From the Pork Barrel: Mr. Paul Goes to Iowa

* If Ron Paul does somehow end up winning Iowa, does he automatically get a show on Fox or does he have to get all fat first?

* I don't think it's an exaggeration to suggest that this might be the greatest day of Jon Huntsman's life — He's beating Ron Paul in a poll!

* I just had a crazy thought: What is Rick Perry is actually a double agent working for the gays?

* Leave it to the media to find the one angry embittered old man who's upset that the Iraq War is ending.

* Newt Gingrich considers a person being gay as a lifestyle decision, like a Catholic priest deciding to be celibate or a "historian" deciding to inject his face full of goose fat.

Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images News/Getty Images

Tags: Iowa, Iowa Caucus, Iraq, John McCain, Jon Huntsman, LGBT, Mike Huckabee, Military, Newt Gingrich, Polls, Pork Barrel, Rick Perry, Ron Paul

Tweet Untweet: I Am Iraq, I Am an Island

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Tags: Iraq, Television, Tweet Untweet, Twitter

Happy Christmas, Iraq War Is Over

It seems really weird to even be writing these words — and, to be honest, there were times when I thought that I would never be writing these words* — but the war in Iraq is officially over as of… now…

U.S. troops lowered the flag of command that flew over the Iraqi capital, carefully rolled it and cased it in camouflage in accordance with Army tradition.

The quiet ceremony, under a bright Iraqi winter sun, was the opposite of the nighttime "shock and awe" bombardment of Baghdad that launched the war against Saddam Hussein in March 2003.

Justified by President George W. Bush on the grounds that Hussein was seeking weapons of mass destruction that he could share with terrorists such as al Qaeda, the invasion was deeply divisive in America and around the world.

I have mixed feelings about this. I mean, yeah, sure, we managed to beat our parents' big defining war by a good four months, but I don't know… I just feeling hollow inside somehow. Like, I never actually liked this war, but I've just become so used to it. Like a warm and fuzzy goiter that I've grown accustomed to stroking in bed while drifting off to sleep.**

I just wish that there was something… anything… that could fill this hole I have in my heart…

Even as President Obama winds down American commitments in Iraq and Afghanistan, Mr. Gingrich is warning of a protracted ideological struggle — and perhaps military intervention in Iran — as part of a battle of ideas in the Muslim world. The United States is "about where we were in 1946" up against the Soviet Union, he said recently.

Aaahhhh… Come to me, my pretty little Persian neck bubble.

.

^{* Like that time I got my hand caught in the garbage disposal. Or that time I got my hand caught in the food processor. Or that time I got my hand caught in the hand guillotine.}

^{** The goiter analogy isn't working for you? Be happy I didn't go with the hemorrhoid one.}

Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images News/Getty Images

Tags: Iran, Iraq, Military

Exclusive Extended Daily Show Interview with Condoleezza Rice

"I don't think that there's any chance that an Arab Spring flourishes in Iraq. An Arab Spring in Iraq looks like Syria, but much much worse. Because, unlike Qaddafi, Saddam Hussein had a massive army, Saddam Hussein had put 400 thousand people in mass graves, he used chemical weapons before. So, I think a very different set of circumstances." — Condoleezza Rice

The interview continues after the jump.

The Daily Show airs Monday through Thursday at 11/10c.

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Tags: Books, Bush Administration, Condoleezza Rice, George W. Bush, Iraq, Jon Stewart, Libya, Middle East, Muammar Qaddafi, Saddam Hussein, The Daily Show, Video

The Daily Show on the End of the War in Iraq

I'm not exactly sure why Republicans are so upset about the long-overdue end of the war in Iraq. Don't they realize that this frees up all the resources President Bachmann will need for sending troops into Iran?

The Daily Show airs Monday through Thursday at 11/10c.

Tags: Afghanistan, Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Hamid Karzai, Iraq, John McCain, Jon Stewart, Libya, Lindsey Graham, Michele Bachmann, Military, Muammar Qaddafi, The Daily Show, Video