Snapshots: 3/29/08

Sometimes little things mean a lot. But you have to read between the lines to find them. For instance:

1. An AP article on the Iraq war leads off with: "U.S. forces stepped deeper Friday into the Iraqi government's fight to cripple Shiite militias..." et cetera. Wait a minute! The last I knew, the Bush administration was spending all its spare time trying to get the _Iraqi government_ to "step deeper" into the war. It is our war, after all, not theirs, but it would be nice to have a bit of help once in a while. Could it be that the regime -- of which the AP is a reliable representative -- is providing a sneak preview or model for the next phase of the conflict, which is that the Iraqi government pretends to fight while we provide air support? Well, a guy dropping bombs from ten miles up is less likely to come home in a body bag, right? And the Iraqis can kill each other off until doomsday, for all we care. Sounds like a plan to me. But it also reminds me of a certain phase of the Vietnam war, I think it's called "the end". But... at what point do we get to see American personnel evacuated from the Green Zone via helicopter? There has been an upsetting dearth of iconic photographs from the Iraq conflict. Someone better start taking some good pictures, and fast, before it's too late.

2. Chelsea Clinton, speaking at a campaign stop in Indiana, responded to a questioner, who asked if her mother's credibility had been hurt during the Lewinsky scandal, as follows: "I don't think that's any of your business." Well, sorry Chelsea, but your mother's credibility is very much the business of the American public. She's not just another SUV-driving soccer mom; she's running for president. So forget all this "you shouldn't hurt my mom's feelings -- she's such a sensitive and delicate flower" crap. (This incident did, however, settle a question that was raised now and then during the Clinton I administration. It is now clear that Chelsea is, in fact, the biological child of both Bill and Hill.)

3. The last good Democrat -- or one of the few -- namely Pennsylvania's Bob Casey, has come out for Obama, who is spending time "wooing blue-collar Democrats and Catholics" (assuming that's not a redundancy). Well, I have a few things to say about blue-collar Democrats and Catholics who still vote Democratic, but that can wait. The point is that Obama is clearly hoping to cut into a significant group of pigeons -- er, voters -- that Hillary had counted on to put her over in the biggest remaining "Rust Belt" state. So let's see -- she has told the blacks to move to the back of the bus, and now she's seeing her Catholic homies getting chipped away. Are there enough NPR listeners in Pennsylvania to keep her campaign alive? At this rate, they're all she's going to have left.

4. Meanwhile, Pat Leahy, the take-no-prisoners senator from the peace-loving and bucolic state of Vermont, has said that it's time for Hillary to toss in the towel. That's right -- the Scourge of Conservatives, who passes out subpoenas like Tic Tacs, is telling her to hang it up (and he's not talking about her hot-line phone to George Soros). But wait! Whatever happend to that death-blow that the Clinton campaign struck on Obama, by pointing out that his pastor makes the Black Panthers look like cute little kitty kats? This is all happening so fast. One minute, the Clinton camp is saying that Obama ought to "fuhgeddaboutit" -- that, in effect, if he thinks the Pastor Wright skirmish was unpleasant, he ought to see what's coming next. And the next minute, Leahy is saying "fuhgeddaboutit" to Hillary. Can a total Democrat meltdown be far behind? And aren't we Pennsylvanians lucky to have front-row seats?

5. A two-headed lizard continues to intrigue customers at a North Carolina pet store. But rumors that it is about to become the official mascot of the Clinton campaign have no basis, according to the management.

6. Update: The end-of-the-worlders holed up in a Russian cave are minus 7 members, all women who decided that facing the end of the world in broad daylight was preferable to spending one's last days in a cave with a bunch of Russian men. Well, we know that life in a cave is much more suited to men anyway -- or so the feminists tell us. And more drop-outs are expected at any time. Clearly, the rumors of Janet Reno's involvement had some basis, and it's obvious that the cave-dwellers caught wind of it. Problem is, do Russian caves burn as readily as wooden buildings in Texas during a windstorm? Stay tuned and we'll find out.

7. It turns out that Afghanistan has people who are actually referred to as "poppy police". (Somebody better warn the Wicked Witch of the West.) Two of them were killed recently for trying to eradicate Afghanistan's only cash crop. Well, you can hardly blame people for getting resentful when stooges on the U.S. payroll go after their main means of livelihood. Of course, it's America's fetish for eradicating all "mind-altering" drugs, and the people who love them, that is responsible for the high profitability of poppy growing in the first place. The U.S. is waging an Opium War in reverse in Asia, and having about as much luck with it as the Brits had with the first one.

8. And finally, a hot dog shop in downtown Pittsburgh has named two new menu items after the leading Democratic candidates, to wit: the Barackwurst and the Hillbasa. So, does this mean that Hillary's kielbasa is bigger than Obama's wurst? The implications are staggering (but not all that surprising, actually). And the shop owners did show remarkable restraint in not naming any of their entrees after Bill Clinton, or any body part thereof. I guess they had too much self-respect to go for such, um, low-hanging fruit.