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Archive for April 8th, 2007

We’ve heard what some of the news reporters had to say about John McCain’s recent trip to Baghdad, and that he lied about the conditions there. In an op-ed piece for the Washington Post today McCain tells us basically why he said what he said the other day:

I just returned from my fifth visit to Iraq since 2003 — and my first since Gen. David Petraeus’s new strategy has started taking effect. For the first time, our delegation was able to drive, not use helicopters, from the airport to downtown Baghdad. For the first time, we met with Sunni tribal leaders in Anbar province who are working with American and Iraqi forces to combat al-Qaeda. For the first time, we visited Iraqi and American forces deployed in a joint security station in Baghdad — an integral part of the new strategy. We held a news conference to discuss what we saw: positive signs, underreported in the United States, that are reason for cautious optimism.

I observed that our delegation “stopped at a local market, where we spent well over an hour, shopping and talking with the local people, getting their views and ideas about different issues of the day.” Markets in Baghdad have faced devastating terrorist attacks. A car bombing at Shorja in February, for example, killed 137 people. Today the market still faces occasional sniper attacks, but it is safer than it used to be. One innovation of the new strategy is closing markets to vehicles, thereby precluding car bombs that kill so many and garner so much media attention. Petraeus understandably wanted us to see this development.

I went to Iraq to gain a firsthand view of the progress in this difficult war, not to celebrate any victories. No one has been more critical of sunny progress reports that defied realities in Iraq. In 2003, after my first visit, I argued for more troops to provide the security necessary for political development. I disagreed with statements characterizing the insurgency as a “few dead-enders” or being in its “last throes.” I repeatedly criticized the previous search-and-destroy strategy and argued for a counterinsurgency approach: separating the reconcilable population from the irreconcilable and creating enough security to facilitate the political and economic solutions that are the only way to defeat insurgents. This is exactly the course that Petraeus and the brave men and women of the American military are pursuing.

The new political-military strategy is beginning to show results. But most Americans are not aware because much of the media are not reporting it or devote far more attention to car bombs and mortar attacks that reveal little about the strategic direction of the war. I am not saying that bad news should not be reported or that horrific terrorist attacks are not newsworthy. But news coverage should also include evidence of progress. Whether Americans choose to support or oppose our efforts in Iraq, I hope they could make their decision based on as complete a picture of the situation in Iraq as is possible to report.

Be sure to read the entire op-ed here.

Hat Tip: California Conservative. <):)

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With the bills in the House and Senate regarding funding of the troops in the supplemental and setting a timeline for withdrawal going to conference to be passed eventually and forwarded to the president for his signature, which will be a veto, it’s beginning to look as though the Senate is thinking of blinking on the timeline and the threat by Sen. Reid and Sen. Feingold to defund the troops completely.

Top Senate Democrats on Sunday appeared to reject their leader’s suggestion that lawmakers set a date for cutting funds off for U.S. troops in Iraq, even as they prepare for a veto from President Bush on a supplemental spending bill that sets a timetable for withdrawal.

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin, D-Mich., said he would not back a plan — to be introduced this week by Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., and already endorsed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid — to cut off money for the Iraq war effort by March 31, 2008. That’s the same date Democrats included in the emergency supplemental spending bill as a target withdrawal for all combat forces.

“We’re not going to vote to cut funding, period,” Levin said. “But what we should do, and we’re going to do, is continue to press this president to put some pressure on the Iraqi leaders to reach a political settlement.”

“Nothing — nothing — will stand in our way of supporting the troops in every way,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., acknowledging that President Bush is likely to veto the $122 billion legislation currently on the table.

If that veto happens, Schumer told FOX News, “We will try to come up with a way, by talking with the White House, trying to compromise with the White House, that both supports the troops and yet changes the strategy in Iraq, which we feel is misguided.”

You know, it seems to me they should have tried talking to the White House before passing their ill-conceived supplemental bills, but I’m just an ordinary citizen.

Then I get confused when I read this part:

The House and Senate are still trying to work out discrepancies in their versions of the legislation to be sent up for a presidential veto. The Senate bill would require a U.S. troop exit to begin within 120 days, with a completion goal of March 31, 2008. The House bill would order all combat troops out by Sept. 1, 2008.

Regardless of either scenario, Bush has said he will reject it. Both chambers have enough votes to sustain a veto, which means lawmakers will have to go back to the drawing board. Meanwhile, military officials claim they need additional funding before late April to avoid adding to strain on troops in the field and preparing for deployment.

The new bill language by Feingold, one of the most ardent anti-war Democrats in Congress, says no funds “appropriated or otherwise made available under any provision of law may be obligated or expended to continue the deployment in Iraq of members of the United States Armed Forces after March 31, 2008.”

But Schumer said the Reid-Feingold bill doesn’t call for a complete defunding of the troops.

“It calls for continued funding even after March of 2008, which is a year from now, for three missions: Counterterrorism, which is what the original mission was to always be, protecting our forces and retraining Iraqis,” Schumer said.

“We are not going to leave the troops high and dry, plain and simple. Senator Reid has said that. I’ve said that. Every leader of the Democratic Party has said that,” Schumer said.

But finding Democratic support for Feingold’s bill may not be easy. The Democratic supplemental legislation passed 51-47 on almost a straight party line. But already Sen. Ken Salazar, D-Colo., who supported the timetable, has said he won’t back cutting off funding for U.S. forces.

“I do not believe that we can or should cut funding for our troops in Iraq or Afghanistan while we anticipate that our troops will be in harm’s way,” Salazar wrote in a letter sent to Bush and key Senate Democrats. The letter also urges implementation of recommendations made by the Iraq Study Group. They include setting a date for withdrawal.

Levin said that while Senate Democrats will largely continue to support funding the troops, he will insist that President Bush live up to his goal of insisting the Iraqi government reach benchmarks for reconciliation.

“We’re very strong in supporting the troops, but we’re also strong on putting pressure on the Iraqi leaders to live up to their own commitments. Without that political settlement on their part, there is no military solution,” Levin said. “We can keep the benchmarks part of the bill without saying that the troops must begin to come back within four months.

The part I highlighted is the part that confuses me. All legislation with divided government, especially, is usually some kind of compromise. I guess we’ll have to see what comes out in the (eye) wash.

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From Today’s Townhall column by Paul Greenberg

“The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken away. Then she runneth and cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple, whom Jesus loved, and saith unto them, They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and we know not where they have laid him.

“And when she had thus said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni;which is to say, Master.”

-From the Gospel according to John

I’ve become an old woman now, and it all makes a kind of sense to me, the way a joke does when it finally dawns on you, and you have to laugh out loud. Of course! Everything falls into its absurd, magnificent place in a blinding flash, like fireworks exploding out of the pitch-black sky, sending pattern after pattern high above and all around, ever closer and closer, and you’re a child again who’s never seen anything so beautiful or overwhelming.

What a solemn fool I was, don’t you know? I was expecting the worst, of course. As we all were, I suppose. Oh, we of little faith! Or else we wouldn’t have believed the worst when actually the best was at hand. The worst, we are always prepared to believe. The best takes faith.

Some more tea, dear? Yes, it is good. Orange pekoe, I think they call it, delicate but with sweet undertones, it says on the box, whatever that means. I myself have no idea. But I used to believe that sort of thing-that one could go by the label, by outward things.

That’s why I’d read the script so wrong that first Easter. I was all set to see a tragedy, you see, and instead it turned out to be a comedy, the grandest and most glorious of comedies, complete with the happiest of endings.

That’s the way it was with me, anyway, that Sunday morning. The sadness, the awfulness of it I understood instinctively. I’d been prepared for it by the kind of life I’d led. I knew what men were like, what life was like, and that neither ends well. I’d swallowed every cliche: Don’t get your hopes up, promises are made to be broken, never give a sucker an even break . . . and all the rest.

I was perfectly prepared for how bad Good Friday would be, but Easter Sunday? My dear, that was quite beyond me. How could I have understood? You might as well have tried to describe sight to the blind, music to the deaf, belief to the cynical. My reality was limited to the evidence of things seen, the substance of things feared.

The empty tomb should have been proof of hope; I saw it only as cause for despair.

So when I saw the gardener-for who else could he be?-I wept and wailed and pleaded. I wanted to wallow in my grief; that was one thing I thought no one could take from me. I held on to it like a treasure.

Then I heard my name. How puzzling: How could the gardener have known me? That’s when I turned. And I realized who had spoken to me, and who The Gardener was, and the whole, fake world was gone, the curtain lifted, the night shattered forever as the sun rose Easter morning. He had risen.

Funny how all you need is to be called by your right name and turn. You have to turn, you know. So you can really see. Only then does everything fall into place.

Surely you’ve felt that way when you’ve been in love, wanting only to serve the other, asking for nothing else, knowing it to be the purest happiness. This was like that, only forever.

More tea, dear? No? Perhaps something stronger? I’d join you in a sherry, but I don’t need it. I’ve been intoxicated with life and love ever since that moment when it hit me. The gardener! My dear, I had no idea.

I copied it in its entirety hoping I don’t get arrested for using his complete work, but it’s such a nice story I just had to share it with all of you.

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The Resurrection

1 But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb bringing the spices which they had prepared.

2 And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb,

3 but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.

4 While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men suddenly stood near them in dazzling clothing;

5 and as the women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, “Why do you seek the living One among the dead?

6 “He is not here, but He has risen Remember how He spoke to you while He was still in Galilee,

7 saying that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.”

8 And they remembered His words,

9 and returned from the tomb and reported all these things to the eleven and to all the rest.

10 Now they were Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James; also the other women with them were telling these things to the apostles.

11 But these words appeared to them as nonsense, and they would not believe them.

12 But Peter got up and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen wrappings only; and he went away to his home, marveling at what had happened.

The Road to Emmaus

13 And behold, two of them were going that very day to a village named Emmaus, which was, about seven miles from Jerusalem.

14 And they were talking with each other about all these things which had taken place.

15 While they were talking and discussing, Jesus Himself approached and began traveling with them.

16 But their eyes were prevented from recognizing Him.

17 And He said to them, “What are these words that you are exchanging with one another as you are walking?” And they stood still, looking sad.

18 One of them, named Cleopas, answered and said to Him, “Are You the only one visiting Jerusalem and unaware of the things which have happened here in these days?”

19 And He said to them, “What things?” And they said to Him, “The things about Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word in the sight of God and all the people,

20 and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered Him to the sentence of death, and crucified Him.

21 “But we were hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel. Indeed, besides all this, it is the third day since these things happened.

22 “But also some women among us amazed us. When they were at the tomb early in the morning,

23 and did not find His body, they came, saying that they had also seen a vision of angels who said that He was alive.

24 “Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just exactly as the women also had said; but Him they did not see.”

25 And He said to them, “O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken!

26 “Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into His glory?”

27 Then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures.

28 And they approached the village where they were going, and He acted as though He were going farther.

29 But they urged Him, saying, “Stay with us, for it is getting toward evening, and the day is now nearly over.” So He went in to stay with them.

30 When He had reclined at the table with them, He took the bread and blessed it, and breaking it, He began giving it to them.

31 Then their eyes were opened and they recognized Him; and He vanished from their sight.

32 They said to one another, “Were not our hearts burning within us while He was speaking to us on the road, while He was explaining the Scriptures to us?”

33 And they got up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem, and found gathered together the eleven and those who were with them,

34 saying, “The Lord has really risen and has appeared to Simon.”

35 They began to relate their experiences on the road and how He was recognized by them in the breaking of the bread.

Other Appearances

36 While they were telling these things, He Himself stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be to you.”

37 But they were startled and frightened and thought that they were seeing a spirit.

38 And He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts?

39 “See My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself; touch Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.”

40 And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His feet.

41 While they still could not believe it because of their joy and amazement, He said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?”

42 They gave Him a piece of a broiled fish;

43 and He took it and ate it before them.

44 Now He said to them, “These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.”

45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures,

46 and He said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day,

47 and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.

48 “You are witnesses of these things.

49 “And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.”

The Ascension

50 And He led them out as far as Bethany, and He lifted up His hands and blessed them

51 While He was blessing them, He parted from them and was carried up into heaven.

52 And they, after worshiping Him, returned to Jerusalem with great joy,

53 and were continually in the temple praising God.

Luke Chapter 24 New American Standard Bible

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