In a move that he has used many times before, David Petraeus is putting out inflated claims on his “training” prowess in advance of a war strategy review. This time, Petraeus’ claim comes through an ISAF press release dated Monday, with the headline “Afghan Force Strength Growing Faster than Projected”. This looks like a direct repeat of September, 2004 when he burst onto the political scene by penning a Washington Post Op-Ed in which he falsely claimed great progress on troop training in Iraq and helped George W. Bush to re-election. Then, in September, 2007, while defending the surge in Iraq (and starting again from scratch on Iraqi troop training), Petraeus’ actions prompted John Arquilla, of the Naval Postgraduate School to note to Michael Hirsh “I think Colin Powell used dodgy information to get us into the war, and Petraeus is using dodgy information to keep us there.” Little wonder, then, that with another Afghanistan strategy review session looming, Petraeus should get ISAF to put out a claim that training is moving ahead of schedule.

Don’t touch my what now? In the week since the biggest travel day of the year, the public attention paid to the TSA’s porno scanners and aggressive groping has plummeted.

The basic story line appears to be that since airports functioned without hiccups from porno scanner opt-outs during the Thanksgiving travel season, the media “overblew” a “false alarm” story. Yet we’re no longer talking about porno scanners and groping because the Thanksgiving holiday passed without incident; no major delays, and even more importantly, no new “don’t touch my junk” videos or similar incidents.

But it was almost too quiet over Thanksgiving…

Johnny Carson and Doc Severinsen — Thanksgiving, 1979, from The Tonight Show.

Happy Thanksgiving, peeps. And remember, if you fall asleep after dinner, it wasn’t really the L-tryptophan in the turkey that caused it…

As we settle into our Turkey Day here in the Great White North, I’m thankful for some comedy relief on the part of Norm “Pot Kettle Black” Coleman giving failed Alaska teabagger Republican Joe Miller some friendly advice.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We do have a lot to be thankful for.

For me this year, I think I’ll skip the discussions of pilgrims and native Americans dining at Plymouth. I’m more caught up in the shift from Thanksgiving as a bunch of local harvest festivals to Thanksgiving as a national holiday — an act undertaken in the midst of the bloody battles of the Civil War. Indeed, on this day of thanksgiving in the midst of massive economic turmoil, I give thanks for those things which transcend haves/have nots or winners/losers, and bind us together in our shared humanity.

A brief look at what’s happening in the news on Thanksgiving morning, 2010.

Sitting at the Thanksgiving table last night, there came a time, perhaps inevitable, where some friends started asking me about the latest developments in the healthcare debate. Where are we at? What’s going to happened next? Will they pass a bill? Will we get a public option? What if we pass a bill, but it [...]

Michigan is, economically, the nation’s basket case.

But because of our agricultural diversity, it is incredibly rich in fresh and local food–perhaps not a bread basket, but definitely a healthy food basket. Which–should you ever decide to limit yourself to local ingredients for Thanksgiving dinner–makes it a wonderfully rich state.