Sen. Obama (D) and Sen. Hagel (R)

Today the Senate hearings continued with Petraeus and Crocker and it heated up with some outstanding rhetoric from the left-side and right-side of the aisle, click Barack Obama and Chuck Hagel to view their assessment of the non-strategy in Iraq. What your thoughts with regard to the comments made by Obama and Hagel?

In Search of a GOP St. George

Iowa Republicans will tell you that the Devil does not wear Prada; she wears a pantsuit, low-heeled shoes and a sunny, I-told-you-so smile. Karl Rove insists that Sen. Hillary Clinton is a "fatally flawed candidate," and many Democrats agree. In a new book, "The Neglected Voter," journalist David Kuhn charts the party's waning appeal among white men—a debilitating trend Clinton seems ill-suited to reverse. But Iowans aren't reassured by Rove or flow charts. They assume Clinton will be the nominee, and, with typical earnestness, are searching for the right Saint George to take on the dragon lady. More of Howard Fineman's article from Newsweek...

The Road to Partition

Musawi’s words are just one more piece of evidence that Iraq will not be put together the way it was. It’s one more piece of evidence that America’s best course is not to reunify Iraq, but simply to inhibit the violence as Iraqis feel their own way to partition.

What we’re really trying to build, in other words, is a road to partition. We’re trying to build a pathway to separation that involves the sort of low-intensity civil war that Iraq is enduring right now. We’re trying to prevent a pathway that is even worse — a high-intensity genocide.

As I was watching yesterday’s hearings, I was thinking of the sensible yet sectarian Musawi. How many American lives is it worth to save those like her? Is it realistic to think U.S. troops can help Iraqis move on that less barbaric path? To read more of David Brooks thoughts...

In Memory of...

How do you feel our government has done in its efforts to capture and bring to justice Osama Bin Laden?