We did not make a revolution to have a democracy

Has anybody been having trouble posting comments, or is it just me?

“The Gitmo Cookbook.” Sigh. It’s being put out by conservatives to prove how coddled the detainees are. Sigh.

Speaking of haute cuisine, a Japanese fast food chain is now offering whale burgers. See, while the Japanese always claim that eating whale meat is traditional, they actually have to work pretty hard to find takers for the relatively small amount they take in their “scientific” culls, which they’re about to double (the scientific study these culls are always part of, by the way, is meant to prove that whales are not in fact endangered). So, with all the talk about anti-whaling activists being cultural imperialists, the Lucky Pierrot chain will be serving whale meat in the traditional Japanese manner: on a bun with lettuce and mayo.

The real victims in Guantanamo are of course the guards. According to an article on the Pentagon website, “servicemembers serving here say they feel the important contribution they’re making to the [war on terror] sometimes gets overlooked.” Poor babies; I mean, they’re living in the tropics, they’re well fed, what more could they want? See if you can spot the irony in this paragraph:

“We’re providing information that’s keeping Americans safe, and that's why I’m here,” said an interrogator at the facility, who asked not to have her name revealed for security reasons.

Baghdad Airport has closed, because the Iraqi government failed to pay the British firm providing security. The BBC notes “the Iraqi transport ministry is frequently accused of corruption.”

Something I’d missed: when Condi Rice was in Saudi Arabia, she was asked to condemn the ban on women driving and refused. It’s “just a line I’ve not wanted to cross,” she said. “places are not going to look like the United States in terms of social mores... I think it is important for us to recognize some boundaries.” (Oddly enough, these remarks are missing from the State Dept web site.)

No such boundaries are recognized for criticism of Iran, of course, although the elections that the US is so roundly condemning are no less democratic than those planned for Egypt. State says Iran is “out of step... with the currents of freedom and liberty that have been so apparent in Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon”. Moving beyond the mixed metaphor, you have to wonder about this continued use of geographic peer-pressure, as if the best argument for freedom and liberty is “all your friends are doing it.” Iran is evidently Winona Ryder, and Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon are the Heathers. Not, of course, that the victory of know-nothing Teheran mayor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (slogan: “We did not make a revolution to have a democracy”), in an election in which Rafsanjani was the liberal, is the most positive sign in the world.