Weekly Review

By Miriam Markowitz

The Cloaca Maxima, 1872

Congress passed a bill allocating $100 billion for war spending without a timetable for troop withdrawal. Congressional Democrats allowed the vote to reach the House and Senate floors despite widespread opposition among their ranks because they didn't want to go on Memorial Day break while soldiers remained wanting. Ten Democratic senators including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton voted against the bill. “I was very disappointed to see Senator Obama and Senator Clinton embrace the policy of surrender,” said Senator John McCain. “This vote may win favor with MoveOn and liberal primary voters, but it's the equivalent of waving a white flag to Al Qaeda.” Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi told reporters she would “never vote for such a thing” just before finalizing the bill with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who called the legislation proof of “great progress.” Senate Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin told his Democratic colleagues that he would reluctantly support the measure because “we do not have it within our power to make the will of America the law of the land.”^{1 2 3 4} Nearly a thousand soldiers had been killed in Iraq since last Memorial Day. ⁵ The body of one of three missing U.S. soldiers was found floating in the Euphrates River,⁶ and an Irish soldier who won the Military Cross for single-handedly defeating a Baghdad suicide bomber was facing a court-martial for auctioning his medal on eBay.⁷

The Defense Department released a how-to guide recovered from an “Al Qaeda torture chamber” near Baghdad. The manual illustrates interrogation techniques such as “eye removal,” “drilling hands,” and “blowtorch to the skin,” and was found along with whips, wire cutters, pliers, handcuffs, hammers, electric drills, screwdrivers, meat cleavers, and a person suspended from the safe-house ceiling.^{8 9} In Darfur, where Janjaweed leaders, frustrated with promises of land, cattle, and wealth gone undelivered by Khartoum, have joined forces with rebel factions, bandits shot and killed their first U.N. peacekeeper.^{10 11} Hamas told Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas it would accept a truce with Israel if the IDF halted air attacks in Gaza, and threatened to kill hostage Gilad Shalit should Israel fail to comply.¹² Israel and the U.S. provided Abbas with light arms and $84 million to fund Fatah's power struggle with Hamas, ¹³ and the Israeli embassy in Washington searched for someone to attend the funeral of Jerry Falwell.¹⁴ In the desert of southern Israel a man wrestled and pinned down a leopard after it broke into his bedroom.¹⁵ Kosovo Albanians were planning to erect a ten-foot-tall bronze statue of Bill Clinton; Tony Blair was said to be next.¹⁶ In Britain, anonymous sources close to Queen Elizabeth II reported that the monarch was “exasperated and frustrated” with the legacy of the outgoing prime minister; in particular, she was said to be deeply concerned about Blair's actions in Iraq and Afghanistan and the outlawing of fox hunting.¹⁷ A South London artist planned to protest the royal family's treatment of animals by eating a corgi.¹⁸ President Bush expressed his continuing support for embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales at a press conference in the White House Rose Garden. “I've got confidence in Al Gonzales doin' the job,” said Bush, as a passing sparrow shit on his sleeve.¹⁹

Jack Kevorkian was preparing to leave prison after serving eight years for assisting in the suicide of a Michigan man,²⁰ and the execution of an overweight prisoner in Ohio was performed 90 minutes behind schedule because medical workers were unable to find a vein for the lethal injection.²¹ Historic cemeteries across the United States were attempting to attract new customers through dog parades, jazz concerts, designer mausoleums, and Renaissance faires.²² An 11-year-old boy had reportedly killed a thousand-pound wild pig after a three-hour, nine-bullet chase through the woods of eastern Alabama. “It's a good accomplishment,” said the boy. “I probably won't ever kill anything else that big.”²³ Dutch television made plans to air “The Big Donor Show,” in which three patients will compete for a dying woman's kidney.²⁴ An area of Topeka, Kansas, was shut down after a robot in a headdress was spotted near the Capitol.²⁵ In Bombay, several thousand untouchables converted en masse to Buddhism,²⁶ and Thunder Ranch, a luxury motel in northern Mexico, was fortifying each of its 35 rooms with steel doors to stop the bullets of skirmishing drug cartels.²⁷ A zoo in Germany hired a clown to cheer up bored monkeys,²⁸ Cairo customs officials prevented a smuggler from carrying 700 snakes onto a plane bound for Saudi Arabia,²⁹ and it was revealed that in 2001 in Omaha, Nebraska, a virgin shark gave birth.³⁰