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Archive for July, 2009

Jul 31st, 2009

Summary: Bombs exploded near five Shiite mosques in Baghdad on July 31, 2009, killing at least 29 people, in an apparent coordinated attack that targeted worshippers leaving Friday prayers. … August 2009 update of key facts, figures, and statistics on Iraq since the war began in March 2003. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on the 17th day of his 2008 campaign against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Aubrey Immelman took Rep. Bachmann to task for talking almost exclusively about energy issues such as the price of gasoline in her reelection campaign, while ignoring important national security concerns.



Summary: The New York Times reports that a senior American military adviser in Baghdad has concluded in an unusually blunt memo that Iraqi forces suffer from entrenched deficiencies but are now able to protect the Iraqi government, and that it is time “for the U.S. to declare victory and go home.” The author, Col. Timothy R. Reese, details Iraqi military weaknesses in scathing language, including corruption, poor management, and the inability to resist Shiite political pressure. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on the 16th day of his campaign against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann for the Republican nomination as House of Representatives candidate in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Aubrey Immelman attended the St. Cloud area joint town hall meeting with the mayors of St. Cloud, St. Augusta, St. Joseph, Sartell, Sauk Rapids, and Waite Park to learn about the concerns of area civic leaders; and attended the Little Rock Lake TMDL Public Meeting to learn about water quality issues on Little Rock Lake and efforts to mitigate phosphorus, the water quality limiting nutrient responsible for the toxic blue-green algae blooms in the lake.


Jul 29th, 2009

Summary: Former U.S. Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), Distinguished Professor in the Practice of National Governance at Georgetown University, will deliver the Third Annual Eugene McCarthy Lecture on Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at St. John’s University in Collegeville, Minn. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on the 15th day of his campaign against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann for the Republican nomination as House of Representatives candidate in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Aubrey Immelman reported on an op-ed article dealing with energy prices that he had written for the St. Cloud Times the previous day; met with Stearns County Sheriff John Sanner and Emergency Manager Marvin Klug; announced the release of a new web video in which he discusses his core campaign issues; and challenged unendorsed Independence Party candidate Bob Anderson’s justification for the Iraq war.


Jul 28th, 2009

Summary: Weekly report of U.S. military deaths in Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom (Afghanistan), compiled from U.S. Department of Defense News Releases. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on the 14th day of his campaign against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann for the Republican nomination as House of Representatives candidate in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Aubrey Immelman said that voters should see the Iraq war not only as a national security or foreign policy issue, but as a pocketbook issue, in that the war and occupation contributed to driving up the price of oil by weakening the dollar. In that context, he also pointed to a Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction report detailing billions of dollars lost on construction projects in Iraq.


Jul 27th, 2009

Summary: First in a two-part series examining the outlook for the 2010 U.S. House of Representatives election in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District. Part I surveys the political environment in which the contest will take place. Part II, to follow closer to the election, will take a look at the candidates. … One-year retrospective: On the 13th day of his campaign against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann for the Republican nomination as House of Representatives candidate in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Sunday, July 27, 2008, Aubrey Immelman posted a public service announcement to help raise funds for memorials in honor of U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan and observed a day of rest.


Jul 26th, 2009

Summary: North Korea is interested in holding direct talks with the United States, according to North Korean ambassador to the United Nations Sin Son Ho. … Psychological Profile of Kim Jong-Il. … One-year retrospective: On the 12th day of his 2008 campaign against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Aubrey Immelman traveled to Minneapolis to tape an interview with Ken Avidor for The UpTake, focusing on his background, his reasons for running, and his core issues of national security, law enforcement/public safety, and border security/illegal immigration. In discussing national security, Immelman pointed to lost opportunities after 9/11, specifically “the ill-conceived invasion of Iraq, which turned a country that had been militarily contained and led by a dictator hostile to Iran and to Islamic fundamentalism … into a foreign policy nightmare that has consumed our domestic political agenda and squandered our finite resources for more than five years.” (Includes video of interview)


Jul 25th, 2009

Summary: For the second time in a week, Taliban fighters armed with suicide vests and automatic weapons attacked a provincial capital in eastern Afghanistan on Saturday, July 25, 2009, triggering hours-long gunbattles that left seven militants dead. … One-year retrospective: On the 11th day of his 2008 campaign against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann for the Republican nomination as House of Representatives candidate in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Aubrey Immelman reported the response of Mr. Mario A. Hernández of the Minnesota Department of Human Rights in reply to his inquiry whether the August 9, 2008, “Know Your Rights” forum in Cold Spring, Minn., was intended specifically for legal immigrants and whether public funds would be used to benefit undocumented aliens.



Summary: The National Republican Congressional Committee has added U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann to its list of most vulnerable incumbents for 2010 in the NRCC’s “Patriot Program,” while the Swing State Project rates Bachmann as being in “real danger” of losing her seat in the next election. … A survey of 25 nations conducted by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center in spring 2009 has found that positive public attitudes toward the United States have surged in many parts of the world since President Barack Obama’s election. Positive opinions about the United States have returned to higher levels not seen since before President George W. Bush took office in 2001. The Bush presidency marked a steep decline in U.S. popularity overseas, notably after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, because of a perception that the post-9/11 war on terrorism was targeted at Muslims. … One-year retrospective: On the 10th day of his 2008 campaign against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann for the Republican nomination as House of Representatives candidate in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Aubrey Immelman met with residents on Little Rock Lake, near Rice in Benton County, to learn about the lake’s persistent water quality problems.


Jul 23rd, 2009

Summary: In a meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki at the White House on July 22, 2009, President Barack Obama said the United States will stick to its status-of-forces agreement with Iraq and remove all its troops from Iraq by the end of 2011. … One-year retrospective: On the ninth day of his 2008 campaign against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann for the Republican nomination as House of Representatives candidate in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Aubrey Immelman issued his position statement on national security.


Jul 22nd, 2009

Summary: Iraq’s western city of Ramadi, Anbar province, has declared a state of emergency and imposed a vehicle ban after several bomb attacks; bombs also exploded across Baghdad, killing 16 people and wounding dozens. … One-year retrospective: On the eighth day of his 2008 campaign against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann for the Republican nomination as House of Representatives candidate in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Aubrey Immelman reported being inundated with questionnaires from special interest groups and commented on the dim prospects for the Republican Party in the upcoming election and the bleak outlook for the GOP in the foreseeable future.