Think Progress

McCain confuses Sudan and Somalia.

John McCain misspoke and confused his African countries while talking to reporters on the Straight Talk Express today. This time, he was bailed out not by Joe Lieberman, but by his close aide Mark Salter. “How can we bring pressure on the government of Somalia?” McCain asked, which prompted Mark Salter to correct him. “Sudan,” Salter said. “Sudan,” McCain repeated. “There’s a realpolitik side of my view of the conduct of American foreign policy.”

Fox and Kristol claim McCain’s VP choice will cause gas prices to ‘plummet.’

On Fox News today, host Alexis Glick previewed an interview with Bill Kristol by claiming that the Weekly Standard editor believes “the second John McCain announces his VP pick, gas prices will plummet.” During the segment, the Kristol Ball’s “prediction” turned out to be that he thinks McCain might pick Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate. Here’s why Kristol claims such a pick would lower gas prices:

KRISTOL: First, I think she would help him get elected, which would be a good thing if you want gas prices to come down. Then she’ll persuade him that we have to drill in ANWR and have an aggressive drilling program across the board.

That’s all Kristol offered to support his and Fox’s ridiculous claim. Watch it:

One major flaw in Kristol and Fox’s claim that drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve would lower prices immediately is the fact that it would take 10 years for the oil to hit the market, and even then, the reserve is estimated to have only enough oil to satisfy six months demand.

Former Joint Chiefs chairman Gen. Richard Myers quashed legal review of torture techniques.

In 2002, as former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld “was considering the approval of three categories of interrogation techniques for use at Guantánamo,” military officials raised “serious concerns regarding the legality” of the techniques in a series of memos. As a result, Rear Adm. Jane Dalton, the legal counsel to then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Richard Myers, “began a fresh evaluation of the legality of the interrogation tactics.” But she was soon ordered by Myers to stop the legal review:

But such an analysis threatened to undermine Rumsfeld’s agenda — and that’s when Myers stepped in. Dalton testified that Myers ordered her to stop that review because of a request from Pentagon general counsel William Haynes. Haynes was spearheading Rumsfeld’s efforts to set up a harsh-interrogation program at the Pentagon. “The best of my recollection as to how this occurred is that the chairman called me aside and indicated to me that Mr. Haynes did not want this broad-based review to take place,” Dalton testified. “When I learned that Mr. Haynes did not want that broad-based legal and policy review to take place, then I stood down from the plans.”

Dalton told the Senate Armed Services Committee earlier this month that Myers was “aware” of the concerns about the techniques’ legality when he quashed the review.

McCain aide: Reporters ‘have to earn’ special interview area seat on new ’straight talk’ airplane.

The Washington Post reports that Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is now traveling in a new “Straight Talk Express” campaign airplane. It “features a special area” with “a couch and two captain’s chairs” where “McCain will conduct group interviews with the press.” But not all reporters covering McCain can enjoy this new lap of luxury. Top McCain aide Mark Salter said “‘only the good reporters’ would get to sit in the specially-configured section for interviews. ‘You’ll have to earn it,’ he said.” So how can these reporters “earn” a seat? Never challenge the Senator, as McCain biographer Matt Welch explained in a recent interview with the Los Angeles Times:

[McCain is] very open to people. You can come on the bus, everything is great but if he knows or if his team knows that you have a hostile line of questioning or you have a long and well documented critique, they’re not going to talk to you. [...]

As a human, he’s haunted by the notion of honesty and about honor and truth. He wishes that he could speak the truth all the time. He doesn’t. I don’t think he speaks the truth any more than any other politician really, no more, no less.

White House: Polls are flawed, Bush sees a ’shift in attitudes’ toward him.

Despite polls showing record levels of dissatisfaction with President Bush, U.S. News reported on Friday that the White House is in an “upbeat mood” and that aides “see a president who still gets his way.” According to the magazine, the administration’s positive demeanor is a result of Bush sensing less “antipathy” than he used to in crowds:

When he travels around the country, Bush feels less “antipathy” than he used to in the crowds, along the motorcade routes, and expressed by the individuals who talk to him at his events. “He feels there has been a shift in attitudes out there that’s not reflected in polling data,” the aide says. [...]

Reinforcing his point, the latest AP-Ipsos poll, released in mid-June, found that only 29 percent of Americans approved of Bush’s job performance, one of the lowest presidential ratings ever. White House officials, by the way, say they aren’t sure such polls should be believed because the questions are biased and the population samples are flawed.

U.S. News reported in January that aides “are predicting a remarkable poll shift to about 45 percent favorable by the time he leaves office next year.”

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McCain’s new Truth Squad has former member of Swift Boat Veterans.

Following the lead of Barack Obama’s campaign, John McCain is establishing his own Truth Squad – an effort to “respond to unfair attacks” on his military record. One of the members of McCain’s new Truth Squad — Bud Day — was a member of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, and appeared in an attack ad for the group in 2004. (See the ads here.) Day said of John Kerry’s military service: “My view is he basically will go down in history sometime as the Benedict Arnold of 1971.”

Iraq contractor reports consistent level of violence despite troop surge.

Last week, the Pentagon reported that improvements in security in Iraq have been “substantial over the past nine months.” But an Iraqi contractor does not see such improvement. Spencer Ackerman reports that GardaWorld, a private intelligence firm doing business in Iraq, finds that since October, levels of violence are largely unchanged throughout Iraq:

NYT: Diversion of resources to Iraq contributed to al Qaeda resurgence in Pakistan.

In a front page story this morning, the New York Times reports on the story of how Al Qaeda “gained a new haven” in Pakistan’s tribal areas across the border from Afghanistan. According to the Times, “it is also a story of how the White House shifted its sights, beginning in 2002, from counterterrorism efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan to preparations for the war in Iraq“:

Current and former military and intelligence officials said that the war in Iraq consistently diverted resources and high-level attention from the tribal areas. When American military and intelligence officials requested additional Predator drones to survey the tribal areas, they were told no drones were available because they had been sent to Iraq.

[...]

One reason for this, according to two former intelligence officials directly involved in the Qaeda hunt, was that by 2006 the Iraq war had drained away most of the C.I.A. officers with field experience in the Islamic world. “You had a very finite number” of experienced officers, said one former senior intelligence official. “Those people all went to Iraq. We were all hurting because of Iraq.”

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Southern Baptist scholar says spousal abuse stems from wife’s refusal to submit to husband.

Bruce Ware — a Southern Baptist scholar – argued that one reason that men abuse their wives is because women rebel against their husband’s God-given authority:

“And husbands on their parts, because they’re sinners, now respond to that threat to their authority either by being abusive, which is of course one of the ways men can respond when their authority is challenged – -or, more commonly, to become passive, acquiescent, and simply not asserting the leadership they ought to as men in their homes and in churches,” Ware said from the pulpit of Denton Bible Church in Denton, Texas.

John Roberts has failed to uphold pre-confirmation pledge.

“With his third term as chief justice coming to a close amid three explosive cases last week, John Roberts has proved to be almost everything conservatives hoped and liberals feared.” The Chicago Tribune recalls his pledge in 2005: “I come before this committee with no agenda, no platform. I will approach every case with an open mind.” Yet, “in his three years on the court, Roberts has never sided with the more liberal members against his conservative brethren in a close case.”