Weekly Review

By Theodore Ross

In Iraq, the sixth suicide chlorine attack in two months killed 20 people in the Anbar province, ¹ the resurgent Mahdi army clashed with U.S. soldiers in Sadr City,² American fighter jets bombed Shiite militiamen in Diwaniya,³ and in Baghdad, a U.S. congressional delegation outfitted with bulletproof vests, flanked by 100 soldiers in armored Humvees, and watched over by attack helicopters, visited a local bazaar to demonstrate the success of the current security plan. It was, said Representative Mike Pence (R., Ind.), just like an “outdoor market in Indiana in the summertime.”⁴ Vice President Dick Cheney attacked the “self-appointed strategists” in Congress who were hampering the Bush Administration's efforts to prolong the war in Iraq,. ⁵ and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates confirmed that the U.S. military was violating its “dwell time” policy, which guarantees soldiers a year between combat postings.⁶ North Korea ordered its diplomats to send all but one child home as collateral against defection,⁷ and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad released 15 abducted British marines. ⁸ Italy banned reality programming on public television,⁹ Thailand blocked access to YouTube,¹⁰ and at the CNN Center in Atlanta, a woman died after being shot in the face by her estranged boyfriend.¹¹ Lapsed Albanian Communists were rediscovering God,¹² Fidel Castro called American biofuel policy an “internationalization of genocide,”¹³ and the market price for children in India slipped below that of buffalo.¹⁴

The Food and Drug Administration proposed new labeling rules that would allow irradiated foods to be categorized merely as “pasteurized,”¹⁵ and the Supreme Court forbade the Environmental Protection Agency to shirk its responsibility to regulate greenhouse gases.¹⁶ Researchers used infrared and atomic-emission spectroscopy, mass spectroscopy, electron microscopy, pollen analysis, and the leading “noses” in the perfume industry to determine that a rib bone unearthed at the site where Joan of Arc was burned at the stake actually belonged to an Egyptian mummy.¹⁷ In Beardstown, Illinois, federal agents arrested 62 undocumented immigrants in a pork plant,¹⁸ and in Mount Pleasant, Iowa, Hillary Clinton accused President George W. Bush of “vetoing the will of the American people.”¹⁹ French archaeologists were using dung-eating mites to study ancient Incan relics,²⁰ British scientists were “baffled” by the discovery of five-footed frogs,²¹ and Dr. Zahi Hawass of Egypt dismissed the Exodus story of the Jews as a “myth.”²²

Dr. John Billings, creator of the “Billings Method” of natural birth control and father of nine, died,²³ and Durex, a contraceptive company located in Knutsford, England, began assembling a “massive” panel of volunteer testers for its condom and lubricant products.²⁴ A Chicago woman filed suit against her dance partner for “negligent dancing,”²⁵ and the estate of deceased actor James Doohan, who was best known for his performance as the space mechanic “Scotty” on Star Trek, paid $495 to have his ashes rocketed into orbit.²⁶ Singer/songwriter Billy Joe Shaver, author of such hits as “Georgia on a Fast Train” and “I'm Just an Old Chunk of Coal (But I'm Gonna Be a Diamond Someday)” was sought by police in Texas after he shot a “drunk, aggressive stranger.”²⁷ The North Carolina Senate expressed “profound contrition” for the state's slave history.²⁸ A 13-year-old girl in Brooklyn, New York, was brought up on criminal mischief charges after being caught writing the word “okay” on her school desk,²⁹ and an elementary school principal in Toronto admitted to pelting an unruly student with feces. ³⁰ Polish burglars knocked over a sex shop in Austria, then used vibrators, prophylactics, and a vacuum cleaner to elude the police in a high-speed car chase.³¹ XXXChurch.com, an online ministry, staged a “Porn and Pancakes” event for evangelicals in Morton, Illinois.³² Gaytanamo: Hardcore, a film set in the “sexiest secret military prison ever,” was being sold at a discount on the Internet.³³ In Miami, the Department of Corrections was housing registered sex offenders under a bridge.³⁴ Herding dogs were being used to control the spiraling goose population in New York's Central Park,³⁵ and a South African farmer received a 20-year sentence for killing a man he mistakenly believed to be a baboon.³⁶ The Walt Disney Company announced that it will begin offering “Fairy Tale” weddings to homosexuals.³⁷