While your 3 points for victory through obliteration are right on, they're also obvious. So clearly, the goal was something else - Eternal Victory - & it was been gloriously achieved! How can we expect to teach the Terrists a lesson if we just win & leave? No! That we can still be blasting away with armor & airstrikes 5 years after Mission Accomplished is the true glory, the unending lesson!

I've never seen a blog with the smarm level of NBCs. The chance that that gang of self satisfied rich white male dimwits will change their stripes is about 0.

Sorry, no real content. I just want to repeat Smug Dimwits until it sticks to NBC News.

If BW reads the responses, it would explain his contempt for his fans. The first 10 or so fanboys were downright skeery.

NBC has taken down the forums they used to have for their primetime shows. I had a pretty good time dumping on The Apprentice, & GEs general inability to operate a functional message board.

Two weeks ago I'd never heard of Megan McArdle. Since then, she's managed to utterly misunderstand Iraqi casualty studies

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200804/war-statistics

post the single stupidest post on foreclosures evah:

http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/03/broken_dreams.php

and now this....

I see the NY Times Editorial page in her near future!

They're a subsidiary of a cable company that carries internet traffic. For all we know, the amnesty CNN is plugging could be their own.

Why would Morrisey care if Kucinich is in the debate?

A bedrock principle of "Conservatism" is that nobody, particularly not a mere state judge, should tell GE what they can and can't do. (They're much more consistent in this than in anything they advertise as a Principle) All the legal issues are irrelevant if the judge has committed mortal hubris by taking the case.

If being kept alive is a basic right, isn't he endorsing free universal health care?

Shouldn't somebody at least ask him?

I have no idea what this phrase means. It seems to suggest that Bush doesn't either, but Glenn is usually pretty careful. Is it like the elastic bonds of truthiness?

Remember Steve DeBerg?

He started out in SF until Montana came along. Then he kept Denver warm until Elway. On to Tampa, until Testaverde was ready. After that, KC tried him for a few years. They finally had to dump him & bring in Dave Krieg.

Bledsoe is better off sleeping peacefully on the Dallas bench than ending up like DeBerg, wandering through 3 more teams before hanging it up.

& you'll never have a better excuse to write it -

History repeats itself as farce.

I don't know if you missed it, but the Post foolishly let their national political reporter talk to the public again.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/discussion/2007/09/02/DI2007090200704.html?hpid=topnews

It got ugly, when a couple of her idiocies got follow up.

Shailagh Murray: Yes, we are all in awe of Karen. Such a fine journalist.

As to the Democrats and this war debate, I expect we are entering the murkiest phase yet. Yes, the Democrats are scaling back their ambitions. But the dynamic in Iraq has changed since the spring, and it is so hard to score these issues in the black and white way that many people would like. I expect that many of you in the anti-war community will be very disappointed a month from now.

led to:

How has Iraq changed?: You write "the dynamic in Iraq has changed since the spring." According to the reporting in your newspaper, the only dynamic that has changed is the political one in Washington. What's actually changed in Iraq? Is the civil war over? Is the government functioning? What?

Shailagh Murray: Well, this is the problem. The tribal dynamic, for instance, is something new that I think a lot of people didn't anticipate. It wasn't part of the model, but it may be a promising development that could lead to more stability from the ground up. I'm not arguing anything here! Just conveying what I'm hearing from politicians, which is that the pieces have moved around on the chess board. I would bet a surprising number lawmakers study these reports closely and listen to the testimony. I don't think many members of Congress think there are many sure answers at this point.

Mine is a happy, friendly guy in a bunny suit that keeps me from turning into an angry hermit.

A couple pages back, RE Schumer, Jesse said:

IOW, as long as they (Dems) are confident the nominee will put the rule of law above political considerations, the Dems won't obstruct the confirmation. If they don't have that confidence, all bets are off and the fight's on. Isn't that all we can ask of them?

No, we can ask for concrete acts & preconditions as evidence of good faith. Enforcing contempt citations, appointing a special prosceutor, & completing several internal investigations suggest themselves as obvious choices

There's a real chance of war with Iran - but surely not 100%.

One way of estimating the chance would be to subtract the current price of oil - $73 - from 100 & get 27%. Another would be to throw a dart. I don't know which is better.

My main point is to remember that we went through all this a year ago with the nuclear panic & carrier groups, & nothing happened. The current causus bellicosity is even less real. The accusations of Iran acting in Iraq change from day to day, seldom make sense, & amount to nothing. Attacking Iran would be grounds to invoke the 25th Amendment for insanity & skip impeachment.