Favorite McClellanism of the week:

From the March 1 White House Press Briefing...

Q Thank you. Can you describe what the United States knows about the conditions under which President Aristide left Haiti? Do we know, did he leave of his own? Was he forcibly --

MR. McCLELLAN: No, that's nonsense. I would just say -- I've seen some of the reports. Conspiracy theories do nothing to help the Haitian people move forward to a better, more free and more prosperous future.

Loverly, captain... just as the word 'forcibly' rolls off the tongue, Scotty beams up the Darth Vader of conversational bludgeons, the scarlet concept of 'conspiracy theory.' These two words distract even the most intrepid social critics, forcing them to deny that their stories are categorically possible before they press on with the details of how, say, the CIA might be interested in carving out revenue streams from illegal drug sales to finance covert wars against unfriendly regimes... the only cool thing Frederic (yes, no damn k) Jameson ever wrote was that conspiracy theory was the only way of totalizing thought left to late capitalism (and he meant totalizing in a good way, like Lukacs, grasping a totality, not in the bad way, like motherfucking Adorno and that French dude). And in that he was right. Go read V., if you're out of work or beset with leisure; TP endores this Jameson fella's ideas.

[first prize goes to the reader who guesses correctly the country I have in mind... is it Panama? Haiti? Nicaragua? {disclaimer: reader will not receive prize}]