The documents found in Saddam’s hide-away seem to convey important information about the network of Baathist insurgency. That’s fascinating news. Already, key figures in the network are being apprehended and the intelligence gains are considerable. The two previous alternatives – that Saddam was conducting the terrorist resistance or out of the loop – can now cede to a third: that he was the rallying point for resisters, and well informed about their operations. We’ll know in the next couple of months if that violent opposition to a democratic transition is demoralized by this capture. Certainly this piece of news suggests that optimism is not crazy.
BUSH HAS IT BOTH WAYS: Those people who believe this president cannot speak in coherent sentences don’t realize how clever his alleged incoherence is. Here’s what the news story I’ve just read says about the president’s position on a constitutional amendment to ban gays from any civil benefits for their relationships:
Bush has condemned the [Massachusetts] ruling before, citing his support for a federal definition of marriage as a solely man-woman union. On Tuesday, he criticized it as “a very activist court in making the decision it made.” “The court, I thought, overreached its bounds as a court,” Bush said. “It did the job of the Legislature.” Previously, though Bush has said he would support whatever is “legally necessary to defend the sanctity of marriage,” he and his advisers have shied away from specifically endorsing a constitutional amendment asserting that definition. But on Tuesday, the president waded deeper into the topic, saying state rulings such as the one in Massachusetts and a couple of other states “undermine the sanctity of marriage” and could mean that “we may need a constitutional amendment.”
“If necessary, I will support a constitutional amendment which would honor marriage between a man and a woman, codify that,” he said. “The position of this administration is that whatever legal arrangements people want to make, they’re allowed to make, so long as it’s embraced by the state or at the state level.”
Let’s unpack that statement. It gives something to the religious right, who want to bar recognition of any gay relationships in the constitution. But it’s all couched in the conditional tense. “We may need a Constitutional Amendment.” “If necessary, I will support …” That’s not an endorsement of the FMA now. What would transform the “may’s” into “do’s”? Dunno. The actual existence of gay civil marriages in Massachusetts? Maybe. Then, he seems to reiterate the Cheney position: “The position of this administration is that whatever legal arrangements people want to make, they’re allowed to make, so long as it’s embraced by the state or at the state level.” Does that mean marriage? Or civil unions? Or domestic partnerships? Or just ad hoc and fragile legal contracts? I don’t know. All in all: a carefully tailored piece of obfuscation. It seems to me that, from this statement, we neither have an unconditional endorsement of the FMA nor an uncategorical defense of states’ rights with regard to marriage. Bush wants to have it both ways. Or am I misreading this? I have a head cold and a fever so I’m headed back to bed. That means I reserve the right to re-think this in the morning.
The Dish 