Don't worry, it was just a bottle rocket

The captain of an American Airlines jet taking off from LAX this past week reported he'd been fired on by a missile. Obviously whatever it was missed, but the crew claims to have witnessed a smoke trail floating past. The flight departed west over the ocean. If true, this wouldn't be the first time.

An investigation ensued and it was concluded it was likely a flare or a bottle rocket, not a missile. That's logical, since you'd think a heat seeking missile fired from close range would at least hit an engine. As to a flare, it wouldn't be out of the question that some drunk fools on a party boat were sending a few airborne. But a bottle rocket? I think an airline flight crew could tell the difference, thank you.

Probably nothing, but I can't help but wonder if the FBI found any witnesses? The story doesn't say. Perhaps if the CIA is called upon to produce another cartoon explaining what the witnesses didn't see, we'll know this one has legs.

UPDATE 12/5

Well, looky here. My, and this story was published only a few weeks before the "bottle rocket" was fired.

Baghdad Bob, where are you?

This story spans the bias spectrum from left to right, and really illustrates how the war is coming along.

First, the charge. The US was caught paying the Lincoln Group, a media company under contract to the Pentagon, to plant favorable or positive stories in the burgoening Iraqi free press. Apparently the terrorists were taking more advantage of the press freedoms we'd just given the Iraqis than the Iraqis were. The news cycle was tilting towards the terrorists.

Since this story provides a veritable smorgasbord of "gotchas" for the left, I thought it would be fun to analyze it from the other side, too. So here goes.

Lefty talking points: Of course this is propaganda. If our version was so truthful the Iraqis themselves would be publishing it, free of charge. Add this waste of taxpayer dollars onto the entire cost of Dumbya's FUBAR war, and its no wonder the deficit is out of control.

And hey, what happened to the Iraqis that were supposed to throw flowers at our troops when we liberated them? What, did our troops shoot them? Or maybe they were killed by all the AQ that flooded in after we declared victory. This story is just more pathetic proof this war for Halliburton has soiled our once pristine integrity around the world, and is more proof Bush should be impeached and charged with war crimes. Then maybe our troops can come home and we can rip those assanine yellow ribbons off every SUV we see, followed by a thorough asskicking of the chickenhawk driver inside. Peace out.

Righty talking points: Another leak. How many has it been lately? First it was Valerie Plame, then Abu Ghraib, then the CIA secret prisons, now this. Some in this country actually want us to lose this war. After all, ridding us from Bush is the only way they can maintain their agenda of murdering babies, legalizing gay marriage, legalizing drugs and prostitution, and outlawing Christ. They can cram their 'holiday tree' the same place they keep their morals--in the sewer.

Regards this linked story-- the AP strikes again! The headline was "Pentagon Describes Iraq Propaganda Plan". Oh how the liberals love the word propaganda, as long as they're talking about republicans. The word brings to mind Goebbels and Tokyo Rose-- or worse yet--Baghdad Bob. But after dropping the P word, the AP story never claims the US was planting fake stories, just said they were attempting to get their version out. Only a sleazy seditionist would call our information "propaganda".



Well, that was hardly theraputic. But you must admit each side's boilerplate arguments contain a few grains of truth. Still, regardless of such point-making, the bottom line leads back to that nasty truth--we're in a war that's hard to win yet simply cannot be abandoned.

Reuters says Rice will "warn" Europe

I can't imagine Dr Rice warning anyone, in the conventional sense anyway. They are referring to certain EU members and their feigned indignance over our CIA rendition flights or secret detention facilities. It's a nice headline, but Reuters isn't far off since Rice will apparently lay it on the line with those "allies", many of whom have been a part of that same rendition program since the Clinton years. They deserve to be warned, or shall we say "sternly reminded".

Anthrax in the news

Nearly all of our forces operating in the Korean, Middle East and South Asian theatres have been vaccinated against anthrax. There are still problems with the program, but they continue to immunize our troops.

Of course we know that Saddam had anthrax, among other nastiness. IF..and this is a huge IF..Saddam was directly or indirectly involved in the anthrax letter attacks that occurred shortly after 9/11 for the purposes of sending a warning not to attack him, our vaccinated forces were certainly in a strong position to invade if necessary. The civilian population here would be left to treat further attacks with Rx Cipro, but we'd all seen that such treatment was possible.

So, if he did send the letters, was it a flop? Hard to say, but the Pentagon remains adament about continuing the program, even with Saddam sitting in jail. Other than Iraq, exactly which countries are we protecting our troops from?

As an aside, the program was started in 1998, which history will show as a seminal year in the as-yet declared Global War on Terror.

Withdraw to where, dear Congressman?

This story should not be missed. Everytime the children run amok through the house scattering the furniture, Mr. Hitchens seems to excel at rearranging everything.

If you live near Tarrytown, NY, you might be able to catch a Hitchens vs Ritter debate on December 20th. Now THAT would be must-see TV for me, unless of course it got in the way of the Grizzlies. Nah, I'd still choose Hitch vs Ritter, mainly to see what Scott has to say about this.

hat tip Jim Rose.

MORE 12/01

Congressman Murtha now says the US Military is broken down and worn out. He would know more than any blogger, however I suppose there's a tiny bit of politics there, too.

There's one little nagging problem I have with all this war stuff. When the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in the 80s, while Iraq was warring with Iran, the US acted under the table to intervene in both events. The entire funding of the Afghan Mujahadeen and subsequent creation of Bin Laden was a CIA-run clandestine operation designed to help drive the Soviets out while also helping bankrupt them. Meanwhile the US and other western powers were selling hardware to Saddam in his efforts against the nasty Ayatollahs.

The goals were achieved. The Soviet Union was toppled and Iraq battled Iran to a standoff, weakening both. The CIA high-fived one another, but what about blowback? If we inadvertently created both bin Laden and Saddam meddling around trying to put out fires, maybe we are just now paying the piper. Unlike many on the left who tote the same line, I believe our intentions were honorable regardless of the unintended consequences.

If our past has led to our present circumstances, it might certainly explain why we had to go after Saddam and why we can't produce Bin Laden as yet. Bush has been reluctant to give many details about why we fight, preferring to say "to make America safer". I have absolutely no doubt he's telling the truth about that, it's the 'why' that remains a little fuzzy.

But let's assume part of the above drivel is correct. Is there any way out? Even if we take up Murtha's mantle and withdraw from Iraq, stepping back will lead to stepping out. As Hitchens indicates, we can't simply "withdraw over the horizon". Doing so would send an unbelievably bad message, with far worse consequences than our retreat from Vietnam, and we'll surely lose the WoT. Therefore, we're left with no choice but to stay the course. Perhaps that's what Bin Laden and Saddam had in mind, I don't know. I do hope we have a "good plan for victory".

The anatomy of a poll

CNN headlined their web site with this screaming headline, "Most doubt Bush has a plan for Iraq victory". Upon reading the story, some interesting things come out:

But the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll released Wednesday night also found nearly six in 10 Americans said U.S. troops should not be withdrawn from Iraq until certain goals are achieved.
Just 35 percent wanted to set a specific timetable for their exit, as some critics of the war have suggested.

Almost surrealistically, the CNN reporter then proceeds to decontruct the headline further by decontructing their own poll:

The poll conducted Wednesday does not directly reflect how Americans are reacting to Bush's speech, because only 10 percent of the 606 adult Americans polled had seen it live and two-thirds had not even heard or read news coverage about it.

Sounds like s a pre-emptive admission to mute criticism from right wing bloggers, who might probably say things like, "that headline was baseless". No worries, CNN went on to tell us why their self-admitted suspect poll contains true value:

But it does indicate the scope of the battle ahead as the Bush administration seeks to regain support for the war among an increasingly skeptical public.

For those scoring at home here's a recap...shorty after a major speech on an Iraq victory plan, CNN headlines their contention 'Bush has no plan for victory' based on their own poll. Then, in the same story they admit only 10 percent of those polled actually watched the speech, and only about 1/3 had any information about it at all. How does one score a foul ball off the foot?

Furthermore:

Asked if the war will make the United States safer from terrorism in the long run, 48 percent said yes and 43 percent no

Say what? The same poll indicated most Americans felt the war will make us safer? Not so fast. CNN made sure we understood that a 5 point margin could be meaningless, since it was "within the poll's sampling error.". What was the sampling error? Five percent.

Court set to force Bush's hand on Padilla

Jose Padilla's lawyers have convinced an Appeals Court to demand the Bush Administration (through AJ Alberto Gonzales) explain why it held him for nearly three years as an enemy combatant for an alleged plot to set off a radiological dirty bomb, only to finally indict him on lesser charges.

This appears to be a trick to force the administration into publicly admitting A) why they were afraid to test the enemy combatant designation in the Supreme Court, and/or B) why they didn't want two AQ terrorists to act as witnesses for the prosecution in the dirty bomb charge.

The two witnesses are both top-level al-Qaida operators, presumably both housed in secret detention facilities run by the CIA somewhere outside America. One of them is the mastermind of the 9/11 attack, Khalid Sheihk Mohammed. Ironically, his nephew sits in the Supermax prison in Colorado convicted of trying to blow up the WTC the first time back in 1993.

Do these lawyers realize there is a war going on? Do they realize the folks they are defending want to murder us all with extreme prejudice? Besides, they would have no practice under Sharia law.