Hm.

Which suggests a possibility, which will not happen, but what the hell:

If Florida will go along with offshore drilling, then there's no remaining political barrier to McCain simply calling for offshore drilling, period, determined by the federal government (as is always the case), no state-by-state determination.

The big two objectors here were Florida and California -- McCain needs Florida, but can't win California. So it hurts him not at all to move in the coming months to a more aggressive posture and simply urge more drilling, whether California wants it or not.

Pissing off Californians, whose electoral votes he won't get, might ingratiate him with Michaganders or Ohioans, whose votes he might.

So, in a fantasy world where McCain actually advocates the right position in terms of both policy and politics, who knows, maybe, in this Bizarro World, he'd slowly roll out a more powerful pro-drilling position.

In the real world, he'll continue running on Iraq, which due to the recent success, might actually not even be an issue in November and could, actually, stand on its own reasonably well by then,* and cutting pork, which is a good-government sort of issue, and goo-goo issues have never, in the entire history of politics in the whole of the known universe, won a single election.

* As the surge succeeds and violence ebbs and normalcy takes hold, Obama's reckless "let's try to lose this as soon as possible" position becomes less reckless. He might be presented with a fait accompli in November in which, actually, he can't lose Iraq anymore, no matter how much he tries, absent re-invading it on behalf of Al Qaeda and Iran.

So, perversely, as Bush and McCain are more proven right, Obama's position becomes more wrong, but also more irrelevant. As Iraq is truly, finally won, the difference between Obama's position and Petraeus' position might narrow quite a bit. We could see Obama arguing "withdraw now," and Petraeus saying "Well, we won the fucking war, so we can prudently withdraw most troops within 3-6 months" -- which is a difference, to be sure, but probably not enough of one to change votes either way.

In short, as victory comes, the difference who say "withdraw after victory" and those who say "withdraw now" narrows. When full and final victory is at hand, "withdraw after victory" becomes "withdraw now."

The pro-surge, pro-victory coalition will have been proven right -- but the public doesn't seem to give a shit, and besides, they're not going to vote against Obama for being on the wrong side of a now-mooted issue.

So, as I keep saying, it would be kinda-sorta helpful to McCain to have a couple of issues where he's on the right side of politics and policy, and which actually might animate voters.

He is behaving as if it's just not "sporting" to take a position opposite your opponent when your opponent is locked in to an godawful position. After all, wouldn't that be taking unfair advantage of an opponent's weakness?

thanks to Gabe.

Posted by: Ace at 12:43 PM | Comments (48)
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Allah points out he used the same verbal formulation when asked about his open-borders, Viva Mexico adviser Juan Hernandez:

Quoth the Maverick, “I would be glad to examine any statement from any supporter of mine,” which would be encouraging if he hadn’t already promised five months ago that he’d be “check[ing] into” the information about Hernandez that some reporter had given him. He always says this when someone puts him on the spot and he thinks he can’t get away with telling them to get bent, as he might with a question about, say, pulling out of Iraq. It’s basically a verbal tic, like his mantra-like repetition of “my friends.”

Apparently he's still examining Juan Hernandez' statement. Maverickeyness, like artistic genius, simply cannot be rushed.

So, you know, forget it.

We Are Fucked.

I really don't have to make threats about not voting for McCain. He's going to lose the race, badly.

When he's sitting out his retirement, he can pat himself on the back for his uncompromising maverickey integrity until his fucking arm falls off.

And that's really all he ever wanted.

Posted by: Ace at 12:07 PM | Comments (46)
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A guy on FoxNews explained the following:

Sheared-off feet are common on plane crashes, as feet slip under the seat in front of the passenger. The impact against the bottom of the seat often fractures the ankle or shears it off completely. Presumably, even if it's only badly wounded, fish and decomposition would do the rest.

There was a plane crash with five missing in the area way back in 2005. (He didn't say this, but obviously those bodies have not been recovered, or he wouldn't have brought it up as a possible cause.)

Ocean temperatures need to rise to around 45-50 degrees, as they are now, in order to permit the gas formation to allow the float. Until now the bodies may have been trapped in the plane or hung up on underwater trees.

As five right feet and one left foot have been recovered, so far, the number of feet are explainable by this five-person crash.

If the feet belong to these missing people, DNA tests will ID them, as the DNA from the feet can be compared to the victims' family members.

I'm not sure why the pilot, who doesn't sit in the sort of passenger seat which results in foot-severing, would also have his feet severed, but otherwise it seems like a pretty good explanation.

Every Question Has an Answer That's Simple, Logical, and Wrong:

"To date, it has failed to match DNA samples collected from members of the crash victims' families with DNA obtained from some of the mystery feet."

--- BBC

Thanks to l4n3.

Posted by: Ace at 11:58 AM | Comments (44)
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The prosecutors have 20 days to file their appeal of Col. Folsom's decision. Something which several commenters noted could happen in this thread the other day, since the charges were dropped "without prejudice".

Filing an appeal is not winning an appeal, but it is dragging out the ordeal for Lt. Col. Chessani and his family.

via HotAir headlines

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 11:51 AM | Comments (10)
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DrewM. thinks that McCain just winked at him, all sexy-like.

I'll bet he'd be happy to reconsider it. To win this election against a money-raising juggernaut, he's going to have to have one or two issues the public actually favors him on.

That would be helpful, I think.

Again, this isn't a true flip-flop, as the circumstances since he first announced his policy (which was also stupid at the time, but not suicidally so) have dramatically changed.

The ANWR moratorium was only mildly retarded at $50 per barrel oil. It's at $140 per oil it becomes toenail-eating profoundly retarded.

To mitigate the flip-flop charge, I'd just steal a page from Barack Obama and either say a "heroic veteran" asked McCain to wear a Drill Now pin at a rally and that changed his mind, and/or say he might have engaged in some "overheated rhetoric" on the campaign trail about a permafrost ice-fen being functionally indistinguishable from the Grand Canyon.

After Cooling Off... This may mean absolutely nothing. McCain's maverickeyness is supposed to mean he's willing to carefully examine (and reexamine) just about any issue -- although, of course, maverickeyness usually means the precise opposite in practice.

So he may be -- and probably is -- just feigning having an open mind, and letting facts and circumstances guide his judgment more than moral vanity.

If that's the case, I wish him well in his post-election retirement. Perhaps President Barack Obama will be nice enough to ask his opinion on how to most speedily condemn Iraq to Al Qaeda, al-Sadr, and Iran.

Price Drop? I have no idea if the market is already taking this potential shift into account, and I actually feel rather stupid and reckless for even suggesting it is.

But, for what it's worth, future oil contracts (which evil speculators buy) are down.

Whoops: There are less-speculative reasons more likely driving the price-drop:

Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell, BP and Total SA are getting ready to formally announce historic contracts to return to Iraq some 36 years after the country's government took control of its giant oil reserves, The New York Times reported on Thursday.

The oil majors, and a host of smaller companies, are in talks with Iraq's oil ministry for unusual no-bid contracts to service the war-torn country's largest fields, said the newspaper, citing ministry officials, oil company officials and an American diplomat.

Beating out offers from 40 other companies in Russia, China and India, the Western majors will announce by the end of the month contract agreement to run for one to two years, some five years after the U.S. military toppled Saddam Hussein.

FoxNews (broadcast) says the deals could up Iraqi oil production 500,000 barrels per day, "in a hurry," though they didn't say what "in a hurry" means in this context.

For comprison, ANWR will deliver a minimum of a million barrels a day.

Another Country Heard From: Slublog thinks it's China's decision to raise oil prices (that is, subsidize the costs by a lesser amount) that is chiefly responsible for the price drop.

That's a good theory too. In fact, it seems to be the correct one.

But all these theories are based on the same principle: More oil = lower prices. (In China's case it's not more actual oil, but the Chinese using less oil because now it's costlier, which results, of course, in there being more oil for everyone else.)

Have You Guys Heard of this New Theory of Supply and Demand?

Jack Straw:

Yep, and demand is dropping here in the states. Driven miles in the US hit a 5 year low last month.

Why, it's almost as if some imaginary force is putting pressure on pricing as demand eases. I wonder what would happen if we announced an increase in supply?

I gotta sit down. I feel lightheaded.

XBradTC:

It's almost like a hand... an invisible hand.... fortunately, the Dems will nationalize our refineries to control the production of gasoline so that durn oppressing invisible hand will go away.

Posted by: Ace at 10:24 AM | Comments (63)
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Hang on, I'll quote it shortly.

Gabriel says the Democrats folded almost completely. As I'm still trying to access the article, I'm not sure about that yet; I know a previous suggested compromise on the telecom immunity issue involved allowing the telecoms to be sued, but also allowed them to argue their assurances from the government that they were acting lawfully to the court and jury. If that's the deal, it's hardly a complete fold, as they still bear a lot of risk and may, as many deep-pocketed defendants do, simply settle out of court for smaller sums here and there rather than risk a huge judgment.

A Better Compromise Than That: A "conditional immunity" for the telecoms, which mostly seems like transparent face-saving by the Democrats, because the condition of that conditional immunity will almost surely be satisfied in every single case:

Critical to sealing the deal was a compromise that would grant conditional immunity to telecommunications companies for assistance they provided from September 2001 through January 2007. If the companies can show a federal district court judge "substantial evidence" they received a written request from the attorney general or head of an intelligence agency stating the president authorized the surveillance and determined it to be lawful, the cases against them will be dismissed.

...

The House Democratic leadership's decision to move forward on the measure reflects a calculation by House leaders to complete action on the issue, to prevent it from becoming a distraction in a campaign season during which they hope to focus on economic, not national-security issues. The House is likely to approve the measure with significant support from Republicans and the measure is expected to win Senate approval easily.

A vote might happen tomorrow.

Posted by: Ace at 10:16 AM | Comments (8)
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Wow.

Ed Yong, health information manager at Cancer Research UK, said: "It's very exciting to see a cancer patient being successfully treated using immune cells cloned from his own body. While it's always good news when anyone with cancer gets the all clear, this treatment will need to be tested in large clinical trials to work out how widely it could be used."

However, the treatment could prove extremely expensive and scientists say that more research is needed to prove its effectiveness.

Genetically altered white blood cells have been used before to treat cancer patients but this is the first study to show that simply growing vast numbers of the few immune cells in the body to attack a cancer can be safe and effective.

Normally there are too few of the cells in a patient's body to effectively fight cancer.

Dr Cassian Yee, who led the team at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Centre in Seattle, said: "For this patient we were successful, but we would need to confirm the effectiveness of therapy in a larger study."

The work raises hopes that this approach could not only offer a more effective treatment for skin cancer, or melanoma, which kills around 2,000 people in Britain alone, but be applied to other cancers too.

Democrats immediately threw cold water on the so-called immune cell "surge strategy," noting that there was little progress on "political benchmarks" between healthy and cancerous cells. Barack Obama issued a terse statement expressing his "deep regret" that diplomacy with the metastatic melanomas had not "been given a chance to work."

Posted by: Ace at 09:43 AM | Comments (31)
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I don't think this is like shark attack fever, where we only notice the odd occurrence because suddenly it's being reported. I'm pretty sure the "normal" number of severed feet that wash up ashore is zero.

Or, at most, two or three a month. Tops.

Six and counting, and so far no concrete indication of why severed feet keep washing up on southcoastal B.C. shores. The latest foot was found on Vancouver Island, near Campbell River, Wednesday morning. It's the second to be discovered this week and the sixth in less than a year....

...

RCMP say this latest foot, which is a right foot, was found in a size 10 black Adidas running shoe. While DNA samples have been taken from some of the feet, no matches have been found, and theories about the origin of the feet also range from the 2004 Asian tsunami, to missing planes or sunken ships.

...

She says the feet might have floated up from Puget Sound but that's less likely because no feet in running shoes have been found there. Allen also says the fact that five 'right' feet have been found versus one 'left' foot is likely just a random event, and not a case of the ocean sorting out the different feet.

RCMP Constable Annie Linteau says they're investigating many possible scenarios and theories, but have not confirmed any links between the feet found so far. "The first four feet found showed no evidence of being severed. The second foot, located last August, was a size 12 mens Reebok show, and the latest case is a size 10 Adidas. But beyond that, we have not confirmed what the investigations showed."

Global warming.

Thanks to Blacksheep.

Posted by: Ace at 09:30 AM | Comments (57)
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A smaller point, I guess, but still pretty brazen.

Shortly after the campaign apparently put out the word that they would be making over Michelle and stressing her "humble roots," Michelle and the campaign began stressing her "humble roots." Fair enough-- but they also deny that's what they're doing.

More importantly, Obama now says all that loose (but electorally useful!) talk about quitting NAFTA was just some "overheated rhetoric" of the sort that politicians sometimes use when they want to, well, lie to voters.

It's so refreshing we finally have a "new kind of politician" willing to lie to the public to dishonestly get their votes.

And the jaded among you never thought you'd see the day.

Posted by: Ace at 08:49 AM | Comments (25)
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Well, that didnÂ’t take long.

Afghan and NATO forces using air power cleared Taliban militants from villages near the strategic city of Kandahar, killing at least 56 Islamist insurgents, officials said Thursday.

Troops were now making a final search of houses in Arghandab district, a day after around 1,000 soldiers launched a huge offensive against the rebels, said the defence ministry and the NATO-led International Security Assistance force.

Â…"Arghandab district is totally cleared of the enemy presence," defence ministry spokesman General Mohammad Zahir Azimi said at a joint press conference in Kabul with NATO officials.

Fifty-six "enemies" were killed, mostly foreigners, while a number of others were wounded, Azimi added, in a likely reference to militants crossing from neighbouring Pakistan.

Also seriously wounded in the fighting was the conventional wisdom that we are losing in Afghanistan and that operations in Iraq are making it easier for the Taliban to regain power.

Posted by: DrewM at 08:33 AM | Comments (18)
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