Wednesday open thread

Got a few things going on this morning – will check back in this afternoon.

4 Responses to "Wednesday open thread"

sodaboy says:

January 16, 2008 at 7:05 pm

I don’t know if any of you have been following the story behind Ezra Levant – a Canadian who has the thought police on his butt for publishing a few Mohammed cartoons (scroll down his blog to watch the video- pretty scary stuff).

In any event it turns out the person who filed the complaint has had the tables turned.

Story on is on Ezra’s blog (link above) but if you want the short version go to LifeSite.
Mwalimu Daudi says:

January 16, 2008 at 8:36 pm

The current approval ratings at Real Clear Politics for Congress are 24% approve and 70% disapprove.
sanity says:

January 17, 2008 at 9:45 am

Anti-war groups retreat

After a series of legislative defeats in 2007 that saw the year end with more U.S. troops in Iraq than when it began, a coalition of anti-war groups is backing away from its multimillion-dollar drive to cut funding for the war and force Congress to pass timelines for bringing U.S. troops home.

In recognition of hard political reality, the groups instead will lower their sights and push for legislation to prevent President Bush from entering into a long-term agreement with the Iraqi government that could keep significant numbers of troops in Iraq for years to come.

….

“There was a consensus that last year was not productive” John Isaacs, executive director of Council for a Livable World, said of a meeting attended by a coalition of anti-war groups last week. “Our expectations were dashed.”

….

During Tuesday night’s presidential debate, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) referenced the kind of legislation that the anti-war crowd will be backing when she asked Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) if he would co-sponsor a bill to prevent the president from entering into any long-term agreements with the Iraqi government without consulting Congress.

Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt said Obama will “support all common-sense efforts to ensure that President Bush does not tie the hands of future presidents through agreements with the Iraqi government.”

….

The anti-war movement also thinks it has a winning argument when it comes to the length of time Americans are willing to see U.S. forces in Iraq. Roughly half of Americans recently surveyed by CBS News want most U.S. troops out within a year, and more than half think it was a mistake to invade in the first place. Every Democratic candidate for president has promised to withdraw almost all troops from Iraq within the first year of his or her presidency.

Earlier this week, Iraqi Defense Minister Abdul Qadir said U.S. troops might need to remain in Iraq until 2018, which could cost the United States $1 trillion or more between now and then, according to Congressional Budget Office projections. Bush said recently that it is “fine with me” if U.S. troop levels remain the same in Iraq, if Army Gen. David Petraeus recommends such a deployment.

Bush also said last week that U.S. troops “could easily” be in Iraq for a decade or more.

AAEI will have a budget roughly as large as it had last year, Mack said, and the new focus should be seen as an addition to its strategy, rather than as a retreat from a previous position. “Clearly, folks continue to oppose any more money for the war, and that was discussed as well. Our groups are still going to actively oppose any more funding” she said.

Link

Seems there is CHANGE already.
Great White Rat says:

January 17, 2008 at 11:56 am

Sodaboy, thanks for the links. I’ve been watching that case too. This may be the key test for whether free speech as we know it survives in Canada.

Levant is unapologetic in his defense of his rights. His opening statement is one of the most hard-nosed, in-your-face rebuttals you’ll ever hear to the PC crowd. He minces no words telling the investigator what he thinks of the idea of criminalizing political speech.

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