Iraq and The Race For 2008 (Monday's First Hour)

Hi everybody. Hope you had a nice weekend. We begin tonight on the topic of Iraq and Anderson intros us into a Dana Bash piece on the current political situation. Democrats are using their new power to ratchet up the pressure on bringing the troops home and republicans are digging in their heels. In an unexpected move to some (though not me) Nancy Pelosi is dissing her number two guy, Steny Hoyer, and putting her support behind John Murtha for majority leader. She says it's because of his position on the war and that may be, but I'm guessing that rumor that she and Hoyer don't get along has something to do with it too. After this we have a Candy Crowley piece on the 2008 race. McCain seems to have his eye on the prize, but his war stance might hurt him. You see, while everyone else wants to bring the troops home, he actually wants to send more over there. I can sort of understand where he's coming from, but what I don't get is where he thinks these troops are going to come from. Adding 10,000-20,000 would do nothing. He has to know that. To have a shot at change we'd probably need to add 100,000-200,000 and unless we're hiding a bunch of troops somewhere I don't know about we just don't have them. If we did, the men and women we have out there now wouldn't be getting back door drafted.

On now to Michael Ware live and he informs us that the Iraqi government is once again being pressured to disband the militias, but of course nothing happens because the militias have power in the government. It is not looking good for Maliki, y'all. I'd say we should place our bets, but, I don't know, too morbid?

Transitioning back to politics we have a round table with Candy, John King, and Marcus Mabry of Newsweek. Candy says that John McCain is definitely running and John thinks he's comfortable in his maverick position. Okay, dudes, he is not a maverick! A maverick would not give a speech at Liberty University to get in good with the Christian Right. A maverick would not have kept quiet when Bush stuck a signing statement on the torture legislation. A maverick would not have supported Bush after what he did to him and his family in the 2000 primary. It's funny because I used to have a lot of respect for McCain, but not anymore. He wants to be president and he'll do anything to get there. He just happens to know how to work the media and sorry, but some of you guys are highly workable. Marcus thinks that McCain is in a good place with his Iraq stance because by 2008 we'll have lost in Iraq and he can say I told you so. Geez, Marcus. Why do you hate America? Then Marcus cites a Newsweek poll that found 78% of Americans are concerned the democrats will pull out of Iraq too quickly and Marcus takes this to mean people already have buyer's remorse. Oh WTF? Yeah, buyer's remorse before they even take over. Are you sure you work for Newsweek? I mean, CNN people were JUST talking about how Bush is the commander in chief and democrats don't have a whole lot of ways to influence Iraq policy and now I'm suppose to believe they alone have the power to pull out too early. Is anybody else dizzy?

Next up we have a Bill Schneider piece with more 2008 talk. Apparently Rudy Giuliani has offically thrown his hat in the ring. He's got a tough road ahead in his own party though because conservatives do not like his stance on social issues. On the other side of the aisle Russ Feingold has broken my political heart by deciding not to run. He was my guy! Now I need a new guy. Not Hillary. Maybe Gore or Edwards. Not Hillary. Maybe even Obama, though I wish he had more experience. Not Hillary. After the piece we have Bill live and The Gerg in studio. The Gerg says that Giuliani is the sentimental favorite because of 9-11, but beyond that he really has nothing to run on. This may be unpopular, but I never got all the hoopla over Rudy's leadership during 9-11. I didn't see anything spectacular and I'm pretty sure anybody else in the same situation would have done the same thing, which was essentially to walk around on camera a lot and look strong. I'm not saying he didn't do stuff behind the scenes, but people loved him for the strong walking. Bill mentions that Mitt Romney has really set himself up for a run after moving to the right a bit. David thinks at this stage charism is one of the main things that matters. That's so sad. I don't care if my guy is dull as a rock as long as he's on the right side of the issues and capable of running the country-hence my support of the dull rock that is Kerry.

Moving on to a John King piece on how the Bush 41 presidency seems to be taking over for Bush the younger. The 41 people have had a lot of access, except in the Pentagon, I guess due to Rumsfeld being a jerk to everyone. Basically no one really knows exactly what's going on with the Bush senior/junior relationship, but I'll tell you this: they've got issues, people. Big issues. Next up we have a Joe Johns piece that's pretty mind boggling. So apparently, along with everything else, we're being misled about the number of wounded troops. It's generally reported that there are approximately 20,000 injured troops from the war, but what they don't tell you is troops who suffer non hostile wounds are not counted. They're also not eligible for the purple heart and in the piece we meet a member of the military who lost his leg while working on a ship. He now goes uncounted. And to make this all much worse, all troops that are evacuated due to illness are also not counted. These number approximately 21,000. 21,000! I wish I knew the total number of troops that have been deployed there because I'd like to know what percentage are getting so sick. I'm wondering if deplete uranium is a factor. Anyway, so the new grand total of troops that are wounded or ill is about 50,000. About a year of so after the war started I began seeing whispers on blogs that the Pentagon was fudging the numbers, but those claims were usually smacked down pretty quick. I guess they were right all along. Sickening.

Our last piece tonight is from Sanjay Gupta and he takes us to medic training. In battlefield medicine there is what is known as the golden hour, which is the time they shoot for from the point of injury to the operating table. The training we're show is pretty intense and it's done in just 16 weeks. Amazing. In civilian society that would take a lot longer. The Shot tonight is a video from youtube of a chimp doing the news in Japan. Anderson takes the opportunity to slam MSNBC who he thinks might be looking for new similar programming. I guess going after Faux is getting too easy. It's funny how The Shot seems to always be from youtube lately. I'm imagining the 360 team just hanging out watching youtube all day. Good show tonight, specifically the Joe Johns piece. I went back and forth on whether I'd blog the second hour and I finally decided to take notes, so hopefully I'll have time tomorrow to get it up. The special bumps the grade up to an A-

Screencaps by stillife.

So what are your thoughts on the 41/43 relationship? Daddy issues? Also, how shocking was that Joe Johns piece?