George W. Bush had a plan to get out of the war in Vietnam.

Lots of great jokes like that on Garrison Keillor today. I missed that show more than any other when I was in Asia.

It’s nice to know that the beacon of democracy we set up in Iraq has spread its sweet light throughout the Middle East.

Prominent Saudi religious scholars urged Iraqis to support militants waging holy war against the U.S.-led coalition forces as American troops prepared Saturday for a major assault on the insurgent hotbed of Fallujah.

The 26 Saudi scholars and preachers said in an open letter to the Iraqi people that their appeal was prompted by “the extraordinary situation through which the Iraqis are passing which calls for unity and exchange of views.” The letter was posted on the Internet.

“At no time in history has a whole people been violated … by propaganda that’s been proved false,” Sheik Awad al-Qarni, one of the scholars, told Al-Arabiya TV.

“The U.S. forces are still destroying towns on the heads of their people and killing women and children. What’s going on in Iraq (news – web sites) is a result of the big crime of America’s occupation of Iraq.”

In their letter, the scholars stressed that armed attacks by militant Iraqi groups on U.S. troops and their allies in Iraq represent “legitimate” resistance.

The scholars were careful to direct their appeal to Iraqis only and stayed away from issuing a general, Muslim-wide call for holy war. They also identified the military as the target, one that is considered legitimate by many Arabs who view U.S. troops and their allies as occupiers.

We’re going to “win” in Fallujah, at least in the military sense. We’ll most likely raze it to the ground. But can we ultimately triumph over all this animosity, from within and outside of Iraq? After all, our winning formula from the very beginning was “hearts and minds.” At this point, no matter how good our original intentions — and I believe they were generally good — we have to face the fact that most of the people in the Middle East see us the way the Poles saw the Germans. Now, that isn’t fair; we’re doing many good things and trying to help in parts of Iraq. But it’s still how we are perceived by so many, and levelling Fallujah probably won’t help. Remember, the image of a naked prisoner wearing a hood is far more vivid and memorable than a photo of kids smiling by a newly built school.

From H.L. Mencken (it’s the legend on Corrente’s blog):

He likes money and knows how to amass property, but his cultural development is but little above that of the domestic animals. He is intensely and cocksurely moral, but his morality and his self-interest are crudely identical…He is a violent nationalist and patriot, but he admires rogues in office and always beats the tax-collector if he can. He has immovable opinions about all the great affairs of state, but nine-tenths of them are sheer imbecilities. He is violently jealous of what he conceives to be his rights, but brutally disregardful of the other fellow’s…This man, whether city or country bred, is the normal Americano – the 100 percent…He exists in all countries, but here alone he rules.

Truer now than ever before.

The latest photos and commentary from our lovely little war in iraq, courtesy of the great ESWN.

He also offers a fine summary of our depressing election.

A lot of it is personal stuff (“miss my girlfriend” and stuff like that) but there are a few posts that pop out at you.

If you voted for Bush, didn’t vote, or voted no on gay marriage, I hope you get drafted. I hope they stick you in my unit, and you go with me to Iraq when my unit goes back in September. I will laugh when you see what soldiers in that country face on a daily basis. I hope you work with gay soldiers too. I did. One of them saved my life. Think he shouldn’t have the right to get married? Fuck you. He fought just as hard as I did and on most days, did his job better than me. Don’t tell me gays don’t have the same rights you do. Think the war in Iraq is a good thing? I’ll donate my M-16 to you and you can go in my place.

It’s worth a look on this, the eve of Vietnam II.

This is vintage China:

The 2008 Beijing Olympics will begin at 8pm on 8 August, in keeping with one of the nation’s lucky numbers.

Eight is considered auspicious in China because its pronunciation in Cantonese sounds the same as the word for to make money.

The Games had originally been planned to commence in late August to avoid Beijing’s soaring summer temperatures.

But Beijing’s mayor said the sporting festival would begin in the luckiest manner possible – at eight on 8/8/08.

Mayor Wang Qishan conceded it would still be hot in early August, with the temperature often climbing above 40 degrees Celsius.

They sure take their lucky numbers seriously there, as I’ve noted before.

God bless them and their Christian values. These were culled from Free Republic by Oliver Willis.

Could explain her dimentia in talking about the Cheney’s daughter. Prayers..

Elizabutt has breast cancer

If I were a doctor, I’d be frightened to treat the wife of a guy who sues doctors for a living.

a pity for sure, but good luck finding a doctor to treat the wife of the most vicious medical malpractice attorney in the nation…what goes around comes around I guess.

she could always go to canada or cuber to get the very best treatment possible.

I want her well, but NOT treated here.

any doctor here who treats her should have his head examined.

It’s also a shame because, if it wasn’t for her bottom-feeding trial lawyer husband, doctors, hospitals and pharmaceutical companies probably would have found a cure for breast cancer by now…

would you bet YOUR house, your kids college on Edwards wife?

Send her to cuber. Libs say their system is better than ours.

….revenge is mine sayeth the LORD!!!!!!!!!

God is not mocked, you reap what you sow. I’m sorry folks but we all have to learn that you cannot go around spewing hatred and leave the door wide open to satan.

sometimes boobs have problems….

“God dont like ugly” (behavior)

I’ll restrain myself from replying with obscenities. but it isn’t easy.

That seems to be the mentality among many Americans as they consider migrating to Canada. No, I’m not kidding.

Wow. Atrios shuts down all comments and disappears for the weekend, saying his much-read blog is starting to annoy him. (I’m feeling the same way, but I’m only determined to post more.)

I guess you have to understand what some of the liberal super-bloggers have been through. Atrios’ site raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for candidates he was supporting, like Joe Hoeffel in Pennsylvania. And Daily Kos raised more than half a million dollars for 15 congressional candidates. All of them, including Hoeffel, lost. To have all that work, all that effort and sacrifice erased literally overnight — I can see why they’d be shell-shocked.

An opinion piece in the LA Times by radio host Frank Pastore:

Christians, in politics as in evangelism, are not against people or the world. But we are against false ideas that hold good people captive. On Tuesday, this nation rejected liberalism, primarily because liberalism has been taken captive by the left. Since 1968, the left has taken millions captive, and we must help those Democrats who truly want to be free to actually break free of this evil ideology.

In the weeks and months to come, we will hear the voices of well-meaning people beseeching the victor to compromise with the vanquished. This would be a mistake. Conservatives must not compromise with the left. Good people holding false ideas are won over only if we defeat what is false with the truth.

The left must be defeated in the realm of ideas, just as it was on Tuesday at the ballot box. The left hates the ballot box and loves its courtrooms, which is why it hopes to continue to advance its agenda through the courts. This must end.

The left bewitches with its potions and elixirs, served daily in its strongholds of academe, Hollywood and old media. It vomits upon the morals, values and traditions we hold sacred: God, family and country. As we learned Tuesday, it is clear the left holds the majority of Americans, the majority of us, in contempt

And bush is beholden to these people and their beliefs; he owes them some big favors. I don’t want to think about it. I want to go away for a few years so I don’t have to watch.

Link via Kevin Drum.

UPDATE: There is an absolutely great article at Slate by novelist Jane Smiley on this topic — what we’re up against. She is devastating. Sample:

The reason the Democrats have lost five of the last seven presidential elections is simple: A generation ago, the big capitalists, who have no morals, as we know, decided to make use of the religious right in their class war against the middle class and against the regulations that were protecting those whom they considered to be their rightful prey—workers and consumers. The architects of this strategy knew perfectly well that they were exploiting, among other unsavory qualities, a long American habit of virulent racism, but they did it anyway, and we see the outcome now—Cheney is the capitalist arm and Bush is the religious arm. They know no boundaries or rules. They are predatory and resentful, amoral, avaricious, and arrogant. Lots of Americans like and admire them because lots of Americans, even those who don’t share those same qualities, don’t know which end is up. Can the Democrats appeal to such voters? Do they want to? The Republicans have sold their souls for power. Must everyone?

Progressives have only one course of action now: React quickly to every outrage—red state types love to cheat and intimidate, so we have to assume the worst and call them on it every time. We have to give them more to think about than they can handle—to always appeal to reason and common sense, and the law, even when they can’t understand it and don’t respond. They cannot be allowed to keep any secrets. Tens of millions of people didn’t vote—they are watching, too, and have to be shown that we are ready and willing to fight, and that the battle is worth fighting. And in addition, we have to remember that threats to democracy from the right always collapse. Whatever their short-term appeal, they are borne of hubris and hatred, and will destroy their purveyors in the end.

Yes. Time for us to become more shrill and more outspoken than ever — when called for. Silence equals death, especially in this environment, when the fate of the world hangs in the balance.