Trapped miners, a pale rider, and no talk of the Iraqi apocalypse

God damn! Talk about perfect timing. Trapped miners — really couldn't ask for a better set-up for extended and irritatingly repetitious cable news coverage and a procession of on-air-heads straining to look empathetic while positioned in front of mining equipment that seems to date back to the 19th century.

Plus the gray, gray skies of West Virginia only make Anderson Cooper's hair look even whiter, his eyes even true-bluer. On and on and on they go.

Interrupted only by a surprisingly long CNN interview with the guy who dresses up as a Trojan and rides the white horse at USC games. Certainly this has to be the most in-depth live interview conducted on CNN in the last 2 or 3 years.

And now we even know that the guy's step-dad was Charlton Heston's stunt double in Ben Hur. I guess that's why they call this the information age.

In Iraq, meanwhile, the face of 21st-century warfare grows clearer: "disparate cells of armed guerillas disrupting critical energy supplies that sustain the global economy."

And God damn! Talk about perfect timing. The IMF decides to kick the average Iraqi citizen just as his car's run out of gas and hit a roadside IED.

[T]he IMF has demanded that the Oil Ministry remove price-supports for the highly-subsidized Iraqi domestic supplies. This has only increased the public's outrage with the ongoing occupation…. In effect, [the IMF's] provisions put Iraqi resources under the direct control of transnational corporations who can then decide the terms under which those resources are sold.

Bet the insurgency is not having trouble hitting its recruitment targets now.

Meanwhile, back in West Virginia….