The War Nerd on Gaza

The War Nerd finally writes about the January war in Gaza. And what he says isn't pretty. Here's the gist of it:

The lowdown on Gaza is simple: in the short run, Israel did a decent job of killing Hamas’s cadre. Gaza’s a small place, and it was pretty much shooting fish with headscarves in a sandy barrel. They blew up the place real good, made themselves feel better after getting roughed up by Hezbollah a couple years ago. OK, so you’re a Hell of a counterpuncher; so what?. . . what happens five years from now when all those dead Hamas guys’ little brothers are ready to graduate from the rebuilt Gaza I-Hate-the-Jews Academy.

He concludes that Israel is going destroy itself in the long run if it doesn't start making better decisions:

. . . what a lot of people don’t get about war is there comes a time when there ain’t no smart moves any more. . . . And Israel, in the long term…well, they’ve got those 200 nukes, and the US Congress…and that’s about all. They won’t get driven into the sea like Arafat used to screech, but they’ll get meaner and smaller until all the smart people, the ones who can, will get out, and what’s left will be another scrappy desert fort making deals with the locals. A lot of Crusader kingdoms went out that way, just one decision away from getting re-absorbed into the Muslim soup. If they’d made a deal with the Mongols, maybe we could’ve done something with this. But nooooooo, they were too snotty. Nope, doesn’t look good, and worse yet it’s going to be some ugly maintenance wars, where you have to blast a lot of schools and hospitals, and still don’t get anywhere. Like that scene in Fight Club where he bleeds all over the Mafia guy, till the wise guy screams he can use the basement. “Lou! Lou! You don’t know where I’ve been!”

Great comment of the day

In Marcy Wheeler's latest post about the developing investigation against the Bush administration torture memo lawyers, commenter "Scribe" writes:

I work as a lawyer. I’ve been one for about 20 years. Addington, Yoo, and the rest of those thugs with bar admissions have given me every reason to rage at, and every reason to hate, both them and their use of my profession. Liars, cheaters, thieves, deadbeats, busted marriages, cops and all the rest are the daily flow of lawyering. But the one group who deserve nothing but to be rooted out of the profession and their careers ended are those who use the law and their skill in it to destroy the law. The lawyer who steals from a client is bad enough. But he steals only money. The lawyer who uses the law to destroy the law steals not from a client, but from both everyone in the future - who will have to live under a system he perverted - and from those in the past who sacrificed their lives for the ideal of law. And he steals something more precious than money. He steals liberty from the future, and shits on the sacrifice of the past.

Oops

I just pulled a post from yesterday because it was based on a news story that was 18 months old -- can't remember now how exactly I found it, or why I thought it was actually new.
Don't you hate it when that happens?

Not outrageous

So Wolfe won and Montcalm lost and ever since we've been singing one of the most xenophobic songs ever written.
Now I like history. But I just can't work up any outrage over this -- it looks like we are not going to reenact some battle from 250 years ago because said reenactment would be needlessly provocative and insulting to many Canadians in Quebec. Good decision.

Wow

Just wow!

Great comment of the day

Scott Lemieux asks the world to Make It Stop about the total awfulness of A-Rod the Steroid Boy Wonder, and commenter McKingford makes this good point:

I always feel like I'm living in some Bizarro-alternate world reality when people get all faux-hysterical about steroids in baseball.
The NFL plays its Pro Bowl today. The NFL now routinely employs men who tip the scales at 350+. 20 years ago virtually nobody did. Yet we dreamily pretend that this phenomenon is entirely a product of grain feeding...
And just to be sure I'm not exaggerating the double standard, lets step back two years. The then-reigning Defensive Player of the Year, Shawn Merriman tested positive for steroids. He quietly served a four game suspension and resumed play, and was *again* a leading candidate (despite missing 1/4 of the season) for DPY. And nary a "tsk" was heard.
Like I said, I feel like the last sane man alive, as the world overturns every stone in an effort to root out steroids in baseball while the NFL drones away, and we all quietly pretend that it doesn't consume enough steroids to double the US annual beef production.

Uh, Mike . . .

PSA has a message for Senator Duffy:

. . . a senator in our parliamentary system has a duty to country, queen and constitution first and party affiliation second. We'll likely be stuck with Senator Duffy long after Steve Harper's political ship has run aground. It would be very nice if he figured out that he doesn't work for Harper, he works for us. The job of that house is to keep the short sighted, partisan twits from the commons from setting the whole damn place to ruin.

And Dave chimes in:

What Duffy demonstrated is what we could expect from elected senators: An endless stream of partisan diarrhea acting as the mouthpiece for their party leader because the only way they would get there is by being an active supporter of a particular party.
What Duffy hasn't gathered in is that the substantial shield he enjoys from his Senate seat protects him from the likes of Harper - not the Canadian public. The whole idea is that a senator rises above the partisan fray - not joins it.
. . . Duffy is no more qualified to engage in sober second judgment than he was to critically question the powerful as an advocate of the fourth estate.

Mike Duffy, proving the case against Senate reform since 2009!

Australian wildfires

Here is one touching photo from the Herald Sun Homepage, where you will find great coverage of the terrible fires with interactive maps.

Praise for Ignatieff

Looks like the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix agrees with me about Ignatieff's leadership:

Saskatchewan citizens know there is not one Conservative MP with the courage to stand up publicly for their province if that means raising the ire of the unelected officials in Mr. Harper's office. At least the people of Newfoundland know where their MPs stand and they know Mr. Ignatieff had the courage to allow them to walk a different path to the same destination.

Is anybody surprised

that Mike Duffy said something offensive and sexist?

No matter how cynical I get, I just can't keep up

Stephen Harper has dropped his defamation suit against the Liberal party over the Cadman affair.

Everybody limbo!

Just when you think that the news couldn't get more trivial, they lower the bar again.
In Canada, when Saskatoon's mayor announced everyone had to wear a tie in his office, the whole country laughed and he was dubbed Craziest Mayor in Canada.
Washington takes itself way too seriously.

Oh Noes!

Posted by commenter Begone at Kos

Mad as hell

Kos:

During the Bush years, the best interests of our country took a back seat to the GOP's failed ideology. Right now, it looks like the best interests of our country are taking a back seat to the failed ideology of "bipartisanship".

Lance Mannion:

It never occurred to me to worry, even at four in the morning, that [President Obama's] vanity lay in his seeing himself as the Great Conciliator. . . . .
[but with the appointment of Gregg as Commerce secretary] Gregg has said, Sure, I'll come work to enact your programs and policies, Mr President, but only if my friends in the Senate retain the same power they had before to sabotage and destroy those programs and policies, and the President agreed to this.
Which looks to me as though it's more important for the President to be able to boast about the number of Republicans in his cabinet than to get his own programs and policies passed by the Senate.

Talking Points Memo:

Obama is, sadly, much to blame for giving the Republicans so much leverage. He defined the challenge as biparitsanship not saving the U.S. economy. . . . He spent the last two weeks empowering Republicans -- including negotiating with them to get more into Senate and his administration and giving them virtual veto-power over his agenda -- and also spending time on his personal cool-guy image (as in interview before the Super Bowl). The country is in danger and he ran for president to solve this crisis in a socially inclusionary way. He should be fighting on that front all the time with all his energies.

Digby:

I think the administration thought they could be mediators between the two parties rather than leaders of the Democratic party. That just won't work . . .

Chris Bowers:

. . . what does President Obama want the American people to do? We are in the midst of a major crisis right now, and shown time and time again that we are willing to take action to help remedy the problem. Millions, tens of millions, of people feel incredibly frustrated, trapped even, and are unsure what to do next. While they are ready to act, someone needs to make the ask. Right now, the person to make the ask is President Obama, but he isn't doing it. What does President Obama want us to do? The silence is deafening.

The difference between Liberals and Conservatives

So with all the sturm and dang about the Newfoundland Liberals voting against the budget, what we are seeing now is the essential difference in leadership now between the Harper Conservatives and the Ignatieff Liberals: The Conservatives will listen only to what their leader wants, while the Liberals will listen to what their constituents want.