"[S]ome 255,000 Iraqis living overseas had registered in 14 nations. Organizers had expected that roughly one million voters would sign up." But why? Could it be that they don't really have a clue how many Iraqis are out there? Have they overestimated the expatriate population? 'In Britain, registration figures remained relatively low, despite the extension. By Tuesday morning, 29,121 Iraqis living in Britain had traveled to three centers in London, Glasgow and Manchester to register....

"Human intelligence, the ability to get inside somebody's mind, the ability to read somebody's mail, the ability to listen to somebody's phone call -- that somebody being the enemy," Bush said in an interview with CNN senior White House correspondent John King. Sir, "the ability to listen to [the enemy's] phone call" is not HUMINT. Link Link Respectfully, SGT pseudosoldier

I should pay more attention. Here I was thinking I was keeping up with my friends' web-sites when I stumbled upon this: Link From Link , those of you who read it know who this man was to me. I had no idea that he was being included in this documentary. There are pictures of his wife and parents on that site that I linked to up top, but try not to eat up all the bandwidth, and keep in mind what they've gone through if you go to gawk. Even I feel guilty about my voyuerism. For tho...

To SSG Geezer... To GJL... To my brother-in-law, Cap'n Andy... To GJS's brother (and all the other guys) in Iraq... Happy 229th! Ooh-rah and Semper Fi! Link Official USMC Birthday Info page Link poignant birthday celebration article These guys would definitely rather be knocking a few back state-side, but I hope they know there are some of us back here looking out for them. God bless.

Link While it was at their own request, the commander of the 343rd Quarermaster Company, made famous by last week's refusal to go on a "suicide mission" that failed to get anyone killed, has been relieved of duty. Also note that five of the soldiers who were involved have been transferred to another unit (I read in an earlier article that it was 3 soldiers, and that they had generally been perceived to be the "ringleaders" of the event). I think that this sort of accountability is a ...

While the statistics from last year's recruitment are encouraging (the Army achieved 100% of it's goal, while the Marines achieved 101%), they may be somewhat misleading. First off, how did the goals compare to the previous year's goals? Did we anticipate difficulties in achieving previous standards, and lower our expectations? Further than that, however, is evidence that our recruiting efforts may indeed be not enough. Take a look at this information about the ARNG: "The Army Nation...

For the LA Times story, "In Defense of Their Soldiers," by Rennie Sloan and Ellen Barry, 19OCT04: " [Theresa] Hill [a long haul truck driver and mother of one of the soldiers involved in the recent refusal of orders] said she was certain the publicity has helped her daughter. "As soon as [Clarion-Ledger reporter] Jeremy Hudson broke the story, they were released miraculously," she said. Hill also believes that the effort has smoothed the way for soldiers to resist orders in the future . ...

I'm sitting here thinking, "Man, I gotta get some sleep. Lemme check the news sites before I hit the sack." CNN front page: Triple blasts rock Israelit vacation spots Link (Kicker: "Thursday's bombings brought to mind the November 2002 attack in in the Kenyan city of Mombasa when three suicide bombers blew up the Israeli-owned Paradise Hotel, killing 12 people. That blast came just after assailants fired two missiles at an Israeli charter plane carrying 271 people but missed their targ...

First off, hat tip to greywar for this, as he was the one who saw this man on Fox News speaking of this experience, and pointed it out to me. Link details how Scott Taylor was taken hostage by insurgents in Iraq, traded from group to group, beaten and tortured and finally released (no spoiler there; how else could he write that article?). What had really taken me aback here (aside from the atrocities that had been delivered upon him, of course): The sight of U.S. paid Iraqi police f...

It seems there are some issues cropping up during the call-up of the Individual Ready Reserves to Active Duty. While the vast majority of these personnel showed up to do their duty, some were unable, or unwilling, to show when told. As the article below details, many of these people are trying to get out of it, either through legal means (which I have no major problem with, as I think many of these requests will be turned down and mostly the truly deserving will get a deferral) or illegal (...

with me, anyway. I hope that the "liberal media" is a myth. I hope they are just trying to do their job, and not color their stories. But I know they do. Even just a little, sometimes, but it's hard to keep your editorializing out of your reporting (two great tastes that taste great together... not). I hope that the media coverage of the recent hostage situation(s) in Iraq has simply had the intent to inform. I hope that it was not aimed at making the war more real for the American pu...

I was reading an article posted on JU Link , where the last comment (at the time... I'm sure the 3 people participating have bumped it up) asked for an Iraqi citizen's opinion. Now, I'm not an Iraqi citizen, but I spent some time searching for something appropriate on the net. Unfortunately, none of the blogs I follow have tackled this obviously weighty issue. I thought about directing him to the Al-Jazeera forums, but I doubt he can read Arabic. But I popped into AJ just to see... I...

Link With no cited explanation, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has postponed its elections for nearly meaningless local positions. Yet again. If they are so interested in political reform, why put this off? Is it indeed because the religious observations would distract from this event? Or the other way around?

Link The BBC has put up a compilation article similar to the one from CNN ( Link ed in another article of mine Link ). Some of these "denouncements" are, well... "One Saudi paper suggests that the perpetrators might have won over converts to their cause had they attacked a military target, rather than a school full of children." At least they're against kid-killing, right? This one starts well: "Iranian President Mohammad Khatami expressed his outrage at the terrorists' inhumane...

I've hated reading some of greywar's articles for awhile now: the Religion of Peace series. It's because he's damned persuasive. It's a dark, dark world, and it's easy to think bad things about a lot of people. I'm the resident Arabologist (and part-time Arabiaphile) of our little group, so I don't like to think bad things about my subject matter, as it were... Link This article, however, is just the type of article that I need to push back the darkness, and convince myself that ther...