POLL: Who Will Be Indicted First?

Added a poll to the right column of this blogger template, who in the Bush Administration will be indicted first?

Your choices are George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Karl Rove and Condi Rice. So many to pick from, it was tough limiting it to 5 people.

Be sure to vote.

Bush Never Met A Fraud He Didn't Like

The Bush Administration turned a blind eye towards corruption for 8 years and we all paid for it. I won't even mention honorary Bush Cabinet member  Ken Lay and Enron:

"Federal officials are bringing far fewer prosecutions as a result of fraudulent stock schemes than they did eight years ago, according to new data, raising further questions about whether the Bush administration has been too lax in policing Wall Street."

It's like we learn nothing from our previous mistakes when Republicans are in charge, greed always wins out.

"At a time when the financial news is being dominated by the $50 billion Ponzi scheme that Bernard L. Madoff is accused of running, federal officials are on pace this year to bring the fewest prosecutions for securities fraud since at least 1991, according to the data, compiled by a Syracuse University research group using Justice Department figures."

Lowest since 1991? I wonder who was President back then?

Source: NYT

Healthcare For All And To All A Good Year

Let the re-booting of America begin.

In Canada, the universal health care system is simply called medicare -- and that's what it should be in the U.S. And instead of the 1342-page proposal Hillary Clinton put together that was a politically jerry-rigged, confusing plan -- or the Obama proposal that would leave insurance companies pretty much intact (whose goal is to make money by reducing care as much as possible) -- it would be the simplest and boldest political move to simply propose to Congress this sentence to become law: "All Americans under the age of 65 will be covered by Medicare Part 'E.'"

This is far from solving all the problems with pharmaceuticals and lobbyists, not to mention cynicism, but this is the direction we need to be heading.

Critics always point out the flaws in otter countries' universal healthcare, why do you think we'll make the same mistakes here, why assume the negative?

Read on: Source: BuzzFlash

Waterboarding Or Waterbeds?

This is how you win the hearts and minds of the Afghans.

The Afghan chieftain looked older than his 60-odd years, and his bearded face bore the creases of a man burdened with duties as tribal patriarch and husband to four younger women. His visitor, a CIA officer, saw an opportunity, and reached into his bag for a small gift.

Four blue pills. Viagra.

"Take one of these. You'll love it," the officer said. Compliments of Uncle Sam.

The enticement worked. The officer, who described the encounter, returned four days later to an enthusiastic reception. The grinning chief offered up a bonanza of information about Taliban movements and supply routes -- followed by a request for more pills.

Thinking "out of the box" has become "get into the box" thinking.

All that waterboarding when all you needed was a waterbed.

Next up, Gillette razors for the ladies.

Source: Washington Monthly

Bah Humbug To Retail Sales

Deflation: why buy now when you can buy later at a cheaper cost? Not really a big story on CNBC or the MSM, the cheaper prices arer good for consumers, but not so great for earnings. I wonder why it's a buried story? *wink*

Price-slashing failed to rescue a bleak holiday season for beleaguered retailers, as sales plunged across most categories on shrinking consumer spending, according to new data released Thursday.

Despite a flurry of last-minute shoppers lured by the deep discounts, total retail sales, excluding automobiles, fell over the year-earlier period by 5.5% in November and 8% in December through Christmas Eve, according to MasterCard Inc.'s SpendingPulse unit.

[C]onsidering individual sectors, "This will go down as the one of the worst holiday sales seasons on record," said Mary Delk, a director in the retail practice at consulting firm Deloitte LLP. 

"Retailers went from 'Ho-ho' to 'Uh-oh' to 'Oh-no.'"

Will be interesting to see the retail landscape in March and April. Lots of lay-offs and store closings.



Source: WSJ

Obama: My Only Real Gift

The only thing I wished for I got.

Happy Festivus

Happy Festivus [for the rest of us] A brief History. As told by George Costanza.

Meanings Behind Christmas Traditions

What's behind Christmas traditions – and just how traditional are they? Should be good dinner table fodder amongst the traditionalists, the neo-gnostics, the secularists and the strict consumerists.

Just one of the UK-centric examples:

Why is Christmas Day on 25 December?

The Bible offers no date for the birth of Jesus, which probably was not in the year 1AD, but a few years earlier, and may or may not have been in December. The celebration of the birth of Christ on 25 December dates back to the fifth century, when Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire.

The date was chosen to coincide with the winter solstice and the Roman festivals associated with the shortest day of the year, which falls between 22 December and 25 December. This was seen as the day when the Romans celebrated Dies Natalis Solis Invicti – "the birthday of the unconquered sun". It was also Jupiter's birthday and, further back, the birthday of his Greek equivalent, Zeus. In Eastern Europe, the various Orthodox churches – the Russian, Greek, Armenian, Serbian et al, follow the old Gregorian calendar, and in which Christmas Day is 7 January There is no Santa Claus in the Gospels.

Source: Independent UK

Holidaze Greetings

From me to you.

Elisabeth Hasselbeck's 25 Most Annoying Moments Of 2008

The IQ of a small stone.



Source: Jezebel

Christmas Personified

Christmas greetings from the GOP. Probably shot last week in Arkansas. Maybe Wasilla?

Henrietta and Merna. Classic



Source: BoingBoing

Cheney Arrogance Should Lead To Investigations

Investigative reporting still exists! The War Criminal exposed:

"Vice President Dick Cheney, according to a still-highly confidential FBI report, admitted to federal investigators that he rewrote talking points for the press in July 2003 that made it much more likely that the role of then-covert CIA-officer Valerie Plame in sending her husband on a CIA-sponsored mission to Africa would come to light.

Cheney conceded during his interview with federal investigators that in drawing attention to Plame’s role in arranging her husband’s Africa trip reporters might also unmask her role as CIA officer.

Cheney denied to the investigators, however, that he had done anything on purpose that would lead to the outing of Plame as a covert CIA operative. But the investigators came away from their interview with Cheney believing that he had not given them a plausible explanation as to how he could focus attention on Plame’s role in arranging her husband’s trip without her CIA status also possibly publicly exposed. At the time, Plame was a covert CIA officer involved in preventing Iran from obtaining weapons of mass destruction, and Cheney’s office played a central role in exposing her and nullifying much of her work."

The small picture is the timing of the outing. Did Dick Armitage actually out Plame some will argue. The big picture is Cheney stops at nothing to get his wars started. Not the Geneva Convention, not the Constitution. Rule of Law was stymied.

Seems Cheney is slipping in his final days, a need to talk to explain his evil just like a common criminal. From authorizing the waterboarding of KSM, to expressing his support for torture, and now this: the ego, the arrogance.

Christmas pardon?

Source: Murray Waas

Hollywood's Sick Love Affair with Che Guevara

Before there was one named stars like Oprah, Bono and Madonna, there was Che.

Che's revolution forced conformity on Cuba as he signed death warrants for independent artists and writers, ordered hunted down by the secret police.

So why the ubiquitous t-shirts? Ironic veneration of tyrants?

Mao but not Hitler?



Source: reason.tv

Al Gore's New Video

Al Gore’s Alliance for Climate Protection and the “Reality” coalition have a new ad out today on the myth of “clean coal.”



Good thing Bush and Cheney are getting lumps of coal for Christmas.

Source: http://www.thisisreality.org/

Obama To Use Lincoln Bible

President-elect Obama will take the oath of office using the same Bible upon which President Lincoln was sworn in at his first inauguration, according to the Inaugural Committee.

Though there is no constitutional requirement for the use of a Bible during the swearing-in, Presidents have traditionally used Bibles for the ceremony, choosing a volume with personal or historical significance. President-elect Obama will be the first President sworn in using the Lincoln Bible since its initial use in 1861.

2008 Greek Riots In Pictures

The death of 15-year-old Alexander Grigoropoulos in Athens on December 6, 2008, has not been covered that much in the US. These pictures tell quite a massive story.



37 more photos at the link below.

Source: Boston Globe

Putin Brings Holiday Cheer, Russian-Style

Putin, right on time, with that Christmas spirit:

"The era of cheap gas is coming to an end, Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has told ministers from the world's major gas-exporting countries. Mr Putin said the cost of extracting gas was rising sharply, therefore 'the era of cheap energy resources, of cheap gas, is of course coming to an end'."

Russia is the world's largest exporter of gas, so Putin's warning carries weight. The good thing is, Bush looked into his eyes and saw a good man. So we have that going for us.

With oil prices tanking, it will be interesting to see how the world's suppliers scramble to make fake quotas, try to drive up price, then navigate around them. Can they all keep tabs on each other? We're talking Algeria, Bolivia, Brunei, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Libya, Malaysia, Nigeria, Qatar, Russia, Trinidad and Tobago, the United Arab Emirates and Venezuela.

Me thinks greed will win out.

Source: BBC