A few additional bits...

...about The Vote.

1) It turns out that only $1.6 billion in the supplemental bill is even subject to the non-existent, soon-to-be-waived "benchmarks." (Thanks to Eric Kleefeld at TPMCafe for the link.)

2) On "Countdown" on Friday, MSNBC analyst Craig Crawford said the Democrats got rolled by the GOPper spin about "abandoning the troops." It was of course nonsense, but the Democrats "could not [even] spin the truth," he marveled.

But that's all wrong. The Democrats didn't fail to beat the GOPper spin, they bought into it, straining to declare their utter fealty to and adoration of every single person in uniform as the very embodiment of all that is just and decent and good and brave and noble (so much for Abu Ghraib) and swearing they would never, ever, horrors no, "defund" the war, er, the troops.

Gary Trudeau expertly punctured that GOPper bs 'way back on April 1 in a strip in which a soldier muses that a cut-off of funding would require a withdrawal - so "supporting" the troops means he stays in the meat grinder while "opposing" the troops means he gets to go home. "Permission to think it through denied," he's told.

3) Rep. David Obey, despite being among the people who "negotiated" the "compromise," apparently joined the ranks of the "idiot liberals" he previously denounced and voted against the bill. In fact, 140 Democrats voted against it (along with two GOPpers) while only 86 voted for it.

“The anti-war Democrats have reached their tipping point,” said Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.), a leader of the Out of Iraq caucus, [the day before the vote]. “It’s going to take Republican votes to pass it.”

And so it did.

4) This is the kicker. MSNBC reported on Friday that

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell predicted a change [in Bush's Iraq policy], and said Bush would show the way.

"I think the handwriting is on the wall that we are going in a different direction in the fall and I think the president is going to lead it," he said.

So we already know the "surge" is a bust? The "give it time to work" brigade is just blowing smoke? And there's going to be a Plan - well, I started to say Plan B but they've got to be to Plan R (With a wing attack?) by now? Wouldn't it just be the ultimate, the true ultimate, in farce if in September the "different direction" was to withdraw and this whole thing with the funding really was just so Bush could say he decided to withdraw rather than that Congress made him do it?

No, I don't actually expect that, but like a car wreck at which despite yourself you keep looking, it's so phenomenally bizarre I can't stop thinking about it.