It’s not a Magpie Watch, but it’s pretty great. Best of the Web has a nifty little selection of Andrew Sullivan quotes about torture, under the headline Mr. Excitable.

Before we happily close the case on the missing boy in Utah, now found and with his family, we should give pause and thank God for returning him alive after those grueling four days … that he no doubt spent aboard an alien spacecraft.

You think I’m joking? Let’s look at what we know so far. According to the fittingly named Forrest Nunley, who found 11-year-old Brennan Hawkins, he “turned a corner and there was a kid standing in the middle of the trail….” As if he was just dropped off. The boy said he ate and drank nothing for those missing days. The aliens do not know what we eat or drink! Summit County sheriff David Edmunds also said Brennan “was in no mood to give us a lot of details…” That is because he has no details to report. They wiped his memory! Almost immediately after getting his necessary human nutrition, Brennan then “wanted to play a video game on one of the searchers’ cell phones.” Just like with a Speak & Spell, he was obviously using the phone to communicate with his new masters. Authorities also described the boy as delirious. Wouldn’t you be after visiting Alpha Centauri?

The Law Jedi makes an important point about Michael Schiavo:

Michael Schiavo lists her date of death as the date of her collapse on February 26, 1990, and that she finally met peace in 2005, after being “peacefully” dehydrated to death, of course. So is Michael admitting that the few years he kept her alive in order to collect on a medical malpractice verdict was a deliberate denial of peace to make some money? And just so it’s clear, you get more money if the person is alive and incapacitated than if they are dead, because you can recover the future costs of care, which are exorbitant, especially when you promise that you will completely rehab the patient.

The final line on the marker states “I Kept My Promise.” But to which promise is he referring? The one mentioned above that he made to the jury which was the basis for their award? The promise to remain faithful to her in sickness and in health? All that twaddle about love, honor, cherish? If anyone has a clue which one of those, or any other I may have missed, was kept, please let me know so that I can appropriately credit him. . . .

But it a fitting epilogue to this very sad story. Because Terri’s story was never really about her. It was, like this marker, about Michael Schiavo. Terri was unloved in health, abandoned except for her financial value to Michael in sickness, a memorial to Michael’s neglect in her decline, and a snicker to her family who loved her in her death.

The Schindlers need not visit the gravesite where their daughter’s ashes lie and where a cruel marker mocks the open wounds of their hearts. Terri is not there. She is elsewhere. Far from the grasp of the man whom she condescended to marry.

Our good friends at Davids Medienkritik, the indispensable blog for “politically incorrect observations on reporting in the German media,” will be demonstrating next Monday, June 27, at Lafayette Park, across from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The reason for their assembly is Chancellor Gerhard Schröder’s visit to Washington where he will be meeting with President Bush as well as business leaders. How very typisch of Schröder, in the heat of an election, with his approval ratings below 30 percent, and critics charging him with anti-American and anti-business rhetoric, that he would now come to meet with Bush, emphasize the need for transatlantic cooperation, and speak to those heartless capitalists. Davids Medienkritik isn’t fooled either. And while the focus of the demonstration will be “against anti-American bias in German media and politics and for German-American friendship and cooperation,” it would also be a fitting sendoff.

The latest issue of GQ features a fascinating story by Lisa DePaulo about the National Guardsmen who recently guarded Saddam Hussein. In the excerpt, we learn the ex-dictator is a fan of Ronald Reagan (“Reagan and me, good”) and dislikes both Bushes (“The Bush father, son, no good”). Clinton was just “okay.” But perhaps most interesting is Saddam’s dislike of Froot Loops (maybe he’s an Apple Jacks guy) and a love for Doritos (I’m guessing Cool Ranch).

Patterico has a soul-shaking post on Michael Schiavo’s continuing campaign against his former in-laws. Do not follow the link if you’re already having a bad day.

Who says:

It is this administration that has brought indelible shame on America, it’s people like Dick Durbin who prove that some can actually stand up against this stain on American honor and call it what it is. Good for him. Thank God for him.

Andrew Sullivan or Markos Moulitsas?

Surprise!

You know Matthew Lesko, the guy with all the question marks yelling about free money from the government. Dave Jamieson has a fantastic profile of him in the Washington City Paper this week.