White House: Ukraine Will Get Rid of Its Highly Enriched Uranium

By GottaLaff

Jake Tapper reports some very good news. So good, in fact, that the GOP will turn it into something horribly negative, unpatriotic, and dangerous.

In fact, if we're not careful, President Obama will not only destroy America, he'll destroy... the whole... wide... world:

President Viktor Yanukovich of Ukraine agreed to give up all of his country’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium (HEU), White House press secretary Robert Gibbs announced Monday after President Obama's first ever meeting with Yanukovich at the Nuclear Security Summit.‬‪

Ukraine will also convert its nuclear reactors that use HEU to ones that will use low-enriched uranium.‬‪

Oh no! Why... why... it's a plot! Yes. That's what it is. And it's been in the works for over a ::dun-dun-dun-n-n:: decade. Hide the kids! Our Muslim Kenyan Commie Gay Abortionist French Marxist president is out to get us:

The US "has been trying to make this happen for more than 10 years," Gibbs said.

The right wing will call this weak.

I call it an accomplishment.

And I'd like to call the panicky, crazed conservatives a whole lot of things, but I'm too busy trying to keep my cool and remain reasonable... Like our, you know, president.

Donald Trump is as dumb as a box of his hair

By GottaLaff

I'm wondering who controls this ignoramus's mouth, The Donald or his comb-over:

With the coldest winter ever recorded, with snow setting record levels up and down the coast, the Nobel committee should take the Nobel Prize back from Al Gore. Gore wants us to clean up our factories and plants in order to protect us from global warming, when China and other countries couldn’t care less. It would make us totally noncompetitive in the manufacturing world, and China, Japan and India are laughing at America’s stupidity.

Wow! He's right! Except for this:

In reality, China, Japan, and India have all submitted greenhouse gas emissions targets under the Copenhagen Accord, and are leading the United States in the race to build the clean-energy technologies of the future.

And this:

[T]he unprecedented weather patterns that have brought snowfall to every state in the continental United States are the product of a record-hot planet. Following the hottest decade on record, we are now in the hottest winter in the satellite record, and this past January was one of the hottest Januaries on record for the planet. (H/T EcoPolitology)

That "he's right" thing? Pfft, that was just a writer's device... Which, of course, means Trump is wrong.

Or his hair is. One never knows who's doing the talking, because that thing on his head is clearly alive.

Actually, his hair is so very, very wrong:

Reid, McConnell Reach Deal to Adjourn Early, End Filibuster

By GottaLaff

Roll Call is subscription only, but here are the basics:

Senate Republicans have agreed to end their filibuster of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) health care reform bill a few hours early on Christmas Eve, a move that will allow the GOP to technically stick to its promise to force Dec. 24 vote on the measure while still making it possible for Senators to return home for the holiday.

The vote will be at 8 a.m.

Ooo, big concession. How could we possibly call them obstructionists now? *sarcasm*

Breaking: International leaders reach tentative deal to reduce greenhouse emissions

By GottaLaff

Email news alert from the L.A. Times, just in:

Key international leaders have reached a tentative deal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and curb climate change, the Los Angeles Times has learned, after the United States and China agreed to a method for recording developing nations' pledges to limit emissions and ensuring those pledges are carried out.

Details of the agreement were approved in an evening meeting with Obama, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, sources said.

Obama has scheduled a press conference shortly in the host Bella Center to unveil the agreement.

More soon at: http://www.latimes.com

However, per what I've been hearing on the Thom Hartmann show, much ado about very little.

Obama: New nuclear treaty is near

By GottaLaff

From a breaking news alert email via WaPo:

The United States and Russia have reached agreement on most major issues in a new treaty that would cut their deployed strategic nuclear warheads by one-fourth and allow each side to continue to verify the other's stockpiles, officials said Friday.

Negotiators have been racing to conclude a replacement for the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or START, the nuclear giants' most extensive nuclear treaty. It expired on Dec. 5.

President Obama said Friday that the two sides are "quite close" to concluding a new version of the pact.

Much more here.

Update: There is some disagreement about this.

U.S. commanders startled: Iraq restricts American troop activities

By GottaLaff

Iraq seems to be breaking up with us:

The Iraqi government has moved to sharply restrict the movement and activities of U.S. forces in a new reading of a six-month-old U.S.-Iraqi security agreement that has startled American commanders and raised concerns about the safety of their troops.

In a curt missive issued by the Baghdad Operations Command on July 2 -- the day after Iraqis celebrated the withdrawal of U.S. troops to bases outside city centers -- Iraq's top commanders told their U.S. counterparts to "stop all joint patrols" in Baghdad. It said U.S. resupply convoys could travel only at night and ordered the Americans to "notify us immediately of any violations of the agreement."

The strict application of the agreement coincides with what U.S. military officials in Washington say has been an escalation of attacks against their forces by Iranian-backed Shiite extremist groups, to which they have been unable to fully respond.

If extremists realize "some of the limitations that we have, that's a vulnerability they could use against us," a senior U.S. military intelligence official said. "The fact is that some of these are very politically sensitive targets" believed to be close to the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

The new guidelines are a reflection of rising tensions between the two governments. Iraqi leaders increasingly see the agreement as an opportunity to show their citizens that they are now unequivocally in charge and that their dependence on the U.S. military is minimal and waning. [...]

The Americans have been taken aback by the new restrictions on their activities. The Iraqi order runs "contrary to the spirit and practice of our last several months of operations," Maj. Gen. Daniel P. Bolger, commander of the Baghdad division, wrote in an e-mail obtained by The Washington Post.

Great. What next...

Iraqi parliament OKs US troops for 3 more years

By GottaLaff

And here I thought Thanksgiving would be so slow that I'd have to manufacture news, but no-o-o:

The long, costly story of American military involvement in Iraq moved closer to an end Thursday when Iraq's parliament approved a pact that requires all troops to be out in three years, marking the first clear timetable for a U.S. exit since the 2003 invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein. [...]

The security deal must now be ratified by the three-member Presidential Council, which is expected to approve it. [...]

Under the pact, Iraq will have strict oversight over the nearly 150,000 American troops now on the ground, representing a step toward full sovereignty for Iraq and a shift from the sense of frustration and humiliation that many Iraqis feel at the presence of American troops on their soil for so many years.

Bush is saying this "affirms the growth" of democracy, and that the Surge worked. Bush is full of... turkey stuffing.

Hmmm. Strings? Attached or otherwise?

Iraqi lawmakers today approved a pact allowing U.S. forces to stay in the country through 2011 after winning support from skeptics by promising a public referendum on the plan. [...]

The lawmakers separately approved a resolution calling for a referendum in July 2009, during which the public will get to endorse, reject or demand amendments to the agreement. The referendum was the key demand of Sunni Arab legislators who had refused to join the parliament's ruling Shiite Muslim and Kurdish blocs in approving the agreement without the referendum promise. [...]

If voters rejected the agreement in the July 2009 referendum, Iraq's government would have to cancel SOFA or demand changes to it. The terms of the agreement allow either side to give the other a year's notice of cancellation, so if Iraq scrapped the pact, U.S. forces would have to leave the country in July 2010. [...]

"There is a provision for extension, by agreement of both sides," one U.S. official said in discussing the pact.

Just get us out of there.

Bush sold out: Pentagon Officials Fear Iraqi Control of U.S. Military Operations

By GottaLaff

From the Topics that Deserve More Attention Department here is a little SOFA news that has eluded us:

But what’s really gotten no attention, even from obsessives like myself, are the restrictions it places on U.S. military operations in Iraq over the next three years. Consider this vague language in Article 4:

All these operations will be conducted with the necessity of fully respecting the Iraqi Constitution and Iraqi Law, and conducting these operations will be without overstepping the sovereignty of Iraq and its national interests as determined by the Iraqi government. It is the duty of the U.S. to respect the laws of Iraq, its customs and traditions and valid international law. [...]

Youssef has a fantastic piece about military commanders’ concerns in this regard. They think that George W. Bush basically sold out their operational flexibility in his odd zeal to get an agreement in place. And sure enough, even though his insistence on a deal gave the Iraqis all the leverage and undid his plans for what Youssef calls “a semi-permanent occupation,” Bush didn’t reject the agreement.

As Obama’s chances to be elected president improved, the White House felt it was under more pressure. Neither the administration nor the Iraqis wanted to extend the U.N. resolution. “It turned into a very peculiar political predicament,” the officer said.

Now back to our regularly scheduled Secretary of Clinton leaks already in progress.

A funny thing happened on the way to the Iraq withdrawal agreement

By GottaLaff

Stop me if you've heard this one before. Okay, see, there was this fraudulent war that turned into an illegal occupation. No, no it gets better. There were this guy named Obama who was against this cosmic roto rooter into our collective psyches, but he got ridiculed by this bunch of thugs we'll call BushCo and Friends. In fact, a lot of us got laughs for the same thing, by a bunch of pseudo-patriots. Are ya with me so far? Good.

Okay, so here's the set-up for the punch line. See, after five years and over 4,000 deaths, finally... finally... there was an agreement. You remember the one: between Iraq and the U.S. The one that gets us out of there by 2011, the one that stops our family members from getting their heads blown off. Yeah, yeah, that's the one.

Well, a crazy thing happened. Oh, this'll knock your socks off. What a freakin' riot. In fact, my stomach hurts already, but not from laughing, because, see, this is no joke:

“Shiite legislators could barely conceal their delight” at the agreement, and noted that “they referred to the pact as the ‘withdrawal agreement.’” As proof of its determination to a firm withdrawal date, the Iraqi government even required that the U.S. “scrap the language that would have allowed the American troops to stay beyond 2011 if Iraq requested.”

Iraqi officials made it perfectly clear that they would take the withdrawal agreement seriously:

– Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh: “The total withdrawal will be completed by December 31, 2011. This is not governed by circumstances on the ground.”

– Deputy parliament speaker Khalid al-Attiya: The “Americans have responded positively on two important amendments. The first one is the Americans should withdraw from cities and suburbs on June 30, 2009, and the second one is that Americans should leave Iraq in 2011.‘”

What a set-up, huh? Abbott couldn't have set up Costello any better. Trouble is, there's no payoff. No punch line. The joke's on us.

The Pentagon, however, seems to view things differently. Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen said today that he still supports “conditions-based” withdrawal only, and indicated that the agreement could always change long before 2011.

You really killed 'em with that one, Mullen.

Literally.

Three more years?

By GottaLaff

Supporters of anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr chant slogans next to a banner picturing Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr, a revered Shiite religious leader and father of Muqtada al-Sadr as they demonstrate against the proposed security pact between Iraq and the U.S., in Baghdad's Shiite stronghold of Sadr City, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 14, 2008. Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Friday renewed threats to resume attacks on U.S. forces if they don't leave Iraq, deepening the unease over a proposed U.S.-Iraqi security agreement that would allow American troops to stay for three more years.(AP Photo/Khalid Mohammed) (Khalid Mohammed - AP)

I posted about the possibility of an agreement earlier. Now we have one:

U.S. and Iraqi negotiators have agreed on a draft of a security pact that would allow American troops to stay in Iraq for three more years after their U.N. mandate expires Dec. 31, a senior aide to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said Saturday.

The aide said the draft could be put to a Cabinet vote in an emergency meeting Sunday or Monday. [...] If adopted by the Cabinet, it would then require parliamentary approval.[...]

The Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, al-Maliki's senior coalition partner and the country's largest Shiite party, has said that it would only sign off on the agreement if it does not breach the country's sovereignty and is endorsed by the country's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

Let's see if this big news had any effect whatsoever:

Also Saturday, a suicide car bomber struck a commercial district in the northern city of Tal Afar, killing 10 people and wounding 20, the U.S. military said. Iraqi police and hospital officials said seven people were killed and 32 wounded in the blast, which occurred near a used car lot. The discrepancy couldn't immediately be reconciled. [...]

In Baghdad, a car bomb parked near the National Theater exploded in the mainly Shiite district of Karradah, killing at least five people and wounding 23, including some who were heading to see a play, according to police and hospital officials. [...]

The U.S. military also said an American Marine died from wounds suffered in a roadside bombing west of Baghdad on Friday.

Nope.

Maliki now supports new U.S. troop deal

By GottaLaff

Flip. Flop. Flip:

Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki has informed Iraq's presidency council that he now supports a security agreement with the United States, a Shiite Muslim legislator who's close to the premier said Friday.[...]

The only person who dissented was the Sunni vice president, Tariq al Hashimi.

Askari said Maliki planned to address the nation in coming days to ask for the people's support of the agreement, which Iraqi officials now call the "withdrawal agreement."

This would represent an about-face for the Shiite prime minister, who was a hard-line holdout throughout the negotiations and had publicly criticized early drafts of the agreement. [...]

"We can't get any more," Askari said. "In practice, the Americans, they can't do anything alone, according to this agreement. . . . He (Maliki) feels now after all the amendments it's not a perfect agreement but he can now go to the people and say look this is far better to accept this than the other options."

While the United States didn't give in to Iraqi demands for the power to prosecute American soldiers, Maliki now thinks that this is the best deal they can get, Askari said. [...]

Currently the draft calls for U.S. soldiers to withdraw from Iraqi cities by the end of next June and to withdraw from the country by the end of 2011. The latest pact had about 100 changes requested by the Iraqi government, including an agreement for the government to inspect American cargo that it's suspicious of, Askari said.

Stay tuned for the next episode of "Deals of Our Lives".

Senate/House: There is a tentative agreement on "broad principles"

By GottaLaff

Everyone's so agreeable! Especially Republican Heather Wilson who said she wants to change her name to Sarah Palin, because she likes her so, so much!

I guess a lot of progress was made on this "on principle" agreement while Gramm-pa McCain was getting his make-up touched up. Or maybe this happened because he suspended his campaign and the notion of his ads being off the air waves cheered everyone up.