It takes a while to get the Rambo stuff out

Bill Maher has described Bush’s aggressively virtuous appointees as men whose sole claim to office is that they “read the Bible and fuck their wives.”

I’ve been reading Hugo Young’s book about the history of British attitudes towards European union. Which was always skittish to say the least, but then there’s this (from today’s Indy): “Tony Blair believes that he may have triggered his heart scare by drinking too much strong coffee at the European Union summit in Brussels.”

A cute detail from day 2 of the Toledo Blade exposé: a panel was created after My Lai to prevent cover-ups in war crimes cases. The panel never actually met.

Fortunately, we’re so much more diligent about investigating war crimes now. The Human Rights Watch report out yesterday says that of 94 civilians killed by the US military in Baghdad alone since May 1 that it knows about (one lesson learned from Vietnam: stop counting), a full 5 have been officially investigated (4 exonerations). HRW’s head says, “Right now soldiers feel they can pull the trigger without coming under review.” The report notes that units went from combat duty to security details and, quoting an anonymous officer, “It takes a while to get the Rambo stuff out.” (Later:) and then there’s this AP story that US soldiers executed a prisoner in Iraq whose hands were tied with those plastic thingies Tiger Force would have loved to have had.

George Monbiot considers the implications of the export of phone support jobs, soon to be followed by middle management jobs, to India.

After 4 days of the summit, Bush finally “confronts” Malaysian PM Mahathir on his anti-semitic remarks. See, he was right, the Jews always do manage to get others to do their work by proxy.

Kidding, kidding. I kid because I love.

I hadn’t realized that Bush has never attended the funeral of a soldier killed in one of his wars (this in a Post story that the military has banned tv cameras showing the return of coffins).