On the same day that the Obama defenders are rallying to his side and suggesting that years of working alongside a domestic terrorist don’t make Obama a bad person, the left is also trying to attach the actions of random crowd members at a rally to McCain-Palin.

Now, I’ll first repeat my firmly held position that John McCain is no great shakes, but come on. How do you, with a straight face, suggest that Obama, who even CNN admits largely owes his political career to someone who targeted his fellow Americans with explosives, should be held harmless for that association? How do you then, in the very next breath, suggest that McCain and Palin are somehow responsible for what one or two unhinged nutbags say or do while attending a rally?

Further, when most of the Democratic party online has spent the last five years calling Bush a war criminal, a traitor, or worse, how do you feign indignation when someone suggests that calling our military a bunch of baby killers is tantamount to treason? Here is Obama’s exact quote in context:

Now you have narco drug lords who are helping to finance the Taliban, so we’ve got to get the job done there [in Afghanistan], and that requires us to have enough troops that we are not just air raiding villages, and killing civilians, which is causing enormous problems there.

Compare that to John Kerry’s now infamous winter soldier testimony:

I would like to talk, representing all those veterans, and say that several months ago in Detroit, we had an investigation at which over 150 honorably discharged and many very highly decorated veterans testified to war crimes committed in Southeast Asia, not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command….

They told the stories at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war, and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.

This portrayal of our military as a bunch of mongols ravaging the countryside with little regard for “killing civilians” and “air raiding villages” is epidemic in the Democratic Party. It is part of the anti-military talking points. You can’t possibly act surprised that people take Obama’s remarks as an attack on our military.

Yet we’re supposed to look the other way when a man who wishes to be Commander in Chief denigrates our troops?

At the same time, we’re supposed to give a candidate a pass for associating with a man who apparently believed, and remains without remorse for the belief, that the only appropriate use of military power should be against civilians working in our own government? A man who, after bombing his countrymen, still says he wishes he could have done more for his cause.

Honestly? You will defend Barack Obama’s associations with that man, and his own disdain for our troops, yet you will try, with flimsy reasoning, to connect the GOP ticket with some random crowd members?

What if the roles were reversed. What if John McCain had spent 15 years cuddling up to Tim McVeigh? What if Terry Nichols had held a campaign kickoff event for J-Mac in his home? What if McVeigh had worked to secure tens of millions of dollars for an initiative that John McCain ran? Would you give him a pass? I doubt it.

While I am shocked by the Democrats’ indifference to Ayers, I also think the events of the Vietnam war were, as Obama says, 40 years ago. People have moved on.

However, I do not see how you can ignore that, also ignore your candidates defamation of our military’s service on behalf of our nation, and then try, laughably, to make McCain and Palin responsible for some random nutjob in a crowd of thousands.

It makes you look hypocritical and ridiculous.

This is a little late, but I was out on travel last week and didn’t have much time to sit and put thoughts together. As I watched Obama trek through the Middle East and Europe last week, a remarkable thing happened. The Iraqi Prime Minister gave the Bush Administration the greatest gift it could have wanted – a way out of Iraq immediately and under the Administration’s terms.

In January of 2005, President Bush was asked if we would leave if the Iraqi government indicated it wanted us out. His reply? “Absolutely. This is a sovereign government. They’re on their feet.”

Last week, when Nouri al-Maliki announced his support for Obama’s withdrawal timetable, and signaled the Iraqi people were ready for us to leave, the Administration had an opening to live up to those words. The Administration should have immediately issued the following statement:

Today, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki announced the desire of the Iraqi people to see a US withdrawal. We have always stated that the US is operating in Iraq only as long as the Iraqi government requests our help. We now see the Iraqi government requesting our departure and we will respect their wishes.

I have asked our military advisers to prepare a plan for the immediate withdrawal of US troops, and I expect to see 50% of our troops stateside within the next six months with a full draw down to be completed by the end of 2009.

This would have done three things. First, it would have taken withdrawal off the table as a political issue the Democrats could demagogue. Second, it would have lived up to the word of the Administration that they would leave when the Iraqis asked. Third, it would have completely deflated one of two issues that will weigh heaviest on the general election – the other being the economic turbulence.

For McCain, it would have offered a chance to shift to support withdrawal without being seen as a flip-flopper. He could simply say that he, too, agrees that the Iraqi move toward self-determination is the final condition for US withdrawal. Having met that, the US will honor its obligation and remove its troops.

Having missed this opportunity, both McCain and the Republicans have a problem in that we are now the occupying force that so many have alleged. If we insist on staying, despite clear statements from Iraqi leadership that they are ready for us to leave, the GOP is in the unfortunate position of having to justify our continued presence in a country that has said they want us out. That’s a much worse position to be in for the general election than simply supporting an unpopular war.

Cinco de Mayo is not Mexican Independence Day. Mexican Independence Day is September 16, and was established 50 years before the event that Cinco de Mayo commemorates. Cinco de Mayo honors the Battle of Puebla in which Mexicans held off a better equipped and larger French force to prevent an attack on Mexico City.

However, as you lift your Corona tonight, don’t toast Mexican Independence, or even Mexican victory over the French. Instead, toast the end of the Civil War.

The Mexican-American War had destroyed Mexico’s economy and left it poor and weak. In debt to many nations, Mexico was invaded by the Brits, the French, and Spain. Having reach an agreement with Britain and Spain, Mexico showed them the door. France, however, saw a greater threat in the US and a way to resolve it through Mexico.

France invaded Mexico as a means to interfere with the civil war we were fighting. If they could take Mexico, they could use the resources there to aid the South and keep the US divided. A US spilt in two would be less a threat than a unified nation. The French tried to take Mexico City and the resulting battle at Puebla kept them from doing so.

Unable to conquer Mexico, the French were prevented from resupplying the South. This gave the North time to build up its army and eventually win the war. While certainly not the definitive cause for the North’s ultimate victory, the Battle of Puebla played more of a role in our own Civil War than it did in Mexican history. The Battle of Puebla is a footnote in Mexican history and the holiday is largely ignored anywhere but in Puebla and in the US.

To put this in perspective, imagine if the rest of the world decided to ignore our recognition of the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, and instead declared the date of the Battle of Bull Run to be American Independence Day. Forget the fact that Bull Run wasn’t even a battle in the Revolutionary War. Forget the fact that it was a regional skirmish that had nothing to do with the eventual outcome of the larger conflict. What you’re left with is a gross misunderstanding of the relative importance of the day within the context of the culture.

Yet every May, we declare the fifth “Mexican Independence Day” and use it as a chance to drink Mexican beer and margaritas and spend the night throwing up guacamole, chips and fajitas.

Don’t be that guy. Tonight, when you drink, toast the end of the Civil War, and give thanks to the Mexicans who helped make it all possible. That’s the best way to commemorate Cinco de Mayo.

I love reading blogs. I also have a particular fondness for columnists. The reason goes beyond a general sense of curiosity about other people, what they think, and why they behave the way they do – which is often tied to how they perceive the world and illustrated in their writing. The reason I love to read people’s personal opinions and thoughts is to be a better communicator myself. This “learning by witness” takes two forms – being provoked into thought by someone else and trying to verbalize my response, or by seeing something that strikes me as abusrd, and not knowing how to respond.

A Wired article titled Suicide Bombing Makes Sick Sense in Halo 3 falls into the second category.

I used to find it hard to fully imagine the mind-set of a terrorist.

That is, until I played Halo 3 online, where I found myself adopting — with great success — terrorist tactics. Including a form of suicide bombing. …

I know I’m the underdog; I know I’m probably going to get killed anyway. I am never going to advance up the Halo 3 rankings, because in the political economy of Halo, I’m poor.

Specifically, I’m poor in time. The best players have dozens of free hours a week to hone their talents, and I don’t have that luxury. This changes the relative meaning of death for the two of us. For me, dying will not penalize me in the way it penalizes them, because I have almost no chance of improving my state. I might as well take people down with me.

Or to put it another way: The structure of Xbox Live creates a world composed of two classes — haves and have-nots. And, just as in the real world, some of the disgruntled have-nots are all too willing to toss their lives away — just for the satisfaction of momentarily halting the progress of the haves. Since the game instantly resurrects me, I have no real dread of death in Halo 3.

The author does specifically state that he is not trying to “trivialize the ghastly, horrific impact of real-life suicide bombing” or to “gloss over the incredible complexity of the real-life personal, geopolitical and spiritual reasons why suicide bombers are willing to kill themselves” because this is “impossibly more nuanced and perverse than what’s happening inside a trifling, low-stakes videogame.”

And yet he follows that disclaimer with this statement:

I’ve read scores of articles, white papers and books on the psychology of terrorists in recent years, and even though I have (I think) a strong intellectual grasp of the roots of suicide terrorism, something about playing the game gave me an “aha” moment that I’d never had before: an ability to feel, in whatever tiny fashion, the strategic logic and emotional calculus behind the act.

This may be one of the strangest pieces of ‘journalism’ I have seen in some time. To argue that you understand terrorism because you have “read scores of articles, white papers and books” and have a “strong intellectual grasp” betrays your completely egocentric worldview. I have read books on terrorism, have taken courses on the subject from renowned experts in the field, and studied the subject with great vigor, but I claim to have no sense of what causes someone to take another person’s life for a political goal.

The one clear difference the writer ignores is the fact the person he’s fragging “from beyond the grave” in Halo was actually trying to kill him in the game. Most often terrorists in real life do not strike directly at other combatants. They strike at innocent women and children.

Thompson’s piece might make sense if terrorism were confined to attacks on military targets (as they sometimes are in Iraq), but falls desperately short of anything approaching a rationale conclusion when weighed against the actions of terrorists who strike at families dining at Sbarro.

Drawing analogies is dangerous if it’s easy to poke holes in your comparison. In this case, it’s all too easy. To compare, in any way, the irrational acts of depraved terrorists bent on killing innocents to make a political point and the spastic tactics of poor video game players does little to make a point. It does more to teach others how not to make a case.

A friend of mine is currently serving in Baghdad and over the last couple of weeks has been sending out some really interesting notes about life in war-torn Iraq. Given that she is also a woman, and has to deal with the unique weirdness that can create in a Muslim nation (and, frankly, in a military setting), I have found a lot of the stuff she writes to be insightful on several fronts. First, she has to deal with the challenges of being very much in the minority. Second, she spends a lot of time examining the challenges on an emotional level. Finally, she really explores the “stranger-in-a-strange-land” aspects of her time in Baghdad.

I’ve asked for her permission to strip the identifying details and share them with others, as I think they’re a really good read. The notes she sends are almost completely non-partisan, and rarely mention the political implications of the war or make an effort to “cheerlead”. They’re just her thoughts on her current situation, and they’re pretty interesting

I’ve posted the full text after the jump, but thought I’d highlight my favorite part of her most recent dispatch.

The unusual becomes commonplace and the completely bizarre becomes completely acceptable.

Even the interaction between people is different. Social norms do not apply. There is an intense need for human connection that drives relationships between people to form quickly and sometimes in unconventional ways. For example, at lunch the other day, I ran into a fellow passenger from my maiden rhino voyage into the IZ. I had not seen him since the morning of our arrival, but he recognized me and asked to join me at the table. Two hours later I found myself able to recite back the intimate details of his life: Where he has lived in the States over the past fifteen years; the names, ages and pursuits of his two sons; the circumstances of his divorce; and the people he most often calls back home.

A few evenings prior, I was dining with a co-worker when an army captain sat next to us, showed us pictures of his grand-daughter‚Äîhis “reason to get home”‚Äî told us all about his wife and children back in Indiana, gave us a full account of the last twenty years of his life, and shared with us his political affiliation and views on the 2008 primaries. He kept commenting on what a pleasure it was to carry on a normal conversation with two-young women.

There is Romanian special operations captain who I occasionally meet for coffee in the evening, simply because he tells me that I am the only person he speaks with outside the office and how he looks forward to it every day. I don’t know what he does here in Baghdad, but I do know all about his beautiful daughter, the reasons for his divorce, the grueling physical and psychological training he endured to obtain his commission, and the songs currently on his I-pod playlist.

It can take years to build relationships in the real world. Here, it may take only hours.

Click through to read more.

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