Frist no brain surgeon

Traveling the Ohio Turnpike today, I heard on PBS the story of the National Intelligence Estimate about the Iraq war's contributions to the growth of terrorism. Something about this report calls to mind my wife's definition of a consultant: "somebody you pay big bucks to tell you what your administrative assistant has been telling you for five years." But if they listen this time (and the advice is right), it may be worth it.

Anyway, PBS read Bill Frist's comment on air, and I almost burst out laughing (citing here a NYT article):

But the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist of Tennessee, used language that echoed that of President Bush, saying that "either we are going to be fighting this battle, this war overseas, or it's going to be right here in this country."

Say what? If you fight a battle overseas that makes your enemy stronger (and weakens you), how exactly does that protect the homeland? (One thinks of the disastrous Athenian attack on Syracuse that led directly to its defeat in the Peloponnesian War.) Heart surgeon or not, the man is talking like an idiot, and does not deserve to be in a position of such responsibility: either he is an idiot for thinking it, or he is so venal as to pass idiocy along [note whom he is "echoing"] in some partisan disinformation effort.

Or is that so long as we're killing foreigners, we're doing something? This from a leader in the party of Christian values? Jesus wept.