The following is an excerpt from OpinionJournal.com’s “Best of the Web” written by the editor, James Taranto.
Not When She’s 20 Points Down in the Polls
“Will a Manicure and Makeup Save Lincoln?”–headline, MSNBC.com, Oct. 13
The Lonely Lives of Scientists
“Scientists Turn Snails Into Slug-Like Creatures”–headline, Universitaet Tübingen.(Germany) press release, Oct. 12
The Lonely Lives of Princesses
“Princess Anne Meets Scientists”–headline, Cambridge (England) News, Oct. 13
But Then Who’ll Eat It?
“Squash Winter Bugs With Food”–headline, HealthCastle.com press release, Oct. 12
The Personal Is Political
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was in Bosnia yesterday, urging reconciliation among the nations that used to constitute Yugoslavia. As the New York Times reports, she made a doozy of a comparison:
Mrs. Clinton said the United States supported constitutional reform, but she added that Bosnia could not move forward unless its Serbs, Muslims and Croats figured out a way to put country ahead of ethnicity. That, she said, is what she and her former rival, and current boss, did.
“I tried to beat him,” Mrs. Clinton told a mixed group of students during the town hall meeting. “And he won. And then when he won, he asked me to work for him.”
“I’m often asked how could I go to work for President Obama after I tried to beat him,” Mrs. Clinton added. “And the answer is simple. We both love our country. That has to be the mind-set here.”
A student explained why the analogy is faulty:
“You said that you love the same state,” she told Mrs. Clinton. “Unfortunately, that is the major problem we have here.”
She added, “Our politicians often prefer other countries more than our state,” in what seemed to be a reference to Milorad Dodik, the newly elected, outspoken nationalist Bosnian Serb leader who is now president of the Bosnian Serb republic that is one part of this country’s unwieldy tripartite government. Mr. Dodik has called Bosnia an “impossible state” and has said he wants his republic to secede.
More than this, though, is Mrs. Clinton really so full of herself that she thinks a personal political rivalry is somehow comparable to a centuries-old ethnic and sectarian conflict.
For more “Best of the Web” click here and look for the “Best of the Web Today” link in the middle column below “Today’s Columnists.
