After all, we’re in the business of dealing with the culture

Headline of the day, from the London Times: “Airstrikes ‘Could Provoke Iran.’” Ya think?

Okay, okay, seriously, a think tank argues that an attack on Iran’s nuclear facility won’t succeed, and that even if it did, Iran would still be able to cobble together a few nukes, like building a car from spare parts rather than building a car factory, and the attack would make it rather likely to do so. All of which is as self-evidently obvious as “air strikes could provoke Iran.”

There was an attack on an American convoy in Afghanistan with a vehicle packed with explosives, combined, the military says, with shooting from several directions in a “complex attack.” Alternately, the troops panicked after the explosion and started firing in several directions, then shot up every vehicle along the highway as they drove to safety, killing many civilians. Or alternately, did not panic, but deliberately shot up every civilian vehicle just to be on the safe side. Nor will they admit that all that shooting resulted in bullets actually hitting anyone. Says spokesmodel Major William Mitchell, “We certainly believe it’s possible that the incoming fire from the ambush was wholly or partly responsible for the civilian casualties.”

But really, what can we do if they won’t even cooperate in our war games? The US military plans to recreate Iraqi and Afghan villages for war games in, where else, Bavaria, and is trying to recruit Arab-speaking extras by placing ads implying they were being hiring for a film. Only four of the people who showed up didn’t leave upon being told the real purpose, which is for them to play natives 24 hours a day for three weeks while being constantly filmed. Said a spokesmodel for the US Army Joint Multinational Readiness Center, the amusingly named Reggie Bourgeois, “The more actual culture we can inject into the exercise the better it is for our soldiers. After all, we’re in the business of dealing with the culture.”

Out of this rubble will emerge a better tomorrow

I had just been getting to the point of writing a post asking what was going on about that Sunni woman who said she’d been gang-raped by Iraqi police. The story had disappeared, as Iraq stories often do these days when it is impossible for reporters to go out and cover them safely. Evidently the US, whose hospital examined her, still doesn’t feel obligated to say if that crime was committed or not, and Maliki is still denying it. Anyway, there was a follow-up of sorts yesterday when 14 (or 18) policemen were abducted and killed in retaliation.

George Bush was in Alabama and Georgia today, offering help to the victims of the tornados, and by help I mean prayers. “And this country is a prayerful country, there are a lot of people praying for you.” He added, “You can never heal a heart, but you can provide comfort, knowing that the federal government will provide help for those whose houses were destroyed, or automobiles were destroyed.” This country is a prayerful country, there are a lot of people praying for your automobiles.

There are also a lot of people praying to be able to provide comfort to 17-year old girls.



Speaking of prayers, here’s a sentence from one report: “‘A hundred kids got out of here alive,’ Bush said to the gathered press corps as he pointed to the Science Wing. ‘It’s a miracle.’” Yeah, it’s a miracle! Fuck you, science!

He told the people of Enterprise, Alabama, “that out of this rubble will emerge a better tomorrow, because that’s the commitment that I hear here in Enterprise. And the role of the government is going to help, to the extent that we can.”

At a certain point, he seems to have forgotten about the whole tornado thing and just started having a good time.



He’s talking to this woman’s boyfriend.

Then he found a toy to play with.


Almost as much fun as comforting 17-year old girls.

Clinton would have found a way to do both at once.

And by “do both at once” I meant play with the quad bike and comfort the 17-year old girls.

Could an imaginary man do that?

Congo-Kinshasa’s new Minister for Foreign Trade, Andre Kasongo Ilunga, has turned out not to actually exist. Each of the parties in the ruling coalition in the incoming government was asked to nominate two candidates for their allotted posts, and the prime minister would choose one. So Honorius Kisimba Ngoy, head of the Union Nationale des Fédéralistes du Congo (UNAFEC),

nominated himself and the fictional Mr. Ilunga, figuring that would ensure that he got the job because he 1) was more or less real, 2) had a cooler name. When Ilunga got the job instead, Kisimba presented a letter of resignation from him, and still won’t admit that there is no such person: “He wrote it himself. He signed it. Could an imaginary man do that?” Can’t fault the logic.

Kind of the safety of mediocrity

Bush went to a school in Indiana today, to push for “standards” and “accountability.” For other people, of course. And definitely not for a surprise episode of “Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?” Yes it’s time to renew the No Child Left Behind Act. He talked a lot about “measuring,” pretending that high-stakes testing is just a passive assessment. Bush said, “I know full well that to make sure a system doesn’t lapse into kind of the safety of mediocrity that you’ve got to measure.” Then he just sighed and whispered “the safety of mediocrity.” Dare to dream, George, dare to dream. “In life,” he went on, “if you lower the bar you get lousy results.” You know, I could say something sarcastic about George Bush coming out against lowering the bar, but that would be too easy, it would in fact just be lowering the bar for sarcasm.


He said, “Testing data has helped teachers tailor instruction. ... That’s why the act is called the No Child Left Behind Act. It doesn’t say ‘all children shouldn’t be left behind,’ it says, ‘no child.’” You just blew my mind.

He praised the school he was in for achieving the supreme pinnacle of success, an applause line during a presidential photo-op: “I appreciate so very much that this school has met state standards for progress under No Child Left Behind every year since 2002. Isn’t that interesting? (Applause.) Isn’t it interesting to be able to say that? You can’t say something that draws applause unless you measure.” Oh sure you can. Try this one: “Ice cream for everyone!”

Dick!

Dick Cheney spoke to the 34th annual Conservative Political Action Conference this evening. He didn’t say anything interesting, so I don’t have anything interesting to say about what he said, and running these amusing pictures of the Dickster (one of them taken by a clearly bored Reuters photographer trying to make him look like he’s wearing a huge American flag skirt) feels a little bit like skipping the vegetables and going straight to the dessert. Well all right, but just this once.

Reminding people that the federal government still knows you exist

As mentioned in my last post, Bush visited Katrina-hit regions today. “And so I’ve come back to New Orleans, Louisiana, to remind people that the federal government still knows you exist”. Knows, yes; cares, not so much. Bush held a photo op at Samuel J. Green Charter School as part of his campaign to exploit the destruction of New Orleans to push his agenda to privatize public schools. “I’m trying to lend my voice to herald this school,” he heralded. And he knows a lot about what makes a good school. “Those are the two things I was good at at school,” he said, “eating and playing.” Sure you were, George, sure you were.

AP caption to this picture: “President Bush, right, examines a plastic bottle terrarium as he visits a third grade class at the Samuel J. Green charter school in New Orleans, La., Thursday, March 1, 2007.” (Good thing they cleared up the confusion about whether President Bush was the middle-aged white guy or the little black boy.)

“No, Mr. President, it’s a ter-ra-ri-um. Try again.” “Tuhrrooriun.”

My most vivid recollection is the piles of rubble

Bush went to the areas hit by Hurricane Katrina today, six months after his last trip. “I intend to keep coming back so long as I’m the President,” he said, then threatened, “and perhaps after the presidency”. Yeah, after the presidency. Sure he will. Why are all the pictures I’m seeing of Bush with white people? Doesn’t Long Beach, Mississippi have black people? Here he is doing the all-important preliminary sleeve-rolling-up. Can’t tour the hurricane site for a photo-op with your sleeves unrolled.


He shared his own memories of the hurricane: “And I guess the -- my most vivid recollection is the piles of rubble”. “It was -- it’s hard to believe then that I would be -- I had faith that I’d be able to come to a home, but I had trouble visualizing.” I’m guessing from some of his words this morning that for him the key to visualization is heavy drinking: “And today, we are able to sit in a homeowner -- the word is ‘home.’ Again, one of the things I like to say is, when somebody walks in, ‘welcome to my home.’” He thinks he lives in Long Beach, Mississippi now. He must wonder what the 84-year old woman is doing in his home.

Bush: “Welcome to mah home.”

Her name, by the way, is Nellie Partridge, a name you really have to be 84 to have. 83 is too young to be a Nellie Partridge, and 85 is too old.

Bush: “Welcome to mah home.”

Bush: “Welcome to mah home.” “That’s a dumpster, Mr. President.”
Then it was on to New Orleans, where he met with local officials at Lil Dizzy’s Café. Bush, aka Big Dizzy, made this, um, promise: “And to the extent we can help, we’ll help.” He demonstrated his grasp of the complexities of the rebuilding process: “I guess the New Orleans Saints football team represents to me what’s happening in this part of the state -- a resurgence, there’s a renewal.”

Deceit and betrayal

Carlos Alvarez, formerly a psych professor at Florida International University, was sentenced to 5 years for “conspiracy to become an unregistered foreign agent” for Cuba. Not even becoming one, which would have doubled the sentence, just conspiracy to become one. He passed to the Cuban government various pieces of unclassified information and personal information on Cuban exile leaders. I’m not sure how this constitutes a crime (the prosecutor was allowed to say that the damage Alvarez may have done is unclear because we don’t know what else he told Havana, which was an attempt to get the court to convict for uncharged crimes for which there was no evidence).

But of course the trial was held in Miami, so Alvarez, and his wife, who was sentenced to 3 years merely for knowing what her husband was doing and not calling the FBI, were really tried and convicted for political crimes. The judge said their actions “undermined U.S. foreign policy.” So? He said they were “in a sense leading a double life,” and that they had committed a “deceit and betrayal” of the Cuban exile community. Which may not be very nice, but... so? Evidently US courts of law, at least in Florida, are now policing deceit and betrayal of the Cuban exile community.

But the idea that I’d go in and threaten someone is an invalid misreading of the way I do business

So on the day we learn that Walter Reed patients have been ordered not to speak to the press, Bush met with some “social entrepreneurs who have decided to help improve the lives of our servicemen and women and their families,” by, for example, entrepreneurially “helping the chaplains help kids, or... helping a family of the injured”. For example, the person in charge of the project giving families life-size cardboard “flat soldiers” was there. They told George some stories: “One of the most enjoyable things I do as the President is to hear stories of my fellow citizens -- stories of compassion, stories of care.” So glad he’s enjoying himself. So glad he thinks of amputees and brain-damaged soldiers as characters in stories. And supporting characters at that. “I’m proud to be the President of a country with so many decent citizens.” Once again, he seems to think that only Americans are decent.

Speaking of decent citizens, you’ll have heard of the background briefing held on Air Force Two by a Senior Administration Official whose name could not be used, who said, “I’ve seen some press reporting says, ‘Cheney went in to beat up on them, threaten them.’ That’s not the way I work. ... But the idea that I’d go in and threaten someone is an invalid misreading of the way I do business.”

The SAO reported on (or possibly gave a valid misreading of) his meeting with Karzai, who he said was “upbeat” because the US is going to give him lots of money and yet more troops. SAO made it abundantly clear that the sole basis of Karzai’s authority is American backing, and that it always has been: “He told a story to the group there about -- this was the immediate aftermath of 9/11 -- about meeting with a group of tribal elders in one of the remote parts of Afghanistan. He was trying to get them organized to participate in going after the Taliban and governing Afghanistan. And he said the only question they wanted to ask me was, is the United States with you.” SAO doesn’t even realize that there’s anything problematic about that.

The SAO warned that Karzai is a crashing bore: “You sit down and talk with Karzai, he’ll talk about the history of Pashtun rule in the region for 500 years. He can tell you what the Durand Treaty was all about between Afghanistan and India in 1889 or whenever it was, and why that’s important to today’s conflict and so forth.” Will this be on the test? No, sadly none of the reporters dared to follow this up by asking the SAO to explain what he – or she! – learned about what the Durand Treaty (of 1893) was all about and why it’s important to today’s conflict and so forth.

Bienvenidos a mi amigo

This morning Bush met with Tony Saca, a minor character on The Sopranos the president of El Salvador. “We spent a lot of time talking together, because I value the advice of the President,” George said, which leads me to wonder how much time ADD Boy considers to be a lot of time, given that he made this comment at 9:51 a.m. I also wonder how much of that time Bush was exercising his linguistic skills. He began their photo-op, “Bienvenidos a mi amigo, Presidente de nuestro amigo de El Salvador. Gracias.”

Bush “expressed my concerns and our condolences about the three gentlemen who were recently assassinated”. Four, actually, but I guess the driver wasn’t a “gentleman,” unlike the son of the guy who ordered an archbishop murdered.

Later in the day he met with the Miami Heat. That’s a basketball team, evidently. At one point he said, “I want to say something to the spouses of the players. Welcome. You’ve got a tough life in many ways with your spouse on the road all the time, and you deserve as much of this championship as they do.” He said “spouse” rather than wives, although I’m guessing they were all wives, because he’s used to saying the exact same thing about spouses of military personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan.


His basketball skills are on a par with his Spanish-language skills. At 11 minutes into this video he attempts to dribble a basketball.


In between those events, there was some dreary swearing-in ceremony he had to sit through. So bored. So bored.




Although at the end a thought seems to have perked him up a bit, possibly, “Ah bet Condi’ll be real impressed if ah show her mah mad hoopball skills at that photo-op with Big Shaq. Ah call him Big Shaq.”

Question authority

The International Court of Justice rules that while genocide did take place in Bosnia (although only the once, in Srebrenica), Serbia is not guilty of genocide. The butler did it. Or possibly Norway. It’s always the quiet ones.

Dick Cheney says the bomb at Bagram Air Base sounded like a “loud boom.” A reporter asked him if the “ludicrous” act was a “self-serving symbolic statement” (which left several ludicrous symbolic corpses). Cheney agreed: “I think they clearly try to find ways to question the authority of the central government. Striking at Bagram with a suicide bomber, I suppose, is one way to do that.”


So the loud boom was a question, sort of like “BOOOOOMMM?”

They text-messaged each other to make sure they didn’t all show up wearing the same outfit.

I like to say we’re in an ideological war that’s going to last a while

The National Governor’s Association, which is the union the governors belong to, or something, is meeting in Washington, so I guess they have to put up with George Bush crashing their party, and laugh at his jokes, no matter how lame: “And we welcome the governors and the spouses. We welcome governors without their spouses. (Laughter.)”

Bush was on his very best behaviour. He didn’t throw his own feces, and even remembered to say ic: “I’ve had some good meetings with the Democrat -- Democratic leadership.”

He wishes he didn’t have to work with the states, or something: “I think about making sure that Homeland Security and our states work closely together. I wish that wasn’t the way it was. But it is.” Or was.

He told the governors about all the shit he likes: “I like to say we’re in an ideological war that’s going to last a while.” “I like to remind people that if we leave Iraq before the job is done, the enemy will follow us here.” “The thing I like most about the law [No Child Left Behind] is that when we find a youngster who is struggling with reading, that we provide extra help to make sure he or she gets up to speed early, before it’s too late.”

That’s the second time I’ve heard him use that “before it’s too late” line recently , which not only suggests that some children will be left behind, because it’s “too late” for them, but is an insult to everyone in an adult literacy program, or indeed anyone who continues to educate themselves throughout their lifetime. But then your understanding of learning must be pretty impoverished if you think it can be reduced to a number: “I don’t see how you can fix a problem unless you measure the problem.”

Not that even he can’t occasionally learn a new word: “Another exciting technological breakthrough is going to come with cellulosic ethanol. It’s a long, fancy word for making gasoline -- or making ethanol out of product other than sugar and corn, like switchgrass or wood chips.” Actually, it’s two words, but thanks for playing.

Caption contest:

We are only left with the suicide bombs and car bombs

Ahmadinejad says Iran’s nuclear program is like a train without brakes or a reverse gear. And the dining car is out of spoons.

Smintheus on the disappearance on the White House website of links to old interviews by top officials, including many of the embarrassing ones – they’ll greet us as liberators, last throes, that sort of thing. This reminded me that several years ago I linked to this article, about the site’s attempt to keep search engine robots from cataloguing pages on certain subjects. For some reason, the Bushies don’t want us to be able to look up what they said in the past.

Holy War Joe Lieberman has an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal in which he warns against “parliamentary trench warfare.” He says, “I understand the frustration, anger and exhaustion so many Americans feel about Iraq, the desire to throw up.”

Oh, sorry, “the desire to throw up our hands and simply say, ‘Enough.’”

His solution is for everyone in Congress to shut up for six months. “Gen. Petraeus says he will be able to see whether progress is occurring by the end of the summer, so let us declare a truce in the Washington political war over Iraq until then.” Finally, Joe Lieberman has found a form of “war” that doesn’t make him as giddy as an inordinately giddy schoolgirl.

(Update: Glenn Greenwald has also read Lieberman, and lobs dozens of whizzbangs into his trench with great force and precision.)

A WaPo story on Operation Imposing Law said of the security stations that are supposed to be built in Baghdad: “Lt. Col. Christopher C. Garver, a U.S. military spokesman, said that although part of the stations’ function is to encourage Iraqis to visit, their locations would not be disclosed because of concern within the Iraqi government that such information would facilitate attacks.”

The story does, however, quote one Baghdadhoovian who sees improvement: “Thank God now the mass abductions and the militias seem to be slowing down, and we are only left with the suicide bombs and car bombs.”

This one is getting intriguing: Eduardo D’Aubuisson, son of evil 1980s death squad leader and evil politician Roberto D’Aubuisson, was killed last week along with two other Salvadoran politicians and their driver in Guatemala (driving to the Central American Parliament, which the three men were members of) and the bodies set on fire. The head of the Guatemalan national police’s organized crime unit and three of his subordinates were arrested for it and within a couple of days mysteriously killed during a prison riot – shot in their cells.

The worst micromanagement of military affairs

Sunday morning Condi Rice was interviewed on ABC and Fox.

The theme of today’s Condi-pics, by the way, is hands.


Chris Wallace asked, twice, if the US can “live with” (i.e., refrain from overthrowing militarily) the government of Iran if they “clean up their act.” She evaded the question twice, as Iran will surely have noticed.

She also wouldn’t say if Bush would veto a bill restricting him in Iraq because she “can’t imagine a circumstance” in which Congress would do so. She said it would be “the worst micromanagement of military affairs” (has she forgotten Donald Rumsfeld already?) to interfere with the “clean relationship” (don’t ask, don’t tell) “between the commander-in-chief and the commanders in the field.” She said such disruption of the chain of command “always served us badly in the past.” She wasn’t asked to what she was referring.


She played up Al Qaida’s supposed role in Iraq in a way that bolsters the theory that the Bushies are going to claim, if Congress does do the thing Condi can’t imagine, that military operations in Iraq are covered not by the 2002 authorization of force in Iraq but by the 2001 one against terrorism in general. She asked, “how do you possibly distinguish what is going on in Baghdad, for instance, from the fight for al-Qaida -- with al-Qaida? We have to remember that some of these car bombs may indeed be the work of an organization like al-Qaida or al-Qaida affiliated allies.” Also, “how can you separate, again, what is going on in places like Anbar from what is going on in Baghdad?” Also, since Al Qaida supposedly started all this with the Samara mosque bombing, “how do you separate al-Qaida’s having helped to spike this sectarian violence from stopping this sectarian violence?” The scary thing is that she thinks this sort of thing is a logical argument in support of her position.

Here’s another one: asked if the change in the nature of the war in Iraq since the 2002 authorization of force doesn’t justify rewriting it, she said: “it would be like saying that after Adolf Hitler was overthrown, we needed to change then the resolution that allowed the United States to do that so that we could deal with creating a stable environment in Europe after he was overthrown.” Isn’t that a convincing analogy?


She says of Maliki, “The Prime Minister has been tireless in going out and promoting the Baghdad security plan.” Not going out in Baghdad of course, that would be crazy.

She also praises the “excellent cooperation” of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia against Al Qaida: “More al-Qaida have been caught in Pakistan and in Saudi Arabia than any other place in the world. And so they are working very hard with us.” Of course, more Al Qaida have also not been caught in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia than any other place in the world.



(Update: and you know what no one asked her about in either interview? Her trip to the Middle East. That’s how significant it was.)

Identical cousins?

From the London Sunday Times: So in May 2006 the Israelis blew up a car carrying a Palestinian family that was in the wrong place at the wrong time, killing the mother, grandmother, uncle and young son, and turning Marya Aman, now 5, into a quadriplegic. There is no medical facility capable of treating her back in Gaza, so she’s stuck in a hospital in Jerusalem, as is her father, who can’t leave the hospital grounds for fear he’ll be deported back to Gaza. This means they can’t see the remaining members of the family, including Marya’s 3-year old brother, also injured in the blast. She will need medical care for the rest of her life and of course the Israeli government is refusing to kick in.

Gosh, there’s nothing much going on that I feel like writing about, so let’s balance that out with some pictures. Cheney in Australia:


They dress alike, they walk alike,
At times they even talk alike.
You could lose your mind.
When cousins are two of a kind.

Capitol Hillary:


That’s almost as disturbing as the Marya Aman story.

A temporary feeling of goodness

Sgt Paul Cortez of the 101st Airborne got 101 100 years for participating in the Mahmudiya massacre, gang-rape, and barbeque. Where one of his accomplices at his own trial explained his actions with the words, “I hated Iraqis,” Cortez said “I still don’t have an answer. I don’t know why.” We’ll check back in 100 years.

Plan your next vacation now: the Guardian visits the Welsh National Wool Museum.

Army chief of staff Peter Schoomaker, who used to run the operation to capture Osama bin Laden, says that it isn’t really that important to capture Osama bin Laden, now that he thinks about it. “I don’t know that it’s all that important, frankly,” he said, and if we did succeed, “then what? There’s a temporary feeling of goodness, but in the long run, we may make him bigger than he is today.” That’s exactly how I feel about Scarlett Johansson not answering any of my letters and emails and invitations to join me in a trip to the Welsh National Wool Museum, and getting that restraining order. I mean, now that I think about it, I don’t know that she’s all that hot, frankly. And if I did succeed, then what? There’s a temporary... okay, I’ll stop there.

Because nothing says democracy like a good old-fashioned rally

The BBC provides an inaccurate but amusing headline today: “Afghan Warlords in Amnesty Rally.” 25,000 “warlords” held a demonstration in favor of the law granting total immunity against war-crime prosecution for mujahedeen, Taliban, etc etc. It has passed both houses of the Afghan parliament, so the demo is to pressure Karzai to sign. Appropriately enough, it was held in Kabul’s Ghazi football stadium, the site of so many public executions. If the United States government has any opinion on the bill, it sure isn’t trumpeting it.



Yes, “police” is in English.

What stirring slogans would be chanted at such a rally? Okay, most of them began “Death to...”, but perhaps we in the WIIIAIosphere can do better. CONTEST: complete the following: “Hey hey, ho ho, ____”

Today (or, with the time difference, yesterday or possibly next week) Dick Cheney was in Australia, which used to be Britain’s Guantanamo Bay. He said, “When Americans think of Australia, we think of a place with a pioneering spirit much like our own.” No we don’t, we think of kangaroos. “We think of a country that shares our founding commitments to liberty and to equality, and to our traditions of justice and tolerance.” Nope, kangaroos. “We think, above all, of the character of the Australian people -- self-reliant, practical, and good-hearted.” Kangaroos. That’s it.

Speaking of rallies for warlords...

Immensely proud

The “intelligence” that US spy agencies have provided the IAEA about the Iranian nuclear program has largely turned out to be wrong.

I know, stunning, isn’t it?

For entertainment, listen to BBC interviewer John Humphrys repeatedly demand that Tony Blair apologize to the Iraqis for fucking up their country.

SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT

Blair does not apologize.

Indeed, he is “immensely proud.”

He came close to demanding that the Iraqis apologize to him for fucking up his vision of the Ruritanian paradise he planned for them. Mostly, though, he insisted that the chaos and violence had nothing to do with a failure on the part of the invaders to plan for the security of the Iraqi people, but rather its is entirely the fault of terrorists who are simply using the invasion of Iraq as an excuse, instead of, as would have been only fit and proper, thanking us for our magnanimous actions in liberating them.

Feel the warmth

In Tokyo, Cheney met, in what the White House website calls “a greeting,” with the parents of a girl who was kidnapped in Japan by the North Koreans in 1977, when she was 13. Below is that greeting, in its entirety. Notice how Cheney connects with the Yokotas on a deep personal level, as fellow parents and fellow human beings:

MRS. YOKOTA: (As interpreted) Thank you for taking time to visit with (inaudible).

THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, this is a very important issue. I know it means a great deal to the Japanese people. The Prime Minister discussed it with me last night in our meeting. And I know you had an opportunity to meet with President Bush, I guess, last year.

Clintonesque, really.

Sincere

One problem Hillary Clinton has with refusing to say that her Iraq war vote was wrong is that it implies she thinks it was right. Since it clearly wasn’t that, she needs some other adjective. Today she chose one: she wasn’t wrong, she was... wait for it... sincere. “My vote was a sincere vote based on the facts and assurances that I had at the time.” As the patron saint of this blog said, once you can fake sincerity, you’ve got it made. Hillary, of course, does not have it made.

She also said “I have taken responsibility for my vote.” Isn’t that nice of her? Like if she hadn’t gone out of her way to take responsibility, whatever that means, she wouldn’t actually be responsible for her vote.

Speaking of responsibility, and indeed speaking of faking sincerity, Tony Blair has no doubt that his decision to join the invasion of Iraq had nothing to do with any subsequent difficulties in that country: “The reason it is tough in Iraq and is difficult is because terrorists are making it difficult. ... We did not cause the terrorism, the terrorists caused the terrorism,” adding, “We will beat them when we realise it’s not our fault that they’re doing this. ... We will win if we don’t apologise for our values.” Yes, but do you take responsibility for your values?

Actually, I’m a little unclear on how not apologizing is relating to the capacity to win a military engagement.

Although the British will be pulling some troops out of Basra, they will be deploying Prince Harry to Iraq. And the Japanese are deploying Prince Pickles. A Defense Agency official explains: “Prince Pickles is our image character because he’s very endearing, which is what Japan’s military stands for.” Among other things.