In his St. Paul victory speech, Barack Obama pledged again to pull out of Iraq. Rather than "continue a policy in Iraq that asks everything of our brave men and women in uniform and nothing of Iraqi politicians, ... [i]t's time for Iraqis to take responsibility for their future."

From the Los Angeles Times, Wednesday, June 11, 2008:

This year's rapid run-up in crude oil prices might have prompted silly legislation at any time -- but the fact that it has happened in an election year has fostered a sort of wrongheadedness renaissance. Lawmakers from both parties are scrambling to dust off failed strategies from years past and tout them as new and improved ways of halting oil's meteoric rise. None of them will work, of course, nor are they intended to; they serve only to mislead the public into thinking that Washington is looking out for consumers.

Jonah Goldberg

Sen. John McCain said this week he would not drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for the same reason he "would not drill in the Grand Canyon ... I believe this area should be kept pristine."

From the Washington Post, Thursday, June 12, 2008:

When high levels of E. coli bacteria turned spinach into a mealtime menace in 2006, we agreed with calls to give the Food and Drug Administration the power to issue mandatory recalls of tainted produce. We also supported the smart idea to require the FDA and other agencies with responsibility over food safety to institute a tracing system so that the next outbreak of tainted food could be contained in days, not weeks. Well, the next outbreak is upon us. And neither good idea has been implemented.

The price of everything, not just driving, is going up in the era of $130-a-barrel oil, but our presidential candidates have a hopelessly thumbless grasp of pocketbook politics. Their mutual slogan could be "Let them eat abstractions."

"We're still watching to see whether or not the outbreak is ongoing. Because of delays, it takes us a while to know whether the outbreak is over and not."

In the genuine historical miracle of Barack Obama -- it was only 43 years ago when African American voting rights remained unsecured -- the political miracle of John McCain has been largely overshadowed.

A few years ago, I heard writer Gerald Haslam explain his struggle to describe the difference between the Kern County burg of Bakersfield, Calif., and the San Francisco Bay Area city of Mill Valley, both of which are settings for his novel, "Straight White Male."