Around The Sphere December 20, 2006
Our linkfest offering readers a menu of posts from sites of varying opinions. Links do not necessarily represent the opinion of TMV or its writers.
What is the Lernaean Hydra and how does it relate to Iraq? The answer is HERE.
What John Edwards Does Over The Break: We’ll give you a hint: it ain’t break dancing. Neil at Ezra Klein has the details. But he also gets into some other interesting areas such as this:
I’m convinced that effectively working the media is mostly a matter of constructing an appealing narrative about your candidate and feeding that narrative relentlessly. People talk about “Teflon candidates” to whom no smears stick, and a big part of that is defining your candidate so strongly that attacks which seek to define your candidate otherwise can’t get traction. While it would’ve been entirely justified to attack Bush for his complete refusal to do anything about North Korea in 2004, he had already defined himself as the candidate of bold foreign policy action with the Iraq War, which made it challenging to tag him with a contrary label.
Read the rest.
A Plan For Victory In Iraq is offered in detail by Darian Wilson at his new blog by the same name. Wilson also works for Stars & Stripes. Is his a good plan or not? We suspect people on all sides will have something to say once they read it…and that’s his point…to offer it as a conversation starter.
Is The Ruling Class And Are The Wise Old Men Angry At Bush? And Why? Thoughts from Atrios.
If You Thought Your Christmas Fruitcake Tasted Had A Weird Vomit Taste HERE’S WHY. (Of course, any high school student will tell you that ALL school lunches taste like vomit..)
Who’s The REAL Time Person Of The Year? HE IS.
The Acclaimed And Needed (especially if you had to wait in line at the DMV) Suicide Hotline Is Threatened…by the federal government again. The government is quietly trying to take over the non-profit groups lines. Read Taylor Marsh’s MUST READ.
Did You Hear The Latest Scandal About (GASP!) Barack Obama’s MIDDLE HAME? Details HERE.
3 Responses to “Around The Sphere December 20, 2006”
thx 4 the link, joe! and congrats on the 2006 weblog award for best centrist blog! glad you beat out that alternative outhouse, if you know what i mean.
Great round-up!
But I have to say, everyone rolling their eyes over the “issue” of Obama’s middle name has forgotten how easy it was to swift-boat John Kerry.
the victory plan seems a bit niaive. Not all Iraqis or foreign jihadists fighting there want the war to end or the US to leave. It’s a recruiting bonanza for them. To allow any significant attack restart the 90 day clock will keep it going forever. “Shock and Awe on a neighborhood level” won’t work either. We never win those. Remember Fallujah? It’s back in their hands and the civilian carnage and kickdown searches further fueled the hatred of US forces.
I also take great umbrage at the “Democrats have no plan” mantra. Here’s the plan:
1. Don’t start wars of aggression
2. Don’t get into open ended wars
3. Have a plan. Execute it. Get out.
Bush wanted the war, lied to get us into it, lambasted everyone who proposed anything but “stay the course” and now these tiny minds want to blame the Dems for not having a formula to get us out? Hogwash!