Casualty of the Surge

The Republican nominee for President, John McCain has asserted that he “would rather lose an election than lose a war.” He may lose an election, in part, because he helped win a war. McCain staked his presidential prospects on a major change in Iraq policy: more troops implementing the Petraeus counterinsurgency strategy. The American public [...]

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The ‘Unthinkable’ in Afghanistan

The current situation is Afghanistan requires higher levels of troop deployments there. Meanwhile, U.S. military leaders are looking to leverage Afghan tribal leaders to help drive out Taliban elements, similar to the uprising that pacified Anbar province in Iraq. Violence around the country has been on the rise. U.S. and NATO forces have been engaged [...]

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Crash Comparison

This isn’t really a post… more like a 1/2-post, I suppose. I was reading up on the current market situation when I stumbled across a chart from CalculatedRisk describing the current market situation in comparison to other crashes in the past. Wow.
Comparing Stock Market Crashes

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Uncle Obama?!

It appears that children halfway across the world are living on a completely different planet than the children in our backyards. Through an article by Khalid Kheshgi from Today’s The News (International) which was cited by Blake Hounshell on FP Passport, I found out that children between the ages of 10-13 in Pakistan were raising [...]

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On my usual topic…

The last time I checked in on our Somali pirate friends, they were threatening to blow up the tank-laden ship they’ve been holding hostage (link). So, whats the news on that situation? Well, the pirates decided not to sink the ship after their demands apparently prompted the owners of the ship to enter into negotiations [...]

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US Invades Syria?

According to Sana, a Syrian news agency claims that four United States helicopters entered a small Syrian town near the Iraqi border and carried out a raid which left eight people dead, including four children.
According to the article, the US is ‘investigating’ to determine if such an attack was indeed carried out.
A US military spokesman [...]

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Iraq Cabinet on US Pact

Iraqi officials in the cabinet have been delaying in giving a final decision on the US Pact which is the agreement currently keeping the continuity of US troop operations in Iraq. On Tuesday, much to the Bush administration’s dismay, the cabinet announced that they wanted changes made to the draft agreement. It appears that the [...]

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The 45th President . . . President Palin

McCain and the politics of mortality – Politico.com Print View
Think Palin is Irrelevant?
In a story posted by Politico, the chances of McCain dying in office before the end of his second term are pretty high. The website points to actuarial tables that predict a 1 in 3 chance (33%) of a man of McCain’s age [...]

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McCain Full of Hot Air

McCain Says He’s Tested and Ready for a Crisis – The Caucus Blog – NYTimes.com
According to this article, in a statement last week or so Vice-Presidential candidate Joe Biden said that President Obama would certainly face an international crisis within the first six months of his presidency. McCain immediately jumped at the chance to attack [...]

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CFR Report Calls for New Nuclear Deterrence Strategy

Deterring nuclear war by threat of mutual assured destruction is largely irrelevant to efforts to prevent one of the greatest threats facing the United States and the world, the use of nuclear weapons by terrorist groups. Efforts to prevent nuclear terrorism have aimed primarily to cut it off at the source by stopping terrorists from [...]

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