What does “Iraqi freedom” mean?

h/t Ellroon.

Five year progress report

a thousand years of war

or ten thousand?

h/t skippy the bush kangaroo.

An Army of One

(h/t Blue Gal @ Crooks & Liars)

Blackwater

[odeo=http://odeo.com/audio/16869233/view]

(h/t Charles @ Mercury Rising)

Ordinary life is beginning to return?

CNN’s Michael Ware translates (h/t Ellroon @ Rants from the Rookery):

How many more have to die?

Prescient and correct

I like Barack Obama, and I wish he would agree with his colleagues Hillary Clinton and John Edwards that the federal raids on California medical marijuana providers, dispensaries and patients must end.

Hat-tip Corpus Juris @ Watching Those We Chose for the video.

Update: Obama To End Federal Medical Marijuana Raids; Democratic Candidates Now Unanimous

Operation Iraqi Liberation progress, part 2

Steve Benen @ TPM:

Tony Snow told reporters yesterday that the administration has seen “a declining level in the overall pace of attacks” in Iraq.

The reality, of course, is far different.

Attacks in Iraq last month reached their highest daily average since May 2003, showing a surge in violence as President George W. Bush completed a buildup of U.S. troops, Pentagon statistics show.

The data, obtained by Reuters from the Defense Department, showed an upward trend in daily attacks over the past four months, when U.S. and Iraqi forces were ramping up operations against insurgents and militants, including al Qaeda, in Iraq.

Related post:

• Operation Iraq Liberation progress

An unnecessary war, an unhelpful war, an unwinnable war

ABC News:

“I am the mother of the driver of the Bradley you see upside down and burning,” she wrote. “He was 19 years old and could see the futility of Iraq invasion and occupation.”

Another relative of a fallen soldier wrote, “For one moment, we captured the sense of fear, hate, anxiety, stress, depression that befell our beloved one. We miss him. I am so angry, because after all of this — the sacrifice — Bush and his supporters have not moved forward on this.”

There’s video too.

Hat-tip Ellroon @ Rants from the Rookery.

Says the Gray Lady, it’s time to go home

The New York Times:

“It is time for the United States to leave Iraq, without any more delay than the Pentagon needs to organize an orderly exit.”

Hat-tip Kathy Kattenburg.

You can tell metaphors

But reality can push back.

Who do you think best speaks for the American military men and women? Not Fouad Ajami.

Thank you Paul Rieckhoff.

Hat-tip Steve Benen @ TPM.

Iraq did not attack the United States.

NTodd:

You know why this ain’t working? Because Whack-a-Mole is a sucker’s game. Oh, and because WE NEVER SHOULD’VE FUCKING BEEN INVADING AND OCCUPYING ANOTHER COUNTRY IN THE FIRST PLACE.