He's getting quite creative, this coy former vice president of ours. When asked if he's running for president in 2008, Al Gore devises every possible answer to throw his questioners off the trail: "I have no intention of running." "I have no plans to be a candidate for president again." "I don't expect to run." "I can't imagine any circumstances in which I would become a candidate again." "Politics is behind me." Every answer, that is, except the one that has any meaning: "If nominated I will not run; if elected I will not serve." That was the unequivocal answer famously given by Civil War-era general William Tecumseh Sherman when asked about his presidential aspirations upon retiring from the Army in 1884. Sherman, unlike Gore, left no doubt of his "intention."

"I haven't made a so-called Sherman statement, because it just seems unnecessary, kind of odd to do that....but that's not an effort to hold the door open. It's more the internal shifting of gears," said Gore in an interview broadcast Sunday on ABC's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos."

The grass roots are just that--roots. The thought is often lost on those at the top of the political food chain. Without roots, the top topples. The grass roots are not impressed with the way that John Kerry conceeded in the face of overwhelming upset at fact and suspicions of foul play, fraud and supression. Some of the 'roots' are disillusioned to the point of jumping ship to Green territory. Some are just not going to choose any alternative. Some secretly wish Al Gore would reconsider and enter.

What the top seldom realizes as they create the campaign blueprints that they expect everyone like sheep to line up and follow, providing the competitive footwork and fund with every agressive email solicitation, is that the grass roots on the last campaign, staked not only their credibility, but took considerable abuse for doing so in backing Kerry. Many of them worked volunteer for many long months at considerable personal sacrifice and negative personal cash flow because they believed it that important to stop the agenda of this Administration.

Have you ever heard someone try to argue that the Iraq War was a mistake but that now the proper course is to continue the mistake a bit longer or to carefully end it in a long and complicated way that could take months or years?  Have you ever wondered how such a position, if examined in detail, could possibly make any sense?

Wonder no more.  Such a position, in various forms, actually makes no sense.  In fact, such a position requires a stunning degree of illogic.

There's an important book at http://www.endthewartour.org called "Iraq: The Logic of Withdrawal" by Anthony Arnove.  The book has a Foreword and an Afterword by Howard Zinn, who in 1967 published "Vietnam: The Logic of Withdrawal."  Arnove's book is important because it refutes all the major claims against immediate withdrawal.

Arnove begins with some historical background, and then lays out an overwhelming case for the following points.  I'll list them here, but you'll need to read the book (it's only 100 pages) for the arguments:

I’ve been thinking about Tariq Aziz a lot since the New York Times printed a front-page story on the former Iraqi deputy prime minister in late May. A color photograph showed him decked out in what the article described as “an open-necked hospital gown, with a patient’s plastic identification tag on his wrist.” He looked gaunt.

The last time I saw Aziz, at a Baghdad meeting two months before the U.S.-led invasion began, he was still portly in one of his well-tailored business suits. If Aziz was worried, he didn’t show it.

Now, he’s playing a part that U.S. media seem to relish. The Times headline said “Hussein’s Former Envoy Gushes With Adulation on Witness Stand,” but to sum up the coverage it might have just as aptly declared: “How the Mighty Have Fallen.”

The Times reported that Aziz defended Saddam Hussein in his May 24 testimony -- after he was not able to cut a deal with Baghdad’s current legal powers-that-be. “At an earlier stage of the trial, American officials said Mr. Aziz had offered to testify against Mr. Hussein on the condition that he be released early, a proposition the Iraqi court and

"It's past time for HIV and AIDS to be relegated to history so that 25 years from now, we can look back at what was and what is no more," said Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese.

WASHINGTON - Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese made the following statement on the 25th anniversary of the first reported case of AIDS:

"In a heartbeat, a generation of Americans was lost to AIDS," said Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese. "While the government's reaction was slow, the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community united into a political force that demanded action and, with an enduring commitment, secured it. Today is a day to honor the lives lost, to pay tribute to the many who took action, and to recognize the great challenges that still stand before us in fighting the scourge of HIV and AIDS.

Solmonese continued, "While we've come a long way, HIV/AIDS continues to devastate communities around the world and in the United States, particularly among men who have sex with men and communities of color. We must demand that more resources are devoted to this fight. The