Ready - Fire - Aim at a New Target!

The McClatchy newspapers are reporting the following:

"U.S. military planners have abandoned the idea that training Iraqi troops will enable U.S. troops to start coming home and now say American forces will have to defeat the insurgents and secure control of troubled provinces. Training Iraqi troops, which had been the cornerstone of the Bush administration's Iraq policy since 2005, has dropped in priority, officials in Baghdad and Washington said.

"Throughout 2006, General Casey and top Bush administration leaders touted the training as a success, asserting that eight of Iraq's 10 divisions had taken the lead in fighting insurgents. But U.S. forces complained that the Iraqi forces weren't getting support from their government and that Iraqi military commanders weren't always willing to embrace U.S. tactics. Some everyday Iraqis said they didn't trust the country's forces, saying they were sectarian and easily susceptible to corruption.

"Most troubling: Insurgents and militiamen had infiltrated the forces, using their power to carry out sectarian attacks. In nearly every area where Iraqi forces were given control, the security situation rapidly deteriorated. The exceptions were areas dominated largely by one sect and policed by that sect."

The full report can be read at:
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070422/NEWS07/704220606/1009

If correct, this report tells us that yet another Bush strategy in Iraq has failed and yet another new (or is it recycled?) strategy is being pursued. McClatchy is quoting Brig. Gen. Dana Pittard, commander of the Iraq Assistance Group in charge of supporting trained Iraqi forces, as saying, “Casey's mandate was transition. Gen. Petraeus' mandate is security."

Said another way, we are no longer pursuing a transition in responsibility for providing security in Iraq, from U.S. to Iraqi troops. There is no more presidential prattle about “When they stand up, we’ll stand down.” They’re standing down, so now we have to remain standing - for God knows how long. Literally - only God knows how and when this will end.

We’re on our own over there. We are the Iraqi military. We’ve become the Iraqi national police force. We are now charged with securing a country that is tearing itself apart in a bloody civil war. American troops are being asked to risk their lives, and to die, in order to resolve an Islamic sectarian battle that has been going on for well over a thousand years.

No one ever declared that to be our mission in Iraq. It’s not our mission.

At least we’ve avoided the definition of insanity that tells us it’s insane to keep doing the same thing and except different results. We keep expecting the same results while doing something different every few months. No, there’s nothing insane about that.

It’s time for every American who claims to “Support the Troops” to go before the pharaoh at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, DC, and demand that he “Let my people go!”

Progress Update

The month of April has closed out in Iraq. 103 U.S. troops died there in April, only the fifth time that the monthly death toll has exceeded 100 since the war began. 53% more Americans died in Iraq during the first four months of 2007 than died their in the first quarter of 2006.

103 dead young men and women is more than three times the number of Americans who died on the campus of Virginia Tech in April. I don't recall anyone showing us pictures of the dead troops on the nightly news or on the front pages of newspapers outside their home towns. No one ordered the flags to be flown at half-staff for them. For some reason, we pay more attention to dead victims than dead heroes.

Isn't 3,350 dead American troops enough? If not, how many will be enough? If it's enough, why will the next one die? Sadly, the next one has probably already died; it just hasn't been announced yet.

The beat goes on. Why?

George Bush intends to keep us in Iraq through the remainder of his presidency. What will the toll be a year from now? What will it be 21 months from now when he's back to being just the Brush Cutter-in-Chief in Crawford, Texas?

Pass the Cake, Sîl Vous Plaît

Marie Antoinette is offering that damned cake, again. You’d think she would’ve learned her lesson on that score. Last time she invited us over for tea and cake she sniveled about the media only showing us the “one bad bombing each day”, rather than showing all the good things that are happening in Iraq (as noted in the “Progress” posting earlier today).

This last week she set out another plate of petit fours and sniffed that “No one suffers more than their president and I do when we watch this” in Iraq. Really, Marie; are you serious; or are you just scratching that itch on your neck, again?

Madame First Lady, dare I suggest that there are millions of people in Iraq and in the U.S. and other Coalition countries who feel a hell of a lot worse about the events in Iraq than you and our president do? Take the following for instance:

§ The families and close friends of every dead U.S. and Coalition soldier. That alone puts us into five figures of people ahead of your suffering level.

§ The 25,000 wounded U.S. troops, some of whom have had to suffer through substandard treatment at Walter Reed Hospital and elsewhere, and the families and close friends who tend to their often devastating wounds. That puts us into six figures of people ahead of the First Couple in the feeling-really-bad line.

§ The families and close friends of the 70,000 to 100,000 Iraqis who have died since your family and close friends ordered the invasion of Iraq to look for WMDs and state-sponsored al Qaeda cells that didn’t exist. If that doesn’t put seven figures of sufferers ahead of you East Wing dwellers, then the next one will.

§ The two million Iraqis who have been displaced from their homes over the last four years of war and destruction. Many of those homes have been destroyed; many of them will be uninhabitable for years to come, if ever again. After all, not too many Sunni families are looking forward to returning to their largely Shia neighborhoods, and vice versa.

But, I’ll give you this, Marie – you’re an improvement on the last generation in the palace. Literally a couple of hours before your husband announced that the invasion of Iraq was underway in March 2003, the Queen Mother in the Bush monarchy, matriarch Barbara, told Diane Sawyer in a Houston interview:

"But why should we hear about body bags, and deaths, and how many, what day it's gonna happen, and how many this or what do you suppose? Or, I mean, it's, it's not relevant. So, why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?"

Now, that’s the epitome of not feeling anything at all. That mind is not so much beautiful as it is untroubled. If fact, it’s so untroubled that it’s deeply troubling to get a glimpse into it. A mind is a terrible thing to waste, especially in a monarchy.

Great Job, AG!

After Attorney General Alberto Gonzales completed his recent testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, the president announced that the testimony increased his confidence in the AG. That produced an audible gasp around Congress and the rest of the nation. Even diehard Republicans thought the AG’s performance was abysmal and more than a few said so publicly.

When the White House deputy press secretary was asked if the president watched or listened to the testimony, she said, “No, he didn’t.” Ah, ha! That explains the president’s increased confidence level. The AG’s testimony is most impressive when it hasn’t been watched or heard.

After all, if the AG kept his job after that performance then the rest of us have to have increased confidence in him as well – because the guy’s invincible. He yanked a grenade off his belt, pulled the pin, threw the pin at the committee, dropped the grenade between his legs, and then fell on it just as it exploded – and then he stood up, walked away and returned to his office with the full support of The Decider-in-Chief.

That, my fellow Americans, is an amazing feat.

This is the same man who cancelled two weeks of appointments so that he could be adequately prepared to say, “I don’t remember” an astounding 74 times in one day of testimony – 45 times by halftime. He wasn’t certain in which month he fired a wad of U.S. Attorneys; he certainly couldn’t remember which week much less which day. Heck, who can recall things like that after a four-month eternity?

Frankly, I can’t believe the AG fires a wad all that often, so you’d think he could recall the shot. You’d also think that when the AG acts as a one-man firing squad that it would have been entered on his calendar and that sometime in the two weeks of preparation he might have gone over that calendar to refresh his recollection. But then I’ve never helped anyone in the Bush administration prepare for testifying under oath, so what do I know.

At least we can take comfort in one thing. After that grenade exploded, it’s doubtful that this AG will ever again fire a wad, and that may be reason enough to keep him in his office for the next 20 months. He may be too wounded to hurt anybody else.

Progress

Twice in the last two weeks the Pentagon has announced the death of nine U.S. soldiers and Marines at one time. Twice in the last two weeks there have been horrific suicide car bombings in the city of Karbala, one of which killed 171 Iraqis in one explosion.

The death rate for U.S. troops in the two months since “the surge” began is greater than in the two months before the surge began. The violence in Baghdad has simply relocated to cities just outside of Baghdad. The supposedly whacked mole has found new holes.

Oh, but wait. The surge isn’t in full surge yet. That will take another two months. Originally, the Bush administration said that we would know if the surge was working by July. Two days ago, they said we would know in September. I’ll tell you when we’ll get a definitive answer – the day after the next presidential inauguration in January 2009.

The U.S. began constructing an Iraqi “Three-Mile Island” of sorts – a three-mile wall in Baghdad that is supposed to separate some Sunnis from some Shia. The Iraqi government called the idea ridiculous and unacceptable and ordered that the construction be stopped. Apparently, U.S. and Iraqi leaders aren’t discussing things like this in advance.

The US Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction recently inspected eight of the major reconstruction projects that the administration has touted as “clear successes” in the effort to rebuild the shattered Iraqi infrastructure. The IG found that seven of the eight projects are no longer operating, including most of the electrical generators at Baghdad International Airport. At a maternity hospital in Erbil, the “new” medical waste incinerator and water purification system are not functioning. The incinerator is padlocked and no one could even find the keys. The IG wanted to inspect several other facilities, but the areas where they’re located are too unsafe for the inspectors to enter. Any bets on the functionality of the reconstruction projects in those areas?

Six members of the Iraqi cabinet resigned as directed by Muqtada al Sadr, the Shiite cleric who is probably the most powerful person in or around Baghdad, if not in all of Iraq. Al Sadr is angry that the Iraqi government hasn't insisted on a timeline for American withdrawal. The Bush administration labeled this a good thing, claiming that it gives the Shia dominated government the opportunity to bring in more Sunnis. Yeah, right. If you believe that you’ll never own your own home.

All this, according to the president, is progress in Iraq and evidence that his plan is working. God forbid that we should ever experience what the president regards as a lack of progress or what he concludes is a failed plan.

Tired

HOTS is tired. There are too many things to talk about, rant about, and muse about. There are too many daily atrocities in the world and our country; there’s too much political and religion arrogance and ignorance begging to be countered; there are too many sensual reflections mixed into each day.

All of these things are experienced subjectively, passing through the myriad of fears, filters, biases, judgments, opinions and conceptual views that inhabit my mind. My perspective is mine and mine alone and it provides a world/life view that no one else can see. It’s a fool’s game to hope or expect that anyone else will share it to any significant degree because everyone else’s mind is inhabited with their fears, filters, biases, judgments, opinions and concepts.

The end result is that a million people inhabit a million different worlds, each of which gives the appearance of being real and none of which are, in fact, real. They are nothing more or less than our one-of-a-kind view; a view that would be better labeled a dream. We long, at some level, to wake up.

If we were to awaken and to become genuinely aware, we would realize that objective reality and absolute truth are “out there”. But, in our walking dream world, reality and truth remain buried under layer upon layer of fears, filters, biases, judgments, opinions and concepts. Each of us is being held captive by and in our own heads. We long, at some level, to be free of those shackles. We wait for our Moses to confront the Pharaoh in our head and demand that s/he “Let my people go!”

At the same time we seem to sense that there’s a long journey through an uncertain and seemingly empty wilderness that awaits us if we’re freed. That wilderness appears uncertain and empty because it isn’t filled with our obsessive, compulsive thinking. After all, we regard being “thoughtless” as a pejorative. Who in their right mind would want to be thoughtless? Ah, if only we were in our right mind. The rightness of our mind is just another illusion we cling to like the handrail between us and the Grand Canyon.

Janis Joplin sang, “Freedom’s just another word for nothing else to lose.” Indeed. Freedom comes in losing all the fears, filters, biases, judgments, opinions and concepts that are scattered like roadside litter along the pathways of our mind.

Sometimes I grow weary of exposing my litter just as I grow weary of seeing the litter tossed out and about by my fellow travelers. Like I said, HOTS is tired.

But, HOTS is also a pressure relief valve and on any given pressure-filled day it serves a worthy purpose as it vents the steam and occasionally the magma that builds as I watch, listen to and absorb the collective illness and insanity exhibited each day by the other captives around me. I’m sure that many of them feel the same way about the illness and insanity that I contribute to the roadside mess around them.

So, what’s the point? HOTS is going to try a different tack – more but shorter entries. Pop the relief valve and move on. Post the reflection quickly and await the next one. There have only been one or two occasions in the last 15 months that I’ve posted more than one entry a day. That’s likely to change because there are too many things to talk about, rant about and muse about.

Put Me in Coach, I'm Ready to Play

Today marks the 60th anniversary of Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier in baseball. On April 15, 1947, he debuted with the Brooklyn Dodgers thanks to the courage and determination of not only Jackie Robinson but also Dodgers president, Branch Rickey. It’s hard to overstate the magnitude of that moment in American history.

Coming a year before the integration of the U. S. Armed Forces, seven years before Brown vs. The Board of Education, and 15 – 20 years before the height of the American civil rights movement, the impact of this simple act of inserting an African-American into a baseball lineup reverberated far beyond the baselines and dugouts of Ebbetts Field.

Surprisingly, there is a question about whether this monumental event continues to reverberate today. I believe it does – just not necessarily as expected.

The question arises because of the steady and precipitous decline in the number of African-Americans who are playing in the Major Leagues. In the 1970s, 27% of the big league players were black; in the 80s, 23%; in the 90s it fell to 19%. That was the period of steady decline. Since 2000, the decline has become precipitous, reaching a mere 8.4% in 2006.

There are indications that the number will go much lower. We have two large high school sports leagues, comprised of 14 high schools, in our city of well over 300,000 residents. While almost 9% of the students at those schools are African-American, only 4.2% of the varsity baseball players are black, with almost half of the black players attending one school. Eight of those schools, including the high school with the highest percentage of black students, 17.5%, have no African-American varsity players.

I won’t play amateur social scientist and pretend to have the answer to the question of why this drop has occurred. It could involve the availability of public baseball facilities and coaches; it could be simply a much greater interest in football and basketball; it could reflect the shifting focus in the homes of black students. I’m sure there are a number of factors, these and many others, that are at play.

But, my point is that the Jackie Robinson reverberation is still alive in America because those students have the opportunity to freely make the choice to walk into those high school and Major League dugouts and to cross the barriers that those baselines used to represent. If they’re choosing football and basketball, or other interests they want to pursue, so be it. Good for them.

If the absence of African-Americans on American baseball diamonds represents something other than a matter of personal choice, then there is need for further dialog with the social scientists, high school administrators and coaches, local government officials who fund recreational leagues and facilities, parents, and, most importantly, the young black athletes.

I hope these athletes are just choosing something that is more appealing and rewarding to them than baseball. I think that would still please Mr. Robinson.

Today I add my voice to saying, “Thank you, Jackie. May the memory and the impact of No. 42 remain alive and well in America. You may have played second base, but your contribution to our country was and is first class all the way.”

Play ball!

Thank God for a Grateful Gentleman

Last Saturday morning I was taking my daily walk through the neighborhood when I encountered a man walking toward me. As we met, he smiled and said, “Good morning,” and I replied, “Hello, how are you?” He responded, “Very good, thank you.” Had he stopped there it would have been a typical exchange of glancing pleasantries. But, he quickly added two words.

“Thank God.”

I smiled and instantaneously felt the warmth of his sincerity. “Amen” I thought to myself, too late to offer that as an acknowledgment of his simple expression of gratitude.

I believe this gentleman is Jewish. I’ve seen him in our neighborhood on other occasions walking around a home that has a lighted menorah in the front window every Friday evening. I often see him walking to and from that home on Saturday, the Jewish Shabbat. If you’ll pardon the reliance on a stereotypical description, he has a full beard and is always wearing a fedora. He looks Jewish. When he spoke I was reminded of certain vocal qualities that I heard many times in the homes of my Jewish friends growing up in Phoenix, where I attended a high school known as “Little Israel”. I became very fond of the mannerisms that I detected again last Saturday.

I was impressed that this man was not just able to immediately connect his sense of well being to his God but was also willing to express it to a complete stranger. I was even more impressed that the spontaneity and naturalness of his two-word addendum allowed me to enjoy it and be uplifted by it without feeling the slightest twinge of intrusion.

I would be better off if I followed this man’s example more often. I suspect that he may be more in touch with the grace that surrounds us every day than I am. I suspect that he may be more consistently grateful for that grace than I am.

It was a pleasant encounter on a beautiful morning – and I thank God for it. I hope to pass his way again tomorrow.

The Canary Died in an Empty Chair

It is with great regret that I must inform you of the death of the canary in the mine. It’s never good news when the canary in the mine dies. It signals serious trouble in the air.

It is with equal regret that I must inform you that the president is attempting to throw a party at the White House to honor a special guest, but he can’t get anyone to be the special guest.

These two events are connected – the canary and the empty chair for the guest of honor at the presidential party are one and the same.

The president is attempting to fill a new position in the White House. He wants to name a “war czar” who would report to the president and would direct the coordination of all military and civilian efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. This plenty potentate overseer would be empowered to give directions to the State and Defense Departments and other federal agencies.

Defense and State have a long history of misalignment on the direction of the war effort and the White House often has to arbitrate their disputes. Thus the need for a chief arbitrator who can tell both of them what to do. One might think that’s the president’s job, but he’s a busy man. There’s a lot of brush to cut in Crawford with all the winter rain there.

Being anointed the War Czar is one hell of a position – a real resume builder. It seems like a perfect fit for a retired military officer of the highest rank; perhaps a four-star general from the Army or Marine Corps. If only the White House could find a retired four-star who is willing to kiss his family and friends goodbye and walk the gangway onto a ship called the Titanic.

At least three retired four-star generals have told the White House, “Thanks, I’m deeply honored; but, no thanks. I’ve seen the movie and I know where that ship is going.” As they walked away from their job interviews they were heard to mumble, “Unsinkable, my ass. That thing is going down.”

Former four-star generals are nobody’s fool. They were listening when they heard one of their brethren, Gen. David Petraeus, the current commander in Iraq, say that the U.S. cannot win this war through military action. And they’ve been listening to the White House long enough to know that those folks don’t appear to be interested in winning the war through non-military action. You don’t have to be a four-star genius to be able to add those two prime numbers.

When interviewed by The Washington Post, retired Marine Gen. John J. "Jack" Sheehan said, "The very fundamental issue is, they don't know where the hell they're going." Sheehan, a former NATO commander, rejected the job, saying he believes that Vice President Cheney and his allies remain more powerful in the administration than the pragmatists who are trying to develop an exit strategy in Iraq. "So rather than go over there, develop an ulcer and eventually leave, I said, 'No, thanks,' " Sheehan said.

Retired Army Gen. Jack Keene and retired Air Force Gen. Joseph Ralston have also declined to rearrange the deck chairs. With the Army, Air Force and Marines having rejected the offer, we’ll now await the responses from the candidates in the Navy, Coast Guard and Merchant Marine. It’s quite a commentary when you can’t find a military leader who is willing to lead a two-front war. The air in that mine must be pretty deadly.

Just think of the glory that awaits the person who steps into this new position and leads us to a resounding victory. Tickertape parades down Madison Avenue, statues in the park, and Congressional and Presidential medals await such a leader. Books will be written; movies will be made; Pulitzers and Academy Awards will be won. Events of this nature put people in the history books for generations to follow.

Ah – there’s the problem. Whoever takes this position will end up in the history books for generations to follow – along with that canary. But, never fear, someone will almost certainly come in to the siren’s song and seize the moment offered by this powerful position. Someone almost always has a seizure of this nature. Almost always.

In the late 60s and early 70s, as Americans grew increasingly weary of another war that couldn’t be won with military action, it was popular to put a different spin on the old party quip and say, “What if they gave a war and nobody came.” How we dared to dream back then.

Well, it appears that the invitations to the most recent war party have been received and the RSVPs are now coming in – in the form of regrets. It’s possible that “regrets” will become the byword of this decade.

After all, when the canary dies it usually means that very regrettable events are likely to follow.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3 (or is it 4 or 5?)

Reports out of Washington indicate that Attorney General Alberto I-Never-Saw-A-Bush-Idea-I-Didn’t-Totally-Love-And-Consider-To-Be-Legal-Beyond-A-Shadow-Of-A-Doubt Gonzales is struggling in preparing to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee about having detonated an IED next to a mini-van filled with U.S. Attorneys. The attendant political and media circus will erect its tent and bring in the clowns a week from today.

We’re told that Mr. A.G. unexpectedly had to clear his calendar completely for the last three days and the next seven days because things aren’t going well the in the “tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth” department. Participants in the remaking project are indicating to the media that Mr. Gonzales is finding it difficult to make his practice answers consistent, complete, coherent and convincing. The “C” words these participants are using to describe the preparation are “contradictory” and “confusing”.

My question is: why? The subject of his testimony is pretty straightforward: what did he do; when did he do it; why did he do it; and who else was involved in the decision? These aren’t trick questions. Assuming his memory is somewhat better than his former chief of staff, Kyle Sampson, who offered up more than 120 “I don’t recall” responses during his senate testimony, Mr. A.G. doesn’t have to address anything other than his role in an event that only occurred a few months ago. Why does someone with his intelligence and experience have to undergo two solid weeks of preparation for this appearance?

My answer is: the truth in this case is a serious problem for the White House and the political pressure to spin the truth violently is creating inconsistent, incomplete, incoherent and unconvincing responses from a witness who is being called upon to protect the White House. If this was just about the AG and DOJ business, Mr. A.G. should be able to get through his testimony with minimal prep work.

Instead, he’s being called up to sweep the trail for the two remaining members of the domestic axis of evil, Dick Cheney and Karl Rove (the third axis member, Don Rumsfeld, having already bit the dust after face planting on the un-swept Baghdad trail). Mr. Gonzales should be very concerned about the sound of the chainsaw he undoubtedly hears in the background. Just as Scooter Libby and Kyle Sampson were expected to hang the White House garbage out on the distant end of a limb, Mr. Gonzales’ is now being sent up the same tree with the same mission.

His chief liaison with the White House, Monica Gooding, resigned preemptively and seized the beloved Fifth Amendment with a white-knuckled death grip. “You’ll get this testimony when you pry it from my cold, dead head!” she was heard to exclaim on the way out the door. That leaves no one other than Mr. A.G. to either twist in the wind under the limb he’s on or to watch that menacing chainsaw cut him down like the piece of White House firewood he’s likely to become.

There may be those who feel that Mr. A.G. should be prepped like any witness getting ready to testify. Of course, he isn’t just another witness – he’s the Attorney General of the United States and a former White House Counsel and member of the Texas Supreme Court. He doesn’t need to be trained in how to respond to the big bad attorneys who might ask him tricky questions designed to trap the unwashed, the unwary or the uninitiated. He needs two weeks of preparation so that he can be trained in how to respond to the big bad senators who might ask him hard questions designed to trap the untruthful.

Looney Tunes, I Tell Ya, Looney Tunes!

You gotta love politicians. You just do. They say and do things that you can’t make up – well, you can make ‘em up, but no one would believe ‘em. One of the traits that makes politicians most endearing is that these varmints will say whatever is necessary at the moment, no matter how untruthful or inconsistent it may be with what they’ve said or done before or what they’ll say or do later. The only thing that matters is that they survive the immediate challenge and live to shoot their mouth off another day.

On Tuesday, former Massachusetts governor, Mitt Romney, was speaking in New Hampshire, where gun totin’ and hunting are pretty popular – not Texas level popular, but enough that any self-respecting candidate who goes there feels obligated to give a tip-of-the-hat to shooting stuff. Sensing the challenge, Romney puffed up his chest and declared, "I purchased a gun when I was a young man. I've been a hunter pretty much all my life." Yep; pretty much, pardner.

The sun hadn’t gone down on the next day before his campaign had to acknowledge that he has been on two – count ‘em, two – hunting trips. The first one was when he bought that gun at age 15 and the second and last one was just last year. Pressed for the gory details about the trophy heads that might be mounted on this lifelong hunter’s wall, the campaign said Romney hunted rabbits in Idaho as a teenager and shot at least one quail with GOP donors at a game preserve in Georgia in 2006. Thus the image of Elmer Fudd, the biggest and baddest of all rabbit hunters, suddenly bursts upon the American political scene in the guise of a Massachusetts Mormon who is undoubtedly fond of saying, "Shhhhhhhh, be vewy vewy quiet; I'm hunting wabbits, heheheheheheh."

On Thursday, the Mittster donned his orange vest, reloaded his ammo belt, chambered another round, and took a second shot at describing his hunting experience. He said he has hunted “small game” since his youth. "I'm not a big-game hunter. I've made that very clear," he said, without making it very clear exactly when and where he’s made that very clear. "I've always been a rodent and rabbit hunter. Small varmints, if you will.”

Cue now the endearing image of Yosemite Sam, the biggest and baddest of all varmint hunters, thereby confirming that American politics is just another version of Looney Tunes! I wonder how many times Mitt drew down on a cottontail and exclaimed, “Say yer prayers, varmint! I'm a-gonna blow you to smithereens!” See, you can’t make this stuff up. If only Mel Blanc were alive to enjoy this.

“I began when I was 15 or so and I have hunted those kinds of varmints since then,” the governor continued. Sensing he was surrounded by skeptics at this point, he added, “More than two times."

We’ll assume that more than two means at least three, with no less than one Berkshires safari being focused separately on rabbit, quail and the always popular Mount Greylock rodents. I’ve never heard anyone include rodents on the “small game” list, but then I’ve never hunted in Massachusetts.

On Wednesday, Romney’s campaign spokesman said that Romney wasn't trying to mislead anyone on Tuesday.

To prove that point beyond a shadow of a doubt, the spokesman began to tout Romney's public support of gun-ownership rights. Just as real hunters might not regard rodents as small game, they might not regard Mitt’s history of supporting gun control as being the equivalent of supporting gun-ownership rights. But then I’ve never looked up the definition of those rights under Massachusetts law.

You see, when Romney ran for the Senate in 1994 (one of the few Rebs who wasn’t successful in that election), he backed the Brady law and a ban on assault rifles. As governor, he supported strict gun-control laws and signed into law one of the toughest assault weapons laws in the country.

On Friday, the Romney campaign spokesman made no statement about whether Romney was trying to mislead anyone on Thursday or whether the spokesman was trying to mislead anyone on Wednesday.

In fairness, it should be noted that Romney is a proud, card-carrying member of the National Rifle Association. In further fairness, it should be noted that he joined the NRA just last August. In the furthest of fairness, it should be noted that he joined last August as a "Lifetime" member – which now allows Mitt to claim that he’s been an NRA supporter even longer than he’s been a hunter. After all, his lifetime is certainly longer than just pretty much all his life.

Bang! Gotcha, you varmint!

That’s All, Folks!

Johnny, Johnny, We Hardly Know Thee

Senator John McCain’s wife, Cindy, once invited me into her bedroom. To those who are saying, “What!?” – I’m neither lying nor joking. I’m not ashamed to say that I’ve been there, done that, and enjoyed it. She was as beautiful and vivacious then as she is now. I dare say that very few men can lay claim to having had such an encounter.

I should add that Cindy McCain was Cindy Hensley at the time and she was about seven years old. Her uncle, Gene Hensley, was my uncle by marriage. So we were cousins-in-law or step-cousins or something like that. We lived within a few blocks of each other and went to the same elementary school and high school, albeit six years apart. Our families would visit each other from time to time.

Because I’m an Arizona native; because I was an officer and a gentlemen in the United States Navy; because I served at the Naval Academy with a number of former POWs (Bill Lawrence, Dick Stratton, Paul Galanti, Ned Shuman, Fred Purrington); and because I’ve shared hot chocolate with his wife, I have tried very hard to like John McCain and embrace his candidacy for the presidency. Unfortunately, he’s made that virtually impossible to do.

First, was the speaking engagement at Bob Jones University, a place so ultra-white and uber-conservative that it outlawed inter-racial dating until just a few years ago; then, the confessional love fest with Jerry Falwell and the resulting shift in positions on various social issues; and then came the breast-to-breast, mouth-to-ear hugging of President Bush on the war in Iraq. This last embrace led the good senator to a potentially disastrous appearance in Baghdad this last week, after which he pronounced the streets and marketplaces of Baghdad to be places worthy of a Sunday stroll for regular people like him. He declared that the American people are not getting the full story about what is going on in Iraq. He’s probably right, but not in a good way.

The senator, joined by Reb Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Reb Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana, strolled through the stalls at Shorja Market, a place that in the two months before had been the target of a couple of car bombings that killed 78 people and wounded almost 200 others. The buildings around Shorja have also been a favorite hangout for snipers. These three dignitaries were apparently very impressed with how safe and secure they felt on the streets of Baghdad and declared the troop surge to be working as advertised.

As they gushed on the evening news, none of these visitors acknowledged that they were made safe and secure by the 100 U.S. troops that cleared the marketplace in advance and accompanied them throughout. Note: no Iraqi troops were invited to the clearing party. I wonder if there are trust issues there. There were also three Blackhawk helicopters and two Apache gunships circling tightly overhead watching every person in or around the market. And, the visitors were wearing the latest and greatest body armor, a fashion statement yet to be made available to most of Shorja’s Sunday shoppers.

President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair could spend an hour buying rugs and trinkets at Shorja if they had enough firepower around them. It was a ridiculous scene and the post-stroll pronouncements were a disservice to the American public. When the Iraqi merchants were interviewed after the visitors left, they uniformly heaped scorn on the idea that this visit represented daily life in Baghdad or that Shorja or its neighborhood was considered safe and secure by anyone, and they made it clear that they conveyed that message to the congressional visitors. Those messages were not relayed by the visitors to the American people, thereby confirming that, indeed, we are not getting the full story from Baghdad.

Five days before this visit the single worst bombing since the beginning of the war claimed the lives of 152 Shiites in Tal Afar, just north of Baghdad. 347 others were wounded. The bomb was hidden in a truck loaded with flour, a truck that supposedly had been searched by Iraqi security forces. Immediately after the bombing, reprisals by Shiite security forces killed another 47. Just two months before this bombing, American officials singled out Tal Afar as a symbol of a violent city turned peaceful. In Iraq, peace is something that can only be secured at any given place and time through the presence of overwhelming American forces.

The day after the McCain visit the snipers returned and struck again at the Shorja market. In the three days after this visit eight American troops died on the streets of Baghdad. Yesterday, the president announced that another 12,000 troops are being added to the surge so that Shorja can be made safe and secure enough for Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie to buy a few brass bobbles in Baghdad without the need for Blackhawk and Apache accompaniment.

When Senator McCain returned to the U.S. and was greeted with a firestorm of criticism for his stage performance in Iraq, he promptly delayed the official announcement of his candidacy and his staff indicated that he was preparing a formal statement on why he supports the president’s policies in Iraq. We can only hope that he has cleared his head and will not cite Shorja or Tal Afar as Exhibits A and B in the case he will present.

I tried, Senator McCain. But I don’t think it’s going to work out between us as well as it did between your wife and me.