In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
Who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, "Is it good, friend?"
"It is bitter—bitter," he answered;
"But I like it
"Because it is bitter,
"And because it is my heart."
(S. Crane, 1895)

Sunshine on My Soldier

By now you've seen the spectacle of Baghdad's residents hauling off refrigerators, pieces of drywall, anything that isn't nailed down and most of everything else. Gotta be the greatest looting orgy since the sack of Rome. The NY Daily News says, "Baghdad's a Grab Bag."

We mentioned earlier that Kellogg Brown & Root Services of Houston, a Halliburton subsidiary, is on the profiteering fast-track with a $7 billion contract to put out oil-well fires and coordinate the restructuring of Iraq's petroleum biz. People are starting to ask questions about this.

"There's gotta be something more to this than putting out a few wells," said Ed Porter, a senior researcher at the American Petroleum Institute. "I've never seen a contract [summary] like this. There's really not much information there."

Yeah, What He Saeed

If anybody on the Iraqi side is coming out of this a winner, s'gotta be former Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf.

We are indebted to Sahaf for giving us those great moments of levity amid all the sturm-und-drang, like his classic, "The infidels are committing suicide by the hundreds on the gates of Baghdad," and who could forget his depiction of the coalition leaders as "an international gang of criminal bastards," "ignorant imperialists," "blood-sucking bastards," and "losers and fools."

Somehow, in some crazy impossible-to-explain fashion, Sahaf turned himself into the closest thing to an Iraqi celebrity that's likely to emerge—he's a media hero. Everybody wants a piece of this guy: he's getting job offers from American public relations firms, and all he needs is a little more public exposure to get his own TV show.

This is where you can help out.

Dubbed Comical Ali by the UK Guardian, Sahaf's likeness de Guevara is appearing on an "El Ministro Saeed al Sahaf T-Shirt" marketed by the Football365 Shop. Comes complete with his signature byline: "We are in control". Order yours today, since the maker has already sold 1,000 of 'em in the two days they've been on sale. I'm thinking about getting one as a kind of personal statement, or maybe just to piss off the guys at the gym.

Sony Patents "Shock and Awe"

Yep, they beat us to the punch. They're planning on the using the phrase as the title of their upcoming wargame release.

A spokesman for Sony PlayStation in the UK admitted the company might not stock the game in Britain and Europe owing to political sensitivities.

The Joker

For some inexplicable reason, the story about the U.S. military issuing the troops with decks of Iraq's "Most Wanted" playing cards is getting a lot of buzz today.

I even caught this on the radio this morning. Every story ends with the obligatory, "And Saddam's face is on the Ace of Spades!" Like that's some kinda big bad mojo we're slapping on the clown. Announcing the cards was Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks, who's become the Schwartzkopf-like icon of the war.

Brooks did not identify those in the deck, except to suggest they included Saddam and his minister of information, Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf, who boasted of battlefield successes right up to the time he disappeared Tuesday.

"There are jokers in this deck, there is no doubt about that," Brooks said.

Al Qaim Mystery

Interesting coverage in the International Herald-Trib about the "mysterious" battle that's been raging at an extensive compound in Al Qaim, near the Syrian border. Incredibly, the defending Republican Guards have held out here for 3 weeks. How is that possible? Because we're not bombing the place. Why not? That's the mystery.

A senior military official says we've been trying "unconventional warfare direct-action missions," which means...anybody have a guess?

Next: Writing and the Meaning of Interpretation. Boring? Pretentious? You betcha!

3:14:52 PM