Poor Man and Atrios got there via Lord Weisberg, so I'll let them deconstruct the new meme that anyone against dWindle's Iraq debacle is ipso facto an "isolationist."

What strikes me is how hard I'm struck by the meme's dissonance. I'm used to the Right's slurs (like, oh, I celebrate the death of every soldier), which no matter how preposterous usually fit their sweaty stereotype of their sweaty manliness, measured best against imagined Left limpdickedness. And I'm used to Right pivots of illogic: Karl Rove has made his career by identifying his opponents' strengths and attacking them as weaknesses.

But the swiftness the Right has swiveled from attacking the Left for wanting the U.S. to engage in multilateral diplomacy rather than cowboying solo to attacking the Left for wanting to cowboy solo, to me, is a breathtakingly new leap of audacious nonsense. Beyond the standard Conservative meme of Liberal cowardice, even by Conservative standards the ahistorical assertions are stunning.

Meaning it's again time to pose the question: Which is worse, that the Right lies and knows it lies or the Right lies and believes it's telling the truth? That the flexibility of the Right's perception of truth is so amoral or that the amorality of the Right's perception of truth is so flexible?

* * * * *

Oh, by the way, that surge to last three months, as originally proposed by it's advocates? Well, now it's eighteen months, minimum.

Once eighteen months gains traction, what incremental step is it in what grander disaster?

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STUPIDEST COLUMN OF THE DAY:

Charlotte Allen breaks out the tired Oh My Gawd, Look What They're Teaching in College column.

Here's one:

6. Border Crossings, Borderlands: Transnational Feminist Perspectives on Immigration'

University of Washington. This women studies department offering takes a new look at recent immigration debates in the U.S., integrating questions of race and gender while also looking at the role of the war on terror.

And the problem, Ms Allen, is?

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Buzz about Negroponte to State, with rumors of Cheney's demise for health reasons (insert snarky disease here) and dWindle elevating Rice to VPOTUS.

Would be worth the price of admission if only to watch St McCain's head explode, spraying lava-hot fury-pus at the realization that dWindle has anointed someone not named St McCain as dWindle's successor.

Don't worry if it's just a rumor - it really is just a matter of time before St McCain's head explodes, spraying lava-hot fury-pus. Just a matter of time. Hopefully before he's elected preznit, mind you.

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Gore 08?

And there are small signs here and there that could be read as the stirrings of his renewed interest in a campaign. Early last month, Gore addressed more than three dozen labor leaders in Washington, a wide-ranging talk about the Democratic congressional gains and the media, said one attendee, who demanded anonymity. Asked about 2008, Gore said that he has taken a number of calls from people encouraging him to consider running but he "didn't know whether he was going to or not," the source said. "Everybody felt he left a small door open."

The trick for Gore is to make this seem like he was drafted. That could work.

You know what else would work, all the way to the White House? Gore/Obama.

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Cat Stevens interviewed. An Argentine shortstory writer translated to English for first time. Richard Powers on speaking a novel to life.