Clinton's visit is a surprise, and Clinton is the highest-profile American to go to North Korea since Madeline Albright's trip in 2000 (Jimmy Carter went in 1994). The Obama administration reportedly considered a number of other possible envoys, including John Kerry. The choice is especially surprising given that Hillary Clinton has been so deeply involved in efforts to free Ling and Lee. However, she has recently been trading insults with North Korean officials, comparing them to "small children and unruly teenagers." The North Korean Foreign Ministry in turn called her a "funny lady" who "is by no means intelligent." Bill Clinton, on the other hand, maybe popular in North Korea because US-North Korean relations were at their best during his administration.

Researcher and ex-North Korean official Jang Cheol-hyeon says Clinton "can surely bring the two journalists back home." Victor Cha, a former Bush advisor on North Korea, concurs, saying, "it would be very difficult for the North not to give these people up" to Clinton. Scott Snyder of the Asia Foundation, however, has concerns. He tells the LA Times, "The question is going to be how could he go to Pyongyang without some assurance that they would be released. For someone at his level to go without a prior assurance of some kind would be to risk a huge loss of face." But analyst Mike Chinoy thinks this is actually evidence that Clinton is confident about the journalists' release. He says, "I suspect that it was made pretty clear in advance that Bill Clinton would be able to return with these two women otherwise it would be a terrible loss of face for him."

Experts are debating the larger diplomatic implications of the visit as well. Obama administration officials say Clinton will try to avoid linking the issue of Ling and Lee to North Korea's nuclear program, and that they aren't willing to offer the North incentives to return to six-party diplomatic talks. But South Korean professor Kim Yong-hyun says of Clinton's visit, "I think it's not just about journalists. It will serve as a turning point in the US-North Korea relations." Senator Lindsay Graham agrees, saying, "Maybe we can build on this to do something better with nuclear weapons. ... I don't know if this is the beginning of something bigger." Jack Kim of Reuters reports that the former President's trip "allows the [North Korean] government to show to a domestic audience, facing deepening poverty, that the nuclear weapons program is making the outside world take it more seriously and the visit will be certain to be portrayed as tribute by the United States." And North Korea expert B.R. Myers says, "It sends all the wrong signals," such as that the United States will reward kidnapping with high-level attention.

However, at least one expert thinks Clinton's trip offers a valuable intelligence opportunity as well as a humanitarian one. Think tank president Ralph Cossa says Clinton will be able to gauge Kim Jong Il's reportedly failing health, and find out who is really running North Korea. He says,

For me, this is a stroke of genius on the part of the Obama administration. Kim Jong Il will have to meet with a former U.S. president. Given his ego and desire for attention, this is a photo opportunity he doesn't want to miss. If he doesn't meet with Clinton, we'll know he is on life support.

Reports: Bill Clinton Arrives In N. Korea [Washington Post]
Bill Clinton Arrives In North Korea [Guardian]
Bill Clinton Visits North Korea In Bid To Free Journalists [LA Times]
Bill Clinton In North Korea To Seek Release Of U.S. Reporters [NY Times]
Bill Clinton In N. Korea For Journalists [CNN]
Bill Clinton In North Korea To Win Reporters' Release [Reuters]
White House Mostly Mum On Clinton's NKorea Mission [AP]

Ling says that in the phone call, her first communication with her sister in weeks, Laura "was very specific about the message that she was communicating, and she said, 'Look, we violated North Korean law and we need our government to help us. We are sorry about everything that has happened, but we need diplomacy.' " She also says it was hard to tell how Laura was doing, but she remains concerned for her sister's health and that of Euna Lee. Laura said in a previous conversation that "she won't survive if she is sent to a labor camp," perhaps because of an ulcer she believes has gotten worse since her imprisonment.

Lisa Ling is still hopeful that the US and North Korea can come to a diplomatic solution to the reporters' imprisonment. "Our countries don't talk," she says, "and perhaps this could be a reason." Supporters of the two women have started a website to advocate for their release, and vigils will be held tonight in Paris, Washington, San Francisco, Sacramento and Phoenix.

According to Gotham Chopra, Ling and Lee have lost one supporter — Michael Jackson, who heard about their plight and was especially upset to learn that Euna Lee was separated from her four-year-old daughter. Chopra says Jackson asked him, "Do you think that the leader of North Korea could be a fan of mine?" He hoped that, if Kim Jong Il enjoyed his music, he might be able to have some influence over the situation. The notion isn't totally far-fetched — Kim Jong Il is a noted pop culture junkie who even kidnapped celebrities to make movies for him. However, Chopra was unable to determine if the North Korean leader was a Jackson fan, and Jackson died before he could do anything. If Kim Jong Il in fact did like Jackson's music, Chopra asks him to release Ling and Lee "as a commemoration of possibly the greatest icon of our times." "Wouldn't it be staggering if one Kim Jong Il were to honor him," Chopra asks, "as a truly great humanitarian?"

Sister Hears From Journalist Held In N. Korea [CNN]
Laura Ling And Euna Lee: 113 Days [LA Observed]
Free Laura Ling And Euna Lee [Official Site]
Marcos Breton: Lisa Ling Waits Out This Story [Sacramento Bee]

• Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has decided the best way to lead the country while thousands of people are protesting the fraudulent elections is to tell them to shut up, accept the results or risk a violent crackdown. [MSNBC]

• Most of his people are concerned that his speech will embolden Iran's Basij militias, who operate in plainclothes to foment unrest and have a habit of beating and killing people simply because they can. [Washington Post]
• Meanwhile, we're boosting our defenses around Hawai'i, since Kim Jong Il has threatened it with a missile strike. [Associated Press]
• China is officially denying that its leadership met with Kim Jong Il's son and successor, Kim Jong Un, two weeks ago. You probably should take that piece of propaganda with a very large, ragged grain of salt. [UPI]
• Back in the States, Obama is more popular than Clinton or Dubya were at this point in their Presidencies. [Matthew Yglesias]
• The husband of the woman who was sexing John Ensign while he was separated went on to have a pretty lucrative career with companies close to the GOP Senator. [Politico]
• Ensign is denying he came forward because of a blackmail plot; he's not saying he just wanted to beat his former staff to the media punch. Also, when he reconciled with his wife, he fired his mistress and paid her severance out of his own pocket. [Las Vegas Sun]
• Crazy fucking conservative Michael Savage said, "The white Christian heterosexual married male is the epitome of everything right with America." The family of the guard, Stephen Johns, gunned down at the Holocaust Museum and George Tiller's family — just for starters — might disagree. [Media Matters]
• Stephen Johns' funeral is being held today. The Museum is being closed to allow all employees to attend, and they've set up a fund for his family. [Washington Post]
• The Supreme Court has ruled that there is no Constitutional right to post-conviction DNA testing. Apparently, "justice" is not about truth. Big surprise. [LA Times]
• The Court also issued a ruling throwing out an established age discrimination law, making it harder for anyone to ever prove ever again that they were dismissed or demoted as a result. [LA Times]
• Finally, the blogosphere is a-buzz that Sarah Palin follows John McCain on Twitter but McCain doesn't follow her back...as if their accounts weren't set up and maintained by their staff. [Mother Jones]

• Hillary Clinton (and Joe Biden) wants President Obama to talk tough on Iran, sympathetic on the opposition. The Secretary of State is also currently recuperating from a fractured elbow, which will require surgery in a few weeks. [Plum Line, CNN]

• Thing is, the Administration is struggling to balance calls to support the Iranian protesters with keeping open an avenue for engagement on nuclear issues with the Ayatollah. [Washington Post]
• The Guardian Council, which backed Mahmoud Ahmadenijad, has offered to meet with Mir Hossein Mousavi and the other, failed Presidential candidates. [NY Times]
• In the meantime, Iranian security forces are rounding up everyone who knows or supports Mousavi and tossing them in jail. [London Times]
• Iran's Interior Ministry has ordered an investigation into the Basji militia's and military's attack on Tehran University that left students dead and injured. [Wall Street Journal]
• Increasingly jealous of all the attention Iran is getting, Kim Jong Il has threatened to launch a missile towards Hawai'i. (Because attacking the Pacific archipelago worked out so well for the Japanese in the 40s!) [CBS News]
• Senator John "Fuckmaster Flex" Ensign has resigned from his Senate leadership position, because you can't have sex with a woman and be a leader in the GOP. Just ask Mitch McConnell! [Associated Press]
• Michelle Bachmann is refusing to participate in the United States Census because she's afraid it will steal her soul. [ThinkProgress]
• Former President George W. Bush has emerged from his gated Texas community, saying that he believes the best way to fix the poor economy is for Americans to spend more money. [Washington Times]

• Last night, Sarah Palin ended up stopping by a Republican fundraiser that she was scheduled to headline, dropped out of and tried to get back into when her 2012 rival, Newt Gingrich, took her slot. [Washington Post]

• Newt Gingrich did plenty of talking, however, offering that he's "happy" Dick Cheney and Colin Powell are Republicans and that he thinks internal debates about policy and ideology should be saved until the party is in the majority again. You know, 'cause that worked so well for moderate Republicans before. [Associated Press]
• One place the GOP has asserted dominance is New York State, where two Democrats with legal problems (Pedro Espada Jr. of the Bronx and Hiram Monserrate of Queens) re-installed the Republican majority in the Senate. Espada is in line to become governor if David Paterson is incapacitated, so it worked out rather nicely for him, if not for the state's LGBT population. [NY Times]
• Former New York Senator Hillary Clinton has told Israel that since the Bush Administration didn't turn over any evidence of their so-called secret arrangement by which Israel would say it had stopped settlement expansion while expanding settlements, there is no such arrangement. [Washington Independent]
• Morgan Tsvangirai, the Prime Minister of Zimbabwe under a power-sharing arrangement with its dictator, Robert Mugabe, will visit with President Obama today. It'll be unseemly to be caught wishing for Mugabe to die already but... [Washington Post]
• South Korea has beaten us in imposing unilateral sanctions on North Korea for all the crazy shit Kim Jong Il's been pulling lately to prove that he hasn't had a stroke and is totally right in the head. [NY Times]
• Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's constituents have finally heard about all the crazy shit he says about being surrounded by light from Allah and whatnot, thanks to a political rival. Unsurprisingly, some people in Iran thinks he sounds batshit. [Huffington Post]
• House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has decided to fuck over the Senate (retribution for all the times it has done the same to her?) and strip out Senator Joe Lieberman's provision that would prevent the release of the rest of the torture photos the ACLU wants. [Politico]
• The Supreme Court plans on reviewing the sale of Chrysler to Fiat, and Congress has decided to try to force Obama to force GM and Chrysler to keep dealerships open despite the fact that the car companies are shuttering entire automobile lines and the dealer networks are increasingly unpopular. You know what the dealers do have? Lots and lots and lots of money to lobby Congress, since they're not bankrupt. [The Hill]

• Dick Cheney thinks: The Gays should be happy with whatever states choose not to discriminate against them; Americans should be glad George Tenet didn't have worse intel about the link between Saddam and Osama; and the Guantanamo detainees should be happy we didn't summarily execute them. [Time, CNN, MSNBC]

• David Duke is mad at Rush Limbaugh for comparing him to that Latina Sonia Sotomayor. But he's not a racist! [ThinkProgress]
• Dick Cheney wouldn't have nominated Judge Sotomayor, but even Dick Cheney is smart enough not to call her a racistwhile he's trying to rehab his image. [Politico]
• Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, however, is not as smart as Dick Cheney. [Politico]
• Sotomayor begins the obligatory meetings-with-Senators today; let's hope she wore some comfortable shoes. [Politico]
• The Obama Administration denies that any of the images of American detainees subject to the ACLU release lawsuit depict sexual abuse, as was reported last week. Please note the careful wording. [Salon]
• The Administration also says that it decided not to release the photos because Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Malik objected and threatened to force us to withdraw even earlier than he planned, which is not nearly as dirty as it sounds. [McClatchy]
• Tom Tancredo staffer Marcus Epstein is a crazy-ass racist who assaulted a woman on the street last year because she was black, and he won't be going to law school now because of it. [DCeiver]
• Kim Jong Il's son, Kim Jong Un, who is 7 years younger than I am, will be taking over the nuclear-armed country of North Korea. This is gonna go well! [BBC]
• Eliot Spitzer has spent a lot of money on sex workers. [NY Times]
• Norm Coleman has spent a lot of money masturbating to his electoral fantasies in Minnesota courts. [NY Times]
• Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner has finally learned how to relax and submit peacefully to our new Chinese overlords. [NY Times]
• You are correct: I have sex on the brain.

• Rush Limbaugh has his big-boy britches in a wad over the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court because she and President Obama are racists for thinking themselves not only equal to white people but superior to some...like Rush Limbaugh. By that standard, we are all racist! [Time]

• We're also superior to Larry Summers, who fell asleep during a motherfucking meeting again. [NY Post]
• Current Illinois Senator Roland Burris (surprise!) bought his sinecure from former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich just like everyone suspected he did. [Wall Street Journal]
• Burris is now departing on a tour of - wait for it - Central Illinois. [Associated Press]
• Obama, however, is headed to Sin City to help out Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, despite the fact that Reid will continue to fuck shit up. [LA Times]
• Apparently, the United States is considering a value added tax (VAT). Don't think that means we'll get to stop paying income taxes, though — the point is not to change the system, but raise more revenues. [Washington Post]
• Economists predict the recession will be over by the end of the year. [MSNBC]
• By then, North Korea might actually have re-ignited the Korean War, which actually never technically ended. What else does Kim Jong Il have to do these days? [NY Times]

• There are already quotes from the Palin-Gibson confab! She threatens war with Russia, sidesteps the hubris question, and can't blink! It sounds all kinds of fair and balanced and totally not fluffy. Just because they're taking a stroll together doesn't mean it was too chummy.[Mark Ambinder, Mark Ambinder, TV Newser]
• But just because ABC is stretching the interview into 5 different news segments doesn't mean they're looking to boost ratings, obviously. The first segment airs tonight during what I like to call "drinking time" and other people consider "dinner time." [LA Times]
• In a page from Bush's playbook, Palin conducts state business on a personal email account to avoid disclosure laws, since that worked out so well for the Bush Administration. [Think Progress]
• Obama may have been kidding about being a Popular Mechanic centerfold, but they're offering to take him up on it anyway. David Axelrod needs to jump on that shit, like, yesterday, and show the pistol-packin' mama (per Cindy McCain) who's a regular person. [Popular Mechanics]

• Elsewhere in the world, Biden and his gaffe-maker (also known as his mouth) are prepping for the debate with Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm. She's going to try to be mean, and he's going to try not to be. [NY Times, HuffPo]
• Bolivia expelled our ambassador for daring to suggest maybe growing coca for export to the U.S. is a bad thing. [LA Times]
• Putin is threatening to point missiles at Europe if we put missiles in Europe, so Palin's thoughts of war with Russia might not really be that far off. [BBC News]
• Oh, and non-North Korea doctors — possibly even ones the regime didn't kidnap — operated on Kim Jong Il's brain after the stroke he's denying he had. Do Chinese doctors take a Hypocratic Oath? Is there a greater-good thing they could've relied upon? [Boston Globe]

MOE: Hi! I am um in the [redacted]. You can delete that part though. Remember when I chatted you from [somewhere else] and mentioned I was in [somewhere else] and hoped no one would notice? They did.

MEGAN: I will redact your location from the transcript! I am still in upstate New York, but I don't care if people notice.

MOE: Whoa, can't read past the headline, Camille Paglia. I think we should talk about North Korea a bit today too though, just putting that out there. And oh yeah Obama the chauvinist pig.

MEGAN: I'm down with that schedule of events, even if it does force me to read Camille Paglia and even (horrors) agree with her, despite her overwrought boating metaphors:

Oh, the sadomasochistic tedium of McCain's imprisonment in Hanoi being told over and over and over again at the Republican convention. Do McCain's credentials for the White House really consist only of that horrific ordeal? Americans owe every heroic, wounded veteran an incalculable debt of gratitude, but how do McCain's sufferings in a tiny, squalid cell 40 years ago logically translate into presidential aptitude in the 21st century? Cast him a statue or slap his name on a ship, and let's turn the damned page.

Oh, but then she sets to world right on its axis by accusing him of trying to "act black" by dropping his G's, as though nobody does that.

I have become increasingly uneasy about Obama's efforts to sound folksy and approachable by reflexively using inner-city African-American tones and locutions, which as a native of Hawaii he acquired relatively late in his development and which are painfully wrong for the target audience of rural working-class whites that he has been trying to reach. Obama on the road and even in major interviews has been droppin' his g's like there's no tomorrow.

And now I feel okay about mildly disliking her.

MOE: She had to bring BDSM into it, didn't she. Now I am getting an image of Sarah Palin …ugh, she is conjuring up scenarios that will be used against me later when she figures out how to ban me from the Library of Congress or something. Also, droppin one's Gs is not a fucking African American pastime Camille Paglia. It's called L-I-V-I-N.

MEGAN: It's also called not being a prissy intellectual. BUT, she does agree with you that there wasn't enough foreign policy in Obama's Invesco speech and then she decides that Palin has supplanted Madonna as a feminist superstar:

In terms of redefining the persona for female authority and leadership, Palin has made the biggest step forward in feminism since Madonna channeled the dominatrix persona of high-glam Marlene Dietrich and rammed pro-sex, pro-beauty feminism down the throats of the prissy, victim-mongering, philistine feminist establishment.

This is, by the way, your BDSM-like punishment for linking me to Paglia before I finish a cup of coffee. HA, Camille Paglia might be older than John McCain, in the end:

She immediately reminded me of the frontier women of the Western states, which first granted women the right to vote after the Civil War — long before the federal amendment guaranteeing universal woman suffrage was passed in 1919.

How many frontierswomen do you think Paglia knew personally or saw speak?

MOE: Hahahaha you mean like Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman? Because I sorta see how they're pursuing similar strategies with the hair.

MEGAN: I will admit, I watched that show. My parents were very strict about TV and didn't have cable. See, I tend to think of Sarah Palin's hair as "wedding hair," but she is wearing it down more and more. My Glamour editor at the conventions said she thought she wore it up to look taller, but I did notice that McCain's kind of short when she's in heels so I'm guessing that's why she's wearing it down now. Okay, here's my last Paglia quote because you will appreciate it and because I frankly can't read any further after this without hurting myself or other people:

One reason I live in the leafy suburbs of Philadelphia and have never moved to New York or Washington is that, as a cultural analyst, I want to remain in touch with the mainstream of American life. I frequent fast-food restaurants, shop at the mall, and periodically visit Wal-Mart (its bird-seed section is nonpareil).

MOE: I really can't figure out how one advances to such lofty ranks of academia only to turn around and promulgate such partisan caricatures.

For Mr. Obama, the race is about the claims of modernism. There is "cool," and the confidence of the meritocracy in him. The Obama way is glib: It glides over the world without really taking it in. It has to it that fluency with political and economic matters that can be acquired in a hurry, an impatience with great moral and political complications.

MEGAN: Um, see, this guy lost me in the first paragraph:

But as Bob Woodward is the latest to remind us, it is presidents, not their understudies, who shape the destiny of nations.

OH REALLY FOUAD AJAMI? Dick Cheney had nothing to do with nothing? Bob Woodward is all knowing? Fuuuuuck you.

MOE: Wow I always figured Camille lived in the terrible drug-addled overtaxed national chain store underserved den of iniquity that is the other side of City Line, the glorified sixth borough Philadelphia. Now I realize she is a real true American, or something.

Oh right? Too ADD to remember that line just now. Um, what's he smoking, seriously? Did Bob Woodward's latest book finally debunk that batshit liberal conspiracy that Cheney somehow runs the Bush Administration?

MEGAN: I think Woodward's book — like all of Woodward's books, relies too heavily on the Big-Man theory of political science in which all of the actions of the entire Executive Branch rest on the shoulders of one man. Thus, is Bush really in charge and his minions report to him rather than — as is always the case — power being actually more diffuse in practice because Bush's speeches are scripted, his opinions are formed by underlings and presented to him and his policies formed by committee. Only people with outsized personalities and force can actually ram their own ideas through that system, which is why people credit Dick Cheney with having more power than the average VP — and, from what I've heard, rightly so.

MOE: Of course he does…From what I recall of Woodward's previous books Dick "Big Time" was Woodward's "Big Man" in a lot of ways, right? Unless I'm thinking of the books on Condi Rice, or by Ron Suskind, or, fuck if I know. Anyway I just don't think this fact is disputed. Cheney runs shit, the end. Next up: Obama makes a coy little joke employing a shop-worn cliche and the Republicans go positively deranged. I can safely say I would feel the exact way if McCain made a the same comment re Hillary. It was sorta funny! Not offensive! Imagine if this happened in the UK. You might have to leave the bar at 11 p.m. and that would suck, but no MP would have the conscience to feign "offense" about it. Oh god…BOAR WAR.

MEGAN: HAHAHAHAHA. Oh, shit, I miss your puns. There are a total of 5 people in America who might get that.

Anyway, I I wondered aloud this morning whether pigs have lips but a Google image search proved that they do and that they can be eaten, were one to be so inclined. I think the campaigns need to sack up and have a pig-lip eating contest and whomever gags first concedes the Presidency.

MOE: Sorry, not my pun. It's the cover of the NY Post. I still need coffee. Hey, check out the pic of the guy on this story about how Palin is "energizing women of all walks of life." That dude looks pretty energized. Or possibly "diabolical"!

MEGAN: Um, I love how the Washington Post just called him a woman. Like, I loved it almost as much as the Post's headline writers, who have apparently expanded the audience for jokes about British colonialist conflicts by a factor of 10.

Anyway, what I want to know is how come since Obama's next line was about stinky rotten fish, no former female Massachusetts governor is calling out Obama for making inappropriate comments about the smell of Sarah Palin's vagina? Huh, Jane Swift? Did you miss that? Because I really think commenting on vaginal odor is, like, totally worse than saying she looks pig-like, not that he said that either but if this is taking-fake-offense day, that's the fake offense I'm taking. Jane Swift doesn't care about women with vaginal odor.

MOE: Hahaha maybe you could be the first. Do you think some people become Republican spinmasters just for absurd opportunities like that? Sorry I'm reading about North Korea. The government is claiming Kim is fine, he sent a birthday greeting to Bashar Assad just to prove it, no one can say what said birthday card consisted of but wouldn't it be cool if it were some sort of strippergram, "foreign doctors" have maybe been summoned to the country to nurse Dear Leader back to health, I am still struggling (Googling) to figure out who noticed Kim's absence in the first place. Does the Chosun Ilbo or whatever have a Pyongyang Bureau? Does Xinhua?

MEGAN: I'm going to go out on a very wide, broad limb here and suggest that one of Seoul's newspapers of record probably doesn't have a really big Pyongyag bureau, if only because of the Dear Leader's penchant for kidnapping South Koreans (and others). Xinhua might, in which case I'm sort of curious what China's interest might be in promoting a story that Kim Jong Il might not be long for the world. Either way, you'd think that if Kim Jong Il was so cool with counterfeiting money and pirating everything under the sun that he might've pirated a couple of copies of Photoshop and kidnapped a couple of South Koreans or Japanese people that know how to use it to take care of contingencies like this.

MOE: I feel like the news out of North Korea would be a lot more interesting if the South Korean papers had a "really big bureau" there. I feel like news about the place always comes from people who've gotten out, though. Oh yeah and Vice. And when they have an anniversary celebration, are there C-Span feeds of that? Because this here is straight-up Kremlinology.

On Monday, North Korea's nominal No. 2 leader, Kim Yong Nam, gave a 60th-anniversary speech that referred to Kim Jong Il mainly in the past tense, said Jonathan Pollack, an Asia expert at the Naval War College. "Generally, when he is praised to the skies, it is in the present tense. But the predominant tone is looking back," he said.

MEGAN: Do we pirate their cable?

MEGAN: This D.C.-based hangover case is trying to get pissed about something but all I can come up with is a sense of mild disgust that Cindy McCain cites Princess Di as an inspiration. I mean, I know between all her recipe-swiping and whatever that Cindy isn't the most creative person in the world but come on! Between this and Jackie O, can she choose more archetypes of the supportive-but-not-controversial wife to emulate to get her husband elected?
MOE: Wait, one sec, I forgot to tell you I'm doing DIRT BAG today. You know what that means? I fucking read TMZ and Page Six etc. etc. all morning. Apparently Janis Ian via David Geffen turned down an offer to do music for The Graduate. And that is what passes for a Page Six item on a Thursday in late June when Richard Johnson is on vacation!
MEGAN: Well, you go get dirrrty, I'll be here when you get back and not remotely envious of your gossip-reading.

MOE: Wait cindy mccain cites jackie as an inspiration? I thought that was Michelle's territory? And wasn't Jackie kind of controversial? Didn't she like, do drugs and give her daughters eating disorders and repress a full 90% of her emotions like all those beautiful icons of her generation??
MEGAN: Well, sure, but no one said anything about that until much later.

MEGAN: Anyway, we should probably totally talk about the whole North Korea thing briefly. Like, I sort of wonder if it's a good thing that all Kim Jong Il has to do is turn over some stuff detailed his weapons programs — without actually, you know, stopping them — and we're already lifting sanctions?

MOE: Well, what the fuck good have the sanctions done? How much thinner can they get in North Korea? I dunno…I kind of don't get the sense that we're dealing with a rational, logical guy in that Kim Jong Il. Maybe "engagement" would be kind of like the oil cleansing method of fighting breakouts. Like a "love bomb" on that show "Intervention."
MEGAN: Except that didn't we try that in the Clinton Administration? We offered them enticements, conducted negotiations and then Kim did what he wanted to do anyway which was get his hands on nukes. It's totally a no-win situation, but I guess I'm concerned in the medium- to long-term that allowing ourselves to be economically invested there could have negative repercussions on our foreign policy since it, you know, seemingly always does.

MOE: Has becoming economically interdependent with China had negative FP repercussions? I mean, sure you'll find lots of instances where that would be the case — the whole career of this guy, such as — and they haven't been exactly helpful when it comes to dealing with the DPRK, maybe some casino magnate can convince them to change their policy about sending North Korean border-crossers back to North Korea, but I'm trying to hone in on what you're saying with the "always does." Anyway in the case of North Korea is the big new concern their cooperation with Syria? I still haven't read the story. I'll do that now. Also we should maybe discuss child rapists and FISA.

MEGAN: I mean, in my mind, we find it really easy to take a hard foreign policy stand in countries where we have no economic interest or, in the case of the Iraq, where a hard foreign policy stand is aligned with our economic interests. Sometimes, like with Burma, that's probably a good thing, other times less so — agricultural competition and Cuba comes to mind, actually. But, yes, China was the example I was thinking of when saying our economic interests seemingly trump our foreign policy ones. Like, there's a whole army of lobbyists that will lobby for their companies' interests in China and strongly oppose any government action against China in a foreign policy sense that might interfere with that.

MOE: Oh god CHECK IT OUT we averted recession go us.
MEGAN: Well, we avoided it first quarter by just being anemic.
MEGAN: I'm not feeling the growth love.
MOE: Yeah I was being sarcastic but you know me.
MEGAN: Also, don't we all love how we live in an age where all kinds of information is at our fingertips, but economists still can only call it an official recession in retrospect 2 financial quarters later?

MOE: I think we should seal all aggregate economic data for a few years and come together as a nation to figure out what would really make everyone happier.
MEGAN: See, I actually wonder if it would even be possibly to determine that given our culture is so steeped in the idea that the ability to consume = happiness
MOE: Anyway, would you get in a time machine and, like, assassinate Kissinger before he had a chance to chill with Mao? Oh shit that reminds me I've got that Harper's somewhere with the amazing transcript of that. Because I wouldn't. Would I? Nah. I mean, it would be interesting.
MEGAN: I've watched and read too much SciFi to think that changing the past like that would be a good idea.
MEGAN: Anyway, so, wiretapping and child rapists?
MOE: Yeah I mean, I'm not really that interested in this fire and brimstone shit but Bobby Jindal is apparently like, okay, if you won't let us execute our child rapists I am going to have them CHEMICALLY CASTRATED. I'm almost afraid to click and find out what that meas.

MEGAN: Well, look, there are 5 states that have the law on the books now, but Louisiana was the first. Patrick Kennedy (poor, black) was the first child rapist ever given the death penalty in such a case, in 2003— but the law was passed in 1995
MOE: Oh man it's just Depo-Provera??
MEGAN: Yeah, mostly. Also, chemical castration doesn't solve the problem Chemically castrated rapists have offended again.
MEGAN: Plus, hello, life in prison?

MEGAN: Basically, the idea is that you can't get a boner or you can't ejaculate, but you can rape a person without a dick and Viagra can overcome Depo. Plus, it's rooted in the idea that rape is about sexual arousal, when when is at least as much about power and dominance.
MEGAN: So, if a rapist wants to show dominance, he doesn't need an erection. Lots of rapes are committed with objects (see:Joe Francis' rape).
MOE: Oh dude…uh speaking of dominance ?…WHAT IS THE DEAL WITH THE POLLS WHY DOES GALLUP SAY IT IS A TIE AND EVERYONE ELSE IS LIKE UH-UH OBAMA IS WINNNNING
MEGAN: Well, Gallup says it's within the margin of error, so they're not even sure it represents a change.
MEGAN: The Rasmussen standard is "likely" voters, while Gallup only asks registered voters.

MEGAN: The real mystery to me is the LA Times/Bloomberg poll which has Obama miles ahead but uses the registered voter standard.
MOE: No but like all the polls had Obama 12 points ahead, and then Gallup came out and declared a tie, but whatever I wanted to go back to the fact that, like, even if you isolate North Korea economically they have gotten really good at printing fake currency so that is a problem. Anyway, here's Condi Rice telling everyone how she decided to remove North Korea from the terror list. Nowhere does she say "they are not terrorists because LOOK THEY DON'T BELIEVE IN ALLAH" but you know that's the subtext.
MEGAN: Sure, counterfeiting our money to give to terrorists in exchange for stuff legit governments won't sell them: not terrorism. Because they're not Muslim.
MOE: Oh, well that's simple enough. Registered vs. likely, sure. Mystery solved.
MEGAN: Also, back to the LA Times poll, they included Barr (3%) and Nader (4%), both coming mostly from McCain voters. Also, the LA Times poll is the only one with that large a margin, the Rasmussen and Gallup are both within each other's margins of error.
MEGAN: Also, it appears that the LA Times poll asked about isues and party affiliation, which would naturally affect responses. Gallup just asks "who you gonna vote for."

MEGAN: So, like, to me, that would indicate that in a knee-jerk reaction poll, they're more even but when voters are asked to think about the issues and with whom they agree and what is most important to them issues-wise, Obama does waaaaay better. Which is really interesting.
MEGAN: Yes, I did take statistical methodology as part of my major in Sociology, why do you ask?
MOE: Wait, ADD time, back to the Supreme Court death penalty decision and how it maybe reflects a shift on how the Court views executing people.

Justice Kennedy's majority opinion includes striking comments indicating possible skepticism about the entirety of capital punishment jurisprudence. In a remarkable statement, he says that the court's extensive body of death-penalty case law "is still in search of a unifying principle." That's a pretty bold statement about the whole project. And consider this statement by Kennedy today: "When the law punishes by death, it risks its own sudden descent into brutality, transgressing the constitutional commitment to decency and restraint."

MEGAN: Well, that goes along with the statement in the majority opinion that taking the death penalty off the table to child rapists reflect shifting social values about the death penalty.
MEGAN: That, like, since the standard for "cruel and unusual" changes over time as society changes, so does the Constitutionality of the punishment. I'm okay with that.

MOE: Me too! I think I'm also okay with Karl Rove calling out Obama's "alpha male attitude." Because, LOL!

Mr. Obama's alpha-male attitude was evident even as he stumbled towards and over the primary finish line. First, his campaign announced in May it was talking to Patti Solis Doyle after Sen. Clinton fired her as campaign manager. This served only to pour salt in the Clintons' wounds.

MEGAN: Right, because most politicians and political operatives aren't Type A personalities AT ALL.

MEGAN: But I guess Karl is himself a little more passive-aggressive, and if Bush really did fire him in church so he couldn't make a scene, so is Bush, so maybe Karl's just too used to passive-aggressivity to view assertiveness as anything other than hyper-aggressive?
MEGAN: WAIT oh my God, Karl Rove is everyone I date.
MOE: Um, also how did I miss Obama dissing Scarlett Johansson, (which Mickey Kaus deems "inexplicably clumsy," somewhat inexplicably, since he cops to having watched her video, and like, hello.)

MEGAN: Ummm, I would guess it has a lot more to do with downplaying the black man-white woman vaguely flirtatious suggestion aspect of it.
MOE: Ya think???
MEGAN: Which is just sad.
MOE: Interesting Spiegel piece on Why Russia Is Risking Another Cold War by amping up its military might. The answer seems to be that it isn't, but Putin talks a good game.
MEGAN: Well, who would they have a Cold War with? We're all into hot wars now, and really only in terrorist-sponsoring states that just happen to be Muslim and don't have nukes and shit.

MEGAN: Obama, by the way, is flip-flopping on the DC gun ban since he's trying to win swing states and the Supreme Court is expected to throw it out today.
MOE: Ugh and what the fuck was up with FISA?
MEGAN: The security of the American people trumps their need to protect (i.e., sue over) their right to privacy. He managed to combine a Republican argument on the supreme importance of national security with an implied Republican argument on tort reform. Plus, he can't look soft on terrorism or something and the Democrats have collectively decided to cave on telecomm immunity because they like having Bush scratch their bellies.

MOE: Oh here, they threw it out. Yay.
MEGAN:

Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for four colleagues, said the Constitution does not permit "the absolute prohibition of handguns held and used for self-defense in the home."

MOE: Scalia wrote the opinion. 5-4 decision. Can't wait to read!

MEGAN: You can right here, if you want.

MEGAN: Oooh, oooh, so the woman ABC is suggesting started the photo controversy (though she denies)? A Washington lobbyist previously identified as in charge of Hillary's unsuccessful Drudge outreach initiative.

MOE: I love that they called that an "initiative." You wonder how they burned through all that cash and it's hard to conclude it wasn't by setting up "initiatives" to achieve such complex tasks as leaking shit to Drudge.

MEGAN: Because, really, you know Tracy wasn't doing that for free. She's a lobbyist.

MOE: So have you been paying attention to these mailer scandals? And did you read Michelle Obama's thesis? Because those things seem to be the only things we haven't discussed that are not "hey did you see that story about Hillary losing?"
 
MEGAN: Can we call them "scandals"?
 But, yes
Basically, according to the Post, he's using a Newsweek characterization of her feelings (a "boon").
  She's likewise taking his shit out of context
And neither one of them hates it as much as the unions.
  
Also, one time I lobbied a pro-union Congress member on a trade agreement and he told me and the other lobbyist I was with that he couldn't vote for the one we wanted because he'd just met with the unions and they told him they were mad that "NAFTA sent their jobs to China."
And I was like, um, sir, did you perchance correct that ever-so-slightly inaccurate impression that the North American Free Trade Agreement doesn't include China? And he laughed at me.

MOE: Hahahaha WOW. I don't even know what to say about that. Can you even isolate which trade agreement lost which jobs? Or like, what about fast track? OH, I know what we were supposed to discuss
Oh yes, I Refuse To Buy Into The Obama Hype

MEGAN: Ok, well, I applaud her research.
  
That's a lot of it.
Though she misses the fact that resolutions have no real force of law, but, good. And, um, well, I don't do that much bill research unless someone is paying me.
 
MOE: Um like I'm so glad re: "S.RES.222 : A resolution supporting the goals and ideals of Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month."
Oh are you watching CNN?
I didn't realize it had gotten so mean!
 
MEGAN: Oh, and everyone? The next time you get that Lifetime TV breast cancer bill forwarded email? Delete it. It's a PR campaign for Lifetime and the bill never passes. It just racks up co-sponsors and nver goes anywhere because no one really cares.
 
MOE: And Hillary's voice: sho shrill?
 
MEGAN: Oh, God, you didn't see that little sarcastic thing from the weekend? Yeah.

MOE: I fucking feel like death. "Grassroots mom" is cool though. It's like, aw: "Truth be told, it was very depressing doing this research to see all these great ideas and how little actually gets done."
OH we should also discuss North Korea. I love how CNN is dictating my agenda today.
 
MEGAN: Yeah, that's like the reason I thought Grassroots Mom is true. Like, I thought everyone already knew that that's how Congress works.
Wow, Alina Cho's aunt starved herself to avoid Korean rape squads? Is that the subtext of "kidnapping teenage girls, but only the healthy ones?"
We might want to explain for people that don't obsessively watch cable television that the New York Philharmonic performed in North Korea today. Also, by the way, we don't have a peace treaty with them. We're, like, still at war with them, technically. It's not good. And Kim Jong Il is a crazy fucker. The end.

MOE: Um, and according to this Style piece about the visit

"It's just a country." And, one might add: It's the music that matters most.

MEGAN: Just a country with nuclear capabilities and a mentally disturbed leader who claims and expects people to believe/confirm lies like he only gets holes-in-ones while golfing.
  Also, he didn't apparently attend the concert.

MOE: I'm kinda uh surprised the Post ran this thing!  
It's very counterintuitive!
North Korea = normal!
Somehow I don't really buy it though.
  I know, I know, I've been brainwashed.

MEGAN: Yeah, I actually don't buy it either. I love that it starts off with "musical pundits don't know anything about politics" and then quotes a British singer and a Austrian professor about how normal everyone is.

MOE: Yeah it's really stomach churning. I think we must have discussed the story in the much-acclaimed Parade magazine in which the guide tells the writer Kim Jong-Il wants everyone to play basketball, to help close the 8-inch height gap between North Korean adolescents and their southern brothers.

MEGAN: Probably. It seems like one or the other of us might've mentioned that not starving said adolescents would be a better plan. Crazy fucking Kim Jong Il.

MOE: Um and by the way this Eugene Robinson piece marveling that Obama has made it okay for Fox News viewers to accept the idea that black people can be smart may be my favorite thing ever.
It starts with Geraldo posturing that Deval Patrick and Barack Obama got together at "black genius camp" and plotted to take over the world.
 
MEGAN: There's a new cabal! And it's members are waaay more attractive then the last one!
Or something,
Also, Mr. Robinson is a Fox News commentator.
Not that that tidbit of info is in the piece.  
OMG, he calls the Obamas the new Huxtables.

MOE: Hahaha he is? Mannnnnn. I don't know if I've ever seen him. Um also there's a story about how some Democrats are worried McCain might win. Meanwhile McCain is worried the war might make him lose! It really is a boring fucking day, right? I guess there is another awesome debate tonight we can talk about tomorrow.

MEGAN: It it boring. Chris Dodd's Obama endorsement is news.

MOE: Aw, Chris Dodd.
  Affable losers.
Oh my GODDDD I feel so crappy.
 I think this is the crappiest crappy hour ever.

MEGAN: No one else is going to get why that's funny.
 
MOE: Why don't we talk about Angelina Jolie and how awesome that she's pregnant again.
MEGAN: Or why, perhaps, advice colums are better in print.
  
Because I don't want to see my aunt discussing a dude's big wang.
MOE: Do you think she could figure out how to adopt a starving child in North Korea and then bring global awareness to the tragedy of North Korean famine and the Obama Administration could meet with Kim Jong Il and play basketball and his sheer height and charisma would cause the Kim regime to fold in a bloodless coup and bring freedom to the poor starving short North Koreans...
MEGAN: Ok, it is officially a slow news day when CNN is airing a story about the Tokyo lost and found. They have 130,000 umbrellas turned in over the last 6 months.
MOE: You know it's a tactic of that "be a millionaire before 30" dude to never buy an umbrella because you should really just lie to bartenders and hostesses and tell them you lost your umbrella and get free ones that way. I guess that's the difference between them and us, huh!
MEGAN: I think the difference between "us" and "them" is that "they" wouldn't pay $25 for a book that tells them the key to financial success is stealing umbrellas.

A few months ago, we were watching Entertainment Tonight when all of a sudden Jim Carrey appeared talking all slow and medicated about Burma and how to remember how to pronounce "Aung San Suu Kyi." And we were like, "What's the big deal? That lady hasn't so much as left her house in years!" Um and if you get that joke you'll probably like "That's So Jane's", the feature formed from a pun on the old slogan of Jane magazine and the Pentagon trade publication Jane's Defence Weekly which we provide for those of you who need a breather from the harsh realities of the crippling addictions and vicious custody battles of Brit and Linds and that girl from Heroes. This week Wonkette's Anonymous Lobbyist talks Burma, TomKat, K-Fed and L'il Kim Jong Il with Dr. Jason Abbott, a lecturer in International Politics at the University of Surrey and "owner of one hot British accent."

Q: So, like, what is the difference between Myanmar and Burma? Because the newspapers all keep talking about the protests in Myanmar, but Bush and other people keep talking about Burma. Is Bush just confused again, or is it like how we all have to call Katie Holmes "Kate" because Tom Cruise says so?
A: Well for once Dubya hasn't misread his briefing notes and the Tom Cruise analogy isn't too far from the truth. The two terms have been used interchangeably for centuries within the country since Burma is derived from bama which is essentially a colloquial form of the more formal Myanmar. Some also claim that Myanmar is more inclusive since the country is home to 8 major ethnic minorities and 130 smaller groups. (So think Britain vs. England). In 1989 the Junta decided to align the international name of the country with the formal local name but the opposition refuses to accept this since they maintain that it was made by an illegal regime.


Q: So, why are all the monks protesting? Are they also mad
about that gay Last Supper poster thing?(Link: NSFW)
A: Two things basically turned the monks, who are Buddhist, into protesters. The first was a response to the economic hardship faced by ordinary Burmese upon whom the monks rely for daily offerings of food. Buddhist monks are supposed to have no material possessions so, as the economic situation worsened, they witnessed firsthand the growing poverty of ordinary Burmese. This situation deteriorated sharply in August when the Junta doubled the price of gas and diesel.

The second reason for the protests is that, at a protest in Pakokku at which some monks participated, the military smashed some heads and some of those happened to be bald.

As for homosexuality... Buddhists are generally not as hung up about homosexuality as Christianity or Islam, as long as the sexual act is an expression of love, respect, loyalty and warmth. So I'm not sure they'd be fans of Sado-masochism nor that they'd look good in leather.


Q: Wow, who knew that monks weren't all Catholic! So let me get this straight: they're protesting because they only just realized their country is dirt-poor. What have they been smoking? And if they're the last guys to notice this shit because of their detachment from material possessions or whatever, why were they the first to go piss off the government about it? Didn't someone try that before?
A: The government has basically kept an iron grip on society in Burma. It's an Orwellian nightmare that makes China look like a liberal paradise by comparison. For twenty years there has been nothing on this scale and when protests have been staged they have been in the order of hundreds and have been easily dealt with.

The monks posed a huge dilemma for the military since they initially felt that they could not simply resort to smashing skulls and opening fire indiscriminately. Buddhists believe that what you do in this life will determine how you come back next time. So massacring a few monks is more likely to see you come back as a cockroach than achieving nirvana.


Q: Oh man, isn't that what we all wish? That Clarence Thomas would come back as a 'Rock of Love' contestant? Anyway, memo to poor people: the world doesn't work that way. Especially when your rulers are military dictators!
A: Well they're not stupid, but you know how the Mafia wouldn't kill Mother Teresa? The reverence of ordinary Burmese for the monks galvanized protesters who had cowered in fear for so long, basically because they began to think, "These guys don't mind if they get reincarnated as a E. Coli." The military apparently decided in favor of coming back as cockroaches in the next life rather than potentially having to give up a modicum of power in this one.


Q: I've also read that Aung San Suu Kyi was elected in 1990 but hasn't yet taken office. Isn't that a really long time to wait for an inauguration? Even The Knot says the average engagement is only like a year, and a wedding is, like, really hard to plan.
A: She did, and it is, absolutely. In 1990 her party, the National League for Democracy, won 59 percent of the vote — translating into 392 out of 498 seats in the legislature. Problem was, this wasn't quite the outcome the Junta has expected. They thought their National Unity Party would win and provide them with democratic legitimacy; when, in fact, Ralph Nader probably won more votes in 2004 than they did. So their response? Well, they proved to be terrible losers.


Q: Well, but how hard can house arrest be? The judge made Paris Hilton go back to jail because house arrest was too cushy.
A: Well, if Paris thought conditions at Century Regional Detention Centre were poor, they look like a Five Star hotel when compared to prisons in Burma.


Q: Wow, you're so right. The before and after photos are not pretty. She should just live in a house
like Paris', if she's going to have to spend so much time there.
A: Aung San Suu Kyi has spent 12 of the last 17 years under house arrest. While for some of that period she was allowed visitors, the Junta have, when they felt it necessary, ratcheted up
the privations she has been forced to endure. Her British husband Michael Aris was diagnosed with prostrate cancer in 1997. Not only did the Junta make it clear that if she left the country to see him she
would not be allowed to return, they also denied him a visa. So she was forced to choose between never seeing her husband alive again or abandoning the people for whom she had become a beacon of hope. We all know that she stayed and in 1999 Michael died.


Q: Aw, that's really kind of sad, but I'm not sure it's fair to say we "all" knew that. Is the reason Burma gets so little press because the head dictator guy isn't as hot as some or as crazy as others?
A: Well Senior General Than Shwe hates the limelight. In fact he is almost never seen in public and rarely makes an appearance, let alone a speech, so he is no international playboy. As for whether he is a crazy... well he is incredibly superstitious, and I don't mean simply reading his daily horoscope (he's a Capricorn by the way).

The Junta decided — after consulting an astrologer — to move the capital of Burma to a small town in the middle of the jungle. Out of the forest, the Junta constructed a city an area 78 times the size of Manhattan because, when the soothsayer looked into his crystal ball, he saw a future catastrophe that could only be avoided by relocating the entire government real estate. The same mystic declared that the best time for the move would be November 6, 2005, at 6.37 a.m. and so, when the day finally arrived, Burma's senior leadership drove into their new town at the ordained hour.


Q: JESUS. That's more ridiculous than all of Kevin Federline's shopping sprees combined. Which reminds me, the K-Fed thing is probably why I hadn't heard of Than Shwe's name but I had heard of Kim Jong Il: because his craziness is more along the level of Britney's! So like, how jealous do you think he had to be of A'Jad's press coverage to have agreed to talk to the other Korean president guy? They're totally more estranged than even Lauren and Heidi!
A: Well I imagine A'Jad must have been pretty irritated that some reclusive general who lives in the forest was stealing all his limelight at the UN last week, while little Kim (he is only 5'3") obviously decided that the only way he could wrestle CNN away from the streets of Rangoon was either by nuking Tokyo or reinventing himself as a man of peace. Maybe he has his eye on next week's Nobel Prize?


Q: Wow, that was totally statesmanlike of him to keep his nukes to himself this time! Maybe he's, like, totally channeling Aung San Suu Kyi!
A: Somehow, I doubt that.


Q: So, how pissed off do you think little Kim really was when the press coverage was all about the other guy's grabby hands? Is ass-grabbing the new boob-grabbing?
A: Well, I think we can blame this trend for wandering hands by Heads of State on Clinton. I doubt little Kim was that bothered... he was probably more interested in the fancy foreign cars that President Roh had driven up to Pyongyang in and wondering whether he could get him to agree to a partial exchange for a few centrifuges.


Q: Ooh, centrifuges! I remember those! They're a totally sweet ride, just like Roh's tricked out limo. How do the Burmese generals roll, besides in tanks?
A: I'm sure everyone hopes that eventually we might see the general's asses floating down a river rather than some innocent monks'.


Q: As long as they're not bare. I want to see that less than Lindsay's Britney!