Wednesday Morning Bullshit

So I'm sitting here, with the news on, and some star-wearing flack says that "the next six to eight months are critical for the war in Iraq" or something like that.

Yeah. How many times have we heard this before? We always seem to be "about to turn the corner" and every other platitude other than "we can see the light at the end of the tunnel."

And them some other (or maybe the same guy) flack says that "attacks are at their lowest level" but then refused to provide any data to back up that assertion.

The Five O'Clock Follies. Different war, same shit.

One thing the "the attacks are down in Baghdad" crowd fail (or refuse) to acknowledge is that for years now, there has been a brutal form of ethnic cleansing going on in Baghdad. As a neighborhood is "cleansed", primarily of Sunnis, the violence in that neighborhood is going to go down once the local militia cements its grip on the neighborhood. That should be relatively evident to anyone with a quarter of a functioning cerebellum and one foot in the real world.

Then the next story was about how the Germans arrested some people for plotting terrorist attacks. For a story that was reporting an imminent threat, there sure seemed to be a lot of "coulds" in the story. They could have done this, they could have done that. Could, could, could.

At least the reporter noted that high-profile charges like this often don't hold up when they proceed to trial.

I am not going to go on, at least now, about Bush's little bit of cock-teasing of "we might be able to bring some troops home soon." First off, it's not the first time he has done this, for when his back is being pressed against the wall about the troop levels, he says 'we can bring some home soon, maybe" and the puppies in the press back off.

Second, Keith Olbermann slammed Bush on this harder than I could. It's worth watching.

And now I'm hearing a story about how the Chinese are pooh-poohing the issue of shoddy quality and poisonous products by dismissing the charges as a salvo in a trade war. Except we know that the Bush Administration fought any move to crack down on the use of lead-based paint on toys.