Deeply Bored

Really, really bored:

Women's basketball event excites war-weary Somalis

You'd have to be very weary of something to get excited by women's basketball -- especially in a Muslim country, where the players are clad head-to-toe. One can't even look forward to oggling some nice gams while at the game. It's probably a lot like watching your granny and her pals at the has-been home while they play shuffleboard and drink Shirley Temples.

The Horn of Africa nation is a failed state. Islamist insurgents have waged an Iraq-style campaign against a weak Western-backed interim government that has killed more than 16,000 civilians since the start of 2007.

Another 1 million Somalis have been driven from their homes.

The United States has long feared the anarchic country could become a safe haven for radical militants, and it says Somalia's hardline al Shabaab rebel group has close ties to al Qaeda.

But most Somalis are traditionally moderate Muslims...

Ah, yes; the fabled and ever-elusive "moderate Muslims." Like unicorns in the forest, one often hears wild tales of these magnificent beasts, but nobody has ever captured one on film or even found a trail. Perhaps one day we'll see one of these strange creatures from a great distance and marvel at its unique beauty for a few seconds before it once again disappears into legend.

As for the "Western-backed" government, we can pull out just any time as far as I'm concerned. Trying to bring civilization to modern Africa is a losing battle. The British, French, and Germans all learned it the hard way, but apparently we're hard-headed enough we'll have to take the long way around as well. It is called "the Dark Continent" for reasons which have nothing at all to do with the melanin count of the inhabitants.