By the way, is there anyone on board who knows how to fly a plane?

When Preznit Bush spoke before the UN yesterday we can count ourselves lucky that he didn't he avoided the use of prop vials of Anthrax when talking about the dangers of Iraqi Iranian WMDs. That would be just about the only thing we could count ourselves lucky as our idiot manchild once represents America's face to the world.

Apparently we're supposed to rejoice in the fact that the administration has dropped the bellicosity down a nudge:

Ilan Berman, vice president for policy of the American Foreign Policy Council in Washington, noted that Bush's comments to Iranians supported their right to nuclear energy.

"The administration is very slowly -- very slowly -- getting a little bit savvier about messaging to the Iranians," he said. "This is sort of an attempt -- a belated attempt -- to divide and conquer." (Washington Post)

Even if we take that observation at face value I'd still be shaking my head at that nonsense. I've said many times before that the President of the United States is much like the job of an airline pilot. There is simply no time for learning on the job. Putting someone in that position of responsibility who is unprepared could be fatal. Stick a plumber or a lawyer or even the owner of the Texas Rangers baseball club behind the wheel of a 747 and the chances are it will end in a flaming fireball.

So it's nice that a little common sense might be sinking in to all the thick skulls in this administration but it's a lot too little and it's much too late.

Yeah, that's the ticket...

Because I refuse to register with the New York Times I'm just going to lift this quote directly from a terrific piece trashing Fred Hiatt by Jane at fireddoglake.

But a week earlier, in an interview in his State Department office, Mr. Powell told three other reporters for The Times that intelligence agencies had essentially rejected that contention, and were "no longer carrying it as a credible item" by early 2003, when he was preparing to make the case against Iraq at the United Nations.

Mr. Powell’s queasiness with some of the intelligence has been well known, but the new revelations suggest that long after he had concluded the intelligence was faulty, Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney and Mr. Libby were still promoting it. (emphasis mine)

This leapt out at me and frankly it pissed me off.

I realize we've been buried under an avalanche of examples of this administration lying over these past few years but for some reason this case, which is not even really new, really sticks in my craw.

I get that the chickenhawks like Bush and Cheney think that winning a late night game of Risk with their buddies when they were twelve equates to them being master strategists but Powell actually served in uniform and saw combat for chrissakes. If he was queasy about the intelligence then why the hell wasn't he yelling about it? He was in a position to do something about this stupid war. Being a grown-up in a room full of children mean you just might have to say "no."

Hello? Hello? Anybody home? Huh? McFly?

John Bolton's reign of error over the United Nation's Security Council ended last Thursday as Argentina took over the rotating Chairmanship. If you're not familiar with the story, Bolton made it a personal crusade to "run the Security Council like a business" and start the meetings promptly on time. He brought the gavel down on the start of his first meeting as Chairman to an empty chamber. It didn't sound like it got much better from that point on.

Of course Bolton was left trying to put the best face on his short, inconsequential tenure:

Bolton has described the U.S. campaign to reform the United Nations as an "irresistible force" pitted against an "immovable object."

Putting aside the concept that reforming the United Nations begins with punctuality, Bolton really is making this more complicated than it needs to be. He's an Ambassador from a country that's made itself a worldwide pariah in it's slapdash foreign policy who arrived at the U.N. without the support of congress through a recess appointment and sporting a reputation for being what is euphemistically referred to as "a colossal jerk."

It could be that the reason delegates couldn't show up on time to the Security Council meetings because they had busy schedules. There could be cultural reasons for the tardiness.

Most likely they were just dissing him.

...and monkeys might come flying out of my butt!

Andrew Sullivan brings a radical solution on Iraq to the table. In fact it's SO radical some may call him crazy.

I'd be one of those people.

So here's a thought: why not send Bill Clinton? For some reason that eludes my own judgment, Clinton has a great deal of cachet in the Middle East, and could defuse the anti-Bush and thereby anti-American obstacles to success. He was, by all accounts, superb at the Doha/Brookings/Saban summit in 2003. He would bring the Democratic party into a much more constructive role in trying to bring about a serious step forward for Iraq, and help unite the country at home.

Does Sullivan read his own stuff? I mean, seriously. George W. Bush would never ask Bill Clinton to help save his bacon in Iraq precisely because it would help the Democratic party and unite the country. Those have never been goals of this administration. Ever. This is the administration who saw the worst terrorist attacks in the history of this country as a great way to gain electoral advantage and played cynical politics with things like the formation of the DHS, originally a Democratic initiative. They have no interest in uniting the country and they certainly have no interest in doing anything that would help Democrats, even collaterally.

Need I remind Andy that the "anti-Bush obstacles to success" were obstactles of his own making? It wasn't some other administration that thumbed it's nose at the world and told the U.N. to take a hike. The U.S. is practically alone in trying to rebuild Iraq by choice. Bush created these obstacles, they didn't appear in a vaccum.

The sad reality is that Bush IS the obstacle to success.

Nothing will begin to change for the better in Iraq until in and around January, 2009. That's when the biggest obstacle for success will be removed.

Until that time neither Bill Clinton nor the cloned and re-animated body of Gandhi could bring some semblance of normality to Iraq. No amount of wishing will make it so.