Of course there are POWs.

Our weaponry is good, but not so good that we're invulnerable.

It was rather disgusting to see what little they showed of the pictures of the dead Americans...one Iraqi guy gloating over them...

Oh, I don't doubt it happens in all other conflicts, on both sides, especially when invading a country, but it usually isn't taped and televised over half the world.

I did love the comment on the general, with the Iraqis shooting into the Tigris for a supposedly downed pilot,

"Their search and rescue methods leave a bit to be desired."

Yeppers.

"A discouraging day".

A realistic day, rather.

This is what war is, and we needn't try to pretend we've gotten things so advanced that it isn't a messay,distasteful business. Enough of this talk of cakewalks. It's a deadly business.

Including---insanity or vengefulness on our own people.

Hence the shooting/grenading of the American officers in the Kuati camp, by one of their own soldiers. That hits a little close to home---Ft. Campbell, Kentucky, where these soldiers were based from, is the closest army base to here.

According to some reports just released, the guy thought he was being discriminated against because of his Muslim religion and obviously Muslim name since his conversion. Others thought he had an "attitude problem" and was "insurbordinate".

Lugging a grenade into a crowded tent---that's pretty insubordinate all right. And it just might lead to some ---justified---discrimination in this case.

I know these guys are under a lot of pressure, but hooo boy.

Some might think Michael Moore's remarks a little crass at the Oscars, while American soldiers are dying...

Michael Moore? A little crass and blunt? This comes as a surprise? That's like criticizing Robin Williams for being hyperkinetically funny.

I'm glad someone said it, actually. I would have dressed it up prettier, but the sentiments were good...

It was the only high point to a rather pointless Oscar night. I thought Adrien Brody's remarks a little more high-class, and I'm glad Peter O'Toole finally won something....

Still, it seemed so unreal in the face of war...

Hooked on a sterile "reality TV" that doesn't capture the face of war adequately.

I suspect one reason something like "Chicago", with its most unreal of settings---a musical---won is that we really don't want to face the unpleasant reality around us...

Didn't musicals do well during World War II?

Also the country is stuck watching unreal "reality shows" where fifty men vie for one woman, or fifty women vie for one millionaire---who isn't.

Moore's right. These are fictitious times.

Orange alerts. Firefights shown live by "embedded" reporters.

That's reality.

Unfortunately.

Give me fiction anytime. And again, maybe that's the point.

We turn to fiction when reality is either too dreary---or too much, to bear.

What can we do now?

(Shrugging.) Nothing. Saddam will be deposed. We can't get halfway through a country, and then go "Oops, sorry, such a mistake," and return.

We can hold mistakes accountable to the ones that make them, though.

These are unreal times. Fictitious times.

Critically unacceptable.

No wonder I turn to my comic strip so much....