Monday, July 25, 2005

On Her Majesty's Secret Service Patrick Cockburn has a report in the Sunday Independent whose title tells you everything you need to know: "Iraq has descended into chaos way beyond West's worst-case scenario." For all the newspaper and television coverage of Iraq the foreign media still fail to convey the lethal and anarchic quality of day-to-day living. . . . The bombers have paralysed Baghdad. . . .  The country has never been as dangerous as it is today. Baghdad must present even more peril to someone like Cockburn, whose mobility is hindered by the polio he had in childhood. Still, it's probably safer than being a Brazilian electrician in London, when an aged Sherlock Holmes, no longer in full possession of his faculties, sends an equally superannuated Agent 007 out to fire seven shots into your head and one into your shoulder for good measure. Soon we shall witness another venerable British tradition, as the barristers don their periwigs and debate the merits of a wrongful death lawsuit.  The only thing missing is Alistair Cooke to introduce the story. 10:58:01 PM

Familiarity Breeds Contempt Today on NPR's "Day to Day," Ron Elving pontificated about current domestic political issues facing the Bush regime: NPR Senior Washington Editor Ron Elving discusses the issues coming up this week in national politics, including the potential fight over the nomination of Judge John G. Roberts to the Supreme Court, and the investigation into the leak of a CIA operative's identity to the news media. While discussing the CIA leak, he referred to the protagonists as Joe Wilson, Al Gonzales, and Andy Card.  Mercifully, he did not call the CIA agent herself Val Plame. This is all part of the Dan Rather syndrome, wherein newsmakers are referred with names like Tim McVeigh, Ken Lay, Jeff Skilling and Bernie Ebbers -- not to mention the Bush syndrome, where terrorists are described as "the folks who did this". In a country where anybody can grow up to be president (provided that he's the son of a president), it's reassuring to know that we can call our political and economic leaders by their schoolyard names. 1:52:26 PM