What is it about politics that makes some people lose all perspective?

Today's two examples come from near -- and far.

In the United States, we have Exhibit A, also known as Newt Gingrich.  

Exhibit B comes from Afghanistan: one Hamid Karzai.

Gingrich wants to be president, but he has no shot.  Karzai is a president, but if he's not careful, he will be shot.

Of course, one doesn't enter politics without a healthy -- some might say overinflated -- ego. The best politicians are, by nature, risk-takers. Where others hold back, they charge ahead.  It takes them to great heights sometimes but also brings great falls: see Clinton, Bill, and Nixon, Richard. 

(Thursday brought another reminder:  Former Illinois Gov. Rod Rod Blagojevich left Chicago for Colorado, where he'll be serving a sentence on corruption charges in federal prison.)

And ego certainly applies to Gingrich. Times staff writer Paul West on Thursday summed up Gingrich's motivation for staying in the GOP presidential race:

At 68, the former House speaker is making what figures to be his last fling at elective politics.  But it is his sense of himself as an epic figure that may well be what's keeping him going.

Gingrich hopes for a brokered convention, something that hasn't happened for decades but that appeals to the historian in him.  It may be a figment of his imagination, but it's a harmless fantasy -- unless you're Mitt Romney and hoping to wrap up the nomination.

Karzai, on the other hand, is playing a much more dangerous game.  On Thursday, Times staff writer Laura King reported from Kabul that the Afghan president "had demanded a quicker end to the Western combat mission and a pullback of NATO troops from rural areas."

Karzai's office said he told visiting Defense Secretary Leon Panetta that by year's end, U.S. troops should be garrisoned only in large bases, abandoning outposts in rural districts like Panjwayi, the scene of Sunday's shooting deaths. 

"Afghanistan's security forces have the capability to provide security in the villages of Afghanistan," said a statement from Karzai's office.

Which makes one wonder what country Karzai thinks he's living in. Especially because the Taliban announced Thursday that not only was it suspending talks with the United States on the war but that it would be "pointless" to engage in any talks with the Karzai government.

Karzai's response?

The president also called for a significant acceleration of the handover of security responsibilities to Afghan forces, saying NATO should wind down its combat role in 2013 instead of 2014. "Our demand is to speed up this process, and authority should be given to Afghans," the presidential palace's statement said.

Perhaps Karzai could take a lesson from Gingrich and read up on his history.  Here's a name he might want to check out: Najibullah.

After the Soviet Union withdrew its forces from Afghanistan, Najibullah was president.  Forced from office during the ensuing civil war, Najibullah took refuge in the U.N. compound in Kabul for four years.  But in 1996, the Taliban seized power. 

A Times' story from Friday Sept. 27, 1996, records his fate:

The bloated, beaten body of the man who also once headed the hated Afghan Communists' security service was strung up from a lamppost outside the presidential palace, reports said.

The Times' Doyle McManus wrote Thursday that given recent events, President Obama needs a Plan C for getting out of Afghanistan.  So Karzai may get his wish for a sped-up withdrawal.  

But if that's the case, Karzai's name just might end up listed next to Najibullah's in the history books of the 21st century.

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Photo: Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, left, meets with Afghan President Hamid Karza in Kabul on Thursday. Credit: Mohammad Ismail / EPA

What keeps alive a story that could keep you alive? On Sunday, José Holguín-Veras' article, "The 1,000-year-old warning," explained how a venerable tale led the people of Murohama, on the east coast of Japan, to safety after last year's Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. The ancient story told of a massive earthquake and tsunami that killed villagers who headed to high ground nearby but were nonetheless swept away. The particulars matched geologic and historical evidence, but what the people of Murohama remembered wasn't corroborating science but the story itself -- and a roadside shrine, tended for generations, near the site where the tragedy happened.  When the Tohoku earthquake hit, most of the people in Murohama heeded the story and headed to safer ground on the other side of town.

One commenter on our website, "clxLAT," said, "A picture of the shrine would have been nice." Holguín-Veras was happy to accommodate that request with a shot  he took of the roadside shrine on his research trip to Japan.  He also included a GPS map based on  Google Earth.  The "directions" on it start at "S" in the village and lead to "E" -- close to the roadside shrine. The safer high ground is south and west  of "S."  

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Photo: Murohama's roadside shrine. Credit: José Holguín-Veras’ / For The Times

The Kony video: You love it or you hate it. Or, if you're a truly world-weary Web troll who mocks memes rather than makes them, you're way, way above it. Meanwhile, if you're an opinionator for the dead-tree media, you wait until most of the fuss is well and truly over before getting around to blogging about it.

Actually, the fuss isn't quite over. Invisible Children, the advocacy group behind the Web video "Kony 2012," announced Monday that its next project will be a video defending itself from all the criticism generated by its last one. That's a good idea because powerful filmmaking is the one thing this group does extremely well (as opposed to, say, benefiting Ugandan children or actually achieving results).

Oops. To all of my Facebook friends under 25: Just kidding about that last sentence. I'm changing my profile photo to a red "Kony 2012" banner. Please don't hack my account and post embarrassing status updates under my name.

The almost evangelical zeal with which many college-ish-age people are embracing the Kony campaign is at once inspiring and distressing -- inspiring because it shows that with a little nudge, America's youth can be driven to care about more than midterms and Internet porn; distressing because it shows how easily public opinion on an obscure topic can be manipulated by savvy new-media marketers. The video, a recitation of the many crimes of Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony, has attracted more than 74 million viewers on YouTube alone, not to mention the millions more who have seen it elsewhere.

If you're familiar with the video (and if you're not, check out this Times story), chances are you're also familiar with the criticisms of its makers, which are many: Invisible Children holds itself out as a charity to benefit Ugandan kids whose lives have been torn apart by violence, yet examinations of its tax returns show that it spends most of its funds on making films; "Kony 2012" urges people to send the charity more money in the name of preventing Congress from withdrawing the small contingent of U.S. military advisors who are helping African troops track down and catch Kony, which is odd considering there was never any sign that Congress was considering any such thing; and the video glosses over the fact that Kony is actually no longer in Uganda and is hiding elsewhere, so his reign of terror is largely over.

What bothers me about the group isn't its financing, strategy or even documentary technique but its focus on a marginalized figure who, while certainly among the world's most wanted criminals, is only one of many international villains, and not the most dangerous. A list of better topics might include the genocide in Darfur, the tragic failed state that is Somalia and the deadly scourges of malaria and AIDS in Africa, any of which would be more worthy of public notice and more amenable to public influence. The fact is that all the money and advocacy in the world can't catch Joseph Kony; about the best Americans can do is to support their government's current work to help with the policing effort. That's hardly a great topic for activism. A few million calls to Congress about providing more funds to the Global Fund to Fight AIDs, Tuberculosis and Malaria, though, could really make a difference.

But that's a quibble. The filmmakers behind "Kony 2012" made the documentary because their lives were touched by Ugandan children and the devastation wrought by Kony's forces; somebody else can worry about AIDs. And it seems odd for the Western media to blame Invisible Children for being late to the game of raising awareness about Kony, when they largely neglected to tell Kony's story in the midst of his worst depredations. If Invisible Children spends its money making movies, that's because its mission is to raise awareness, and that's not a bad thing. American high school kids might not be able to find Uganda on a map, but at least they now know who Joseph Kony is.

So it's a mixed bag. But if you're itching to right Africa's wrongs with a little cash, there are better places to send it than Invisible Children. Here's one of the better ones.

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Photo: Image from the Kony 2012 action kit. Credit: www.invisiblechildren.com

It's not often you can say that someone saved the world -- and mean it literally.

But that's the case with F. Sherwood Rowland. The UC Irvine chemist, who died Saturday at 85, was one of three scientists who won the 1995 Nobel Prize in chemistry, The Times reported, for their work "explaining how chlorofluorocarbons, ubiquitous substances once used in an array of products from spray deodorant to industrial solvents, could destroy the ozone layer, the protective atmospheric blanket that screens out many of the sun's harmful ultraviolet rays."

In hindsight, it seems straightforward: Bad stuff was eating away a vital part of Earth's environment. So get rid of it.

But it wasn't so simple in 1974, when Rowland and fellow scientist Mario Molina published their concerns in the journal Nature.

As The Times says, the findings "were met with scorn by the chemical industry and even by many scholars. For a decade, Rowland and Molina persevered to prove their hypothesis, publishing numerous scientific papers and speaking to sometimes hostile audiences at scientific conferences. It took almost 15 years for the international scientific community and chemical industry to accept the pair's findings."

Hmmm, starting to remind you of a little something called "climate change," is it?

But here's something of a vital difference between the ozone debate and the current climate change one:

Manufacturers began to phase out chlorofluorocarbons in the late 1980s, prompted by the discovery of an ozone "hole" over Antarctica that formed each winter in response to weather conditions and the falling worldwide levels of ozone. The Montreal Protocol, a landmark international agreement to phase out CFC products, was signed by the United States and other nations in 1987.

The protocol was proof that nations could unite to address common environmental threats, Rowland contended. "People have worked together to solve the problem," he said.

Rowland was right then.  Nations did unite to address a common environmental threat.

But have we taken that lesson to heart?  Will we accept the scientific consensus on climate change and work together to save the planet?   

Or will it continue to be a political football, at least in the United States, where too many politicians are opting for short-term partisan gains at the risk of the planet's future?

Donald Blake, a colleague of Rowland’s at UC Irvine, told The Times that Rowland considered the phase-out of CFCs his greatest achievement.

It would be a shame if Rowland won the ozone battle -- but the rest of us lost the war for Earth’s survival.

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Photo: F. Sherwood Rowland, shown in his UC Irvine lab.  Credit: Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times

These just in -- two dispatches from the front of the war on drugs:

"U.S. fails to catch two-thirds of drug boats, general says," and "Man charged with smuggling 40,000 erectile dysfunction pills."

One is about being stupid. The other is about being caught.

I'll let you decide which is which.

First, Air Force Gen. Douglas Fraser, commander of the U.S. Southern Command, told reporters Wednesday that military efforts to stem drug smuggling from Latin America are being hampered because planes and ships have been diverted to combat operations elsewhere.

It's certainly not a problem of funding, though. As The Times' story says:

The military has spent $6.1 billion since 2005 to help detect drug payloads heading to the U.S., as well as on surveillance and other intelligence operations, according to a report last year by the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

At prices like that, it might be cheaper for the government to just buy the cocaine from the cartels.

And, of course, there's this little Catch-22:

"Any drug interdiction strategy is a Band-Aid, a temporary fix," said Bruce Bagley, who studies U.S. counter-narcotics efforts at the University of Miami at Coral Gables, Fla. "It may reduce the supply for a short time, but what does get in is worth more."

Well, yeah, there's that. Otherwise known as the 800-lb. gorilla of the whole war-on-drugs policy. Drugs are illegal, but people still want them.  So someone supplies them. So we spend a fortune to try to stop them. And whatever we catch just makes the stuff we don't catch more valuable, which makes the guys who supply it richer. 

Legalization, anyone?

Naw, then people might use more drugs, and that would mean more addicts, and that would mean we would have to spend money on treatment. Instead of, uh, spending a large fortune trying to fight cartels that corrupt governments and kill people and -- well, OK, it's a mess.

Honestly, I don't know if legalization would work. But I'm pretty sure that what we're doing now isn't working.

Still, I'll admit that the current system did manage to get its man, one Kil Jun Lee, 71, of Westlake, Calif. 

Lee allegedly tried to slip 29,827 counterfeit Viagra tablets, 8,993 counterfeit Cialis pills and 793 counterfeit Levitra tablets past authorities at LAX by hiding them in his golf bag and luggage. (Which, of course, was his first mistake, because as any wife who's been abandoned for five hours on a Sunday by her golf-addict husband can tell you, golf and sex never mix.)

And it's not as though the law enforcement guys didn't have a sense of humor:

According to the criminal complaint, Lee concealed the tablets in aluminum-foil-wrapped packets, and was questioned by authorities about whether the pills were all for personal use. He responded that he had a heart condition, and using all the pills would kill him.

Oh, ha ha -- "all for your personal use."

Also, Lee didn't come across as your typical hardened drug smuggler:

He also said he "did not believe the pills were genuine," adding that "he was sorry" for bringing the pills and "will not do it again."

Which, really, is good enough for me. A sincere apology and a promise not to be a repeat offender for what is, in a sense, a victimless crime. (Unless, of course, you paid good money for the counterfeit stuff -- but then again, caveat emptor!)

So the Navy and Coast Guard will continue their futile efforts to stop Latin America's cartels. 

And the good folks at LAX will continue to protect us from the evils of phony Viagra.

And we taxpayers will keep paying for it all.

And that's no joke.

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-- Paul Whitefield

Photo: Colombian police at a cocaine production laboratory in the jungle. Credit: Mauricio Duenas / EPA

I've never been a big fan of those alternative-history novels in which Hitler wins World War II or Richard Nixon becomes president for life, but recent events have me pondering a hideous prospect: What if John McCain had defeated Barack Obama in 2008? The answer, as indicated by McCain's recent posturing, is that we'd be struggling with a lot more than an economic downturn; we'd probably be in costly and unwinnable wars not just in Afghanistan but in Syria and Iran.

McCain has not only forgotten the lessons of his own generation's war in Vietnam, he's forgotten what this generation learned in Iraq. He is eager not just for Israel to bomb Iran, which would set off a devastating regional conflict likely to drag in the United States, but for Washington to bomb Syria. On Monday, he became the first U.S. senator to call for air strikes on that country, and during a Senate Armed Services Committee meeting Wednesday, he admonished Defense Secretary Leon Panetta for failing to show leadership by "focusing on diplomatic and political approaches rather than a military intervention."

Panetta didn't take this sitting down; he said the administration was working to build international consensus, as it did in Libya, rather than taking unilateral action, and that as Defense secretary he has to know "what the mission is. I've got to make very sure we know whether we can achieve that mission, what price and whether or not it will make matters better or worse."

That's the part McCain either doesn't understand or doesn't care to discuss. U.S. military intervention in Syria in any form -- whether airstrikes or arming rebels -- would be extraordinarily risky. Syria is a powder keg of ethnic and sectarian factions with networks in neighboring countries; foreign intervention there would set off a proxy war that would further destabilize the entire Middle East.

To name just a few of the complications: In Lebanon, the politically powerful and heavily armed Hezbollah is committed to upholding the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad, and it's not unrealistic to think that a broader civil war in Syria could spread to its fragile neighbor. If Assad should fall, it would almost certainly lead to reprisals, and likely atrocities, against Syria's minority Alawite community, the regime's most important domestic backers. The Syrian opposition that U.S. hawks would like to arm is an unknown quantity made up of Islamic fundamentalists and other groups that aren't necessarily sympathetic to U.S. interests. Taking out Syria's air defenses would be nowhere near as simple as taking out Libya's and would require a massive U.S. military commitment; it also presents risks that it would prompt Assad to use his country's stockpile of chemical weapons, which is said to be 100 times the size of Libya's.

I could go on, but I doubt I could say it better than the International Crisis Group, which wrote in a recent report:

Frustrated and lacking a viable political option, Western officials and analysts have toyed with a series of often half-baked ideas, from initiating direct military attacks to establishing safe havens, humanitarian corridors or so-called no-kill zones. All these would require some form of outside military intervention by regime foes that would more than likely intensify involvement by its allies. Even if they were to provoke the regime's collapse, that in itself would do nothing to resolve the manifold problems bequeathed by the conflict: security services and their civilian proxies increasingly gone rogue; deepening communal tensions; and a highly fragmented opposition.

McCain's hawkishness is starting to turn off most of his fellow Republicans, and even if he had won the White House, he might not have been able to fulfill his neocon nation-building fantasies. Fortunately, it will take an alternative-fiction writer, rather than a journalist, to imagine the harm he could have done.

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$3 billion in U.S. humanitarian aid buys little respect

--Dan Turner

Photo: Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) talks to the press Monday after calling for air strikes on Syria. Credit: J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press

Americans see themselves as generous people, and the dollars spent on humanitarian aid abroad bear that out.

So why don't others see us the same way?

Reporting on a new study of humanitarian aid by the group DARA, a nonprofit that has offices in Switzerland, Spain and the United States, The Times said Wednesday:

The U.S. ranked 17th out of 19 countries in aid effectiveness in the report, ahead of Luxembourg and Italy. Norway topped the list for the most effective aid.

Political and economic agendas have gotten in the way of help for suffering people, the group said. Foreign humanitarian groups overwhelmingly said they believed U.S. aid was driven by other economic or political interests, one factor that dragged down its rating….

The U.S. gives more money than any other country, more than $3 billion last year, according to the United Nations Financial Tracking Service. However, it gives a smaller percentage of its income (0.21%) than the 0.7% the United Nations has urged, the report says.

So, in a nutshell: We're the biggest donors, but apparently still not big enough, and those who use the money don't like the strings we attach to it or trust our motives. (Although the report doesn't mention any of them turning down the aid. I guess they just hold their noses when taking the money.)

Of course, the accusation that the United States uses foreign aid to further its political agendas isn't news.  For example, in an Op-Ed on Wednesday titled "Why Egypt doesn’t trust us," former Times staff writer Stanley Meisler talks about the troubled history of U.S.-funded pro-democracy groups such as the International Republican Institute, the National Democratic Institute, Freedom House and the International Center for Journalists.

Most Americans typically see these groups as working for positive change.  The Egyptians, and obviously other countries, see more sinister motives.

Whatever the truth is, it's troubling that, at least when it comes to humanitarian aid, the United States is viewed so negatively.  When $3 billion is being spent, it would be nice to know that it's actually doing some good. (And heck, it might even be nice that those getting the aid show a little appreciation.)

Perhaps we should examine what Norway is doing to earn that No. 1 spot. (Of course, it might be just that no one mistrusts Scandinavians, while plenty of people apparently mistrust Americans. Although try telling that to Dag Hammarskjold.)

Still, perhaps we could solve the problem by funneling our $3 billion to Norway, and let the Norwegians handle the rest.

We might not get the credit, but at least we might get more bang for our bucks.

And the Norwegians might even say "Thank you."

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Photo: Donated food is divided at a refugee camp in Darfur in 2004. Credit: Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times

So this is getting seriously stupid, all the campaign-season rhetoric about Iran.

First, President Obama, speaking Sunday to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, says:

"I will take no options off the table, and I mean what I say. That includes all elements of American power. A political effort aimed at isolating Iran; a diplomatic effort to sustain our coalition and ensure that the Iranian program is monitored; an economic effort to impose crippling sanctions; and, yes, a military effort to be prepared for any contingency.

"Iran's leaders should know that I do not have a policy of containment. I have a policy to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. And as I've made clear time and again during the course of my presidency, I will not hesitate to use force when it is necessary to defend the United States and its interests."

Sounds clear and tough-guy enough, right?

COMMENTARY AND ANALYSIS: Presidential Election 2012

Well, apparently not to Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, who, The Times reported from Snellville, Ga., reacted to Obama's speech this way:

"If Barack Obama is reelected, Iran will have a nuclear weapon and the world will change," Romney told a crowd of more than a 1,000 people at a pancake breakfast that his campaign hosted in this Atlanta suburb.

When an 11-year-old boy asked the candidate how he would keep Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, Romney said Obama had not imposed "crippling sanctions against Iran." "He's also failed to communicate that military options are on the table and in fact in our hand, and that it's unacceptable to America for Iran to have a nuclear weapon.

"I will have those military options. I will take those crippling sanctions and put them into place," he said. "And I will speak out to the Iranian people of the peril of them becoming nuclear …. I'm not willing to allow your generation to have to worry about a threat from Iran or anyone else that nuclear material be used against Americans.”

Oh, and have some more pancakes, young fellow. I want you big and strong for when I send you off to war!

But seriously. Obama said all options were on the table -- and Romney still called him out. What is this, the second-grade playground?

C'mon, fellows, stop and think a minute. If you don't want Iran to develop a nuclear weapon, does it make sense to keep bombarding it with threats of military action? I mean, I'm pretty sure they've got the picture by now. 

Do you really have to make a bunch of paranoid types more paranoid? Isn't this why Israel says it fears Iran -- because it has threatened to destroy Israel?

So how do all of these threats to attack Iran make it want the bomb less?

The bottom line: This is political gamesmanship at its worst. Romney and the GOP candidates court pro-Israel votes by taking an ultra-hard line on Iran. Which forces Obama to hew to a hard line as well.

But it's a very dangerous game. It could lead to war. It could get lots of people killed.

And yes, for me, it's personal too: I have two sons.One just turned 18, at which point you are -- yes, still -- required to sign up with the Selective Service System.

Frankly, I'm getting tired of hearing pandering politicians cast about for votes by offering up the lives of other people's kids in the name of national security.

Take Romney's sons: Did he offer them up as cannon fodder? Check out this New York Times story in 2007, the last time he ran, when he was asked about whether they had served in the military:

Mr. Romney expressed appreciation for the country's "volunteer army" and said "that's the way we're going to keep it." He explained his sons had made different career choices in life and had not chosen to serve in the military, but he mentioned a niece whose husband, he said, had just been called up by the National Guard ….

But he wound up his response with this: "It's remarkable how we can show our support for our nation, and one of the ways my sons are showing support for our nation is helping to get me elected, because they think I’d be a great president. My son, Josh, bought the family Winnebago and has visited 99 counties, most of them with his three kids and his wife. And I respect that and respect all of those in the way they serve this great country."

Yes, well, Mitt, the campaign trail is a rugged place, that's for sure, especially in a Winnebago.

But ask the fathers and mothers and husbands and wives of the thousands of Americans killed in Iraq and Afghanistan about real war.

And then, just maybe, you -- and, frankly, Obama too -- might decide to take your finger off the trigger.

And quit playing politics with the lives of American kids.

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-- Paul Whitefield

Photo: Mitt Romney speaks Sunday at a pancake breakfast at Brookwood High School in Snellville, Ga., outside Atlanta. Credit: Justin Sullivan / Getty Images

The departure from Egypt of six American employees of nongovernmental organizations is good news for those involved and may dampen efforts in Congress to cut military aid to that country at a delicate time in Egyptian politics. But the price tag for their release -- $300,000 in bail  per defendant -- makes the  resolution  look more like a hostage deal than a victory for due process. Indeed, the Americans were hostages of a sort, having  taken refuge in the American Embassy in Cairo. One is the son of U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

The  Egyptian government has not ended its investigation of  the National  Democratic Institute and the International Republican Institute (LaHood's group), which walk the fine line between promoting democracy and interfering in Egypt's internal affairs. A State Department spokeswoman warned  that the decision to allow the activists to leave "doesn’t resolve the legal case or the larger issue of NGOs in Egypt," and noted that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton must certify to Congress this spring that Egypt is abiding by democratic principles.

The crisis might be finessed if Egypt's new parliament were to repeal the registration law the NGOs were accused of violating. But the initial reaction from Egyptian politicians  has been criticism of the military government for caving in to the United States. Investigating the NGOs may have been the brainchild of a holdover from the Hosni Mubarak regime, but perceived U.S. interference in the Egyptian judicial process offended even reformists.  Nor are the NGOs necessarily welcomed even by Egyptian parties that took advantage of their expertise in the past.

Meanwhile, the imagery of the Americans' ordeal isn't likely to do a lot for tourism.

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Photo: American activists arrive to the airport to leave Egypt aboard a U.S. military plane, in Cario, Egypt, on March 1, after the government lifted the travel ban. Credit: STR/EPA

Vive la France! Vive l'Empereur!

Vive l'Empereur's French theme park?

Oui!  Just as some U.S. politicians today are busy venerating "American exceptionalism,"  the French are apparently having, as Times staff writer Devorah Lauter put it, "something of a Napoleon moment."

And in the town of Montereau-fault-Yonne, she writes, scene of one of Napoleon Bonaparte's final victories -- over Austrian troops and their allies 198 years ago -- that fervor has sparked plans for a theme park  "complete with snowy battle reenactments and a ride in the shape of Napoleon's famous arched hat."

Oh boy, you can't say the French don’t know how to have fun. Still:

The idea is not to vaunt a bygone glory, [Mayor Yves] Jego insisted, but rather "to give a little pride to France, to show that the figure of their history has an international dimension," and to use "innovative" ways to illuminate his unappreciated sides.

Well, OK, if you say so. Because his other sides are pretty well known, and somewhat less savory:

Yes, the hero's grandiose ambitions led to war after war, countless deaths and, finally, the collapse of his empire.

Oh, that.

Now here in California, we know from theme parks.  We've got Disneyland (which has been exported to France, of course), Knott's Berry Farm, Six Flags Magic Mountain and Universal Studios Hollywood, to name a few.

But we just honor cartoon characters, and movie creatures.  Sometimes we do take note of famous American leaders -- like Abraham Lincoln at Disneyland -- but no one much cares. Kids today would much rather throw up on Space Mountain than listen to a robot that looks like Lincoln "perform."

Sure, Jefo can argue that Napoleon was "a legal authority of great standing, an extraordinary conqueror, an incredible soldier, strategist and a romantic."

"I think that history should be shared with the people," he said. "And visiting a historic park is more enriching than visiting a park about a cartoon character, however great he is."

But Jefo obviously hasn't ridden on Space Mountain or King Kong 360-3D lately.

No, if he wants his Napoleon theme park to succeed, it had better be more "Austerlitz: Kill Zone 360" and less "Hello, Josephine, My Little Buttercup."

Instead, although details are sketchy, Lauter writes:

One sketch shows a giant N-shaped water feature running through a landscape sprinkled with carefully trimmed parks typical of the period, castles, a cathedral, a small mountain range and a likeness of the Sphinx.

Which, except for the Sphinx, just sounds like a smaller version of France itself.

Heck, I've visited the country twice.  The whole place is like a theme park already.  I mean, Mont St. Michel is way better than Cinderella's Castle. Most of Paris is far more charming than Universal CityWalk.  (Although much of the country does shut down every day from noon to 2 for lunch -- and for all of August, naturally. On the plus side, you can eat dinner all night long.)

This is the Old World, though, so of course there's this "never miss a chance to rub it in" critique from across the English Channel:

"A country which can still partly revere such a man surely has a problem," wrote Stephen Glover of Britain's Daily Mail, describing Napoleon as "a man whose actions led to the deaths of millions of people -- and whose defeat paved the way for British 19th century supremacy, reducing France to the rank of a second-rate power where, let us be honest, it has remained."

Which is pretty funny when you think of it: A columnist from a second-rate power calling out another second-rate power. And one from a paper that's busy celebrating the Diamond Jubilee of that ultra-modern institution, the British monarchy.

No, I'm not so ready to kill Mayor Jego's dream.

And especially not when Napoleon's tomb was one of my favorite stops in Paris.

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Photo: Montereau-fault-Yonne Mayor Yves Jego with performers dressed in Napoleonic uniform. Credit: Devorah Lauter / For The Times