Just Because Alfie Blogging

IMG_3967.JPG, originally uploaded by virgotex.

“Pretty soon I’ll be big enough to kick Willie B’s ass.”

Even the douchebag can see it

Bob Novak, WaPo, today

Hadley called his expedition a “scouting trip,” leading one senator to ask what he was seeking. It was not advice on how to escape from Iraq. Instead, Hadley appeared interested in how previous supporters of Bush’s course had drifted away. In the process, though, he planted seeds of concern. Some senators were left with the impression that the White House still does not recognize the scope of the Iraq dilemma. Worse yet, they see the president running out the clock until April, when a depleted U.S. military can be blamed for the fiasco.

Novak gives a suprisingly frank assessment of Stephen Hadley’s Capitol Hill scouting trip to sound out the Republican graybeard response after Lugar went off the reservation week beforelast re Chimp’s Iraq policy.

As the first in a succession of Republican senators to be critical of Bush’s Iraq policy, Hagel feared the worst when he returned home to conservative Nebraska for Fourth of July parades. Instead, he was pleasantly surprised by cheers and calls for the troops to be brought home. Perhaps a White House scouting trip into the American heartland might be worthwhile.

I don’t think the White House could find the American heartland, even with all the “scouts” at their disposal. They’ve spent too long simultaneously ignoring it, running from it, not seeing or hearing it, pretending it’s something it’s not, and trampling on its rights that by now they wouldn’t recognize it if it passed them on the sidewalk.

Yesterday is History

Skeleton Plant (Lygodesmia texana) with unidentified skipper.

‘Tis so far away
Yesterday is Poetry
‘Tis Philosophy

Yesterday is mystery
Where it is Today
While we shrewdly speculate
Flutter both away

—Emily Dickinson