Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt or Lindsey Graham’s sexual identity

John McCain and Lindsey Graham are back from Egypt and oh so eager to share what they have learned with the WaPo readers.

BECAUSE IF THERE’S ANYONE WHO HATES POLITICAL CRISES... “We traveled to Cairo this week to support a U.S. and international effort to help Egyptians end their political crisis.”

WE CALCULATE TIME IS RUNNING OUT AT THE RATE OF ONE MINUTE PER MINUTE: “We returned convinced that time is quickly running out to resolve this crisis”.

YEAH, THAT’S KIND OF THE PROBLEM: “We are longtime friends of Egypt and its armed forces.”

AND YET, YOU’RE STILL HANGING AROUND, MAVERICK-BOY: “But as we said again this week in Cairo, we find it difficult to describe the circumstances of Morsi’s removal from office as anything other than a coup. Unsuccessful leaders in a democracy should leave office by losing elections.”

AT A RATE WHICH OUR FIGURES SUGGEST IS APPROXIMATELY ONE DAY PER DAY: “We heard much that was encouraging in our meetings, and we have urged all sides to back up their good words with constructive actions. We have urged them to do so quickly, because time is running out.”

JUST LIKE McCAIN HAS SO GRACEFULLY ACCEPTED LOSING THE 2008 ELECTION: But their sage advice to the Muslim Brotherhood is to “accept that [Morsis’s] actions generated massive public discontent and that he will not be reinstated as president of Egypt...”. So they should just “accept” the thing McCain & Huckleberry just described as a coup. Which Team Maverick already has done, because the word “reinstated” suggests that Morsi is somehow not the president of Egypt, because the military says he isn’t.

“...that they must refrain from acts and incitement of violence; and that eventually they will need to move out of the streets and into the political process, because there is no good or effective alternative to advance their interests.” Yeah, because participating in a political process in which the military exercises a veto has been soooo effective in advancing their interests so far. Also, you guys claimed earlier to have supported the 2011 revolution against the last military dictatorship, so what’s changed?

They call for “releasing political prisoners, including Morsi supporters,” which is not a call to release ALL political prisoners or to release Morsi himself.

DIDN’T YOU SAY THE SAME THING ABOUT IRAQ? I MEAN, THE EXACT SAME THING? “We still believe Egypt can serve as a model of inclusive democracy that can inspire the region and the world, and, in this great endeavor, the United States must continue to offer its support.”

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The military can’t keep running the country

John McCain and Lindsey Graham are in Cairo to “defuse the crisis,” because if there are two people who are all about defusing crises, it’s John McCain and Lindsay Graham (it was evidently the Obama administration’s idea to send these guys, which says all you need to know about how seriously the Obama administration is taking the coup in Egypt).

Graham says the Egyptian army “move more aggressively” to hold elections. Really really aggressive elections.

“The military can’t keep running the country,” Graham says, demonstrating his firm grasp of the last 60 years of Egyptian history.

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A crucial time

John McCain posted this picture with the caption “@JoeLieberman @Grahamblog & I had good meetings with Iraqi leaders in Baghdad today at a crucial time.”


Judging by McCain’s appearance, I think by “crucial time” he meant that he needed to go to the bathroom.

Can we do better than John McCain? CAPTION CONTEST!

Caption contest

Posted by John McCain, this is him, Huckleberry, Holy Joe and Colonel Combover in Afghanistan.


See also his pics inspecting Afghan troops, and at a shura with locals in Kandahar, in which the Three Amigos are dressed like they’re on a fishing trip in Boca. At least take off the baseball cap when sitting – indoors – around a table with Afghan leaders.

Bullhorn moment

Lindsey Graham says Obama needs “a bullhorn moment where he went to the Gulf of Mexico and said, ‘We’re going to get this right, I’m going to get on it.’” So President Canute needs to go to the Gulf and yell at the oil spill. Excellent advice, Huckleberry.

Still not done making fun of McCain

In that clip two posts back, Obama told McCain, “The election’s over,” and McCain responded, “I’m reminded of that every day.” Do you think he has an aide (or possibly Lindsey Graham) whose task it is to remind him of that fact every day, or does Cindy leave post-it notes on the bathroom mirror: “Your name is John,” “You are a United States senator,” “You are not the president (sorry),” “You are a ‘maverick,’” “The nice man who just gave you the sponge bath is named Lindsey,” etc.

Obama doesn’t want witch hunts taking place

I am not paid enough to read all 5 transcripts of Obama’s tv appearances today, much less watch them (Lindsey Graham made a little joke about him appearing everywhere except the Food Network – because if there’s anything Lindsey Graham hates, it’s a media whore). So let’s look at just one, Face the Nation.

On insurance companies: “We don’t mind them making profits, we just want them to be accountable to their customers.” Whatever that means.

Asked if insurance companies won’t just pass the proposed taxes on them on to their customers (but in an accountable way): “Here’s the problem, they’re passing on those costs to the consumer anyway.” They’re passing on costs that don’t exist yet?

SO STOP SENDING HIM THOSE EMAILS ABOUT INCREASED SIZE, HE JUST ISN’T INTERESTED: “I have no interest in increasing the size of government.”

On the Justice Dept investigation of the CIA’s interrogation practices (or, as he put it, “problems that occurred under the previous administration”): “I don’t want witch hunts taking place.” Although dunking them in ponds to see if they’re witches would be nicely ironic.

Really, with no doubt at all that the CIA tortured prisoners, the phrase you choose to describe investigating and prosecuting those practices is “witch hunt.”

Talking about the cancelled missile defense program, Mister Diplomacy referred twice to “the Iranian threat” and twice said that Russia was “paranoid” about the program.

Lindsey, do you have a douchbaggery problem?

CONTEST: Provide a better answer than whatever Sotomayor said, which I can’t even remember, in response to Lindsey Graham’s question, “Do you think you have a temperament problem?”

ALTERNATE CONTEST: Provide a caption for this photo:

Sotomayor hearings: Most of our judges understand what it’s like to be old

More opening statements (Sessions’ in previous post).

Chuck Grassley: “Judge Sotomayor, I’ll be asking you about your ability to wear that judicial blindfold.” Kinky.

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Lindsey Graham attempted to out-brown her: “No Republican would have chosen you, Judge; that’s just the way it is. We would have picked Miguel Estrada. We would all have voted for him. And I don’t think anybody on that side would have voted for Judge Estrada, who is a Honduran immigrant... So the Hispanic element of this hearing’s important... my Republican colleagues who vote against you I assure you could vote for a Hispanic nominee.” So that’s okay, then.

(Update: By the time I got around to writing the post, I’d forgotten why I selected the quote: No Republican would have chosen Sotomayor? Hey Lindsey, who appointed her to a judgeship the first time?)

A WARNING TO KEEP HER HOT LATIN BLOOD IN CHECK: “Now, unless you have a complete meltdown, you’re going to get confirmed.”

WHAT BOTHERS LINDSEY: “It just bothers me when somebody wearing a robe takes the robe off and says that their experience makes them better than someone else.” Especially if they’re wearing women’s underwear but they’re not a woman – I’m looking at you, Scalia.

SO THERE: “I think your experience can add a lot to the court, but I don’t think it makes you better than anyone else.”

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Tom Coburn, who brings to the Judiciary Committee, as he told John Roberts, his “medical skills of observation of body language”:

SOMETHING REMARKABLE: “It is truly an honor to have you before us. It is -- says something remarkable about our country that you’re here.” And something remarkable about you that you’re still awake... Ms. Sotomayor?... hello?

“And I assure you, during your time before this committee, you will be treated with the utmost respect and kindness.” ACCUSATION OF RACISM IN 5,4,3...

EVIDENTLY SOMEONE WHO COMES FROM THE HEARTLAND GRASPS AND HOLDS MORE THAN A WISE LATINA DOES: “And I’m worried that our Constitution may be seen to be malleable and evolving when I, as someone who comes from the heartland, seems to grasp and hold and the people that I represent from the state of Oklahoma seem to grasp and hold that there is a foundational document and there are statutes and occasionally treaties that should be the rule, rather than our opinions.” Can we just agree that anyone who’s ever argued that there is more wisdom in one part of the country than another or used the phrase “San Francisco liberal” or “un-American parts of our nation,” can just shut up about the “wise Latina” thing?

“During the campaign, he promised to nominate someone who’s got the heart and the empathy to recognize what it’s like to be a young, teenaged mom. The implication is that our judges today don’t have that. Do you realize how astounding that is? The empathy to understand what it’s like to be poor, to be African-American or gay or disabled or old. Most of our judges understand what it’s like to be old.”

WHERE EMPATHY COMES FROM (THE STORK?): “We expect a judge to merely call balls and strikes? Maybe so, maybe not. But we certainly don’t expect them to sympathize with one party over the other, and that’s where empathy comes from.”

Sotomayor hearings: Empathy for one party is always prejudice against another

Just as I turned on the Sotomayor hearing, heard Lindsey Graham say “wise Latina woman”; turned off Sotomayor hearing.

But Jefferson Beauregard Sessions (by the way, that is the way he referred to himself before he became “Jeff” to run for the Senate) has helpfully posted his opening remarks online.

LEAHY BROUGHT BROWNIES! “I hope it will be viewed as the best hearing this Committee has ever held.”

SO THEY CAN HEAR YOU CALLED A RACIST OVER AND OVER: “I know your family is proud, and rightfully so. It is a pleasure to have them with us today.”

“I expect this hearing and resulting debate to be characterized by a respectful tone, a discussion of serious issues, and a thoughtful dialogue”. FIRST ACCUSATION OF RACISM IN 5,4,3...


DUDE, YOU JUST BLEW MY MIND: “our legal system is based on a firm belief in an ordered universe and objective truth.”

He warned of “a Brave New World where words have no true meaning...” I mean, “rhubarb” could mean “rutabaga”! It’s a madhouse I tell you, a madhouse!!! “...and judges are free to decide what facts they choose to see.” I was going to make a Fox News joke or something, but in a court, isn’t “deciding what facts they choose to see” actually called “applying the rules of evidence”?

“We have seen federal judges force their own political and social agenda on the nation, dictating that the words ‘under God’ be removed from the Pledge of Allegiance and barring students from even silent prayer in schools.” Putting aside that “under God” was a late addition to the pledge, any court ruling wouldn’t actually govern the content of the pledge, just what can be said in a secular public school. Also, in addition to the metal detectors that schools now have, which they didn’t have in my day, are there also telepaths to ensure that students don’t engage in “even silent prayer”?

“Judges have – contrary to the longstanding rules of war – created a right for terrorists, captured on a foreign battlefield, to sue the United States government in our own courts. Judges have cited foreign laws, world opinion, and a United Nations resolution to determine that a state death penalty law was unconstitutional.” Note that Sessions, in the sentence immediately preceding the one expressing his disgust with foreign laws, world opinion etc being mentioned in an American court of law, suggested that “longstanding rules of war” should have precedence over the United States Constitution.

CALL IT RHUBARB: “Call it empathy, call it prejudice, or call it sympathy, but whatever it is, it is not law.”

CLUELESS: “Could it be that her time as a leader of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund provides a clue as to her decision against the firefighters?”

EMPATHY IS ALWAYS PREJUDICE: “It seems to me that in Ricci, Judge Sotomayor’s empathy for one group of firefighters turned out to be prejudice against the others. That is, of course, the logical flaw in the ‘empathy standard.’ Empathy for one party is always prejudice against another.” And there’s the Republican party’s philosophy encapsulated for you.

BECAUSE HE HATES US, AND WANTS US TO SUFFER: “I hope the American people will follow these hearings closely.”

A SLIGHTLY STONED, MELLOW JUDGE? “And, at the end of the hearing, ask, If I must one day go to court, what kind of judge do I want to hear my case?”

Of musketeers and mouseketeers

John McCain refers to himself, Lindsey Graham and Holy Joe Lieberman as “the Three Musketeers.”

Speaking of silly titles, Kim Jong Il, the “Dear Leader” and son of Kim Il-sung, the “Great Leader,” has designated his 25-year-old (give or take)_son Kim Jong Un as his successor. Clearly, he needs an adjective of his very own. CONTEST: What sort of Leader is Kim Jong Un? (Since he was once caught trying to use a forged passport to visit Tokyo Disneyland, perhaps he should be called the Dear Mouseketeer)(Update: my mistake, that was Kim Jong Nam, the eldest son).


Oh, and if you want to submit a better name than the Three Musketeers for the team of McCain, Graham and Lieberman (the Axis of Evil?), feel free to do that too.

Of moving on from debates about the past and killer tennis balls from hell

John McCain and his aged catamite Lindsey Graham have an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal, mostly about how “preventive detention” of enemy combatants should go on for as long as The War Against Terror (TWAT) continues (i.e., forever) and how America’s silly criminal courts aren’t up to the task of dealing with such prisoners. They also reiterate McCain’s position on the legal memos that it is time to “move on from debates about the past,” i.e., torture, which is interesting from John “I hate the gooks. I will hate them as long as I live” McCain.

I was in a dollar store today. The cat is currently staring dubiously at the tennis ball I bought her. It’s just sitting there, but she’s seen it roll, and that’s pretty suspicious in her book. Wait till she finds out there are two more tennis balls.

But the real question of the day is, who would buy a home pregnancy test at a dollar store?

Besides a member of the Palin family, I mean.

Republican Convention: Of moose and mavericks and my friends

The last day, praise Jebus.

Brownback on America: “it’s blessed to be a blessing.”

Joe Gibbs, the former head coach of the Washington Redskins: the election of McCain & Palin will bring “a return to God’s word that will lead America to a spiritual revival”. Something to look forward to, then.

Lovely video about 9/11. Slo-mo and everything.

Lindsey Graham: “this speech is for the troops.”


Lindsey Graham talking about “straight talk” just sounds... wrong.

Graham: Obama gave troops only “a patronizing pat on the back”. Whereas you gave them... this speech.

Graham: Everyone knows the surge is working – especially Al Qaida know it – everyone except Obama and his “buddies” at MoveOn.org. And there wouldn’t have been a surge without McCain.


Video on Palin: “Mother... moose-hunter... maverick.”

Oh good, a picture of her and her father with a dead moose.

She likes moose stew.

Tom Ridge’s speech bored me... ridge-id.

Sorry. It’s very hot.

Ridge tries to get a call and response thing going where the audience is supposed to chant “That’s John McCain,” but they pay about as much attention as America did to Ridge’s color-coded terrorism alert levels.

I was in the bathroom, but I could swear Cindy McCain said that she was inspired by John’s example to go to Bangladesh and adopt one if its orphans. Er, didn’t John’s example involve going to an Asian country and creating orphans?

They fell in love at first sight, she says. I wonder if she’s leaving out any little detail about that event.


McCain thanks Bush for his leadership after 9/11, does not actually utter the name “Bush” anywhere in the speech.

Some “Iraq veteran against the war” (according to his t-shirt) has a sign and is heckling (there were others, but he’s the only one I saw on-screen on PBS), which leads to the edifying sight of pudgy delegates trying to drown out a war vet with chants of “USA! USA!” McCain tells the audience to ignore the “static.” Ha ha, that veteran isn’t really speaking in any known language, it’s just meaningless noise.

McCain must really hate having to give the part of his speech I’m listening to now, because we all know how much he hates talking about being a POW. Almost as much as he hates saying “My friends.”

Seriously, the POW portion of the speech went on a very long time.

Which he does a lot, even after everyone has been making fun of it. Can’t help himself. Unless someone thought it would be funny to put it on the teleprompter 500 times.

He actually suggests that people join the military. Or serve your country in other ways (though not as a community organizer): teach an illiterate adult to read (insert obligatory George Bush joke here). Or feed a hungry child – but not candy in the back of your van.

Went to a dark place there.


A bad speech, though delivered fairly well by McCain standards.


Hey, guy with sign: it’s spelled maverick, not mavrick!

Hey, Jim Lehrer: “they” don’t have seven children; he does.

I’m still too lazy to... I mean, time for another CAPTION CONTEST! YAY!!

Bush, still working on that walking-and-waving-at-the-same-time thing:


Why is this man smiling?


Who gave Stumbles McDrydrunk their baby to hold?


What is it with him and other people’s personal space?


Isn’t he adorable when he waves?


Still, nothing says awkward like McCain holding hands with the Dalai Lama.



And I see he brought along his fluffer. Although say what you will about Lindsey Graham, he did coordinate his tie with the Dalai Lama’s robes.


When old men meet.

Sausage fest

Today, Obama visited Germany and McCain visited Schmidt’s Sausage Haus und Restaurant in Columbus, Ohio. He had the bratwurst.

Speaking of things whose exact contents you really don’t want to know, McCain spoke his mind, saying that he stands by his previous declarations that Obama wants to lose the war in Iraq for political reasons, saying, “It’s pretty obvious he’s taken this position to secure the nomination of his party.”


He also got some cream puffs to go.

And speaking of cream puffs to go, Lindsey Graham was with him.


Fudge haus? Really, McCain? Really? That’s what you chose to stand in front of? Really? I spend much of my time making fun of the way George Bush speaks, and I still find that insultingly easy. Fudge haus, indeed.

Happy Captive Nations Week, everybody! Bush gave a little speech today about the “freedom agenda” at the offices of the USAID, which he described as being “on the front lines of compassion and decency and liberty.” Because nothing says compassion and decency and liberty like war terminology.


He quoted former presidents about how liberty and democracy and shit. It may be the first time I’ve ever heard someone quote Woodrow Wilson’s pledge to make the world safe for democracy other than in an ironic or sarcastic way.

He also talked about things former presidents did for liberty and democracy and shit, including “the Marshall Plan, the Berlin Airlift” and... wait for it... “support for freedom fighters in Central America”. Also, the invasions of Grenada and Panama.

“Even now, change is stirring in places like Havana and Damascus and Tehran. The people of these nations dream of a free future, hope for a free future, and believe that a free future will come. And it will. May God be with them in their struggle. America always will be.” So evidently we always will be, but God might be, because God’s a little, well, unreliable.

There’s a good reason they are called Al Qaida in Iraq

This morning, Bush was thrilled – maybe a little too thrilled – to be going on a little field trip.


In the company of a wax replica of Lindsey Graham, Bush visited Charleston Air Force Base and toured the cargo loading operations or, as he put it, “Nice big airplanes carrying a lot of cargo.”


He gave a speech devoted to playing up the role of Al Qaida in Iraq and to denying “that the organization called al Qaeda in Iraq is an Iraqi phenomenon, that it’s independent of Osama bin Laden and that it’s not interested in attacking America.” “That would be news to Osama bin Laden,” he said. So that’s one guy totally out of touch with reality defending his delusions by quoting another guy totally out of touch with reality.


And, of course, there’s the Oath. “It’s hard to argue that al Qaida in Iraq is separate from bin Laden’s al Qaida, when the leader of al Qaida in Iraq [Zarqawi] took an oath of allegiance to Osama bin Laden.” And you took an oath to uphold and defend the constitution of the United States, but that didn’t turn out to mean very much, now did it?

Last week, the Pentagon was claiming that the Iraqi head of AQI, Umar al Baghdadi, never existed. Today, Bush said Baghdadi is “only an actor.” Possibly Fred Thompson.

Bush’s logic is impeccable: “They know they’re al Qaida. The Iraqi people know they are al Qaida. People across the Muslim world know they are al Qaida. And there’s a good reason they are called al Qaida in Iraq: They are al Qaida ... in ... Iraq.” Also, there’s a good reason it’s called Alice in Wonderland. Just saying.


More of his diamond-cutter logic: “Yet despite all the evidence, some will tell you that al Qaida in Iraq is not really al Qaida -- and not really a threat to America. Well, that’s like watching a man walk into a bank with a mask and a gun, and saying he’s probably just there to cash a check.” Er, how is it like that?

So to summarize, the war in Iraq is not a distraction from the fight against terrorism: “We are fighting bin Laden’s al Qaida in Iraq.”


As Bush is now portraying the war, Iraq itself is more or less irrelevant to the war taking place in it, as are the Iraqi people, so it doesn’t matter if they never get their shit together, achieve a single benchmark, or if the Iraqi parliament ever comes back from its August recess.

Douchebag of the day

Lindsey Graham, yesterday, opposing a measure to give troops as much time out of combat zones as in them: “if you want to take care of the troops, let ‘em win.”

The full picture

John McCain was in Iraq today, complaining during a press conference in the Green Zone that Americans aren’t getting the “full picture” from the media about how safe Iraq is now. “Never have I been able to drive from the airport, never have I been able go out into the city as I was today”. How did he (and other congresscritters) go out into the city? If you guessed wearing body armor, in armored vehicles, with helicopters flying overhead, accompanied by many, many soldiers, you guessed correctly. Isn’t that how everyone goes to market? The delegation went rug-shopping in the largest Baghdad market, where the AP notes that some sellers “would not take money for their souvenirs”. With all those men with guns sweeping through their stalls, they probably thought it was a stick up.

[Update: Newsweek reports: “‘I bought five carpets for five bucks,’ Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina gushed at a presser shortly after the visit.” Ah, the spoils of war! That makes it all worthwhile.]

I asked about the Iraqi police who participated in the massacres in Tal Afar. Still no news, but their very existence is now being denied by the local American commander, Lt. Col. Malcom Frost, Military Moron: “As we investigate this, there’s no indication that this was an inside job... As much as we want war to be, it is not a zero-defect exercise, and unfortunately the enemy sometimes finds a seam. This is the case in this incident.” He went on, “Sometimes you must take half a step back to take two steps forward.” It is unclear if that half a step was the market bombing, which killed 152, or the reprisal massacres of 50 to 70 (such counts are highly political in Iraq, with Frost and the Tal Afar city government giving lower figures than the interior ministry). Like McCain, M.M. Frost chided the media and told it to just grow up already: “It is both foolish and immature to let this one event represent the progress Tal Afar has made.”

Gay marriage is not the magic bullet to get us out of our situation

The pope weighs in on the Iranian nuclear issue: “May an honourable solution be found for all parties, through honest and serious negotiations.” Now why did no one else think of that? That must be why he’s the pope.

Iyad “Comical” Allawi and Adnan Pachachi suggest a coup to “save [Iraq] from its current deadly crisis,” with a government of strong men modesty forbids them from naming, ignoring the results of the December elections.

The Chicago Tribune (via Juan Cole, reg./BugMeNot, void where prohibited) asked how the US was following the Leahy Amendment, which requires no military aid to foreign security units connected to human rights violations, in Iraq. You will be surprised and amazed and shocked to hear that it isn’t. In fact, the US isn’t really tracking where the tens of thousands of guns it has given the Shiite-militia-riddled Interior Ministry are going. And the US embassy has no system in place for tracking allegations of human rights abuses. And despite the discoveries of secret Interior Ministry torture prisons, Americans still don’t inspect Iraqi detention centers.

In case the US invades, Iran has started recruiting martyrs. They sign a “Registration form for martyrdom-seeking operations.” Who knew there’d be paperwork?

The NYT says that inflammatory social issues may not do it for the Republicans in the 2006 elections. Lindsey Graham utters this rather wonderful sentence: “Gay marriage is not the magic bullet to get us out of our situation.” The article has this picture, featuring the international symbol for unisex bathrooms heterosexual marriage.

Congress stumbles, and Bush reminds

Kadima (which means “At least we’re not Bibi” in Hebrew) wins the Israeli elections, in the sense that the Kadima party, itself an uneasy coalition, will lead an uneasy, unstable coalition government. Acting- and future-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is talking about setting permanent Israeli borders, unilaterally or otherwise. “We are ready to compromise, to give up parts of the beloved Land of Israel... and evacuate, under great pain, Jews living there, in order to create the conditions that will enable you to fulfil your dream and live alongside us.” Isn’t that sweet of him, giving up parts of the beloved occupied Palestine Land of Israel like that? But the Palestinians must “accept only part of their dream.”

Speaking of dreams, I just took a nap and dreamed that I was talking on the phone to my mother, looked out the window and noticed that my car had been stolen. When I woke up, I said, Whew, you could tell that was just a dream because no one would want to steal my car. Boy what a... relief.

Hamdan v. Rumsfeld keeps getting wackier. This is the case that Scalia did not recuse himself from after saying in advance that the position of the Hamdan side was “crazy.” And it’s the case where Senators Lindsey Graham and Jon Kyl told the Court that it should interpret Congress’s intentions in passing the egregious Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 based on a conversation between the two of them that they intended the justices to think occurred on the Senate floor before the vote, but which did not. And it’s the case in which the US Solicitor General today told the Court that it was possible and legitimate and legally binding for Congress to have suspended habeas corpus unconsciously, to have “sort of stumble[d] on a suspension of the Writ.” Possibly Congress all took Ambien and ate the Bill of Rights in their sleep.

Funniest headline for a piece of WaPo so-called analysis: “[Andy] Card’s Departure Seen as a Sign President Hears Words of Critics.” Which is peculiar, because Bush once said that he never reads newspapers, the filter, he gets all the news he needs from Condi Rice and Andy Card. Anyway, Bush used the same search process to replace Card that he used to pick Harriet Miers for the Supreme Court, and chose Joshua Bolten. The best line on that is by John Dickerson at Slate, “[Bush has] defined ‘the bolten’ as a new unit of Washington measurement. It is the smallest staff change possible short of doing nothing at all.”

Bush says of his next (sigh) speech on Iraq, “I’ll remind the people we’re not going to lose our nerve.”