DeLay to Resign From Congress

Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), a primary architect of the Republican majority who became one of the most powerful and feared leaders in Washington, said today that he will give up his seat rather than face a “nasty” and expensive reelection fight that was becoming a referendum on his ethical troubles.

Now that a major source of rot has stepped down (no doubt to face even more criminal charges, so he’ll need the money for his defense fund), the race for his old seat in Texas just got a lot more interesting. With a viable Independent candidate in the mix, it’s even more of a crapshoot than ever.

Middle East” href=”http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article355178.ece”>Independent Online Edition > Middle East

The Pentagon has revealed that coalition forces are spending millions of dollars establishing at least six “enduring” bases in Iraq – raising the prospect that US and UK forces could be involved in a long-term deployment in the country. It said it assumed British troops would operate one of the bases.

Almost ever since President Bush claimed an end to “major combat operations” in Iraq on 1 May 2003, debate has focused on how quickly troops could be withdrawn. The US and British governments say troops will remain in Iraq “until the job is done”. Yet while the withdrawal of a substantial number of troops remains an aim, it has become increasingly clear that the Pentagon and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) are preparing to retain some forces in Iraq for the longer term. The US currently has around 130,000 troops in Iraq; Britain has 8,000.

Well, that’s just spiffy. So Operation Enduring Freedom morphs into Operation Enduring Bases Paid For With Our Tax Dollars, Indefinitely Manned By The Youth of Our Nations.

I suppose this is the “Minor Combat Operations” that carry on for untold years into the future, long after the “Major Combat Operations” ceased on May 1, 2003.

Criminey, the geographer from Evergreen State (which even I think is a bastion of lefty hippy granola-powered wacky activism) says “After every US military intervention since 1990 the Pentagon has left behind clusters of new bases in areas where it never before had a foothold. The new string of bases stretch from Kosovo and adjacent Balkan states, to Iraq and other Persian Gulf states, into Afghanistan and other central Asian states … The only two obstacles to a geographically contiguous US sphere of influence are Iran and Syria.”

Yikes. I have to think about that statement a little more.

The Seattle Times: Nation & World: Ex-stripper evangelizes to sex industry

RIVERSIDE, Calif. — The phone rang — again — and Heather Veitch answered in her three-bedroom tract home. It was another radio station, this time from Detroit, and the disc jockey wanted to hear the tale of the stripper turned evangelist.

“I don’t try to change their life,” she said of the women she seeks out at strip clubs. “I just want them to have a relationship with God.”

Amazingly, this does not appear to be an April Fool’s joke. The same story shows up on a lot of different sites, with March posting dates.