at-Largely

Conyers: We're Closing In On Rove" - ‘Someone’s got to kick His ass...or go & have him arrested’

Posted by Kathy

Hello all. I bring gifts:

Just off the House floor today, the Crypt overheard House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers tell two other people: “We’re closing in on Rove. Someone’s got to kick his ass.”

Asked a few minutes later for a more official explanation, Conyers told us that Rove has a week to appear before his committee. If he doesn’t, said Conyers, “We’ll do what any self-respecting committee would do. We’d hold him in contempt. Either that or go and have him arrested.”

Conyers said the committee wants Rove to testify about his role in the imprisonment of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman, among other things.

“We want him for so many things, it’s hard to keep track,” Conyers said.

Also see Think Progress.

Plumbers = Authorities now?

Okay boys and girls, let us read this article together and see what the actual scandal is (see poll after):

Ohio Attorney General Marc Dann, who led investigations into companies blamed for the state's subprime mortgage mess, resigned under a cloud on Wednesday after admitting to an affair with a female staff member.

"Unfortunately, it is now clear that the last step I must take to fix these problems is to resign as attorney general effective immediately," Dann told reporters.

In addition to Dann's relationship with a member of his staff, his office was roiled by sexual harassment claims.

Also, local media reported that authorities staged a raid on the attorney general's offices on Wednesday, carting away documents as part of an undisclosed investigation.

Well, can you spot the actual scandal in this story?

Liquid Lunching With Rummie

Posted By Cernig

Audio segments from the Pentagon's document dump reveal that fun and games were had by all at a Christmastime 2006 luncheon hosted by Donald Rumsfield for the Pentagon's pet military analysts:

As documented by Newsvine, it all went down at a valedictory luncheon Rumsfeld hosted for those analysts on December 12, 2006. Many of the "message force multipliers" named in the original New York Times piece were in attendance, including David L. Grange, Donald W. Sheppard, James Marks, Rick Francona, Wayne Downing, and Robert H. Scales, Jr. They were treated to an extraordinary conversation (Newsvine has highlights, the hour-long clip of which can be found here) with Rumsfeld, that included many jaw-dropping moments, such as Rumsfeld admitting that in Iraq, the U.S. "can't lose militarily, but...can't win by military means alone," an agreement that Iraq could use a Syngman Rhee-type dictator (because that's what democracy smells like!), and a lengthy passage where Rumsfeld jokingly offers a bottle of champagne to anyone who could kill Moqtada al Sadr. You sure don't see too many people joking on al Sadr these days!

But by far the most extraordinary part of this luncheon is the antipathy the gathered members exhibit toward the American people for having the temerity to vote the Democrats back into power. When Lt. Gen. Michael DeLong bemoans the lack of "sympathetic ears" on Capitol Hill, Rumsfeld offers that the American people lack "the maturity to recognize the seriousness of the threats." What's to be done? According to Rumsfeld, "The correction for that, I suppose, is [another] attack."

Pakistan goes political kaboom...

This is looking worse and worse:

"Pakistan's six-week-old coalition is unraveling because of a dispute over whether to remove President Pervez Musharraf, undermining efforts to rein in surging food prices and maintain stability.    

Nine ministers from Nawaz Sharif's party withdrew from the cabinet today after the former Prime Minister failed to win the reinstatement of justices who might force Musharraf's ouster. Sharif's senior coalition partner, Asif Ali Zardari, favors leaving the former army general as president while stripping away powers he seized during eight years of military rule.    

The stalemate has hampered government efforts to control inflation, which jumped last month to its highest rate in at least 25 years, and to ensure food for the poorer half of Pakistan's 160 million people. The struggle between Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League and Zardari's Pakistan Peoples Party is helping Musharraf regain influence after his supporters lost half of their National Assembly seats in the February election.    

``The country is on the brink of a social upheaval because of food prices and the fact that people are struggling to survive,'' said Ishtiaq Ahmed, a political scientist at Quaid-i- Azam University in Islamabad. The division ``strengthens the hand'' of Musharraf's camp, ``which keeps power through a strategy of divide and rule,'' Ahmed said."

The good news is in this mess (if such a mess can have good news) is that at least in Pakistan someone  is willing to fight for the people. In the US, extremely high gas prices have made Congress stand up and...  and... and ... engage in bipartisan finger-pointing. 

Oh, and the firing of justices in Pakistan? Well that too appears to be part of someone in Pakistan fighting for the people. In the US, the firing of US Attorneys who would not engage in political prosecutions (and the retaining of US Attorneys who did) has gotten Congress to... to... write more letters demanding answers.

Yes,  in a third-world country - falling apart and infested with terrorists of the actual al Qaeda variety - government officials of two parties whose leaders have either been assassinated or have had an assassination attempt on their life still seem to be fighting for the people.

The bad news is that with this much instability and with Bush throwing nuclear-war hopes toward Iran, the failed war on terror will implode into an all out free-for all. If only we had a Congress who might stop funding the Iraq war and actually have some concern for our national security. 

Freedom is on the farce!

Meddlers!

By Cernig

We've heard a lot recently about US allegations that Iran is interfering in Iraq, aiding insurgents with weaponry and training, but Iran has also long said that both the US and Britain back insurgents inside Iran and we hear rather less about that.

That might change if Iran goes ahead with a lawsuits, as it claimed today, against both nations for aiding terrorists who allegedly blew up a mosque.

Iran's judiciary said on Monday it would file international lawsuits against the United States and Britain, accusing them of providing financial support to those behind a blast in a mosque that killed 14 people.

Iran's intelligence minister last week said Iran had arrested five or six members of a terrorist group with links to Britain and the United States who he said were involved in the explosion that also wounded 200 in the southern city of Shiraz. Iranian officials had previously said the April 12 blast, during an evening prayer sermon by a prominent local cleric, was caused by explosives left over from an exhibition commemorating the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war.

Judiciary spokesman Ali-Reza Jamshidi told state television the terrorists behind the bombing were agents of the U.S. and British governments in Iran. "The relationship of those who planted the bombs in Shiraz with the U.S. and Britain was identified and they were being financially supported and in fact they acted as foreign agents in Iran," he said. "In view of the documents obtained the judiciary in cooperation with the government and the Foreign Ministry will file lawsuits with international authorities against their supporters, who on the one hand claim to fight terrorists and on the other hand provide them with equipment," he said.

He was clearly referring to Britain and the United States, but did not give details on how Tehran would take legal action against them. Iran has in the past accused the two countries of trying to destabilize the Islamic Republic by supporting rebels, mainly those in sensitive border areas.

The British government recently failed to prevent judges from ordering the removal of the main suspect in foreign-backed meddling in Iran, the MeK, from being removed from the UK's terror list. Iran isn't too happy about that, summoning the British ambassador to protest the removal - and in truth the British government didn't try too hard to keep the MeK on the list. Neoconservatives and rightwing regime-change advocates have given the MeK heavy political backing in the last few years in both the US and UK and it seems likley that the US State Department will follow suit when it next reviews the MeK's inclusion in October.

Sadr Surrenders? Nope

Posted By Cernig

An article from McClatchy today reports a "big concession" from the Sadrist movement which it says is "a surprising capitulation that seemed likely to be hailed as a major victory for Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki"

Followers of rebel cleric Muqtada al Sadr agreed late Friday to allow Iraqi security forces to enter all of Baghdad's Sadr City and to arrest anyone found with heavy weapons...

In return, Sadr's Mahdi Army supporters won the Iraqi government's agreement not to arrest Mahdi Army members without warrants, unless they were in possession of "medium and heavy weaponry."

The agreement would end six weeks of fighting in the vast Shiite Muslim area that's home to more than 2 million residents and would mark the first time that the area would be under government control since Saddam Hussein was toppled in 2003.

Rightwing pro-occupation bloggers in America are positively gloating at the news, claiming all kinds of victory for Maliki's government.

But not so fast. Who gets what out of this deal? For once, Jules Crittenden has it almost right.

Al-Maliki gets a win. Big power broker stops the killing, Mahdi Army rolls over and everyone goes how. Al-Sadr gets one. It was all about Sadr City residents leaning on the Sadrists. Al-Maliki to the resuce.

Al-Sadr gets a big win. His private army lives to extort, intimidate, murder another day. But Iran could have the biggest win.  Heat’s off.  Maybe that U.S. drawdown continues. Lower election season profile.

News reports and statements from Iraqi government members say that once again Iran played a big role in getting Maliki to back off from wiping out his main political rival, through pressure on Sadr as well as on the ISCI and Dawa parties. The deal thus consolidates Iran as the main Big Brother neighbour for Iraq's Shiite majority and makes it's influence there well-nigh unshakeable. Witness Maliki's back-pedalling on U.S. claims of Iranian weaponry.

As to Sadr, winning an armed conflict with the U.S. and the Iraqi central government was never an option for him. He's succeeded in splitting the Iraqi Army off from U.S. aid against his movement - thus neutralising the threat to his militia, as Crittenden notes, because the Iraqi Army on its own cannot defeat the Mahdi Army despite U.S. spin to the contrary. Maliki has backed off from earlier demands that the Mahi Army be dissolved and there will, it seems, be a four day ceasefire before the Iraqi Army begins to search the teeming slum for heavy weapons. Best of luck to them with that, after giving the militias so much time to hide everything.

But far more important for him is that he now keeps his political hopes alive, with elections where his movement can expect to make considerable inroads against his ISCI rivals looming. That was always the prize, and he has taken it.

As I wrote on April 22nd, the outlook from now is what Anthony Cordesman described: "both sides become locked in a lingering intra-Shi’ite power struggle that mixes violence with political power plays." As my colleague Eric Martin noted at the time, that dim outlook was Cordesman's best case scenario. So now we have the best of all possible "victories" in Iraq, with a Sadrist "capitulation" that is really nothing of the sort but instead prolongs the low-scale Shiite civil war in both the military and political arenas.

Congressional GOP wakes from coma...

From Politico:

"Shellshocked House Republicans got warnings from leaders past and present Tuesday: Your party’s message isn’t good enough to prevent disaster in November, and neither is the NRCC’s money.

The double shot of bad news had one veteran Republican House member worrying aloud that the party’s electoral woes — brought into sharp focus by Woody Jenkins’ loss to Don Cazayoux in Louisiana on Saturday — have the House Republican Conference splitting apart in “everybody for himself” mode.

“There is an attitude that, ‘I better watch out for myself, because nobody else is going to do it,’” the member said. “There are all these different factions out there, everyone is sniping at each other, and we have no real plan. We have a lot of people fighting to be the captain of the lifeboat instead of everybody pulling together.”

In a piece published in Human Events, the Republicans’ onetime captain, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, warned his old colleagues that they face “real disaster” on Election Day unless they move immediately to “chart a bold course of real reform” for the country."

I am not sure what is more astounding, the fact that Republicans are shocked (shocked I tell you) that their looting of the US treasury, illegal war of choice, and gross-massive corruption is not popular OR that Newt Gingrich thinks that after 7 years of this, a sudden show of "real reform" in a few months will make a difference.

This is what happens when you have no interest in governing, but instead, only in winning elections. Yes Congressional GOP face an electoral disaster, one long overdue in my humble opinion and one likely to have happened sooner if not for all those pesky voting glitches and flag-waving dirty tricks (like getting your opponent out of the way by putting him in jail). 

And no Mr. Gingrich, a "bold course of real reform" won't really put a dent into the massive criminal enterprise the GOP has constructed, which is now thankfully crumbling all around them. I say we first put these folks on trial for fraud, bribery, abuse of power, and so forth and then if they are acquitted (by some miracle) you are more than welcome to suggest "bold reforms." Sound about right?

Can you spot the corrupt officials in this story?

Sorry folks, I have been on deadline. Now, some very strange news today that I have no idea what to make of and since it is by way of Foxified WSJ, it really provides me with little ability to even speculate as to why this happened:

"WASHINGTON -- Federal agents raided the Office of Special Counsel, a government agency involved in several high-profile and politically sensitive investigations. The agents seized computer files and documents from its chief, Scott Bloch, and his staff.

Mr. Bloch, who was appointed by President Bush, has been under investigation since 2005 by the Office of Personnel Management for employee claims that he abused his agency's authority, retaliated against its staff and dismissed whistleblower cases without adequate examination. Mr. Bloch couldn't be reached to comment.

<snip>

In the Journal article, Mr. Bloch confirmed the Geeks on Call visit but said it was needed to eradicate a software virus. He said that none of the documents sought in the inquiry were affected and that the employee claims against him were "unfounded and unfair."

The Justice Department had no comment about Tuesday's raid. A Special Counsel spokesman said, "we are cooperating with law enforcement. We do not yet know what this is about." He said the agency "is continuing to perform the independent mission of this office."

In the Tuesday raid, 20 agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and an inspector general's office served grand jury subpoenas on Mr. Bloch and searched his office and home. At least 17 employees were asked to appear before the grand jury next week and answer questions about possible obstruction of justice and destruction of federal records during an investigation.

The Office of Special Counsel, created in the 1970s in the wake of the Watergate scandal, probes sensitive personnel and whistleblower claims by government workers. It also enforces the Hatch Act, which forbids the use of federal resources for partisan political purposes.

Among the office's recent inquiries was whether former White House political director Karl Rove and others improperly used U.S. agencies to help elect Republicans.

Mr. Bloch's investigation of the White House political operation began after a Rove deputy gave a series of political presentations to government agencies on Republican prospects in specific congressional races."

Is this related to the series Raw Story and Harpers has been doing on political prosecutions in the deep South? I don't know. Can we trust the DOJ - after everything - to police itself and actually investigate someone helping out the Rove machine? I don't know. Is Bloch a patsy target or corrupt? I don't know. Honestly, this is where things have gotten to. When you cannot tell if the alleged criminals are those making the arrests and raiding offices or the ones whose offices are being raided and who are arrested. Justice is the true victim of this administration and on every level.

Bob Schieffer, Company Man

Posted by Brad Jacobson

Bob Schieffer's coverage during the George W. Bush years, weighed against his hushed compromising relationship with the president, belies the CBS newsman's projected image as an unimpeachably principled journalist and typifies the way our media class operates.

In a Sunday post on Crooks and Liars, under the headline "Schieffer Wakes Up to Life in the Bush Administration," Nicole Belle wrote: "I don’t know where Bob Schieffer’s been these last seven years, but he thinks that the White House might have an credibility problem." She was reacting to Schieffer's Face the Nation commentary on the Lurita Doan scandal:

SCHIEFFER: I saw a story in the Washington Post the other day, where a reporter granted a government official anonymity in order as the newspaper put it, ‘for the government official to speak more candidly.’ Well, that made me wonder. Do we no longer expect government officials to tell the whole story if they must take responsibility for what they say? Even worse, do we believe that is acceptable?

For sure, the White House won no prize for candor last week; it gave the outgoing head of the General Services Administration, Lurita Doan, a big send off by thanking her for making government buildings more energy-efficient or some such, when in truth, she was forced out. She was the object of multiple investigations, suspicious dealings on government contracts, and asking government employees what they could do to help political candidates, which is, of course, against the law. Even the government’s watchdog agency recommended she be disciplined to the fullest extent. Yet the White House spokesman declined to say if her resignation had anything to do with any of that. From the White House came only thanks and confirmation she was gone. The government saw no obligation to say why, which leads me to this: have decades of secrecy, spin and stonewalling conditioned us to accept less than the whole story from the government? Is telling the whole truth no longer a given? Frankly, I’m not sure. What I do know is more and more people seem skeptical of everything the government says and does. What we saw last week may be one reason why.

Belle then pointed out the underlying absurdity:

The Lurita Doan scandal is such a minor one relative to all the other lies, spin, incompetence and outright negligence of the Bush administration that it’s tragically laughable that this is the one that Schieffer thinks exemplifies why the American people are skeptical to what comes out of the White House.

This also epitomizes Schieffer's reporting on the administration, which has treaded between muted criticism and outright fawning. It's no wonder after Dan Rather's departure from CBS Evening News, President Bush gladly granted Schieffer an exclusive interview. Something he never afforded Rather.

In a March 2003 interview, Schieffer was asked "if the Pentagon's decision to allow reporters to embed with troops" will "make it difficult for journalists to remain objective?" His answer was telling:

BOB SCHIEFFER: No, I don't think so at all. I think it was a very good decision. I must tell you on this one, I'm sort of like Ronald Reagan who used to say of the Soviet Union, "Trust but verify." I take them at their word at the Pentagon, if they're going to let these reporters go along and give us a view of this war if it does come. But I'm going to wait until the shooting starts until I give a final opinion. So far, they are saying all the right things. I give them the benefit of the doubt. I think they're going to try to do the right thing. But we'll see once the shooting starts if they follow up. If they do what they say they're going to do, it would be a very good thing. I also think it's not just good for the American people to have independent observers along, I think it's also good for the military. Had there been a reporter along with Lieutenant Calley when he massacred those people in Vietnam, I think that probably wouldn't have happened.

The truth is, however, in covering the Bush administration, Schieffer has been overly willing to trust and, whenever discrepancies between administration claims and the facts are verified, ever reluctant to hold anyone accountable. The ideal company man. Affable and avuncular yet trusted and above the fray. Walter Cronkite without that pesky willingness to speak truth to power. In the end, Schieffer might as well replace "trust but verify" with "ask but don't follow up."

Throughout his January 2006 interview with Bush, Schieffer responded "Um-hmm" and "Okay" and jarringly changed topics when the president's absurd answers demanded further inquiry. His misplaced deference lent credence to Bush's specious, unconstitutional explanations on everything from wiretaps, speaking with our enemies, the state of Iraq, Katrina, healthcare and energy independence. Moreover, Schieffer's final three questions were embarrassing softballs: "Has the presidency changed you, Mr. President?"; "What has been the worst part?"; and "What has been the impact on your family?"

The "Indiana Market" Analogy

Posted By Cernig

Ovet at VetVoice, Brandon Friedman is scathing about Pentagon-led plans for a $5 billion Green Zone development in Iraq which will include condos, a Western-style mall and a Marriott.

I guess my main question (among the many) would be this: Since when is the American military charged with driving economic development in Iraq?  I wonder what the Iraqis think of the American military making plans to build lavish, Western-style condos and a shopping mall in central Baghdad.  And second, even if the American government is responsible for something like this, where the fuck is the State Department?   

Am I insane, or should the Pentagon be planning our exit from Baghdad--and not five billion-dollar "zones of influence?"  If Iraq wants something like this, then Iraqis should get to planning.  Not the U.S. military.  If they want help, they can ask Condi's State Department.  Or maybe the EU.  Or the UN.  Or their Arab neighbors.  (Forget the last one.  It'll never happen.)

Places like Iraq desperately need private investment, but I think we're getting a little ahead of ourselves here.  And let's be honest, I don't think we're anywhere close to being ready for something like this.

Spencer Ackerman sees it as a drain on Iraqi resources as well as a propaganda gift to insurgents.

In a city consumed by chaos, war, occupation, corruption, intermittent and unreliable electricity, sewage overflows that you sometimes have to wade through, food shortages, public-health crises, you know what you shouldn’t build? "…luxury hotels, a shopping center and even condos in the heart of Baghdad." ....That sort of indifference to the suffering of Iraq is provocative. If I was Moqtada Sadr, I would use it as a rallying cry.

James Joyner, on the other hand, argues that the gap between rich and poor is always with us.

Presumably, companies investing $1 billion in facilities will have a great stake in working to improve the infrastructure, security, rule of law, and other things necessary to ensuring the success of their business venture. Even for conglomerates, that’s real money.

At what point is it conscionable to build luxury hotels? Certainly, most of Cairo, Egypt is a slum by Western standards. Yet, there you will find more than a dozen magnificent luxury hotels, mostly clustered into a central zone, which cater to well-off tourists. Is that immoral? Or does it provide jobs for locals and gradually improve their standard of living?

For that matter, while America’s inner cities are a far cry from Baghdad, many of them are nonetheless impoverished, crime-ridden, and dysfunctional. Yet, almost all of them have luxury hotels, condos, restaurants, and so forth. Indeed, that’s true of our nation’s capital, where $500 a night hotels and restaurants selling $200 bottles of wine are within easy walking distance from neighborhoods none of the patrons of said establishments would venture into at night.

This argument is an echo of the oft-used rightwing talking point that Iraq is no more dangerous to life and limb than living in inner-city America and has also been advanced by the company responsible for building Baghdad's new "Zoo and Entertainment Experience".

Well, you live here in Southern California and there’s drive-bys and everything else. So there’s danger everywhere, and I think the key thing is this will be tremendous for Baghdad.

This argument might well be termed the "Indiana Market" Analogy, after a particularly infamous example - and it's one that Fester debunked some time back.

Major, 100+ fatality car bombings have occurred several times a year for the past two years in Iraq. The United States has experienced no car bombs during this time frame. The same applies to suicide bombings, company sized ambushes of the New York Police Department, the overrunning of the Montana State House, the capturing of the governor of Missouri and the assassination of the director of the Washington D.C. METRO system. These are common types of events in Iraq. If the US was as dangerous as Iraq, we would be seeing these actions occurring here. We don't.

Advanced math or statistics is not needed to say that there is a significant difference in risk and security between Iraq and the United States. All that is required is some willingness to look at history and an unwillingness to believe that clapping louder will make things better.

Let me make it plain - there is no time at which a useful equivalence can be drawn between experiencing drive-bys and airstrikes, between muggings and IEDs. Using the Indiana Market Analogy is either dishonest or simply illogical. The end.

Posted By Cernig

Ovet at VetVoice, Brandon Friedman is scathing about Pentagon-led plans for a $5 billion Green Zone development in Iraq which will include condos, a Western-style mall and a Marriott.

I guess my main question (among the many) would be this: Since when is the American military charged with driving economic development in Iraq?  I wonder what the Iraqis think of the American military making plans to build lavish, Western-style condos and a shopping mall in central Baghdad.  And second, even if the American government is responsible for something like this, where the fuck is the State Department?   

Am I insane, or should the Pentagon be planning our exit from Baghdad--and not five billion-dollar "zones of influence?"  If Iraq wants something like this, then Iraqis should get to planning.  Not the U.S. military.  If they want help, they can ask Condi's State Department.  Or maybe the EU.  Or the UN.  Or their Arab neighbors.  (Forget the last one.  It'll never happen.)

Places like Iraq desperately need private investment, but I think we're getting a little ahead of ourselves here.  And let's be honest, I don't think we're anywhere close to being ready for something like this.

Spencer Ackerman sees it as a drain on Iraqi resources as well as a propaganda gift to insurgents.

In a city consumed by chaos, war, occupation, corruption, intermittent and unreliable electricity, sewage overflows that you sometimes have to wade through, food shortages, public-health crises, you know what you shouldn’t build? "…luxury hotels, a shopping center and even condos in the heart of Baghdad." ....That sort of indifference to the suffering of Iraq is provocative. If I was Moqtada Sadr, I would use it as a rallying cry.

James Joyner, on the other hand, argues that the gap between rich and poor is always with us.

Presumably, companies investing $1 billion in facilities will have a great stake in working to improve the infrastructure, security, rule of law, and other things necessary to ensuring the success of their business venture. Even for conglomerates, that’s real money.

At what point is it conscionable to build luxury hotels? Certainly, most of Cairo, Egypt is a slum by Western standards. Yet, there you will find more than a dozen magnificent luxury hotels, mostly clustered into a central zone, which cater to well-off tourists. Is that immoral? Or does it provide jobs for locals and gradually improve their standard of living?

For that matter, while America’s inner cities are a far cry from Baghdad, many of them are nonetheless impoverished, crime-ridden, and dysfunctional. Yet, almost all of them have luxury hotels, condos, restaurants, and so forth. Indeed, that’s true of our nation’s capital, where $500 a night hotels and restaurants selling $200 bottles of wine are within easy walking distance from neighborhoods none of the patrons of said establishments would venture into at night.

This argument is an echo of the oft-used rightwing talking point that Iraq is no more dangerous to life and limb than living in inner-city America and has also been advanced by the company responsible for building Baghdad's new "Zoo and Entertainment Experience".

Well, you live here in Southern California and there’s drive-bys and everything else. So there’s danger everywhere, and I think the key thing is this will be tremendous for Baghdad.

This argument might well be termed the "Indiana Market" Analogy, after a particularly infamous example - and it's one that Fester debunked some time back.

Major, 100+ fatality car bombings have occurred several times a year for the past two years in Iraq. The United States has experienced no car bombs during this time frame. The same applies to suicide bombings, company sized ambushes of the New York Police Department, the overrunning of the Montana State House, the capturing of the governor of Missouri and the assassination of the director of the Washington D.C. METRO system. These are common types of events in Iraq. If the US was as dangerous as Iraq, we would be seeing these actions occurring here. We don't.

Advanced math or statistics is not needed to say that there is a significant difference in risk and security between Iraq and the United States. All that is required is some willingness to look at history and an unwillingness to believe that clapping louder will make things better.

Let me make it plain - there is no time at which a useful equivalence can be drawn between experiencing drive-bys and airstrikes, between muggings and IEDs. Using the Indiana Market Analogy is either dishonest or simply illogical. The end.