DeLay Gate Continues

Michael Scanlon former partner to Abramoff the lobbyist pal to Tom DeLay plead guilty today. He cut a deal to spill his guts and testify against Abramoff...where oh where will the charges stop. Stay tuned for more exciting indictments and plea bargains, at a court house near you!

Yes, I'm Bush I Am

The Trade Center fell and we were so sad
Sadam must have been there, ooh I'm so mad
Let's tell the folks he's got WMD!
Just kidding, but it's too late golly gee

Shock and Awe look so purty
The war's so much fun not dirty
Can't pull out to early
Dicky says I'm your daddy

Freedom and democracy are so fine
But it's for the oil so divine
Sadam is gone, hip hip hurray!
Mission Accomplished quickly today

More then 2000 counted so far
Thought we were done, fillup that car
The war on terror sounds so good
But people aren't buying sounds like deadwood

I'm Bush I Am
All the world's a stage
Off to the treadmill
Then back to Bushville

Kansas Redefines Science, Life is Intelligent Now!

I'm beginning to think that all these intelligent Design people have things right. It's going to make life much easier.

According to a NY Times article the good people of Kansas have redefined "science":

The changes in the official state definition are subtle and lawyerly, and involve mainly the removal of two words: "natural explanations." But they are a red flag to scientists, who say the changes obliterate the distinction between the natural and the supernatural that goes back to Galileo and the foundations of science.

Well, Galileo died condemned of heresy, maybe Kansas should bring back that practice as well!

Instead of explaining "natural" phenomenon, we get to explain unnatural phenomenon.

Let's see my car didn't start the other day, clearly an unnatural act most likely caused by aliens as I had just had the car tuned!
I can't lose those extra 20 lbs. Obviously I'm using all my intelligence in that endeavors, to know avail. There must be some extra special intelligence working to foil my every attempt. The damn TIVO didn't record last night's "Daily Show," now that's an unnatural act if ever there was one!

I'm so tired of trying to find logical explanations to life's problems, let's all just get intelligent!

It's the Intelligent Voter

It's amazing but the voters of Dover PA voted out all 8 members of the school board who were pushing to teach Intelligent Design in science class. Somehow I'm always amazed when "reason" takes hold. Oops I spoke too soon, shortly after the vote trust Pat Robertson was on the job! Declaring that disaster might strike because the town "voted God out of your city".

Ya gotta admire the man for his salemanship, how else can he keep his coffers full. The only annoying thing is why the hell does he get to keep his tax exempt status?

President Bongo Comes to Washington

Sometimes events sound so ridiculous it seems like the news is writing scripts for comedy shows all by itself. According to a Nov. 9 article in the nations, Jack Abramoff (you remember him DeLay's buddy) was supposedly seeking $9 million to arrange a meeting between the President of a West African nation and President Bush. The West African gentleman is President Bongo (yeah really!). Of course everyone involved denys any money actually changed hands for the meeting and nothing improper, blah blah blah occurred.

Apparently the big Bongo meets Bush meeting occurred on May 26, 2004.

Vatican Supports Evolution

Totally amazing...the Vatican issued a statement supporting the theory of evolution. Apparently there is intelligence in Rome and none in Kansas.

Darth Cheney Treads on Torture

The continuing embarrassment of Detainee limbo is being pushed primarily by Darth Cheney.

In what is clearly one of the most despicable policies of this administration the torture of detainees and their exile to mysterious CIA "black" sites is one of the most dangerous practices for the people of the US. Senator McCain, one of the only Senators to actually have endured torture is leading the way to restrict these practices. The Israelis, a people that has been the subject of terrorist attacks for their entire existence have outlawed torture! It doesn't work...period. No one is saying we should be serving coffee and crumpets to the terrorists.

If we continue these policies then we become the enemy.

Ahhh Now We Can Talk Ethics

So the Bush administration has been having a few problems lately. We have the Libby indictment, the dealings with shady characters all tied up with DeLay, and so on. The solution is easy. Make the staff take an ethics course!

I wonder if Bush himself has to take the course?

Evolution, Intelligent Design & Astrology

Hey kids tired of boring science classes? Stumped by rational thinking? Have I got a theory for you!

It's called Intelligent Design (ID rhymes with idiot) and it's the new rage! Proponents of ID note that it's just
as valid as astrology...jeepers all the memorizing of those zodiac names like Sagittarius or Gemini and those things will finally pay off in a real live science class! Well maybe, it depends on how that pesky court case goes.

And don't forget to make your travel plans now for the Creation Museum in beautiful Petersburg Kentucky! It's going to have animatronic dinasaurs that we all know existed at the same time as humans only 5 or 6 thousand years ago....golly do ya think they will find some dinasaurs with leashes. "Honey I have to go out and walk the T-Rex!"

Hmmm do you think they had pooper-scooper laws back then?

American Girl Dolls - Boycott?

Those wacky Christian Conservatives are at it again. The American Family Association is seriously considering promoting a boycott of the popular American Girl dolls. It's obvious from a cursory glance at the American Girl website that their link to the American Red Cross encouraging donations for hurricane relief make this a highly subversive organization deserving of the scorn of all "true" Americans.

Apparently Girls Inc. supports a woman's right to choose, i.e. a law.

(Sigh...)

The AFA says that American Girl is donating to another highly subversive organization called Girls Inc. The Girls Inc. Web site prominently points out that they:

In addition, since 1992 Girls Inc. has provided over $1.8 million in college scholarships to girls who have become leaders in all walks of life and has played a crucial role in advancing girls' rights through supporting legislation such as Title IX and the Violence Against Women Act.

Clearly these are horrible actions deserving of a boycott.

The AFA claims:

AFA does not support "censorship." Censorship, by definition is government imposed. What AFA does support is responsibility. Producers and advertisers alike realize that what people see and hear does affect them. (If this were not true, they would not pay the astronomical fees for advertising.) Our belief is that if we can encourage advertisers to sponsor only quality programming, then networks and producers will not have the financial encouragement to produce shows diametrically opposed to the traditional family.

In other words they aren't the government so by definition they can't censor anything but golly they wish they could.

It's always a pleasure to see YAHTT (Yet Another Holier Then Thou) organization getting busy!

Watch Those Leaky Condoms Karl

Ya gotta hand it to the latest group of protesters pointing out poor Karl Rove's problems. A collection of 3 condoms could be seens marching in from of the Washington DC Disctric Court where Karl was, for the 4th time, testifying before the grand jury investigating the leak of a CIA agent's identity.

Pehaps if things don't work out for Karl he can endorse Condoms..."They don't leak...Karl swears!"

Arrogance, Corruption, & Incompetence...Oh My!

Things are not looking pretty for the Bush administration and the Republicans in general. Let's see where to begin there's just so much news! The War (you know the one in Iraq) continues to be a disaster, the body count is almost at 2000, the Iraqi Army is not doing well taking over, and the impending elections are just a big question mark.

In general the war seems to have been run like disaster preparedness at home. Speaking of home, there not much more to say about the joke of a response to Katrina, the incompetence of FEMA, Brownie and the entire Homeland Security apparatus.

Last but not least we have the troika or the leak of a CIA operative by someone close to Rove or Rove himself or in that ballpark; the investigation of Bill Frist for that oh so convenient timing of stock sales, from a blind trust - good trick! and finally the indictment of Tom (the Hammering one) DeLay, and he was such a kind fellow.

How's that saying go, power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely..?

First Screw Up, Then Get Paid to Tell How You Screwed Up

Hard to believe but according to the article Brown serving as consultant to FEMA on CNN's web site Brownie has himself a nice little gig. Now I completely understand the utility of having Brown tell the powers that be all he knows about the response to Katrina. I believe that would be called testifying under oath!

Clearly the next step is the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

How many more Michael Browns?

A new Time Magazine article investigates the placement of political cronies at all levels of the government. It's nothing new and all administrations, since the days of George Washington have pursued this approach. The Bush administration however has taken the practice to new levels and made it an art form. Indeed the article points out that they aren't apologetic for the practice they just "want government to work".

In the Time article:

Internal e-mail messages obtained by TIME show that scientists' drug-safety decisions at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) are being second-guessed by a 33-year-old doctor turned stock picker. At the Office of Management and Budget, an ex-lobbyist with minimal purchasing experience oversaw $300 billion in spending, until his arrest last week. At the Department of Homeland Security, an agency the Administration initially resisted, a well-connected White House aide with minimal experience is poised to take over what many consider the single most crucial post in ensuring that terrorists do not enter the country again. And who is acting as watchdog at every federal agency? A corps of inspectors general who may be increasingly chosen more for their political credentials than their investigative ones.

Interestingly a just published study from Princeton University reported in Federal Computer Week, reports that career employees make better managers then political appointees.

Well, it is only Princeton.

OK Kids, Let's Play Mitigation

Browsing through the fascinating FEMA site for kids I tripped upon the Photo's and Video link (from the Search button). It actually doesn't link to a Photo's and Video page but to a Library page.

On the library page is a list called "photo library" and the first link is titled "Mitigation Photos". Keep in mind this is a site for CHILDREN, how many kids do you know that understand the word "mitigation"??? OK so I clicked on the link hoping that it would at least explain the word but nope...they just go on to display some photos of mitigation.

Sigh

Intelligent Design for Homeland Security

I don't understand what everyone is complaining about. The Department of Homeland Security now contains FEMA. FEMA during the Clinton years was finally reconstituted as an effective organization. A government agency, efficient! accomplishing its mission! ...we can't have this.

Enter stage right...the DHS(Department of Homeland Security). What's all the fuss over the new organization of DHS. It's obviously very complex. Mere mortals can't possibly understand it. FEMA now reports to the director of the DHS, its budget has been emasculated and all the responsible people in charge are political hacks. The only reasonable conclusion is that it must be a product of "Intelligent Design".

The Republican Nightmare

It appears that the Republican's greatest fear is coming true, they are being forced to deal with "poor people". As usual this brilliant observation comes thanks to Jon Stewart of the Daily Show where we now turn for "real" news. Bush's heartfelt speech in New Orleans last week was genuine, well delivered and about as emphathetic as the guy gets. He exclaimed that he will spend whatever it takes to rebuild New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.

Bush is going to "confront poverty" but fails to explain how. It is of course too soon to explain in detail all the options, the "empowerment zones" and funding for retraining all sounds potentially reasonable, but in the same breath he exclaims that he won't raise taxes. The deficit is in the process of exploding but the consequences won't matter until way after Bush is out of office.

Oh well my kids need more bills.

Bush's Pals in New Orleans

Got a disaster? Want to rebuild a city? Whether it's bombs or hurricanes...you can count on Halliburton to get those contracts.

"On Friday [ ed. Sept. 9], Kellogg Brown & Root received $29.8 million in Pentagon contracts to begin rebuilding Navy bases in Louisiana and Mississippi. Norcross said the work was covered under a contract that the company negotiated before Allbaugh was hired."

Note to former FEMA Director Brown: you're old buddy Joe Allbaugh (former Bush campaign manager) has a load a new companies to advise...come on down!

News services continue to report that New Orleans has a fetid smell. Hmmmmmm

Don't Blame Brownie

OK great, Michael Brown head of FEMA, gets reassigned and is pulled back to Washington DC so he can oversee future disasters. Ya gotta love this administration. Only a week ago Bush exclaimed, "Brownie, your doing a heck of a job."

I don't blame this former lawyer at the Arabian Horse Association for the problems responding to Katrina. He was a political supporter and was given the job as political payback. Clearly Dubya and crew viewed FEMA as just another bloated bureaucracy. It's justo one of those myriad four letter agencies that could just as well be farmed out to contractors. So why not appoint a good ole' buddy to head the agency.

Shouldn't be a problem right?

Intelligent Spaghetti Monster Visits Kansas

According to Bobby Henderson, of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (FSM), the Kansas School Board is finally giving some respect and serious consideration to the FSM. Clearly rational minds are starting to take hold.

It is important to note that, according to my own extensive research, prior to the formation of the FSM the primordial dough was formed, quite surprisingly, by a large pasta explosion - the so called big-pasta-banger. The indisputable evidence for this portion of the FSM is founded by the large quantities of flour that can be seen in virtually every corner of my house.

http://www.venganza.org/store.htm
Pass the sauce and Praise the FSM!

Dicky in Wonderland

"I think the performance, in general, at least in terms of the information I've received from locals, is definitely very impressive." said Dick Cheney on his tour of Gulfport. Meanwhile evacuees in Houston waited for hours for the mythical FEMA $2000 debit cards which NEVER appears. Instead the lucky ones were given Red Cross debit cards worth much less. In addition hundreds of trailers that could provide temporary housing were still sitting in Georgia in a big parking lot, waiting for one or another FEMA officials to get their heads out of their butts. Speaking of FEMA they are also, as of yet, incapable of telling a German company that wants to provide critical communications equipment, that they can just fly it on over.

And finally a medical team in Kentucky, "...about 600 other Kentucky doctors, nurses and other medical professionals have notified the Kentucky Department for Public Health that they will volunteer in the relief effort, said state epidemiologist Dr. Kraig Humbaugh. However, FEMA has not notified the state whether any of those people will be needed."

Gee I'm impressed

Wolf Blitzer, News for People with ADD

Welcome to Wolf Blitzer's "The Situation Room". About a month or so ago Wolf Blitzer on CNN started a "raw news" show that purports to give you the news as it's happening. The set is just amazing array of TV split screens. We see Wolf standing infront of a display wall, actually two of them. On one the wall is split into 8 sets of displays. Often one of those 8 is itself split into four. We see, in one view 1) Wolf interviewing somone on on display, 2) a scene of a helicopter dropping water onto a fire, 3) an overhead view of hurracaine destruction, 4) the burial of a supreme court justice, 5) a second view of hurracaine destruction, 6) a third view of hurracaine destruction, 7) long view of broken bridges, 8) a map with a pulsating point of interest. Are you dizzy yet! Just try wathing this stuff.

On top of all this maniacle visuals, Wolf often interviews somone who controls a Google Earth zooming view of some area and this guy love to zoom in and out and tilt the view. I'm getting motion sick watching this stuff!

Pollution Rules

According to an August 30, Washington Post article, the Bush Administration has drafted new regulation that would permit power plants to emit more pollution, of course under the guise of emitting less and improving the environment. Are these guys brilliant or what!

This is a classic move by the Dubya crew, and now with the Katrina disaster it will clearly not get any media coverage.

According to the article: "Under the new standard, a modernized plant's total emissions could rise if the upgrade allowed it to operate longer hours. In court filings, the EPA estimated in 2002 that an hourly standard would allow eight plants in five states -- including Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia -- to generate legally as much as 100,000 tons a year of pollutants that would be illegal under the existing New Source Review rule. That equals about a third of their total emissions."

It's just brilliant, change the language of an obscure regulation and you get your corporate donors, all out of major public view.

Remember When Gas was $3

Here it is the summer of 2025 and I remember way back in 2005, when that storm Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast in August. It was a month of so after the oil companies reported record profits and the Iraq ("you're either with us or against us") war was still piling up bodies. Just before that storm gasoline was licking at the $2.75 mark but afterwards it shot up a good quarter. That was the last time I ever saw gas below 3 bucks. Of course now with gas holding steady at the $7.50 mark it just seems quaint!

Intellagint Desine

Dir Prezadent Bush,

I wuz so viry happy to here that you think intellagint desine shuld be tot in scool. I do not undirstand why peeple are
so confuzed. Everybuddy nows that Gawd creatid everythin' , I saw it in a muvee with that Rifel guy, Charly Hestin, and
piktures dont ly.

I also wint to the zoo the othir day and tried to talk to the monkeeys. They did not talk back at all but did spend
a lot of time picking each other's butts, so we can not be related to thim.

A Fan

PS I thawt you wuld like the pikture I found...some bad peeple say u look like a munkey...butt I dont think so

Diapers and Terrorists - Oh My!

A couple of news items grabbed my attention this week and just warmed my heart. First, those alert Germans sprung into action and had a bomb alert when an "electronic nappy" (diaper) set off an alarm. Apparently this gadget is supposed to beep when the little fellow let's loose in the nappy. According to the article this nappy ticked instead of beeped and the squad cars went into action.

From the "I'm tryin' to think but nothing is happenin' department" babies have been flagged by the terror watch list. Apparently their names were the same or similar to names on the "no fly list".

Just imagine what would have happened if the "no fly list" infant was wearing an electronic nappy!

It's Just Incidental Radiation

Ya gotta love Dubya's administration. That little $5.7 billion cleanup project in Hanford Washington, to clean up 30 years worth of radioactive waste seems to be going a little slower then expected. (Just as an aside I actually remember having a debate as a Senior in High School, like 30 years ago! (ahem) ...in which I clearly recall the Hanford site. ) anyway the idea is to place the radioactive sludge into a form of glass, to classify it, so that over that pesky 10,000 years during which the waste will remain toxic, won't leach into the ground.

The cleanup is going slow and is just a big problem. Sooooo the brilliant solution is to classify the stuff as "incidental radiation."
If it is classified that way they can just officially leave it where it is...are these genius' or what!

It's only $120 Billion Less

Amidst all the noise of the "war on terror" and the brew-haha about Karl Rove, no one is paying any attention to the little
$120 billion reduction in penalties sought against the tobacco companies. In the multi-year litigation still going on between the Feds and the tobacco industry, at the last minute the Justice Department, aka the Bush Administration, decided to ask the courts for a penalty of $10 billion, not $130 billion as generally advised.

According to a CBS news story:
The government asked Kessler [the judge] to require the companies to fund a five-year, $10 billion program, a fraction of the 25-year, $130 billion program suggested by government witness Michael C. Fiore, a University of Wisconsin medical professor.

Democrats and other administration critics claimed that top Justice Department officials pressured the lawyers handling the case to back off the more expensive anti-smoking campaign.

What Me Worry...Insult!

So the GOP is berating Hillary Clinton for comparing Pres. Bush to Alfred E. Neuman and his "What me worry?" attitude. They are 100% correct! It is an insult to compare the current president to that great icon of Mad magazine one of the crowning achievments of 20th century journalism.

Ms. Clinton please what did Alfred do to deserve this insult?

Erectile Dysfunction Association

Notice a trend these days? It started with Viagra, went to Cialis and Levitra, what is it with all these drugs for erectile dysfunction. Rather then inundate American TV with saturation coverage I'd like to suggest that the pharmaceutical industry, at least in the USA, join forces to create the Happy American eRectile Dysfunction Omnibus Nation (HARDON).
HARDON will commit to airing equal treatment of these three drugs at opportune times, Football games, pro Wrestling and the like and alleviate the rest of us having to endure "...while rare, persons with erections lasting more then four hours should seek immediate medical treatment".

Stem Cell Confusion

I'm confused. The US Congress is about to pass a law stating that embryonic stem cell research should be funded. Tom Delay get's up and claims that no taxpayer money should be used to "dismember" these embryonic humans. Of course he forgets the fact that there are no "members" to dis. The confusing part to me is there are approximately 400,000 frozen embryos sitting in cryogenic tanks. Most of these are the byproducts of fertilization efforts. Many couples don't know what to do with these embryos so they just sit there. Many more simply tell the storage facilities to destroy the embryos. Explain to me why it's legal to destroy those embryos, but NOT to use them for research?

Let me repeat, it's legal to destroy unwanted embryos, it's illegal to donate them for research. Welcome to the Alice in Wonderland world of partisan politics.

Weather or Not

Hey you know the weather service...The National Weather Service (NWS), an agency of the venerable US Government. They do a terrific job gathering data, forecasting the weather and making it available to the public. OK got that straight. Well golly gee they are doing such a wonderful job that it must be a problem right? Well thank goodness Pennsylvania Senator Rick Sanitarium oops Santorum has introduced a bill that will greatly limit the distribution of weather information.

Why you ask? Well that great American institution know as campaign donations has come to save the day as AccuWeather a private forecasting weather company, coincidentally based in Pennsylvania, think that the NWS is competing with them and making their little ole' job too difficult. Let's forget that the data gathered by oodles of sensors and satellites is ALL taxpayer funded. And let's forget that timely weather information is vital to saving lives in tornado alley and hurricane battered states. And let's forget that pilots are vitally dependent on accurate timely weather information. We've simply got to ensure that the future restrictions on data access are put into place to help the great state of Santorum.

Hey you want weather data, stick your head out a window!

If Star Wars Characters were Politicians

Just imagine if the the Star Wars characters were politicians...who would they be?

Han Solo = Howard Dean; Han tends to scream a lot

Yoda = Senator Robert Byrd; No one pontificates like Senator Byrd

Queen Amadela = Paris Hilton; Yep a total air head

Obi-Wan Kenobi = Ronald Reagan; Everybody likes the guy

Chewbacca - Zell Miller; Gets mad good

Luke Skywaker = John Edwards; Tilting at windmills

R2/D2 = John Kerry; More facts then we want to know

C3PO = Ross Perot; So polite and great with numbers

Princess Leia = Hillary Clinton; Way too ambitious

Darth Vader = Dick Cheney; No explanation necessary

Hello Mom...Iraq?

Hey Mom...how's Iraq? Yeah I miss.....bzzzzzz....excuse me hang up that telephone. Hell no! It's my mom from Iraq!

In another example of the genius of "no tolerance" rules, the bright bulbs at Spencer High School, in Columbus Georgia suspend
a student for taking a call from his mother in Iraq.
Suspended

But wait! A couple of days later, after public outcry, the school suddenly backtracks and reduces the suspension to "time served"
Back at school
I love school bureaucracies.

Laura "Leno" Bush

Just in case you missed the big news, this past weekend Laura Bush "roasted" her hubby George. Mrs. Bush delivered a series of zingers at the annual White House Correspondents dinner, an attempt to bring the media closer to the White House, not a bad idea actually. No question about it, she was a riot (good writers) and her delivery was superb. Now just imagine if some of the jokes had been along the following vein:

After George's 9PM bed time the twins and I really party, the Secret Service get's the best weed.

We just love piping Howard Stern into the FCC meetings.

At the last meeting of the RNC we snuck copies of "Fahrenheit 9/11" into the gift bags, it was Cheney's idea, he's such a stinker.

The last time we had a family gathering at Camp David, my mother in-law was there and I kept on flushing the toilet while she was taking a shower...wow you should have heard those screams!


Ah well...maybe next time.

(Note that the title of this blog entry is an actualy quote of George)

Computer Rage...Damn Technology

Came across an interesting article in the Washington Post the other day titled, Repair Teams Try to Calm Computer Rage. It was very interesting and pointed out how people that used to be counselors are now manning help desks being empathetically and soothing to their customers. But it made me think of all those devices and programs that try to be "smart" and usually do the wrong thing. That is maddening!

We have this "smart" copy machine at work that detects the size of the piece of paper and picks the source bin for the paper. So if you are copying a large piece of paper it uses the large size paper, like legal size as opposed to the usual letter size. I needed to copy some small pieces of paper, receipts I think, so I put one down, moved it over to the side but still on the glass, and voila I had LARGE pieces of paper coming out....Annoying. I'm happy to just pick the source bin myself since that's a simple process. I don't need this kind of "intelligence".

Microsoft Word manages to do oodles of "smart" things that are wrong sooooooo much. Ever try to type a word at the beginning of a line and have Word magically "decide" to capitalize it...even when you didn't want it capitalized? OR ever try to get numbering to work correctly. Hit the return and it goes back to 1 when you want it to continue or visa versa. Of course these things can all be fixed but there are a maddening number of menus to go through.

Then there is of course the famous user interface conundrum for Windows that forces you to click on the START button to get to the dialog to shut it down!

The Mac is not immune to such nonsense (although it is now fixed) for years you had to drag a floppy to the trash can to eject, NOT to erase...oy!

Of course we'd all like a DWIM (Do What I Mean) mode but that seems to be a few years off.

In the rare case of an erection lasting more then 4 hours...

We have a bad habit in my house of turning on the TV while eating dinner. There's nothing like watching the news and chowing down at the same time. All of us just perk right up when we watch the onslaught of "erectile dysfunction" products on the tube. You would think that not a single male in America could get it up given the quantity of ads spewing out of the screen. They are however, most entertaining.

I thought I was watching a Saturday Night Live skit when I first saw the ad for one of these gems showing a whole neighborhood of men jumping up and down to the tune of Queens, "We Are the Champions". Clearly the ad agency was on other drugs when they came up with that one. Of course the highlight for most of these ads is listening to the fast talker at the end of the ad stating all the obligatory contraindications. Wouldn't you like to be a fly on
the wall of that emergency room when all the 4 hour erection males show up!

Energy, Ethics and Nukes oh My!

President Bush came forward today with a number of brilliant suggestions to solve the energy crisis. Build refineries on closed military bases, not a bad idea except refineries don't make money so oil companies don't want to build them. Tax breaks for clear diesel cars, that's a genuinely good idea, really! Give the energy industry guarantees to avoid all those pesky regulations when building a nuclear power point. Never mind that the American public is terrified of the plants, ever hear of Three Mile Island; and all that nasty nuclear waste still has no place to go for oh, 1,000 years until it decays. All of those suggestions won't help for years, if ever. It would be silly to ask for increasing the CAFE (car gas fuel requirements) standards wouldn't it, that would only reduce demand. Pardon me silly thought.

Speaking of nuclear waste and Nukes, the nuclear option, removing the ability to filibuster on judicial nominations, remains on the table at the Senate. Of course a recent ABC poll illustrated that 60% of the public is against this radical rule change, so let's hope the rules get changed! Nothing like a good enemy to unite the opposition.

Speaking of enemies, poor Tom DeLay, is having a bad ethical day. Dennis Hastert, speaker of the House, ate some crow today and is changing the ethics rules back to where they were. Now a split House ethics committee vote will start an investigation. Good thing DeLay's PAC is a significant contributor to the chair of that committee.

I'm getting flush with all the exciting stuff going on!

Data? We don't need no stinkin' data!

Yes folks it time once again for this years edition of the US State Department's annual terrorism report, "Patterns of Global Terrorism 2004". Last years report had to be withdrawn and a "corrected" version was issued to get rid
of all the undercount problem. You know sort of reverse exaggeration. Rather then deal with the embarrassment of an incorrect report, this year, the problem was neatly solved by simply withholding the data. Just because the press is reporting that the numbers show that attacks are way up is no reason to present the public with actual, dare I say it, data.

Way to go Condi!

Florida and the NRA, they Deserve Each Other

Just when you thought that wacky Florida legislature was resting from their numerous attempts to "save the life" of Terry Schiavo because all life is precious, the "force with force" bill allowing the use of deadly force was passed. Thanks to the lobbying efforts of the National "pry that gun from my cold dead hands" Rifle Association, Jeb (Dubya's bro) Bush signed a law allowing the use of deadly force to defend oneself on the street. This means that if you piss off someone in Florida, they can just shoot to kill, claim they were in fear of their life and they are off the hook. Wham bam thank you maam! Personally I'm looking forward to the day the NRA holds a convention in Florida and serves a lot of booze.

I love the smell of a nuclear Senate in the spring

Ahhh the cherry blossoms have bloomed, the trees are green again, Terry Schiavo has gone to meet her maker and Senator Frist is about to detonate a nuclear bomb on the floor of the Senate. Ain't springtime in Washington grand? When last we left our beaten and bereaved troop of Democratic candidates, their heads were clearly tucked between their legs. Then all of a sudden, just one persistent vegetative state, and a private account away and poof, those Dems almost seem to have their proverbial act together!

Now the honorable Senator Frist, or should I say Dr. Frist who was playing to the right via an HIV incident described as:
"ABC?s George Stephanopolous, questioning Frist about the inaccuracies in many abstinence-only sex education curricula that were brought to light this week by California Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman, asked whether ?tears and sweat can transmit HIV.? Frist first said, ?I don?t know,? then later said, ?You can get the virus in tears and sweat. But in terms of the degree of infecting somebody, it would be very hard.? is again playing hard right with the judiciary.

So 200 years of good Senatorial practice isn't good enough for Dubya and his lackeys. That truly quaint old rule, the filibuster, which allows any individual Senator to block virtually all legislation is under attack! Nevermind that the Republicans blocked twice as many judicial appointments during the Clinton years as the Dems are now doing for Bush. Nevermind that the Constitution has that pesky line about the Senate to "Advise and Consent" judicial nominations. It would be great for the "right-to-stay-in-a-persistent-vegetative-state" association or the "my-religion-is-right-and-yours-is-wrong" movement to simply buy off a few extra votes and get some real laws put into place.

Nuke em! Nuke em all! Let's see whose left standing in a year or two.