A Bad Idea?

So, I haven't posted on the Foley scandal, and I haven't said much about the Woodward book. On the Foley scandal, I don't have much to add. It seems to me that it's pretty hard to believe that the leadership did "everything they could have done" to protect pages from Foley's, um, advances. And it seems pretty clear that at least some members of the leadership had enough knowledge of Foley's activities that they were "on notice," with at least some obligation to investigate. OK, nothing to add there. And it seems pretty clear to me that Hastert has been lying about what he knew and about the Democrats' role in the uncovering of the emails and IMs.

Perhaps the biggest surprise to me is that this scandal is the one that might bring the GOP down. But the media will always cover a sex scandal. Lobbyist scandals, another story.

On the Woodward book, few new details, if you've been paying attention the last four years. I realize that most people haven't been, but if you have been, you already knew that the administration went to war--rushed to war--without a clue about what deposing Saddam Hussein would actually mean. What is more interesting, and more on this to come, is that almost everyone who talked to Woodward about this book seemed determined to throw Rumsfeld under the bus. About 300 pages into the book, it's easy to reach the conclusion that Rumsfeld screwed this up. Oh, sure, Bush and Cheney played their own roles (incompetent dufus and evil madman, respectively). But it was Rumsfeld. That seems to be the message of the book, so far.

Oh, did you catch Woodward on Meet the Press this Sunday? There's been some controersy over some of the statements of Cheney, Scowcroft, and a few others in the book. A few of these folks have denied that they spoke to Woodward about State of Denial. And that is true, as far as it goes. Woodward had an inspiration in working on this book, though. Why not, at the same time, write a book on the Ford administration? After all, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and many other players in the Bush adminsitration were in the Ford administration . . . so, at the end of the "on the record" interview on the Ford years, a question about the Iraq war kind of pops up, and the interiewee answers, without having asked, "Is this still on the record?" Brilliant. Can't wait to read that book on the Ford years.

Speaking of old times, I should note that the Tigers start their American League Championship Series showdown with the Oakland Athletics tonight. It's funny the difference that a week makes. On October 1, the Twins won the AL Central, the Tigers finishing the season with a humiliating sweep at the hands of the woefully bad Kansas City Royals. A week later, the Twins had been swept by Oakland, and Detroit had dominated the Yankees to advance. So the Twins had a good week, followed by a bad week, but the Tigers had a series of bad weeks, followed by one great week. Let's hope that that string of good weeks continues. GO TIGERS!

Finally, that brings me to the point of this post.

Have you seen the ads for this new Robin Williams movie, Man of the Year? The one where the comedian runs for and wins the presidency. This seems like the worst idea for a movie I've ever seen. Oh, sure, it would have been funny seen years ago, when we lived in a non-serious time, dominated by MonicaGate. But these are serious times. Are people really in the mood for a "politics is a laughing matter" movie . . . ?

Besides, when was the last time that a Robin Williams movie was actually funny?