JAMIL HUSSEIN: I haven't commented on this story, or lack thereof, because I don't have the facts of the case, only a lot of assertions and counterassertions, and I like knowing what I am talking about before I have an opinion about it. It seems, however, that Captain Hussein does, in fact, exist, and so the defenders of the AP are shouting Glory, hallelujah, we're saved, praise the Lord from the mountaintops and damning all those who denounced the AP's refusal to produce such an omniscient source. Captain Hussein may well be everything the AP says he is, but it seems to me that before the leftosphere goes into full attack mode it might do well to remember that owning a pair of pants is not the same as actually wearing them. If Captain Hussein is connected with the Shi'a militias, it seems to me, then the AP has to explain why it allowed those militias to use its newswires as a megaphone for Shi'a propaganda. Just based on what I've seen so far, I strongly suspect that the AP's reluctance to produce Captain Hussein might have far less to do with protecting a source than it does with covering the AP's institutional backside. In unrelated news, however, it is now 71 degrees in our happy little burg, the kids are playing soccer in the park, my apple tree is beginning to bud, and the guy across the street from me is mowing his lawn, thereby raising the phrase 'January thaw' to the nth degree of ridiculousness.