An interesting point noted in a Washington Post article referring to Condi Rice's forced appearance before the 9/11 committee. The note: President Bush has not talked to the public via a news conference since Dec. 15, 2003 when he was basking in the arrest of Saddam. How I miss his wonderful smirk. President Bush - please don't deny us your deep thoughts. Come forward sir, and talk.

It is day 108 and counting since your last news conference.

Sometimes, the story will just speak for itself - no comment needed. Today's New York Times portrays one of the most horrendous days in the American occupation. The Invasion of Iraq, as the rest of the world calls it, is not going well for the Bush Administration, or for the rest of us. Bush the Younger will eventually go down in history as perhaps in the top 5 worst presidents.

This is very very sad.



FALLUJA, Iraq, March 31 — An enraged mob attacked four American contractors here today, shooting them to death, burning their vehicles, dragging their bodies through the downtown streets and then hanging the charred corpses from a bridge over the Euphrates River.

A State Department spokesman, Lou Fintor, confirming the nationalities today, said neither the names of the victims nor the name of the company for which they worked would be immediately released.

Meanwhile, less than 15 miles away, in the same area of the increasingly violent Sunni Triangle, five marines were killed in one of the deadliest roadside bomb incidents for coalition troops in weeks. The marines were traveling through a dusty village along a supply route when the explosion ripped into their vehicles.

The steadily deteriorating security situation in the Falluja area, west of Baghdad, has become so dangerous that no American soldiers or Iraqi security staff responded to the attack against the contractors.

There are a number of police stations in Falluja and a base of more than 4,000 marines nearby. But even while the two vehicles burned, sending plumes of inky smoke over the closed shops of the city, there were no ambulances, no fire engines and no security.

Instead, Falluja's streets were thick with men and boys and chaos.

Boys with scarves over their faces hurled bricks into the burning vehicles. A group of men dragged one of the smoldering corpses into the street and ripped it apart. Someone then tied a chunk of flesh to a rock and tossed it over a telephone wire.

"Viva mujahadeen!" shouted Said Khalaf, a taxi driver. "Long live the resistance!"

Nearby, a boy no older than 10 put his foot on the head of a body and said: "Where is Bush? Let him come here and see this!"

Many people in the crowd said they felt as if they had won an important battle. Others said they thought that the contractors, who were driving in four-wheel-drive trucks, were working for the Central Intelligence Agency.

"This is what these spies deserve," said Salam Aldulayme, a 28-year-old Falluja resident.

The attack on the American military vehicle occurred in Al Anbar province, a wellspring of resistance to occupation forces, said Sgt. James Oleen, a military spokesman in Baghdad. The military offered no further information on the incident.

Witnesses said the attack occurred in Malahma, 12 miles northwest of Falluja, The Associated Press reported.

After the attack in Falluja, residents told The A.P. that the burned cars contained weapons and that some of the bodies were dressed in flak jackets. The A.P. television network showed one American passport near a body and a United States Department of Defense identification card belonging to another man.

The series of deadly attacks on American troops and foreign civilians in the Sunni Triangle area of central Iraq, particularly around Falluja, and a similar spate of attacks in the northern oil city of Mosul, have raised doubts about the cautiously optimistic appraisal of American progress in the war that has been common among United States generals since the beginning of the year.

Military officials have said that the capture of Saddam Hussein on Dec. 13 and documents seized with him had allowed them to penetrate the cell structure of that part of the insurgency that sought to restore a "Saddamist" or Baathist government to Iraq, with the Sunni minority once again dominating the majority Shiites.

American generals have said that these breakthroughs had given them the upper hand in the battle against Saddam loyalists and created the conditions for the American occupation authority to move forward with confidence to the planned handover of sovereignty under an interim government on June 30 and to an elected government in January 2006.

At the same time, the generals have been saying that their main focus in the conflict has shifted to Islamic terrorists who they believe to have been responsible for many suicide bombings and other attacks on the Iraqi police, civilians and foreigners. These attacks, they say, have effectively carried the Iraqi conflict into a new landscape that makes the fighting here part of the worldwide war on terrorism.

But today's events at Falluja indicate that the war may not have changed as much as the generals have suggested.

Mr. Clarke vs Condi Rice. Could you ask for more?

This is turning into one incredible election year. The campaign has been in full swing since Kerry's ascension. George Bush says he endorses his ads. Kerry is making jokes. Chaney is playing his evil Machivellian self (this guy would give me nightmares if I was a kid - he's scary). Nader actually told news people that his campaign ACTUALLY would help defeat Bush. Is this guy really lost touch with reality? And Janet Jackson tells Letterman that her exposure of her breast was an accident. Hmmm.

Keep focused on the message: Bush must be defeated.

But if you want to play around with something else, how about Leviticus. I wish some Jewish rabbi would finally admit that Leviticus was a satire written to amuse Jewish children sometime in the third century before the common era. Then maybe the religious right and the mindless evangelicals of the Christian community could get off this concern that marriage is being destroyed and that we are ushering in the Great Satan by have a gay guys and gals marrying each other. You would think they would endorse the end times since ALL of them would go immediately to heaven with the Rapture! But I guess we would miss their piousness.

But maybe not.

The polls are in and Bush is looking baddddddd. Bad as in bad - not good. Fifty-seven percent of those polled say they want someone to steer us away from his administration policies. Nice number, but the election is still far, far away.

It was interesting to watch Bush sashay through a Houston rodeo waving to the crowd and talking to cowboys. The White House said it was a trip in his capacity as chief executive, and not a campaign trip, therefore the taxpayer picked up the tab. Bush patted one brahma COW on the head and gave out his soundbite for the day: "Boy, I thought the biggest bull came out of Washington!" Uh, Mr. President, that's a cow - not a bull. Gender IS important even in joking asides.

Speaking of jokes:

The Tonight Show with Jay Leno:

"President Bush has unveiled his first campaign commercial focusing on his accomplishments. That's why it's only a 60 second spot."

"President Bush has just one question for the American voters: Is the rich person you're working for better off now than they were 4 years ago?"

The new Bush in '04 ads are now on the screen. Remember the day of 9/11 when Bush was flying around keeping out dangers. Well, he forgot.

Rather than comment on it, I will let Maureen Dowd do so:

"You've got to admire the Bush re-election ads being rolled out today. With up to $60 million to spend by convention time, the campaign is plotting the most expensive political advertising seduction in history, and you can see the money on the screen.

"In scary/gauzy images, the president does his best to shift the blame, take the credit and transmit concern about regular folks — waitresses, welders, firefighters, black children, black seniors, middle-class families — when he really spends more time helping his fat-cat corporate friends.

"Mr. Bush continues to imply that we should be scared because we're not safe, so we need to keep him to protect our national security. Which seems like a weird contradiction. If he's so good at protecting us, why aren't we safe?

"The president doesn't hesitate to exploit 9/11 in his ads, even as he tries to keep 9/11 orphans and widows in the dark about what really happened.

"Mr. Bush's ad flashes a shot of firefighters removing some flag-draped remains of a victim from the wreckage at ground zero even as he prohibits the filming of flag-draped remains of soldiers coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan. You might call the Bush ads, an homage to Ronald Reagan's famous ads, "Mourning in America."

"Nothing like hypocrisy with high production values."

It's officially over and JFK, or as we know him, John F. Kerry is the Democratic candidate for the presidency.

How odd to be for a man, and frankly not have an ounce of understanding of his positions. But I'm no different than many of the electorate - this single issue is that George Bush must be defeated. The man must be beaten, and Kerry appears to be the one. I really liked what I saw of Edwards - and maybe he will be Kerry's running mate - but I am not sure he could cut it alone.

Damn, Kerry. It's up to you.

Mel Gibson. "The Passion" is (in a hundred words or less) a violent, highly impactful movie supposed to stimulate a religious revival in your soul. It has also been termed anti-semetic, possibly fascist, and definitely very Roman Catholic (assuming you are a 13th Century Roman Catholic).

I don't know. I haven't seen it nor do I ever intend to see it. First of all, I do not intend to add a few more dollars to Gibson's money making off the slaying of Jesus. Secondly, I find the whole idea of Gibson's movie concept sick and unredeeming.

Unfortunately, the marketing has had a dramatic affect on turnout and he will make millions. It will be interesting to see how the Academy Awards deals with it next year. I think Gibson should spend a little more time on the meaning of Jesus' life, not the amount of suffering he received at the hands of the Romans and at the instigation of the mob. Just my opinion.

Oh, and Mad Max is no longer on my list of my 50 favorite films of all time.