Winners and losers.

As of this writing, there have been 3 "major" primary contests on the Republican side - Iowa, New Hampshire, and Michigan - and just as many winners. Good grief. One might only hope that it would continue along these lines, right up to their caveman convention. Still, I'm certain they'll congeal around one of those disgusting blisters and proceed with their usual (and often successful) attempt to race-bait, terror-scam, and otherwise bluster their way into the White House for another term. Hardly matters who the actual candidate will be - whichever one takes his party's grisly mantle, he will no doubt benefit enormously from television ads that open with an ominous low note and a blurry photograph of their opponent. Just hold out for a few more weeks, folks, then it'll be open season. (They're loading up the slime cannons right now.) And whoever emerges from the fray with the most votes this November... well, their savaged remains will take up residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Okay, so what are the Democrats doing? Well, they're busily generating ammunition for the Republicans to use in their Fall campaign. Expect to hear familiar themes being sounded across the airwaves this fall, to say nothing of what will arrive in your mailbox (and inbox). During the 2006 congressional race - a hotly contested one up in my neck of the woods - the national Republican party was airing T.V. ads and sending out glossy fliers depicting pole dancers that they inferred had some tenuous connection with Democratic candidate (now congressman) Michael Arcuri. That was just plain low, sure, but what impressed me most was the sheer volume of advertising. If nothing else, it gives you a sense of what it's like to live in a contested state - something New York has not been since maybe 1984, with respect to the general election. So pretty much any negative campaigning during primary season will be recycled and amplified by the opposition come September.

In one sense, this is the dynamic that drove Democratic support for the Iraq war authorization resolution back in 2002. Many war supporters wanted to inoculate themselves from being attacked as "soft on Saddam" and, more generally, "soft on terror". I don't believe for a moment that it was any great moral leap for Hillary Clinton to vote with the president on that. She practically out-Cheneyed Cheney on the Senate floor as they debated that ridiculous resolution. And my feeling is that she will take ownership of that vote again if circumstances allow her (and the administration) to act as though there's something to celebrate in our Iraq policy. That's why John McCain is strutting around like a turkey... because he feels like his brick-brained support for the invasion of Iraq is finally paying off. Hillary may end up playing that card as well. Never mind that their support for the war has led to the deaths of probably 750,000 to 1 million people and created 4 million refugees. That's Rwanda territory, far outstripping Saddam's record... and they can stack that atop the probably 500,000 who died as a result of U.S./U.K. -driven sanctions during the 1990s. And I don't hear any convincing talk of withdrawal from either side, so it's likely to add up to even more.

Bottom line: whoever wins, Iraq loses. You can take that to the bank.

luv u,

jp