political nonsense

A survey found that almost 60 percent of the military community are critical of the Bush Administration’s handling of the war.
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Australia ratified the Kyoto protocol, leaving the United States the only major industrialized country not to do so.
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Voters in Venezuela narrowly defeated a referendum on changing their constitution to abolish presidential term limits and vastly increase President Hugo Chavez’s executive powers.
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The Bush administration threatened to lay off up to 150,000 civilian workers at military bases in mid-December if Congress does not approve unrestricted Iraq funding immediately, around 60% of all foreign militants who entered Iraq to fight over the past year came from two of America’s allies- Saudi Arabia and Libya, a former top US commander in Iraq has come out in support of withdrawing most combat troops by the end of next year, and Al Qaeda insurgents disguised as members of a Sunni alliance council attacked the council’s headquarters outside Baghdad leaving at least 18 people dead.
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Nearly all Democrats and more than six in 10 Republicans think the country is going in the wrong direction.
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OPEC’s members have expressed interest in converting their cash reserves into a currency other than the depreciating U.S. dollar, referred to by the President of Iran as a “worthless piece of paper.”
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The House approved a war funding bill ordering President Bush to withdraw most troops from Iraq by the end of next year.
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Fifty-five percent of Americans believe President Bush has committed impeachable offenses.
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It was revealed that US snipers would kill Iraqis that picked up fake guns they had planted as bait regardless of any further indication they were insurgents, the US contested that the quantity of Iranian bomb-making components being found in Iraq is increasing and 20 Iranian-trained agents are still operating south of Baghdad, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki announced amnesty for detainees who had been “deceived” into joining the insurgency in Iraq, and the head of police intelligence in Iraq’s Kerbala province was detained after roadside bombs and other weapons were found in a raid on his house.
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It was reported that 2007 was the deadliest year yet for US troops in Iraq, hundreds of US diplomats protested against a government move to force them to accept postings in war-torn Iraq, the UN reported that independent security contractors in Iraq are mercenaries, Congress approved a $459 billion military spending bill, and the Pentagon was secretly reviewing plans to ease enlistment standards to make up for recruiting shortfalls. The number of recruits seeking waivers for criminal behavior rose three percent last year to nearly one-fifth of all prospective servicemembers. Two-thirds of the waivers were approved.
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Supermodel Gisele Bundchen stopped accepting payment in dollars.

[no longer accepting dollar bills]
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The Bush administration is trying to diffuse a public relations fiasco over news U.S. diplomats are refusing mandatory job assignments in Iraq.
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A Republican state legislator who repeatedly voted against gay rights measures resigned his seat Wednesday amid revelations he had sex with a man he met at an erotic video store while in Spokane on a GOP retreat. “I am not gay,” he said.
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UN atomic watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei said Sunday he had no evidence that Iran is building nuclear weapons and accused US leaders of adding “fuel to the fire” with recent inflammatory rhetoric.
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FEMA apologized for holding a fake press conference.
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The US government is to order up to 50 diplomats to fill vacant posts in Iraq in the first such large-scale forced assignment since the Vietnam War, at least 33 people were reported killed in a fresh wave of Iraq violence, Turkey’s prime minister rejected an Iraqi proposal to resolve the standoff over raids by Kurdish guerrillas across the rugged border into Turkey because it included a military role for the United States, Iraqi troops found 17 decomposed bodies of unidentified men, and a British private security company was being sued in the US over the death of a US soldier hit by one of its convoys in Iraq.
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The Bush administration intensified its campaign against Iran with a new round of sanctions against its military and leading companies.
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It was reported that there are now more than three quarters of a million names on the U.S. government’s terrorist “watch list,” and a government report raised concerns the list may be becoming too large.
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A State Department review of its own security practices in Iraq assailed the department for poor coordination, communication, oversight and accountability involving armed security companies like Blackwater USA and DynCorp, Blackwater was being accused of tax evasion and defrauding the government of millions of dollars by designating many of its employees as independent contactors instead of company personnel, President Bush requested another $46 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan bringing the total request this year to $196 billion, Osama bin Laden released a video urging Sunni Arab insurgents in Iraq to unite to fight against the US, about 10,000 Turkish troops were amassed along Turkey’s border with Iraq, and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said he would shut down the offices of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, and will not allow the group to operate in Iraq after Kurdish rebels killed 12 Turkish soldiers on Sunday. The PKK has been fighting for Kurdish autonomy in southeastern Turkey since 1984.
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Michael Chertoff, the homeland security secretary, waived several environmental laws to resume building the Mexico border fence; meanwhile President Bush announced he will ask Congress to approve a $500 million package to help Mexico fight drug cartels, the largest international anti-drug effort by the United States in nearly a decade.
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