Iraq and Taxes with an Apple Smoothie

Things often are never as they appear. In the case of Iraq, Democrats are upset that the Bush administration knew of General Casey's plan to recommend two combat brigades totaling 7,000 troops to withdraw from Iraq. The better news is that by my recollection, there are about five support personnel for every combat troop, which would imply a withdrawal nearer to 40,000. If this was the case, it would bring the number of U.S. troops in Iraq to about 87,000. My way of thinking it's a win for all who have been pushing for withdrawal so we can reunite families in our country while keeping 40,000 more of our honorable troops from any further harm in an amoral war. It also allows Iraq to pursue its self-determined rule with the U.S. further on the sideline if it is needed. It diminishes the arguments of "we broke it - we fix it" and "stay the course" advocates.

There is also a silver lining that a wholesale burden transfer onto the middle class was lessened as the complete removal of estate tax for those households with $4 million and more was stymied. Who said some election year victories cannot be had? Now the real task is to determine whether our Congress has the fortitude to acknowledge that national single payer health care and high quality public education are two concrete investments that would be viable if we roll back the millionaire tax cuts to pre-2001 levels. In 20 years we'll have an entirely different country with an optimistic future for working and middle class families with these achievements.

Personally, I've been dragging this past week with family, work and campaign responsibilities. I took it easy and my son Erik and I took in Click, the Adam Sandler movie, and the soaked Air Show down at Quonset. When we're under the weather, it's times like this that we feel our vulnerabilities and good fortune to be healthy and to have health insurance. As one who pays for my own family's coverage, I can clearly see the need to ensure we all have access to health care. Thing is, my physician thought a high red cell count in my urine and painful kidneys was a second bout with kidney stones, but the CT scan found no stones. So I swallowed a Barium Sulfate Suspension in an apple smoothie so we can rule out other potential problems. Sheldon Whitehouse is not going to get off that easy!