Late to the Party

Is the NY Times editorial page, but they are truly delivering now. How much longer will Fred Hiatt and the Washington Post hang out in the bunker?

George Bush's asian virtual sex tour is being recognized, by the Times at least, as the first class disaster it was -- worse than Bush sitting and dreaming of having his balls scratched like he was before Katrina. I cannot reasonably expect a President to stop hurricanes (his ability to ameliorate the damages are another matter entirely). I can expect, however, a President of the United States to understand the necessity of preventing nuclear arms races in global hotspots. Even in a venal need to look triumphant.

It's just baffling why Mr. Bush traveled halfway around the world to stand right next to one of his most important allies against terrorists — and embarrass him. India and Pakistan are military rivals that have fought each other repeatedly. They have both developed nuclear weapons outside the nonproliferation treaty, which both refuse to sign. When India exploded its first acknowledged nuclear weapons eight years ago, Pakistan felt obliged to follow suit within weeks.

So when Mr. Bush agreed to carve out an exception to global nonproliferation rules for India, it should have been obvious that Pakistani opinion would demand the same privileged treatment, and that Mr. Musharraf would be embarrassed by Mr. Bush's explicit refusal to provide it.

Mr. Bush was right to say no to Pakistan. It would be an unthinkably bad idea to grant a loophole to a country whose top nuclear scientist helped transfer nuclear technology to leading rogue states. Granting India a loophole that damages a vital treaty and lets New Delhi accelerate production of nuclear bombs makes no sense either.

Mr. Bush should have just stayed home.

How about we compromise and George Bush just goes back to Crawford and stays there?

Which always sounds great, of course, until the thought of just how much that will cause Cheney to go hunting occurs to me. Iran has some fine game birds just waiting to be missed.

On the other hand, Chris Matthews says that Hillary Clinton is a socialist so that's important.