Dumb, but far from the dumbest

To me social networking seems like the least social activity somebody could do. Then again, I may be one of the last few members of Generation Y (anybody born between 1980-1997) that is not on Myspace or Facebook.

My reasons for resisting the temptation to build a personal shrine for others to see are based solidly upon hypocrisy and, though I struggle to admit it, sanctimonious illusions disguised as disingenuous ideals.

The whole concept of keeping a Web site that chronicles your favorite books, music, drinking habits and political and sexual leanings is stupid for more reasons than worth listing here. However, like most innovations, there are enormous opportunities for humanity to communicate with each other within these sites.

I will admit that I know how to navigate both Myspace and Facebook, and often do. My buddy from college has a login that I still remember. So yes, there’s the hypocrisy. Also, the truth is I like using the sites to see who is getting married or who has drifted apart and all that shit. A friend who is currently living in Japan regularly posts pictures on Facebook that I check to keep myself up to date on why my life sucks.

But I like telling people that I am not a member of either site. Why? Well, I am not sure. A girl I work with once told me that, “Not being on Facebook doesn’t make you a person people think of as quirky or intellectually superior…it makes people think nobody is thinking about you at all.” I had to laugh because I THINK, judging by the three separate uses of the word THINK in her ridiculous explanation, that she was serious. I told her I was perfectly fine with not having anybody thinking about me. When I said I also don’t have cable television her eyes widened and she changed the topic.

Later, though, I felt I may have come off as extremely haughty, like I was trying to portray an idealized version of myself -- the man who reads Chaucer, listens to Chopin and refuses blow jobs. I can assure you I’ve never done any of these things. I do, however, have an extreme aversion to the stupidity on television. Yes, Sportscenter and the Daily Show are excellent but try watching anything else. Fear Factor, Deal or No Deal, Dateline, The Biggest Loser and so many others are made solely for the resting retard within us all. And those popular programs are examples from just one network (NBC).



In a new book by Mark Bauerlein called “The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes our Future (Or don’t trust anyone under the age of 30), ” the author suggests that Generation Y will basically bring an end to the world because of our lack of understanding of history. Obviously, we have our shortcomings but the book is ridiculous on a number of levels. I fundamentally disagree that our generation (at least in totality), which Bauerlein dubs the dumbest, is less educated than my Grandpa’s, which Tom Brokaw and many others have called the greatest. There’s just no way, if the ages are compared by any logical barometer (literacy rate, % of college degrees, even IQ tests to name a few).

Also, it’s tough to believe that Mr. Bauerlein’s own generation is not to blame for our so-called stupidity. Last time I checked adults ran institutions of higher education and implemented the criteria for what students are forced to learn. Bauerlein, himself, is a professor of English at Emory University.

But, yes, it is scary to see surveys that show up to a quarter of Gen Y’ers can’t name the vice president or one member of the Supreme Court. So does this mean we will bring about an end to civilization as we know it, though? Almost surely not.

And I’d argue that more young people are involved today in issues ranging from global warming to electing the president (See Barack Obama’s base) than ever before.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/26/education/26green.html?scp=2&sq=seed+house&st=nyt

There is reason to believe that social networking can lead down an anti-social road when someone has 167 online friends and no human friends. Or if wikipedia and google are constantly being used as substitutes for memorization, red flags should fly. And finally without question "Dancing with the Stars" makes dumb people dumber.

However, innovations like the Internet or the I-pod, which Bauerlein blames for distracting our youthful minds, are not the causation for society’s declining intellect – if it is, in fact, in decline.

Bauerlein’s points are trite and his conclusions reek of the same ambiguous odors that past generations tried to place upon his generation. For whatever reason, the old finds it their inherent rite to give up on and look down upon the young. The cycle will almost surely continue.

It’s tough to argue against the fact that reading more Rousseau and watching less MTV would be beneficial for society, but it’s even more difficult to allow Mr. Bauerlein to get away with all of his conclusions scot-free.

Perplexing Patriots

I should dislike the New England Patriots. Usually teams that have their qualities I utterly despise.

Their coach seems like a pretentious prick that will do anything – legal or not – to gain an advantage. Their golden boy quarterback left his pregnant girlfriend (who is really hot) for a Brazilian supermodel, who is also off-the-charts banging. And their best wide receiver once said he’d pay his $5,000 fine from the NFL with “straight cash homey.”

They kind of remind me of Duke’s basketball team in the early 1990’s. That Blue Devils squad had guys like Christian Laettner, Bobby Hurley and Grant Hill. They dressed like choirboys but played like Soviet spies. They were well manicured and absolutely lethal. They looked at basketball like Karl Rove looks at politics: All tactics are always on the table. In terms of preparation and execution, nobody was even close. But I hated them on a visceral level for reasons I simply can’t explain. Watching Bobby or Christian hug Coach K and then have to hear them talk about how the parts of the team came together as a whole made me want to vomit - preferably on one of their blue cashmere sweaters.

But with the Patriots something is different, appealing even. It’s like they all wear Teflon coats. So far just this year, they have been caught cheating, one of their best defensive players was suspended for performance enhancing drugs and they’ve run up the score in so many games, they’re almost universally vilified. However, they also happen to be the most appealing team to watch in a league that is mostly unappealing.

This is largely because they are undefeated after 15 regular-season games, something that had never been done before in league history. The 72’ Dolphins won 14 straight, when the season was only that long, and then ran the table in the playoffs as well.

The undefeated season is pretty much unheard of in the NFL and it’s even starting to be that way at the collegiate level. LSU, which is probably the most talented team in the country, will play Ohio State in the National Championship next week, and they have two losses. And the last few champions have all had at least one defeat.

An impressive achievement still doesn’t explain why people give the Pats the benefit of the doubt, though. Barry Bonds’ anabolic achievements were no doubt awesome but also cancerously soiled in most people’s eyes. Yet the Patriots haven’t been sent to the public guillotine for their supposed sins.

I wonder if once the season or the streak ends, they’ll face more scrutiny. My bet would be no. People don’t seem to care that they were caught taping the Jets sideline (something they surely did multiply times prior to that Sunday). Or if they do, they feel electrocuting dogs is more worthy of their dismay.

But what I can’t put a finger on is why Belichick’s boys seem pissed off that they have to be so good. I’ve never seen a team that, from top to bottom, exudes their type of non-emotion emotions. They never stray far from the game plan, rarely go off message off the field and seem to have magically installed robotic qualities in narcissistic athletes. Somebody on that sideline knows the formula for transforming money-hungry individuals into kool-aid drinking altruists. And it’s nothing short of amazing.



As Brady throws deep into double coverage for the one guy who could catch the clap from a nun, he knows Moss will bring it in. The superstars may bump helmets in the end zone afterwards but then they’ll walk off the field and act like they just went three and out.


The underdog is always fun to cheer for but New England is bringing style back to Goliath. Which makes it confusing for fans hoping to form an opinion on the inevitable.

The Diamond that sparkles to only half the world

In the fantastic movie “What about Bob?,” Bill Murray tells his therapist Richard Dreyfus that “There are two types of people in the world: those who like Neil Diamond and those who don’t. And my wife loves him.”

This is the analogy that Bob uses to describe why his marriage fails and subsequently why his life turns into a schizophrenic rollercoaster ride bound for hell. On its face, the exchange seems like any other ridiculously contrived scenario scripted by a Hollywood writer pandering to pop culture stereotypes. However, I’ve thought about the particular scene a lot and believe it to be true. It’s a very Bushian “with us or against us attitude” that applies quite well to most people.

Now, anyone slightly knowledgeable about music usually has a very concrete opinion about Neil Diamond: That he sucks. But I should mention first and foremost that I think Neil is a badass in every sense of the word. The guy is pure cock. So, obviously, it’s apparent what camp I fall in with.

And, hopefully, not to sound like I am auditioning for the sequel to Saving Silverman, the intro to Crunchy Granola Suite on Hot August Nights still makes me happier (i.e. when I am fall down drunk) than any other song I’ve ever heard. If you’re not dancing on a raised surface or dry humping a bar stool by the time that song ends, then we’re probably not going to be friends. [Editors note, I have two friends]

Of course critics will always hate a guy like Neil Diamond. He’s the Velveeta of cheese dicks, the quintessential hairy ball of testosterone that kind of reminds you of your least favorite uncle. He dresses in shirts that porn stars at discothèques couldn’t pull off. His lyrics are mediocre at best and his catalog includes names of songs like “Soggy Pretzels” and “Porcupine Pie.” But what these so-called experts often fail to realize is that THE NEIL thrives off of the criticism. How do I know this? Because I saw the man say it on VH1 Behind the Music, that’s how.



Plus, Neil ranks behind only Elton John and Barbra Streisand for most records sold amongst living artists – over 120 million. And when you live in the same space as Streisand, highbrows who still view music as art probably should dismiss you. However, can music ever really be bad if it does the two things it’s supposed to do: Make you want to dance and have unprotected sex with strangers?

No.

Neil isn’t the only artist I loved that the collective pool of paid music aficionados hated. The Beastie Boys (especially their album Paul’s Boutique, which is quite possibly the best music compilation ever made) was trashed by critics, who called the Brooklyn trio misogynists and frat-boy messiahs. Also when I was big into Dave Matthews, I still remember an unflattering portrait in Spin magazine that wounded my soul.

Growing up, my ultimate barometer for a band being cool was my older brother. If he listened to them I dug it by default. My first memories were of him listening to a lot of show-us-your-tits hair bands, but I think I kind of missed that boat. Groups like Pearl Jam, the Dire Straits and Neil Young I recall hearing in his car as he drove us to school, and man oh man, Eddie Vedder was pure cock as well.

This still holds true today, and he’s almost always the one that introduces me to new music. And now, largely because of him, there’s stuff on my iPod that even critics adore, like Wilco, whom I agree kicks ass with boots on.

Anyway getting back to Neil and the cultural chasm that his music has created. Unfortunately the folks who generally say they love Neil are either big fans of the refrain to Sweet Caroline (but think Red, Red Wine is a UB40 song) or are women nearing death hoping for one last orgasm. And the man that will give it to them: “The Diamond in the please-don’t-make-it-rough, Neil.”

This is why his music is so easy to dismiss. To steal a line from Chuck Klosterman’s Fargo Rock City, people like artists based on who else likes that artist. It’s natural and will never change. And when you’re at a show and all you see is slurring 20-somethings and horny members of the Greatest Generation singing Cracklin Rosie (while Neil is supine on the stage), I agree it might be difficult to take the dude seriously.

My only argument though would be that Neil understands what he was and has become. Don’t get me wrong, I think he takes himself seriously and would be offended if anyone were to insinuate that he were a joke or novelty act, but he knows his shtick and lives in it and with it to the fullest.

The guy may not necessarily be a visionary, but try throwing him on at an after-hours party and see how the crowd responds. If he bombs, you need new friends.

If he nails it, you’ll need a new coffee table. Take your pick. It’s always a choice with the diamond that is forever polarazing.

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Ah, what’s not to love about football season?”

That’s a question I hear a lot during this glorious window in between summer and winter. And I’ll agree this is generally when sports are at their best.

But I’ll tell you one thing that is certainly “not to love” about football season: The advertising. And specifically the one’s for truck companies. I mean the truck ads, and the target audience they must be after, is only rivaled in ridiculousness by the spots for the Marines.

In their campaigns, the army wants you to believe that the Marines will teach a youth how to scale mountains without ropes, attend graduate school without money and slay mythical fire monsters without weapons. And in the end “when the journey is complete,” they’ll be transformed magically into a man (or woman) who looks awfully gay. For obvious reasons, these ad wizards think showing18-year-olds taking on fire monsters is a better sell than highlighting the sand monsters they’d no doubt meet.

Yet the truck ads are far worse. I can at least stomach the military using patriotic sloganeering, because serving in the armed forces is certainly honorable and certainly not something I want to do. But evoking the most visceral emotions in people, whether by using wounded veterans or soot-covered Sept. 11th workers waving American flags, simply to sell trucks is criminal.

As football games go to a natural or a scripted break, that’s when the saturation begins. Last Sunday, I started laughing because I saw one spot for Chevy where the ad has kids from the Great Depression playing football, then some sort of ranch-hand wiping sweat from his brow and then a dude for the present-day 49ers makes a diving catch. And it’s all cued up to John Mellencamp’s “This is Our Country.” The sequence seemed extremely convoluted and totally nonsensical.



“This is our country, and THIS is our Truck.” Making me wonder: Whose country? The little shavers from the Depression? Or the sweaty vaquero? Or the millionaire athlete? Oh, I get it now; the U.S. is all of ours. Thanks Chevrolet.

However, this is not a new campaign for Chevy. They’ve been running them for at least four or five years, and the new ads are more or less trite offshoots of the original:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=k-ZOtlQJnqI

The ad above is the definition of insanity. With only 59 seconds to work with, a customer might think marketers would be hamstringed in their quest to tap deep into the nation’s well of faux nostalgia. But au contraire mis amigos, there’s plenty of time to see footage from: WWII, the 1950’s auto boom, hula hoops, Rosa Parks, The Cougar playing guitar on a Chevy, Muhammad Ali, Vietnam, hippies dancing, Martin Luther King Jr., Richard Nixon, Neil Armstrong’s moon-walk, Forest Fires, Hurricane Katrina, Dale Earnhardt Jr., 9/11 freedom lights, soldiers returning from Iraq and the Grand Canyon.

I think if the Louisiana Purchase and the Teapot Dome Scandal could have been squeezed into the spot, Chevrolet would have run the entire gauntlet of American History in one advertisement for, eh hem, the FUCKING CHEVY SILVERADO.

Yet Chevrolet is certainly not the only truck guilty of terrible advertising. Dodge Ram, I believe, is the company that always has a really deep voice saying something like, “Truckers say if you can pull 10,000 pounds, you damn well be able to stop 10,000 pounds.”

Then the truck, which is pulling what appears to be the western side of the Hoover Dam, speeds down a runway (narrowly missing a swinging piece of concrete along the way) before slamming on its brakes right before the edge of a cliff. I mean, what demographic possibly pulls 10k’s and then needs to stop on a dime inches from the edge of a cliff? That’s like Smokey in the Bandit shit combined with some Incredible Hulk on wheels.

Toyota Tacoma also tries to stay well below the fray, spewing out ads that have their trucks challenging Raptors and winning and driving through fantasy land’s Las Vegas: The World of Warcraft video game. The Tacoma is actually a player in the game who, of course, can’t be killed. This would be a perfect scenario if people who enjoyed dinosaurs, video games and constant masturbation also enjoyed trucks. Not sure if they’ve been focused-grouped, however.



And last but certainly not least there's Ford, a company who uses the assiest of ass clowns out there: Mr. Toby Keith. The guy repeatedly makes the claim that he's a "Ford Truck Man." I'll make the claim once and for all that he's a gigantic wanker.

I’d bet that even people who hate ads like these are willing to stomach them, though, because they understand how the bigger game works. And plus now and then, an advertisement hits the right button at the right time.

And the alternatives suck too. The idea of TiVO – who promotes the campaign, “Work T.V. around your schedule rather than the other way around,” is pathetic on at least three levels - if there were hypothetically three total levels.

The point is that football is something I need to watch. But truck ads are something I can’t watch.

Damn the TiVO to hell. For I may need his services after all.

New phone, old problems

After a little over two years I finally have a new cell phone. My friend said the old one was starting to look like a two-way carcinogen. An overall fair assessment on her part.

But my disdain for Sprint PCS, which is well documented, has somehow increased over the last few days. I honestly think retarded apes run the place.

So here’s an abbreviated version of how I came to contemplate therapy last night.

My day started yesterday when I was given a Sprint LGX-180 phone as a birthday present. I followed the instructions that were enclosed in a huge yellow brochure with tiny black print to activate the curse. It said I needed to locate the ESN number, an eleven-digit number (according to the reading material that made about as much sense as Finnegan’s Wake) on the battery, and call 1-888 something.

Of course I did all that and got the same female automated voice used by almost every company. You know the woman because she’s probably on your voicemail. The voice sounds like the Whore of Babylon, but probably doesn’t put out at all. I hate her.

DA DING DONG: “Welcome to Sprint’s customer service line. Please listen carefully because our menu has changed. If you’re a Sprint PCS employee calling to check on the whereabouts of your soul, please press 1. If you’ve been experiencing problems with your Bluetooth-980 headset with dual antennas, please press 2. If you’d like to listen to slow jazz for the next 45 minutes, please 3. If you’re an overweight Mexican and can’t understand shit I am saying, please press cuatro. If you’d like to hear this menu repeated more slowly and condescending, please press 5. For all other inquires we’d advise you to hang up and go to our Web site, which is more than likely under repair. Message 181.” HANG UP.

“Ah, god dammit anyway,” I said to myself. I called back and figured out which number to push in order to get a real person. I think it was cuatro. A woman named Jeanine picked up, who happens to be both extremely polite and extremely dumb.

“Oh hello, sir, what can I be of assistance with today?” I gave the reason I was calling and asked if I could have all of my contacts in my old phone transferred over to the new LGX-180 as well. “Oh that shouldn’t be a problem,” she informed me.

The conversation took maybe five minutes at most. Jeanine gave a couple of simple commands and said to wait about two hours and the phone would be activated and that all my old contacts would show up in roughly four hours. “This is great,” I thought.

However, in typical fashion things didn’t quite go as planned. Four hours soon became seven hours and my phone was still not working. And what about my contacts? God only knows where they were. Probably out making new contacts: Those backstabbers.

When I called again I got a male voice. I don’t remember his name, but homeboy seemed to have the same gleefully moronic disposition as Jeanine. He asked for my social security number and went through all the jazz to confirm that I wasn’t somebody else trying to access my account. Who would try to call these people if they didn’t have to, I thought? And what could they rob from my cell phone carrier other than my nights and weekend plan?

Abruptly, he asked if he could put me on hold while he accessed my account in the computer. I said that was fine and prepared for the elevator music to be cued. But it wasn’t and something far worse was: A dial tone.

Now, generally I try to keep my profanity to a minimum. Only in rare cases will I let f-bombs drop in multitudes of expressive rage that generally end with a certain part of the male anatomy being sucked. However, this was certainly one of those times.

I called back and began trying to take note of every detail I could. The woman who answered this time was Gale. Gale was bar none the stupidest human being I’ve ever talked to. She repeated this question twice: “So you’re having problems with your phone, right?”

For the first time, I snapped. “Gale, do people ever call to tell you guys how well their phone is working?” Gale didn’t respond. Gale then had the nerve to ask me how the weather was. Honest to god, that’s what she asked next. Didn’t even bother asking where I lived. “The weather is absolutely lovely, Gale.”



My friend sensed that it was no longer a good idea for me to keep talking. Taking the phone from my ear, she hung up on Gale and told me to calm down. I laughed at her certitude and sense of purpose immediately. “Why did you just do that?” She didn’t answer and called Sprint from her phone, leaving me to open a beer.

I sat down and proceeded to watch her talk to two Sprint representatives in a span of 25 minutes. After that, my new phone rang for the first time. And it was like seeing my first child come out of the womb – even though I don’t have children and wombs frighten the hell out of me.

All in all, the process took nine hours, five customer service operators, two people and one newly anointed 25-year-old’s sanity for the Sprint LGX – 180 to be activated.

Oh yeah, and later I was informed that I'd have to find a Sprint store at “one of our many convenient locations” in order to get my contacts transferred. Which would cost $30. Also, because they updated my account I was obligated to sign a new two-year contract.

By the end, I was so angry I decided to count the digits on the ESN number. And it was 17 digits long.

Fucking. Cock. Suckers.

The MC that refuses to stop hammering

I went out of my way to see MC Hammer last night. Not that there was a whole lot on my schedule, but I planned an evening around the man born Stanley Kirk Burrell who happens to be credited with bringing “2 legit 2 quit” into the lexicon.

Yes, I realize how this sounds. It’s on par with searching out a foot willing to give your balls a kick.

And, frankly, the only thing that might be more pathetic than seeing MC Hammer is blogging about the experience of seeing MC Hammer. But this was something that needed to be done. For I didn’t know the emcee still performed

So I met a group of co-workers and we made our way to the metro, laughing. Most of us, myself certainly included, were hoping for only one thing from the Hammer Man: The pants. “God damn I hope he is wearing those Hammer pants.”

Nobody in our group could name more than three of Hammer’s songs, or knew if he had more than three songs. To tell you the truth, I think I was the only one who could name the third. I remember seeing him perform the “Addams Groove,” the featured song from the Addams Family motion picture, on Saturday Night Live. It was a reference that didn’t win many cool points I could tell. Maybe because I knew the song’s title.

Excitement had reached a fevered pitch, as if brewing tea were ready, when we detrained at the Federal Triangle metro stop. This was the venue Stanley Kirk Burrell had been reduced to (the stage was literally steps from the exit of the metro). And judging by the number of people there initially, it looked as if we’d have an excellent opportunity to touch the man who’d made a career out of telling people that that particular sense couldn’t be done.

Then I proceeded to get drunk, really drunk. Sobriety and MC Hammer didn’t sound appealing. Shit-faced and MC Hammer sounded fucking awesome.

Waiting at this uppity bar in plain view of the stage, I proceeded to listen to hands-down the worst R&B I’d ever heard in my life. Not that I’m a Rhythm and Blues connoisseur by any stretch, but these guys made R. Kelly sound messianic. The group was the first of two opening acts and they did mostly a cappella numbers, with one member even in charge of what seemed to be the horn section.

When the second act finally completed, the Master of Ceremonies waited for over 30 minutes to take the stage. The performer still knows how to toy with the crowd. He’s a hammerin’ puppet-master with a world full of adoring pawns. Or maybe that’s hyperbole.

Chants of “Hammer, Hammer, Hammer,” and “Hammer, don’t hurt em,” continued to rain down. With fits of laughter almost always following the yells. Which made me feel kind of sorry for the guy, because I wondered if he knew that the clown aspect of his alter ego was the reason he garnered an audience at all (even one that didn’t pay a dime).

When Hammer finally walked out, I realized there was a decent-sized crowd waiting for him. And people erupted. It was as if Barry Bonds had just shown up at a Human Growth Hormone testing lab. There was genuine excitement in the air and some disappointment that he was not wearing his trademark pants. Hammer’s pants were not Hammer pants. In fact, they kind of looked like Dockers.

He was dressed in all black with sunglasses and a bandana. He sang the few songs we knew, minus the Addams Groove. I can’t even tell you if Hammer’s a great performer or awful. Maybe somewhere in between. I mean the music was certainly awful, but the ensemble of dancers he had was downright nasty. They knew how to shake it.

The highlight of the evening had to be when a fellow emcee joined Hammer, who went by the name of Pleasure Ellis. Pleasure gave a speech, while rapping mind you, about the benefits of safe sex. He kept screeching, “If you’re going to have pleasure, oh pleasure, I say pleasure, it’s gotta be, yes girl, ya know it’s gotta be, chocolate girl it’s gotta-got to be, you know, safe.” Or something like that. The refrain might not be verbatim but it’s damn close. And then Pleasure endorsed Trojan as his prophylactic of choice.

This was all followed by Hammer telling the crowd he did not mean to have his last child with his wife.

Unbelievable.



So unbelievable that when I got home I had to check out a few things about Hammer’s life: “His rise, his fall, his redemption.” That line I stole from a Hammer tribute Web site.

The site chronicled how a dude with a net worth, at one point, of $33 million can go bankrupt. Hammer in his hey day owned two helicopters, invested over $1 million in Thoroughbred racehorses, paid his entourage of 200 people a total of $500, 000 a month, and leased a Boeing 727. And there are so many more accounting anomalies that it moves beyond ridiculous into a realm all its own.

My favorites have to be that he repeatedly bought platinum gold chains for his 4 pet Rottweilers and once had a dishwasher installed in his bedroom so that he could easily, “clean up after a midnight snack.”

If you want to hear from the man himself, check out his own blog at: http://mchammer.blogspot.com/

Whew, MC simply dropped the hammer last night. And it's made today awful thus far.

A not so gay week for the G.O.P.

In a city known for its gravity, with the ability to bring the haughtiest of the haughty back to earth, an amazing week passed in the world of politics. Not since a chubby intern sucked her way into the hearts of salacious journalists everywhere, was a story of one man’s love of fellatio so widely reported.

And the tapping sound coming from the stall belonging to Sen. Larry “I am not gay” Craig, a staunch conservative (especially on matters dealing with gays), came after an already brutal stretch for Republicans.

It started at the top when President Bush compared the Iraq War to the one conflict he’s tried for the better part of four years to distance the fiasco from: Vietnam.

The veteran of the mighty Texas Air National Guard told a Veterans of Foreign Wars group in Kansas City that "To withdraw without getting the job done would be devastating…..and unlike in Vietnam, if we were to withdraw before the job was done, this enemy would follow us home.”

Beyond the ridiculous premise that Sunni and Shiite insurgents are going to obtain U.S. passports and continue their civil war on our soil, lies an even more baffling argument the president is trying to make.

A consensus can be found in most analytical circles that, in terms of departure, our troops left Vietnam far too late, not early. And that our presence destabilized Cambodia and opened the door for Khmer Rouge, under the leadership of Pol Pot, to execute an estimated 1.5 million people.

This is why in the past the administration went to absurd lengths not to hint at any analogies between the two foreign campaigns. For a solid argument exists in each case that U.S. military escalations turned once functional societies into regional buffets of bloodletting and anarchy, with few of the desired objectives being realized.

The comparisons left most of the country scratching their heads – even the heads belonging to those dwindling few still in the president’s wheelhouse.

Army Gen. John Johns (a dude who clearly was without creative parents), a Vietnam veteran who spent 12 years specializing in counter-insurgency missions, told the Atlanta Journal Constitution that "What I learned in Vietnam is that U.S. combat forces could not effectively conduct counter-insurgency operations,” he said, “the longer we stay there, the worse it's going to get."

Then, the already bad week became worse as Bush headed to Crawford and the pesky brush that needed pulling back.

Sen. John Warner of Virginia, a leading voice for Republicans in terms of military strategy, said the U.S. should begin withdrawing small numbers of troops in Iraq by Christmas. His comments were followed by a report from the Government Accountability Office that determined only three of 18 benchmarks, set previously by lawmakers for security and political stability in Iraq, had been met.

Warner went ahead and did the tour de talk shows on Sunday, laying out coherent strategies on why the Iraqi government needs to be held to account and why allied commitments must not be open-ended.



With Monday, however, came an event that appeared would never happen: The resignation of Selective Amnesia Al. The attorney general had become a colorful piñata – the defining symbol of nepotism’s trump over knowledge within an administration more irrelevant by the day.

But the Gonzales resignation was drowned out by the Craig incident, a weird twist in a life of a man almost nobody had ever heard of. The G.O.P. quickly tried to makeup the black eye and demanded the three-term senator - whose explanation of the events is laughable (A guilty plea to a lewd act in a men’s room stall will make it go away?) - resign.

Craig caved to his party’s wishes the day before another White House official jumped ship. Press Secretary Tony Snow, the generally likable face of the administration, who also is fighting a resurgence of cancer, stepped down. Even though Snow recently said the Iraqi Parliament went on vacation simply because Baghdad is 135 degrees in August, missing the obvious irony that our troops spend their days outside, he did an admirable job under the circumstances.

And Karl Rove exited stage right on Friday – meaning the once mighty Republican vanguard had officially fallen victim to gravity’s downward tug.