I panned the puerile recommendations of the Iraq Study Group in an earlier column, and will not re-plow that ground here.  But the mere existence of the ISG tells us some unpleasant things about ourselves that we ought to know, but evidently don't. First, there is the speed with which Congress palmed off its responsibility to conduct oversight of Executive  Branch policies to a private panel of has-beens.  It's time our lawmakers paid more attention to their responsibilities, and less to their privileges. Then there is the glee with which many in the Washington establishment -- particularly in journalism -- greeted the (glaringly obvious) finding that things are not going well in Iraq suggests an elite so insulated and out of touch that it sees no ill consequences flowing to themselves from a defeat being inflicted upon their country.  The appropriate response of serious people would have been concern, perhaps anger.  But an elite that sees a big setback in the war against Islamofascism chiefly in terms of its impact on domestic politics is not comprised of serious people.

The Jade Steps Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Night of Tears Malinali looked at each of the men standing silently around her.  Several of them were weeping.  She caught Bernal's eye.  "We mourn for him, Doña Marina," he said quietly to her, "and not just those of us who were unable to protect him from his own people today.  All of us are in sorrow, for he showed such kindness to us." That she would be holding the hand of an Aztec Emperor as he died, that the Aztecs themselves would murder their King, that these mysterious men from another world who had come to conquer his kingdom would weep openly over his death - these were thoughts she found overwhelming.  She crossed herself and prayed silently to the Virgin Mary for comfort and understanding. It was Cortez who broke the silence.  "Doña Marina, please select a noble from Montezuma's entourage and have him deliver a message to the people of this city:  He is to tell them that their Lord is dead at their hands, that they have killed their king.  They must now give him the funeral and burial rites he deserves, and after that they must allow us to leave the city in peace."

If you've seen the story all over the media about incoming Democrat Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee Silvestre Reyes botching basic questions about Middle East politics, you've probably asked yourself - are these guys really that dumb? Here's one way to answer the question.  Until he was tapped by President Bush to run the Security & Exchange Commission, Chris Cox (R-CA 1989-2005) was acknowledged for years to possess the most formidable brains on Capitol Hill.  There is absolutely no doubt - he is breathtakingly bright. But when I tweaked him once about his reputation (I've known Chris since 1986 when he joined the legal counsel's office in the Reagan White House), he gave me a bemused smile and said, "Jack, being the smartest man in Congress is like being the tallest building in Topeka."

In a story that attracted international attention, the Associated Press reported Nov. 24 that:

Shia militiamen grabbed six Sunnis as they left Friday worship services, doused them with kerosene and burned them alive near Iraqi soldiers who did not intervene, Iraqi Police Capt. Jamil Hussein said. The savage revenge attack for Thursday's slaying of 215 people in the Shiite Sadr City slum occurred as members of the Mahdi Army militia burned four mosques and several homes while killing an unknown number of Sunni residents in the once-mixed Hurriyah neighborhood of Baghdad.

President Kennedy once hosted a dinner for Nobel Prize winners.  At the dinner he reportedly said: "I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined here alone." After reviewing the report of the Iraq Study Group, released Wednesday, New York Post editorial page editor John Podhoretz declared: "The nation's capital hasn't seen such concentrated wisdom in one place since Paris Hilton dined alone at the Hooters on Connecticut Avenue." T. F. Boggs, an Army sergeant recently returned from his second tour in Iraq, said the recommendations were a "joke" that "could only have come from a group of old people who have been stuck in Washington for too long."