call it the "Save the Vulnerable Freshmen Democrats" Rule?

Obey outlined an unusual procedure in which lawmakers in the House could cast two votes, one on the war-related provisions, and a second on all other items. That would allow liberal Democrats to oppose the war funds, confident that Republicans would supply the support needed for it to prevail. The opposite would be true for the domestic spending, which draws more support from Democrats than Republicans.

The bill would then go to the Senate, where senators would have to vote yes-or-no on the entire package.

I don't recall hearing this in my High School Civics Class on how a bill becomes a law. Then again, Kiel is not what I would call a "progressive" place.