TELL US AGAIN EXACTLY WHAT IS...

Some things you hear or read you just wonder about. Maybe it's a gut feeling or maybe it goes contrary to what you know or simply contradicts your hazy general impressions, but something smells fishy and there's no fish in the vicinity. And so you wonder. Scratch your head even. Here's an example: some big muckety-mucks in the international community (and you have to also wonder about just what the hell is the "international community") are urging the United States government to engage diplomatically with moderate elements of the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan. And so you say to yourself: Tell us again exactly what is a moderate Taliban?

Do they advocate allowing women to be merely indentured servants who can read a little bit instead of illiterate slaves under house arrest? Are they for banning only music but dancing is fine? Are perceived sins against their harsh brand of Islam punishable by being stoned only half to death, maybe into critical condition? No one seems to have a solid definition of what a moderate homicidal maniac might be and how you would be able to tell them apart from the full-blown crazed killers. Maybe the people suggesting this approach could interview them first, sort of let everybody know exactly who's who before our diplomats waste their time. That would be helpful. Providing they survive the encounters, of course.

Then there's the (mis)conduct of our war against these people, the one we got involved in as a byproduct of our failed manhunt for Osama bin Laden, the war we're supposed to be winding down. After all, just like in Iraq, right off the bat we defeated the Afghan armies and toppled their government, pretty much the textbook definition of winning a war. Well, also just like Iraq, for some reason we're still there fighting against whoever will have us; ragtag militias, trained insurgents, crazy God-complex dudes with fanatical followers, it really doesn't matter all that much. That's what armies do, fight battles, and all they were ever designed to do, and whenever a mobilized foreign army is in your neighborhood, someone's going to take up the challenge. It's just human nature to repel the interlopers. Weren't we told that this was a war we would wrapping up ASAP? Is that ringing any bells here? So... tell us again how sending in another 22,000 troops is accomplishing this? Seems sort of counter-productive on the face of it.

And aren't our unmanned aircraft drones operated with a video game joy stick by CIA computer geeks from the air-conditioned comfort of Las Vegas doing a decent enough job of winning the game of hide-and-go-seek with these Taliban guys? That's more like hide-and-go-heat-seeking-missile and bye-bye Mr. Taliban with no Marines killed by roadside bombs 10,000 miles from home sweet home. Can someone in the Obama administration explain exactly what their thinking is on this escalation of hostilities? Maybe put our minds to rest here with the explanation of their ingenious master plan, the one where we finally get bin Laden and leave that godforsaken nation to their own devices, such as they might be? They don't have to give away any secrets, just kind reassure us a little bit. There is a plan here, isn't there? Isn't there?

That gut feeling is one we shouldn't ignore. Like that skin-crawling creepy sensation you experience when you see a broadcast of Sarah (I'm bailin'!) Palin. Why the hell would anybody point a TV camera her way anymore? There's more interesting and substantive working Moms on every street of every town in America, and few of them are as willfully ignorant as she is, and fewer still are quitters. She made a farewell speech Sunday night explaining that she's quitting the Governorship of Alaska, a job she committed herself to and the voters of Alaska entrusted her to complete by saying she quit because she's (¡?!) not a quitter Wow. The jaw drops and the eyes glaze over...

This was not a comedy routine, either. She delivered it with a straight face and no trace of irony, then admonished the American press corps to "stop making stuff up" because America has brave soldiers. What? Maybe she can refresh our memories on what exactly that has to do with anything, anything at all. Just throw something out there, Sarah, whatever pops into your pointy little head! No one will expect you to make a lick of sense, just babble about veterans and farmers and apple pie and Coca Cola and American-made cars and the flag too while you're at it. Your fans will love it and the rest of us will just sort of scratch our heads and stare into space with unfocused glazed eyes.You betcha!

And can anyone (Not her, please God not her!) tell us again exactly why this overambitious mental midget is important to anybody not directly related to her? And does she plan to even read the book that somebody with actual skills and an orderly, lucid mind is going to write for her so she can make 7 million bucks? So now she'll probably go hang out with those "real Americans" she keeps ranting about, providing of course they're the kind of real Americans who will pay her huge piles of cash money to keep on saying stupid shit that means absolutely nothing on her very own TV show. A nation waits with bated breath...