This data is an accounting of civilian deaths in Iraq to date.
See Iraqbodycount.net for statistical methodologies

Best of the Bush, Round Two
"Another example (of activist judges Bush wouldn't appoint to the Supreme Court) would be the Dred Scott case, which is where judges years ago said that the Constitution allowed slavery because of personal property rights"

"I own a timber company? That's news to me. Need some wood?"

"First, the National Journal named Senator Kennedy the most liberal senator of all. And that's saying something in that bunch. You might say that took a lot of hard work."

"I can see why people at your workplace think he changes positions a lot. Because he does. "

"Now, you asked what mistakes. I made some mistakes in appointing people, but I'm not going to name them. I don't want to hurt their feelings on national TV."

Capper for the Evening: "I'm not telling. I really don't have, haven't picked anybody yet. Plus I want them all voting for me."
On whom he would appoint to the Supreme Court.

Kerry's Parrys
"Military's job is to win the war. The president's job is to win the peace."

"I can't take what is an article of faith for me and legislate it for someone who doesn't share that article of faith."

"I'm going to be a president who believes in science."

Pandemonium on the Podium
Under a heavy dose of anti-smirk medication* from good pal Rush Limbaugh (*may cause excessive blinking, oblique historical references and sanctimonious references to failed war strategy), Bush came out swinging and swaggering in debate #2. By all accounts, Bush appeared significantly less incoherent and further up the hominid evolutionary scale than in debate #1. Consequently, Kerry crushed him less soundly than the first debate, which was the polemic equivalent of the New York Yankees vs. the Washington Generals. (editor - are we okay with mixed sports metaphors?)

Bush lashed out with many bold statements. He insisted that he would choose a Supreme Court justice who did not have an activist record of defending slavery. He offered to sell firewood to the enshivered (Kerry's odd reference to Bush's interest in a timber company was actually true and would include Bush as one of the 900,000 small business owners using Bush's own statistical methodologies), admitted appointment mistakes, railed against Teddy Kennedy's voting record and jovially (at least to himself) referenced his "hard work" reference and smirking from debate #1.

Kerry watched a couple of gentle pitches waltz over the plate and chose not to swing, including his weak comeback of Bush's policies against the environment and his reference to Bush's "weapons of mass deception," a phrase this very column first plagiarized back in early 2003. Still he had some zingers regarding winning the peace, giving a quarter of a billion dollars to Enron, losing 1,600,000 jobs American under the sofa cushions of Saddam's grand palace.

A closer debate for sure, but it will do little to undo the Bush damage wrought in the great clue-bobbing of Sep 30th.

Veep-athon
In between the debates to see who will preside over operation Bush cleanup, the veepstakes contest was Rottweiler vs. Poodle. Last election saw the most infuriating love-fest between Cheney and Leiberman which some sources reported ending in a backstage two man love sandwich fueled by cheap liquor.

Not this time, folks. Whatever decorum the prez contenders were pretending to uphold, their veep counterparts were pissing up a storm. It seemed fairly even from my highly biased perspective, although the internet follow up was pretty revelatory of Cheney's generous interpretation of reality.

For those of you who watched the debate and actually cared about it, try the brain teaser below:

1. "you are still not being straight with the American people"
2. "The senator’s got his fact wrong"
3. "He just got it wrong"
4. "They got it wrong"
5. "the figure is just dead wrong"
6. "So your facts are just wrong"
7. "What the vice president has just said is just a complete distortion"
8. "Your rhetoric would be a lot more credible if there was a record to back it up. There isn’t"
9. "his judgment is flawed"
10. "it’s hard to know where to start. There’s so many inaccuracies there"
11. "This, unfortunately what the vice what the vice president is telling people is inconsistent with everything they see every single day"
12. "It’s not true"
13. "It’s not true"
14. "They know the charges are false"
15. "That was a complete distortion of my record"
16. "He’s the one who didn’t talk about it"

Click here for the answers...

Afghanistan Rocks the Vote
Wow. 150% participation in the re-anointment of Hamid Karzai. That's pretty good return on America's investment.

Seriously though, it's a good thing that just happened in Afghanistan, thanks to the broad participation of the international community. Over-registration was rampant, America dumped lots of mullah moolah into Karzai's re-election and there were still parts of the ravaged nation that were under-represented, but nonetheless the outcome was far more democratically represented than can be hoped for in the Bush fantasy Iraqi election scheduled for January of 2005.

Even though the debates next Wednesday night are supposed to cover domestic issues only, expect to hear the Rhinestone Cowboy trot the Afghani election out a couple times to show that there are still aspects of foreign affairs outside the scope of his far-reaching blunderment.

Imagine how effective the image of bringing democracy to Afghanistan would be if not hideously counterbalanced by the escalating carnage in the streets of Iraq.

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