His brain has not only been washed, as they say... It has been dry cleaned.

It's a no-brainer that the letter released yesterday from captured British sailor Faye Turney was coerced, probably at the point of torture-

"Unfortunately during the course of our mission we entered into Iranian waters. Even through our wrongdoing, they have still treated us well and humanely, which I am and always will be eternally grateful.

I ask the representatives of the House of Commons after the Government had promised that this type of incident would not happen again why have they let this occur and why has the Government not been questioned over this?

"Isn't it time to start withdrawing our forces from Iraq and let them determine their own future?"

Doesn't exactly make it sound like she's sitting in an Iranian hotel room, sipping a cup of tea and dashing a letter off to mum and dad, does it?

Tony Blair is filled with righteous indignation-

I just think it's completely wrong, a disgrace actually, when people are used in that way. That's contrary to all international laws and conventions, and is not going to make any difference to us.

Really Tony? Completely wrong?

Then why didn't you speak up last month when this story hit the news?

WASHINGTON -- Khalid Sheikh Mohammed confessed to cutting off the head of American journalist Daniel Pearl, as well as plotting the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, according to a revised transcript of a statement released by the U.S. military.

Before I continue let me add the obligatory observation that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is an evil man and it's obvious he did probably have a leading hand in the September 11th attacks and I hope he burns in hell after his inevitable execution. Under no circumstances am I defending this man.

But it's just as obvious that his confession to so many acts of terrorism over so many years would put him into a category of supervillain somewhere between the Riddler and the Green Goblin. It is virtually impossible that he did all the things he told the tribunal he did. (His confession ran off the rails for me personally when he claimed that he had "moved the iceberg of Allah into the path of the infidel Titanic.")

Most of Western media and talk radio has acknowledged this reality but written it off as simple bravado. The man's trying to appear more important than he is. He's a terrorist with an ego the size of Donald Trump. Mohammed's wide ranging confession was itself turned against him as a sort of character flaw.

To me his confession brought uncomfortable similarities to years of seeing images of our own servicemen held by hostile forces in Vietnam, Iraq and North Korea "confess" to whatever the man pointing the gun at them off-camera was telling them to confess to. These images were never convincing for a simple reason: coersion and torture don't bring out the truth.

Anne Applebaum wrote a great piece in the Washington Post a couple of years ago entitled The Torture Myth which takes to task the assumption that torture is an effective means of discovering information.

Meet, for example, retired Air Force Col. John Rothrock, who, as a young captain, headed a combat interrogation team in Vietnam. More than once he was faced with a ticking time-bomb scenario: a captured Vietcong guerrilla who knew of plans to kill Americans. What was done in such cases was "not nice," he says. "But we did not physically abuse them." Rothrock used psychology, the shock of capture and of the unexpected. Once, he let a prisoner see a wounded comrade die. Yet -- as he remembers saying to the "desperate and honorable officers" who wanted him to move faster -- "if I take a Bunsen burner to the guy's genitals, he's going to tell you just about anything," which would be pointless. Rothrock, who is no squishy liberal, says that he doesn't know "any professional intelligence officers of my generation who would think this is a good idea."

Reading Blair's statement on Turney's confession is painful. After years of Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib the UK and United States have exhausted our moral capital. Blair has no standing to complain about forced confessions and "international laws." We have encouraged reciprocity in our enemies and we have nobody to blame but ourselves.

Hey, Daddy, I want an Oompa Loompa. I want you to get me an Oompa Loompa right away.

Nancy Pelosi may be a politician that I've spoken derisively of before, but I'm damn proud of her comments yesterday to Bush telling him to "calm down with the threats." That's exactly the sort of tone you should take with a spoiled child that's having a tantrum in the middle of the toy store.

If the behavior continues then I might just have to change my views on corporal punishment. "George, go out to the Rose Garden and get yourself a switch."

Stwike him, Centuwion. Stwike him vewy wuffly!

Err, I don't see this.

The House has already passed legislation requiring troops to be withdrawn by Sept. 1, 2008. The Senate vote assured that the Democratic-controlled Congress would send Bush legislation later this spring that calls for a change in war policy. A veto is a certainty, presuming the president follows through.

That would put the onus back on the Democrats, who would have to decide how long they wanted to extend the test of wills in the face of what are likely to be increasingly urgent statements from the administration that the money is needed for troops in the war zone.

Democrats just won an election largely on the basis that they would change course on Iraq. The President won't just be vetoing legislation, he'll be going against the will of most of the country that his failed war be brought to an end.

I'm sure there are people around Bush that are blowing smoke up his butt and playing to his short guy syndrome but the American people won't be as easily dazzled by bullshit this time around. Add to that the large number of Republican Senators up for re-election and I think it's fair to say that a funding crisis would largely put the onus on Bush and the Republican party to join the rest of America on this issue.

(I see Gordo voted with the angels on this one. I don't care. If this weren't an election cycle I haven't the slightest doubt he'd be on the other side. When it comes to principle he's the exact opposite of the principled tradition of Oregon Senators and no heir to Mark Hatfield.)

You gotta have presence on the court. Presence like a cheetah rather than a chimp.

College basketball is an strange thing. It has a reputation for fairness over the other NCAA sports, especially football. This is probably mainly due to their playoff system in which Cinderalla teams can stun the big conference teams. After watching a few games this season and following the playoffs a little more closely this year I'd have to say I agree with this guy that that reputation is in danger ( http://msn.foxsports.com/cbk/story/6604346)

Both games yesterday featured ticky-tack fouls that seemed to go one way and big guys throwing elbows that weren't drawing fouls. Having almost the entire starting lineup of the Ducks foul out while the Florida starters had no more than 2 fouls each is joke. I don't want to put on a tinfoil hat but it sure looks like the fix is in.

I'm Dar.

Scenes You'd Forgotten (or wished you had) Part 1: Rodent Napkin.

In the 80's fantasy flick "The Beastmaster" our hero played by the great thespian Marc Singer ends a speech rallying the people to fight off the shackles of their oppressors by wiping his face with a ferret. Apparently they're so oppressed they can't afford Brawny.

My, my, my! Such a lot of guns around town and so few brains!

We all recognize that there isn't much that a country like Iran can do to keep from getting attacked by the Bush administration. Disarm as Iraq did and they hit you. Accelerate development of nuclear weapons and they hit. Actual posses ion of significant mounts of the weapons themselves seems to be the only true deterrent (see North Korea.)

But do they really have to poke Bush with a stick?

Iranian Navy Seizes 15 British Sailors

Blackanthem Military News, WASHINGTON, D.C. – The British government is demanding the immediate and safe release of 15 sailors whose boats were surrounded by Iranian navy vessels and escorted into Iranian territorial waters in the Persian Gulf this morning.

You're not Superman, you know.

Swinebread will probably enjoy this. Top 15 Unintentionally Funny Comic Book Panels.

My favorite is the one from "Spiderman." Poor Aunt May.

I'm Bart Simpson. Who the hell are you?

This is way late but Swine tasked me with listing five reasons I blog. I'd twist that a little and say I blog because it combines five things I really enjoy doing-

1) Spending time on the computer rather than doing the dishes.

2) Spouting off about the topics of the day.

3) Being a smart ass about those same topics.

4) Listening to the sound of my own voice. In print.

5) Digging through the IMDB looking for the perfect quote to go with what I've written.

Women are still worth 10 points more than men in all age brackets, but teenagers now rack up 40 points and toddlers under 12 now rate a big 70 points!

I consulted the Death Race Judges about the recent series of movie stars such as Keanu Reeves and Lindsay Lohan running over paparazzi and they confirmed my suspicions- points are scored for hitting and killing members of society that are actually valuable. Paparazzi are actually negative points.

I don't give a monkey's arsehole about Mods and Rockers. Underneath, we're all the same, 'n't we?

I've been meaning to write something for a couple of weeks but simply haven't had the time. Stupid work and family getting in the way of blogging!

In discussion on Snabby's site on Iraq I bounced in and made these comments:

Bush is a conservative, pa've. Sorry.

I know you'd like to believe conservatism can't fail but it has and does.

Evidence is the streets of Iraq. Throughout New Orleans. And a big gaping hole in the center of New York.

Snabby, ever wiser and level-headed than myself, gently took me to task:

Dean: I probably have some of the same differences with some of Pa've's factual interpretations as you. However, Conservatism is a many-headed dragon with pre-Goldwater conservatives, pure libertarian conservatives, post-Goldwater big government/low revenue Reagan era conservatives, and of course, the neoconservatives which I believe Pa've is rightly rejecting.

Thinking conservatives like Pa've are grappling with those distinctions just like Democrats are grappling with whether the DLC corporatists are the best voice for the Democratic Party or whether a more optimistic people-oriented view needs to prevail.

Over time, I hope the debate becomes more like Hatfield vs. Kitzhaber (former Oregon governors) than Hatfield vs. McCoy.

This actually got the wheels spinning and I spent quite a bit of time reflecting on don's insightful response. One of the great things about the intertubes is that you occasionally come across something that makes you think. Even better when it's someone you know.

It's been observed on more than a few occasions that the language of politics has devolved in a crass, polarizing muck over the last couple of decades. Our national political discourse has been almost completely absorbed by tribalism with cliches and talking points all but replacing thoughtful debate. It makes consensus impossible. I share the belief of many that this is a Very Bad Thing. It could even be the Worstest Thing. It's slowly killing our country.

Why then do I myself engage in political shorthand in my constant references to the failures of "conservatives?"

For a couple of reasons. The first is merely practical and is directly related to the war in Iraq. Is there any question that "conservatives," regardless of personal variety, were united four years ago in their support for George W. Bush and the war in Iraq? Now that the war is a demonstrable failure to pretty much everybody we hear self-described conservatives either distance themselves from Bush by trying to claim he's not a real conservative or distance themselves from the neocon variety of conservative and attempt to hide behind their own "Eisenhower conservatism," "social conservatism," "fiscal conservatism' or whatever. I don't want to give them any breathing room. This is their war and their intellectual and moral failure as much as Bush's.

For all the differences between the different strains and brands of self-described conservatives they do have one thing in common. It's the thing that unites them above all else and causes them to put aside their differences each November as they head into the voting booth. Their intense hatred of "liberals."

Liberals. Democrats. The Left. The Great Satan. Everything that is wrong with this country (and the world) can be attributed to those vile critters. If "conservative" means anything it means "not liberal." Not Liberalism is a powerful self identity.

Unfortunately the "liberalism" that Not Liberalism is fighting has grown over the years in definition from the few anti-war protesters and flower children in the sixties to extend to pretty much all of academia, the mass media and the scientific community. Not Liberals are pretty much at war with everybody that doesn't self-identify with their group.

For discourse to be meaningful all sides will have to reach a place where they identify more with the need for consensus than disagreement. In the United States our entire political structure is built on this premise. For our system to work all parties need to identify as Americans before they identify as Whigs, Republicans, No-Nothings, Democrats or whatever else. As long as a significant portion of Americans continue to define themselves by their Not Liberalism over their citizenship this country will remain dysfunctional and will continue to fall apart at the seams. This is paradigm we need to break and this is why "conservatives" need to be held to account.