My heroes this week are Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos, but since Gary already wrote about them, I'll also mention the Colorado Rockies and the San Diego Padres, for playing 22 innings last night in an epic pitchers' duel:

Colorado and San Diego did just that Thursday night and into Friday morning, slogging through a 22-inning game that was the longest in the majors in nearly 15 years.

The Rockies finally won 2-1, with Troy Tulowitzki’s two-out RBI double bringing in Willy Taveras with an unearned run in nearly empty Petco Park. A game that lasted 6 hours, 16 minutes was decided by an unearned run.

Hack this week is Jimmy Carter, as his one man mission for peace (at what cost?) brought him to laying a wreath at Yasser Arafat's grave. Even Obama, who wants to 'meet with our enemies' (which isn't as bad an idea as it sounds, really) was criticizing him for it.

(Dis)honorable mention goes to President Bush, for a lapse of logic worthy of note.

Bush rejected Iran's argument that its nuclear activities are intended only for a civilian energy program.

"If that's the case, why did they have a secret program?" he said at a Rose Garden news conference with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

Now, I'm certainly not a fan of the Iranian regime, but maybe, just maybe, they were hiding their program because the United States is Hell-bent on shutting it down, and the Iranians are worried about an Iraqi invasion redux, which was over an alleged WMD program.

Labels: Blame it on Bush, Hero/Hack, Iran, Israel, Sports

Posted by Ryan S. at 10:37 AM | Permalink | |

WASHINGTON, Dec. 3 — A new assessment by American intelligence agencies concludes that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and that the program remains frozen, contradicting judgment two years ago that Tehran was working relentlessly toward building a nuclear bomb.

The conclusions of the new assessment are likely to reshape the final year of the Bush administration, which has made halting Iran’s nuclear program a cornerstone of its foreign policy.

The assessment, a National Intelligence Estimate that represents the consensus view of all 16 American spy agencies, states that Tehran is likely keeping its options open with respect to building a weapon, but that intelligence agencies “do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons.”

Invade Iraq, end WMDs in Libya and Iran. Whoddathunkit?

Labels: GWOT, Iran, Iraq

Posted by Ryan S. at 9:17 PM | Permalink | |

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was laughed at during his speech at Columbia University:

Vilified as a Holocaust denier, a supporter of terrorism and a backer of Iraqi insurgents, the president of Iran was actually able to make New Yorkers burst into laughter -- but not at a joke.

"In Iran we don't have homosexuals like in your country," Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said at Columbia University on Monday in response to a question about the recent execution of two gay men there.

"In Iran we do not have this phenomenon," he continued. "I do not know who has told you we have it."

Loud laughs and boos broke from the audience of about 700 people, mostly students at the Ivy League school whose garb included "Stop Ahmadinejad's Evil" T-shirts.

Ridicule can be an effective weapon.

Michael Barone:

Columbia doesn't host ROTC or (I think) military recruiters on campus, because it would be just too offensive to do so, because the military obeys the law passed by a Democratic Congress and signed by Bill Clinton which bars open homosexuals from serving in the military. OK.

But Columbia does host Ahmedinejad who heads a government which executes homosexuals for the crime of being homosexuals.

So it's obnoxious beyond belief to exclude homosexuals from military service, but it's not obnoxious beyond belief to hang them from the neck until dead.

Labels: Iran

Posted by Ryan S. at 9:47 AM | Permalink | |