FIGHTING
DEMS NEWS SERVICE
foreign
policy * national security * military & veterans
affairs
February 15,
2007
Vol. 2
No. 5
THE
NEWS HEADLINES
Bush Budget Whacks VA
Funds
Sunni Insurgents:
What They Want
Pace Contradicts Iran
Arms Claims
Bush Hurts Iran
Reformers
House Military Damage
Assessment Begins
Short &
Sweet
THE
OP/ED HEADLINES
Send Bush 41, Clinton To
Middle East
Doug Feith, Reinventing
History
Is War with Iran
Inevitable?
About Fighting Dems News
Service
THE
ARTICLE SUMMARIES AND LINKS
BUSH BUDGET WHACKS VA
FUNDS
President Bush's 2008 budget for Veterans Administration funding calls for an
increase next year but would cut funds in 2009 and 2010 and then freeze the
funding levels thereafter even as the number of veterans seeking VA medical
care continues to rise.
FDNS Report At:
http://tinyurl.com/2z34dw
SUNNI INSURGENTS:
WHAT THEY
WANT
Iraq insurgents have, for the first time, put in writing their terms for a
ceasefire in a document passed to the Independent of London newspaper.
Although the current conditions are not those any U.S. administration could
meet eventual ceasefires in other conflicts have often began with one side or
the other presenting demands the other could not accept that later developed
into workable proposals.
FDNS Report At:
http://tinyurl.com/2f5ft6
PACE CONTRADICTS IRAN
ARMS
CLAIMS
American media widely and uncritically published reports based on a press
briefing by anonymous military officers in Baghdad last Sunday to the effect
that the Iranian government was sending weaponry into Iraq that had been
responsible for the deaths of some 170 U.S. troops. Now, Gen. Peter
Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has apparently contradicted the
anonymous claims. However, the story reflects points related to the
collection and analysis of intelligence that may be little understood by most
Americans.
FDNS Report At:
http://tinyurl.com/yv4qes
BUSH HURTS IRAN
REFORMERS
Although Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has become increasingly
unpopular inside Iran his opponents in that country complain that the Bush
administration's threats and hostile rhetoric is pulling the rug from
underneath them reports the Los Angeles Times.
FDNS Report At:
http://tinyurl.com/2ycfwa
HOUSE MILITARY DAMAGE
ASSESSMENT
BEGINS
Two subcommittees of the House Armed Services Committee have formally began
"assessing damage to the armed forces of the United States … from sustained
operations in two wars and its impact on overall readiness." According
to the two subcommittee chairman, Rep. Solomon Ortiz (D-TX) and Rep. Neil
Abercrombie (D-HI), readiness "has suffered in the past six years from
inadequate planning, dubious civilian leadership and little or no
congressional oversight."
FDNS Report At:
http://tinyurl.com/2ol7oq
SHORT &
SWEET
Americans Oppose Surge
And Cutting Funds
Six in 10 Americans oppose
President Bush's increasing the number of troops in Iraq according to the
latest USA Today/Gallup Poll.
By a nearly equal number
Americans also oppose any attempt by Congress to cut off funding for those
troops according to the poll.
The poll also found most
Americans paying close attention to the unfolding debate
FBI
Cutting Their Losses
Theft and disappearances of FBI
weapons and laptop computers have been cut but the agency still has a problem
with between three and four computers being stolen or lost each month.
Beyond that, says the Justice Department inspector general, the agency does
not know whether the information on computers is sensitive or
classified.
Five years ago the inspector
general issued a report saying that 354 weapons and 317 laptop computers were
either lost or stolen within a 28-month review period.
The new report says that 160
weapons and 160 laptop computers disappeared during a 44-month
period.
GOP Scared
Of Iraq Debate
In a "Dear Colleague" letter
Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) and Rep. John Shadegg (R-AZ) urged Republicans to
dodge debating the Democratic Iraq resolution in terms of the war in Iraq
because their side would lose.
"The debate should not be about
the surge or its details. This debate should not even be about the Iraq
war to date, mistakes that have been made, or whether we can, or cannot, win
military. If we let Democrats force us into a debate on the surge or the
current situation in Iraq, we lose," wrote Hoekstra and Shadegg.
Instead the two GOP
representatives told their colleagues to debate the resolution in terms of
international terrorism and discussing "radical Islamists and the consequences
of not defeating radical Islam in Iraq."
They attached a map of major
international terrorist attacks around the world which have nothing to do with
the Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias inside Iraq.
THE
OP/ED SUMMARIES AND LINKS
SEND
BUSH 41, CLINTON TO MIDDLE
EAST
President Reagan did not lift his presidency by escalating war but by
escalating diplomacy with Gorbachev and achieving monumental
breakthroughs. We can break through the pessimism and win national and
global acclaim by sending Bush 41 and Bill Clinton on game changing diplomacy
for Iraq and the Middle East.
Commentary By Brent Budowsky At:
http://tinyurl.com/3cjsxa
DOUG
FEITH, REINVENTING
HISTORY
Dougie Feith appeared on Faux News with Chris Wallace and emphatically denied
that he or anyone in his office ever said there was an operational
relationship between Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden. How sad.
Mr. Feith apparently has early on-set Alzheimer's disease. He's
forgotten that someone in his shop at DOD leaked his October 2003 memo to the
Senate Intelligence Committee to one Mr. Stephen Hayes, an enterprising
journalist, who in turn published the breathless findings in the Weekly
Standard.
Commentary By Larry C. Johnson At:
http://tinyurl.com/yshkv7
IS
WAR WITH IRAN
INEVITABLE?
As the President fights for public support of his troop surge in Iraq, he is
also ratcheting up the pressure on Iran. A second aircraft carrier battle
group (with Newsweek reporting a third group likely to follow), Patriot
missiles to protect our allies, arresting Iranian personnel in Iraq, releasing
additional information about Iranian involvement, appointing a Navy Admiral to
command forces in the region, even seeking diplomatic support from Sunni Arab
friends in the region - Yes, the Iranians are interfering inside Iraq and
seeking nuclear capabilities. Yet the President's recent actions give the US
little additional leverage to engage and dissuade Iran, and, more than likely,
simply accelerate a dangerous slide into war. The United States can do
better than this.
Guest Commentary By Gen. Wesley Clark At :
http://tinyurl.com/26sfrq