I've got a question. "General, sir, how is it you have time to brief a bunch of bloggers when the Iraqi police force so obviously needs your undivided attention? Is this an attempt at disseminating positive information via Teh Internetz because the MSM devotes a disproportionate amount of coverage to car bombs rather than cars that are not in fact exploding at this moment in time?"

Who are the other bloggers? Michelle Malkin? Hey, if the conference call is really early, you can actually claim that you've made a sacrifice in the war on terror by getting less than eight hours of sleep. WOLVERINES!!!

Do you feel there is (or will be in the near future) a sufficient US force to provide adequate security in Baghdad, and the country as a whole, so the Iraqi gov't can claim enough credibility to make the decisions/compromises necessary for political/economic progress, since it has been said by many people that military means are not enough?

I was planning to ask about if any of the ideas Malcolm Gladwell talked about his his book and article "The Tipping Point", would have applicability in Iraq. Gladwell talked about how at a certain point in crime prevention, just enough police work has the effect of radically reducing crime, in a non-linear fashion. He describes the work of the New York City Transit Authority:

The broken-window hypothesis was the inspiration for the cleanup of the subway system conducted by the New York City Transit Authority in the late eighties and early nineties. Why was the Transit Authority so intent on removing graffiti from every car and cracking down on the people who leaped over turnstiles without paying? Because those two "trivial" problems were thought to be tipping points-broken windows-that invited far more serious crimes. It is worth noting that not only did this strategy seem to work-since 1990, felonies have fallen more than fifty per cent-but one of its architects was the then chief of the Transit Police, William Bratton, who was later to take his ideas about preventing crime to the city as a whole when he became head of the New York Police Department.

I don't expect to ask sufai's question.

What is being done to eventually eliminate the seemingly endless flow of homicide bombers and when will this flow be stemmed enough to allow some stability to set into Iraq and the Iraqi people?

I would like to know ...

If the congressional funding squabble is causing any difficulty in Iraq, such as lack of funds to buy proper equipment for Iraqi policemen, soldiers ...

Are the Iraqi people still responding to recruitment needs of the Iraq government?

Hey Charlie, isn't that idiotic hypothesis of Gladwell's book addressed in "Freakonomics"? Doesn't that book offer a much more empirically credible hypothesis, namely, that crime rates fell because of Roe v. Wade? That there was a sudden and severe drop-off of children born to incompetent parents in low-income urban areas?

Maybe you could think of a better question, especially since your question is predicated upon the veracity of a New Yorker article published in 1996 that lacked any longitudinal sociological analysis. Just sayin'.

My question is, what defines winning?

For instance, let's say we manage to help Iraq have an independent Democratic government and a lack of civil unrest.

If they then fully Democratically decide they won't sell any of their oil to us and want us out of their country to never return - does that mean we've won?

Charlie:

One question for the General:

Through my readings of "The Iraq Report available at The Weekly Standard, I understand that part of the Baghdad Security Plan is to limit the times trucks and cars can enter marketplaces where many suicide bombers have hit in these types of vehicles. Are Coalition, Iraqi Army and Iraqi Police still securing and enforcing those hours in the marketplaces? If so, was there a lapse in security after last week's terrible bombings?

Thanks.

Given that we will not have 'victory' in Iraq until the Iraqis can handle things on their own, with only minimal support from America, I humbly request you ask the General the following two questions:

(1) what percentage of Iraq, measured by both population and geography, are the Iraqis are currently handling police and security with only minimal involvement of US forces?

(2) what is the timetable by which you project Iraqi forces to be fully capable of handing police and security for all of Iraq with only minimal involvement of US forces?

General, who is the more dangerous or formidable foe of the military, the Iraqis, Iranian insurgents in the mideast, or Libs right here in the USA?

Have we turned the corner?

My question would be why doesn't the military kick out all MSM reporters, who do not want to report on facts, and replace these with good, honest mil-bloggers?

I thought of another one:

How significant is the role hired contractors play in Iraq? Could US forces replace them? What oversight/regulations apply to them? Do you see their presence increasing or decreasing over the next several years?

Thanks for your ideas. I was able to ask a few of the suggested questions. I'll have the podcast up in a few days.

The General got a chuckle out of the question about formidable foes: Insurgents, Iran, Al Qaeda, Sunni's, Shia, or Congress. He took the predictable high road. These guys don't like going on the record against those who fund, or in some cases, fail to fund, their pay checks.