• MUSHARRAF HAS HAD IT: “Faced with desertions by his political supporters and the neutrality of the Pakistani military, President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan, an important ally of the United States, is expected to resign in the next few days rather than face impeachment charges, Pakistani politicians and Western diplomats said Thursday.” Ha, so much for that guy. Will Benazir Bhutto take over by default now? Oh right, she’s very dead. We should squeeze Mitt Romney in a little box and mail him to Pakistan and be like, “this guy’s awesome, let him take over.” That would be so great, they’d have no idea. [NYT]

Each week, The Comics Curmudgeon helps explain Today’s Cartoons. Most political discourse is a bunch of blah blah blah talky talky jaw jaw crappy crap. Political cartoons have the unique ability to short-circuit all that, with their purely visual representation of important world and national events (assuming they don’t get out of control with labeling everything). But what if political cartoonists used the power of visual images … for evil? MORE »

On Friday, we expressed a certain level of skepticism at the Pakistani government’s announcement that Bhutto was not killed by either the guy who shot her or the suicide bomber, but by hitting her head on the sunroof (which they’ve since modified to “the sunroof lever”). Unsurprisingly, we weren’t the only ones. What is surprising is who refused the autopsy.

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• Though he is “of a tender age,” Benazir Bhutto’s teenage son is now the head of her party. Democracy lives! Yay! [BBC, New York Times, Washington Post]
• On the anniversary of the day his head popped off, Iraqis remember their bro Saddam Hussein. [Los Angeles Times]
• Geez, we wish these two would just fuck and get it over with already. [New York Times, New York Times]
• John McCain is back, very much like Jesus Christ. [Washington Post]
• Wyoming is upstaged by Iowa and New Hampshire probably because it’s Wyoming. [Washington Times]
• Hillary is relying on Bill? Really? [Politico]

• Ads in Iowa, this shit is almost over except there’s another week. [Horse Race]
• A million little Zapruder films! [Hot Air]
• Looks like Mittens is soft on criminals after all. [Michelle Malkin]
• Joe Lieberman is still a major douche sack! [[Carpetbagger]
• Do you like paying for gas? Then we have great news! [Raw Story]
• Fred Thompson may not agree, but we like to see Huck apologizing for the deaths of world leaders and should keep doing it. [Political Radar]
• They both like shooting reporters, however. [Redstate]
• It’s going to take a major toolbox to fill Trent Lott’s shoes but Haley Barbour has our full confidence. [Election Central]

If there’s one absolutely, totally clear thing that has emerged from the assassination of Benazir Bhutto yesterday it is that Pakistanis coming into the US need closer monitoring. So, we’re thrilled to hear that Mike Huckabee has finally said what someone besides Tancredo needed to say. Some might wonder what monitoring immigrants just because they’re Pakistani has to do with anything and, even though we don’t really have answer to that question, we know that such people are not serious about securing America. MORE »

After Benazir Bhutto’s assassination yesterday, Hillary and Barack got into one of their little spats over how the other one was politicizing it for a last-minute gain. Hillary’s statement on the assassination offered regrets and also mentioned that she knew Bhutto as first lady. Barack’s statement just offered regrets, because he didn’t know the lady. But the big politicizing came later in the afternoon, when Barack’s senior foreign policy adviser David Axelrod went meanypants on Hillary: She authorized Iraq, which diverted our attention from Pakistan, which grew into further turmoil, which is where Bhutto was assassinated. Now, if you’ve been following Andrew Sullivan’s blog the last few months, you’ve noticed that he’s not only supporting Barack — which obvs is fine, go for it — and slamming Hillary in every post for her gutless attacks, but he won’t say a friggin’ word when Barack pulls out the Nasty. Check out how he handled yesterday’s Clinton-Obama repartee, and then someone please tell him to go back to libertarian land, where he belongs. MORE »

The mini-horserace among presidential candidates over Who Can Exploit That Assassination Better saw John Edwards transform into, essentially, a starstruck 13-year-old girl outside TRL. Apparently he kept calling and calling Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan like, all morning, and then Musharraf TOTES called him back! OMG a real live embattled president who has lots of shit on his plate today actually called to chat! I bet it was soooo awks, because he probably didn’t even know who John Edwards was! I guess we have to vote for John Edwards now. MORE »

Most of the Democratic candidates’ statements about Bhutto have called for calmness in Pakistan until shit gets sorted out. Hillary mentions that she and Bhutto knew each other pretty well, which some people think is evil politicizing, but these same people like to destroy Hillary Clinton in every post, no matter what she does. The statement that’s really making waves today, however, is that of the Mexican candidate, Bill Richardson. Instead of urging calmness, he says that right now, Musharraf needs to step down, and entire new Pakistani government needs to form, and we’ll like, give them a sandwich or something if they do this. MORE »

Two big things are happening today: A shocking political assassination in a tense Middle Eastern (or is it in Asia?) country, and a bunch of old assholes running around in the corn fields of Iowa. Of course, the peoples on the Internets have been trying to jigsaw these two disparate strands for most of the afternoon, especially for the Republicans. Basically, it’s that the assassination of Bhutto and ensuing chaos is the best thing that EVER happened to McCain and Giuliani! MORE »

When something like today’s assassination of Benazir Bhutto and the suicide bombing of her and her supporters occurs and it actually makes the nightly news or the papers of record, you’ll usually see a photo like this, conveying the shock and horror of another observer to the carnage without showing you the carnage. This doesn’t show you that the photographer is standing in a pool of blood from someone recently deceased, or the mutilated bodies at this man’s feet because an editor somewhere has decided that you don’t need to see it to understand. Maybe they’re right, but having seen the raw photos, I don’t think so today.

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