Blog post

IAVA Daily Brief 8.27.10
Posted by Isabel Black on August 27 2010

Here are some of today's top stories and happenings at IAVA.  Prefer to receive real-time updates about major stories and legislation that IAVA is tracking?  Follow us on Twitter @IAVAPressRoom or subscribe at www.IAVA.org/DailyNewsBrief. Please note: The IAVA Daily News Brief will be on hiatus next week from Monday, August 30th through Monday, September 6th.

MUST READS

1) Iraq seven years later: Was the war worth it?
 
Despite the fact that Saddam Hussein has been unseated in Iraq and the country has held democratic elections, many Iraqis are not pleased with life.  Unemployment is 35%, electricity is unreliable and there are terrorist bombings almost every day.
 
2) Taliban primp, sing, snipe US troops in rare video
 
This video is the product of a Norwegian documentary journalist who embedded with a Taliban commander earlier this year.  The video is a rare inside look at the Taliban and how they operate and interact with one and other.
 
3) The Muppets' Military Mission
 
The Sesame Street Workshop has been steadily expanding a program called "Talk, Listen, Connect" aimed at kids of all ages who have a parent in the military.  More than two million US children have been affected directly by a parent's military wartime deployment to Iraq and Afghanistan and 40% of these children are younger than 5 years old, with more than 12,000 military children experiencing the death of a parent in the past 8 ½ years.
 
AFGHANISTAN

• Gunmen in western Afghanistan abducted ten campaign workers for a female parliamentary candidate.
• The CIA is making secret payments to multiple members of President Hamid Karzai's administration, in part to maintain sources of information in a government in which the Afghan leader is often seen as having limited grasp of developments.

IRAQ

• Seven years after the US-led invasion, Iraq's petroleum industry shows signs of living up to the potential that American planners hoped for at the start of the military operation, a potential boost to the war-ravaged country's economic recovery.
• The withdrawal of American combat troops from Iraq will not correlate to a reduction in flights of unmanned aircraft, in fact, the flight hours will rise, according to US Army officials.

MILITARY AFFAIRS

• The VA is still having problems issuing proper payments for students and spouses using the Post-9/11 GI Bill.
• As part of Defense Secretary Robert Gates' proposed changes to improve the efficiency and budget at the Pentagon, he has taken aim at the military's sacrosanct corps of generals and admirals.

INSIDE WASHINGTON

• The White House said the outbreak of deadly violence in Iraq, as President Obama is preparing to speak to the nation Tuesday about the end of the US military's combat mission there, will not affect the administration's timetable for withdrawal.

A wide-range of views, positions, and publications are represented in these articles. These views, positions and publications are not endorsed by nor do they necessarily represent the views of IAVA.

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