Archive for the 'Terrorism' Category

McCain’s Hamas Quote In Context Shows Consistency

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, McCain, Media, Partisan Hacks, Terrorism, The World, Video

Good catch from Hot Air…

While I still think it was hacky for McCain to raise money off of Hamas’ “endorsement” of Obama, it’s clear his 2006 statements square with his current stance.
What’s also clear is that James Rubin was clearly mischaracterizing McCain’s statement and likes to play fast and loose with the facts. I mean, [...]

May 16th, 2008 | Permalink| 1 Comment »

Obama Unwraps Bush’s Gift

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Bush, Democrats, Foreign Policy, History, Iran, Israel, McCain, Republicans, Terrorism, The War On Terrorism, War

And something tells me that this will be one of those gifts that’ll keep on giving…

May 16th, 2008 | Permalink| 5 Comments »

Bush’s Gift To Obama?

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Bush, History, Iran, Israel, McCain, Terrorism, War

Chuck Todd explains why the Obama camp is cheering today…
When President Bush — thousands of miles away in Israel — decided to fire his thinly veiled shot at Obama yesterday, it was a giant gift to the Illinois senator and his campaign.
Why?
One, it essentially kept Clinton on the sidelines just two days after [...]

May 16th, 2008 | Permalink| 1 Comment »

McCain’s Hamas Problem

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Israel, McCain, Terrorism, The War On Terrorism, The World

(UPDATE: Go here to read how McCain’s statement was taken out of context. In other words, this post was based on a false report and should be read as such, even though I still think McCain raising money off of Hamas’ “endorsement” of Obama is hacky at best.)
As most of you know by now, Hamas [...]

May 16th, 2008 | Permalink| 4 Comments »

Defense Secretary Robert Gates: Appeaser?

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Bush, Foreign Policy, Iraq, Terrorism

How exactly does Bush explain his speech when his own defense secretary’s opinions seems to place him in the “appeasement” camp with Obama?
Here’s what Gates said…
The United States should construct a combination of incentives and pressure to engage Iran, and may have missed earlier opportunities to begin a useful dialogue with Tehran, Defense Secretary Robert [...]

May 15th, 2008 | Permalink| 13 Comments »

The Difference Between Diplomacy And Appeasement

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Bush, Democrats, Lieberman, Media, Partisan Hacks, Republicans, Terrorism, The War On Terrorism, The World

Bush apparently doesn’t know.
Neither does Lieberman.
And tonight Chris Matthews ran into one of these well studied right-wing radio hosts and asked him if he knew the difference.
Watch the results…

Moving on…

May 15th, 2008 | Permalink| 4 Comments »

Lieberman Backs Bush’s “Appeasement” Statements

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Bush, Iran, Iraq, Lieberman, McCain, Republicans, Terrorism, The War On Terrorism, The World, War

Here’s the transcript from MSNBC via ThinkProgress:
“President Bush got it exactly right today when he warned about the threat of Iran and its terrorist proxies like Hamas and Hezbollah. It is imperative that we reject the flawed and naïve thinking that denies or dismisses the words of extremists and terrorists when they shout “Death to [...]

May 15th, 2008 | Permalink| 8 Comments »

Jon Stewart Interviews Doug Feith On Iraq

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in Bush, History, Iraq, Terrorism, Video, War

Feith is famous for being the guy who formed the “Office of Special Plans”, a group that cherry-picked the intelligence for the administration so they could justify going into Iraq because of WMDs and ties to al Qaeda. And now he’s out on the talk show circuit hawking his book which claims that their was [...]

May 13th, 2008 | Permalink| 2 Comments »

McCain Promotes Aide Who Lobbied For Saudi Arabia

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, McCain, Saudi Arabia, Terrorism, The World

McCain hits Obama on an endorsement from Hamas he couldn’t control, then uses the situation to raise money, but then promotes a guy to one of the top spots in his own campaign who worked for a country where a majority of the 9/11 terrorists came from?
Hmmm…
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) plans to name former [...]

May 12th, 2008 | Permalink| 5 Comments »

Over 43,000 Soldiers Unfit For Combat Were Deployed

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in Afghanistan, Health Care, Iraq, Mental Health, Military, News, Terrorism, The War On Terrorism, War

The title says it all.
USA Today has the details:
More than 43,000 U.S. troops listed as medically unfit for combat in the weeks before their scheduled deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan since 2003 were sent anyway, Pentagon records show.
This reliance on troops found medically “non-deployable” is another sign of stress placed on a military that has [...]

May 8th, 2008 | Permalink| No Comments »

Post-War Suicides Could Exceed Combat Deaths

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in Afghanistan, Iraq, Mental Health, Military, Terrorism, War

Some sobering news about how many of our young men and women are dying from wounds they suffered on the battlefield that nobody could see until it’s too late.
From Bloomberg:
The number of suicides among veterans of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan may exceed the combat death toll because of inadequate mental health care, the U.S. [...]

May 6th, 2008 | Permalink| No Comments »

McCain’s Odd Definition Of “Out Of Touch”

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Bad Decisions, Barack, Dumb Things Said By Smart People, McCain, News, North Carolina, Partisan Nonsense, Terrorism, Video

Recently, McCain admonished North Carolina Republicans as being “out of touch” for wanting to run this ad…

Now, let’s make one thing clear. Obama was not at church during the “god damn America” sermon and he’s made that clear. The commercial purposefully tries to blur that line and suggest Obama agrees with Wright’s sentiment, and for [...]

April 26th, 2008 | Permalink| 3 Comments »

McCain Links Obama To Ayers

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Democrats, History, McCain, Republicans, Terrorism

Well, I guess this will be the theme this Fall. First, McCain’s team ties Hamas to Obama because they said they wouldn’t mind dealing with him (in a fundraising email no less) and now the candidate himself is saying that Ayers remains an “open question” and he wonders if Obama would condemn Ayers actions.
From CNN:
The [...]

April 20th, 2008 | Permalink| 17 Comments »

McCain Fundraising Email: Hamas Wants Obama

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Democrats, Israel, McCain, Republicans, Terrorism

Well, that didn’t take long…
This is what it says:
“Barack Obama’s foreign policy plans have even won him praise from Hamas leaders. Ahmed Yousef, chief political adviser to the Hamas Prime Minister said, ‘We like Mr. Obama and we hope he will win the election. He has a vision to change America.’”
Do note that Obama condemned [...]

April 20th, 2008 | Permalink| 11 Comments »

Iraq Is Won. Time To Shift Back To Afghanistan.

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in Afghanistan, Biden, Iran, Iraq, Military, Pakistan, Terrorism, The War On Terrorism, The World, Video, War, al Qaeda

An interesting moment from yesterday’s testimony with Biden, Petraeus and Crocker.

And while some on the left and the right have been trying to make hay out of this, the segment does have my wondering why, if our highest priority targets are in Afghanistan, that we’re not trying to destroy them.
I understand we think we [...]

April 9th, 2008 | Permalink| 3 Comments »

The Yoo Torture Memo

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 9/11, Bad Decisions, Bush, Cheney, Civil Liberties, Constitution, Ethics, Foreign Policy, Guantanamo Bay, Iraq, Islam, Law, Military, Terrorism, The War On Terrorism, The World, Torture, War

All 70+ pages of it.
Here’s the gist…
In the March 14, 2003 memo, Yoo says the Constitution was not in play with regard to the interrogations because the Fifth Amendment (which provides for due process of law) and the Eighth Amendment (which prevents the government from employing cruel and usual punishment) does “not extend to alien [...]

April 1st, 2008 | Permalink| 1 Comment »

Small Explosion Hits Times Square

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in New York City, Terrorism, United States, Video

It looks like a small device was set off next to a military recruiting station.
Here’s more…
The police said the explosive device involved in the Times Square blast this morning was “roughly similar” to the devices used in two earlier bombings at foreign consulates in Manhattan, in 2005 and 2007, Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly said [...]

March 6th, 2008 | Permalink| 1 Comment »