A couple of things

First, the dust up about Obama and his former minister (the man retired from the church last year - a point that people tend to overlook). From an atheist's standpoint, the belief in the supernatural of any sort is to be rather, well, "touched in the head". Therefore, whether Obama agreed with his minister's position or not, the very fact that he's attending church makes him no worse or better than Clinton or McCain. There's no reason to differentiate between the degrees of craziness in religions. As to the minister's political views? Some of defensible, many are not. But how that makes Obama any more susceptible to them as opposed to JFK following the Pope or Romney following his elders (weren't Republicans going to great lengths recently to calm the electorate about possibly nominating a Mormon?) or McCain following Robertson and crew, I don't know. It's just political/media theater.

Secondly, regarding the Obama/Clinton/McCain passport mess. What I want to know is why aren't there safeguards - not just for the candidates, but everyone - to prevent this stuff? Why are contracters allowed to see this data in the first place? Why are trainees allowed access to even read live data, particularly during a training session?

Finally, this from the Washington Post - not surprising, but still alarming:

In the months leading up to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, the Bush administration threatened trade reprisals against friendly countries who withheld their support, spied on its allies, and pressed for the recall of U.N. envoys that resisted U.S. pressure to endorse the war, according to an upcoming book by a top Chilean diplomat.

The rough-and-tumble diplomatic strategy has generated lasting "bitterness" and "deep mistrust" in Washington's relations with allies in Europe, Latin America and elsewhere, Heraldo Mu¿oz, Chile's ambassador to the United Nations, writes in his book "A Solitary War: A Diplomat's Chronicle of the Iraq War and Its Lessons," set for publication next month.

"In the aftermath of the invasion, allies loyal to the United States were rejected, mocked and even punished" for their refusal to back a U.N. resolution authorizing military action against Saddam Hussein's government, Mu¿oz writes.

But the tough talk dissipated as the war situation worsened, and President Bush came to reach out to many of the same allies that he had spurned. Mu¿oz's account suggests that the U.S. strategy backfired in Latin America, damaging the administration's standing in a region that has long been dubious of U.S. military intervention.

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