Killing a Career
Chuck Colson (Hat tip: Russ Vaughn)

have what some might consider the macabre habit of reading the casualty reports from Iraq every day in the New York Times. This may reflect the fact that I served in the military or that I worked in the White House during Vietnam.

But there’s one name that hasn’t yet appeared in the casualty reports: the name of General Peter Pace, the first Marine—and I say this with pride as a former Marine—to serve as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Why am I looking for Pace’s name on the casualty list? His distinguished military career was recently ended by the crudest kind of politics. ...

Below the fold:

• Some words about Iraq and Iran from Gen. George Patton
• Aide to Iraq's Top Shiite Cleric Fatally Stabbed
• Turkey Faces The Polls
• Which way, Turkey? Update: 17 hurt in election violence

See also:

• Video: Reid finally answers a question about potential genocide in Iraq, sort of
• Secret Agent Ma'am
• An Army of George Galloways

Some words about Iraq and Iran from Gen. George Patton

Aide to Iraq's Top Shiite Cleric Fatally Stabbed
Supporters of Sistani See Attack as a Warning, Consider Moving Leader Out of Najaf

BAGHDAD, July 21 -- A top aide to Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani was stabbed to death in what Sistani's supporters believe was a warning to Iraq's senior Shiite cleric, authorities said Saturday.

Abdullah Falaq was killed Friday in his office, which is adjacent to Sistani's home in the Shiite holy city of Najaf, about 100 miles south of Baghdad, according to an aide to the cleric. Sistani is considered one of the most influential Shiite leaders in Iraq, and Falaq was his chief adviser on matters of Islamic law.

Police said they had taken four suspects into custody. An officer said he could not comment on whether the men were part of any insurgent group. In January, an attempt to assassinate Sistani was foiled during a battle between U.S. and Iraqi military forces and insurgents near Najaf.

A representative from Sistani's office expressed concern that an armed attacker had gained entrance to the heavily guarded compound and said he suspected that one of the cleric's bodyguards aided the killer. He said officials close to Sistani interpreted the attack as a threat to the ayatollah and are considering moving him out of Najaf. ...

Turkey Faces The Polls
Ed Morrissey

Turkey faces a critical test today in its national elections, and the results could have wide implications for the entire region. The government has remained unsettled since the attempt to elect Abdullah Gul president and the threatened military coup that scotched Gul's rise. Now the Turks will recast its parliament, and the West waits to see whether Islamists can grab enough power to change the relentlessly secular government: ...

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Which way, Turkey? Update: 17 hurt in election violence
Michelle Malkin

Turkey is holding parliamentary elections today. The importance of the vote there can’t be emphasized enough. The choice in the minds of many Turks is this: sharia or secularism? East or West? Submission or resistance? A battle over Muslim headscarves prompted the elections:

A general election on Sunday in this mostly Muslim nation might help answer a divisive question: whether women should be allowed to wear head scarves in official settings and state institutions.

It was a tempest over a head scarf that helped trigger the elections in the first place. Secularists reacted with outrage when the Islamic-oriented ruling party proposed a presidential candidate whose wife covered her head ...