om•e•let also om•e•lette (om'lit) n. 1. A dish consisting of beaten eggs fried over high heat until set, often served folded in half over a savory filling such as cheese or mushrooms. 2. Political support or currency. 3. Iraq.

In the last two days, I've read two non-culinary articles in the San Francisco Chronicle that mention omelets.

The first article ran yesterday and discussed Arnold's State of the State address. The reporter spoke with Terry Connelly, a dean of business at a local university. Here's the relevant excerpt...

The governor, he said, is "offering a grand bargain against the political encampments of the past" by effectively thumbing his nose at the political axiom -- one adhered to by the Bush administration -- that an elected official should "never, never anger your base."

Schwarzenegger "has been there and done that. He'll say, 'I played to the base with poorly drafted stuff, and that ain't the way you make an omelet,' " Connelly said. "You make an omelet by breaking some eggs -- and you have to move past the comfort zone politically."

I'm not sure, but I believe the omelet, in this case, is meant to represent political support or currency. I'm assuming "poorly drafted stuff" would be like using rotten eggs or an inferior egg substitute. As for the eggs themselves, I haven't a clue as to what they symbolize, but apparently they need to be broken outside of the comfort zone, which could be just the pan or maybe the entire kitchen, depending on one's omelet abilities.

The second article, a piece about Bush's "new" plan for American involvement in Iraq, ran this morning. Here's the pertinent sentence...

Rep. Tom Lantos, D-San Mateo, said, "It's too late to unscramble the omelet'' of four years of mistakes in Iraq.

Doing anything to an omelet after four years, whether it be unscrambling, eating, or touching it, would sound a bit on the late side. Then again, in a related article I found on the web, a Michigan State University professor was quoted as saying, "The United States has unscrambled the omelet, and it's very difficult now to put it back together once again."

So, it might not be too late to unscramble the Iraq Mistake Omelet after all. Reassembling it could be an issue though. Mistake, I'm guessing, must be a type of mushroom, like shiitake. If it is, this omelet must be packed with mushrooms.

And stretching the poor metaphor even further, Bush seems to believe the only way to fix the troublesome omelet is with a surge of cheese (or a cheese escalation, as the Democrats would say).

Just for fun, I did a little digging around for any other mention of Iraq and omelets. The most amusing find was this Tom Toles political cartoon that appeared in the Washington Post last year...

All this talk of omelets leaves me feeling hungry. It also leaves me wondering when and where the next political omelet will appear. Maybe I should keep an eye out for it.