Necessary News

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Afghanistan: Flirting With Failure

• News flash: Things aren’t going well in Afghanistan — the model that the Bush administration was touting as its great international success. Opium production is skyrocketing. The Taliban is resurging. Roadside bombings are occuring more frequently. And the White House is just starting to notice. [New York Times]
• The New York Times reports: “Deeply concerned about the prospect of failure in Afghanistan, the Bush administration and NATO have begun three top-to-bottom reviews of the entire mission, from security and counterterrorism to political consolidation and economic development.”
• The reviews are an acknowledgment of the need for greater coordination in fighting the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, halting the rising opium production and trafficking that finances the insurgency and helping the Kabul government extend its legitimacy and control.
• But don’t expect any large press releases. The review’s being kept on the DL, and won’t result in any major troop deployments. Mainly because there aren’t any troops available.
• Publicly, administration officials have expressed optimism that the war in Afghanistan can be won, but Defense Secretary Robert Gates told Congress last week that his optimism was “tempered by caution.”
• “I have a real concern that given our preoccupation in Iraq, we’ve not devoted sufficient troops and funding to Afghanistan to ensure success in that mission,” Rep. Ike Skelton (D-PA) said. “Afghanistan has been the forgotten war.”

Losing the forgotten war.

Bali: The U.S. U-Turn

• For the past two weeks we’ve been keeping you up-to-date on the movements at the UN climate change conference in Bali. Now, as the meeting comes to a close, the delegates from over 190 countries were able to reach a consensus...after an unexpected shift in the U.S.’s position. [Der Spiegel]
• In case you forgot: The goal of the conference was to create a policy which would replace the Kyoto agreement, which is set to expire in 2012. Up until now, the U.S. has posed serious roadblocks to any consensus by refusing to agree to set emission reductions.
• But, on Saturday, the US delegation made a U-turn in a final negotiating session, where Paula Dobriansky, leader of the US delegation, and her colleague James Connaughton were the target of naked animosity.
• When Dobriansky announced that the US would not sign up for the Bali roadmap, boos echoed through the room. Afterward the Americans were sharply attacked by several delegations. “If you’re not willing to lead, please get out of the way,” said a US environmental activist representing Papua New Guinea.
• The US was opposing a proposal by the G77 bloc, which represents developing countries, for rich nations to do more to help developing countries combat increasing greenhouse gas emissions. 
• However opponents of binding targets for greenhouse gas emissions, such as Japan or Russia, did not come to the defense of the US, and the Americans gave in. “We will go forward and join consensus,” said Dobriansky. This time the delegation was rewarded with a standing ovation from some participants.

Why we’re not totally happy: The roadmap created by the delegates still lacks concrete carbon reduction targets.

States Say “No!” To Abstinence-Only

• Teenage pregnancies are on the rise for the first time in 14 years, and Congress keeps pumping millions of dollars into ineffective sex-ed. Luckily, States are starting to get wise. [MicCheck] [MicCheck] [Washington Post]
• The federal government is considering boosting the money available to states for abstinence-only sex education to $204 million.
• States can use this money, about $15 million -$50 per state, for “school classes, community groups, state and local health departments and media campaigns. But the money is restricted to efforts focused on promoting abstinence.”
• But 14 states want none of it. Why? Abstinence only doesn’t work.
• Kids who receive abstinence-only sex ed have been shown to have sex just as often, and start just as early, as kids who have sex-ed that includes the use of condoms and other birth control and STD-prevention methods.
• “Why would we spend tax dollars on something that doesn’t work?” asked Ned Calonge of the Colorado Department of Health and Environment, which has declined $450,000 in federal funds. “That doesn’t make sense to me. Philosophically, I am opposed to spending government dollars on something that’s ineffective. That’s just irresponsible.”
• In 2006, only four states revjected the funding, but in 2007, that number shot to 14. Two more states, “Ohio and Washington — have applied but stipulated they would use the money for comprehensive sex education, effectively making themselves ineligible, federal officials said.”

Just say no.

Sunday, Bloody Sunday: We Watch So You Don’t Have To

FOX NEWS SUNDAY with Chris Wallace

Guests: Rep. Jane Harman, Rep. Pete Hoekstra, on the destroyed CIA tapes.

• HOEKSTRA: Once these witnesses appear in front of the committee, then I think we’ll have to make the decision as to whether we’re going to provide them with immunity or not. But our investigation should move forward.
• WALLACE: So, you’re going to defy the letter that you got from the Justice Department
• HOEKSTRA; I think so. I mean, obviously, I have to talk to the Chairman of the Committee about that.
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• HOEKSTRA: “The CIA did not tell us about the existence of these tapes. They did not tell us that they were going to be destroyed. There’s a constitutional responsibility for them to keep Congress informed, and they have not. And we need to hold them accountable.”
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• HOEKSTRA: “You’ve got a community that’s incompetent. They are arrogant. And they are political. And they don’t believe that they are accountable to anybody. They don’t believe that they’re accountable to the president. They’ve clearly demonstrated through the tapes case that they don’t believe they are accountable to Congress, and when we are at war, that’s a terrible position for the intelligence community to be in.”
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• HOEKSTRA: “I think that we’re going to hold Mike Hayden accountable, because some of these misleading statements occurred on his watch.”
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• HARMAN: “I — warned them not to destroy the videotapes. I sent them a letter in 2003, and they did it anyway and they didn’t tell us. So, it smells like the cover-up of the cover-up.”
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ABC THIS WEEK, with George Stephanopoulos

Guest: Former Fed chair Alan Greenspan

• GREENSPAN: “We are beginning to get not stagflation, but the early symptoms of it.”
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• GREENSPAN: “Fundamentally, inflation must be suppressed. It’s critically important that the Federal Reserve is allowed politically to do what it has to do to suppress the inflation rates that I see emerging, not immediately, but clearly over the intermediate and longer-term period.”
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That’s what we were doing while y’all were finishing your Christmas shopping. You’re welcome.

White House Paper Shredding Costs Spiral

• We could barely believe this either. [Radar]
• In an elegant summary of the Bush administration’s record on secrecy and obstruction of justice, Radar reports that White House document shredding costs have increased more than six-fold since 2000.
• In 2000, the federal government spent only $452,807 on “contracts for paper shredding services,” according to the new site, USASpending.gov.
• By 2006, that number skyrocketed to $2.9 million.
• What on earth could they be shredding? Hmm...let us think.
• How about millions of politicized e-mails, records of Jack Abramoff’s White House visits, Cheney’s energy meeting transcripts, descriptions of the CIA torture tapes, internal documents related to the firing of the U.S. attorneys, or State Department files on shady Iraqi reconstruction contracts? [House Government Oversight]
• Not only that, but the Bush administration has been achingly slow to respond to document requests under the Freedom On Information Act. [MicCheck]
• In 2006, only 2 of every 5 requests was processed, and the “number of of exemptions cited to support the withholding of information has increased 83% since 1998.” [Think Progress]

Bush = The Shredder. Someone call the Ninja Turtles.

Good News, Bad News

Church Of Satan Snitches

A troubled teen is in custody after he e-mailed his Satanist church threatening to “kill his grandparents and steal their money and car.” Peter Gilmore, the high priest of the New York City-based Church of Satan, turned 18-year old Andrew Culver over to the police because he wrote he “had access to an arsenal of weapons and wanted to ‘kill in the name of our unholy lord Satan.’” Eeeee... [Fox]

Good News

It’s nice to know that even high priests of the church of Satan can be trusted to do the right thing.

Bad News

If insane killers can’t even confide in Satan anymore, what’s the world come to?

Quote Of The Day

The Bush administration’s arrogant bunker mentality has been counterproductive at home and abroad.

— Presidential Candidate Mike Huckabee, in a new opinion piece out last week in Foreign Affairs magazine. [Foreign Affairs]

vs.

I didn’t say the President was arrogant. … I’ve said that the policies have been arrogant. … I’m the one who actually supported the President’s surge.

— Presidential Candidate Mike Huckabee yesterday on CNN’s Late Edition, backing waaaaay down after being criticized for his comments by fellow candidate Mitt Romney.

Speed Round

FOLLOW-UP

Remember last week when we told you the American Bar Association had named former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales as its “Lawyer of the Year”? They’d like you to know they’ve *clarified* that distinction and now he’s officially known as the “Newsmaker of the Year.” Carry on. [Think Progress]

GONE, DADDY, GONE

The head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, the controversial John Tanner, quietly quit Friday. Tanner, remember, was the guy who justified discriminatory voting laws by noting, “our society is such that minorities don’t become elderly the way white people do. They die first.” [TPM] [TPM]

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 18

Date set by House Oversight Committee Chairman Henry “Mustache of Justice” Waxman has set to hear testimony from baseball Commissioner Bud Selig, players union leader Donald Fehr and former Sen. George Mitchell. [Politico]

ON THE WATCH

Santa’s not the only one on the watch for bad behavior this year: Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid may keep the Senate in session during that week between Christmas and New Years to stop President Bush from getting sneaky with the recess appointments. [Washington Post]

WHAT WAR BRINGS HOME

McClatchy kicks off a four part series on the National Guard units returning from Afghanistan and Iraq and the impact they have on the small towns they go home to. Required reading. [McClatchy]

AFGHANISTAN

Things are getting hairy for the U.S. mission in Afghanistan, so Bush and NATO have begun “three top-to-bottom reviews” of our presence there. [NY Times]

WIRETAPPING IMMUNITY

Bush is lobbying hard to keep the telecom companies that helped him illegally spy on Americans from being prosecuted. One wrinkle: fewer lawsuits against telecom companies means less evidence against the Bush administration. [NY Times]

CAN’T GO HOME AGAIN

The Iraqi government and U.S. forces are having a terrible time reintegrating returning refugees in to the new “balkanized” Baghdad. [Washington Post]

COMING SOON

Fish from China harvested from toxic waters. [NY Times]

IT’S (NOT) BEGINNING TO LOOK LIKE CHRISTMAS

Retail sales are sluggish for the holiday season, signaling an economic slump. [NY Times]

THIS IS NEVER GOOD

“Pakistan Says Terror Suspect Has Escaped” [NY Times]

BRING AN UMBRELLA (ELLA ELLA)

The East Coast is getting slammed by a deadly winter storm. [USA Today]

IRAQ

The Turks bomb a group of Kurdish rebels in Iraq and say they had the green light from the U.S. [USA Today]

REFUGEE CRISIS

For the 1.4 million Iraqis who fled their country for Syria, a balkanized homecoming awaits. [Washington Post]