The slippery naked truth: Republicans believe the world is unfair and unbalanced and with this understanding have successfully gamed the system to their advantage...but, only temporarily as the nation slowly awakens to the emperor clothed only in a slick of oil. As a group the republican party now being guided by McCain et. al., (perhaps), seem not to be ashamed of their public nakedness. They should be. With the selection of outspoken Sarah Palin as McCain‘s running mate providing a much needed distraction from his flip-flop weakened platform, (remember Nixon’s diversion using Spiro Agnew as a decoy?), the party can go forward with complete disregard for the Bush/Cheney administration’s previous lack of moral focus and openness with the American people. In spite of the fact that moral and ethical integrity was originally John McCain’s strongest attributes, it appears some shadow operatives felt he was not making the case strongly enough, thus Palin. Once again the new-Grand Old Party has not provided the moral compass to find direction out of the ‘puppet master’ guided hell of the previous eight years. Instead the objective of the GOP leadership seems to be taking aim at a new cold war ‘enemy of convenience‘; that is, by threatening conflict with Iran and Syria--buffered by the recent Georgian fiasco, AND, bringing Russia back as the ultimate excuse to maintain a military empire around the world. Let us not kid ourselves, the mock enemy hunting is still all about oil and most likely the underpinning of whatever October ‘surprise‘ might be forthcoming. G. H. Diel