Some of what you'll read here can be found at USATODAY.COM.

A  Sunni vs. Shiite soccer match was held in Ghazaliyah, west of Baghdad, in late November.  A crowd of 1,500 showed up without a fight. Everything went just fine.  The Shiite's won with a score of 2-0.

Attacks on U.S. and Iraqi forces have dropped to about one a day, from 25 per day in June.

"Throughout the country, the level of violence has come down very substantially in the last five months," says Gen. David Petraeus, the top American commander in Iraq.  "What comes next is building on the momentum that has been achieved."

Here's my theory on what happened the first of this year.  The military generals were asked by President Bush, VP Cheney and Karl Rove what they felt they needed to resolve the Iraq quagmire.  

The Generals said, "sir, we need to curb the violence long enough to allow the Iraqi government a chance to reconcile their differences.  Without a government in charge and with power, this war will go on forever.  There needs to be a political solution, not a military one."

The President then asked the generals, "how many more soldiers do you need to do that?"  "It will take at least 30,000", they said.  "How long would it take to get the surge of troops to Iraq?"  "About 6 months sir; if we start deploying in April, we should be in full swing by September of 2007."

You must be enrolled in VA health care system to receive benefits offered in the Medical Benefits Package. To apply for VA health care benefits, including enrollment you must fill out an application.

Eligibility for VA health care is dependent upon a number of variables, which may influence the final determination of the services for which you qualify. These factors include the nature of a veteran's discharge from military service (e.g., honorable, other than honorable, dishonorable), length of service, VA adjudicated disabilities (commonly referred to as service-connected disabilities), income level, and available VA resources among others.  We use the application to determine:
*    Whether you have qualifying service as a veteran
*    What your veteran status is so that you can be placed into    
        into one of the priority groups.

Hillary's team claims the 'guys' ganged up on her during the Democrat's last debate. Perhaps she's right?

I've noticed of late how John Edwards hasn't been attacking Barack Obama on the issues the way he's been going after Hillary, even though Obama has basically agreed with Hillary on how long troops will be in Iraq and he's agreed with her feelings toward the New York's Governors plan to give licenses to illegal immigrants. Senator Obama is in second place in most polls, including in Iowa.

The Examiner.Com:

WASHINGTON - Sandy Berger, who stole highly classified terrorism documents from the National Archives, destroyed them and lied to investigators, is now an adviser to presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton. Berger, who was fired from John Kerry's presidential campaign when the scandal broke in 2004, has assumed a similar role in Clinton's campaign, even though his security clearance has been suspended until September 2008. This is raising eyebrows even among Clinton's admirers.

There's been a lot of talk about Hillary being ahead of Obama by 30pts in the national polls and in some States.

Has anybody heard about a poll that's been taken nationally that only has Hillary and Obama on it?  If so, who took it and where is it?  Who won?

As far as I know, most polls ask you to vote for one out of ALL of the candidates.  I want one with just the two of them.

Democrats in Congress tried recently to create a new tax to help pay for the Wars.  That of course hit a brick wall.  I can almost bet you those that fought the idea were those that have been pushing War from day one.  

I'm sure the real reason for trying to pass a tax bill was to get American's to wake up.  Most of us know that when Americans are hit with possible tax increase they immediately go into Alert mode.  Yes, I want new schools.  Yes, I want new roads.  Yes, I want new infrastructure and new bridges.  Yes, I want a stronger military and yes, I want to go to war; but don't ask me to pay for it.

United States Constitution

Article I, Section 8

The Congress shall

Have Power To Declare War.  

Raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;

Provide and maintain a navy;