James Pinkerton on the "Halberstamization" of the Iraq occupation.

What Julian Borger of the Guardian/UK wrote as Bush wings his way to Africa, the continent he thought was country -- Bigger? Than Texas!?

President Bush's trip to Africa this week signals a recent strategic decision to increase America's military presence to bolster what Washington now sees as two important national interests on the continent - the supply of oil and the struggle against terrorism.

What we all know really should be said: "grab for oil on the excuse of terrorism?"

A Darwin sidelight. Two biographies of Robert Fitzroy, captain of The Beagle, display another bright British eccentric.

Moreover, FitzRoy was the instigator of what now seems to us a very bizarre enterprise: the conversion of the native inhabitants of Tierra del Fuego to evangelical Christianity by teaching them English ways. FitzRoy took four Fuegians home with him to England, had them taught the rudiments of English and theology, and then returned them to their remote homeland, complete with tea services, butter dishes and tablecloths. The result, needless to say, was not Tunbridge Wells-on-Cape-Horn: FitzRoy's efforts stirred a sometimes murderous resentment in the inhabitants of that region against their would-be benefactors.