Our Little Southern Belle got the reputation for being a Big Anti-Torture campaigner because he was held prisoner and tortured by the North Vietnamese so that he would give false confessions of war crimes. This torture was successful, in that it produced the confessions sought. Since Princess McCain obviously knows what torture is and what it produces, he is justified in being opposed to it. But his actions indicate he isn't really opposed to torture as practical matter, only a moral one.

Those false confessions extracted under torture are very useful after all. And utility outweighs morality any darned day. Ask any of our trolls.

So. As far as McCain is concerned, torture away, as long as the official line is that We Do Not Torture. Those false confessions have such huge propaganda utility (just ask McCain's torturers). Keep on keeping on.

Simple.

McCain has been back to Vietnam many times, and on some of those visits he has got together with his captors and torturers and they have hugged and smiled and laughed and shaken one another's hands, much as McCain has embraced Bush and Rove and the others who did him so much dirt on the campaign trail when time was.

What's to fret? Business is business.

As Democrats get more and more deeply mired in parsing the moral character of their candidates -- how the hell did that happen? -- McCain just takes a practical approach.

And that's why he's probably going to be your next president.

-But the only reasonable understanding of her statement is not that we "could," but that we would. Everyone knows that we can obliterate any country. That's so well-known that nobody would ever point it out. The only reason to point out that we could is to say that we would.-

Of course you are correct, especially since the preceding line was (paraphrase) 'If Iran attacks Israel with nukes (which they don't yet have), we *will* attack Iran in retaliation', then goes on to indicate that Iran should make no mistake because 'we have the goodies on hand to obliterate y'all'.

Not much ambiguity at all in the larger context of her statement...

...but I've noticed in the comments here discussion of the possibility that Osama Bin Laden is dead, and has been for a while. I'm curious to know about the source of this notion. What's the best evidence for or against this?

That's awesome...nice catch...

But as the doomsday alarm grew shrill, few noticed that on this same day in Pennsylvania, 27 percent of Republican primary voters didn’t just tell pollsters they would defect from their party’s standard-bearer; they went to the polls, gas prices be damned, to vote against Mr. McCain. Though ignored by every channel I surfed, there actually was a G.O.P. primary on Tuesday, open only to registered Republicans. And while it was superfluous in determining that party’s nominee, 220,000 Pennsylvania Republicans (out of their total turnout of 807,000) were moved to cast ballots for Mike Huckabee or, more numerously, Ron Paul. That’s more voters than the margin (215,000) that separated Hillary Clinton and Mr. Obama.

"I suggest you buy a blender and some frozen peas and have a nice pea soup smoothie with bucky." -- lwm

I would suggest that little cowards like you stop taking shots were you think the other fellow will not see you. I also suggest you or Susie Sunshine tell us what Timberman did to fix our broken democracy yesterday; you know, write about actual things that happened rather than hurl insults at people.

(NYT)

But as the doomsday alarm grew shrill, few noticed that on this same day in Pennsylvania, 27 percent of Republican primary voters didn’t just tell pollsters they would defect from their party’s standard-bearer; they went to the polls, gas prices be damned, to vote against Mr. McCain.

We heard a lot several months ago about McCain's problems with the Republican base. Those stories have only gone into remission because so much attention has been paid to the Obama-Clinton death match, but the problem is still there and the scab can easily be ripped off.

What I also think is very important for Democrats to realize is that exacerbating the problems between McCain and the GOP base is better for the Democratic nominee (i.e., Obama) than allowing him to rebuild those relationships. If you look at the completely incongruous attacks made on John Kerry in 2004 - he's both a flip-flopper and a solid liberal, both a turncoat combat veteran and a weakling, etc. - you see that McCain can similarly be pitted against the Republican base and be portrayed as a radical with regard to torture, war, and so on. This is particularly true where the issues on which the base is provoked to dislike McCain are different from the issues on which he is portrayed as a right-wing radical - for instance, racist attack ads on the one hand, foreign and economic policy on the other.

The key is to overwhelm the McCain campaign with salvos of targeted attacks on character and policy. Even if they seem contradictory at times, the sum-total of the attacks, if each has individual force and substance, can severely harm the candidate and force him to spend valuable time, energy, and money fending them off.

This needs to be happening now, and with greater support from all quarters. Doing this also has the added benefit of pulling attention away from the "problems" and "division" of the Democratic Party to which the media loves to default.

...but I've noticed in the comments here discussion of the possibility that Osama Bin Laden is dead, and has been for a while. I'm curious to know about the source of this notion. What's the best evidence for or against this?

-- vercingetorix

He might as well be dead. He never calls me anymore. And after all we've been through, too.

-We heard a lot several months ago about McCain's problems with the Republican base. Those stories have only gone into remission because so much attention has been paid to the Obama-Clinton death match, but the problem is still there and the scab can easily be ripped off.-

Or peeled off slowly and salted.

Which is not torture.