Updated from the top. Please treat this as a blog-within-a-blog, come back often, and scroll down till you hit something you saw on your last visit.

• Into Every Life, Some Reid Must Fall
• Your chance to tell a treasonous rat bastard what you think of him
• Harry Reid Declares Iraq War is Lost
• Jon Voight said what?
• Beyond the Surge, The Strategy
• Democrats Would Make Iraq Timetable in Bill 'Advisory'

Click here to see my last previous roundup.

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Into Every Life, Some Reid Must Fall 
Dafydd ab Hugh

Today's lily-livered belly crawling by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Caesar's Palace, 95%), flatly announcing that "this war is lost," should disqualify him from the "leadership" position he now occupies, say I... since he is no longer leading but deserting.

Reid triumphally pronounced defeat in a press conference he called shortly after leaving the White House and his discussion with President Bush. Reid particularly singled out the counterinsurgency strategy -- which of course he belittled as "the surge" -- as having been an abject failure... because there were some big bombings yesterday:

"Now I believe myself ... that this war is lost, and that the surge is not accomplishing anything, as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq yesterday," said Reid, of Nevada....

Well, who could argue with that? I also conclude that, since it was chilly yesterday, therefore global warming is false.

People of at least ordinary intelligence understand that both global warming theory and the counterinsurgency strategy must be evaluated after a reasonably long period of time: ten years or so for the former, six or seven months for the latter. In both cases, a single day is void of meaning.

I have had my suspicions about Reid from the git go. Consider the biography of Harry "Pinky" Reid. ...

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Your chance to tell a treasonous rat bastard what you think of him

An invitation for our troops 
Michelle Malkin

Active-duty military readers and military bloggers: If you'd like to send a message to the treacherous Harry Reid--who just declared the war in Iraq lost today--e-mail me or leave a trackback. I'll reprint/link them here as they come in. Here is Reid's contact form. He really needs to hear from you.  ...

Rejoinder: Appeal For Courage.

Related must-read: ...

I've been home from Nam almost 35 years, so I guess my comments aren't really what Michelle's looking for. Still, 35 years isn't nearly long enough to forget what it feels like to watch your country snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in a war you helped win, a war thousands of your brothers didn't come home from. Let's spit on the graves of a few thousand more dead soldiers, Harry. Hell, why not? They probably didn't vote for you anyway. You sorry son of a syphilitic crack whore, I may not live to piss on your grave but a lot of younger dogs will; the line will stretch for miles. 

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Harry Reid Declares Iraq War is Lost 
Kim Priestap

I'd make a bigger deal out of this if it weren't so predictable:

The war in Iraq "is lost" and a US troop surge is failing to bring peace to the country, the leader of the Democratic majority in the US Congress, Harry Reid, said Thursday. ...

Before Harry Reid proclaims the surge is a failure, maybe he should wait until it's in full swing for a while.

Dan Riehl: Harry Reid Is No Walter Cronkite

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Jon Voight said what?
Michelle Malkin

Radar Magazine sent me a link to a very interesting interview with Jon Voight, the Hollywood actor and father of Angelina Jolie. Here's an excerpt:

You recently visited with wounded troops at Walter Reed. What were your impressions?

I was deeply impressed by them. Most I spoke to were young people, around 20 years old. And they were really very eloquent, very positive, very respectful. You have to be proud of the children we're turning out from looking at this group of people. For me, I would much rather hear from these guys than the people who are presenting the news on television on a daily basis.

Were you able to gauge the mood among the troops—have they lost a sense of mission?

These guys say, well, it's possible to win it. And I'll tell you one thing they said that was very remarkable: the increase in troops that has been recommended by the president, they say anybody who's over there knows the value of backup and we should be behind this. When you're out in that situation in danger, you want to know you've got backup. Only one guy said he wasn't going back to Iraq, and he had been wounded a couple times. But all the other guys wanted to go back. One young woman, a very attractive young woman, had her leg amputated. But she says she's going to find a way to get back into it. She just reupped and she said they would find something for her to do.

Do you think it's possible to win the Iraq War?

Here's what I think: ...

He also talks about left-wing bias in the media, his support for the Patriot Act, and his criticism of Bush hatred. ...

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Beyond the Surge, The Strategy
Greyhawk

(A companion piece to this entry can be read here: Slaughter)

More University Killings?

BAGHDAD - A suicide car bomber killed 12 people outside a Baghdad take-away shop on Thursday, one day after 190 people died in a bombing blitz that brought into question the US-backed security plan for the capital.

The latest bomber blew up his car in the central Jadriyah district -- a majority Shiite area -- killing 12 and wounding 28 and also setting ablaze a nearby truck loaded with gas cylinders, a security official said.

The force of the blast ripped through civilians outside the popular Hassan take-away eatery, where university students had stopped to buy lunch, said a police colonel scrambled to the scene.

One thing generally absent within stories that bring "into question the US-backed security plan for the capital" are any attempts to answer said questions. But explanations of exactly what Coalition Forces are doing are available and unclassified - in the broader details - thus there's no valid reason to leave the reader to conclude that the answer is "nothing".

But for reasons as inexplicable as the motives behind suicide attacks on university students, most reporters are content to do just that.

Kudos to the New York Times (yes, the New York Times) for not leaving that gap in their report on this week's atrocities: ...

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Democrats Would Make Iraq Timetable in Bill 'Advisory' 
By Peter Baker and Jonathan Weisman (H/T: Michelle Malkin)

Congressional Democratic leaders are moving to make their proposed timetable for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq "advisory" as they seek to reconcile two versions of war spending legislation into a single bill that they plan to pass next week, according to several House members.

The compromise language would keep the deadlines included in the original House bill but make them nonbinding, as the Senate version did, and would allow President Bush to waive troop-readiness standards, lawmakers said. Bush has vowed to veto legislation with timetables in it, calling it a schedule of surrender, but Democrats hope to show that they are being flexible and the president rigid by softening the terms. The compromises may cost Democrats votes among antiwar liberals, but they hope to pick up some Republicans.

The haggling between congressional Democrats came as their leaders met at the White House with Bush to try to hash out their dispute. Both sides termed it a polite, productive meeting in which they restated their positions but emerged without an agreement. Democrats promised to send Bush their bill next week. ...