Oct. 30 - I still haven't seen the tape (and am unlikely to, as I'd have to, like, tune on CNN and pay attention in order to view the tape ... yeech!) but the Fox website has what appear to be most of the words and Matt Druge has the transcript.

Is he actually suing for peace? I think we've gone way, way beyond that, although it will please those who are openly in favour of appeasement.

So long, Osama. Nice to hear from you again, but we're a bit busy these days hunting down your friends and dispatching them to the lower regions of Hell.

If you let us know where you can be reached, we'll drop a daisy cutter by for tea someday.

11:23: Some different views on the tape from Wretchard (who says "Though it is couched in his customary orbicular phraseology he is basically asking for time out,") Beldar (who believes he is making "an invitation to Pres. Kerry to negotiate a truce,") Donald Sensing calls it a "yawner" and notes "the tape is the best al Qaeda can do. A videotape is their pre-election surprise" and although he cautions against letting our guard down thinks "... the new OBL tape should encourage us that we are winning. Before 9/11, bin Laden acted, not blustered. Now bluster is about all he's got against America, though al Qaeda sadly still kills abroad." Roger Simon reluctantly admits OBL seems alive, and links to a commenter with more than the usual credentials who makes some interesting observations that suggest OBL really is dead (a must read!)

It struck me that OBL is suing for a separate peace. That would mean that, having initiated and take the leadership in the war on terror, we could just abandon it and save our skins, but what of our allies? What of Iraq?

Another thing: he focuses solely on the Mideast, but doesn't mention other hot spots, such as Indonesia. Australia has her own just grievances against OBL, but unless something has occurred in the past few hours, a similar offer hasn't been made to her or any of our other allies (the real ones, I mean, not the "traditional" ones, as an offer was allegedly made to France in exchange for rescinding the headdress ban.)

There have been a variety of opinions as to whether this helps President Bush or Senator Kerry, and we should see a lot of spin from the media and their trained seals experts as to which. As though we haven't already had plenty of that in the course of this campaign.

To more important matters: it appears the assault on Fallujah is underway, and eight good Marines have died.

Semper fi.

Oct. 31 - 18:01 - I'm wrong about the campaign in Fallujah. Iraqi interim Prime Minister Allawai is warning that patience is wearing thin:

Prime Minister Ayad Allawi's warning, delivered in a nationally televised news conference, occurred as U.S. forces prepare for a showdown with thousands of militants holed up in Fallujah - the city that has become the focal point of armed resistance to the Americans and their Iraqi allies.

Allawi appeared to be aiming to prepare the Iraqi public for an onslaught likely to unleash strong passions, especially among the country's Sunni Muslim minority.

[...]

U.S. officials say Allawi will personally issue the final order to launch any all-out assault on Fallujah and other Sunni insurgent strongholds north and west of the capital.

Allawi gave no deadline for talks with Fallujah city leaders to bear fruit, but he insisted they must hand over foreign fighters and allow Iraqi security forces to take control of the city.

"We have now entered the final phase of attempts to solve Fallujah without a major military confrontation. I hope we can achieve this, but if we cannot, I have no choice but to secure a military solution," he added.

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Oct. 29 - The MuNu server went down before I published anything this morning (which I took as a sign to get some sleep) and I woke up to learn I had slept through a new Osama tape. CNN is all a-twitter about it, but the only thing that surprised me was that he actually seems to have taken credit for the Sept. 11 attacks, which deals a severe blow to those who insisted it was Mossad, the CIA, or never even happened. Other than that, I don't see that it informs me of anything we didn't already know: he doesn't care who wins the election because he hates us. Period.

The tape did say that they will continue to attack us until we stop attacking them, which is a backwards endorsement for President Bush as it affirms that we are attacking them and a blow to Kerry who insists Iraq was a "diversion."

It's hard for me to tell if I'm overly dismissive about this latest tape (although I'll concede it appears the bastard is still alive) or if it is truly dismissible, but I think maybe the media is running too hog-wild with it because the missing explosives story is faltering and they want to divert us.

Maybe I'm just tired of everyone trying to divert us. Taking the fight to the enemy is basic military strategy, so what does make my eyes light up is news that finally, finally, it appears that we are going to renew the campaign in Fallujah. Sooner, please?

As for Osama? He still hates us. And after all we've done for him ...

And as for me, I am off to work.

Update: This should learn me (again!) to trust CNN snap headlines. Now that I've been able to read the transcript I think this is a significant change from the usual bin Laden message. But I think he still hates us.

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Oct. 29 - The issue from beginning of this story was when did they go missing.

A news video might be of the missing explosives or they might show another explosive material classified 1.1D.. (I didn't see ABC News last night so can't comment to the video shown in that broadcast, but Deacon at Power Line says its useless.)

By the way, Fox has the IAEA report of January 14, 2003, online here in .pdf form for anyone who is interested (it's about 11 pages long in Adobe Acrobat.)

CNN has what may be the best description of the affair: Two more bits of possible evidence have surfaced in the mystery of the missing Iraqi explosives, but they appear to bolster two different scenarios as to what may have happened to the cache.

Maj. Austin Pearson with the 3rd ID has stated that they removed and destroyed about 250 tons of explosives from Al Qaqaa in April, 2003 but doesn't know if they were the ones said to be under IAEA seal.

I turned CNN on in time to hear commentators express incredulity that the Pentagon cannot yet state which explosives were destroyed by the 3rd ID, which reinforces the fact that none of them have ever served in the armed forces. Sen. Kerry is pounding the same theme, though, which is odd because we all know that he did serve so he should know fully that backtracking events in the military is laborious and time-consuming. They don't call it "the army way" for nothing.

The stickers said to be on the boxes in the video released by ABC evidently are of a substance that is mixed with water (or did ABC use stock footage of boxes that were not at Al Qaqaa?) I've had some small experience with Hazmat designation numbers up here in Canada, and all I know for sure is that the classification numbers are intended to tell emergency crews what they are dealing with - corrosives, explosives, etc. - rather than identify any specific substance. If I'm following this correctly, the IAEA numbers have the same degree of specificity.

But now the debate has shifted over to things that make my eyes glaze over as the last chemistry class I took was long ago.

Wretchard does his best to clarify matters for even a science-challenged person like me here and looks at the possible content of those boxes here.

Sometimes one just has to rely on their common sense. Power Line notes drily "I'm not sure how you would "specifically search for" seven hundred fifty-four thousand pounds of explosives, but somehow, I suspect that if you saw them, you'd notice." The supposition that two different military units failed to notice that many boxes under IAEA seal just doesn't hold water.

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Oct. 29 - Space Monkey is conducting an online exit poll here. Those who have cast early or absentee ballots can, if they chose, state who they voted for and in which state.

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Oct. 29 - Be sure and read Humalia Akrawy: An Iraqi Woman Speaks Out.

I tried to excerpt it to give you a taste of how passionately the post vibrates with her love of freedom, and couldn't. You will have to read it for yourself.

(Link via One Hand Clapping.)

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Oct. 28 - Okay, I had some dinner (it's a shift work thing) and have had time to try to let this thing settle. The fact remains that the IAEA inspectors cannot have inspected the explosives if the bunkers were sealed, so the repeated assertions that they "inspected the explosives" is simply untrue - the inspectors merely looked at the seals.

I'm willing to attribute the inaccurate assertions of "inspected the explosives" to careless wording by the New York Times and other news media, but if the ABC story that the bunkers were readily accessible without breaking the seals holds up and we remember the NY Sun article stating that the IAEA refused to destroy the explosives despite the urging of the inspectors, some of the statements in that NY Sun article suddenly seem more than speculative:

On Monday, a spokesman for the American mission at the United Nations questioned the timing of the release of the material on the part of Mr. ElBaradei. Rick Grenell told the Sun's Benny Avni the "timing seems puzzling."

After a behind-the-scenes battle inside the State Department this summer, the Bush administration opted to reject Mr. ElBaradei's bid for a third term as director general of the atomic energy agency.

At the time, Washington was collecting intelligence - disputed by some agencies - that Mr. ElBaradei was providing advice to Iran on how to avoid sanction from his organization for its previously undisclosed uranium enrichment programs.

Mr. al-Baradei has publicly urged the Iranians to heed an earlier pledge to suspend enrichment, but he has also opposed America's policy of taking Iranian violations to the U.N. Security Council. Mr. al-Baradei has announced he will nonetheless seek a third term. Nominations for the director general position close on December 31. [Emphasis added.]

Suddenly Hans Blix is no longer merely irritating and Mohammed El Baradei is no longer merely pompous. They are two incredibly powerful men who literally had the world in their care and dropped the ball. The question is if it was due to negligence or corruption.

The case for war has suddenly, in retrospect, been altered. (No, I don't think the president lied, but I've always assumed that the government concealed information - not out of malevolence toward the American people but because that is the nature of being at war.)

Many of us who supported the war had some lingering hope for the inspection process but recognized that regime change, which is to say removing Saddam and his psychotic sons, was the only right thing to do. But now we are faced with the fact that Iran and N. Korea have or are close to having nuclear capability and it was done on the El Baradei's watch.

The mood of the American electorate as both El Baradei and Benon Sevan are revealed to be incompetent at best or corrupt at worst will not bode well for the U.N. The one poll that hasn't been conducted lately is to assess the confidence of Americans in the U.N., but the most recent ones had indicated growing disillusion with that organization, and that will be a consideration when voters cast their ballot for "American unilateralism with staunch and valiant allies" or "global test."

Five.More.Days. Judging by the past four days, it will be longer than a lifetime.

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Oct. 28 - Ghost of a Flea celebrates his Second Blogiversary. Go thank him for his wonderful contribution to the blogosophere. Right now!

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Oct. 28 - This is going to be one of those crescendo posts, so if you're in a hurry, skip to the last two links.

The NY Times reports today that President Bush responded to the charge that US forces were negligent and allowed 380 tons of explosives to fall into terrorist hands:

"Our military is now investigating a number of possible scenarios, including that the explosives may have been moved before our troops even arrived at the site," Mr. Bush told thousands of Republicans at an airport rally in Lancaster County, Pa., his first stop of a day that took him through three states.

"This investigation is important and it's ongoing," he said, "and a political candidate who jumps to conclusions without knowing the facts is not a person you want as your commander in chief."

The exact timing of the disappearance of the explosives is critical to the political arguments of each campaign. Mr. Kerry's contention that the administration did not adequately secure the country and was unprepared for the war's aftermath presumes that the explosives disappeared after the fall of Saddam Hussein on April 9, 2003, as officials of the interim Iraqi government say.

If the explosives disappeared before Mr. Hussein fell, as Mr. Bush now says is possible, that would undercut Mr. Kerry's argument and bolster Mr. Bush's contention that his opponent is making charges without all the facts.

[...]

The last time that international inspectors saw the explosives was in early March 2003, days before the American-led invasion. It is possible, inspectors with the International Atomic Energy Agency say, that Saddam Hussein's forces may have tried to move the material out of the 10 huge bunkers at the Al Qaqaa facility where it was stored to save it if the facility was bombed.

If so, that would partly support Mr. Bush's contention that the Iraqis could have moved 380 tons of material very far without being detected.

But Mr. Bush on Thursday did not address a critical issue raised by the discovery of the missed explosives: why American forces were not alerted to the existence of a huge cache of explosives, even though the atomic energy agency and American officials had publicly discussed the threat it posed, and knew its exact location.

The commander of the troops that went into the Al Qaqaa facility on the way to Baghdad in early April, Col. Joseph Anderson, of the Second Brigade of the Army's 101st Airborne Division, has said he was never told the site was considered sensitive, or that international inspectors had visited it before the war began.

Another article in the NYT, 4 Iraqis Tell of Looting at Munitions Site in "03, revisits the looting (perhaps because it's the only leg this story has left to it?) and still can't answer when the explosives went missing:

Agency [IAEA] officials examined the explosives in January 2003 and noted in early March that their seals were still in place. On April 3, the Third Infantry Division arrived with the first American troops.

Chris Anderson, a photographer for U.S. News and World Report who was with the division's Second Brigade, recalled that the area was jammed with American armor on April 3 and 4, which he believed made the removal of the explosives unlikely. "It would be quite improbable for this amount of weapons to be looted at that time because of the traffic jam of armor," he said.

The brigade blew up numerous caches of arms throughout the area, he said. Mr. Anderson said he did not enter the munitions compound.

The Second Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division arrived outside the site on April 10, under the command of Col. Joseph Anderson. The brigade had been ordered to move quickly to Baghdad because of civil disorder there after Mr. Hussein's government fell on April 9.

They gathered at Al Qaqaa, about 30 miles south, simply as a matter of convenience, Colonel Anderson said in an interview this week. He said that when he arrived at the site - unaware of its significance - he saw no signs of looting, but was not paying close attention.

Because he thought the brigade would be moving on to Baghdad within hours, Al Qaqaa was of no importance to his mission, he said, and he was unaware of the explosives that international inspectors said were hidden inside.

Pentagon officials said Wednesday that analysts were examining surveillance photographs of the munitions site. But they expressed doubts that the photographs, which showed vehicles at the location on several occasions early in the conflict, before American troops moved through the area, would be able to indicate conclusively when the explosives were removed.

Col. David Perkins, who commanded the Second Brigade of the Third Infantry Division, called it "very highly improbable" that 380 tons of explosives could have been trucked out of Al Qaqaa in the weeks after American troops arrived.

Moving that much material, said Colonel Perkins, who spoke Wednesday to news agencies and cable television, "would have required dozens of heavy trucks and equipment moving along the same roadways as U.S. combat divisions occupied continually for weeks."

He conceded that some looting of the site had taken place. But a chemical engineer who worked at Al Qaqaa and identified himself only as Khalid said that once troops left the base itself, people streamed in to steal computers and anything else of value from the offices. They also took munitions like artillery shells, he said.

Mr. Mezher, the mechanic, said it took the looters about two weeks to disassemble heavy machinery at the site and carry that off after the smaller items were gone. [Emphasis added.]

What the NY Times story doesn't tell you is that there was a major battle in the area before the 3 ID entered the facility on April 3.

[Army Col. David] Perkins commanded 2nd Brigade of the 3rd Infantry Division. A unit under his command, the 3rd Battalion, 15th Infantry, entered the depot on April 3, 2003, and defeated the enemy forces there in a two-day battle.

[...]

Perkins, now assigned to the Joint Staff, said it is "highly improbable" that the enemy was able to take the explosives out any time after U.S. forces arrived in the area. It would require "that the enemy sneaks a convoy of 10-ton trucks in and loads them up in the dark of night and infiltrates them in your convoy and moves out," he said. "That's kind of a stretch too far."

When his battalion arrived at Al Qaqaa April 3, it engaged several hundred enemy soldiers and the paramilitary Fedayeen Saddam in the area. The unit killed or captured all who were there, with the battle lasting through April 5.

[...]

At the same time, Perkins said, the soldiers of the unit did an initial assessment of the depot. "The concern was what's the capability of the munitions, rather than how much was there," he said

His soldiers concentrated on looking for weapons of mass destruction, especially chemical weapons. They found suspicious white powder and reported that through the chain of command. A chemical unit arrived, tested the powder and determined it was safe. The soldiers did not find the IAEA- sealed explosives.

Iraq was one of the most heavily armed countries on Earth. Perkins said it is important to remember that in its push to Baghdad, the brigade passed many depots containing thousands upon thousands of tons of arms and armaments. The brigade had no indication that the Al Qaqaa depot was anything special. "It was just another cache of weapons like the dozens we had passed," Perkins said.

The unit left the area April 5. "The mission was to quickly defeat the enemy and cause the collapse of the regime," Perkins said. "So what we did then was continue to push down the east side of the Euphrates because there was a whole brigade of the Medina division facing them."

After the 3rd Infantry Division left the area, the 2nd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division, took up residence through April 11.

The 75th Exploitation Task Force visited the facility May 7, May 11 and May 27. They found no IAEA material during any of these visits. [Emphasis added]

Russian special forces troops moved many of Saddam Hussein's weapons and related goods out of Iraq and into Syria in the weeks before the March 2003 U.S. military operation, The Washington Times has learned.

John A. Shaw, the deputy undersecretary of defense for international technology security, said in an interview that he believes the Russian troops, working with Iraqi intelligence, "almost certainly" removed the high-explosive material that went missing from the Al-Qaqaa facility, south of Baghdad.

Iraqi officials may be overstating the amount of explosives reported to have disappeared from a weapons depot, documents obtained by ABC News show.

The Iraqi interim government has told the United States and international weapons inspectors that 377 tons of conventional explosives are missing from the Al-Qaqaa installation, which was supposed to be under U.S. military control.

But International Atomic Energy Agency documents obtained by ABC News and first reported on "World News Tonight with Peter Jennings" indicate the amount of missing explosives may be substantially less than the Iraqis reported.

The information on which the Iraqi Science Ministry based an Oct. 10 memo in which it reported that 377 tons of RDX explosives were missing — presumably stolen due to a lack of security — was based on "declaration" from July 15, 2002. At that time, the Iraqis said there were 141 tons of RDX explosives at the facility.

But the confidential IAEA documents obtained by ABC News show that on Jan. 14, 2003, the agency's inspectors recorded that just over 3 tons of RDX was stored at the facility — a considerable discrepancy from what the Iraqis reported.

The IAEA documents could mean that 138 tons of explosives were removed from the facility long before the start of the United States launched "Operation Iraqi Freedom" in March 2003.

[...]

The IAEA documents from January 2003 found no discrepancy in the amount of the more dangerous HMX explosives thought to be stored at Al-Qaqaa, but they do raise another disturbing possibility.

The documents show IAEA inspectors looked at nine bunkers containing more than 194 tons of HMX at the facility. Although these bunkers were still under IAEA seal, the inspectors said the seals may be potentially ineffective because they had ventilation slats on the sides. These slats could be easily removed to remove the materials inside the bunkers without breaking the seals, the inspectors noted. [Emphasis added]

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Oct. 27 - There still hasn't been anything definitive as to when the explosives were taken, but everyone has pointed out that a cache that large would have required 40 trucks to move, and since there seems to have been a lack of IAEA seal sightings, the implications are that they were moved before US troops arrived.

Almost time to go to work, but here are some links on Bombgate (or NYTrogate as Captain's Quarters is calling it, or Qaqaagate from Powerline) starting with the CBS report filed April 4, 2003, which indicates that

a) CBS doesn't believe their own stories, and/or
b) CBS doesn't read their own stories, and/or
c) they still don't both to fact check their stories in their rush to impugn the president, and/or
d) all of the above.

From the CBS story:

U.S. troops found thousands of boxes of white powder, nerve agent antidote and Arabic documents on how to engage in chemical warfare at an industrial site south of Baghdad. But a senior U.S. official familiar with initial testing said the materials were believed to be explosives.

Col. John Peabody, engineer brigade commander of the 3rd Infantry Division, said the materials were found Friday at the Latifiyah industrial complex just south of Baghdad.

"It is clearly a suspicious site," Peabody said.

It would have been nice had they destroyed the explosives then, I guess, but since suspicions were high that there were chemical and biological agents hidden in the facility, maybe that wouldn't have been such a good move, hmm?

Good old 20/20 highsight. It never comes in time to actually inform decisions.

Super good links to follow are Captain's Quarters which was first with the CBS story about the 3rd ID visit to Al Qaaqa in April, 2003. (Link via Instapundit post by Michael Totten.)

Wretchard clarifies matters best. Excellent post as always.

The NY Sun says UN inspectors were urged to destroy the explosives in 1995.

N.Z. Bear wonders why the explosives haven't been used and has a comprehensive link round-up including this one which wonders about Mohammed Al Baradei's motives.

Power Line covers the President's response to the issue.

I have to get ready for work, but am taking a moment to reflect on the way things were in the early days of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

You remember the March and April days of Operation Iraqi Freedom, don't you? When the troops kept their gas masks close at hand, and we were braced for an attack of sarin or mustard gas. When we prayed it wouldn't happen because even though the troops had personal protective equipment the Iraqi people didn't and the death toll of civilians would have been staggering.

We weren't looking for conventional weapons. Those we found. We were looking for the unconventional ones. We didn't find them, and that has been a campaign issue.

We found conventional ones, and that has become a campaign issue too.

6 more days. Please let the country stay sane.

I was in media post when the server went down, and regret I don't have time to respond to some comments in earlier posts, but I'll miss my bus if I don't get the heck out of here. Please excuse poor grammar, spelling errors and incorrect syntax.

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Oct. 27 - Sorry, MuNu went offline this morning while I was writing this post, but in truth I needed sleep more than I needed to post (selfish, I know.) It was a very rough night at work, so going to bed early might have been for the good.

I haven't focused on the vandalism and intimidation that has becoming a worrisome part of this campaign but now I read that someone tried to run down Rep. Katharine Harris with his car before swerving away at the last moment.

It would seem Bush supporters are safer in Canada than in the USA!

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Oct. 26 - [Update: The Third ID was at the facility a week before the 101st. Scroll down for more.]

An NBC crew embedded with the 101st Airborne Division accompanied the soldiers to the Al Qaqaa weapon storage facility on April 10, 2003, and found the powerful explosives already gone. (Note that the fall of Baghdad occurred April 9, 2003.)

The last IAEA verification that the material was at the facility was in January, 2003.

Aside: Joe Lockhart, Kerry's senior advisor, is an ass. After the story went Pop! there was a somewhat petulant exchange:

"John Kerry's attacks today were baseless," Bush campaign spokesman Steve Schmidt said. "He said American troops did not secure the explosives, when the explosives were already missing."

Schmidt also said that Kerry "neglects to mention the 400,000 tons of weapons and explosives that are either destroyed or in the process of being destroyed" in Iraq.

But Kerry senior adviser Joe Lockhart fired back with a statement of his own, accusing the Bush campaign of "distorting" the NBC News report.

"In a shameless attempt to cover up its failure to secure 380 tons of highly explosive material in Iraq, the White House is desperately flailing in an effort to escape blame," Lockhart said. "It is the latest pathetic excuse from an administration that never admits a mistake, no matter how disastrous."

Lockhart did not elaborate on how the Bush campaign was distorting the NBC report.

8:06: The CBC is sticking with the original story as of this time.

UNITED NATIONS - Hundreds of tonnes of high explosives are missing and probably looted from a former Iraqi military facility, the United Nations nuclear watchdog said on Monday.

[...]

The Al Qaqaa facility, a large military installation located 45 kilometres south of Baghdad, has been under U.S. military control since the war, but has repeatedly been looted.

Some wonder whether the missing explosives are now being used in insurgent attacks against the forces of the U.S.-led coalition. (Bolding added)

10:58: The National Review has the transcript of the story from last night on NBC News:

Here's the MSNBC report of this story. (Update: It seems to have been expanded at my second viewing at 8:51 p.m.)

12:01: The CBC still hasn't updated the story, and the Toronto Star is carrying the original account, or yesterday's discredited news today. I almost feel sorry for them, they're having such fun over an already discredited story.

By the way, today's account in the NY Times is Iraq Explosives Become Issue in Campaign. Yep, you might say that.

Wretchard ties in the removal of the explosives some time between January and April, 2003, with the "global test" so many promote:

Although it is both desirable and necessary to criticize the mistakes attendant to OIF, much of the really "criminal" neglect may be laid on the diplomatic failure which gave the wily enemy this invaluable opportunity. The price of passing the "Global Test" was very high; and having been gypped once, there are some who are still eager to be taken to the cleaners again.

21:00: It appears the Third Infantry Division arrived at al Qa Qaa a week earlier on April 3, 2003 (google search here - you need a paid subscription to read old articles on The Straits Times.) I haven't seen anything on what explosives the Third ID found but this reprint of an AP story is extremely interesting:

Closer to Baghdad, troops at Iraq's largest military industrial complex found nerve agent antidotes, documents describing chemical warfare and a white powder that appeared to be used for explosives.

U.N. weapons inspectors went repeatedly to the vast al Qa Qaa complex - most recently on March 8 - but found nothing during spot visits to some of the 1,100 buildings at the site 25 miles south of Baghdad.

Col. John Peabody, engineer brigade commander of the 3rd Infantry Division, said troops found thousands of 2-inch by 5-inch boxes, each containing three vials of white powder, together with documents written in Arabic that dealt with how to engage in chemical warfare.

A senior U.S. official familiar with initial testing said the powder was believed to be explosives. The finding would be consistent with the plant's stated production capabilities in the field of basic raw materials for explosives and propellants.

Remember: in the first months of OIF, we were more concerned about stockpiles of chemical weapons.

The MSNBC has expanded their earlier article on this including the recollections of the embed who was with the 101st Airborne on April 10 which are that the 101st was only there 24 hours and didn't conduct a thorough search.

The Toronto Star reports on the NBC embed's recollections but that aspect has lost traction after the report that the 3rd ID had been there a week earlier.

From Drudge, Elizabeth Jensen of the LA Times reports:

CBS News' "60 Minutes" landed a major story last week: the disappearance in Iraq of a large cache of explosives supposed to be under guard by the U.S. military. But the network nevertheless found itself in the journalistically awkward position of playing catch-up when it wasn't able to get the piece on the air as soon as its reporting partner, the New York Times, which made the report its lead story Monday.

Tangentially, Roger L. Simon urging that the possibility that Mohammed El Baradei is the source of this story - and the timing - be explored further. If the UN is attempting to influence the US elections it is a major scandal, although after UNSCAM I guess I'm prepared to believe the worst.

CBS and the NY Times really should consider putting on their 'jamies occasionally and researching articles more fully. Unfortunately, I have to change out of mine and dash off to work.

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Oct. 25 - From an AP story, Convoys bombed, 8 killed:

BOMBINGS STRUCK four coalition and Iraqi military convoys and a provincial government office yesterday, killing at least eight people, including an American soldier and an Estonian trooper in the Baghdad area. Coming a day after the bodies of nearly 50 Iraqi military recruits were found massacred, the bombings occurred as a UN agency confirmed that several hundred tonnes of explosives were missing from a former Iraqi military depot in an insurgent hotspot south of Baghdad. [Note: explosives story has been discredited]

The revelation raised concerns the explosives fell into the hands of insurgents who have staged a spate of bloody car bombings, although there was no evidence to link the missing explosives directly to the attacks.

Thank you for your support and sacrifice, Estonia.

Yesterday, a roadside bomb in western Baghdad killed one U.S. soldier and wounded five, the U.S. military said. An Estonian soldier died when a roadside bomb exploded at a market just outside Baghdad as his patrol went by, the Estonian military said. Five other Estonian soldiers were wounded.

[...]

Insurgent attacks across Iraq have increased by 25% since the holy month of Ramadan began two weeks ago.

[Note that the paper editions of, er, newspapers were printed before they realized that the missing explosives story was wrong.]

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Oct. 26 - Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty has affirmed that the new health care tax is a tax, not a premium which means that people, not employers, must pay it.

His statement came in response to an ruling that a nursing home must cover it's employees at a cost of up to $900 per worker because the arbitrator considered it to be a premium and the contract said that the employer covered OHIP [Ontario Hospital Insurance] premiums. Another arbiter ruled that it was a tax, so opinion is divided.

If it is a premium, then the Ontario government (which means us) will have to pay it on behalf of government employees which could run as high as $2 billion, according to NDP leader Howard Hampton.

It's all about the wording. Premier McGuinty said

"But the intention remains the same, and it's been very clear from the outset, this is a tax provision found within the Income Tax Act and our intention is that taxpayers will pay this new premium."

McGuinty called the tax a premium in an advertising campaign, and Finance Minister Greg Sorbara referred to it as such in his official budget speech.

[NDP leader Howard] Hampton said their statements have created a problem for labour arbitrators who are dealing with contracts that refer to health premiums.

"I suppose the government could bring in legislation that says that Dalton McGuinty and Greg Sorbara misinformed the public," Hampton said.

Tory Interim Leader Bob Runciman said the government may have to bring in legislation to clarify that the premium is, in fact, a tax.

This crisis in health care has reached alarming proportions. Waiting times for diagnostic tests can run to several months. Imagine a doctor saying I don't want to alarm you but I'd like to schedule a CAT scan because I think you may have a brain tumor. Let's see, you should be able to get the test 6 to 9 months from now so we'll schedule a follow-up appointment for next year and review the findings of the scan, okay?) "Americanized health care" is demonized but it's also what desperate Canadians utilize by travelling to the US, getting the CAT scan the day after they arrive and the results of the test that day.

Has the Canadian federal health care system become one of rationed health care? Yes, at least here in Ontario.

Robert A. Heinlein used a word in his book The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress which means "there ain't no such thing as a free lunch" - tanstaafl. The failure to heed the lessons of that 1966 novel are being driven home in Canada because the cure for less and less efficient delivery of those services is proclaimed to be Yet More Money which will ensure that services won't deteriorate as rapidly.

In spite of their inability to maintain health care services, the Canadian federal government is already setting the groundwork for establishing a federal child care program (or is that an early education program?)

The extra neat twist is that, according to the Canadian Constitution, health care and education are provincial mandates, so the federal government has usurped one set of provincial powers and is preparing to usurp another set of provincial powers with nary a whimper from Ontario.

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Oct. 26 - Another legend has passed on, baritone Robert Merrill. One of my favourite recordings of La Boheme is with him as Marcello (it was a record set which I had wisely copied to tape cassettes.) It also featured Jussi Bjorling and Victoria de los Angeles.

Robert Merrill, Roberta Peters and Beverly Sills were names I cam to know as I was exposed to and learned to love opera. (The biggest influence, though, remains dear Leonard Bernstein.)

Although I couldn't find a mention of it, I am pretty sure Merrill once appeared on The Odd Couple TV series and TV Tome has these listings for him.

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Oct. 25 - John Hawkins at Right Wing News conducted a poll among 85 right-of-center bloggers about the elections, and the results are in.

No real surprises, but it's still gratifying!

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Oct. 25 - I've been trying to think of something to say about the Tons of Iraq explosives missing but I've developed a severe headache from banging my head on the desk.

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Oct. 25 - This report on the Kosovo elections is sharply critical of the failure of the U.N. and the recent elections (Kosovo poll reveals failure of UN rule) which were notable for their apathy and the boycott by Serbs:

Early results from the weekend's general election showed that five years of UN rule had only deepened ethnic divisions as Kosovo's voters signalled their despair with the Balkan province's administrators.

Barely more than half of Kosovo's 1.4 million voters went to the ballot box. While the province's majority ethnic Albanians were struck by apathy, its 130,000-strong Serb minority was seized by anger and completely boycotted the poll.

Only a handful of Serbs voted, following calls from Vojislav Kostunica, the Serbian Prime Minister, and the Serbian Orthodox Church to stay away. Mr Kostunica described the election as a "failure".

[...]

A victory for the moderate Albanian LDK party of current President Ibrahim Rugova was indicated by early results but it has once again fallen short of an outright majority and will have to form a coalition.

Once formed, the local government will have a slim portfolio of responsibilities, while all meaningful power remains with the UN.

The provisional result equates to a maintenance of the political status quo by default, as both Kosovo's bitterly opposed ethnic Albanians and Serbs signalled their dissatisfaction with foreign rule.

[...]

At the moment, though run by the UN, Kosovo is still officially part of Serbia and a land which Serbs have cherished for centuries.

Long happy to do nothing, Kosovo's international administrators were stung by riots in March that made clear that maintaining the stand-off was counterproductive. Now Kosovo appears deadlocked.

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Oct. 25 - It takes a lot to leave me speechless, but this does: Military housing rents to be increased:

CANADA'S cash-strapped soldiers living in military homes will see their rents hiked by up to $100 on Nov. 1. Defence department spokesman Tina Crouse said the Canadian Forces Housing Agency will increase rents on bases across the country to bring them in line with surrounding rental prices.

"For the small number of occupants who have not reached appraised shelter values, their rent will continue to increase until they are paying based on the appraised value of their home," Crouse said.

Crouse said about half the military's 15,000 homes and apartments will see a rent increase to a monthly maximum of $100.

The boost comes while soldiers haven't seen their pay increased since April 2003, when they received a 2.5% hike. The lowest-paid private makes $26,616, while a sergeant can receive a maximum salary of $53,484.

Nov. 18 19:00: There may be a reprieve on the rent. Let's hope.

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Oct. 25 - Don Cherry will be the featured "great Canadian" on CBC tonight. Wrestler Bret Hart will make the presentation.

Don says here that

... he's a good Canadian, not a great one. On CBC last week, he threw his support behind another Top-10 finalist, Sir John A. Macdonald.

"Gotta endorse another good Kingston boy," he said.

He now says he would vote for Canada's Unknown Soldier, who placed No. 21 on the list. "As far as I'm concerned, he's the guy who should be the greatest Canadian. He paid for Canada with his life."

Cherry thinks he'd win hands down if the show was called The Most Popular Canadian. "I've got no humility on that one," he told the Sun.

"It's funny, eh? The frenzy the left-wing media is in," Cherry said.

"So far, I've been called shallow, narrow-minded, high-collared, low-brow, racist, retarded, hidebound dinosaur -- I don't even know what that means, hidebound," he said.

Cherry continued: "Embarrassing, buffoon, monster, cash cow, beer-swilling, puck-chasing hoser. Beer-swilling, puck-chasing hoser -- that sounds like a good Canadian to me."

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Oct. 25 - Donald Sensing has posted some joyous news about the Graduation Day of a Marine.

There are some other posts at One Hand Clapping, including one about the probable impossibility of stopping nuclear proliferation.

I don't know if the good Reverend plans to begin posting daily to his blog, but I certainly hope so.

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