Eating alone, in Iraq. Guess those troops aren't as dumb as the senator thinks they are.

[Update at 10 AM EST]

Here's more. You do have to give him some credit for being a good sport, though:

Before taking off, supposedly the helicopter pilot jumped out of the front seat while the rotor was turning (an extremely rare event), approached the rear of the bird, and asked Senator Kerry to autograph a copy of the photograph below.

To his everlasting credit, Senator Kerry was a good sport and actually signed it!!!

[Update on January 5th, 2007]

This story seems to have been debunked.

funny picture, why is the Union Jack the predominant
flag in the background?

Is that the british officers mess?

Also, why so many waiters? It's a war zone?
Shouldn't every man jack be toting a rifle?
why are only two men in the picture wearing camo
and there are 8 waiters in Uniform?

I mean sure, ti's great service for chickenhawk central,
but that's a hell of a military mess.

No wonder this war is being lost.

So now it's the neocons' fault that a Democrat United States Senator wasn't eating an MRE out of a mess kit in a foxhole?

why is the Union Jack the predominant
flag in the background?

Because they are part of the coalition fighting in Iraq. You may not catch that if you believe the rhetoric they we went in to Iraq alone. Besides, it isn't the only flag being shown predominantly.

Is that the british officers mess?

From the story: "Check out this photo from our mess hall at the US Embassy yesterday"

why so many waiters?

It looks like a rather large gathering for a meal with about one waiter per table. That's fairly normal for a diplomatic meal in which speed and service is important.

It's a war zone?

It's an embassy.

Shouldn't every man jack be toting a rifle?

Not inside the embassy, and especially if there isn't a threat. Apparently it is pretty safe to have a nice meal at the embassy without the threat of quagmire erupting.

two men in the picture wearing camo
and there are 8 waiters in Uniform?

It's the US embassy.

I mean sure, ti's great service for chickenhawk central, but that's a hell of a military mess.

Once again John Kerry is proved wrong. Anonymous proves he is an illiterate moron, yet he is not in Iraq. Fortunately, the US military gave him his DD-214, so he wouldn't be a danger to others by toting a rifle around during a diplomatic breakfast, recognizing the support of our allies, inside an US embassy.

No wonder this war is being lost.

If the war is being lost, how come John Kerry feels safe enough to visit Baghdad and have breakfast without wearing a flak jacket?

Here is another article about how we are "losing" the war. Not.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/12262006/postopinion/opedcolumnists/the_boom_outside_baghdad_opedcolumnists_amir_taheri.htm

Oops.

That originally was posted here by Rand a couple of days ago.

:)

Here's another question: How do you coorelate losing the war with the fact that Saddam Hussein will be executed by his own people within the next month?

Leland:

Was our strategic goal to execute saddam hussein?
If so, we could have done that 3 years ago, and been out.

Ergo, our goal must not have been to execute hussein.

if our strategic goal is to execute hussein, will we leave
after he is executed?

If not, then executing hussein must not be our goal.

It seems very lelandish to discuss the execution of hussein
when it's irrelevant to our strategic goal.

now whatever our goal is, 4 years, $600 billion dollars spent,
25,000 men dead or wounded and we don't seem to be
approaching it.

GWB the chimperor even said "We aren't winning in Iraq".

well, i'll tell you something, if we aren't winning, we are
losing.

And the bulk of the reason we are losing is that the
neocon's who started this war are far too cowardly to
go fight this war.

leland

if the war is being won, how come condi rice
wears a flak jacket at the airport in Baghdad?

If the war on crime is being won, why do police officers wear ballistic armor?

It seems well worth noting that “Ben of Mesopotamia” — aka Benjamin Runkle — one of the RW bloggers who first really pushed hard on this non-story about the photo in question, is a self-described communications specialist (which means, in some quarters, ‘propaganda specialist’) who has worked for the DOD, the NSC, and according to his blog’s ‘About Me’ blurb is a “Harvard PhD and Presidential speechwriter called back to Active Duty for Operation Iraqi Freedom.”

Is this another example of BushCo’s proven policy of planting propaganda mouthpieces into supposedly non-partisan bailiwicks so that they can churn out pro-administration spin and misinformation? Could this be another sock-puppet soldier embedded with the troops so that he can influence them on the ground and feed back pre-canned points to the folks at home?

I’m not saying that he’s just another paid BushCo spokespuppet hiding behind a blogname, because I don’t have access to enough facts to prove or disprove that. But given the little bit of facts that are available to us on this end, especially coupled with this administration’s known history of using plants and fake pundits to feed false information to the public, it certainly seems to me like this is something that bears further investigation by those with more access to the details.

It seems well worth noting that Kerry apologists are attacking Benjamin Runkle as a Bush shill for no other reason than to try to impeach a funny picture.

Jeez, some people really needed for Santa to bring them lives for Xmas.

"It seems well worth noting that Kerry apologists are attacking Benjamin Runkle as a Bush shill for no other reason than to try to impeach a funny picture."

A sure symptom of mental retardation on their part and nothing more. Occam's Razor.

I suggest they go to www.powerlineblog.com today and read how the minions of moonbattery got hoisted on their own pitard on this picture issue.

It seems well worth noting that Kerry apologists are attacking Benjamin Runkle as a Bush shill for no other reason than to try to impeach a funny picture.

And they probably still believe that the turkey was plastic, but being ignorant of the truth and hypocrits at the same time is nothing new for these guys.

By the way, great job to Powerline (hattip Mike) for doing a deeper investigation than M. Loutre was willing to do.

> If the war on crime is being won, why do police officers wear ballistic armor?

It's a quagmire. We should pull our cops out of America before it's too late.

If the war on crime is such a quagmire, please tell me the
last time a police car was destroyed by an IED.

http://www.nleomf.com/TheMemorial/Facts/names2006.htm

let's see according to the national law enforcement memorial
approxiamtely 466 police officers died nationawide in the line of duty in 2006.

http://www.nleomf.com/TheMemorial/Facts/causes.htm
it seems to indicate almost as many died in auto accidents
as due to gun fire. certainly the stats indicate that
accidents predominate in law enforcement deaths.

Now let's look at Iraq:
www.icasualties.org

We see lots of bombings, gunfire, missile attack...
Oh accidents, that's in the noise.

let's see, i've lived in some pretty tough cities,
that would make a little prissy white boy pee
themselves. I recall the cops disliking patrolling
the hood, heck, i disliked going down there on work,
but, i don't recall the chicago cops or the LA cops
needing tanks and machine guns to patrol
in compton or Horner.

Tell you what puckett, i'll spend an afternoon
in compton, in my suit coat, you spend an
afternoon in baghdad in your body armor,
let's see who shits themself first.

Considering that you are too cowardly to even post your name, the answer is self-evident.

I hope your Jackboots were issued with depends.