John Boehner’s view that dozens of dead Americans and billions of dollars per month is a “small price” to be paying in the Iraq War is an interesting perspective on the conflict but, I assume, a reasonable inference from the oft-stated conservative view that what’s needed to shore up public support for the war is more rhetorical emphasis on the alleged stakes. To me, it seems like a pretty big price, especially because even the war’s more serious proponents tend to take a surprisingly dim view of the prospects for success.

I find myself dispirited by The Washington Post‘s account of what Michael Cohen rightly derides as the Democrats’ “Rodney King strategy” on Iraq legislation. Simply put, acknowledging that they don’t have the votes to overcome a GOP filibuster, Democrats are looking to get pragmatic and forge compromise language that might pass the Senate.

Getting pragmatic and trying to forge compromise language that might pass the Senate is, in general, something I’m inclined to support.

But in this instance, the sticking point is that Republicans won’t support anything that makes Bush do anything to end the war. They want bills that somehow suggest troop withdrawals without making anything happen. But there’s nothing “pragmatic” about compromising on those terms. Ideally, Democrats could secure Republican support for a bill to tie the president’s hands, and thus start ending the war. But if Democrats can’t do that, what they need to do is make their Republican opponents pay a price in 2008. The worst thing imaginable would be for Democrats and vulnerable Republicans alike to join hands in passing a meaningless bill that does nothing but give political cover to members of congress who, when the rubber was hitting the road, did nothing but insist on a blank check for the president.

Professor Charles Courtemanchey of Washington University in Saint Louis not only has a cool name, he’s also got a fascinating research result (PDF):

A causal relationship between gasoline prices and obesity is possible through mechanisms of increased exercise and decreased eating in restaurants. I use a fixed effects model to explore whether this theory has empirical support, Önding that an additional $1 in real gasoline prices would reduce obesity in the U.S. by 15% after five years, and that 13% of the rise in obesity between 1979 and 2004 can be attributed to falling real gas prices during this period. I also provide evidence that the effect occurs both by increasing exercise and by lowering the frequency with which people eat at restaurants.

This comes to me via Ryan Avent. Maybe presidential candidate and weight-loss guru Mike Huckabee would like to take this insight up as part of a comprehensive anti-obesity, anti-global warming, double-whammy.