Credit: Alyson Hurt/NPR Taliban Raid Tests Coalition’s Surge Gains — Wall Street Journal KABUL—A large number of Taliban insurgents, aided by foreign fighters, have tried to overrun the district of Sangin in Afghanistan’s southern Helmand province, triggering a two-day battle that seemed to be abating by Tuesday night, Afghan officials said. At least four Afghan policemen and several insurgents were killed in the clashes, some of the most serious combat since the Taliban launched their annual spring offensive last month. Sangin, known for its opium production, has long been a Taliban redoubt. Helmand, including Sangin, was the focus of President Barack Obama’s troop surge, with tens of thousands of U.S. Marines flooding the province in 2010-11. In a separate attack on Tuesday, a roadside bombing killed seven Afghan policemen in the western province of Herat, a local government spokesman said. Read more …. My Comment : I expect more Taliban raids from now to the eventual withdrawal of ISAF troops …. and when most of these troops are gone …. these same Taliban raids are going to escalate into major military operations and and holding of territory.
Report: Justice Department Targeted TWO Fox News Channel Reporters And A Producer For Talking With Government Sources — Daily Mail * Inspector General report found agents read emails, tracked phone records * Reporters James Rosen and William La Jeunesse, producer Mike Levine were the subject of subpoenas but never notified by the government * Fox News says U.S. journalism ‘up until now has always been a free press’ * An FBI agent swore out an affidavit claiming that Rosen had broken the law, ‘at the very least, either as an aider, abetter and/or co-conspirator’ * New allegations add fuel to the fire started with a DOJ investigation into the Associated Press The Fox News Channel is outraged over new revelations that three of its reporting staffers were targeted by the U.S. Department of Justice in criminal investigations related to their attempts to obtain information from government sources. James Rosen, the network’s chief Washington correspondent, has become a First Amendment cause celebre over his treatment by the Obama administration. But the DOJ, Fox says, also investigated the Emmy Award-winning investigative reporter William La Jeunesse and Fox News producer Mike Levine. Rosen, according to affidavits filed by FBI agents, was considered a possible criminal co-conspirator. Read more …. More News On The White House Targeting FOX News Justice Department affidavit labels Fox News journalist as possible ‘co-conspirator’ — FOX News Justice Department’s scrutiny of Fox News reporter James Rosen in leak case draws fire — Washington Post Obama administration targets Fox News reporter in ‘chilling’ echo of AP probe — Christian Science Monitor An Inside Look at How DOJ Goes After Reporters, Not Just Leakers — Kevin Drum, Mother Jones Beyond Rosen and the AP: Who Else Has the DoJ Put Under Surveillance? — Garance Franke-Ruta, The Atlantic My Comment : Last week it was the AP. Today …. it is FOX News. Tomorrow …. stay tune.
White House Knew IRS Probe Findings Earlier — Washington Post The White House offered a new account Monday of how and when it learned that the Internal Revenue Service had improperly targeted conservative groups, saying that some senior officials were informed of the findings but that President Obama was not. The assertions came as the White House struggled to contain a political uproar over the IRS, which targeted conservative organizations for extra scrutiny, as well as over the administration’s aggressive pursuit of journalists in leak investigations and its handling of the deadly attacks in Benghazi, Libya, in September. Read more …. More News On The IRS Scandal White House Says It Didn’t Loop Obama In on I.R.S. Inquiry — New York Times White House counsel kept IRS probe results from Obama — Reuters Obama chief of staff ‘knew of IRS inquiry’ in April — BBC Top White House Aides Told of Audit — Wall Street Journal White House: More top aides knew about IRS probe — Kansas City/McClatchy News White House officials knew of IRS audit findings weeks in advance — L.A. Times The White House’s shifting IRS account — Politico My Comment: If liberal organizations were also put under the microscope for extra scrutiny …. this would be a non-issue. But …. apparently no liberal non-profits were targeted. Instead …. what we have are conservative organizations, donors, supporters, critics of the Obama administration, etc. …. being targeted en masse and in huge numbers by the IRS. Here is an easy prediction …. I think we have seen nothing yet.
Complaint Alleges Marine General Influenced Video Probe — USA Today Allegations target Gen. Jim Amos’ involvement in cases stemming from insurgent urination video. WASHINGTON — The top Marine general and four of his legal advisers are implicated in a complaint to the Defense Department Inspector General charging they inappropriately inserted themselves into the prosecution of cases stemming from the infamous video showing scout snipers urinating on dead insurgents in Afghanistan. The complaint, filed by Marine Maj. James Weirick, an attorney assigned to Marine Corps Combat Development Command in Quantico, Va., alleges Commandant Gen. Jim Amos, or others acting on his behalf, deliberately sought to manipulate the legal process, effectively stacking the deck against the scout snipers in the video. Read more …. My Comment : If these allegations are true …. this is very disturbing.
The Unstoppable Force vs. The Immovable Object — Noah Feldman, Foreign Policy Could the United States really go to war with China? Are we on the brink of a new Cold War? The question isn’t as outlandish as it seemed only a few years ago. The United States is still the sole reigning superpower, but it is being challenged by the rising power of China, just as ancient Rome was challenged by Carthage, and Britain was challenged by Germany in the years before World War I. Should we therefore think of the United States and China as we once did about the United States and the Soviet Union, two gladiators doomed to an increasingly globalized combat until one side fades? Or are we entering a new period of diversified global economic cooperation in which the very idea of old-fashioned imperial power politics has become obsolete? Should we see the United States and China as more like France and Germany after World War II, adversaries wise enough to draw together in an increasingly close circle of cooperation that subsumes neighbors and substitutes economic exchange for geopolitical confrontation? Read more …. My Comment : To begin …. I doubt very much that we will ever see such a conflict in our lifetime. But if such a possibility does rear it’s ugly head …. in today’s climate I doubt very much that the U.S. would go to war against China. There is zero political will in Washington to even fathom such a possibility. On the flip side …. I cannot same about the Chinese …. and this is my biggest worry.