Days before his annual State of the Union address, US President George W. Bush faced sharp criticism of his new Iraq strategy from increasingly vocal Republican allies-turned-critics in the US Congress.
His party’s leadership in the US Senate and House of Representatives has held fast behind his plan, but some rank-and-file Republicans in both chambers have broken and are publicly assailing it.
President Bush insisted on Thursday his reworked Iraq strategy could succeed as he worked on a State of the Union speech expected to include a new defense of his much-criticized policy.
Bush’s plan to send 21,500 more U.S. troops has been hammered by Democrats and many Republicans since it was unveiled last week. He suggested it should be given a chance and challenged critical lawmakers to offer an alternative.
“I believe it will work,” Bush told Belo television, a U.S. group of local stations.
When my family and I visited a friend at her home last summer, I marveled at the “job chart” she posted each morning for her five children. Even the youngest, at age 7, had a number of chores assigned. For the most part, it seemed they did them diligently and without too much complaining. Maybe they just knew they would lose any argument with their parents anyway.
Hmm, would a job chart work in my house, I wondered? Sure, my kids were asked to empty the dishwasher, take out the garbage, pick-up after themselves (sort-of), that kind of thing.
Attorney Mark E. Goidell once represented rapper Sean Combs, known at that time as “Puffy.”
He defended a New York man convicted of double murder. He defended a woman who falsely accused a co-worker of sexually abusing retarded patients.
Former Rep. Gary Condit, though, has proved to be one client too much.
Goidell wants a federal judge to let him out of a defamation case he brought on the California Democrat’s behalf. Facing potential sanctions for filing an allegedly frivolous lawsuit against author Dominick Dunne, Goidell agreed this week that the case never should have been brought.