THE POETRY OF POLITICS

"Democrats face this terrible arithmetic in the Electoral College where if they don't carry any of the 11 Southern states [of the Old Confederacy] they need to win 70% of everything else," says Merle Black, an expert on Southern politics at Emory University.

BLESSED BE THE TRUE BELIEVERS

A positive approach is needed
In these days of infamy;
Why not ask the Southern states
To re-form the Confederacy?

The folks of fervid faith can chant,
"Holy, holy, hola!
O Lord, send us a worthy Son,
A Dixie Ayatollah."

-- Leon Freilich

And in response to this item earlier today, our Calvin Trillin writes:

THE HAVES AND THE HAVE-FEARS

The theocrats have Bush
And the plutocrats have Cheney;
And what do the rest of us have?
A country going down the drainy.