FIFO

It stands for "first in first out." It's an accounting term referring to a method of inventory valuation. But it also describes the tortured presidential campaign of the hapless Tim "Dwarfed by Corn" Pawlenty.

Like the deer he gut shot in the Minnesota woods and then abandoned to flounder and die, he has been abandoned to the same fate by Republicans in Iowa. Good riddance.

Dan Burns has another warm recollection of the boy we all call TeaPaw.

The cartoon is by Avidor.

Update: Returning to the theme for a moment, I have always thought that gut shooting the deer was one of the more revealing acts of Pawlenty's odious career. It was a bad and ill-considered shot. It undoubtedly caused great suffering by his quarry. But rather than taking personal responsibility for his action, he abandoned the deer and left the job to others.

So he could go to a fundraiser in Iowa. If you believe in karma, I think it's at work here.

Searching for wounded game is part of the ethic of hunting; it is penance for your failure to make a clean kill. This is why you cannot delegate responsibility for the search. We learned more about the scrub TeaPaw on that occasion than any other I can recall.

Tim Pawlenty's behaviour that November day is a blot on his escutcheon that he will have to wear to the end of his days.