What makes the current president or any politico in the West or anywhere, think he or she can "fix" an intertribal mess in Iraq (or anywhere, really) that has lasted seven centuries-plus? Sticking around a few years is only going to exacerbate festering old wounds. So I assume the GOP's putative candidate would actually have us "staying the curse" for eight hundred years, to prove a point. Looks like Dubya arrived at a cockfight without any corn.

US demand for petroleum is absolutely inelastic. If prices at the pump were to reach $100 per gallon we'd see people shooting each other over it, but driving would not abate. Hooked is just that, hooked. But telling Joe Six-Pack that gas prices could go DOWN, even a little, is a lot like telling him those dirty illegal aliens are taking his job (never mind the wholesale export of jobs to India)! It gets the old sound-bite knee-jerk blood pressure reaction. And it gets Republicans elected! But hold on; just how would we pay to maintain the nation's roads, which are vital to the economy? After all, "if you've got it, a truck brought it." Or so the Teamster's Union bumper sticker said. Since Sen. McCain has no good looks with which to keep up the highways, perhaps this alone tells us who his running mate will be. Hint: he last held office in Taxachusetts.

John McCain was flattened in the 2000 campaign, in South Carolina. The Bushies gave it to him, shock and awe and all the rest. He apparently wishes to show us he isn't vindictive, that he does not have a volcanic temper, that he can forgive and forget. How to fit this with Iraq, where the Arizonan apparently thinks we can fix what more than 800 years have failed to change in what we call the nation of Iraq. Oh, no; does that mean we must stay for 800 more years? Maybe McCain also cannot add.

Wow. Ask Levey if he was also consulted regarding control of Israel's nukes. After all, if you keep half the bomb over here on this side of the hangar, and the rest over there on that side, each is just equipment (some of it slightly radioactive); there is no weapon! Perhaps policy on use of these -- er, pieces of equipment is made in much the same way as the voting described in his piece, from his book. Ouch.

What working class? At least some of it is still working, for now. I have been increasingly disturbed over the lack of advocacy or specific program / policy positions and recommendations from Mrs. Clinton. I infer that she does not wish to become President to . . . She just wants to become President. Beat Crocker Jarmon, then we'll see. Fuggettabouddit! Just because her husband showed the ability to out-Republican the Republicans (and so survive), does not mean she learned anything in the White House ladies' room. Experience, my foot. Okay, leaders are made, not born. I think. But perhaps she wants the office just to get back at or one-up Bubba. Stranger things could be. Just where is Monica when we really need her?

Does everyone remember hot food served by gracious, poised, even stylish flight attendants (male and female), with complimentary drinks (other than club soda)? I remember air liners with empty seats, for God's sake, back when deregulation was just a gleam in some Republican's eye. Now, of course, air lines think they cannot charge the flying "public" what their service is worth. Of course, all the carriers want to go to the same places at the same times (NOT meal times; see "deregulation," above). But there is still one air line seat with some of the old panache, though the aircraft is still crowded: on Lufthansa you get real food and free beer / wine. Oh, it's not free, and the fare is higher than most. But the service is superb, and on the ground you are treated like something more than ballast. This air line even cleans its bathrooms! Don't I wish this outfit flew to L. A. from Denver!!

This just reinforces the sense that excess has become our most common product in the USA. Everyone reading this should immediately read Jared Diamond's book "Collapse." Ever notice how as you get closer to being out of toothpaste, you have to squeeze the tube harder? To afford the lifestyle portrayed in the article, how many people must be laid off by those who move in and pull up the drawbridge? Why does this not lead to huge protests, sit-ins, etc.? Answer: there aren't many people out that way, and besides, not much of that kind of thing happens in Montana. Did all the idealism of youth and righteous outrage of the boomers get squeezed out by cell phones, I-Pods, SUV's, and the pursuit of "happiness?" Where I live most would tell you that the only way to be happy is to be spending money. Now that tells one a great deal. How do you spell "co-opted?" It's the great divide, all right. I wonder if the guys and gals we send to Iraq (get to) read this stuff. They need to know what they are REALLY fighting and dying for. And it ain't FDR's America!

I'll tell you when: 260 days.