ChasingBlueSky

They are playing on guilt when they do this...guild connected to the way the troops were handled after the disaster that was Vietnam. The politicians and generals all walked away with money can good careers after that, but those kids were treated like shit. It took nearly a decade to even start the recognition and respect those troops deserved and most remember the embarasment of that. Thus, they are playing upon the fears of doing that again. I'm also insulted to beleive that they insult our intleigence by claiming this is a black/white issue....as if no one can comprehend the complexity of what is going on.....nor that it is possible to seperate feelings into different catogories on the same topic. I fully support the troops over there. I am fully against this Administration, its policy and this war. Fuck off to anyone that tells me I can't feel that way. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

I've been reading bits of his book since they were released yesterday. Meanwhile he has been on many news programs talking about how rough he had it back then, how he wanted to resign but couldn't. How is it that he now has the courage to speak out only when he is going to make money from it? What happen to his sense of duty four years ago? After looking around, I finally found one of the blogs talking about it: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/why-didnt-george-tenet-j_b_47226.html _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

I'm currently reading Failed States by Noam Chomsky and he quotes this stat: "From 1998 to 2003 there were 315 suicide attacks worldwide, initially for the most part by the secular Tamil Tigers. Since the US invasion, estimates of suicide bombings in Iraq (where such attacks were virtually unknown before) range as high as 400." He continues: "A study by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) found that "85 percent of Saudi militants who went to Iraq were not on any gov't watchlist, al Qaeda members or Terrorist sympathizers" but were "radicalized almost exclusively by the Coalition invasion." He goes on to explain that Iraq has become the extemist (neo-Salafi) breeding ground and the NSC [redicts that as the conflict in Iraq lessens and targets aroudn the world become higher priority that they will be attacked by individuals trained in Iraq. In fact, the training they get in Iraq will be better than any in the past as they can effectively test their training against Coalition troops. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

I thought it was about democracy in Iraq and a safer US. Isn't that the point of this new surge in troops? _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

Not only that, we are adding fuel to the fire outside Iraq: http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/17151354.htm So... The DC spin machine doesn't add in the primary source of violence in the region and calls it a victory. Meanwhile, the treatment and confinement by the US is providing future generations with even more terrorists. Meanwhile, worldwide terroism has increased: http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/17151354.htm Remind me how this Admin has made the US and World a safer place? If you read part of George Tenet's book, he feels the ultimate goal fo UBL and company is to explode a nuke on US soil. Now thanks to this Administration, they will have more people jaded enough to go extreme and help with those plans. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/news/nation/17134253.htm IRAQ WAR U.S. officials exclude car bombs in touting drop in Iraq violence By Nancy A. Youssef McClatchy Newspapers WASHINGTON - U.S. officials who say there has been a dramatic drop in sectarian violence in Iraq since President Bush began sending more American troops into Baghdad aren't counting one of the main killers of Iraqi civilians. Car bombs and other explosive devices have killed thousands of Iraqis in the past three years, but the administration doesn't include them in the casualty counts it has been citing as evidence that the surge of additional U.S. forces is beginning to defuse tensions between Shiite and Sunni Muslims. President Bush explained why in a television interview on Tuesday. "If the standard of success is no car bombings or suicide bombings, we have just handed those who commit suicide bombings a huge victory," he told TV interviewer Charlie Rose. Others, however, say that not counting bombing victims skews the evidence of how well the Baghdad security plan is protecting the civilian population - one of the surge's main goals. "Since the administration keeps saying that failure is not an option, they are redefining success in a way that suits them," said James Denselow, an Iraq specialist at London-based Chatham House, a foreign policy think tank. Bush administration officials have pointed to a dramatic decline in one category of deaths - the bodies dumped daily in Baghdad streets, which officials call sectarian murders - as evidence that the security plan is working. Bush said this week that that number had declined by 50 percent, a number confirmed by statistics compiled by McClatchy Newspapers. But the number of people killed in explosive attacks is rising, the same statistics show - up from 323 in March, the first full month of the security plan, to 365 through April 24. Overall, statistics indicate that the number of violent deaths has declined significantly since December, when 1,391 people died in Baghdad, either executed and found dead on the street or killed by bomb blasts. That number was 796 in March and 691 through April 24. Nearly all of that decline, however, can be attributed to a drop in executions, most of which were blamed on Shiite Muslim militias aligned with the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Much of the decline occurred before the security plan began on Feb. 15, and since then radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has ordered his Mahdi Army militia to stand down. According to the statistics, which McClatchy reporters in Baghdad compile daily from Iraqi police reports, 1,030 bodies were found in December. In January, that number declined 32 percent, to 699. It declined to 596 February and again to 473 in March. Deaths from car bombings and improvised explosive devices, however, increased from 361 in December to a peak of 520 in February before dropping to 323 in March. In that same period, the number of bombings has increased, as well. In December, there were 65 explosive attacks. That number was unchanged in January, but it rose to 72 in February, 74 in March and 81 through April 24. U.S. officials blame the bombings largely on al-Qaida, which they say is hoping to provoke sectarian conflict by targeting Shiite neighborhoods with massive explosions. Ryan Crocker, who became the U.S. ambassador in Iraq this month, said the bombings are a reaction to the surge of additional U.S. troops into Baghdad. "The terrorists like al-Qaida would make their own surge," Crocker said this week. U.S. officials have said that they don't expect the security plan to stop bombings. "I don't think you're ever going to get rid of all the car bombs," Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said this week. "Iraq is going to have to learn as did, say, Northern Ireland, to live with some degree of sensational attacks." But some think that approach could backfire, with Iraqis eventually blaming the Americans for failing to stop bombings. "To win, the insurgents just have to prove they are not losing," said Denselow, of London's Chatham House. Experts who have studied car bombings say it's no surprise that U.S. officials would want to exclude their victims from any measure of success. Car bombs are almost impossible to detect and stop, particularly in a traffic-jammed city such as Baghdad. U.S. officials in Baghdad concede that while they've found scores of car bomb factories in Iraq, they've made only a small dent in the manufacturing of these weapons. Mike Davis, who recently wrote a history of car bombs, said that once car bombs are introduced into a conflict, they're all but impossible to eradicate. A few people with rudimentary skills can assemble one with massive effect. "They really don't have to be very sophisticated; they just have to be very big," Davis said. Davis said checkpoints are useful in detecting car bombs "until they blow up the checkpoint," and erecting walls is not practically feasible in communities. When U.S. officials proposed building walls around Baghdad's most troubled neighborhoods to fend off car bomb attacks, residents balked, saying the walls would further divide the city along sectarian lines. Bombers also have shown that they can adapt quickly. When the U.S. military blocked off markets to vehicular traffic, bombers wearing explosive vests were able to walk into the areas. Finding a defense against car bombs has fallen to the Joint IED Defeat Organization, a Pentagon task force created in 2003 to find ways to protect U.S. troops from roadside bombs, which remain the No. 1 killer of Americans in Iraq. But car bombs aren't the primary killer of American service members, said Christine Devries, the task force's spokeswoman. Roadside bombs are. --- ABOUT IRAQI CIVILIAN CASUALTIES There are no authoritative statistics on Iraqi civilian casualties. The Iraq Study Group in its report last year found that the Pentagon routinely underreports violence. Other groups have criticized the Iraqi government's statistics as unreliable - a moot point since the government recently stopped releasing comprehensive totals. On Wednesday, the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq chastised the Iraqi government for withholding statistics on sectarian violence. One study, conducted by Johns Hopkins University's Bloomberg School of Public Health and Mustansiriyah University in Baghdad, estimated that 78,000 Iraqis were killed by car bombings between March 2003 and June 2006. Iraq Body Count, which keeps statistics based on news reports, finds that there have been just over 1,050 car bombs that have killed more than one person since August 2003, when a car bomb detonated in front of what was the United Nations headquarters, killing 17. McClatchy gathers its statistics daily from police contacts, and while they're not comprehensive, they're collected the same way every day. A roundup of Iraq violence is posted daily on the McClatchy Washington Bureau Web site, http://www.mcclatchydc.com. Click on Iraq War Coverage _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

There is very little privacy in this country as it is. There is the rhetoric that the administration tosses around. Somedays its about protecting your rights, the other days its about being patriotic and allowing laws to bend to the will of the White House to protect you. In reality, it all comes down to who is looking to make money and will it benefit someone that is in good will of this admin. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

Did all leave at the same time? How many people traveled with them? It is logistically possible to guess that 4 jets were physically needed. Know what the biggest issue with politics and those who follow (and I have been guilty of this)....is the desire to 'score' one against the other side, to get another zinger in, to spin the top one more time and focus more on rhetoric. To make it worse, we have individuals on both sides of the aisle making the situation worse by leading the debate with jokes and insults (Daily Show, Coulter, etc). Not only do both sides buy into their own rhetoric, they use it as a way to debate each other! Meanwhile, no one is held accountable, the rhetoric fails to see a follow through too many times and public policy becomes seperated from what the public wants. I'm tired of it all and I only see it getting worse from here on out. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

Damn, I love this show. They really know what they are doing and using the internet to not only increase hype but expand the characters. And this getting moved to SC is classically funny. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

Interesting in my 4 years of studying Theology I missed that section of the bible. Can I find that special edition somewhere? Was it in the Director's Extended version? In other news, Greedo shot first. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

They gave her more money and she changed her mind. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

My childhood doctor missed mine for years...it wasn't until 5th grade that a school nurse caught it during a physical as I was trying out for the football team. This pissed me off as I was never allowed to play football again in any school. I never did the brace bit because mine is pretty bad and they wanted to put me in something called "the milwaukee torture/brace" or put a bar in my back....both things would have stopped me from being a kid for about 5-6 years (this is all there was in the early 80s). I slightly regret it now with the amount of pain I am in on a daily basis. With Scoliosis what matters is the degree of the curvature and if any other bone issues have come up from this. This will be a factor in the possibility of pain or a number of other issues. Most people never notice mine unless they really look. They can see that my shoulders are not even, nor are my knees, hips, feet, arms. BUT don't panic. If hers is just showing up now it most likely isn't that severe....and severe instances (like mine) is where the real issues come in. However, she should go see a specialist and get checked out right away to make sure there are no possible complications. An MRI may be in order to make sure she doesn't have Spina Bifida Occulta which is a VERY common thing that tends to cause a curve in your spine....even after 15 years of xrays they never noticed that on me until I had a lower back MRI. Once again, if she made it this far without many issues, then she should be fine. But don't let her go without talking to a doctor. I let mine go and it got worse. I have some rather painful medical issues due to mine now and it has taken me out of skydiving due to the level of pain I have in my back every day along with loss of feeling in my legs and a few other issues. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

You may want to check that point blank stuff. I've read a couple accounts where he walked into the doorway of a classroom and just started shooting people from that position. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

He wasn't in a position of power where he can use his staff to meld things to fit his point of view....no graphics, camera angles, raising his volume above everyone else, etc. Also, if he made a fool of himself there....if Letterman destroyed his credibility he could never live it down. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

The murder toll for 2001 was 16,037. 11,348 of these were by firearm. In the U.S. for 2001, there were 29,573 deaths from firearms, distributed as follows by mode of death: Suicide 16,869; Homicide 11,348; Accident 802; Legal Intervention 323; Undetermined 231.(CDC, 2004) This makes firearms injuries one of the top ten causes of death in the U.S. The number of firearms-related injuries in the U.S., both fatal and non-fatal, increased through 1993, but has since declined steadily.(CDC, 2001) However, firearms injuries remain a leading cause of death in the U.S., particularly among youth (CDC, 2004). So, it is ok to implement something like the Patriot Act to lead to less deaths from terrorism in this country....but one of the leading yearly sources of death shouldn't be changed? What I also find interesting is that many that defend the Patriot Act are strong gun rights supporters. Again, I've never taken a side on gun ownership because there are too many issues with both sides. I do however like taking a step back and seeing it from a larger view. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

How is this any different than attending other special interest group functions while in office or while on the campaign trail? Isn't the point to show the people that you are still connected to the population and listen to their concerns? Seems like this is part of Politics 101 to me. On a side note....Sharpton pulling in these candidates is exactly the sort of response he wanted from the whole Imus thing. He flexed his muscle to show he still can have a negative impact when he raises his voice. Candidates will run to him out of fears of what snubbing him would mean. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

I'm not saying anyone should go re-write the foundation of this country. But I did hear this perspective on removing personal freedoms associated with the 2nd.....The Bush admin had no problems pushing thru the Patriot Act with a lot of tag ons to help reduce your personal freedom in the name of saving lives. Around 3000 people died in 2001 from terrorist attacks. I believe the number of gun related deaths in 2001 was over 29000 (I'm sure John Rich or Douva will correct that number if it is off). _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

Or it would prompt more "shoot first, steal after" situations. The reason this is debated so much is because there are too many variables that cannot be controled....on both sides. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

Do those of us that have already had a gun pulled on us get to play? Simple fact....Crime does happen. YOU may not want to be armed to protect yourself, but others do. They have that right, just like you have the right not to be armed. I've had a gun pulled on me and pointed at me. I don't own a gun and my FOID is now expired by choice. I didn't lose money, I didn't get hurt, I'm still here. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

Agreed. This isn't a movie. Shoot outs get ugly, crossfire and friendly fire will happen. Despite the close combat scenario good aiming would still be an issue as well. Communication was poor and those untrained armed students would have been shooting anyone that had a gun in defense of their own life. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

First off, people were going to die on Monday and I'm not sure there was much anyone could have done about it. From there all arguments are hypothetical. I did here this perspective on removing personal freedoms associated with the 2nd.....The Bush admin had no problems pushing thru the Patriot Act with a lot of tag ons to help reduce your personal freedom in the name of saving lives. Around 3000 people died in 2001 from terrorist attacks. I believe the number of gun related deaths in 2001 was over 29000 (I'm sure John Rich or Douva will correct that number if it is off). _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

I can think of 32 people who might disagree. I can think of a few problems with this. Notice comes in that a college age kid is walking around with a handgun killing other students...the info on this shooter is limited but he might be male and tall. How does any member of the assault team know who the kid is? Now they start looking in windows and see nothing but college men with handguns in the entire building....while looking around they see some shooting from inside classroom out into the hallway at something. Meanwhile reports of students getting killed are still coming out from the students that got out of the building (who will all spend the next few days in jail because they had handguns and the need to figure out who was killing and who was doing it in self defence). Meanwhile the order to shoot the killer comes in.....and friendly fire happens to some students. Also, the killer could actually escape alive in this scenario if he kept his face covered and acted like he was only shooting in self defence. Don't forget that there was a lot of panic from these students and they didn't know who the killer was....so on the way out of the building they see another kid with a gun so they shoot first and ask questions later....another friendly fire death. This is really a big 'what if' scenario but for every person that says more guns would have meant less bodies I tend not to agree with them. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

Nah, according to Jack Thompson it was video games that caused the shooting on Monday. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

Didn't say it was the right thing or the logical thing. It was just expected after that sort of tragedy _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....

First off, Fox did the right thing here. They reported news. The medium played it's roll here. News is two things: reporting and showing the impact it has on people. Also, you are claiming to know how this parent should react and how his emotional state should sway in an event like this. In my opinion, that form of judgement can't take place until you can match the experience and emotions. Even then, everyone reacts differently and there will always be someone that responds differently than you. _________________________________________ you can burn the land and boil the sea, but you can't take the sky from me.... I WILL fly again.....