First of all, let’s assume that the latest Mahdi uprising was aimed at embarrassing (and weakening) the Iraqi government. If the offensive was going so well, why did Sadr -- or more correctly, his patrons in Iran -- decide to pull the plug? Assuming they still controlled large sections of Basra, Iraq’s second-largest city, the Mahdi fighters had little reason to lay down their arms.

Instead, it was Sadr who ordered his factions to cooperate with Iraqi security forces. During six days of intense fighting, the Mahdi Army took a beating, literally and figuratively. Even an insurgent force can’t afford to lose over 200 fighters a day, including those killed and wounded. We doubt that Sadr was concerned about the number of fighters he lost. What he couldn’t tolerate was the image of Iraqi security forces, backed by U.S. troops and airpower, routing his forces in Basra and Baghdad.

That sort of black eye doesn’t help Sadr, who still views himself as a major political force in Iraq.

It seems clear that this year’s establishment candidate, Hilary Clinton, will not have organized labor rush to her rescue. Part of this may be political payback for her husband’s presidency. After aggressively supporting Bill Clinton twice, many labor unions felt that his administration either ignored them or endorsed legislation (such as NAFTA) that was inimical to union interests.

But there are more fundamental issues that explain labor’s shift. For starters, the leaders of today’s unions are different from those of yesteryear in personality and ideology. Consider Andy Stern, the charismatic president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and arguably the most important labor leader in America. Stern didn’t get his start in the union movement working at a steel mill; instead, he attended the University of Pennsylvania in the late 1960s and first joined the SEIU as a social worker. Unlike Meany or Kirkland, Stern is unabashedly liberal on nearly every policy issue. And when Stern was unhappy with the leadership of the AFL-CIO, he spurned the old labor line about “solidarity,” withdrew the SEIU from the AFL-CIO, recruited like-minded unions to do the same, and formed an entirely new labor federation, dubbed Change to Win.

The logic of production is freely carried out in the treatment of manufactured embryos, though tellingly the State wants some control over the kind of offspring parents may accept. The sinister concept of the ‘permitted’ embryo, and the permission for embryos to be ‘preferred’ for transfer as healthy, but not as sick or disabled, are obvious examples. Not everyone is welcome in the libertarian Brave New World.  

The brutal disregarding of the respect and reverence due to human procreation is continued in allowing human material to be used to substitute for animal sperm or ova or their parts. Whatever the risk of creating actual human embryos -- which depends on the specific technique -- it devalues human procreation to interact this way with animal reproductive processes. 

What can be done?  We can fight for amendments that prohibit abuses, or mitigate their effects -- without, however, telling anyone how to plan, or carry out, such abuses. An example would be birth certificates, which can and should record donor conception, for the benefit of any child conceived.  At the end of the line, we can oppose the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill, braving any repercussions this involves, and supporting others with any repercussions they experience.  And, of course, we can pray.

Conservatives fear John McCain because they assume he approaches politics the way most people do, and so take his substantive views to express an underlying liberalism. That is certainly mistaken. McCain is neither a liberal nor quite a conservative. Even if his actions do not always live up to his own standards, McCain is an honor politician — aggressive in opposing corruption, hypersensitive to inauthenticity or dishonesty, addicted to big causes, essentially uninterested in what most conservatives take to be the substance of politics, and, lest we forget, supremely vain. This is not a wonderful combination, but it is not a terrible one, and it could well be a winning one in November. Conservatives should view McCain not as a hostile force, but as a foreign and unfamiliar presence, bearing real potential as well as real risk.

To make the most of McCain’s potential -- his appeal to voters, his personality and force of character, his immensely impressive personal history, his patriotism and devotion to America -- conservatives should seek ways to make their causes his, and so to focus on the elements of honor and of greatness in the defense of the American family and the country’s freedom and prosperity. They should emphasize the elements of their worldview that speak to honor, just as McCain should emphasize the elements of his that speak to freedom, family, and limited government.

It's been said the press notice the homeless problem only when a Republican's in office. The same could be said for food stamps, which the media now are using as an economic indicator.

Scary headline in Monday's Times: "As Jobs Vanish And Prices Rise, Food Stamp Use Nears Record." Scarier headline in Britain's Independent: "USA 2008: The Great Depression."Why didn't the Times editors just say: "Economy In Shambles — It's All Bush's Fault"? Or the Independent condemn the president for his war on the poor?

Despite the many reasons not to use food stamps to gauge economic health, the media still do it. They're sure that many voters will make their choices this fall based on what the press tells them. Things will change, though, if a Democrat is elected president. Expect to start seeing glowing reports on the economy about a year from now — no matter what shape it's in.