Real genius

So did everyone spend the day mourning Gerald Ford? Did you assemble in your respective places of worship, there to pay homage to the memory of President Ford?

Patrick Cockburn: “It takes real genius to create a martyr out of Saddam Hussein.”

In that cell-phone footage, Saddam was looking directly at the camera. Imagine you’re being executed and you see someone whip out a cell-phone-camera to take a few snaps.

A NATO spokesman, Brig. Richard Nugee, who is the International Security Assistance Force’s Chief of Effects, whatever that means, says that in Afghanistan NATO kinda screwed up in killing all those innocent civilians, and they’ll really try to not do it quite so much in the future, but that the Taliban also kill lots of civilians, and show “no remorse at all.” Thanks for putting it all into perspective for us, Brig. Nugee.

Fiji’s leader, known in these parts as Commodore Bananarama, seems to be handing power back to the president he ousted, possibly in response to the complete lack of international pressure.

Chief Justice William Rehnquist’s FBI files have been partially released. They show that the Nixon and Reagan administrations investigated the witnesses at his Senate confirmation hearings, and that he was addicted to powerful pain meds and went bonkers when he was taken off them in 1981, trying to escape the hospital in his pajamas.

From today’s Gaggle:

Q: Has the President seen the videotape of the execution?

MR. SNOW: I don’t think so.

Riiiight.

And now, two totally gratuitous pictures of The Decider from this morning, because I’m the blogger and I decide what’s best.