After producing and directing the 2004 documentary Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism, filmmaker Robert Greenwald and his company Brave New Films partnered with several other organizations, including MoveOn.org and The Sierra Club, to act as an online watchdog group against FOX News and their “fair and balanced” reporting. This video from said watchdog group, FOX Attacks, is a side-by-side comparison of FOX News’ rhetoric leading up to the war in Iraq (much of which was inaccurate and misleading) and the current FOX News drum-beating about the dangers posed by Iran. Is FOX News trying to push America into another war? Boy, I hope so!

Frankly I’m not sure what Robert Greenwald is so worried about. I mean, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are going so well, I bet we could just pop over to Iran, knock that place into shape and be home in time for Leno. After all, we do have a massive surplus of fully trained, combat ready troops, just sitting around in their brand-new fully-armored Humvees with nothing to do. Sure, Iran is larger and more heavily populated than Iraq and Afghanistan combined, but after the easy KOs our boys scored in both of those countries I think they’re ready for a challenge. Also, look at a map -- Iran is right in-between Iraq and Afghanistan, so once we get Iran in line, we can just combine all three countries into one giant country called Irafraqanistan. Then all the problems in the Middle East will be solved and we can move on to bigger issues: like when is Robert Greenwald going to direct the film adaptation of the stage adaptation of his 1980 Olivia Newton-John roller disco musical Xanadu?

One of the great things about this job is that, as I don't consider myself a "real journalist," I don't feel obligated to keep my opinions to myself. When I cover a political video, sure, I try to be fair, but I also feel free to give my own personal take on the contents. As long as I also give you the opportunity to view the video and form your own opinion, I feel I've done my job.

One of the other great things about this job is that every once in a while, I come across a video that makes me want to shut the hell up.

This dynamic spoken word performance by a (perhaps fittingly) anonymous Marine -- the full text of which can be found here -- is a breed apart from the armchar analysis of most political videos on YouTube. Yes, it's got passion, it's got politics, but at its core is a powerful reminder of a simple truth: that the men and women of our all-volunteer armed forces have all willingly given up their own safety and freedom to serve what they believe to be a greater purpose.

We all have our opinions -- about the administration's actions around the world, about the current state of the military. But there is no opinion involved in knowing this: it's a brave and extraordinary thing to choose to serve -- to choose to leave your life and family behind and go wherever called, whatever the risk, and to do it without question. To serve your country.

I'll have more opinons tomorrow. But today ... Semper Fi.

In this 1994 post-Desert-Storm interview, Dick Cheney is asked if UN troops should have invaded Bagdhad. His confident and emphatic reply? "No." And why is that? Well, he says:

1. If we'd gone in there, we would have been alone, without the support of other forces.

2. Once we'd taken down Saddam's regime, what would we put in its place? It's a volatile region, and if you destabilized the central government, you create the possibility of pieces of Iraq splitting off, either voluntarily or by the force of neighbors such as Syria and Iran.

3. While Desert Storm had a low-by-military-statistics number of casualties (146), as Cheney points out, those numbers were not small to the fallen soldiers or the people who loved them. So the natural next question becomes, "How many additional dead Americans is Saddam worth? And our judgement was, not very many, and I think we got it right."

Um... Was there some kind of pod person incident sometime after '94 I'm unaware of? Where was this guy in March 2003? 'Cause this guy is all chatty and reasonable and cautious and forthcoming with information and whatnot. But here we are with the thousands of dead Americans and the Iraqi citizens getting blown up by car bombs every day, and I look at this interview and I feel like Adam Sandler in The Wedding Singer: "Once again, things that could have been brought to my attention YESTERDAY!"

Most of the Iraq War's propaganda videos we've seen -- whether they're for the war or against it -- tend to be put together without too much thought behind them. "Lee's life for Lies" is a curious exception.

The desricription of this clip by YouTube uploader "tamerghonym" claims that it's "A Message from a US soldier in Iraq Lee K. Tucker to his family. The message was found in a flash memory after his Humvee had been attacked by the Islamic Army in Iraq." The footage of Tucker, along with a recorded letter he wrote to his parents, implies that Lee was against the war. It also implies that he died when his Humvee was blown up.

The problem is that Lee is alive and well. And he almost certainly never wrote or recorded the letter. The footage of him and his fellow soldiers was either stolen or found, and then manipulated to make it seem genuine. (The other four parts can be viewed on tamerghonym's YouTube channel while it's still up.)