For those of you who have been resisting my suggestion that Chicago is clearly the Blue team:

MANNING -- IT FIGURES. I knew I wasn’t crazy about Peyton Manning. To me, he’s a great 1980s quarterback -- a classic pocket passer with zero mobility who, if he has to run, looks like he’s carrying a beach chair on his back. He’s been very lucky to have a great offensive line that minimizes the number of hurries and sacks, because if he were playing behind five second-raters, he’d be only above average, or perhaps lost to injury every year by Week 9. To me, that’s always been reason enough to cheer against him in the big games.

Now, another reason. According to Kos diarist teenvote, we see that Manning gave $2,000 to Bush last cycle and maxed out ($4,000) to Bob Corker in Tennessee. The only political-checkbook-opening Bear that teenvote could find happened to be their biggest star, linebacker Brian Urlacher. He gave $1,000 to Democratic Congressman Luis Gutierrez. On top of that, who would you rather see happy: Barack Obama and Jan Schakowsky or Richard Lugar and Dan Burton? And on top of that, Chicago rocks really hard.

I suppose this is a memo to myself as much as anyone else. I suppose this is what it must have been like for the entranced spectators of government in the summer of 1914, when, as Hannah Arendt said, the bourgeois citizens of the world waltzed, glassy-eyed, into the inferno.

I'll quote what Josh Marshall says about all of this, not because Marshall is the best analyst of the situation, but because he is a reasonably smart, always careful and circumspect, and usually conventional liberal who runs a successful mainstream media operation which cannot afford to be inflammatory. His rhetoric of "national interest" and "America being able to survive the Iraq-disaster" are not the way I would put it. But that's why I'm quoting him: he's essentially a liberal establishment, pro-Israel type who is incredibly well-connected. If he is saying what he says below, it's because he has heard very bad things.

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From the AP ...

Citing Iranian involvement with Iraqi militias and Tehran's nuclear ambitions,
the Bush administration has shifted to offense in its confrontation with Iran — building up the U.S. military in the Persian Gulf and promising more aggressive moves against Iranian operatives in Iraq and Lebanon.

The behind-the-scenes struggle between the two nations could explode into open warfare over a single misstep, analysts and U.S. military officials warn.

This is the preeminent, really the only question in American politics today: Do we want to go to war with Iran or not? With the escalating chaos in Iraq and the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan, is it in our interests or not to get into a shooting war with Iran? The debate over the 'surge' of US troops into Baghdad is significant in its own way, but it pales in comparison to this one.

I've always viewed the fears that the White House would try expand the war into Iran with a mix of deep skepticism, fascination and latent foreboding. Logically, it makes no sense on any number of counts. But the last half dozen years has taught us all that that's simply not a significant obstacle. There are any number of ridiculous gambits I was sure these guys wouldn't try before they did try them.

Again, the 'sensible' interpretation of what's happening right now is that the administration is trying to regain control of the situation in Iraq. And to further that aim they're rattling their sabres at Iran to get them to back off and stop making trouble. That's the sensible explanation. But we're not dealing with sensible people. And much more important, the folks who are running this show are simply too stupid to be trusted to execute such a delicate and perilous feint.

I don't mean they're dumb people. I'm sure they have high IQs. Most went to prestigious universities. They have lists of accomplishments. But the record of the last six years shows so many mistakes, such a record of incapability and incompetence, so many misjudgements, screw-ups and boners that there's no other suitable word.

Through plan or imbecility (and most likely, given who were talking about, both) they're drifting toward war with Iran.

As I wrote last night, I think the new campaign of anonymous leaks suggesting Iranian involvement in the Najaf raid has rather less than no credibility. But even if you assumed, for the sake of discussion, that it were tied to, say, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and that (as the narrative goes) the attack was retaliation for the Erbil raid on the Iranian consulate, that still would not change the question we face: is it in our national interest to go to war with Iran or not?

Everything flows from the answer to that question. Tits for tats or who started what fade into the background. If the answers no, we should be calibrating our actions to avoid such an outcome, not taking actions likely to provoke it. We need a regional plan to walk this mess back from the brink rather than simply yanking every thread on this already frayed fabric and watching it disintegrate in front of us.

We've heard a few squawks and warnings from members of Congress. But now is the time for members of the House and the Senate to get serious about asserting some control over this rapid descent.

I've said this before. But perhaps it seems like hyperbole. So I'll say it again. The president's interests are now radically disjoined from the country's. We can handle a setback like Iraq. It really is a big disaster. But America will certainly surive it. President Bush -- in the sense of his legacy and historical record -- won't. It's all Iraq for him. And Iraq is all disaster. So, from his perspective (that is to say, through the prism of his interests rather than the country's -- which he probably can't separate) reckless gambits aimed at breaking out of this ever-tightening box make sense.

Think of it like this. He's a death row prisoner concocting a thousand-to-one plan to break out of prison. For him, those are good odds. The rest of us are doing three months for disorderly conduct. And he's trying to rope us into his harebrained scheme. Like I said, his interests are very different from ours.

Speak up. We're on the edge of the abyss.

FT this afternoon:

US power is strong enough to establish an agenda for international activity but is too weak effectively to implement that agenda globally.

-- John Chipman, Chairman, Institute for International Strategic Studies

AmCop last year:

It's over.

-- Scats, "It's over."

Stick that in your UK Snapshot.

Bitch.

Good news--Air America has been purchased--which I guess means rescued--by Mark Green's brother.

For those of you not aware that Air America is "still on" in New York, it's still on, AM 1600, although the new lineup sucks: no Mike Malloy, no Garafolo, Maddow instead of Seder in the evening slot (though Maddow's good, and Seder's still on in the morning), and of course, Armstrong Williams, aka "Armie." W/r/t that, a commenter at TPM Cafe rightly notes:

The first step for the new ownership, after stabilizing AAR, has to be finding a new home for the "flagship" New York station. Let WWLR go back to being whatever it was before and find a station with a powerful signal and the ability to put decent people on the air, including Seder. Where we don't have to listen to AAR proclaiming Armstrong Williams is a progressive.

The other good/bad news is that, coinciding with the purchase, Al Franken will be leaving to pursue a Senate run against corpseflesheater Norm Coleman. This sucks because Franken is a great radio host and his absence will hurt. This is good because maybe Franken will beat Coleman, the SMLM* (Senate's Most Loathsome Member).

* Those of you who object that the SMLM is in fact Joe Lieberman (CFL-CT) should be aware that Lieberman (or as the chien would have it, "Liberman") occupies the esteemed SMLM-T chair, which signifies his status as the Senate's most transcendentally loathsome member. Coleman is merely most loathsome in the Senate's mundane sphere.

From the Edward Gorey House: