More Fuel for the Man Crush ...

... on Jon Stewart, as he makes Bill Bennett look like a drunken fool on the gay marriage debate. Seriously, that was embarrassing.

My God, watching that, with clearly stated arguments and pinpoint attacks on his opponent's weak positions and logic, as he shreds a man who is twice his age and has spent his life in the pundit business, one has to wonder how Stewart does it even though he's not of those professional politicians with their spin doctors and consultants and carefully prepared position papers.

It's almost as if nothing more than a lifetime of performing comedy had honed his ability to make his point clearly, highlight and ridicule the idiocy of his opponents' argument simultaneously, and do so with a simple emotional resonance so effective his opponent is left helpless to respond.

But that would be NUTS.

Jon Stewart just beat Bill Bennett into wet tissue in a manner none of the professional liberal pundits or politicians who debate him on the chat shows have ever done.

We're out here, candidates. Professional communicators with proven track records. And unlike fucking DLC consultants, we can be bought off with beer and pizza.

Lions/Donkeys Note

Hey, two things. First, I've dropped the reference to food issues for the troops -- there are ambiguities about the story, and so it doesn't deserve to be in a section with the word "inarguable" in the title. So, we'll just have to settle for shitty water in a desert war, and shortages in body armor and Humvees. Which is no big deal at all.

That was the nice part, now for the annoyed. Some people in e-mails have taken issue with the word "inarguable" when it comes to the troops not receiving proper armor/vehicles/support.

I thought that the lack of body armor and armored hummers was settled as fact as soon as Gen Abizaid ADMITTED that it was an issue, and the Secretary of the Army admitted the Humvee armor had been shanked, and the Marines recalled 10,000 suits of body armor ... etc. etc. basically, once the Army itself started admitting it had screwed up, I figured we could call that a fact and move on.

I will say this slowly, and in large font:

Once the PENTAGON ITSELF ADMITS IT FUCKED UP, you can no longer defend the point.

Oh, and for the odd "cuts of the Clinton era" are to blame idiots: first off, you know how that argument flies here. "You go to war with the Army you have, not the Army you want." Yes, but it's RUMSFELD'S JOB to make sure he has the Army he wants. We're not talking robot warriors here, people, derailed during R&D , we're talking body armor. Purchasable at yor local Walmart in the finer hunting states. Report after report -- most of them from the Pentagon itself, or the GAO -- have shown that the stuff was out there, but the Administraition, in the considerable amount of time it had to prepare for the war (a war started on its own timetable) shagged the dog.

Just more of the Special Olympics Government. Were supposed to be WMD's -- not our fault, bad intelligence. Was supposed to plan for the post-war -- not our fault, bad advice from expats. Was supposed to get armor for the troops -- not our fault, Clinton cuts (I cannot emphasize how retarded that particular line of reasoning is on the body armor issue, and I didn't even like Clinton.). Was supposed to prep for Katrina -- not our fault, no way to know the levees would break. Supposed to get Osama -- not our fault, Pakistanis helped him. Ports and airports not secured -- not our fault, because ... actually, we're just going to go with a generic "not our fault" there.

The buck stops -- OOO! SHINY!!