political nonsense

US and Iraqi officials were negotiating Baghdad’s request to expel the private security company Blackwater within six months following last month’s deadly shoot out in Baghdad, a Washington Post correspondent was shot dead in Baghdad, former US military commander in Iraq Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez described the war as a “nightmare with no end in sight,” the Turkish government formally sought authorization from the Turkish parliament to invade Northern Iraq and attack Kurdish rebel groups after amassing 60,000 troops along the country’s border and shelling Kurdish regions across the border, and a former top US general admitted the war in Iraq was about oil. “Of course it’s about oil, we can’t really deny that,” former Commander General John Abizaid said.
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Two thirds of American CEOs, a study found, think that American CEOs are overpaid.
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Researchers reported that strippers earn more money when they’re ovulating.

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Economists pointed out that going to college might not be worth it.
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The Israeli military ordered the seizure of vast new swaths of Palestinian land in the West Bank.
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The United Nations reported that people around the world are healthier, and wealthier. “People around the world are becoming healthier, wealthier, better educated, more peaceful, more connected, and they are living longer,” they said.
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Burma’s junta claimed that peace and stability had been restored following its crackdown on mass pro-democracy protests in which at least 30 people, but likely far more, were killed.
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The United States decided it should deliver weapons to Iraq faster after finding out that the Iraqis ordered $100 million in military equipment from China, Iraqi officials accused the US of killing at least 17 Iraqi civilians in multiple helicopter air strikes near Baquba on Friday, an Iraqi judge concluded corruption extended into the government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and an American official said that US efforts to combat the problem are inadequate, General Petraeus blamed Tehran for escalating violence in Iraq, current and former US officials accused the State Department of ignoring repeated warnings that private security contractors were endangering Iraqi civilians and undermining US efforts to win support from the population, and the Iraqi prime minister’s office reported that the government’s investigation had determined that Blackwater USA private security guards who shot Iraqi civilians three weeks ago in a Baghdad square sprayed gunfire in nearly every direction, committed “deliberate murder” and should be punished accordingly.
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A British think tank concluded that the War on Terror has been a disaster.
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The US House of Representatives passed legislation that allows the prosecution of security personnel contracted by the US government for work in Iraq and other hostile places.
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police officers have begun patrolling the Internet sites where guilty parties sometimes freely admit to committing various crimes without apparent fear of reprisal, such as parties and protests.
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North and South Korea agreed today to press their superpower allies for a peace treaty to end the world’s oldest and bloodiest cold war conflict, as the leaders of the divided peninsula wrapped up only their second summit in more than 50 years.

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A woman ran over her own legs with her SUV in a McDonald’s drive-thru.

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The Bush administration increased more than fivefold Tuesday the number of Near East and South Asian refugees the U.S. can admit as it seeks to accept 12,000 Iraqi refugees during the next 12 months.
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Paris Hilton decided to go to Rwanda to do charity work.

[not in rwanda]
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Burma’s military government has intensified its crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators, abducting people from their homes in the middle of the night. U.S. Embassy personnel have found some Buddhist monasteries completely deserted while others have been closed off by soldiers.
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The Ozone Layer shrunk by a third this year.
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Bush vetoed the child healthcare bill and 51% of Americans said they would be willing to pay higher taxes so that all children could have health insurance,with those with lower household incomes showing the most support.
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The Department of Homeland Security announced that the completion of a $20 million “virtual fence” pilot project along the Mexican border near Tucson would be delayed because its cameras and radar were unable to distinguish people and vehicles from bushes and cows.

[not a mexican]
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The Senate voted to authorize spending another $150 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the FBI is sending a team of agents to Baghdad to investigate Blackwater, a senior al-Qaeda leader was arrested, Iraq announced it wants the UN Security Council to extend the mandate of the United States-led multinational force in Iraq only through the end of 2008 and then replace it with a long-term bilateral security agreement, The US Embassy criticized a Senate resolution that could lead to a division of the country into sectarian or ethnic territories-agreeing with a swath of Iraqi leaders in saying the proposal “would produce extraordinary suffering and bloodshed,” it was reported that at least 3,802 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war, and the US military said it regrets civilian deaths, as it announced a new surge of strikes against Al-Qaeda in Iraq in which six militants were killed and a child was hit in the crossfire.
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