Saturday "What I Found On You Tube" Post



Color-Sonics--gotta love that name...

A Real Man of the People


Link. And I hear his manservant Jeeves likewise thinks Senator McCain is "a man of the people."

Round Up the Usual Buzzwords


President Pissy-Pants gets ever more shrill in his petulance.

C'mon--I understand that wingnuts aren't exactly the sharpest knives in the drawer and will fall for Shrub's shit faster than a redneck in a original specs General Lee, but everyone else must realize that the Chimperor's spin is his last refuge, especially as it gets harder and harder to deny that the last seven years of his economic program is fraying faster than a five-dollar dimestore suit.

Legacy? Hell. The assclown's just trying to hang on till January.

Note: Speaking of hanging on--I'm feeling a lot better than I did yesterday, and miles above Wednesday night...but I'm still more under the weather than on the downward slope--the gods of rest and recuperation are making it pretty clear that I'll be catching up with them for the rest of today.

See you tomorrow.

Extraordinary Courage From The Armchair Warrior


It won't surprise me at all if a White House ""fort" is discovered one of these days, complete with video game console, empty two liter bottles of soda, and perhaps a few crumbs/hot dog residue.

Well, what do you expect when you hand the keys to the country over to pure evil and pure stupid?

Under the Weather

I've been feeling kind of crappy for the last few days but figured it was just the usual...last night things changed a bit--the congestion reached my right ear...and now I remember why little kids howl when they've got a bad earache. Geez.

I almost would've settled for getting shot instead.

And bleeding from said ear certainly isn't pleasant, although that at least reduced the pressure enough to sleep. Anyway, today is full rest, minus maybe a trip to the store for symptom-reducing medication. If anyone has any suggestions beyond "decongestant" I'm open, not having experienced the "thrill" of a genuine earache like this in, oh, only about thirty years or so.

Catch you tomorrow.

James Cheney Wasn't Exactly "Lucky"

Neither were Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner

Meteor Blades has a post up that's very much worth reading in light of yesterday's primary and recent, sadly stupid comments by a former vice-presidential candidate.

Like Bizarroworld, But Weirder Still


Fred Kagan, on the Lehrer News Hour. But Kagan's SO weird they had to balance him with a dose of reality--Nir Rosen.

Mitch Slap


This looks like it falls under the classification "F.U." and I don't mean Friedman Unit--the Jindal administration is looking to cut $10 million dollars from Lieutenant Governor Landrieu's budget, in addition to a hiring freeze affecting personnel at both the State Library and State Parks.

It'd be one thing if the Gret Stet was in rough shape financially, but the situation is actually the opposite. Sure, it's a hell of a way to obtain a solid financial footing, but the Bush disaster that's brought $100 dollar plus barrels of oil, and the increased sales tax revenues obtained from people replacing things like cars, refrigerators/large appliances, and so on, has resulted in significant surpuluses for Loosiana.

And it's not like the $10 million is going to be missed elsewhere.

So much for changing the tone...call this politics as usual.

The World Is Your NOLA: An Ongoing Series


A couple of science items in Pravda-Upon-Hudson are worth noting--this one considers the effects of rising sea levels along the East Coast and what that means for things like cities and infrastructure--which will have an effect on commerce, which will affect the availibility of goods and services (and not just crap from Wal-Mart, but essentials like food), which will affect employment, and so on. In other words, it's something normal people can and should consider, even if it's several feet above your average wingnut's grasp.

The other article notes an odd anomaly--far from being an inevitable consequence of time, sea level rise is in fact a short term, manufactured phenomenon. Long range projections show sea levels FALLING as ocean floors, basins, and seabeds age and subside.

With proper management, coastal and/or low lying areas can continue to be productive and desirable locations for human habitation. Indeed, this is consistently proven out: more people worldwide live near or along a coast than live inland. Only ignorant and sadistic goons would work to turn coastlines into disaster areas...

Unfortunately, ignorant and sadistic goons are in control of the federal government...

Rough Analogy


Using the Emperor Club's vernacular, it looks like oil is now at around five diamonds, with some saying it might go all the way to seven, while others insist prices will moderate.

Hmmm...I'm reminded of a crude joke, no pun intended, that goes something like this: did you know that in the great depression you could get laid for a quarter?

But...who the hell had a quarter?

Experts Agree


The surge is truly a blast.

"McCain Defends Farrakhan Hagee: 'He Said That His Words We're Taken Out of Context' "


Imagine the shitstorm if Saint John was defending the evil (and, good heavens, colored) menace...but the right (read "white") bigotry still manages to find a place at the GOP table with hardly a word of criticism from the "objective" media.

Remember, Hagee is the person who claimed--and claims--God destroyed vast swaths of the Mississippi Gulf Coast to punish "gay" New Orleans, which tells you more about Hagee's perverse dementia than anything else.

American Kabuki


While I don't feel all that sorry for Eliot Spitzer--after all, a politician who makes his name as a moral/ethical crusader getting caught literally with his pants down is about as close as you can get to the epitome of "hoist with his own petard," (though somehow David "family values" Vitter got/gets a pass...hmmm...I guess IOKIYAR trumps)...anyway, I couldn't help but think that it speaks volumes, and not in a good way: sexual activity--admittedly, for money--between consenting adults is pronounced a political death sentence the very same week that literal torture in the form of waterboarding is officially sanctioned by the federal government.

Oh, and NPR at least had one guest on who pointed out the very odd circumstances FDL's noted--the odds of this really being an "out of the blue" instance of "unusual cash transfers" are slim and none...

But with the powers vested in the federal government at the petulant request of Team Bush, we might all find ourselves having to explain our personal business to the man one day. I wonder if the country really feels any safer as a result...

Doing the Work Thing

And I can't even claim to be Client 9, 10, or whoever. Dang. But the Shrub National Security Apparatus can confirm from a quick glance at my phone records that I've been busy.

Too bad they can't bother with tracking bin Laden, but hey, I guess they've gotta slither before they can crawl, right?

From Fourth Estate to Clubby Courtiers


Greenwald on the sorry state of the journalism "profession," with a bonus comment from one of his readers.

I think I'm being kind in calling them courtiers...you could make the argument that it should be courtesan.

The Equalizer?


So, it'll be interesting to watch the reaction to Spitzer's admission of Vitteresque behavior, presumably minus the Pampers and/or Huggies. My own suspicion is that the media will pursue this gleefully--it's the sex scandal equivalent of Dollar Bill's asinine--and, to be fair, to date alleged--bribe taking magically making "corruption" a bipartisan affair. Way to go, Bill...and way to go, Eliot.

That said, it could be worse. I didn't see mention of even a single wetsuit, much less two.

Update: Oh--I guess the Spitzer story is more important, but in the meantime, the price of oil hit $108 dollars a barrel, or, if it'll generate media interest, it means the price of one of Spitzer's, ahem, escorts just went up to about a dozen Hummer fill-ups, no pun intended.

And...five US soldiers were killed in Iraq.

Liar's War


Doug Feith is still the stupidest fucking guy on the face of the planet, but he's confirmed yet again that George W. Bush is a flat out, baldfaced liar:

Among the disclosures made by Feith in War and Decision, scheduled for release next month by HarperCollins, is Bush's declaration, at a Dec. 18, 2002, National Security Council meeting, that "war is inevitable."

Now, maybe Feith doesn't give a shit one way or the other--or maybe he IS the stupidest...you know the rest...but that statement alone means Shrub might well find himself Kissinger-ized, that is, he might have to plan his post-presidency vacations carefully.



Then again, as horrible, as creepy, and as ignorant as Shrub is, he'll probably be cut a tad more slack in a sort of divine right of kings kind of bullshit. Besides, the guy's such a dullard I doubt he'll ever get beyond Houston.

Cheney Water: The New Vichy Water!


It oozes:

Dozens of U.S. troops in Iraq fell sick at bases using "unmonitored and potentially unsafe" water supplied by the military and a contractor once owned by Vice President Dick Cheney's former company, the Pentagon's internal watchdog says.

Unsafe water now available in domestic versions, too.