by Scarecrow [courtesy of Firedoglake]

With increased US forces likely in Afghanistan, the US command invited the NYT to review rules of engagement designed to minimize civilian casualties. But they also revealed the US has less restrictive rules in Iraq than in Afghanistan, where casualties have been high and a frequent concern. What does that say about what happened in Iraq's Sadr City and Basra?

by Todd Beeton [courtesy of MyDD]

John McCain has boxed himself in on Iraq on at least 2 counts. First of all, putting aside for a moment the lack of a definition of victory, are his two differing pronouncements of what happens when we achieve it: 1. we stay for a hundred or more years because the fatalities will have ceased, or 2. we withdraw -- "as they stand up we stand down" & "conditions-based withdrawal" and all that. Two completely different results from presumably the same situation.

McCain is finding a similar paradox when speaking about the current situation on the ground in Iraq. On one hand, he must continue to frame Obama's withdrawal position as surrender, as he did today in an offensive repetition of a new McCain talking point trotted out by McCain's foreign policy aide Randy Scheunemann last week.

"Senator McCain said he would rather lose an election than lose a war and see the nation lose a war.

"Senator Obama seems to think losing a war will help him win an election."

But on the other hand John McCain has been insistent that we're winning now thanks to the surge, as he did at a townhall in New Hampshire today.

"The fact is that everybody recognizes, including Prime Minister Maliki, that we have to have conditions-based withdrawal, and we all -- we are gonna withdraw," McCain said. "We will withdraw. The fact is, is whether we withdraw in victory or whether we withdraw in defeat. And again, you and I have different versions. We have succeeded. The Sadr City is safe. Mosul is safe. Basra is safe. The people of Iraq, and I've been there, are now leading normal lives."

by The Huffington Post News Team [courtesy of Politics on HuffingtonPost.com]

WASHINGTON — The military surge into Iraq that began more than 18 months ago has ended. But 150,000 U.S. troops remain, as many as 15,000...

by Mark Levine [courtesy of Politics on HuffingtonPost.com]

Much of the recent ICC indictment again Bashir could just as easily be applied to our own president, George W. Bush, as it could be applied to his Sudanese counterpart.

by The Huffington Post News Team [courtesy of Politics on HuffingtonPost.com]

CAMP LIBERTY, Iraq — U.S. forces may be close to unlocking the mystery of who is behind a deadly innovation in Iraqi insurgents' weapons, a...

by The Huffington Post News Team [courtesy of Politics on HuffingtonPost.com]

BAGHDAD — A bomb struck a district council building Tuesday in Baghdad's Shiite militia stronghold of Sadr City, killing at least 10 people, including four...

by Michealene Cristini Risley [courtesy of Politics on HuffingtonPost.com]

Wake up America. We are so close to losing any semblance of democracy in our country.

by smintheus [courtesy of Daily Kos]

We talk so much about Bush III that we've perhaps paid too little attention to George III.

Shambling, fitful, and proudly belligerent, George III is the archetypal clueless monarch, always and stubbornly out of touch with reality. On July 4, 1776, he famously wrote in his diary:

Nothing important happened today.

That's brought to mind for me almost every time John McCain speaks about Iraq. It's as if to McCain the actual conditions in Iraq were as obscure and unknowable as the progress of an insurrection in the colonies had been to the Court of St. James during the eighteenth century - when news actually took weeks to cross the Atlantic. The disconnect is stunning.

To take just the latest example, on May 29 McCain once again painted a sunny picture of progress that bore little relation to the facts.

So I can tell you that it is succeeding. I can look you in the eye and tell you it’s succeeding. We have drawn down to pre-surge levels. Basra, Mosul and now Sadr city are quiet...

He was speaking on a day that saw a deadly suicide attack on police in Mosul and bombs directed against an American outpost in the city. At the same time, thousands of Iraqis were about to march in Sadr City and in Basra and other cities against the US occupation of their country. "Quiet" is just plain out of touch with reality.

by J Ro [courtesy of MyDD]

While we're waiting for more from the RBC, here's a little on McCain.

A minor flap Thursday and Friday is providing a window onto the kind of man John McCain is and the kind of President he would be.

On Thursday at a town hall event in Wisconsin, McCain said:

"I can tell you it is succeeding. I can look you in the eye and tell you it is succeeding. We have drawn down to pre-surge levels. Basra, Mosul and now Sadr City are quiet."

Now, this inaccuracy really isn't a huge deal by itself. McCain may have simply got his numbers wrong - it's easy enough to do. Or he may have misspoke. It's the way the campaign has dealt with the resulting fallout that calls McCain's character into question.