Recoil

(posted as part of the the I Can Do It Better blog-a-thon! at gee bobg)

The Day of the Jackal (1973)
Director: Fred Zinnemann



I hate to repeat myself as I've already posted something on this movie last October for the Close-Up Blog-a-thon in The House Next Door (Mad Dogs and Englishmen). But I literally just watched the last thirty minutes of it an hour ago.

The Day of the Jackal is the film version of a Frederick Forsyth novel set in 1961 about a fictional plot by the OAS, a French terrorist group, to assassinate President Charles de Gaulle.

Actually, there's not much that NEEDS changing. I'd say it's 99 percent perfect.

However, someone in 1997 did think they could do it better and the result was lightweight remake The Jackal starring Bruce Willis (in the title role), Sidney Poitier, and Richard Gere.

The original movie followed the novel closely and was a straight-forward, realistic thriller. The remake brought the story into present day and turned it into one long pyrotechnic laden Hollywood action flick.

But I digress.

According to the IMDB trivia for the 1973 version:

Michael Caine lobbied for the role of The Jackal, but director Fred Zinnemann did not want a movie star in the role as he thought that using a recognizable face such as Caine's in the role of a man who essentially is and remains a cipher would reduce the suspense felt by the audience. Thus, Zinneman offered the role to the lesser known Edward Fox...

Zinneman was right. Fox dissolves into the role of "The Jackal." Whereas, in the remake, Bruce Willis is conspicuously PLAYING at being an international assassin.

The other main character of The Day of the Jackal is Claude Lebel, the lead inspector for French Security (Michael Lonsdale). Seeming more like Columbo than Mannix, Lebel doesn't rely on brute force as do many of his fellow officiers. During one scene, he's critical of the severe interrogation methods used on a suspect that make waterboarding seem rather tame.

The Day of the Jackal follows two stories: the assassin's preparations to be in the right place at the right time to take out DeGaulle and the efforts of Lebel methodically and dispassionately following various bureaucratic paper trails to uncover who "The Jackal" is.

Throughout the film, Lebel is conspicuously shown with a pen in his front pocket. It's not even clear if he carries a gun. After all, the pen IS mightier than the sword.

Many viewers have complained that the relative lack of action makes The Day of the Jackal boring (it wasn't a financial success).

While I couldn't disagree more with that assessment, there is ONE thing I would do to make it better.

The film unfolds in a credible and realistic chain of events UNTIL the dramatic climax. While faithful to the novel, it's staged in a typical Hollywood fashion.

Lebel manages to get the drop on "The Jackal" (we never learn his real name) and shoots him with a machine gun before the assassin can carry out his deadly plot.

When shot, "The Jackal" is lifted up and tossed backward in the air. Though you can't see it, the actor is clearly being pulled back by a wire. Even worse, the wall he flies into moves a little when he bangs into it and thus reveals itself to be part of a set.

Anyone who's seen Mythbusters knows that in real life, the law of physics don't work like they do in Hollywood. Had the bullets really exerted enough force to throw "The Jackal" back five feet, Lebel would have been tossed back five feet as well.

Were I filming it, the assassin would simply have slumped back and down to the ground. This would have been in keeping with the no nonsense, almost documentary tone the film had struck from the beginning.

The "action film" staging Finnemann chose for the ending doesn't RUIN The Day of the Jackal for me. I still love the movie.

Like the assassin's plan, it's ALMOST perfectly executed.

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Blame Canada

For all his talk about working with foreign governments, Barack Obama seems to have irked Canada before he's even been elected.

How does $5.00 a gallon gasoline sound?

Obama, Clinton err on NAFTA (Toronto Star, 02/29/08):

...In a debate in Ohio this week, Clinton bluntly vowed to tell "Canada and Mexico that we will opt out (of the North American Free Trade Agreement) unless we renegotiate the core labour and environmental standards." Not to be outdone, Obama quickly echoed her: "I think actually Senator Clinton's answer on this one is right."

...Prime Minister Stephen Harper rightly told Parliament yesterday, U.S. politicians who want to reopen NAFTA need to consider that Canadians have issues we'd like to raise.

...A U.S. push to reopen NAFTA now would invite Canada to use its leverage as the biggest fuel supplier to the U.S. to bargain for better terms. That would not be in the interest of U.S. consumers and jobs.

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Matt and Sarah and Jim and Affleck

Jimmy Kimmel is officially the "King of Late Night."

I'm F**king Matt Damon



I'm F**king Ben Affleck

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Perfect Brew

Whatever they discussed during yesterday's Starbucks "shutdown" must have worked.

Today, my standard coffee was EXCELLENT. Not that she isn't normally, but the barista was EXTRA attentive. She said a special "hello" and wrote my name on the cup (personal touch).

Starbucks Promises Customers Perfection
Starbucks' New Pledge: to Make a Perfect Cup of Coffee, or Do It Over Again
SEATTLE (AP) -- A day after shutting down most of its U.S. shops for three hours to retrain baristas on espresso basics, Starbucks is welcoming customers back Wednesday with a new promise posted in stores: "Your drink should be perfect, every time. If not, let us know and we'll make it right."...(more)

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Now THAT'S Depressing

A double dose of bad news.

Sigh -- no Caramel Fluoxetine Macchiato today!

Coffee break: Starbucks closing for 3 hours today
SEATTLE (AP) — Starbucks is closing the doors at its 7,100 stores across America for a brief barista re-education.

CEO Howard Schultz announced the 3-hour closure starting at 5:30 p.m. local time Tuesday to energize 135,000 employees...(USA Today, Feb 26, 2006)

Manufacturers rebut study on pill used by 40 million worldwide
London, February 26: For years, Prozac has been one of the best-selling anti-depressant drugs, available in India under brand names Prodep and Fludax. All over the world more than 40 million people rely on it to cure depression. It’s often described as the “happy pill” but now an international team of doctors has found that Prozac doesn’t work and it could be a waste of time and money...(The Indian Express, Feb 26, 2006)

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Stoned

Yet another lame New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest # 133:



My entry was: "We heard that the 'director's cut' was more violent." A friend of mine submitted "You really suffer for your art."

Here are the official winners. I only liked the second one.

• "I almost wore the same spear." - this one doesn't seem to get the cartoon
  
  
• "So how much of the story is autobiographical?" - not bad
  
  
• "So you're the guy who discovered friendly fire." - zzzzzz

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The Smokeless Gun

The New York Times takes on itself for publishing the McCain story.

What That McCain Article Didn’t Say (NY Times)

...The article was notable for what it did not say: It did not say what convinced the advisers that there was a romance. It did not make clear what McCain was admitting when he acknowledged behaving inappropriately — an affair or just an association with a lobbyist that could look bad. And it did not say whether Weaver, the only on-the-record source, believed there was a romance.

...A newspaper cannot begin a story about the all-but-certain Republican presidential nominee with the suggestion of an extramarital affair with an attractive lobbyist 31 years his junior and expect readers to focus on anything other than what most of them did. And if a newspaper is going to suggest an improper sexual affair, whether editors think that is the central point or not, it owes readers more proof than The Times was able to provide.

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BAM!

Wow. I was just as skeptical as anyone about the Pentagon's plan to shoot down that failing satellite.

But as this video shows, you can't argue with success.
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Fidel and Me

Michael Moore still kissing the ass of brutal dictator Fidel Castro:

From Newsvine.com
"I got some great news today because I was trying to figure out how I was going to get Castro into the Oscars and for me he resigns today so he can come to L.A. and go as my guest and perhaps give the acceptance speech," Moore told AP Television on Tuesday night."

As long as he keeps it under five hours. I'm telling you, that's got to be a ratings grabber. Can you imagine him? Showing up? If I could talk to (Oscar producer) Gil Cates and maybe get Castro in a dance number at the beginning of the show? Great."

Ha ha...maybe...ha ha...after the dance number...hee hee...they can have Castro cap a few "dissidents" right on stage too...ha ha ha.
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got delegates?

As Obama and Clinton battle for enough delegates to win the Democratic nomination, one undecided superdelegate, Debbie Kozikowski from Massachusetts said jokingly, that she was going to join a witness protection program.

According to this USA Today article, the DNC is struggling to come up with a way to include Michigan and Florida into the mix.

Maybe they should try rock, paper, scissors.

From USAToday:

Dems stumped figuring Fla., Mich. into delegate equation
WASHINGTON — In the fight for the Democratic presidential nomination, the votes in Florida and Michigan didn't count when residents in those states went to the polls in January.

But now Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama are locked in a fierce battle for every possible convention delegate, prompting talk of a showdown at this summer's
national convention and raising the specter of a divided party going into the November election.

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Double Features

It's always fun for cinephiles when two similarly plotted films are released within months of each other.

In 2006, for instance, Infamous, a film depicting Truman Capote's writing of In Cold Blood, took a beating (perhaps undeserved) because it came out AFTER the very successful Capote (2005).

Even delaying the its release to allow Capote fever to die down didn't help very much. Infamous virtually became a straight to DVD project.

While each movie puts a different spin on the plot (Infamous seems to cut Capote less slack), they're both worthy efforts, I favorted Capote.

It's not a bad movie, but my problem with Infamous is that Daniel Craig, a talented actor, is just wrong for the part of the diminutive murderer Perry Smith. Because Smith's physicality is integral to understanding what he's all about, Craig's more imposing stature is too much of a distraction.

This prompted me to list and compare other such parallel feature film releases.

In many cases, trying to decide which version is better, is a lot like answering the eternal question: who's hotter -- Mary Ann or Ginger?

Sometimes, I just can't make up my mind.

Dr. Strangelove/Failsafe (1964)

This is the mother of twin releases.

Henry Fonda said he would never have made Failsafe, if he had seen Dr. Strangelove beforehand.

Like Infamous, Failsafe is a good movie, but clearly suffered by being released second. It suffered BIG TIME by being released second to a masterpiece.

Failsafe has enjoyed a bit of a revival in recent years and has emerged from of Dr. Stranglove's shadow to be appreciated on it's own. George Clooney even championed 2000's live television remake (in black and white, no less).

While I like Failsafe, Dr. Strangelove wins hands down. The characters in Failsafe seem to waste a lot of time pontificating about the perils of the nuclear age rather then simply working the problem.

The ultimate irony is that even though Dr. Strangelove is a comedy, it feels more realistic than Failsafe. Okay, maybe the war room in Dr. Strangelove is surreal. But for the most part, Dr. Strangelove seems more accurate and less dated when viewed today.

For example, both movies contain scenes in which the pilots break open and read their respective mission orders. In Dr. Strangelove, the "attact profile" contains a mix of written plans, target coordinates and detailed procedures. The attack plan scene in Failsafe focuses on an unintentially funny index card that simply has the word "MOSCOW" printed on it in thick black ink.

And the last line in Dr. Strangelove, "Mein Furher, I can valk" totally destroys Failsafe's last line, "I'm the matador."

Verdict: Dr. Strangelove

Never Say Never Again/Octopussy (1983)

Sean Connery agreed to appear one more time in an "rogue" Bond flick which was essentially (and legally) a remake of Thunderball. This set the stage that year for a head to head competition with the 007's franchise "official" entry to the series.

Critically, if not financially, Never Say Never Again, got the better of it. Those who had been lambasting Roger Moore's less serious interpretation of Bond since Connery left the part in 1971 seemed vindicated by the real-time comparison.

While it's initially exciting to see Connery strapping on the Walther PPK again, Never Say Never Again is a bit of a disappointment. The original plan was to have Connery play an older Bond. But, they chickened out. Connery's brown hair piece seems more unbelievable than his flying motorcycle. And like Thunderball did seventeen years earlier, Never Say Never Again proves that there's no way to make an underwater scuba fight seem interesting.

On the other hand, Octopussy has a scene where Roger Moore's Bond is dressed in clown make-up and big floppy shoes. 'Nuff said.

Verdict: Never Say Never Again by a hair(piece)

Armageddon/Deep Impact (1998)

Deep Impact's original script was altered from the president saying "Life will go on, we will prevail...THIS IS NOT ARMAGEDDON!" to "Life will go on, we will prevail" because the producers knew that they were indeed facing Armageddon (at the box-office anyway).

Both movies are standard disaster vehicles that are chock full of special effects catastrophies. And both movies end with a major character sacrificing themself. To it's detrement, Armageddon seems a little too happy about it.

Verdict: Tie

Valmont (1989)/ Dangerous Liasions (1988)

An interesting piece of trivia from IMDB has it that Michelle Pfieffer was offered the role of the older Marquise de Merteuil in Valmont at the same time she was offered the role as the younger Madame de Tourvel in Dangerous Liaisons.

While Pfieffer may be a bit too old for her character in Dangerous Liasions, I can certainly see how losing her could drive one to suicide.

In Valmont, the characters talk and act in a more contemporary (late 1980's) manner than Dangerous Liasions which plays out more like a time capsule for the period in which the story occurs.

I enjoyed both movies equally. In fact, comparing their respective approaches is an interesting, if not geeky, exercise.

Verdict: Tie

Tombstone (1993) /Wyatt Earp (1994)

Both Tombstone and Wyatt Earp present historically accurate reenactments of the famous gunfight at the "OK" corral (in real life, it lasted less than a minute). Both Kurt Russell (Tombstone) and Kevin Cosner (Wyatt Earp) portray Earp as a flawed lawman.

It's close, but Wyatt Earp is a more fully realized effort. And Dennis Quaid (who lost thirty pounds for the part) as Doc Holiday is more credible as the gentleman killer than Val Kilmer's more dandified version.

Verdict: Wyatt Earp

Actually, the answer to the Mary Ann vs. Ginger question is easy: it's Batgirl, of course!


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Now THAT'S Hardball

Chris Matthews confesses to multiple on-air "obamasms."

His MSNBC cohorts give him a really hard, er, I mean tough time about it too.

Speaking of "hard," that Mika Brzezinski's a real dish.


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Bread and Circuses

Is it me, or was it crazy for Clemens, who could go into a 'roid rage at any second, to be seated at the House steroid hearings right next to McNamee, the man who could keep Clemens out of the Hall of Fame?

From USA Today:

Under oath, McNamee and Clemens draw battle lines

...The exchange kicked off an extraordinary Capitol Hill hearing in which lawmakers took aim at the credibility of Clemens and McNamee, who told investigators for MLB he had injected Clemens with steroids and HGH 16 to 21 times from 1998 to 2001. Under possible penalty of federal perjury charges, Clemens and McNamee gave vastly different accounts of their relationship and whether Clemens had been a part of the steroids scandal that has plagued baseball.

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Too Little, Too Late

It's too bad for Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick that this Blackberry outage didn't come sooner.

From the New York Times:

Again, BlackBerrys Are Disrupted by a Technical Snag

OTTAWA — For the second time in less than a year, a technical failure on Monday idled the thumbs of many BlackBerry users by severing their wireless link to e-mail and the Web.

Representatives of several North American carriers said they were told by Research In Motion, BlackBerry’s maker, that a significant failure had occurred somewhere in the servers it operates to connect the popular hand-held devices with the Internet...

BTW, the shirts are IN!!!
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Blond Ambition

The Host (Gwoemul) - 2006
Director: Joon-ho Bong

In a lot of the write-ups for Cloverfield, this year's surprise box-office hit, I noticed many comparisons to The Host, a South Korean monster flick from 2006. Reviewers point out similar plot elements and in a surprising number of cases, give the nod to The Host as the superior film.

I agree with the first part. Both films feature treacherous bridge crossings, nerve racking tunnel searches, and the main character's return to "ground zero" of the monster attacks to rescue trapped girls.

However, there's no question for me that Cloverfield is the better of the two. Where Cloverfield is sharp and insightful, The Host is often clumsy and silly.

One need look no further than how the families in both movies are shown dealing with their respective grief for proof of this.

Cloverfield, has the main character somberly informing his mother of his brother's death in a quiet, understated cell phone conversation that was more moving than I would have expected from a monster flick.

In The Host, what should be a important family moment becomes laughable when staged as a temper tantrum which degenerates into a ridiculous kick fight between the characters who are literally rolling around on the floor. Was that supposed to be poignant or funny? If I had to pick a point where the movie lost me, it was RIGHT there.

As I've written earlier, for me Cloverfield is a metaphor for the power of an unrealized love.

Unfortunately, because I never connected with the characters, I found The Host to be no more than a straight-forward, and not so subtle, statement on the perils of unbridled Western (American) style capitalism.

Godzilla, the 1950s era giant monster movie, was born out of Japan's reaction to the U.S. dropped atomic bombs that ended World War II. One got the feeling that while the Japanese film pointed the finger of blame on capricious tinkering with nuclear weapons, it's ire is directed at mankind in general, rather than specifically at the United States.

On the other hand, The Host's South Korean director, Jooh-ho Bong, seems to hold the U.S. singularly accountable for the creature and is damn angry about it.

I don't have a problem with the specifics of the politics the director is trying to convey. I loved the new Day of the Dead. It took many satirical shots at different elements of America's consumer driven culture. But the underlying drama didn't suffer.

In The Host, the director's vision is expressed in such a heavy handed manner that it gets in the way of the story.

The movie follows an already dysfunctional family that is further ripped apart when a mutated creature emerges out of the Han River next to where they run a small snack bar.

The cause of the mutation is an American doctor, with apparent control issues, who carelessly dumps formaldehyde into the river because the bottles are dusty (out with the old, in with the new). His South Korean assitant is a reluctant, yet willing participant in this.

The Host introduces the main character asleep at the counter of the family store. His dark Asian hair is frosted blond and he's laying face-down on a pile of coins.

While the creature certainly is a villian. The highly Westernized South Korean culture, bombarded by MTV style television and an atmosphere of conspicuous consumption, is portrayed as equally dangerous.

The OTHER American character is a doctor who runs a kafkaesque hospital that functions to quaranteen people exposed to a virus carried by the creature from the general population. There, "patients" are subjected to horrible treatment in the sterile, dehumanized facility.

The doctor is a shallow, straw-man who comes across no better than a sterotypic mad scientist from a 1950's monster film (or the X-Files).

While the military doctors in Cloverfield are equally pragmatic and emotionally detached from their suffering patients as their counterparts in The Host, they don't come off as cartoonish.

The Host's evil doctor, preparing for some curious form of brain surgery, points to the main character's head and declares "the trouble is in there."

This scene was ham-handed and did nothing to advance the plot. Watching it, I had to ask myself WHY did the director choose to include it?

The answer was that so HE could make HIS broader statement (the mind altering effect of Western culture). Unfortunately, his point is made at expense of credible story development. Thus, taking me out of the experience as a viewer.

By the movie's unsubtle end, the hero is sitting once again at the counter of the family store. But this time, made wiser by the ordeal, he's more alert to the world around him and his formerly blond colored locks are back to their natural dark shade.

I really wanted to like The Host, but found Joon-ho Bong's attempt to add social commentary to his story more distracting than Godzilla's fake rubber suit.
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Who the #$&% is Bonzo?

Here's why the Internet was invented:

An artist or an ape?

by Mikhail Simkin

Some of the images displayed below are masterpieces of abstract art, created by great artists. The rest were painted by an ape. Can you tell which is which? After each picture indicate what it is. Hit the Submit button when done. The quiz will be graded and you will see the correct answers.

Take the quiz at http://reverent.org/an_artist_or_an_ape.html

h/t to andrewsullivan.com

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Honey, I Shrunk the Kids' Trust Fund

Poor Mitt Romney. He spent $40 Million and all he got was this lousy t-shirt and bumper sticker.

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When it Rains, It Pours

To prove that I call it as I see it...

My submission for the New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest # 131 was NOT as good as the winners.



My entry:

"It looks like they've adjusted 'Pennies from Heaven' for inflation." (eh)

And the winners:

• "And tomorrow there's a twenty-per-cent chance of anvils." (great)
  
  
• "Great. Safes everywhere, and I'm on probation." (okay, this one sucked)
  
  
• "Every time I wash the car." (good)

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Luckily It Was a Good Game

Most of this year's Superbowl ads were mediocre to bad. Instead of spending $2.7 million for a mere 30 seconds, these big companiess would probably get a better return-on-investment by spending that money on a huge sale.

Seriously, what would get Coca Cola better PR -- the stupid spots they ran during the game, or giving away two million free cans of Coke?

In no particular order, here's my personal Superbowl ad rundown:

AUDI
The worst. This must have been written by an Gen X'er who's never seen The Godfather?

Word to the wise, if you get Moe Green for a commercial, SHOOT HIM IN THE GLASSES!!!

Etrade
In the valley of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. Pound for pound, the Etrade talking baby ads were the best of the bunch.



Broadstone
This Bridgestone tire ad was my second favorite. But if they had any guts, the car would have hit Richard Simmons.



Amp
Never get high on your own supply. The ad agency writers were clearly drinking too much Amp. I'd love to hear how they pitched this mess to the client ("...and then he attaches the jumper cables to his nipples") .



Planters
The ugly chick Planters ad targets the much coveted misogynist market.



GoDaddy
Nice beaver. Didn't actually air. Viewers were directed to go to GoDaddy's website to see this ad.

Remember the good old days when GoDaddy made funny commercials? By that I mean LAST year.

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I Love NY

Boy, that was fast...

From Tabloid Tshirts (link)


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Kindler's List

Posted as part of South Dakota Dark’s Deeply Superficial Blog-a-thon.

According to IMDB, The Stranger was Orson Welles' least favorite film of his own. He made it in 1946, after the ill-fated Magnificant Ambersons, just to prove to the studios that he could complete a project on time and within budget. This was the only film directed by Welles to show a profit in its original release.

It's a tribute to Welles' talent that one of his mediocre efforts is still more interesting than the "A" game of a lot of other filmmakers.

Set just after World War II, The Stranger follows the cat and mouse game between an investigator of the Allied War Crimes Commission named Wilson (Edward G. Robinson) and Franz Kindler (Welles). Kindler is a Nazi who has seeken refuge in Harper, a small collage town in Connecticut, under the false identity of Dr. Charles Rankin.

In The Third Man, Welles gave fugative Harry Lime a thin layer of charm and a hint of regret over his core of greedy, self-indulgent malevalence. So, it's understandable for Holly Martin and Anna Schmidt to love and defend him.

But as Kindler, mastermind of the "Final Solution", Welles mugs and chews so much scenery that one wonders why it takes so long for the people around him to figure out that something is wrong.

Orson Welles originally wanted Agnes Moorehead to play Wilson. But the studio balked at the idea of a female investagator and instead cast Robinson. Not the clichéd shoot'em up cop, Wilson is a cunning and quiet pursuer. Robinson is as restrained in the part as Welles is over the top.

Rounding out the cast is Loretta Young, who plays Kindler's new bride Mary Longstreet. Acting as an enabler for Kindler's facist nature, Longstreet could give lessons in naivety to Kay Adams from The Godfather.

Like the Lady From Shanghai (another superficial masterpiece), banal dialog is overcome by interestingly staged camera angles and lighting. This somewhat redeems the movie for lines that border on camp as when Young, screaming in alliterative hysteria, declares "Charles is not a Nazi!"

As part of his plan to elude Wilson's investigation, the ever regimented Kindler walks around with a to-do list that includes laughable tasks like "establish alibi." He even dutifully crosses each item off the itinerary as he completes it.

There are some wonderful moments in The Stranger. One such moment is the bit in a phone booth where Kindler absent-mindedly doodles a swastika while making a call.

I particularly enjoy the dinner scene that has a suspicious Wilson engaging Kindler/Rankin in polite conversation as a method of tripping him up. One of the topics they discuss is what to do with Germany in the aftermath of the war.

Even though he's pretending to be an American college professor, Kindler can't help but let his true Nazi tendencies peek through when he suggests that a post-war annihilation of the entire German population "down to the last babe in arms" is the only sure solution.

Mary is shocked that her dear sweet Charles could even suggest such a "Carthaginian peace."

To which Kindler/Rankin calmly replies, "As an historian, I must remind you that the world hasn't had much trouble from Carthage in the past 2000 years."

Wilson later realizes that he's on the right track when he remembers other details of that dinner conversation and in a "eureka" moment exclaims, "Well, who but a Nazi would deny that Karl Marx was a German... because he was a Jew?"
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If It Walks Like a Duck...

He's my guy, but I was getting a little weary of John McCain hammering Mitt Romney on the Iraq "timetable" issue.

It seemed a bit contrived (bordering on dishonest). However, here are two news stories from April 2007 confirming what McCain was saying about Romney's support of timetables.

While I don't think McCain should base his entire campaign around this, Romney's words speak for themselves.

Of course, he could have changed his mind (again). Maybe Mitt was FOR timetables before he was against them.

Romney Embraces Private Iraq 'Timetables'
Republican Presidential Contender Creates Some Distance From Bush War Policy

By TEDDY DAVIS April 3, 2007

Mitt Romney, the Republican presidential candidate who sits atop the GOP pack in fundraising, appears to have grown comfortable with talk of "timetables," in addition to talk of "milestones," when discussing U.S. involvement in Iraq.

The former Massachusetts governor is quick to note, however, that these timetables should be private and not published.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Story?id=3003765&page=1

Romney advocates non-public Iraq benchmarks
By Elana Schor Posted: 04/04/07 02:59 PM [ET]

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, newly minted winner of the GOP's first-quarter presidential fundraising sweepstakes, on Wednesday endorsed setting "timetables and milestones" for Iraq policy but keeping them private - an approach notably supported by Democratic Sen. Mark Pryor (Ark.).

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/romney-supports-secret-iraq-timetable-2007-04-04.html

Hat Tip to Redstate.com

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