Watch out for the Hispanicane....and the Stormbrero!

Today, the House is voting on a non-binding resolution that sets in stone the fact that Iraq is (now) a large part of the global war on terror, and that there are currently no plans to withdraw. Ever.

*****UPDATE*****

House Rejects Timetable for Iraq Pullout

In a 256-153 vote, the GOP-led House approved a nonbinding resolution that praises U.S. troops, labels the Iraq war part of the larger global fight against terrorism and says an "arbitrary date for the withdrawal or redeployment" of troops is not in the national interest.

*****END UPDATE*****

Last night, on Hardball, Duncan Hunter (R-CA) went head to head with Marty Meehan (D-MA) on the resolution. Duncan Hunter wasn’t able to answer the Why-Did-We-Go-To-War question that Chris threw out at him, but he did say that congress voted to move into Iraq, installed a free government, and did something that will ultimately result in having an American ally for future generations. He also said some bullshit about Iraq being fragile, but free... Naturally, Chris had no follow-up after his rambling non-answer. Chris cut to commercials with a Carvillian metaphor (paraphrased): A lot of people think you guys gave Bush a blank check. He filled it out and it said WAR on it. I want to have Chris Mattews circa Tip O'Neil's era to fill me up with his babies. In the Assholes-On-Parade segment, Chris talked to Bill Frist (R-TN) and, I kid you not, the cat killing monkey doctor said “cut and run” like 4 times in less than a minute-and-a-half. Had he been decked out inna seersucker stylee for the interview, it might have been a little more exciting. Then, Chris talked to Al Sharpton and Ed Rogers, a former Bush 41 advisor. Nothing newsworthy there…really there wasn’t. Moving on to the morning time dot dot dot NBC is really trying hard to force-feed the Bush Is On A Roll narrative down our throats before the week is over. Zarqawi was just the beginning of all this great news. Things are on the up and up for POTUS: Rove was cleared, Bush is getting a lot of mileage (literally!) out of his recent 5 hour visit to the Green Zone, and the stealth manner in which the whole trip was carried out just added dramatic effect to the who kick-ass affair. Charlie Cook said it was like an exclamation point at the end of this fantastic week. After too many reach-arounds to count, what’s-her-face had Micheal Smerconish and James Carville on to talk about the President’s GREAT week. (Did he get his mojo back or what?!)Smerconish referred to Bush as the new Comeback Kid, f’real. Carville giggled the way Carville giggles and pointed out the fact that (according to NBC) this is the biggest 1 point jump in approval ratings ever. Snap!

Paraphrased Carville nuggets:

Bush goes from 36% to 37% and NBC is ready to declare a national holiday. Talk about the soft bigotry of low expectations. We used to get concerned in the Clinton White House when his ratings dropped below 57%.

In the end, all Smerconish could finish with was a breathless : “It’s a good week for America!” AND… In the department of Who Gives A Shit: Jay Z has given up on Cristal.