Typical Republican Hypocrisy

“As usual you missed the point.

The White House also faces charges of hypocrisy -- claiming executive privilege -- at the same time it made public confidential e-mails and transcripts of background briefings to discredit chief critic Richard Clarke.”

“And by the way, anybody else notice that the Bush-haters are giving the administration no credit for what they did after 9/11? Everybody just assumes that if Al Gore were president, he also would have invaded Afghanistan and overthrown the Taliban. - stratdewd

...and did you notice that the Bush supporters are giving no credit to Bush for preventing 9/11?”

“who prevented pearl harbor?

who prevented oklahoma city?

who prevented waco?

who prevented the titantic?


who prevented hitler?


it's over dood, you think he did too much after 9-11 and too little before 9-11....


rice's own words;

Condoleezza Rice:
Bush team took al-Qaida threat seriously
By CONDOLEEZZA RICE

THE AL-QAIDA terrorist network posed a threat to the United States for almost a decade before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Throughout that period — during the eight years of the Clinton administration and the first eight months of the Bush administration prior to Sept. 11 — the U.S. government worked hard to counter the al-Qaida threat.

During the transition, President-elect Bush’s national security team was briefed on the Clinton administration’s efforts to deal with al-Qaida. The seriousness of the threat was well understood by the President and his national security principals. In response to my request for a Presidential initiative, the counterterrorism team, which we had held over from the Clinton administration, suggested several ideas, some of which had been around since 1998 but had not been adopted. No al-Qaida plan was turned over to the new administration.

We adopted several of these ideas. We committed more funding to counterterrorism and intelligence efforts. We increased efforts to go after al-Qaida’s finances. We increased American support for anti-terror activities in Uzbekistan.

We pushed hard to arm the Predator unmanned aerial vehicle so we could target terrorists with greater precision. But the Predator was designed to conduct surveillance, not carry weapons. Arming it presented many technical challenges and required extensive testing. Military and intelligence officials agreed that the armed Predator was simply not ready for deployment before the fall of 2001. In any case, the Predator was not a silver bullet that could have destroyed al-Qaida or stopped Sept. 11.

We also considered a modest spring 2001 increase in funding for the Northern Alliance. At that time, the Northern Alliance was clearly not going to sweep across Afghanistan and dispose of al-Qaida. It had been battered by defeat and held less than 10 percent of the country. Only the addition of American air power, with U.S. special forces and intelligence officers on the ground, allowed the Northern Alliance its historic military advances in late 2001. We folded this idea into our broader strategy of arming tribes throughout Afghanistan to defeat the Taliban.

Even their most ardent advocates did not contend that these ideas, even taken together, would have destroyed al-Qaida. We judged that the collection of ideas presented to us were insufficient for the strategy President Bush sought. The President wanted more than a laundry list of ideas simply to contain al-Qaida or “roll back” the threat. Once in office, we quickly began crafting a comprehensive new strategy to “eliminate” the al-Qaida network. The President wanted more than occasional, retaliatory cruise missile strikes. He told me he was “tired of swatting flies.”

Through the spring and summer of 2001, the national security team developed a strategy to eliminate al-Qaida. Our plan called for military options to attack al-Qaida and Taliban leadership, ground forces and other targets — taking the fight to the enemy where he lived. It focused on the crucial link between al-Qaida and the Taliban.

We would attempt to compel the Taliban to stop giving al-Qaida sanctuary — and if it refused, we would have sufficient military options to remove the Taliban regime. The strategy focused on the key role of Pakistan in this effort and the need to get Pakistan to drop its support of the Taliban. This became the first major foreign-policy strategy document of the Bush administration — not Iraq, not the ABM Treaty, but eliminating al-Qaida.

Before Sept. 11, we closely monitored threats to our nation. President Bush revived the practice of meeting with the director of the CIA every day — meetings that I attended. And I personally met with George Tenet regularly and frequently reviewed aspects of the counterterror effort.

Through the summer increasing intelligence “chatter” focused almost exclusively on potential attacks overseas. Nonetheless, we asked for any indication of domestic threats and directed our counterterrorism team to coordinate with domestic agencies to adopt protective measures. The FBI and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) alerted airlines, airports and local authorities, warning of potential attacks on Americans.

Despite what some have suggested, we received no intelligence that terrorists were preparing to attack the homeland using airplanes as missiles, though some analysts speculated that terrorists might hijack airplanes to try to free U.S.-held terrorists. The FAA even issued a warning to airlines and aviation security personnel that “the potential for a terrorist operation, such as an airline hijacking to free terrorists incarcerated in the United States, remains a concern.”

We now know that the real threat had been in the United States since at least 1999. The plot to attack New York and Washington had been hatching for nearly two years. According to the FBI, by June 2001 16 of the 19 hijackers were already here. Even if we had known exactly where Osama bin Laden was, and the armed Predator had been available to strike him, the Sept. 11 hijackers almost certainly would have carried out their plan. So, too, if the Northern Alliance had somehow managed to topple the Taliban, the Sept. 11 hijackers were here in America — not in Afghanistan.

President Bush has acted swiftly to unify and streamline our efforts to secure the American homeland. He has transformed the FBI into an agency dedicated to catching terrorists and preventing future attacks. The President and Congress, through the USA Patriot Act, have broken down the legal and bureaucratic walls that prior to Sept. 11 hampered intelligence and law enforcement agencies from collecting and sharing vital threat information. Those who now argue for rolling back the Patriot Act’s changes invite us to forget the important lesson we learned on Sept. 11.

In the immediate aftermath of the attacks, the President, like all Americans, wanted to know who was responsible. It would have been irresponsible not to ask a question about all possible links, including to Iraq — a nation that had supported terrorism and had tried to kill a former President. Once advised that there was no evidence that Iraq was responsible for Sept. 11, the President told his National Security Council on Sept. 17 that Iraq was not on the agenda and that the initial U.S. response to Sept. 11 would be to target al-Qaida and the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Because of President Bush’s vision and leadership, our nation is safer. We have won battles in the war on terror, but the war is far from over. However long it takes, this great nation will prevail.”

“Top U.S. civilian administrator in Iraq Paul Bremer, speaking at a police cadet graduation ceremony, said, "Yesterday's events in Fallujah are a dramatic example of the ongoing struggle between human dignity and barbarism."

The four -- employees of a security company that has provided security for Bremer -- "were attacked and their bodies subjected to barbarous maltreatment," Bremer said. "The acts we have seen were despicable and inexcusable. They violate the tenets of all religions including Islam as well as the foundations of civilized society."

Any hypocrisy there? I guess invading another country and looting and killing innocent people based on lies and deception by Bush qualifies as acceptable Christian values."”

“USA, just a quick question for you. Have you read any of the weblogs of Iraqi's, and if so, what is your opinion of their view of the war and aftermath?”

“(CBS/AP) The Justice Department probe into whether someone in the White House broke federal law by naming a CIA agent to the press may be expanding, a newspaper reports.

The New York Times reports the investigation is looking at whether people have lied to federal investigators or mishandled classified documents.

The newspaper also reports the special prosecutor leading the probe, Patrick Fitzgerald, may be ready for another round of grand jury testimony, and perhaps close to ending his investigation. It is not clear whether he has decided to press charges or not.

The case concerns the publication last summer of the name of a CIA agent who is married for former Ambassador Joseph Wilson. The agent's name emerged after Wilson publicly criticized the Bush administration for making a false allegation against Iraq.

Naming a clandestine agent could violate federal law. The CIA asked for an investigation of the leak, and the Justice Department agreed. Three months ago, Attorney General John Ashcroft recused himself from the case, and Fitzgerald took over.

Several top White House staff members have already testified before a grand jury in the case, and still more have met with the FBI.

The Times reports Fitzgerald is looking at possible contradictions between their statements. Documents like e-mails and phone records may also clash with the statements.

In addition, investigators want to know if the CIA agent's name was taken from a classified document. It could be illegal to disclose any information from such documents.

The Times reports Republicans are worried that if Fitzgerald pursues charges unrelated to the leak itself — like someone allegedly lying to the grand jury — the probe will drag on like the Whitewater probe of the Clinton administration, which began as an investigation of real estate deals, but ultimately examined President Clinton's lying about sexual improprieties.


Those Poor republicans, worried about an investigation. I just can't believe there could be liars in the Bush white house. Dubya is a straight shooter.”

“It seems as though, as the days pass, there is more problems recently.

A lot of people (Americans in Iraq) are getting there ass handed to them, and it hasn't been pretty, folks.

Remember in December, when they told us the violence in Iraq was on a decline. A year later, what's our "body count" in this action? I'd hedge a bet that it what ever it is, it too much considering what we just did.

History will be the final judge in this matter, but we will all pay in the meantime.”

“Depending on who you talk to, body counts don't matter. Apparently the only time they do matter is when they are used to criticize the adminstration. As far as the probe goes, it seems that liberals think a Justice Dept. probe was not a good idea, but now that it is uncovering interesting things, the libs have pulled their typical stunt of changing their story. Now, for some reason, they find this probe to be credible. This is why it's not surprising that liberals are correctly seen as out of touch with reality.”

“Posted on Fri, Aug. 15, 2003
Walter Cronkite | Liberalism in media


I hope we all get along as we go along. I expect that occasionally we'll have some differences of opinion. I expect to be provocative.

After more than 60 years as a journalist, I have some ideas about the state of our nation, of our world, of our culture, and I wouldn't be true to the purpose of a column if I didn't vent them here.

My hope is that you will find my commentary interesting, informative, perhaps occasionally amusing (deliberately, that is) and, at all times, fair and as unbiased as it is possible for opinion to be.

You are going to disagree with me from time to time; I'll be disappointed if you don't. That fulfills the provocative requirement of a column like this.

When the nation was deeply divided over the Vietnam War, we at CBS got a lot of mail complaining about our coverage. I was disturbed until we found out that the number of letters condemning us as being government lackeys in support of the war almost precisely balanced those condemning us as being sympathetic to the war protesters. I relaxed with the simple philosophy that if you are being shot at from both sides, you must be in the middle.

Let's face this one down right now: I'm neither Republican nor Democrat. I'm a registered independent because I find that I cast my votes not on the basis of party loyalty but on the issues of the moment and my assessment of the candidates. Basically, I'm a fiscal conservative and a social liberal, but those who rabidly support those positions will be more often disappointed in my views than otherwise.

I believe that most of us reporters are liberal, but not because we consciously have chosen that particular color in the political spectrum.

More likely it is because most of us served our journalistic apprenticeships as reporters covering the seamier side of our cities -- the crimes, the tenement fires, the homeless and the hungry, the underclothed and undereducated.

We reached our intellectual adulthood with daily close-ups of the inequality in a nation that was founded on the commitment to equality for all. So we tend to side with the powerless rather than the powerful.

If that is what makes us liberals, so be it, just as long as in reporting the news we adhere to the first ideals of good journalism -- that news reports must be fair, accurate and unbiased.

That clearly doesn't apply when one deserts the front page for the editorial page and the columns to which opinion should be isolated.

The perceived liberalism of television reporters, I am convinced, is a product of the limited time given for any particular item. The reporter desperately tries to get all the important facts and essential viewpoints into his or her piece but, against a fast-approaching deadline, he or she must summarize in a sentence the complicated story.

That is where the slippage occurs and the summary too frequently, without intention, seems to emphasize one side or the other.

The answer to that problem, as with much else in television news, is in more time for the dominant evening newscasts.

In our ever-more complicated and confusing world, those newscasts need an hour.

Incidentally, I looked up the definition of "liberal" in a Random House dictionary. It gave the synonyms for "liberal" as "progressive," "broad-minded," "unprejudiced," "beneficent."

The antonyms it offered: "reactionary" and "intolerant."

I've always suspected those fine folks at Random House of being liberals. You just can't trust anybody these days.”

“Lapiss, Glad you brought this up. There have been significant declines in violence. Look it up. Statements and decisions based upon emotion are not what we need. Let's react to the facts, not isolated highly publicized incidents.”

“I'd like to get to the facts as well, Miss Informed.

Where are they? Are we off our 1 a day pace yet? It's on your side to back yer statments up wth sources, we all know that the "look it up" thang doesn't pass muster, mister. I have not the time to chase yer red herrings.

When Saddam was captured, they said they we confident that the violence would stop. Isolated or not, there was just a huge cluster phuck over there.

It would seem that there is still a lot of work to be done there, so we can meet our June 30th pull out, right?”

“You can find the number of dead and wounded info on CNN. It is also published in your local newspaper. I assume people with strong opinions such as yourself read a newspaper once in a while. I can see I was mistaken.

Who said they were confident the violence would end? My recollection was that the statement was it would not end. Do you have a source?”

“Here's a quick one:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,105706,00.html

*snip*

from Fox News....

"This success brings closure to the Iraqi people," Sanchez said.

"Saddam Hussein will never return to a position of power from which he can punish, terrorize, intimidate and exploit the Iraqi people as the did for more than 35 years."

Washington hopes Saddam's capture will help break the organized Iraq resistance that has killed more than 190 American soldiers since Bush declared major combat over on May 1 and has set back efforts at reconstruction. U.S. commanders have said that while in hiding Saddam played some role in the guerrilla campaign blamed on his followers.

In the latest attack, a suspected suicide bomber detonated explosives in a car outside a police station Sunday morning west of Baghdad, killing at least 17 people and wounding 33 more, the U.S. military said.”

“What is your point? Who said that the violence would end? The article does not support your accusation.”

“Then that's yer problem, pal.



Per request - I checked out the figures, fist tme in a few weeks and.....ah......I'm not impressed in the least. At this rate, 1,000 will have given there lives for this action by the end of summer. There better be a damn good result of what where doing there.”

“You should work on your reading comprehension.”

“Now THAT'S FUNNY!


heeeehhhhaawwwwww”

“The price must be paid for being a lonely super power.And in this case ,the super power that feels it and only it knows what is right for all else.The bible says somewhere" thow shelt bow down to no other gods",or something to that effect, will in the long run be the fall of this police station state.”

“What has gone right in Iraq
Jeff Jacoby
April 2, 2004


With all the news coming out of the Middle East, here is a detail you might have missed: A few weeks ago, the United Nations shut down the Ashrafi refugee camp in southwestern Iran. For years Ashrafi had been the largest facility in the world housing displaced Iraqis, tens of thousands of whom had been driven from their homes by Saddam Hussein's brutality. But with Saddam behind bars and his Baathist dictatorship crushed, Iraqi exiles have been flocking home. By mid-February the camp had literally emptied out. Now, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees reports, "nothing remains of Ashrafi but rubble and a few stones."

Refugees surging to Iraq? That isn't what the antiwar legions told us would happen if George Bush made good on his vow to end Saddam's reign of terror. Over and over they warned that a US invasion would trigger a humanitarian cataclysm, including a flood of refugees from Iraq. This, for instance, was Martin Sheen at a Los Angeles news conference a month before the war began:

"As the dogs of war slouch towards Baghdad, we need to be reminded that as many as 2 million refugees could become a reality, as well as half a million fatalities."

Writing on the left-wing website AlterNet last March, senior editor Tai Moses dreaded the coming of a war that "could create more than a million refugees in Iraq and neighboring countries." The BBC, citing a "confidential" UN document, predicted that up to 500,000 Iraqis would be seriously injured during the first phase of an American attack, while 1 million would flee the country and 2 million more would be internally displaced -- all compounded by an "outbreak of diseases in epidemic if not pandemic proportions." The Organization of the Islamic Conference foresaw the "displacement of hundreds of thousands of refugees," plus "total destruction and a humanitarian tragedy whose scale cannot be predicted."

Wrong, every one of them, along with all the other doomsayers, Bush-haters, "Not In Our Name" fanatics, and sundry "peace" activists who flooded the streets and the airwaves to warn of onrushing disaster. How many have had the integrity to admit that their visions of catastrophe were wildly off the mark? Or that if they had gotten their way, the foremost killer of Muslims alive today -- Saddam -- would still be torturing children before their parents' eyes? Instead they chant, "Bush lied, people died," and seize on every setback in Iraq as proof that they were right all along.

But they were wrong all along. Operation Iraqi Freedom stands as one of the great humanitarian achievements of modern times. For all the Bush administration's mistakes and miscalculations, for all the monumental challenges that remain, Iraq is vastly better off today than it was before the war.

And the Iraqi people know it.

In a nationwide survey conducted for ABC and the BBC by Britain's Oxford Research International, 56 percent of Iraqis say their lives are better now than before the war; only 19 percent say things are worse. Asked how things are going for them personally, seven out of 10 Iraqis say that life is good. Because of "Bush's war," Iraqis today brim with optimism. Fully 71 percent expect their lives to be even better a year from now; less than 7 percent say they'll be worse. Iraq today may just be the most upbeat, forward-looking country in the Arab world.

With hard work and a little luck, it may soon be the best governed as well. The interim constitution approved by the Iraqi Governing Council last month protects freedom of speech and assembly, guarantees the right to privacy, ensures equality for women, and subordinates the military to civilian control. It is, hands down, the most progressive constitution in the Arab Middle East.

Nearly a year after the fall of Baghdad, Iraq is hugely improved. Unemployment has been cut in half. Wages are climbing. The devastated southern marshlands are being restored. More Iraqis own cars and telephones than before Saddam was ousted. Some 2,500 schools have been rehabbed by the US-headed coalition. Spending on health care has soared thirtyfold, and millions of Iraqi children have been vaccinated. Iraqi athletes, no longer terrorized by Saddam's sadistic son Uday, are training for the summer Olympics in Greece.

Above all, Iraq's people are free. The horror and cruelty of the Saddam era are gone forever. In the 12 months since the American and British troops arrived, not one body has been added to a secret mass grave. Not one woman has been raped on government orders. Not one dissident has been mauled to death by trained killer dogs. Not one Kurdish village has been gassed.

Is everything rosy? Of course not. Could the transition to constitutional democracy still fail? Yes. Do innocent victims continue to die in horrific terror attacks, or at the hands of lynch mobs like the one that dragged the corpses of four Americans through the streets of Falluja this week? They do.

But none of that changes the bottom line: In the ancient land that America liberated, life is more beautiful and hopeful than it has been in many decades. Bush's foes may loudly deny it, but the refugees streaming homeward know better.”

“The truth is out.If you do what god says you are insane.Only in Tejas.Shame on that court.”

“The truth is out.

Americans don't read.

Buy a newspaper.”

“the truth doens't interest liberals unless it makes bush look bad.....”

“Jesus, I’m so sick of the damn fishing expeditions the left is launching against conservatives. Bush takes a shlt and they want an inquiry. The saddest thing is how the left’s perspective is so skewed. Our President is a republican so everything most be wrong and the world sucks. Under a liberal president they have their rose-colored glasses on and can overlook anything and life is peachy. The most satisfying thing for me is the fact it won’t work. Simply taking the exact opposite stand as Bush is not offering a platform on anything. America is not that stupid.

It’s a shame that they can’t even see their own hypocrisy.”

“Remember,invading Iraq was the most liberal act this country has ever been involved in.Republicans better start learning what conservative is.In US politics a conservative action would be one which maintains the original intent of the founders of this country.Start talkin conservatives.”

“LMAO at Nigal. How easily they forget the witch-hunt investigation the republicans had of Clinton into a bogus claim of an investment of real estate deal before Clinton ever took office at the White House. That invetigation led to a white lie about a blow job which the Republicans saw fit for impeachment.

No wonder republicans are worried. If a white lie about a blow job is cause for impeachment, what would a lie about a crime that occured in the Bush White House be cause for?”

“Thr real problem is that Nigals statement is as true for the right as it is for the left and both sides are in denial.”

“Nigal knows he's trippin'. It was kinda funny, though, him callin' the kettle black.”

“the white water investigation led to 17 convictions of clinton's close associates and freiends. susan mcdougal, & her hubby...who died in prison....the govenor of arkansas was also convicted, and the republican leutenant gov , mike huckabee took his place and is still our govenor. to say that a blowjob is all that came of it is an outragous lie. i could go on and on about what they found...nobody even knows about it cuz it's not on the nightly news...

musthike, there has never been this level of animosity towards a sitting president. the left no longer cares if they hurt our country, put our troops in danger, give aid and comfort to the enemy...as long as it hurts bush, anything is fair game now.
it's reached a new level..”

“I never said the right never did this to Clinton. But the number of red herrings the liberals are going for shows their desperation due to a lack of origanal political ideas. Hey, if ya can't come up with a legitit way to win simply try to discredit the guy that's in office.”

“right on nigal

i've been saying it all along.

all they have is negativity. sad way to run a country...telling people how horrible your president is....they call him hitler, evil, satan....it's a sad situation...

at least they will loose”

“Both sides need to revisit Iran-Contra and see how,in the name of 'save the populace from the horrors of', has been used to keep the people from knocking the white house door down.”

“there has never been this level of animosity towards a sitting president. - strat

You must be talking again of the Clinton witchhunt. No charges ever came against the Clintons. The rightwing attempt to discredit and smear the very popular Clinton who had the country in great shape was not animosity?”

“I see Powell is backing off further from his dog&pony show at the UN last year. It seems the 'faulty intelligence' line needs another coat of paint.”

“Good old Newt did get on a roll there. The Contract of America, came in with a lot of venom.

This is politics, people. Both Bush and Kerry will be slinging mud, we all know that. Both sides have been slinging mud for years. I don't see how either side can run the "there being so mean to me" trip, doesn't work as a defense.”

“It ain't beanbag.”

“twister?”

“Pin the war on the douchebag?”

“I'm sorry Man! That was just Too Damn Easy!”

“Strat, if you read about the Whitewater investigation you will find that the special prosecutor knew that they had nothing on the Clintons for several years. However, because of politics, they knew that if they hung around, the fact of an investigation would hurt the presidency. If you recall, the investigation went on many a wild goose chase. All that Bill and Hilary did was to put money into a bad investment scheme that was run fraudulently without their knowledge. All of this happened WAY before Clinton became president. Should we start a special investigation into GW's past? He made some deals that could be seen as just as shady as the Whitewater deal.”

“If starting a war based on lies isn't an impeachable offense, what is?

Did anyone else catch John Dean on the boob tube this weekend?”

“Operation Rescue founder's son — 'I'm gay'

By The Associated Press

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The son of Christian activist Randall Terry, known for his strident opposition to abortion and homosexuality, says he is gay.


http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?c=1&slug=gayson23&date=20040423&query=gay

Dumbass Conservative Christians teaching their children to be sinners in God's eyes. The shame! Typical republicans.”

“someone who chastises someone else for being Christian is just as bad as someone ridiculing another for being gay....

loosah says wha?”

“Not chastising Christians.

Chastising hypocrites who happen to be conservative christians.”

“bad”

“WASHINGTON (CNN) -- One of President Bush's closest confidants challenged Sen. John Kerry on Sunday to further explain comments he made in 1971 that he participated in "atrocities" in Vietnam.

"I wish we knew a little bit more about that," Karen Hughes, the former White House communications director, said on CNN's "Late Edition."

"Did he think he did commit them or not? And who else did? And what was he really saying? Was he totally exaggerating? Was he making it up? I think the press ought to follow some line of inquiry about that."

Kerry campaign spokesman Phil Singer called Hughes' comments "misleading," adding that "we will stand toe-to-toe with [Bush] on our military service any day of the week."

In an interview on NBC's "Meet The Press" last Sunday, Kerry was asked about statements he made about Vietnam War atrocities during an interview with the same program in 1971, when he was a leader in the antiwar movement.



Of course we know Bush didn't commit any atrocities while AWOL from the Guard.”

“Kerry:
Three Purple Hearts
Bronze Star
Silver Star


Junior:
Two Cavities”

“i did not throw my medals away!

er...uhhhmmm....maybe i did...but they were ribbons.....with medals attached.....and i threw other peoples medals over the fence.

that file footage is bogus!


LMFAO!

man, charlie gibson is frying kerry right now! i can't believe it! gibson was there and watched kerry do it and he's not letting him off the hook......”

“So What???”

“Kerry had the guts to oppose a war he saw as illegal and immoral. I concur with that. He waited until he was out of uniform to protest, also. That shows the respect he has for the military.
One of the latest chapters on Republican hipocracy was written by Justice Scalia when he had tape recordings erased and confiscated after a speech. If the "conservatives" could be honest about this, they would admit that Ginsburg doing the same thing would bring down a chorus of howls from the right. We would never hear the end of it. What liberal media??????”

“RENO, Nevada (AP) -- The U.S. military is demanding the return of five howitzers that two Sierra Nevada ski resorts use to prevent avalanches, saying it needs the guns for the fighting in Afghanistan.

Alpine Meadows and Mammoth Mountain received the artillery pieces on loan from the Army and began using them last year to fire rounds into mountainsides and knock snow loose.

But the ski resorts received word earlier this month that the Army's Tank Automotive and Armaments Command at the Rock Island Arsenal in Illinois needs the howitzers back.

"I need to have them back in the troops' hands within 60 to 90 days," said Don Bowen, the Army command's team leader in charge of the howitzers.

"It's a very short timeframe to get them serviceable and back into the theater in southwest Asia. Afghanistan is the immediate concern."



Ooooooops, guess junior shouldn't have siphoned $700 million away from the Afghan war.”