Paul Ryan performed a phalange-ectomy today on CNN’s State of the Union today, cleaning up comments he made about military leaders lying to Congress about their true opinions on the defense budget.

In a sign of how well things are going in Afghanistan, NATO and US troops are designating guards for any time they come into contact with the Afghan security forces they’re supposed to be training.

I mentioned earlier that Paul Ryan seems to think that the military operates under a kind of Stockholm syndrome. They have fallen in love with their captors in the Obama Administration and have started to happily parrot their thoughts on trims to the military budget. But they don’t really believe in any of it, according to the House Budget Committee chair.

Here’s an almost completely unremarked-upon side effect of the foreclosure fraud settlement: the tax implications. If you are one of the lucky few eligible to receive a principal reduction from the settlement, when the banks aren’t paying off their penalty bulldozing homes and waiving deficiency judgments, you have to reckon with this: because of the expiration of a Congressional law, every dollar you receive in principal reduction would be viewed for tax purposes as income, and thusly taxed. Most of the people needing a principal reduction are in dire financial straits; they wouldn’t need a write-down otherwise. So now, we’re going to hit them with a big tax bill that they can pay for with money they don’t have.

Is war determined by our genetic makeup? Is war an innate part of humans and subsequently of the human condition? Well respected science writer John Horgan says no, and in turning the matter into one of science rather than morality demonstrates that war is more often avoided than engaged in.

Despite widespread reports of abuse and troubling signs of suppressing dissent, the Egyptian military will get their US funding restored, at least in part. The State Department plans to make the announcement today.

Next week, Paul Ryan will introduce the Republican budget, which we already know will set a discretionary spending level roughly $20 billion below the spending cap negotiated in the debt limit deal. We also know that it will include the premium support program for Medicare that would end the guaranteed system in favor of a voucher to seniors to choose between a menu of private plans and traditional Medicare, necessarily weakening the bargaining power of Medicare, the best part of the US health care system in terms of cost control. Now we learn that the budget will also attempt to overrun the defense trigger, replacing the cuts to the defense budget with cuts from elsewhere, mostly to federal employees.

A two-day motion hearing for Pfc. Bradley Manning, accused of releasing classified information to WikiLeaks, is scheduled to conclude today. Three motions involving discovery of evidence, depositions and particular details surrounding the case were deliberated over in court yesterday and Col. Denise Lind, the judge, is expected to rule on those motions. She also is expected to release a calendar for upcoming dates, including when the trial will begin.

The Syrian uprising began one year ago. The Assad regime marked it in two ways. First, with a Potemkin rally in Damascus, with tens of thousands of pro-regime demonstrators coming out (read: forced to come out) in support. They called it the “Global March for Syria.”

The second marking of the uprising was by armies marching on Syrian cities.

Pfc. Bradley Manning, accused of leaking classified documents to WikiLeaks, is appearing in court today for a pre-trial motion hearing. The military judge presiding over the hearing, Col. Denise Lind, is likely to set an actual date when Manning’s trial will begin.

Three motions will be discussed during the first day of what is expected to be a two-day hearing: a motion to compel discovery, a motion for a bill of particulars and a motion to compel depositions.