Ultimately, it's simple: You love who you love, if you're lucky enough to find love.

I've never heard Mr. McCain pressed in person on the matter of his circular logic.

He says, on the one hand, that we should stay in Iraq for upwards of 100 years, perhaps even longer, but only if American troop casualties are remarkably low or non-existent. This, of course, implies a peaceful Iraq.

On the other hand, he argues that we should never leave -- never surrender, as he puts it — as long as Iraq is unpeaceful, which could very well translate into the same occupational duration that, ostensibly, only his first stipulation allowed.

In short, he says, we can stay in Iraq on good terms, which can only be achieved through bad terms, whose terms naturally force abiding troop casualties, which is obviously the reason we cannot stay, but which is just as obviously the reason we must — indefinitely.

The new group’s name takes its inspiration from the 25th chapter of the gospel of Matthew in which Jesus talks about how he will select people like a shepherd separating sheep from goats, saying, “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.”

In many respects, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama has played right into the hands of cynics who have long doubted his promises to create a new and more progressive role for the United States in the world. The very morning after the last primaries, in which he finally received a sufficient number of pledged delegates to secure the Democratic presidential nomination and no longer needed to win over voters from the progressive base of his own party, Obama – in a Clinton-style effort at triangulation – gave a major policy speech before the national convention of the America-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). Embracing policies which largely backed those of the more hawkish voices concerned with Middle Eastern affairs, he received a standing ovation for his efforts.

His June 3 speech in Washington in many ways constituted a slap in the face of the grass roots peace and human rights activists who have brought him to the cusp of the Democratic presidential nomination.

As Obama's remarks to AIPAC confirm for yet another time, out of similar countless times, both parties have brought us to the very edge of the possible ultimate nightmare: a broad regional and even a world war, perhaps fought with nuclear weapons, that begins with an unprovoked, non-defensive attack by the United States on Iran.

And you're still going to leave it to the elected Democrats and Republicans to prevent this catastrophe? Wake the hell up: it's up to us now, as it has been for a long time...

It's no surprise that presidential contenders Barack Obama and John McCain are vying to promise relief from high oil prices. Obama promises to tax oil company windfall profits, double fuel-efficiency standards for the auto industry and increase government-funded research into alternative energy sources. McCain swears he'll suspend the federal gas tax, rely on market innovation to spur conservation and open up currently off-limits coastal areas for oil drilling.

But what neither mentions — and the media rarely point out — is that US foreign policy also has a dramatic impact on the price of oil. So if you don't like gas at more than $4 a gallon, you should look at the candidates' foreign policy platforms too.

I wish to draw the attention of the blog world to Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s articles of impeachment presented to the House in order that two faithless public servants be removed from office for crimes against the American people. As I listened to Rep. Kucinich invoke the great engine of impeachment — he listed some 35 crimes by these two faithless officials — we heard, like great bells tolling, the voice of the Constitution itself speak out ringingly against those who had tried to destroy it.

Although this is the most important motion made in Congress in the 21st century, it was also the most significant plea for a restoration of the republic, which had been swept to one side by the mad antics of a president bent on great crime. And as I listened with awe to Kucinich, I realized that no newspaper in the US, no broadcast or cable network, would pay much notice to the fact that a highly respected member of Congress was asking for the president and vice president to be tried for crimes which were carefully listed by Kucinich in his Articles of Impeachment.