Dr. Cole of Informed Comment notes:

Bush told Wolf Blitzer he thought Iraq was a comma. But Iraq is very clearly an exclamation point. Now you know why the whole policy has been wrong. Bush has been trying to close off a dependent clause, not realizing he was forcefully making a declarative statement.

Watertiger of Dependable Renegade mentions George Allen’s new nickname: Sen. Macacawitz

The first incident is the Shrubbery using crypto-Christian in public. The sense of the “comma” is that we shouldn’t judge his Iraq policy at this point because we don’t know the outcome. The “comma” is from “don’t use a period where G-d put a comma”, but reality and long experience tells us that it is no longer a question of whether the Iraq situation will end well or badly, but of how badly it will end.

The second is an example of a different religious group, Jews. If you aren’t familiar with Jews you won’t understand the significance of the ending.

These were insiders talking among themselves not being understood by outsiders, but the next example is an outsider attempting a joke about Islam.

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Tristero at Hullabaloo makes the point that torture should be opposed because it is morally wrong. It doesn’t make any difference if it works or not, it is wrong.

I don’t disagree, but as a former military interrogator and law enforcement interviewer, I would like to go on record as stating: it doesn’t work.

A point most people miss in the classic “good cop/bad cop” routine, is that the “good cop” is the successful interviewer. The purpose of the “bad cop” is to speed up the connection between the suspect and the interviewer. You don’t need the “bad cop”, it just speeds things up with a certain type of person. There is a danger if the routine is tried with the wrong person it will blow up the process.

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