I am very happy with the foreign policy advisers that Hillary has with her. These are the very people who had us at peace and who won over in Kosovo without a shot fired during the 90’s. So I would suggest all of you who are commenting on Hillary’s advisers, take a look at who’s in there now. Half of the positions are vacant and the other half are useless.

bwall

So here are the names on Hillary’s list of foreign policy advisers:

Madeleine K. Albright, President Clinton’s secretary of state and now chairperson of the National Democratic Institute, foreign policy adviser
Samuel “Sandy I put it in my pants” R. Berger, President Clinton’s national security adviser and now a principal at business consultancy Stonebridge, foreign policy adviser
Lt. Gen. Daniel William Christman, a former West Point superintendent and now senior vice president for international affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, foreign policy adviser
Gen. Wesley K. Clark, President Clinton’s Kosovo commander and now a Democratic fundraiser, endorsed Sen. Clinton Sept. 15
John H. Dalton, President Clinton’s Navy secretary and now president of the Financial Services Roundtable’s Housing Policy Council, veterans and military retirees for Hillary
Lee Feinstein, a deputy in President Clinton’s State Department, national security coordinator
Leslie H. Gelb; president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, a former New York Times correspondent and a former State and Defense Department official, informal adviser
Richard C. Holbrooke, President Clinton’s UN ambassador and broker of the Dayton Peace Accords (and now a Washington Post columnist), foreign policy adviser
Martin S. Indyk, President Clinton’s ambassador to Israel and now director of Brookings’s Saban Center for Middle East Policy, foreign policy adviser
Gen. John M. (”Jack”) Keane, a former Army vice chief of staff who co-crafted the Iraq “surge” and is now a military analyst (sometimes for ABC news), military issues adviser
Lt. Gen. Claudia J. Kennedy, former deputy chief of staff for intelligence, veterans and military retirees for Hillary
Lt. Gen. Donald L. Kerrick, President Clinton’s deputy national security adviser, organizes meetings of retired officers
Vali Nasr, Naval Postgraduate School professor, Middle East adviser
Michael O’Hanlon, Brookings senior fellow and former Congressional Budget Office defense and foreign policy analyst, supporter
Rep. (and retired Vice Adm.) Joseph Sestak, veterans and military retirees for Hillary
Andrew Shapiro, Sen. Clinton’s Senate foreign policy staffer
Jeffrey H. Smith, former CIA general counsel and now a partner leading the public policy and government contracts group of law firm Arnold & Porter, national security adviser
Strobe Talbott, Brookings president, informal adviser
Togo D. West, President Clinton’s secretary for veterans affairs and former secretary of the Army, veterans and military retirees for Hillary
Former Amb. Joseph C. Wilson IV, the half of the Plamegate couple who criticized the administration for using questionable evidence to promote the Iraq war, endorsed Sen. Clinton July 16

Most of the names on Hillary’s list are Clinton era members of the Washington foreign policy Establishment. Most are hawkish. There are none that represent anything new. A few like Wesley Clark and Joe Wilson are well regarded here (although both are more conservative than most here). A few are real howlers like Gen. Jack Keane who along with Fred Kagan put together the “surge” and, of course, the vacuous Michael O’Hanlon. Indyk cut his teeth at A*P*C. Not sure about some of the others and would be interested in what others have to say about them.

The problem with catholic candidates:

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ST. LOUIS — Roman Catholic Archbishop Raymond Burke, who made headlines last presidential season by saying he’d refuse Holy Communion to John Kerry, has his eye on Rudy Giuliani this year. Giuliani’s response: “Archbishops have a right to their opinion.”

Burke, the Archbishop of St. Louis, was asked by The St. Louis Post-Dispatch if he would deny Communion to Giuliani if the former New York mayor approached him for the sacrament.

“If the question is about a Catholic who is publicly espousing positions contrary to the moral law, and I know that person knows it, yes I would,” the paper quoted the archbishop as responding.

Burke has said of Giuliani: “I can’t imagine that as a Catholic he doesn’t know that his stance on the protection of human life is wrong. If someone is publicly sinning, they should not approach to receive Holy Communion.”

We know the Catholic church is a one trick pony. They sold their soul to the devil over the abortion issue. Lot of good that did them. If Rudy is the Rethugs nominee, I wonder what they are gonna do. It will put them on the spot for sure.

bonkers @ 5

There’s still so far to go in silencing the Noize Machine, but it was quite encouraging to watch Jon Stewart dismantle Chris Mathews the other day.

That is such a clear example of the New Guard taking down the Old Media Guard. Face to face. And notice how childish and completely defenseless Matthews is when challenged. You can almost hear the synapses in his head shorting out, “BBZZZTTT! Does Not Compute!”

Exactly.

It shows just how much they’ve bought into their own crap. Matthews’ capacity for independent thought atrophied decades ago.

Jon’s remarks were clearly well thought out, especially so on his salvo on Matthews new book and IIRC it triggered his desperate meltdown and darting eyes and finally rendered him speechless finally. Simply delicious.

Jon and Keith are a link with sanity for this ole newsbrat. Any updates on the future of Limpballs and O’Reilly going down?

John McCain. You are a Republican boob. Thank you for reminding us about this. I had almost forgotten.

Republican White House hopeful John McCain said Wednesday that President Bush made a mistake after the Sept. 11 terror attacks by encouraging people to shop rather than urging citizens to join the military or volunteer.

“I believe that the big mistake that our leadership of our nation made after 9-11 is we told people to go shopping and we told them to take a trip,” McCain told students at a military prep school in this early voting state.

Bill “William the Bloody” Kristol is backing McCain … no wonder why he wants to bomb Iran .. Max Boot too? … the Republicans sure love to go the extremism route

Actually, I thought what he came up with was that annoying ’step away from the car’ alarm, not the Club.

BTW John Edwards is the only top tier candidate to address the “Blackwater” problem on his web site today.

http://johnedwards.com

BTW here is my newest scandals list entry on Blackwater:

256. Blackwater is the largest private security contractor working in Iraq. It was first hired by Paul Bremer’s CPA in 2003 in a $21 million no bid contract. This was followed by another no bid contract in June 2004 to provide security for State Department (DOS) personnel in Iraq. The no bid contract was let as a matter of urgency but if this was the case, it is unclear why Marines or Special Forces were not used, or why, despite the urgency, there was still time to do a comparative cost analysis of various security contractors before awarding the contract to Blackwater. The no bid contract was eventually shifted to a “competitive” one in May 2006 (actually 3 security contractors were each awarded $1.2 billion). DOS has paid the company $832 million for services in Iraq from 2004 to 2006. In all Blackwater has received over a billion dollars in federal contracts going from $737,000 in 2001 to $593 million in 2006.
It costs 6 times as much to use a Blackwater operative as it does for a US serviceperson or about $445,000 a year. Many of Blackwater’s contractors received their training in the US military.
The DOS has a detailed guide of how Blackwater is supposed to act in potentially threatening situations and how force is to be escalated, but in practice with convoys barreling down roads often the wrong way, these are routinely ignored and maximum force is used first not last. Between January 2005 and April 2007, Blackwater personnel were in 168 incidents involving firearms. In 143 or 85% of them, Blackwater employees fired first. The situation is complicated by the fact that private security contractors are responsible to no one. Just before leaving Iraq in June 2004, Paul Bremer signed Order 17 which placed all contractors outside Iraqi law. As civilians, contractors do not appear to fall under the military’s UCMJ, and federal investigation from the US is difficult and has not been rigorously pursued.
Blackwater first came to national attention on March 31, 2004 when 4 of its contractors were caught in Falluja in unarmored vehicles and killed. Their burned bodies were hung from a bridge. This incident sparked the first siege of Falluja and eventually the destruction of that city later that year.
On June 25, 2005 in al Hillah, Blackwater employees initially tried to cover up the shooting of an innocent bystander, a father of six. In a DOS effort to hush up the incident, the victim’s family was paid $5,000
On November 28, 2005 in Baghdad, a Blackwater commander directed his convoy to randomly collide with 18 vehicles “for no apparent reason”.
On Christmas Eve 2006 in the Green Zone, a drunk Blackwater employee shot and killed a bodyguard of Iraqi vice president Adel Abdul Mehdi. The DOS helped spirit him out of the country within 36 hours of the shooting. His punishment was that he was fired by Blackwater. The DOS also talked down a settlement to the victim’s family from $250,000 to $15,000 arguing that they did not want to set a precedent.
On September 16, 2007, Blackwater employees securing a square in western Baghdad for a second convoy escorting USAID officials (evacuated from a meeting because of a bomb) fired a single shot at a car (for no discernible reason) in a line of traffic some distance from their position. Although the driver had been killed, the car continued to roll forward and Blackwater employees opened up on it and the surrounding area with indiscriminate fire that killed 17 and wounded 24.
Blackwater was also involved in post-Katrina security and was criticized for its heavyhandedness.
The company is owned by Erik Prince a well connected Republican and former Navy Seal. Our country spends more on defense than the rest of the world combined yet essential government security services are being contracted out (at inflated rates) to private armies made up of cowboys and mercenaries. This is not only expensive in monetary terms, but the lack of accountability of these armed and dangerous actors seriously undercuts America’s already precarious position in Iraq. It rings hollow to talk about law and order to Iraqis when high profile security contractors show on a daily basis that they have no use for either.

http://johnedwards.com