Remember the Bush-Gore debate back in 1999 or so, where Bush decried “foreign entanglements” and liberal-minded “state-building enterprises,” saying they would bloat the federal budget and divert funds from Amuhrica? It’s gotta be on YouTube somewheres.

The facts of the Bush presidency have demonstrated there was no conviction in any of that blah blah. Today’s headlines speak to the reigning Republican ideology regarding government spending. Here is how Slate summarized those headline stories this morning.

On the one hand:
“The Washington Post leads with word that the Bush administration wants more money for the Iraq war and is planning to ask Congress for up to $50 billion next month…. The extra money for Iraq would be in addition to the approximately $460 billion in the defense budget and it will probably be added to the $147 billion supplemental bill to pay for Afghanistan and Iraq. The Post breaks it down: “the cost of the war in Iraq now exceeds $3 billion a week.”"

On the other hand:
“The Los Angeles Times, USA Today, and the Wall Street Journal’s world-wide newsbox lead with new census figures that show the number of people without health insurance increased by 2.2 million in 2006 to a grand total of 47 million. In terms of the overall population, 15.8 percent of people lacked insurance, which is the highest level since 1998. At a time when President Bush is in a fight with Congress over health insurance for children, the LAT points out that the number of uninsured children grew by 600,000.”

If by governance we mean running a state in the interests of the greatest number of its citizens, safe to say that this is some all-time bad governance. If by governance we mean making Halliburton stock valuable, then we got some damn-fine people running the show.

Larry Craig Congressional tip of the day: Always maintain a narrow stance in a public restroom and never play footsie with the undercover cop in the adjacent stall. Because that’s just lewd!