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US strikes inside Pakistain 'intolerable', says Gilani
Today's Headlines
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Page 6: Politix
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Home Front: Politix
Obamas choose Quaker school for daughters
President-elect Barack Obama and his wife have chosen private Sidwell Friends School in Washington for their two daughters.

A spokeswoman for Michelle Obama, Katie McCormick Lelyveld, says the Obamas considered several schools for 10-year-old Malia and 7-year-old Sasha but decided Sidwell Friends was the best fit.

Sidwell Friends is a private Quaker school in northwest Washington that Chelsea Clinton attended.

The family also looked at Georgetown Day, which was founded in 1945 and was an early pioneer in integration.
Posted by: 3dc || 11/21/2008 18:04 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Why would the Obamas(peace upon them) want to send their girls to a place where they might mingle with full blooded black people?
Posted by: Carbon Monoxide || 11/21/2008 18:17 Comments || Top||

#2  Not gonna hear much Jerimiah Wright there. Kid's are gonna suffer.
Posted by: Hellfish || 11/21/2008 18:49 Comments || Top||

#3  How very civilized.
Posted by: Besoeker || 11/21/2008 18:59 Comments || Top||

#4  Bad link, Visitor.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 11/21/2008 19:15 Comments || Top||

#5  Ag...! Werks vir my. Try again Gromji.
Posted by: Besoeker || 11/21/2008 19:24 Comments || Top||

#6  Wow, hot chicks from 1912. Cross-dressing too!
Posted by: Scooter McGruder || 11/21/2008 20:14 Comments || Top||

#7  Not all Friends think alike as some would have you believe.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 11/21/2008 21:40 Comments || Top||


Obama Disillusionment Watch #6: useful idiots discover they've outlived their usefulness
"JammieWearingFool"

Hope, change and whining. The election is over 16 days now and all the promises of a shiny new progressive world haven't yet materialized. It's one thing to pander to the far left, but when it comes time to actually be president, Barack Obama at least realizes stocking his cabinet with nutroots darlings isn't the way to go.

Look, there are a lot of talented progressives who could be in an Obama cabinet. Joseph Stiglitz is a Nobel Prize-winner in economics and a critic of corporate globalization. He should be Treasury Secretary. Senator Russ Feingold is a champion of civil liberties. He should be Attorney General. . . .

And if Obama really wanted change, if he really wanted to honor progressives who backed him early on and then did the grunt work against McCain, he’d nominate Dennis Kucinich as Secretary of State.

That sure would indicate a welcome departure from empire as usual.

But at this point, progressives are getting absolutely nothing from Obama.

No wonder all he's taking from these idiots is their money. Seriously, Dennis Kucinich as Secretary of State? Good grief.
Posted by: Mike || 11/21/2008 08:53 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Denny wouldn't be a bad choice for Secretary of Unicorns and Rainbows, though.
Posted by: Cornsilk Blondie || 11/21/2008 9:34 Comments || Top||

#2  They fall for that old gag every time.
Posted by: bigjim-ky || 11/21/2008 10:49 Comments || Top||

#3  he's a politician
whats the 1st rule of a politician again?
Posted by: Albert Spusotch7979 || 11/21/2008 10:50 Comments || Top||

#4  I thought Dennis K was going to be Secretary of the Department of Peace.
Posted by: Lampedusa Shavique7878 || 11/21/2008 10:52 Comments || Top||

#5  if the stories, after the primary, on NPR, are to be believed ... Dennis should be secretary of hot necking on stage during breaks.

Posted by: 3dc || 11/21/2008 12:00 Comments || Top||

#6  Simply proves some wimin will do anything to escape England. I wonder if he's finally said 'yes' to matching tongue studs.
Posted by: Besoeker || 11/21/2008 12:25 Comments || Top||

#7  Starting to seem like it is the conservatives who are more likely to give the guy a chance than his own base.

Hey goofballs we tried to tell you; is waking up the day after a wet dream...messy?
Posted by: swksvolFF || 11/21/2008 12:26 Comments || Top||

#8  She clearly thought the was a leprechaun.

She is a cute on though. Gotta give Dennis props there.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 11/21/2008 17:12 Comments || Top||

#9  Obama is only doing to limosine liberals what they have been doing to Blacks for many decades: ignore them until election time; then tell them how much you love them.

P.S. I nominate Dennis as Ambassador to Another Planet.
Posted by: Frozen Al || 11/21/2008 17:25 Comments || Top||


''Uncle Ted'' Delivers Senate Swansong
"Uncle Ted" Stevens, an old-style Senate giant and the chamber's longest-serving Republican, delivered his swansong address and yielded the floor for the final time Thursday. He was saluted by his colleagues as a staunch friend and teacher.

Family members and aides wept openly in the gallery as Stevens, who turned 85 this week, spoke of having "no rearview mirror" and looking forward to a time when he might be vindicated. He lost his bid for a seventh term this week after his convictions in federal court on charges of lying about gifts on Senate financial disclosure forms.

"I only look forward and I still see the day when I can remove the cloud that currently surrounds me," Stevens said.

The speech was a poignant coda to a four-decade Senate career that began not 10 years after his home state, Alaska, achieved statehood. It came as the 110th Congress finished business with a sizable caucus of senators over age 80 whose regard for each other transcended their party affiliation.

Perhaps a quarter of the Senate filed into the chamber to hear the speech, with Republican Leader Mitch McConnell turning his chair all the way around to face Stevens. Those gathered in the galleries and on the Senate floor gave the outgoing senator a standing ovation, a violation of Senate custom. But no one objected.

"More than anyone else, you have taught me the meaning of representing my state," said another retiring senior senator, Pete Domenici, R-N.M., 76.
Posted by: Fred || 11/21/2008 00:00 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  He was saluted by his colleagues as a staunch stench.

There, corrected.
Posted by: Besoeker || 11/21/2008 5:36 Comments || Top||

#2  Welcome to the prison debate club, Uncle Ted.
Posted by: ed || 11/21/2008 7:33 Comments || Top||

#3  "I only look forward and I still see the day when I can remove the cloud that currently surrounds me," Stevens said.

He must really believe it to stand up in front of the Senate and say it like that. Kinda raises the question: Is he delusional or innocent?
Posted by: Ebbang Uluque6305 || 11/21/2008 13:59 Comments || Top||

#4  He can bring in OJ Simpson as an advisor since OJ was so successful in his vow to discover who killed his ex.
Posted by: gorb || 11/21/2008 17:11 Comments || Top||

#5  Don;t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out Ted, you sumbitch.
Posted by: OldSpook || 11/21/2008 22:09 Comments || Top||


It is time for Sen. Byrd to retire
HIS friends won't tell him this, so maybe the one guy in West Virginia who is not a fan of Robert C. Byrd should tell him: It is time to retire from the Senate.

Fifty years is enough.

His is a remarkable story. Byrd's rise from the hardscrabble of Sophia in Raleigh County to being a couple of heartbeats from the presidency is a story that should live on at least in West Virginia lore.

After a nice run as Senate Democratic leader, Byrd became the chairman of the appropriations committee. It requires a nimble brain to select exactly where in the $3.2 trillion budget to park the Robert C. Byrd this and the Robert C. Byrd that.

The billion-dollar Byrd brain still works with Swiss-watch precision. He counted noses last week and realized he lacks the votes to remain as chairman.

They told him: It's time.

If I am following the law correctly, a retirement in February, so Byrd can bear witness to the inauguration of the new president on Jan. 20, would allow Gov. Joe Manchin to appoint a Democrat who would then have ample time to establish prowess as an earmarker and be rewarded with an election to a two-year term in 2010.

And the state can rename the state holiday on the day after Thanksgiving "Robert C. Byrd Day" in honor of his birthday.

Whatever it takes.
Posted by: Fred || 11/21/2008 00:00 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Wait! Put the taxidermist on hold, AIG is hiring lobbyists.
Posted by: Besoeker || 11/21/2008 6:03 Comments || Top||

#2  Who's been seen last in public - Byrd or Kimme?
Posted by: Procopius2k || 11/21/2008 9:20 Comments || Top||

#3  I can see it now. The band playing, the crowd on it's feet, as the old man rises from his wheelchair to wave to his fans as they raise his Exalted Cyclops sheet to the rafters at the Klan Hall of Fame...
Posted by: tu3031 || 11/21/2008 12:42 Comments || Top||


Kerry poised to cap long journey
More than three decades after he first appeared before the panel as a 27-year-old Vietnam veteran-turned-antiwar protester, Senator John F. Kerry will be named chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, giving him enormous influence over President-elect Barack Obama's foreign policy, according to congressional officials. He will be handed the gavel when the new Congress convenes in January, replacing Vice President-elect Joe Biden.
Posted by: Fred || 11/21/2008 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  ....giving him enormous influence over President-elect Barack Obama's foreign policy.

Yes, yes, yes of course.
Posted by: Besoeker || 11/21/2008 6:06 Comments || Top||

#2  The adults have abandoned the field. On the other hand, we can expect State Dept SOP to include "raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, cut off limbs, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in a fashion reminiscent of Jenjis Khan ... ." It may be an improvement.
Posted by: ed || 11/21/2008 7:38 Comments || Top||

#3  Senator John F. Kerry will be named chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee...

Note to Liveshot - this means you'll actually have to show up to your job now.
Posted by: Raj || 11/21/2008 8:16 Comments || Top||

#4  It's the consolation prize 'cause he's not going to be Secretary of State.
Posted by: Mike || 11/21/2008 9:56 Comments || Top||

#5  I wonder if the Globe had to go out and get new kneepads when he was reelected or if Jawn went out and bought some for them himself?
Posted by: tu3031 || 11/21/2008 14:40 Comments || Top||

#6  But was it a magic cap.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 11/21/2008 18:48 Comments || Top||

#7  Okay, I'll say what you're all thinking....


Better the Messiah than that idiot.
Posted by: .5MT || 11/21/2008 18:54 Comments || Top||


Round 1: Pelosi Bags a Dingell
The first round of a rare committee chairmanship fight in the U.S. House is over, with Henry Waxman, who is seeking to grab the powerful Energy and Commerce gavel from John Dingell, winning a vote of the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee, 25-22. The outcome is hardly final, and Dingell will now appeal the matter to the full Democratic caucus, which will probably vote tomorrow.

Waxman's initial victory, however, is noteworthy because the Steering and Policy Committee, which makes formal recommendations to the whole caucus on committee assignments, is packed with Speaker Nancy Pelosi's loyalists. Pelosi has been publicly neutral in the Waxman-Dingell contest, but there are plenty of reasons to suspect she's with Waxman -- and may have even encouraged him to run. His win in what is essentially her committee will only fuel these suspicions.

Still, it's entirely possible that the whole caucus will reverse the Steering and Policy verdict tomorrow. Chairmanship fights are rare, particularly on the Democratic side, because of the primacy of the seniority system. The last successful challenge on the Democratic side (until now, perhaps) came in 1985, when Illinois' Mel Price, well into his 80's and suffering from Parkinson's Disease, was pushed aside as Armed Services chairman by party leaders and replaced by Les Aspin, who won a narrow vote of the full caucus to leapfrog a more senior member.

With the full caucus vote nearing, Dingell's side has been aggressively portraying Waxman's challenge as a threat to the seniority system, calculating that Democrats with multiple terms under their belts will think twice before ousting a committee chairman if it could lead to their own seniority being ignored down the road. There are indications that this strategy has worked particularly well with the Congressional Black Caucus, which includes many long-tenured House members from safe districts whose main avenue to power within the House is the seniority system.
Posted by: Fred || 11/21/2008 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Didn't the Dems run on a platform of bipartisan inclusion in 06'?
I'm still waiting for them to do something bipartisan. Oh, wait, they did vote on their salary increase didn't they? That was prolly pretty bipartisan.
Posted by: bigjim-ky || 11/21/2008 11:00 Comments || Top||

#2  Fill your left pockets with shot, your right with powder. On my command, 20 paces, turn and commence firing. May the best SOB democrat win!
Posted by: Besoeker || 11/21/2008 11:40 Comments || Top||

#3  First, a the democratic congress punts on providing support for automakers, presumeably going on vacation. Then they yank Dingell's commerce committee chair.

Wonder how this is playing in Michigan.
Posted by: DoDo || 11/21/2008 14:36 Comments || Top||

#4  Michigan is counting on the Federal teat. It'll play fine.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 11/21/2008 15:12 Comments || Top||

#5  And they'll get it only if they pretend to be happy with what Beverly Hills wants them to do.
Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain || 11/21/2008 21:46 Comments || Top||

#6  I'm sure Beverly Hills knows a lot more than the rest of us about how to make an energy industry, after all, their great-grandparents made fortunes in it.
Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain || 11/21/2008 21:51 Comments || Top||

#7  They want Dingelll out of the way -- because he puts automakers first over environmentalists.
Posted by: OldSpook || 11/21/2008 22:03 Comments || Top||



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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.

Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.

Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has dominated Mexico for six years.
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Meet the Mods
In no particular order...
Steve White
Seafarious
tu3031
badanov
sherry
ryuge
GolfBravoUSMC
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trailing wife
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Two weeks of WOT
Fri 2008-11-21
  US strikes inside Pakistain 'intolerable', says Gilani
Thu 2008-11-20
  U.S. Dronezap Kills 6 Terrs in Pakistain
Wed 2008-11-19
  Indian Navy destroys Somali pirate mothership
Tue 2008-11-18
  B.O. vows to exit Iraq, shut down Gitmo
Mon 2008-11-17
  Pirates take Saudi supertanker off Mombasa
Sun 2008-11-16
  Lankan Army seizes entire west coast from LTTE
Sat 2008-11-15
  Al-Shabaab closes in on Mog
Fri 2008-11-14
  U.S. missiles hit Pak Talibs, 12 dead
Thu 2008-11-13
  Somali pirates open fire on Brit marines. Hilarity ensues.
Wed 2008-11-12
  Philippines ship, 23 crew seized near Somalia
Tue 2008-11-11
  EU launches anti-piracy mission off Somalia
Mon 2008-11-10
  Somali gunnies kidnap two Italian nuns
Sun 2008-11-09
  Boomerette hits emergency room west of Baghdad
Sat 2008-11-08
  Mukhlas, Amrozi and Samudra executed
Fri 2008-11-07
  Pak: 13 dead in dronezap


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