Troop withdrawal from Iraq?

I'm curious to hear what our military experts (Arthur, Dave) think about withdrawing troops from Iraq. Recently, an editorial was written on that very idea and now there's reports in the British press that the US and UK are planning to withdraw troops by early 2007.

The crux of the argument now is that:

• First, Iraqi politicians will not apply sustained pressure to their security forces to improve themselves so long as they know that the Americans will remain to protect the state from the insurgents.
• Second, the Iraqi units themselves will not grow in capability and confidence so long as they are relying upon American command and control, firepower, and tactical acumen.
• Third, the political leaders of Iraq’s three main factions will not make difficult compromises so long as the United States remains in Iraq.
• Fourth, the American presence fuels all four social sources of insurgent support.

Read the editorial for details. So guys... do you agree?

Let the real debate on Prop 77 finally begin

Proposition 77 in California is aiming to redraw legislative districts by appointing a group of retired judges to decide legislative district boundaries rather than allowing current legislatures who clearly have a conflict of interest in preserving their own status quo in deciding the boundaries.

From the article:

The California Supreme Court ruled Friday that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's attempt to change the way legislative districts are drawn should be placed back on November's special election ballot.

The 4-2 decision overturns a state appellate court ruling that removed the measure because of a wording dispute. It also settles the slate of initiatives voters will decide Nov. 8, unless the governor and the Democratically controlled Legislature agree to a compromise set of reforms in the days ahead.

The initial brouhaha was centered on the different wording between the text submitted to the Attorney General for placement on the ballot and the text presented on the petition in obtaining signatures. Daniel Weintraub's California Insider lists the differences between the two, which mainly differs on "nominating" versus "selecting".

In another post, Weintraub pointed out that even Former Governor Gray Davis supported remap reform:

I think its better off having people who are not combatants in this process, retired judges, draw those lines. Actually, I think of the last 4 reapportionments, Eric, 2 were drawn by judges because the courts threw out the redistrict plans and they turned out fine. So, uh, I’m for that initiative. I’m not for it starting in 2006, but I’m for the concept of having judges draw the lines.

Here is the description for Proposition 77 prepared by Attorney General Bill Lockyear's office. A list of other ballot initiatives for California can be found here.

On haitus...

Just thought I'd point out that we're all sort of on haitus until at least after the CA Bar and a suitable recovery period...

Deep Throat unveiled!

The cat's finally out of the bag: Deep Throat is none other than W. Mark Felt, second-in-command at the FBI during the 1970s.

Guide to the Republican Herd

NYT has an article that talks about problems within the Republican party now. The articles notes:

Gone are the days when the Republican Party could easily (if simplistically) be divided into social conservatives versus fiscal conservatives. There are libertarian Republicans, Christian conservative Republicans, moderate Republicans, Wall Street Republicans, balanced-budget Republicans, tax-cutting Republicans, cut-the-size-of-government Republicans, neoconservative Republicans supporting global intervention and isolationist Republicans who would like to stay at home.

The title link jumps to the graphic accompanying the article.

Volatility in the markets

The currency markets are rebounding (with respect to the dollar) now that South Korea clarified that it's reserve diversification plan isn't anything new. The Dow dropped 174 points today in earlier trading, for the biggest fall since mid-2003, as traders fretted that the dollar was weakening. Well, that and rising oil prices.