Georgia

Bill Clinton was the last Democrat to win Georgia, so it’s fitting that he heads on down there and campaigns for Jim Martin. Well that’s exactly what he is going to do:

Former President Bill Clinton will headline a rally for Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Jim Martin on Wednesday, the candidate’s campaign announced Saturday. Clinton is the first big name Democrat to stump for Martin in his Dec. 2 runoff battle with Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss.

There has been a lot of talk that Obama should go down there and campaign. I haven’t been on that side of the argument. I think Obama has a rather full plate right now. I’m sure if he could find the time to do it, then he would, but there is also a huge security risk now that he is President-elect Obama. I also think Bill will give Martin every bit as much of a boost as Obama in Georgia.

Saxby Chambliss has just given Democrats some good ammo for the run-off:

Saxby Chambliss is resisting an order to give evidence in a lawsuit by families of victims killed or hurt in the Imperial Sugar Co. explosions and fire earlier this year.

The U.S. senator was subpoenaed last month on behalf of four victims - two dead and two injured - of the Feb. 7 Port Wentworth inferno that claimed the lives of 14 workers and hospitalized scores of others.

The conduct of Chambliss concerning the disaster has developed into an issue in his re-election campaign against Democrat Jim Martin. The incumbent outpolled Martin and a third candidate on Nov. 4 but failed to win a majority. Chambliss now faces runner-up Martin in a Dec. 2 runoff.

Savannah attorney Mark Tate, who issued the subpoena, said the Republican lawmaker tried to talk some of Tate's clients out of suing Imperial Sugar.

Through his attorneys, Chambliss has said that as a U.S. senator, he does not have to comply with the subpoena.

So because Chambliss is a Senator he doesn’t have to testify? That’s the biggest line of bull I have ever read. This shows that Chambliss is out to abuse his position and something Jim Martin can really hit on. Imagine losing your loved ones in a tragedy like this, only to be called by a U.S. Senator and told “hey don’t try to seek damages”. I smell the birth of a hard hitting political ad here.

McCain campaigned hard against Russia following the Georgia conflict this summer, so its no shock this information comes out after the election:

Newly available accounts by independent military observers of the beginning of the war between Georgia and Russia this summer call into question the longstanding Georgian assertion that it was acting defensively against separatist and Russian aggression.

Instead, the accounts suggest that Georgia’s inexperienced military attacked the isolated separatist capital of Tskhinvali on Aug. 7 with indiscriminate artillery and rocket fire, exposing civilians, Russian peacekeepers and unarmed monitors to harm.

The accounts are neither fully conclusive nor broad enough to settle the many lingering disputes over blame in a war that hardened relations between the Kremlin and the West. But they raise questions about the accuracy and honesty of Georgia’s insistence that its shelling of Tskhinvali, the capital of the breakaway region of South Ossetia, was a precise operation. Georgia has variously defended the shelling as necessary to stop heavy Ossetian shelling of Georgian villages, bring order to the region or counter a Russian invasion.

A lot of experts said that the conflict was actually reversed from the Washington meme; it was Russia defending a sovereign nation that Georgia had attacked. If this is truly the case then the U.S. and a lot of the world has egg on their face, and its no wonder why Russia has been acting so much more defensive. When facing false allegations from a nation who has a track record of invading countries on lies (the U.S.), wouldn't you also get defensive?

That's not what I am saying, but rather what Putin is saying:

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has accused the United States of orchestrating the conflict in Georgia to benefit one of its presidential election candidates.

In an exclusive interview with CNN's Matthew Chance in the Black Sea city of Sochi Thursday, Putin said the U.S. had encouraged Georgia to attack the autonomous region of South Ossetia.

In a perfect world we would write this off as the ramblings of a mad man. Sadly this isn't a perfect war and we have an administration who wouldn't think twice about doing something like this. Hopefully it will send enough of a message to Congress so that they start asking some questions. If there is any merit to these allegations at all, then the U.N. needs to start investigating also.

Bush speaking today about the Georgia conflict:

"Bullying and intimidation are not acceptable ways to conduct foreign policy in the 21st century."

Not acceptable unless your name is George Bush. His foreign policy has been based on nothing but "bullying and intimidation". Just ask Iraq.

A column in the Guardian really takes a different look at the conflict in Georgia. The byline alone is an eye catcher:

War in the Caucasus is as much the product of an American imperial drive as local conflicts. It's likely to be a taste of things to come

It deserves a thorough read as I am sure it will really get under the skin of some.

Georgian President, Mikheil Saakashvili, tells McCain it's time to turn words into deeds:

Yesterday, I heard Sen. McCain say, ‘We are all Georgians now,’” Saakashvili said on CNN’s American Morning. “Well, very nice, you know, very cheering for us to hear that, but OK, it’s time to pass from this. From words to deeds.”

When I heard McCain had said that yesterday, something popped into my mind. McCain keeps accusing Obama of acting like he is "already President". Well this comment from McCain really sounds like he is playing President also.

I also wish CNN would report all the facts in their stories:

McCain’s foreign policy adviser Randy Scheunemann told reporters on the campaign plane Tuesday that McCain’s remark “obviously meant a lot to Saakashvili personally, but more importantly the message it conveyed to the Georgian people in this really, time of unprecedented national emergency.” Scheunemann said McCain and Saakashvili are friends who have speaking daily throughout the crisis.

Wouldn't it be nice to include little tidbits like; Scheunemann was a lobbyist for Georgia, or Scheunemann was advising McCain while receiving money from Georgia. You would think the "most trusted name in politics" would adhere to the principals of full disclosure of such information - wouldn't ya?

Condi has to go to work now:

"To demonstrate our solidarity with the Georgian people," the president announced that he was sending Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to Paris to assist the West's diplomatic efforts on the crisis, and then to the Georgian capital of Tbilisi.

Funny how the great Russian expert, Condi Rice, has been non-existent while the turmoil in Georgia spins out of control. Just another member of the "My Pet Goat" administration.

Reports are mixed this morning, but it appears Russian troops are now heading towards the Georgia capital of Tiblisi. There's a lot of mixed reports coming out, but CNN is showing Russian troops pressing further into Georgia, and saying that alone is a violation of the cease fire.

How many times have we heard about all the "expertise" Condi Rice has on Russia? Interesting that during this conflict we haven't heard much from her. Well it turns out Condi too busy on "holiday" to be bothered with the problem, though the State Department claims she has made over "90 phone calls" about the situation.

As we move forward with technology, our sources of warfare also transform. This could be what's happening in Georgia right now:

August 11, 2008 (Computerworld) Hackers, perhaps affiliated with a well-known Russian criminal network, have attacked and hijacked Web sites belonging to Georgia, the former Soviet republic now in the fourth day of war with Russia, a security researcher claimed on Sunday.

Some Georgian government and commercial sites are unavailable, while others may have been hijacked, said Jart Armin, a researcher who tracks the notorious Russian Business Network (RBN), a malware and criminal hosting network.

This is an angle to warfare that is only discussed in theory, and one most think of as the plot from some sci-fi movie. Today it looks more like reality.

The people in Georgia wonder why the U.S. and NATO isn't there helping them fight Russia:

As a Russian jet bombed fields around his village, Djimali Avago, a Georgian farmer, asked me: “Why won’t America and Nato help us? If they won’t help us now, why did we help them in Iraq?”

A similar sense of betrayal coursed through the conversations of many Georgians here yesterday as their troops retreated under shellfire and the Russian Army pressed forward to take full control of South Ossetia.

If the U.S. gets involved militarily in this conflict, it means we are at war with Russia. If we go to war with Russia, we can expect that war to include us against China. Is this something our stretched out military can really handle now?

While the media is fixated on the Edwards affair, there is real news out there. Reports are indicating that some 1,500 people have been killed already in the fighting between Georgia and Russia. Georgia has also approved a "state of war" against Russia.

Yesterday the word was that this has the potential of exploding into something really bad, today that looks more like a reality.

Here we are in 2008 and a Republican in Georgia wants to redraw the state lines to fix a problem from 1818:

Nearly two centuries after a flawed survey placed Georgia's northern border just short of the Tennessee River, some legislators are thirsting to set the record straight.

[SNIP]

"It's never too late to right a wrong," said Georgia state Sen. David Shafer (R), whose bill would create a boundary-line commission that aims to resolve the dispute.

The reaction of Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen (D): "This is a joke, right?"

I hope this is a joke also. To sit there and expect some big fight over the border, and take a chance at tearing apart some of our nation's cities is a joke. Of course this is a microcosm of a look into what the future will hold, with diminishing water supplies. If we are going to have a battle between two states over this, imagine the battle between countries when they are running out of water.