Cheney is still refusing to reveal how closely his energy policy was influenced by Enron. It is a matter of principle: they are fighting to preserve the right of future presidents to receive candid advice from the people who have bought the right to give that advice.

US forces are now on patrol in the Philippines, but only in areas where they’re not expecting any rebels to be. Which means we spent millions to send them on a nature hike.

Evidently the Bush administration defines an illegal combatant as one who is “beyond the control of any state.” A couple of problems with that.

First, I thought we bombed and invaded a whole country that we considered to *be* responsible for them. Second, we didn’t recognize the Afghan government, so, what, no Afghans could take up arms because the US didn’t recognize that they had a state to control them? Third, if we’re going to war with entities that consider themselves beyond the control of any state, does that mean we’re going to invade Enron next?

Still, that definition confirms something I said early on, which is that the Morons Crusade was fought on behalf of the nation-state, any geographically defined nation-state, including the Philippines, Indonesia, China, Pakistan etc, against any (non-corporate) extra-national force or ideology.