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A friend emailed me with the news, but I also got this link from Timshel:

HOUMA, La. (AP) — A National Guardsman and father of three from Raceland was among as many as six Louisiana soldiers reportedly killed in a bomb blast that struck their patrol vehicle in Iraq.

A uniformed officer informed family members that Sgt. Kurt Comeaux, 34, was one of those killed in the blast, Comeaux's mother-in-law, Karen Gunn, said Friday.

"We got the knock at the door about 10:30 last night," Gunn said.

Officials told Comeaux's family that six of the seven fatalities are believed to be a part of the Louisiana National Guard 156th Mechanized Infantry Charlie Company. The other soldier was from New York.

Charlie Company's guardsmen come from Terrebonne and Lafourche parishes, New Orleans and the Morgan City area. The troops were deployed in October.

There's more here at Channel 9's website.

Interestingly, though, there isn't a whole lot in the national press, although the Times carried this--the usual bloviating from the man who put us in this mess:

"Democracy is hard," Mr. Bush said in a brief question-and-answer session in the White House. "Our own country's had a history of kind of a bumpy road toward democracy."

Huh? Back to "it's hard work?"

Referring to the campaign to stabilize Iraq, Mr. Bush said: "I know it's hard, but it's hard for a reason. And the reason it's hard is because there are a handful of folks who fear freedom."

Let's face it--when it comes to Iraq--a $140 BILLION dollar sinkhole into hell, Bush is without a clue. This is an embarrassment, and, if you ask me, criminally negligent. I think someone--hey, where's Alberto Gonzales when you need him?--should write a memo suggesting that Bush ought to get smacked upside the head every time he knee-jerks out of his piehole the expression "they fear freedom" or "they hate freedom."

Contrast Bush's idiocy with someone who actually knows a thing or two about foreign policy--Brent Scowcroft:

Brent Scowcroft, who was national security adviser for the first President Bush, said on Thursday that he had grown pessimistic about chances for stability in Iraq. "The Iraqi elections, rather than turning out to be a promising turning point, have the great potential for deepening the conflict," Mr. Scowcroft said in a speech to a public policy group, The Washington Post reported.

So, what else does The Post have to say? Quite a bit:

Scowcroft told a Washington luncheon yesterday that he expects "an incipient civil war" between Sunni and Shiite Muslims in Iraq after the Jan. 30 elections. He said the U.S. military presence in Iraq is inflaming the Middle East and hurting the war on terrorism, and he suggested turning the operation over to NATO or the United Nations.

And, here's Bush's response to these very valid concerns:

Asked whether he shared Mr. Scowcroft's concerns, Mr. Bush replied: "Quite the opposite. I think elections will be such an incredibly hopeful experience for the Iraqi people."

The president went on to reaffirm his faith that "democracies can take hold in parts of the world that have been condemned to tyranny, and I believe when democracies take hold, it leads to peace."...

Asked whether he shared the concerns of people who have expressed worries that many Sunnis will sit out the elections, thus diluting their validity and sparking even more unrest, Mr. Bush said, "Well, I want everyone to vote, and I understand that parts of the Sunni area are being targeted by these killers."

"This administration firmly believes that if people are given a right to express themselves in a ballot in the ballot box, in the public square, and through a free and open press, it'll lead to peace."

The president said he viewed the elections as an "historical marker for our Iraq policy."

"I suspect if you were asking me questions 18 months ago and I said there's going to be elections in Iraq, you would have had trouble containing yourself from laughing out loud at the president," Mr. Bush said.

I don't know about anyone else, but I'm not laughing out loud at this moron. I'm shaking my head, wondering how a simpleton like this could be trusted with something as dangerous and as complicated as foreign policy. We're not just talking about the equivalent of handing a gun to a drunk. We're giving him extra bullets, several sticks of dynamite, gallons of fuel oil, corporate sized bags of ammonium nitrate, blasting caps, gasoline, matches, roman candles--and an old barn full of dried hay, right next to a building full of kids...

I mean, my god--look at this direct quote:

"I think we're making great progress" in Iraq. He added, "And it's exciting times for the Iraqi people. And it's so exciting there are some who are trying to intimidate people from going to the polls."

And it's so exciting that you've got a full-scale war going on--a war that's killing people, like the six Louisiana soldiers noted above--or the estimated 15,000 or more Iraqi civilians.

Pathetic.

Pitiful.

What a fucking moron.