So i bumped dev-libs/cloog-ppl to a newer version just now. cloog-ppl (and it's buddy PPL) are new dependencies of the new Graphite framework in GCC 4.4 (still masked). They're optional dependencies, and on a whim I wanted to see if configure would fail if they were missing or just detect it and continue on. So I did this:

emerge -C cloog-ppl

Oops.

configure: error: C compiler cannot create executables

Every Gentoo user has seen this at some point. It's a very general error that can range in meaning from "you mispelled a CFLAG" to "wow you're screwed". I knew what the error here would be without looking, but for those following along at home:

rest here