A Quick Expression of my Utter Love for You All - Battlestar Galactica was back on its game tonight, I thought, but I don't feel like going into it right now. Soon I'll run a couple more e-mails I got, including the first one critical of the show. In the meantime, may I suggest people revisit or visit the fine links in the current New Crew? Tomorrow: Did James D. Guckert kill Rafiq Hariri? And does this mean I'm never going to get an answer to the e-mail I sent Hariri two years ago?

Lazy Warblogger Night - Matthew Yglesias has the hopeful sign; Spencer Ackerman the disquieting portent; Porter Goss the admission of the obvious and James Joyner the latest example of neocon mau-mauing. (He's against it.) And now, to bed.

Lazy Fanboy Night - Two more lists for Mike Sterling to add to his master list of 100-item love: Alex Knapp of Heretical Ideas; and Steven Vincent who falls, admittedly, a few items short of a full hundred. It's all good stuff, though.

To Coin a Phrase - Back when I was a kid there was a popular bumper sticker that read YOUR GOD IS TOO SMALL, taken from the title of a then-popular book. Thinking about the suicide paper title business and so much more, I think it's time for a new bumper sticker:

YOUR GOD IS TOO PETTY.

Lazy Blogger Night - Turning in early. Things that caught my eye today:

Per Salon and elsewhere, it appears that Jeff Gannon/James Guckert was attending White House press briefings shortly before "Talon News" even got going. Meanwhile Maureen Dowd, who has been a White House correspondent, says that the procedures by which he was cleared were decidedly non-standard. There's an awful lot of smoke around the whole affair. I'm still betting that there's a fire generating it. Two stray thoughts: 1. I'm certainly not down with THIS passage from the Salon article:

Critics have charged that while Talon News may publish regularly, it boasts a nearly all-volunteer news team that includes not a single person with actual journalism experience. (The team does, though, have quite a bit of experience working on Republican campaigns.) In other words, the outfit is not legitimate or independent, two criteria often used in Washington to receive press credentials.

Get over yourself, Eric Boehlert. Also, how rich is it that the linchpin of the story has become the comments section at what Loyal Readers know is my favorite weblog, Winds of Change. My old pal Armed Liberal suggests

So as a thought experiment, can I suggest that some enterprising blogger with more time on his hands than I have file a FOIA request and ask who got white house press passes allowing them to come to press conferences and what their affiliation was for the date range from, say June of 04 to December of 04??

Sure, it might be instructive. I think there's another tack, though, that could be just as productive. Look at February 2003, when "Jeff Gannon" sprung full-blown from the brow of - well, maybe not the brow. Anyway, see what was going on in the news at that time. If I weren't making an early night of it, I'd do it myself.

Many bloggers are blogging from this year's CPAC convention, though under near-intolerable conditions owing to the failure of the blogger-proletariat to rise up and smash the data access oligarchs. Radley Balko takes the occasion to wonder

whether or not there's any room left on the "right" for libertarians and "leave us alone" conservatives. My sense is that there isn't.

Mine too, and not just because of the big, obvious stuff, and not just because of the Bush Administration, but its supporters, and not just the mouth-breathers and spittle-spewers. Take Robert Tagorda, who speweth not, on the recent "gay suicide title flap." Tagorda devotes an entire item to it in which he laments the nasty language used in some of the complaint messages to the bureaucrat who insisted that the words "gay," "lesbian," "bisexual" and "transgendered" be dropped from the title of the panel on suicide among the, um, gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered. He opines that he personally doesn't see the requested title wording change "would marginalize the constituents as much as the activists claim." He suggests that it's "rather paranoid to believe that the White House has much interest in the title of a relatively obscure bureaucratic event."

But does he have any opinion on whether the bureaucrat's decision in this case wise wise, just and necessary as opposed to picayune and officious? If he does, it's not important enough to share with us. Only the unofficial behavior here - those unpleasant e-mailers and "paranoid" activists - is worth his comment.

Other business: In case you missed three hundred other pointers, let me commend to you the live chat with reporter Rod Nordland of Newsweek from Groundhog Day. Fun. Ny. One single excerpt:

Grand Rapids, MI: If WMDs don't exist in Iraq, where are the destroyed ones? Rod Nordland: I think they're in Atlantis.

Here's what I take from Michael Young's Daily Star editorial on the murder of Hariri and the question of Syrian complicity. It's interesting that various Lebanese politicians are holding up placards that say "Syria Did It." Like I said the other day, maybe Syria did. But since they are politicians lining up, it's probably more about sensing which way the wind is blowing and sizing up the best approach to the buffet line. Syria's hold on Lebanon may indeed be crumbling. It's far from clear to me that that will be an unmixed blessing. I'm old enough to remember the 1980s very well, which means I remember what Lebanon was like before Syria succeeded in bashing a critical mass of heads together. A lot of Republican hawks are fairly salivating at the prospect of undoing what some blog commenter called "Ronald Reagan's greatest failure." I fear they may simply lead to us - and, moreso, the Lebanese - reliving Ronald Reagan's greatest nightmare.

But maybe it will all be swell.

Cheap Transmutation of Matter - Henry Farrell offers to lend me a book, which is generous and, hey, I love free reading. This particular book, by Jared Diamond, will be starting from behind, though, thanks to Henry's item, which describes Diamond's account of Julian Simon's famous bet with Paul Ehrlich:

But what I suspect Jim doesn’t know (and what I didn’t know until I read it yesterday in Jared Diamond’s Collapse), is why Simon was quite so confident that metal shortages weren’t a problem. Over to Diamond:

There is an abundance of errors of the latter sort (anti-environmentalist predictions that have proved wrong): e.g. overly optimistic predictions that the Green Revolution would already have solved the world’s hunger problems; the prediction of the economist Julian Simon that we could feed the world’s population as it continues to grow for the next 7 billion years; and Simon’s prediction “Copper can be made from other elements” and thus there is no risk of a copper shortage.

Wow, I thought. Simon really said we could make Copper from other elements? Immediate reactions: Gulp; Really? and Why was I not informed? Henry goes on rather a tear about it.

Problem is, as links and accounts of the original interview make clear, Simon's alleged claim was not only less dire than presented, but not really dire at all. I came away from Henry's item thinking that Simon believed he would win his bet with Ehrlich because "we could make more Copper out of other metals," which we couldn't practically do in the 1970s and can't do now. In fact, context makes it clear that Simon believed no such thing. His comments about making copper from other metals were plainly far-future speculation, essentially an answer to similar far-future speculation on the part of environmentalists that "In the long run there's a finite supply of everything." Simon's remarks about the ultimate limit being "the weight of the universe" are a bit of a tip-off here. The "earthlings of the future" reference is also a tip-off. It's separate from Simon's near-term optimism about resources.

Which leaves us a question: Are we dealing with a good-faith misreading of Diamond by Henry or a bad-faith misreading of Simon by Diamond. Henry has the excuse of not having seen the original quotes from Simon. He simply made the same leap of credulity to which we are all prey: believing something about our political opponents that's too good to be true. Diamond presumably has seen Simon's original statements, so a mistake on his part would be less forgiveable.

It's Always Something - Republican activist groups have begun booming what we might call "The Anti-Gannon." You'll be hearing all about him in the coming days. I checked the February 1 briefing transcript at Whitehouse.gov and the guy really does exist. His questions are genuinely trollish in an anti-Gannon way - they are gotchas designed to leave the press briefer with no good answers.

Here is anti-Gannon's, aka Russell Mokhiber's homepage. Biased? You betcha. An offender against our absurd laws against victimless crime, like Gannon? Who can say. Maybe he does drugs. He doesn't seem to have websites where he offers to do drugs with you for money. And he seems to have taken up the journalism business more than five days before getting his White House press pass.

The Gannon story remains interesting because Gannon is a one-man nexus between prostitution and national security. He is a prostitute turned instant journalist at the heart of the mystery surrounding the betrayal of Valerie Plame's identity to the media and our enemies. It's also fun. Russell Mokhiber seems mostly tedious. Nevertheless, it's interesting to see that pressroom trolls are, as a class, ambidextrous.

Links for the Coming Campaign - Here are a few:

Syria Comment
The Arabist Network (both via Yglesias)
The Daily Star (Lebanon)
Amarji - A Heretic's Blog

Second Verse, Same as the First - Does anyone really believe the US government has the faintest idea whether the Syrian government was behind the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri or not? One day later?

I was afraid of that. I'm reminded of an epigram from Samuel R. Delany's Stars in my Pocket Like Grains of Sand:

Ignorance is a condition. Stupidity is a strategy.

At least there's some humor value in the case, however bitter. CNN reports

Meanwhile, U.S. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the United States has "made it clear" it wants Syria, which maintains some 16,000 troops in Lebanon, to use its influence to prevent attacks such as Monday's massive bombing.

We have around 150,000 troops in Iraq and can't prevent people from shelling the Green Zone. But we feel free to insist that Syria's 16,000 soldiers in Lebanon prevent all political violence. Rich.

Look, Syria may really be behind the murder of Hariri. But neither Condi Rice nor Scott McLellan nor Richard Boucher has any idea. The US reaction to the murder is the sheerest opportunism. Our rulers are practically pissing themselves with joy over this man's death. It's like a valentine from their one true love, War. The Administration's brain trust (please throw scare quotes around each of the two preceding words) took a good long look at Iran, decided it wasn't so appetizing after all, and cast about for a seemingly more digestible meal. As usual, they get to eat and we get what comes out the other end. Grab your nose plugs and a shovel, folks. As the poet said, "We must suffer them all again."

A Hustle Here and a Hustle There - Major Olmsted believes "the Left" et al have hit rock bottom in our coverage of male prostitute/journalist (apologies for the redundancy) Jeff Gannon/James Guckert. (See last night's item.) So does John Cole. White House Press Secretary Scott McLellan says Gannon got his clearance under his real name and only used his pen name for the reporting. (McLellan himself uses "Jeff" repeatedly when calling on Gannon, which he seems to have done a lot, per the WMV clip that Tex offers.)

But I'm still curious. Alexa says Talon News was established March 29, 2003. Gannon/Guckert was credentialled almost simultaneously with the "news" site's foudning. Is that typical, that an unknown reporter for a brand new news service can get immediate credentials? How did Gannon/Guckert come to the attention of GOPUSA's Bobby Eberle? Maybe these kinds of things do happen routinely, in which case we can all go home. But I don't think it's been established yet.

Lovey-Dovey - Comics-bloggers have been posting 100 things they love about comics for Valentine's Day. Fred Hembeck started it off and Alan David Doane went nuclear. Here's my own list, explanatory links to be added at my leisure:

1. The last page of Ghost World.

2. Swapping books with Nate, Bill and Mark.

3. Eve Tushnet's reviews.

4. The diner scene in Planetary #1.

5. The snowscapes in the recent Conan adaptation of "The Frost Giant's Daughter."

6. Inset panels.

7. Avengers 113.

8. The issue of Jonny Quest narrated by Bandit.

9. Reading trade paperback collections in a comfy Borders chair.

10. Buying DC's Cartoon Network titles with my children.

11. The change of Mrs. O's expression from contemptuous to captivated as she deigned to read the first issue of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

12. The conclusion of the Defenders' Sons of the Serpent storyline where the guy in the crows says, "But that don't mean ya gotta go around burning them to death either."

13. Rorschach.

14. The recent She-Hulk story with the Ghost.

15. Peter Parker telling Mary Jane his secret identity in Ultimate Spider-Man.

16. The All-Chaykin issues of American Flagg.

17. The Regency Elf.

18. Finder: Sin-Eater I and II.

19. The Beat.

20. Eightball 22.

21. Mother Come Home.

22. Plucking the first printing of the first issue of Batman: The Dark Knight Returns off the shelf.

23. "The Death of Speedy."

24. Daredevil: Born Again.

25. Sandman: A Game of You.

26. Jack Kirby's The Hunger Dogs graphic novel.

27. Understanding Comics.

28. The two-track narration in Spiders issue 2.

29. Copious softcover reprints.

30. The Gotham City issues of Alan Moore's Swamp Thing.

31. We3.

32. Mayfair's DC Heroes Roleplaying Game.

33. Marvel's Marvel Universe RPG.

34. Earth II.

35. The Trial of the Flash.

36. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay.

37. What They Did to Princess Paragon.

38. The last story in A Contract with God.

39. Gil Kane's wiry figures, especially someone who just got punched.

40. Joe Staton drawing Guy Gardner.

41. Reed talking to Galactus/Franklin Richards in Earth X.

42. "How do you get to Bahia?"

43. Vertigo, notwithstanding.

44. Bendis, notwithstanding.

45. Gene Colan drawing Daredevil.

46. George Tuska drawing Iron Man.

47. Herb Trimpe drawing Hulk.

48. Neal Adams drawing Batman.

49. "The Night Gwen Stacy Died."

50. The giant crashing through the wall in Pop Gun War.

51. The car up on blocks in Pop Gun War.

52. William Messner-Loebs' Journey.

53. The panel backgrounds in Church & State Vol. II.

54. Planetary/Batman: Night on Earth.

55. My script-formatting macros in OpenOffice.org Writer.

56. Subscription box pickup day!

57. Joel at Big Planet Comics in Bethesda.

58. John at Beyond Comics in Gaithersburg.

59. Watching Justice League Unlimited with Offering Boy.

60. Comics blogs in general.

61. Spider-Man movies.

62. Small Press Expo.

63. "I did it thirty minutes ago."

64. Jim Starlin's 70s panel layouts.

65. Jim Steranko's 60s panel layouts.

66. Irv Novick drawing the Flash.

67. Yes, Todd McFarlane drawing Spider-Man.

68. Hopey.

69. NuMarvel's recap pages.

70. For the Man Who Has Everything.

71. A certain Zot splash page.

72. Reading most of the Bruce Jones-Mike Deodato Hulk run in a week.

73. The larger-trim manga format.

74. Walking into the Million Year Picnic in Harvard Square the first time in 1978.

75. The storytelling skills of Dan Clowes.

76. Reading Frank Miller's Daredevil run as it appeared.

77. Journalista! (Oh well.)

78. The Comics Reporter.

79. Franklin's Findings.

80. Steve Englehart's Captain America.

81. Gerry Conway's Spider-Man.

82. Marvel's 1970s reprint comics.

83. Marvel's 1970s black and white magazines.

84. Figuring out that Mezzrow from Nexus got his name from a ticket stub.

85. Everyone else's Top 100 lists.

86. Waid, Weiringo, Fantastic Four.

87. Batroc Zee Leapair!

88. John Romita drawing Spider-Man.

89. The star-crossed lovers chapter of Uzumaki.

90. People who can write about how art works.

91. Getting comics-related e-mails.

92. Realizing eventually that this will be a life-long love.

93. Saving the most-anticipated title in the stack for last.

94. Reading the most-anticipated title first.

95. Learning that Iris Allen knew her husband was the Flash because he talked in her sleep.

96. Getting to borrow the O'Neil/Adams Batman issues from a high school teacher.

97. Making up Legion of Substitute Heroes identities for ourselves with my fraternity brothers.

98. Carla Speed McNeil's art in Frank Ironwine.

99. Daredevil: Underboss.

100. John Cassaday.

Freaky Deaky - The "Jeff Gannon" story gets weirder. The liberal Americablog does the digging. The Poor Man adds

Think about it: what are the chances that a media whore like Gannon would turn out to be an actual whore? It's impossible. It boggles the mind how infinitely unlikely this is. It's like if you found someone pirating CDs, and it turns out he actually had a peg leg and a parrot on his shoulder and sailed around the Caribbean saying "arrrrrr!" and plundering booty.

Ind - uh, sorry.

It's possible that Gannon decided to make a life change in Spring 2003. One hits the wrong side of 40, reassesses what one wants out of life and, like so many of us who switch careers in midlife, becomes a fully accredited White House correspondent pretty much instantly while forgetting to take down stray online ads offering sexual services for cash.

Or, and I'll grant this is much much less likely, it could be the blackmail.

24 More - Whee! We finally found someone CTU won't torture! An actual terrorist! The actress playing Mrs. Araz has been the best thing about the show, though the dragon-lady bit threatens constantly to fall into camp. The ending seems a bit of complcation-for-the-sake-of-complication, though. You would think, them being married, that Mr. Araz would be able to guess the thought processes that Mrs. Araz explains to Jack Bauer in the parking garage, so he has no reason not to waste the kid. (When he first grabs Fayrouz, he has the hope of using the boy to find Mom. Once you're trapped with no way out, the kid's continued existence is pointless, isn't it?) Speaking of actresses whose names I don't feel like looking up, I thought the woman playing Edgar's mom did a nice job.

But let's think about that passage for a minute. In my continuing act of driving John Cole batty by reading too much into the show, I must state my displeasure at the evacuation-related scenes. Mrs. Styles is stuck in the radiation zone because her usual driver is nowhere to be found and by the time she maneuvered her wheelchair outside "all the neighbors were gone." Why does Fox hate America? I have neighbors, and I am one. Had we a wheelchair-bound invalid on this block, No, we would not all of us drive off without checking to see if she needed help in the face of a disaster. I don't believe Mrs. Styles neighbors would either. We have evidence in this direction, the conduct of New Yorkers during the atrocities of September 11, 2001. If only they had filmed my own 24 story instead!

We also have Daughter Heller complaining that a quarter of the people in the evac zone are ignoring directions on where to go, and another quarter don't even realize that they're in the evac zone. Meantime the state police and National Guard don't cooperate effectively until Daughter Heller makes them, from her improvised command post at CTU. Moral: The American people are a bunch of boobs! Only the stern but loving direction of our masters, taking what time they can spare from the pressing business of torturing innocents, can save us. Bleat! Bleeeeeat!

Stray thought: Did the background data relayed to Jack about Mrs. Araz make it sound like she and Mr. Araz got married in the United States within the last couple of years? Whose kid is Fayrouz then? I probably misunderstood that part.

Way-Delayed Mailbag - Way back last September I was talking about Rwanda, which generated two critical e-mails I meant to run before, as so often, I was distracted by shiny things. First, from Tacitus:

Regarding Rwanda, I ought to point out a few things:

1) Getting there, militarily, would not have been terrifically difficult. All those staging areas in Kenya we used for Somalia? Just as good for hitting Kigali. Heck, you could have flown some heavy-lift craft direct from Europe to eastern Congo, and then marched in -- France did it. Speaking of which, France's mini-invasion on behalf of the Hutu genocidaires sort of disproves the notion that there were barley-surmountable logistical challenges to getting there. The French military is not what I would characterize as significantly mobile.

2) We could have taken the country much faster than the 100 days it took the RPF to overrun it. Maybe 30 days, is my guess -- especially with the RPF's assistance. Why? Helicopters. Lives saved? Countless.

3) Rwanda is one of the most densely populated countries in the world. Only a corner of the northwest is trackless jungle. The rest of it is under heavy cultivation and habitation. That means lots of roads. And where there are roads, there are maps.

4) The war in and around Rwanda and Burundi continues mostly because the United Nations, led by France, stepped in to create safe zones for the genocidaires who fled to the Congo. So, a movement that was on the verge of total collapse was given a reprieve, allowed to reconstitute, and carried on its war. This led, more or less directly, to the ongoing slaughter in the Congo, which is a long story in itself. There was, however, nothing inevitably quagmire-ish about a Rwandan intervention in 1994.

Rwanda was about as clear-cut a case for intervention you can get. My perception is that the opposition to engagement there rested mostly on a feeling that central Africa was a murky, unknown place unsusceptible to our feeble powers to change it. These assumptions are all false.

Second, from Peter Caress:

Some points you should consider in your analysis of Kosovo and Rwanda.

First, Kosovo. Yes, the Clinton crew dishonestly made wild estimates about how bad things were in Kosovo -- shades of the Bush team making crazy claims about Saddam to whip up support for invading Iraq. But you treat Kosovo like it was a hermetically sealed conflict, totally unrelated to Bosnia. We saw what happened in Srebrenica; it's plausible that similar massacres would have eventually happened in Kosovo had NATO not intevened.

You also seem to wonder why we intervened in Kosovo but haven't intervened in Sri Lanka or Nigeria. The answers: (a) Kosovo borders NATO countries, and (b) the perceived consequences of inaction in Bosnia had shocked many people's consciences.

Next, Rwanda. If I understand you correctly, Rwanda made you an isolationist mostly because the Belgian peacekeeper troops turned tail. You wrote, "How many Tutsis died because of the false security Belgium's pantomime of concern engendered?" My guess is not many. Back in 1959, Belgium backed a revolt against the Tutsi monarchy that touched off a mini-genocide of the Tutsis by the Hutus. This was merely the first of many spates of anti-Tutsi violence. Given this history of anti-Tutsi violence and past Belgian perfidy, I doubt that many Tutsis truly believed the Belgian troops would protect them.

You then wrote, "Absent Belgium's 'humanitarian' intervention, the Tutsi would have known ahead of time what was true anyway: they were on their own and needed to look to their own defense." But as a practical matter, what could they have done to defend themselves? Although the genocide was widely abetted by the Hutu populace, the principal perpetrators were militia bands organized in advance by the Hutu faction of the government. Even the machetes were part of the plan: the plotters of the massacre stockpiled the machetes and distributed them to the militias and Hutu civilians. The Tutsis really had no chance against these government sponsored irregulars: the only way the Tutsis could have defended themselves was to flee the country altogether.

Finally, you question whether America would have stopped the genocide any faster than the RPF, the Tutsi resistance group. My own feeling is that the genocide stopped no so much when the RPF won militarily, but when they won _politically_: the genocide stopped when it became obvious that the RPF was in control and that the previous Rwandan government was no longer around to support and protect the genocidaires. If America had begun a major military intervention, I suspect we would have won politically almost immediately, thereby stopping the genocide even before we controlled the country militarily. Unlike the fight between the Rwandan army and the RPF, there would have been no doubt that America would have quickly prevailed: the Rwandan government might have folded overnight, once American troops started arriving in force.

However, you're right about the moral hazard of wading into the Rwandan quagmire. Once foreign troops were in Rwanda, they would have had to stay there for years, even decades. A quick pullout of troops could easily have ignited another genocide, just as the rapid British pullout from India ignited horrendous violence there.

I think Tacitus' offers a plausible best-case scenario. It might indeed have gone that well. And I agree with him that the French role in the aftermath of the slaughter and Tutsi reconquest was contemptible. I also think that Peter Caress' last remarks highlight all the uncertainties of the aftermath of Tac's best-case scenario. Among Burundi, the Congo and Rwanda itself, there were going to be a lot of corners to tuck in no matter who intervened when. If we take Hutu thugs for serious people - at least as serious as Somali warlords, they'd have had a strong motivation to keep free and troublesome in any scenario, and a number of opportunities to do so. We'd have been responsible for setting up some kind of "permanent" solution to Rwanda's governance problems. We would incidentally, though no one was thinking this way at the time, have provided al Qaeda with one more set of exposed targets.

It might have worked. But I think Iraq offers a useful caution re best-case scenarios.

Light a Single Candle - Now we have a Syrian dissident blogger. Go, Dude!

Being a liberal in this imploding part of the world, means that I am more of a heretic than a dissident really. Other than to the small and seemingly marginal group that shares in the heresy, one way or another, I can belong to nothing over here. I can believe in nothing that seems too indigenous. Indeed, I sing a totally different tune, one that will not be appreciated any time soon. I am forever off-key around here. I am a heretic. If anything I have to say today is ever going to be appreciated widely by people here, this will not going to happen for a hundred some years. And though I am always willing to be surprised, I have long reconciled myself to that. Being solely recognized by my fellow heretic suffices me. Well, it will have to suffice.

As such, those who doubt the ability of “me and my ilk” to change things hereabout do seem to have a legitimate point, but that’s only because they misunderstand the nature of our intended role.

There's only one post so far. May there be many more.

A Humdrum Decade - Drizz at Magnifisyncopathological marks the ten-year anniversary of Texas' concealed carry law. Upshot: Nothing happened. There has been no bloodbath of hot-tempered citizens turning their everyday frustrations into duels or drive-bys. Life goes on. Crime has gone down - murder troughed in 2000, rising slightly since then to a level well below the high in 1992 - but crime went down everywhere in the mid-to-late 1990s. Further evidence for my own hypothesis, formed during the height of the John Lott-Tim Lambert battles, that gun laws have no effect on crime rates to speak of. Any effect they do have is swamped by other factors, typically economic fluctuations and demographic shifts. (Deplete the pool of young men, lower crime.) Or, as Drizz puts it:

It just emphasizes that relatively educated humans who at least have rudimentary concepts of personal responsibility and respect for individual rights won't go on killing sprees at the drop of a whim if they are allowed (with several nontrivial restrictions, mind you) to carry handguns in public.

Self-defense is about as basic a right as one can conceive. The argument for abridging it via gun control was pragmatic - gun controllers promised that restricting effective self-defense by limiting civilian gun ownership would increase public safety. It doesn't. It's not enough that it doesn't measurably decrease public safety, because gun control is itself a harm in principle. If it provided a compelling practical benefit we could have an interesting debate over whether principle or praxis should tell. But it doesn't even have the excuse of working.

On Spec(ulations) - Thomas Nephew has found some material that may explain the famous Bush Bulge photos from the Presidential debates. And rounding out this site's Talon News coverage, Rigorous Intuition considers the possibility that, It's not the sex. It's the blackmail.

UPDATE: NAME NOT USABLE writes

Sometime about the winter 2001-2002 I was eating in that New Orleans restaurant in Rosslyn Va. near the Metro and Key Bridge by myself when very near me came a young man who was an intern or some low-level guy in the White House and who was having dinner with a charming young lady he was clearly trying to impress. Naturally, being a man of honor, I did my best to conceal my intense eavesdropping. At one point the guy had the nerve to actually think I was eavesdropping, or someone might be, because he lowered his voice and said something like "You know Bush has a [or wears a ]..." and it was clear he was referring to something sensitive and possibly health-related. The woman's voice was louder and said "Oh, people probably know that and ..." words to the effect of no one would make a big deal about it. For awhile I've suspected thereafter he wore a hearing aid; by process of elimination of the fact that it was something not too visible or obvious, nor was it a greatly shocking thing but no photo showed it. When the bulge was an issue, I saw no confirmation of that. Looks like that blogger did his homework. I've google hearing aid and Bush but nothing definitive came up, or at least I saw nothing.