Take me out to the women’s softball game

US forces have been bombing Fallujah over and over, in what it amuses them to call “precision strikes.” The WordPerfect dictionary has this usage notation in its definition of “precise”: “Strictly speaking, precise does not mean the same as accurate. Accurate means correct in all details , while precise contains a notion of trying to specify details exactly: if you say ‘It’s 4.04 and 12 seconds’ you are being precise, but not necessarily accurate (your watch might be slow).”

Every blog and cable news show is talking feverishly about Mary Cheney. I wonder if this isn’t playing into Team Chimpy’s hands, not by raising the ire of the God-botherers (my favorite silly argument is that Kerry & Edwards are trying to pry homophobic voters away from Bush...by publicly praising and supporting a lesbian), but by not talking about Bush’s poor debate performances and other, ya know, substantive policy issues. This may be why the Chimpites are keeping the issue going.

Not that homophobia isn’t an issue, of course, especially given Alan Keyes’s comments & Marilyn Musgrave (R-Colo.)’s anti-gay, but rather poorly phrased fund-raising letter: “Leaders of the homosexual lobby know if they can take me out, no one will stand against them in the future.” Oh you just wish, Marilyn. Just sitting by the phone, waiting for the leaders of the homosexual lobby to call, waiting, waiting...

I remember the first US Senate race between two women (1986), in which Linda Chavez started a whispering campaign that Barbara Mikulski was gay, and started calling herself Mrs. Chavez.