You Know, I Almost Feel Sorry For Dubya

Almost, but not quite. When I got up off the floor from laughing at the video of the leader of the free world being assaulted by footwear, I read the AP article about the incident. I was shocked to read the following:

In Iraqi culture, throwing shoes at someone is a sign of contempt.

Um, in what culture is throwing shoes at someone anything other than a sign of comtempt??? I mean, have you ever, anywhere in the world, been at what passes for a wedding and heard someone say:

Here comes the bride and groom. Let's celebrate their magical day by pelting them with shoes!

Or have you ever seen a proud couple bringing home their first-born and thought:

Damn, I wish I had some stiletto slingbacks to hurl at them to demonstrate the joy I must feel.

I could go on, but power under the bridge where we now live is limited, and we must preserve the lights to stave off the increasingly-aggressive rats who seek out our dwindling supplies of food ...

Here's a simpler TARP plan

So we're not actually using the $700 billion set aside for buying bad mortgages to buy bad mortgages? Interesting. What are we using it for? Whatever Hank Paulson wants to do with it.

This will make government budgeting so much easier. You just hand the money to appropriate secretary and let him spend it however he wants.

Anyway, I see they've appropriately name this the Tarp program. Because once these Bush clowns are through with us, they'll buy us all big blue tarps to set up as shelters in the homeless camps.

No bailouts for Main Street!

I have to say all this talk about letting the automakers go bankrupt is getting on my nerves.

We're hearing all the usual junk from the right about socialism, our tax dollars, overpaid workers, free-market principles and such things as the GOP seems to view this as a chance to regroup. Even Glenn Beck, who claims to be a populist and who shills for Chevy, is on the case.

But c'mon. Didn't this stuff about socialism go out the window when we voted to hand the banking industry $700 billion? Ditto for free market principles; the market capitalists of Wall Street wasted no time in coming to beg for our money. They gave it up.

As to the idea of blowing 'our tax dollars,' that cat's out of the bag, too. We're $10 trillion in debt as a nation; we're in the hole a trillion for just this year. Tack $25 billion on to the end, and no one alive today will be repaying it. (Hell, if GM can escape its debt by declaring bankruptcy, maybe the country should try it.)

The other thing they're doing is trying to make us hate auto workers, because they have good retirement plans, health care and can't be laid off easily. Hey folks; maybe instead of asking why they have this stuff, more people should ask why more of us don't.

See, what we're talking here is perhaps 3 million jobs. Maybe more; they say one in 10 american workers, all told, are supported by the auto industry. We're talking about shutting down a good part of what little industry America still has. If this goes, we're a nation that manufactures little more than the caps for tubes of toothpaste and the thong part of things (the soles come from Korea.)

Besides, think about it this way. We can pay $25 billion, demand concessions and try to save 3 million jobs. Or we can let Obama try to use the government to create 3 million high paying jobs to replace them. How much do you think that will cost?

Going, Going ...

Reading my colleague's post below, I am moved to ask the question:

What is this "Ford" thing I hear about occasionally?

Seriously, walking the dogs last night, I counted 20 vehicles parked on my street. One was a Saturn, one a Mercury Topaz (with a Power Forward Toyota license plate frame, so it had been traded in for a Toyota), and two were American pickups at least 20 years old.

So 80 percent of the cars were non-American.

Blaming the American auto industry's problems on union members and labor costs doesn't address the biggest problem any manufacturer can have - no one wants to buy the shit they're producing.

You, me and AIG

We've always known Americans are generous to a fault. But at least the bastards on Wall Street could ask.

This morning it was just Treasury chief Hank Paulson and Fed chief Ben Bernanke, the bailout boppsy twins, tearing up that $123 billion bailout for AIG and replacing it with a $150 billion plan. Sort of like buying a Ford Focus and the dealer handing you the keys to a BMW at the same price.

I think we the taxpayers get a little bigger piece of the insurance giant, which is throat-deep in bad paper from underwriting all the mortgage derivatives that are causing so much trouble. But at this point, no smart investor would want to own any piece of AIG.

After all, this crisis couldn't have happened without the good folks at AIG.

Why will $150 billion work when $123 billion wouldn't? Don't ask, because the twins are just guessing. There are endless trillions of derivatives in play, and most of them have ties to AIG.

When the bailout was approved, the hope certainly was that banks would realize the party was over and start behaving responsibly. They haven't -- witness the stories about bailout funds going for big bonuses and to lobby Congress. It's still business as usual.

I certainly expect the next administration to lay down the law to these clowns. But there's no telling how much more good money the twins will throw after bad by the time these Bush clowns get shown the door.

Followup

I asked my wife who she would have voted for, McCain or the Sleestak. She hestitated, and asked, "Who would McCain's running mate be?"

"The same as the ticket he had, Palin," I answered.

"Then I'd have had to go with the Sleestak," she said.

Post-Mortem

- On the day when a black man reaped the ultimate benefit of the nation extending constitutional to people of all races, blacks in the "liberal" state of California voted overwhelmingly to take away the constitutional rights of a different subculture. I understand the historical and socio-political context of the black vote on Prop. 8. It doesn't excuse the behavior. It is shameful, and should cause a thorough soul-searching in the hearts of black voters everywhere. The politics of hate and division still work, and they can work with anyone, anytime.

- Since we're talking about race ... much has been said about the election of Obama to the White House. But really, given the mood of the nation, and given how badly the Republicans had thoroughly and comprehensively fucked up our foreign policy, our economy, and given what McCain was offering (Palin? Come on! And a tax credit to purchase individual health care? If you're losing your house, that meant absolutely nothing at all!) one has to wonder how well an eight-foot-tall Sleestak from the Land of The Lost running against McCain would have done. Americans are scared right now, as scared as I can remember them being. I'd suggest that the election result was as much a vote against McCain (and Bush) as it was a vote for Obama.

UPDATE: As usual, the Onion says it more eloquently than I:


http://www.theonion.com/content/news/nation_finally_shitty_enough_to

- Speaking of Palin, did anyone note the body language on stage at McCain's concession speech? Here's how they lined up to wave once more before walking off the stage: Palin, her husband, McCain's wife, McCain. The candidate and his running mate were as far apart as possible, with two people in between. Speaks volumes.

gop, let's go with Palin/Bachman '12!

I'd like to offer conservatives some support today. this election should be a lesson against the wisdom of going with moderates.

So you should think about going with the woman who fired up the base (even though she turned off everyone else) and the woman with the good sense to call for another unAmerican activities commission. Which can't start too soon. A majority of Americans are now unamerican.

Palin/Bachman 2012. Get going.

Go Ahead And Cry, Dad

I called my father tonight, and he told me that he's been crying most of the night. Every time he stops, he said, "The tears just come again."

You might think that he's emotional because he's black. Not only black, but a black man who grew up in the South, where he wasn't allowed to drink from certain faucets, wasn't allowed to sit next to his white friends at the movie theaters, a man who grew up with a bitterness toward America's mainstream that only the truly oppressed will ever know.

One of the most important things my father ever did was to allow his children to grow up without passing along the scars from the slings and arrows hurled at him in his lifetime. And while his bitterness and anger toward the mainstream mellowed over the years, his cynicism remained.

So you might think my father's tears were because he felt past injustices had been righted, that the vote somehow validated his perseverence in the face of adversity.

Not so.

He was looking toward the future.

"Mike - Michael (he never gets that right, but I never correct him, and tonight, he really wanted to get his words right) I have always wondered when this country would get smarter, grow up, mature," he said.

"Tonight, we've grown up."

I couldn't think of anything to say. The best I could come up with was, "Go ahead and cry your fuckin' eyes out, Dad."

Voting matters

I voted today. It mattered. The country is different tomorrow. Any kid really can grow up to be president.

Obama has a lot to do in the next four years. But just with today's election, nothing will ever be the same.

You don't get to say that very often.

McCain camp classless to the end

Well, we're winding to a close and on the final weekend, McCain and his supporters once again found a way to reach a new low.

There was the 529 group running ads from crazy preacher Wright -- whose 'god will judge america' rants were shameful but no different from the rants of preachers like Jim Hagee that McCain has aligned himself with.

Well, different in a couple of ways -- he's black, and the others were white, and the idea of a fat bald white preacher ranting isn't nearly as scary to voters. And Wright was saying we'd be judged for historical racism, not gays and liberalism. Wright makes us uncomfortable.

(Of course, Libby Dole's shameful ad aimed at her "godless" opponent shows the right will use this tool against white democrats, too. and that it turns off a lot of people.)

Then there was this sudden discovery by Fox News and Drudge and others that a San Francisco newspaper was 'hiding' a tape (on the world wide web, of all secret places!) that has Obama wanting to kill coal with a cap and trade plan. Fair issue, I supposed, though they and Sarah Palin don't mention that McCain supports the same.

And then there were attacks on Obama's aunt, who he barely knows, but an illegal immigrant. I guess it's only unfair to drag Palin's family into the campaign.

So it goes. It's never been clear that McCain appreciates the stuff done in his name, but that doesn't let him off the hook. Here's hoping the GOP is routed and he never lives down the shame.

How much do we really know about McCain

We've heard from McCain that the questions about Obama's past associations are really about his rival's judgment.

But now, as I posted earlier, we know that the man he calls a "PLO spokesman" was funded by a group McCain leads.

Similar associations have also been made between a group McCain joined that supported central american terrorists and thugs in the 1980s. There are photos of him meeting Gen. Pinochet, a dictator, in Chile without preconditions.

And of course, as politico has told us, McCain has spoken out in support of ACORN, the voter registration group.

Now, I'm not sure the guy's really a PLO spokesman, or ACORN is evil. But McCain seems to think they're up there with Pinochet.

So what does it say that he associates with such people? How much do we know about the real McCain?

Now on Fox: McCain financed anti-semitic PLO terrorist!

Surveying the news this morning, I learned on Fox that this election could be decided by a videotape the LA Times has of Barack Obama saying something at a dinner for a PLO terrorist.

McCain has put this forward. ABC News reports today on a radio interview in which McCain referred to Obama's toast for a "PLO Spokesman." The name is Rashid Khlaidi, who's a Palestinian activist but a moderate one -- and a college professor, so it's no surprise Obama might go to a dinner.

The Times says it can't release the tape because of a promise with its source. So we don't really know if it's damning or not.

Funny thing, though: We do know, courtesy of the Huffington Post, that John McCain has funded this "PLO Spokesman," distributing a half-million bucks to the pro-Palestinian group he chaired.

Of course, he's actually no more a terrorist than Joe is a Plumber. But if he was, I imagine he'd rather half a half-million bucks than a toast. I'm sure the folks on the right demanding the tape will want to make sure we get all the details of McCain's relationship with this terrorist.

Crawl on Fox News

I got stuck watching Fox News while eating at Der Wenierschnitzel today. While I was nauseated, not by the food but by what passes for "journalism" on that channel (my j-profs would have shot me for behaving like that) I was mesmerized by the crawl on the bottom of the screen ...

"God endorses McCain ... Official: Palin Not 'Completely Crazy,' Ready To Lead ... Obama Is Having Sex With Your Daughter Right Now ... McCain's Economic Plan Will Eliminate Cancer ... Cindy McCain Will Give Hand Job To Everyone Who Votes For Her Husband ... Democrats Cause Bubonic Plague ... Obama: America Can Kiss My Black Ass ... Biden: I Hate Puppies ... "

So much for the "laughable curve"

Arthur Laffer has been making the rounds with his book proclaiming that the 'Age of Prosperity' is over.


He should call it the age of debt.


This is, of course, the guy who came up with the Laffer Curve that told Ronald Reagan he could cut taxes to stimulate the economy and raise revenues in the process, eliminating the budget deficit and national debt and making us all prosperous.


So what happened? Well, the economy did surge, though due as much to Reagan abandoning any plan to stop spending (according to David Stockman, his own budget chief) as to the tax cuts. The annual deficits surged. The national debt we hand to our kids soared from less than $1 trillion over the first 204 years of our nation to around $10 trillion today.


Not only did official spending and annual deficits soar, politicians learned to take wars and other pet projects 'off budget.' And most of them share the blame, though we did best under Bill Clinton and a GOP Congress, and worst under George Bush and a GOP Congress, in terms of fiscal responsibility.


But we're buried in freaking deep by now. More than one in four dollars we pay in taxes now goes for debt service, soon to be one in three. If our mortgaged nation were a mortgaged home, we'd turn in the key and let the creditors take in back.


Worse, perhaps, is how this national lack of responsibility seemed to impact the business world. The tech bubble, the housing bubble, cdos, etc., etc., all fed by an orgy of debt helped along by federal action to eliminate the rules that kept business from sinking into the same hole.

Which would be fine, except that they also got permission to lie about it to investors, and funneled more and more of our retirement dollars into these sinkholes.

This has all come crashing down lately. And it's now pretty clear that the age of 'conservative,' Laffer economics was really an age of debt. What we thought of as prosperity was really just the thrill a gullible college kid might feel when the first credit card arrives in the mail.

You have fun buying rounds for a night or two, then regret it when the bill arrives.

As a nation, we've gotten the bill. And conservative tax-bashers are going to choke when they realize that, yes, we really all have to pay.

Murrow be damned!

Another broadcast journalist has to be credited for lowering the already low standing of the ol' news profession.

After recently serving softballs to John McCain, Florida WFTV anchor Barbara West interviewed Joe Biden with a series of question right out of the Fox News talking points. Ayres, Acorn, you name it.

Fair play aside, she even went as far as to ask if Obama's fairly mild economic proposals didn't make him a Marxist for wanting to 'spread the wealth around.' (This 'redistribution' thing is more than a little silly, since both Obama and McCain just voted to redistribute $700 billion in taxpayer dollars to the big banks.)

But really, Marxist? She actually quote Karl, and Biden asked the obvious question -- is this a joke? -- but she was instead serious, or thought she was.

Now, I learned in journalism school about Edward R. Murrow, the broadcaster who helped take down Joe McCarthy and bring an end to the redbaiting of fine Americans for political gain.

Ms. West probably did, too, but now it sees she's joined the right wing brigades who want to bring this back. We've come to expect this from Fox and politicians like Palin and Bachman, the woman who called for loyalty investigations quite recently.

But from a local newscaster? Shameful.

Get Rich The McCain Way!

At a recent campaign stop, McCain told his audience, "I want you to be wealthy." Wow, that's taking a controversial, hard-hitting stand.

Sorry. What I really want is to do is become a multimillionaire the McCain way - marry someone rich!

President McCain - America's First Kept Man.

Joe the Dictator?

Can't leave without noting an item at Huffington Post that details a meeting between John McCain and the bloody Chilean dictator Pinochet, back in 1985. Seems he was for meeting dictators without preconditions before he was against it.

He's been out campaigning as the guy for Joe the Plumber, Joe the Teacher, Joe the Hedge Fund Manager.

Guess he's also the candidate for Joe the Dictator.

Stephen Hawking steps down in failure

A little distraction from politics today. I read at MSNBC that the the vaunted pop cosmologist Stephen Hawking is leaving his post at Cambridge -- Lucasian Professor of Mathematics, a title once held by the great 18th century physicist Isaac Newton -- to move to a quieter phase of research.

Hawking, of course, is as well known for his wheelchair and computerized voice as his work, which to be frank, most of us couldn't understand if we tried. He could out-think us with 100 IQ points tied behind his back.

But for all he has overcome, I must say that I'll have to consider him a failure.

Yes, he's written a couple of best sellers, like "A brief history of time," which is basically quantummechanicalastrophysics for dummies. He's thought many big thoughts. Yet after so many years as the human race's leading expert on time and gravity...

not a single flying car or time machine.

Good thing he's an academic. In private industry, he'd have been out of work years ago. Experts like these may explain what the hell happened to the future.

Tested?????

So Sen. McCain would like us to remember that back in the French-Indian War, or back in 1963, when I was exactly one year old, he was willing to obey orders and drop bombs on impoverished people from the safety of a front-line U.S. fighter plane.

So, what, exactly, is McCain trying to say? That he's proven that he's willing to kill people? Um, wow.

More to the point here, if McCain wants me to believe he's passed some sort of leadership "test,' then I've got a few more questions:

- What will he bomb into generating more jobs for Americans who have been reduced to service work, when they can find work?
- What will he bomb to reduce our need for foreign capital to save our banking system?
- What bank is he going to bomb to restore stability to our shattered economy?
- What is he going to bomb that will reduce our federal deficit?
- What country will he bomb to reverse our trade deficits?
- What will he bomb to ensure that the tens of millions of Americans who have no health coverage get it?
- What country do you bomb to restore the U.S.'s decayed manufacturing infrastructure?

I swear, it's the Mike Tyson approach to problem-solving. With apologies to Mike; even he's learned by this point that there are one hell of a lot of problems in life that you just can't bomb into submission.

Am I Reading This Correctly?

The Republican candidate for president looks at an unlicensed plumber who's failed to pay his taxes and sees him as "the man" and "what small business people all over this country are about."

I guess holding up a lawbreaking tax scofflaw makes sense to a man who, on the eve of his nomination, in front of the national press, shook hands with a "man" who knocked up an underage girl.

To paraphrase Obama, this says a lot about McCain's campaign.

Fuck Joe the Plumber until he pays his taxes like I do, and have, without fail and without delay, for the past 30 years of my life.

Why Is This Person Allowed To Vote? Part 2:

"I don't trust Obama," a woman said. "I have read about him. He's an Arab."

Well, if it's on the Interweb thingee, it must be true!

I tried to come up with something insightful to say about this, but all I keep coming back to is that in our system of government, her vote counts as much as mine or yours.

Grudging Respect

I rarely have anything good to say about our mass commercial media. But I have to commend my former profession and vocation for one thing that seems to have been done well in this election - what we call in the classroom "second level" reporting. Reporters have gone beyond Level One - get the quote right, spell the names right. When Sarah Pitbull starts spewing racist vitrol, I have seen reporter after reporter check into the facts behind the claims - and state that they are simply wrong. Or when Obama makes a claim, someone checks to see if it's real or not.

Here's my take: Many of the people in newsroom management can remember being played by the first Bush administration with the "Willie Horton" ads. And ever since, the political relationship with the media has been an increasingly one-sided one. Politicians use the media to make claims that are about as substantial as ad copy, secure in the knowledge that few, if any, reporters will be given the time or resources to investigate those claims.

But there are a lot of working journalists right now, I suspect, who feel a deep, personal shame for every time they wrote the phrase "weapons of mass destruction," knowing that they didn't know if it was true, couldn't know if it was true, knowing only that they were being used as cheerleaders to lead the nation to a war that was laughable in its premise from day one. And those same journalists also knew that if Obama was nominated, the campaign battlefield would be littered with barely-concealed racist attacks, especially if the Republican candidate got behind. As I said to a class of students six months ago, at the end of this campaign, watch how many new ways you will learn to say "nigger" without saying "nigger."

Getting played on complex issues of foreign policy or economics is one thing - few reporters truly are knowledgable enough about such issues to make intelligent commentary. But members of the working press know racism when they see it. They know personal attacks when they see them. And this time through, they've called it what it is.

How can McCain actually say that "We don't know who the real Obama is?" The man's been running for office for two years - and if there was anything in his background that was unpleasant, it had been raised and raised. There's nothing new in the McCain camp's attacks. They are just another way of raising the same old tired issues, this time by a hick-talking pitbull with lipstick.

Maybe McCain really feels the ends justifies the means. Or maybe he's old, tired of losing, knows this is his very last shot at the Big Prize, and has simply told his handlers to do what's necessary to win, no questions asked.

The saddest part is that McCain is a bright guy who might actually have some ideas on how to improve the country. But he's chosen this moment, when the world's eyes are turned to him, to assasinate the character of a colleague, someone who McCain, deep down, knows isn't a "danger to America." But in politics, nothing is too low, too debasing, too shameful to do when it comes to winning.

McCain is the O.J. of this year's presidential campaign. He may win, but no one I know would want to shake his hand.

McCain hides behind Palin's skirts

My comment on last night's debate is simple. Even the right wing is disappointed, and for good reason.

McCain sends his lady out to call Obama a terrorist sympathizer and a crook, the sort of underhanded and unfounded attacks usually assigned to folks with some distance from the campaign.

But he refuses to say to Obama's face what his lady says behind his opponents back.

Old Johnny's a coward. Plain and simple.

Some one will label Johnny's obvious disdain for "that one" and refusal to face him as racist. Others will say it's rightous indignation. But it's must simpler. He's a coward.

I'm sure glad McCain and the GOP caught on to Franron

John McCain keeps trying to reassure us that hey, he blew the whistle on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac back in 2004 and 2005.

Indeed, the whole GOP seems to want to have this both ways. I heard Libby Dole on radio this morning whining that she and members of the Senate Banking Committee tried hard early on to put a stop to this. (She also complained about the pork added to the latest bailout bill, ignoring the fact that it was tucked in to win support from reluctant GOPers.)


But I have to wonder: since the GOP controlled both houses of Congress, the White House and the courts in the years the housing bubble blew up, starting in 2002...

Why couldn't they get anything passed?

I know John McCain seems to have decided to run against the GOP and President Bush in this race, as well as Obama. But if Republicans in general try to run against the GOP, who's going to buy it.

They like to pretend the war and the housing mess started when democrats took Congress in 2006. That ain't going to fly this time.

Finally, Charles Keating Surfaces

I've been wondering when the Obama campaign was going to re-introduce the American public to Charles Keating, the face of the first deregulated banking industry scandal. This is why I'm not a political consultant; I'd have been screaming for months about Keating and John McCain's decision to keep federal regulators at bay while his friend and business colleage Keating fleeced people's retirement accounts and other investments. I'd have the Senate's ruling that McCain "exhibited poor judgement" all over the airwaves.

But Obama's campaign kept that card as an ace in the hole for when things turned nasty. And they have played that card with exquisite timing. McCain's people can sink to whatever unreal, hideous depths they want (Terrorist? Nauseating and inexcuseable. An insult to every soldier, sailor, and law enforcement member actually fighting terrorism).

The "Keating Five" tag attached to McCain resonates with people terrified of losing their savings, their jobs and their homes. No average American can comprehend a Senator sitting in a room with a thief, telling the federal regulators to back off. And no matter how long it's been, or how minor McCain's role in the Keating scandal may have been, those harsh, ugly facts are there, indisputable, and more relevant than ever as the next president will have to preside over the re-regulation of the financial industry.

As the AP described it, it is the political wound that will never heal for McCain.

House conservatives: we can be bought

Well, the House has voted in favor of the Wall Street bailout, er, Main Street rescue, bill.

The big shift from Monday: House conservatives, who rejected it as too big Monday, like this even bigger bill, to which every uncovered tax cut ever proposed has been added, as well as giveaways and health provisions and wooden-arrow rebates and god knows what else.

None of which is paid for. Even if the bailout works out, this is a $300 billion addition to the federal deficit, at minimum.

Now, there are very good reasons for passing this, but they haven't changed since Monday.

So one can only assume that the rebellious conservative Republicans and blue dog Dems sent a message Monday, and the leadership answered:

"We can be bought."

"Here ya go."

Ifel tower of debate BS

John McCain's folks are suddenly up in arms that Gwen Ifel, debate moderator, has a book coming out next year about black political power in the "age of Obama."

Now yeah, it's a conflict, but this is TV. It's not like the talking puppets on Fox aren't partisan.

But the truth is, this book had been written about well before McCain agreed to let this woman host the debate. Hell, I think you could order it on Amazon via presale.

If the McCainiacs really didn't know, it's another sign of their flat-out incompetence. Do we want incompetents running FEMA? Again.

Rather, I think the problem is that this surfaced on the Internet via the ever outraged Michelle Malkin, the campaign denied it knew, and now McCain has to reluctantly get his back up over another phony issue. Or be shown as incompetent on the campaign front.

And, once again, a former man of honor becomes a crybaby willing to trash a respected woman he agreed to host this thing, who hid nothing. (Yes, John doesn't do that Internet thing, but someone in his campaign must know how.)

Phony outrage and nonsense. That seems to be all he has going for him.

Gee, Who Saw This Coming?

Whites lift McCain to slim lead over Obama in poll

By ALAN FRAM, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 38 minutes ago

We're Doomed, Redux

Why is this person allowed to vote?

"My heart sort of runs with McCain and my mind probably tends to run toward Obama," said David Scorup, 58, a county government official in Othello, Wash. "I think I resonate more with McCain."

Sarah Palin was a brilliant choice for the VP slot for McCain:

Sarah Palin was a brilliant choice for the VP slot for McCain:

There are two main roles women play in our media environment and there is one consistent behavior. The roles are object of sexual desire and nurture/caregiver. The consistent behavior is that they cede authority to men. Call this the “Good Woman” mythology. If you doubt this, go sit down at your TV set and watch the next 10 commercials. Watch who makes the decisions, who drives the cars, which gender turns to which gender for answers, and what gender the Voice of God (the narrator, the voice of authority in the commercial) is.

These mass commercial media representations have been consistent for decades, and are part of the mythology that women are taught virtually from birth. The message women receive on a daily basis is that if they look hot, take care of the kids, and don’t get too big for their britches, they will get True Love and happiness. (This mythology, not incidentally, is the value system that keeps most of the companies advertising in the mass commercial media profitable. No one makes money telling women that their intelligence is a thing of value. But Revlon makes a shitload of cash by telling them that the right eye shadow will win them Prince Charming. If you are relying on your audience to buy into that, it’s best to start teaching ‘em young, and keep reminding them of that daily.)

Hillary rarely played the mom card, shot for the top spot on the ticket, and was, unfortunately, publicly outed as a failure in terms of object of sexual desire. If she was doing her “job,” as Chris Rock suggested, all Monica would have had access to was one of the balls – maybe. For that, Hillary was vilified. Even if she’d won the Democratic primary, she’d have been slaughtered in the general election. That is one of the reasons Obama got the nomination.

Palin knows her place – No. 2 on the ticket – and bills herself as a “hockey mom” who wasn’t afraid to strut her stuff in a beauty pageant.

Which of these two women come closest to the “Good Woman” mythology?

Not only that, Palin comes in virtually criticism-proof. She can hide behind her children anytime embarrassing facts start to show up. Spend money from the state taxpayers to take her daughter on a junket to New York? Hey, she’s just trying to raise a family, the best she can! Quit picking on her! (I find this one really ironic, I once wrote a series of articles that ended up with a city manager going to prison for misuse of travel funds. It’s called misappropriation of public money. Or, more bluntly, stealing.)

Polls show that Palin’s pick has drawn white women to the McCain ticket. Of course it does. For these voters, Palin’s selection validates the decisions they’ve made in their lives. The obvious contradictions – I’m just an ordinary mom with five kids, so give me a job where I’ll never have time to raise them, my family’s off-limits unless I’m parading my pregnant unwed teen daughter on stage – don’t matter when it's not about facts, but feelings. For these voters, selecting the best person for the Oval Office isn’t the question at hand. It’s about the narrative and how it makes them feel. Besides, it always works out in the end on Lifetime TV. Why wouldn’t it work out here?

Well done, McCain folks. Sheer cynicism – and sheer brilliance.

Little Facts ...

John Feehery, a Republican strategist, said the campaign is entering a stage in which skirmishes over the facts are less important than the dominant themes that are forming voters' opinions of the candidates.

"The more the New York Times and The Washington Post go after Sarah Palin, the better off she is, because there's a bigger truth out there and the bigger truths are she's new, she's popular in Alaska and she is an insurgent," Feehery said. "As long as those are out there, these little facts don't really matter."

We're on a bridge to nowhere

I've been too busy commisserating with the folks at Daily Kos over this Palin thing lately to update my own blog. But I must pause to offer this to the Obama camp:

It's time to fight back.

Because the other side is simply making stuff up. In the past, at the worst, even the Bush campaigns, there was some passing acquaintance with reality. It was silly to question if Kerry was wounded enough, but it could be debated.

But really, Palin? She campaigned on support for the bridge to nowhere, now she's campaigning because she gave it up under fire? Just flat-out lying. And yet, Americans seem eager to walk the bridge to nowhere with her.

More shocking to me is that John McCain, after cozying up to Bush and the far right to get the GOP nod, now wants to be a maverick again. Obama needs to call him on it, loudly. I'm waiting for this speech:

"I'm not going to get personal, but it's time to talk about the record. The record is that over the past several years, John McCain has shifted his positions to those of George Bush and the far right. The only thing he changes anymore is his mind.

-- he opposed George Bush's tax cuts for the rich, saying they'd bust the budget. They did. Now he wants to keep them.

-- "he opposed lobbyists, then hired them to run his campaign. He saw his child slandered by Karl Rove and Co. and condemned them. Now they run his campaign.

-- "he called those who seek to divide us over religion divisive forces. Now he praises them and gives them his vice presidential pick.

-- "he wrote a fair bill on immigration the far right hated. Now, he opposes his own bill.

"This is not change, it's more of the same. But overnight, he's changed from falling in line with President Bush to calling himself a maverick again. That's not change you can believe in."

C'mon, Obama. It's time to fight.

Side note: As a former journalist who's worked all over the western states, I can tell you I never met a working journalist from the University of Idaho. Never heard of one. On this part of the resume, it may make him an elitisit but at least Harvard Law grads tend to succeed.

The beautiful world of McCain (in song)

I was reading over McCain's famous quote about how he don't know much about economics. and it brought a song to my mind. Amazing how the lyrics to this oldie fits what McCain doesn't know much about:

Don't know much about history
(Sunni? Shia? That's why I bring Joe)
Don't know much biology
(I support abstinence-only education, though the facts say it doesn't work.)
Don't know much about a science book
(Intelligent-design creationism should be taught in schools.)
Don't know much about the french I took
(According to Gallup, John McCain is less popular in France than perennial fascist candidate Jean-Marie LePen.)

But I do know that one and one is two
(and I'm a PO-double-you)
What a wonderful world this would be
(If you just stop complaining. As my man Phil Gramn, said, "We have sort of become a nation of whiners.")

Don't know much about geography
("I'm afraid it's a very hard struggle, particularly given the situation on the Iraq-Pakistan border." The countries do not share s border; oops.)
Don't know much trigonometry
(The Congressional Budget Office projects a deficit of $443 billion in 2013 if President Bush's tax cuts are extended, as Mr. McCain wants.)
Don't know much about algebra
(When was the last time you pumped your own gas and how much did it cost? "I don’t recall and frankly, I don’t see how it matters.")
Don't know what a slide rule is for
(except maybe figuring out how many homes one has.)

But I do know that one and one is two
(and I'm a PO-double-you)
What a wonderful world this would be
(as long as we stay in Iraq 100 years)

Now I don't claim to be an "A" student
("The issue of economics is not something I've understood as well as I should.")
But I'm trying to be
("I've got Greenspan's book.")
So maybe by being an "A" student baby
(but not a Harvard elitist, mind you.)
I can win your love for me

But I do know that one and one is two
(but I was wrong about the tax cuts, too,)
What a wonderful world this would be

McCain flap is reverse sexism

So I feel a need to speak out on a yet-unexpressed part of the flap over John McCain not knowing how many houses he owns.

(A problem that plagues many of us working class folks. I mean, I know I have two or three houses my wife doesn't know about, and I figure she does, too. Until the wills kick in, we'll never know. And it's hard to tell the condo in Malibu from the ones on Maui or St. Croix, since they're all on Ocean Drives.)

But really, we don't expect Giuliani's former mistress to know about his finances, even now that she's his wife. Spitzer pulled down a big salary, and I'll bet his girl toy didn't know more about him that his hotel room number.

And face it, rich guys have been marrying poorer women for years, and we never expect them to know much more than how to find their way back to one home. That's the definition of traditional marriage.

McCain's marriage is untraditional. Cindy makes the real money, pays the housing and airfare bills, and pretty much wears the pants. John McCain was the catch who dumped his old lady to take up with the richer prospect.

He's a kept man.

So yea, he's a senator, a part-time job which apparently take very little of his time. He didn't even show up to vote down the bill he opposed for more veterans' benefits. He's like the little lady who takes a part-time job at the boutique to keep herself busy.

We wouldn't expect her to know her family finances. To expect John McCain to know his is reverse discrimination. Or at least, a clear bias for kept men over kept women.

What McCain really believes

I've been traveling a lot and haven't posted, but I have been watching the presidential race closely. Or at least, half of it.

See, whatever I turn on -- including Fox News and right-wing talk radio -- I hear a great deal of what Obama says and believes, and who and what he might be.

I hear very little praise of McCain, even in the most Republican of places.

And McCain's most recent ad focuses on how so many people show up for Obama, why that is, and whether Obama is qualified. But there's nothing about why McCain is.

Of course, given the number of times he's changed positions, it's probably hard for McCain to take a stand for anything.

But if he wants to be president, it seems to me he should tell us something about himself besides the fact he approves of this or that attack ad.

McCain just out and out lies

It's been a long time since I was shocked at the idea a politician might fib, fabricate, stretch or wiggle the truth. Really.

But today, John McCain pulled one that puts 'I did not have sex with that woman' to shame.

Marking the passage of the Jim Webb bill to give GI Bill benefits to soldiers fighting in Iraq, McCain notes:

"I'm happy to tell you that we probably agreed to an increase in educational benefits for our veterans that not only gives them increase in their educational benefits, but if they stay in for a certain period of time than they can transfer those educational benefits to their spouses and or children. That's a very important aspect I think of incentivizing people of staying in the military."

"Probably" is there because "we" didn't do a damn thing. The Senate voted but we didn't show up.

But really the lie involves the word happy. This is the bill that some feared would encourage soldiers not to re-enlist and opposed.

Among those who opposed it were the GOP twins President Bush and John McCain. When Obama called McCain on it, McCain flipped out with an "how dare you, I served, you young whippersapper."

But he still opposed it.

I suppose you could say he's happy the Senate overrule that bastard John McCain, but really. I guess you could say oral opposition (like oral sex?) isn't really opposition (sex) if you wanted to pull a Clinton.

But Mr. Straight Talk Express? Never.

Sadly, we can't expect McCain to be called on it. I blogged recently about the lie he told newsweek -- saying he hadn't said something in a speech when he had, and you can watch the video from any Internet connection -- and, yet, newsweek hasn't called him on it.

I'm betting only the blogosphere will call him on this.

I've Heard This One Before - And Before

Listen up, Corporate America: We're all on to you. When we call and hear "We're experiencing higher-than-normal call volumes" EVERY TIME we call, it's not us. It's you. And I'm guessing that you're not really experiencing high call volumes, but you just don't want to pay any of those pesky "salaries" to customer service reps. Doesn't really help the bottom line, does it?

Corporate swine ...

Does he know the diff between Iraq and Iran?

Is it a Freudian slip or campaign strategy?

Illinois Republican Mark Kirk is in the blogosphere's doghouse today for a quote posted at Daily Kos, from a radio broadcast in which he said he supports a polict "where if we see Obama there's a shoot-on-sight order."

Now, officially he was talking about Osama bin Laden and just got mixed up. OK. I'll take at his word it's not part of the GOP smear campaign to paint Obama as a closet Muslim raised in a madrassa and sympathetic to terrorists. Or trying to encourage some gun nut.

But riddle me this, Illinois voters. If the man confuses a presidential candidate from his own state with the mastermind of 9/11, should we let him hold public office? Lord no.

Another good journalist bites the dust

Back in the 1990s, the image of esteemed journalists collecting cash from corporate interests for hobnobbing with them, like politicians lending an ear to their money men, steamed a columnist named David Broder. He said:

"It’s clear that some journalists now are in a market category where the amount of money that they can make on extracurricular activities raises, in my mind, exactly, and, clearly, in the public’s mind, exactly the same kind of conflict-of-interest questions that we are constantly raising with people in public life. . . .

"People think that we are part of the establishment and therefore part of the problem. I mean, what bothers me is the notion that journalists believe, or some journalists believe, that they can have their cake and eat it too, that you can have all of the special privileges, access and extraordinary freedom that you have because you are a journalist operating in a society which protects journalism to a greater degree than any other country in the world, and at the same time you can be a policy advocate. You can be a public performer on the lecture circuit or television. I think that’s greedy."

What he might add today: Greed is good. Harpers reports that Broder has joined the ranks of the bought-and-paid-for corporate journalist.

Guess when you're esteemed enough, you don't need credibility. This should help convince the public journalists aren't part of the problem.

" ... a lot of the information that we accept as true, and will pass on to others as true, is dependent upon our own self-interests. Anyone who claims otherwise is expert at deluding themselves or is knowingly lying ..."

Remember, the media is only as liberal as its conservative corporate owners allow it to be. Enlightened self-interest that helps you meet your Wall Street numbers ...

Mr. Obama meets Mr. LieberMcCain

This is the most interesting political news I've heard since McCain kept confusing sunnis and shiites while fact-finding in Iraq. (He likely thinks Obama should visit the Big Sandbox more often so he could be confused, too.)

Seems Sen. Obama met Sen. ol' Joe Lieberman on the Senate floor the other and pulled him aside, having heard what the erstwhile independent has been running around saying about the Democratic nominees and supporting Republican 100-year-warrior McCain.

Joe, of course, is the two-faced politician who ran halfheatedly with Gore a few years back, but recently has been hanging out with GOP while caucusing with Democrats to main some sembalance of power in the Senate.

He's also endorsed McCain, raising the possibility of a Zell Miller-like diatribite again the party's candidate, since Joe seems to think opposing ill-planned wars in Iraq means you support I'm-a-dinner-jacket and a new holocaust.

Man, I would have loved to hear that talk:

Obama: Hey Joe, got a sec?

Joe: well, um, not really I have an interview planned with fox news about your.. well, I mean

Obama: Over here Joe. Now.

To which they proceed to a quiet corner while Joe -- shaking with the fear of an old white guy faced with a young black man -- fidgets nervously.

Joe: OK, no one can hear. You can yell. I know you're not happy. But understand, liberals won't give me money any more. I have to court cons.

Obama: Oh, I'm not going to yell.

Joe: Then what?

Obama: Simple. Come November, we're going to hang GW Bush's legacy from the rafters with this tragic, ill-run war. We're going to hang McCain right beside it. Watch your step or you'll be hanging up there, too.
We're taking the White House. We'll have a much bigger margin in the Senate. The GOP will have rent space if it wants a place on Capitol Hill. You get that?

Joe: Well, um, I am an independent, not a Republican.

Obama: Right. And come next year, we won't need you to hold a majority. Majority leadress Clinton may hang with you now, but she plays the power gain. When you're irrelevant, she won't even have a junior aide return your calls. Your committee seats, your caucus seats. Gone. So if you aren't careful, there's an office on the senate subway deep underground with 'independent' and your name on it.

Joe: Well then, I might just switch to the GOP, then.

Obama: Yea? You think your state's democrats will help you then? Do you think your GOP buddies will help you when they're barely hanging on.

Joe: Well um, OK.

Obama: OK what?

Joe: OK... sir.

---

read about it here: http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/06/obama-confronts.html

It's official: hopeful change vs. grumpy mcsame

first off, poor Hillary Clinton. The sad spectacle of failing to step aside with grace after Obama's clear win, while trying to win a spot as his vice president, just shows how desperate she is to rescue the tarnished clinton legacy.

I can only assume she's convinced she has to leverage such a bid at risk to the party and the country, because otherwise, she's not going to get it. And she shouldn't. She's an amazing woman and a tough campaigner -- but no presidential candidate would saddle themselves with a vice presidential spouse so desperate for the spotlight.

That said, the speeches last night made the race quite clear. McCain proclaims change, but he's voted with Bush 95% of the time, and he's reversed himself on the difference that counted most. He opposed the Bush tax cuts as budget busters too weighted to the rich; he was right. Now he wants to extend them.

And after three decades in Congress, during which the country built up a huge pile of debt, he can hardly portray himself as an agent of change. He's either been part of the problem or ineffectual at solving problems.

And really, he comes across as Bob Dole in 1996. He got the bid because the other GOPers lost, and he deserves it, and if you don't like it, screw you. He's too old and too tired to try to court voters.

Sure, I wish Obama had a couple more terms in Congress than he does. But if we waited for two terms under McBush, he'd also have any more problems to solve.

What do Rush Limbaugh and Osama bin Laden have in common?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080531/ap_on_re_mi_ea/al_qaida_s_women

'nuff said ... well, I can't help but speculate: Does this mean that Al Qaida is against gay marriage, too? Maybe Bush should rethink this "war on terror" thing. He could use an expansion of the Republican conservative base ...

Stupid People

If your main claim to political fame is that you are the candidate of choice for the least-educated state in the nation, isn't that a sign from the universe that it's time to quit, for the good of the country?

Sorry Hill, party's over, you're going home alone

Poor Hillary Clinton. She's a good hearted woman. And after working hard to become one of the hard working, gun toting plan folks, it must be tough to have to tell the nation they just won't vote for a black guy.

Truth is, of course, that's not her at all. She may have moved to Arkansas to help Bill politically, but she was damn sure not going back when he left office.

No, as I've written before, the real problem is that Hillary at heart will always be that smart college girl in the thick glasses desperate in need to a man to complete her. That's she ended up with Bill, the slick-talking philanderer who she knew could be a great man one day. And stuck with him when he humiliated her publicly. More than once. And even sent her out to lie for him.

It would have been a problem as president, I think. Suppose Putin took the little lady out fishin' and doffed his shirt. Or some slick republican in the Senate sweet-talked her out of the budget.

We've avoided that, but now we have a different problem. The party's over. She is not going to be the nominee. But she's sticking things out in hopes we decide we like her, we really like her.

We do Hill, but the party's over. You're going home alone. Sorry, that's just the way it is.

Gas tax holidays in the sun

Policy has finally intruded on the 'who's your spiritual daddy' debate that is our presidential race.

Hillary Clinton boldly said 'me too' to John McCain's idea of a gas tax holiday starting in less than a month, which would give us all two extra dimes to rub together per gallon. At least, until Big Oil raises prices another two dimes.

Barack Obama, meanwhile, once again decided to treat American voters like adults. Chump change and pandering. And I'm sure it'll end this debate just as it ended the Rev. Wright debate.

And y'know, maybe it shouldn't, In DC or New York or out here on the West Coast, where salaries are larger and distances shorter, none of this seems like much.

But out in the vast heart of American where people make average American salaries of 40K or 50K, people are seriously being hurt by gas prices. If you live in Billings, you can't hop a bus to the next town for pocket change. They need help now.

So when Obama dismisses this as pandering, and says to Americans they'll have to wait until a new president is elected and takes office and gets his stuff together and can enact a new long-term energy policy, and then let's wait for that to take effect...

He risks being labeled out of touch or, dare I say it, elitist. And dismissed because we all know Washington will never do something real or effective.

Of course, the real pandering here is that candidates Clinton and McCain talk about this holiday starting very soon. But senators Clinton and McCain haven't even filed a bill. No doubt the candidates will blame the senators for failing to act, and call for change....

McCain, the media and credibility

Wow. Just wow. David Broder, the esteemed Washington Post columnist, had a column yesterday saying the race has hurt the Democrats and proven Hillary Clinton will do anything to win.

OK, fine.

But he goes on to say John McCain is the opposite.

"Yet, in pointing to those vulnerabilities in her rival, Clinton has heightened
the most obvious liability she would carry into a fight against McCain. In an
age of deep cynicism about politicians of both parties, McCain is the rare
exception who is not assumed to be willing to sacrifice personal credibility to
prevail in any contest."

Umm, excuse me?

• McCain took endless aim at GW Bush's 2000 campaign work that said he'd fathered an illegitimate black child. Now he hugs bush whenever her gets a chance.
• He called the revs. falwell and robertson divisive forces; now he's cozy with such folks.
• He opposed the Bush tax cuts; now he wants to extend them and faults anyone who says otherwise.
• He opposed aid to Katrina victims in various forms; now he says such things will never happen again.

McCain has surrendered credibility in every step of this campaign, and it would be simple enough to show if the press asked any hard questions. People like Broder used to do this. No mas. I guess McCain's barbecue is just too good.

Deocrats clearly need to end the primaries and get on to running against John McCain, because it's clear the media will not ask him hard questions.

Obama says what she said

Once again, I see that the vaunted Washington press corps is cutting through the nonsense. Not.

The headlines this morning lead with Obama saying something in passing not terribly positive about McCain: "Either Democrat would be better than John McCain...And all three of us would be better than George Bush.''

Hillary Clinton, of course, fired back that no Democrat worth his salt would say something positive about the foe.

She forgets, I suppose, that she's said this: "I think it's imperative that each of us be able to demonstrate we can cross the commander-in-chief threshold. I believe that I've done that. Certainly, Sen. McCain has done that and you'll have to ask Sen. Obama with respect to his candidacy."

So she not only complimented McCain but suggested he'd be better than Obama.

So I assume the nation's press corps called her on this, well, contradiction, right? Nope. Not MSNBC. Not the New York Times. Not CNN.

The Slush Funds Go Here ...

Senator "Keating Five" McCain says he'll release his tax returns, but his wife's will remain private. Good plan! That way, the bribes - uh, sorry, consultant fees from lobbyists - will go into his wife's checking account, and there will be none of that annoying "disclosure" to the public.

Seriously. For a guy who wants to represent me, how come him and the missus don't file a joint return? Just 'cause she's got way more money? I mean, if SHE don't trust him with the joint checking account, why the HELL should I vote for him for President?

Just asking, ya' know?

McCain: Another quarter a gal for big oil, yeah baby

So I see John McCain is out with a new plan to cut the gas tax for the summer.

McCain's gas tax holiday would suspend the 18.4 cent federal gas tax and 24.4 cent diesel tax from Memorial Day to Labor Day. Which, mind you, doesn't mean we'll pay less; seems to me like an easy way to keep people from noticing the next price hike for record profits.

IE, another quarter per gal for big oil.

Wasn't McCain the maverick who keeps preaching about fiscal responsibility. Gas taxes fund roads and bridges, and as it is, ours are falling apart.

But hey, perhaps this is a bow to the most radical greens among us. Collapsing bridges do get people out of their cars. And at his age, I doubt they let him behind the wheel, anyway.

The Legendary Graveyard of the Radio Hosts?

So another DJ has resigned over comments made about a political candidate. What happens to these people? Do they go to limbo for a bit, then go back on the air? Do they have to wear an ankle braclet?

It seems to me that hurling a grenade onto the cultural wasteland that is our mass commercial media environment, then apologizing and quitting, has become a calculated part of the political process.

Maybe I'm cynical. But dammit, apologizing isn't enough anymore. I want to see Don Imus chop off a finger every time he says something stupid. I want to see real contrition. Let's get some of those Inquisition priests (or modern CIA agents, apparently). They know how to work an apology out of someone that means something.

BEIJING (Reuters) - China is preparing an arsenal of rockets and aircraft to protect the Olympics opening ceremony from rain, hoping to disperse clouds before they can drench dignitaries at the roofless "bird's nest" stadium.

I dunno. Blowing anything that they don't like to crap with rockets works for everything else, why not the weather?

Don't burn, baby, don't burn

Every once and a while, something happens that makes me think there's enough people power left in the world to have a little hope.

Witness the Olympic torch protest parade, in which China's efforts to capitalize on the Olympic spirit with a waltz around the world are being foiled by tons of protesters who see it for what it is. The free world's governments may ignore China's efforts to eradicate Tibetan culture, heritage and independence, but the people haven't.

It never made sense, of course, to send the Olympic Games to Beijing. Between the dirty air and water and the child labor, it's hardly an ideal proving ground for young athletes. Aligned with the world's most brutal dictatorships, it's hardly a showplace for global unity.

And not that long ago, we all watched on TV as tanks rolled over Chinese young people for the crime of demanding freedom -- an event China's leaders not only don't apologize for, but basically deny ever happened.

The aftermath shamed the US as well. Then-President Bush waited barely a blink to send his emissaries over to shake the bloody hands of China's leaders and reassure them. The assurance: there had to be sanctions, but they'd be weak and short-lived. Almost immediately, US and Western businesses parachuted in with money and big deals.

Sure, we spent trillions of dollars and many lives to topple one freedom-hating Communist superpower. But they could help build another in China. And China promised stability; they knew how to deal with rabble-rousers.

So today, they give us lead-filled toys and other dangerous products, and we give them hard currency and a huge trade surplus. And the Olympics.

The Olympic Charter starts like this:

1. Olympism is a philosophy of life, exalting and combining in a balanced whole the qualities of
body, will and mind. Blending sport with culture and education, Olympism seeks to create a
way of life based on the joy of effort, the educational value of good example and respect for
universal fundamental ethical principles.

It also says:

5. Any form of discrimination with regard to a country or a person on grounds of race, religion,
politics, gender or otherwise is incompatible with belonging to the Olympic Movement.

and it adds:

6. Belonging to the Olympic Movement requires compliance with the Olympic Charter and
recognition by the IOC.

Exactly what part of that ideal does China represent? Perhaps they need to add "Cash-rich countries able to throw a grander bash will be granted an exemption from these ideals."

future for journalism students?

I have pointed out before to my co-writer that my problem with moving to academia, as he has done, would be keeping myself from advising journalism students to run for the exits.

It's not just the increasingly lurid tone of the press, and its acceptance. The Idaho Statesman, for example, just got a runner-up award from the Pew-litzer folks for asking a bunch of men if Sen. Larry Craig came on to them, long before the now-famous bathroom incident.

It's not just the limited career opportunities. Most big newspapers have suffered layoffs, and many small ones (like the last newspaper I worked at) are no more.

It's not just what's replaced them. Witness this recent New York Times story about bloggers blogging themselves to death.

It's that amid all this, people like Anne Coulter and Bill O'Reilly have made millions posing as journalists.

Breaking News???

This is why I have such a difficult time looking my journalism students in the eye when they ask about what their career is likely to be like ...

p.s. I've had the occasional oral encounter, and while many of them have been very nice, I don't think I'd call any of them "fateful" ...

breaking news, hillary was home

Just caught a special report on abcnews.com. Seems Hillary was home when Bill Clinton stained the blue dresss.


And I really get a kick out of the byline: By BRIAN ROSS and the ABC NEWS INVESTIGATIVE UNIT (see it at http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=4482242&page=1)


Said investigation involved:


1. sifting through documents released by the National Archives to anyone who cared;

2. zeroing in on the most salacious parts.

Yea, it's nearly as much work as unveiling the Pentagon Papers. But no doubt technology helped; the docs probably came on e-mail or as a .pdf file, so you just search for 'oral.'

No doubt it makes the likes of Woodward and Bernstein proud.

this is what McCain gets for listening to Bush

What's that country lyric about not knowing the difference 'tween Iraq and Iran'?

John McCain, GOP candidate for president, traveled to the Middle East yesterday and showed once again he has no more clue than the current administration.

McCain said several times during his visit that Iran was training Al Qaeda in Iraq. Oops. Iran is a Shiite theocracy that the U.S.. claims has been training Shiite extremists in Iraq. Al Qaeda in Iraq is a Sunni insurgent group that blows up lots of people, but particularly Shiites. The two groups don't like each other.

You'd think McCain, who has based his presidential run on being the best man to handle the war in Iraq, would know that.

Yet asked about it, McCain said: “Well, it’s common knowledge and has been reported in the media that Al Qaeda is going back into Iran and receiving training and are coming back into Iraq from Iran. That’s well known. And it’s unfortunate.”

Senator ol' Joe Liebermann, who was with him, then whispered in McCain's ear. "I’m sorry,” Mr. McCain said, “the Iranians are training extremists, not Al Qaeda.”

Guess we can only hope that Joe is in bed with McCain when that 2 a.m. call comes and he has to decide whether to bomb Iran or Iraq to get Shiite terrorists or Sunni terrorists.

Of course, confusion has been the Bush policy thus far in Iraq, and McCain's position is to continue Bush's policy. And of course, "Al Queda in Iraq" is no more the Al Queda group that attacked us than Indiana boys who listen to rap and wear red bandannas are really insane crips.

But Bush and Cheney have consistently told us this war is us and Iraq vs. Iran and Osama. I think down deep they know better. But they have McCain convinced.

Is confusion a policy we want to continue for the 100 years McCain says we'll stay in Iraq?

I see the China Olympics are underway...

and really, should the world be surprised that China's demonstration sports include Tibetan-protester bashing and the security-police biathlon (they run to where protesters are gathered, then shoot guns)?

The tank-catching event will be held in Tiananmen Square this summer.

The Dalai Lama has said he'll have to step down if protesters get violence, but really, he had to say it. Truth is, no one would have listened to Ghandi until it was clear his nonviolence was the only alternative to a lot of very real anti-British violence.

Besides, he was picked to be Lama when he was 2 because he was someone's reincarnation. How exactly do you resign from that?

Also this summer in China, the smog-choked runner's marathon; the pollution-choked waterway individual medley; and a special gymnastics event in which the little girls on the US team will challenge Chinese children in making toys for Mattel.

There's some buzz about a boycott, which would be pointless. The world decided the Olympics should be held in a Communist dictatorship which values basic freedoms almost as much as the air we're now worried the athletes have to breath. Is any of this really a surprise?

Just because you have 'free trade' with it doesn't mean a country is free.

Sometimes the Bear eats you

Here's what no one's said about the Bear Stearns sweet deal:

Last Friday, thousands or millions of everyday investors, people counting on 401(k)s and IRAs for their future, owned shares of Bear still worth more than $30.

If JP Morgan had decided Monday to try a buyout, it would have had to go to the market, and those folks might have gotten, oh, $27, $25, $21 -- something.

Instead, the Fed and JPM cut a deal over a weekend and decide the shares will be worth just $2. That adds up to a couple hundred million for those shareholders. Bear Stearns' building alone is worth much more than that.

Is this the way the market is supposed to work? Because if it is, we shouldn't put a dime into stocks, because the Fed can decide to write your stocks off tomorrow and hand the company you own to someone else for pennies on the dollar.

Simply amazing. The government didn't act this fast to bailout Katrina victims.

The Middle Class Need Not Apply

From the AP:

After days of denials that it had liquidity problems, Bear was forced into a JPMorgan-led, government-backed bailout on Friday. The arrangement, the first of its kind since the 1930s, resulted in Bear getting a 28-day loan from JPMorgan with the government's guarantee that JPMorgan would not suffer any losses on the deal.

And the government wants me to worry about gay marriage?

Me Too!

I can't help it. I wanna bag on Elliot, too. It's just too easy.

Actually, we're OK with married men hiring hookers. That Repub in Louisana did that and he's still on the public's payroll.

We're not OK with:

- Laziness. Jesus, take a lesson from organized crime; USE CASH! Is it that hard to do?

- Unsafe sex. THAT was the thing that was so emotionally disturbing.

The real hero here?

Kristin.

An 18-year-old hooker was ready to tell the Governor of New York, "Look, you either wear a condom, or take your hardon and walk."

Prosecute her? Hell no! Kristin for President, I say. She'll have the same background, ethics and do the same thing as McCain, but at least she'll be nicer to look at.

A lazy man's guide to political scandal

Ah, Eliot. I'll let Wall Street and Capitol Hill celebrate your downfall and do the moralizing -- as if high-priced pros don't find lots of work from those two centers of power.

No, what I may mind most is your laziness.

You wanted to be governor of New York. You might have been president. You couldn't just go out and find a lady to supplement your marital bliss?

You're a celebrity, cavorting in New York and Washington, with plenty of cash to lay down for meals, plush hotel rooms and assorted other forms of fun, You could get millions of people to vote for yo. But you couldn't close the deal in a Westside singles bar? Nothing steamy in the Georgetown night? You couldn't just get a girlfriend?

We could debate whether that's morally superior, of course. But American political life is full of politicians who've done quite well despite having girlfriends as well as wives. Yes, you might eventually have to choose between them -- Clinton chose Hill, Newt dumped two wives for girlfriends, McCain dumped one -- for the sake of a campaign.

But that's like shampoo. Rinse, cycle, and then repeat. It doesn't end your career. And then you can get another. We've outgrown Gary Hart. Heck, Rudy Giuliani left his wife in the New York mayoral mansion to publicly date his mistress, and he was a serious candidate for president. As a Republican.

But hookers? Nah. Sure, Charley Sheen can still get a TV show. Jimmy Swaggert and Ted Hagget can still pack churches. But you're not an actor or an evangelical preacher; you're a moralistic politician.

So I suppose it's OK to celebrate your downfall.

The Race Card and Political Suicide

I'd expected someone to eventually try to smear Obama with the "affirmative action" charge; i.e., as the latest Clinton gunslinger says, he got where he got because of his race. (The laughter you hear is that of every African-American person in the U.S.; blacks in the U.S. get to where they are in spite of their race, not because of it. If Obama were white, he'd be the nominee now.)

What I didn't expect is for Hillary to be the one to sling this particular bit of mud. And I'm curious as to how Hillary expects to win the general election while alienating one of the largest voting blocks that has stuck by the Democratic party in times good and bad. Maybe she figures that demonizing minorities of all stripes - illegal immigrants, gay people, even strong women - has worked for Republicans, so it might work for her. It's as though she's forgotten that there's already a Republican in the race.

Never underestimate the power of a Democrat to self-destruct. Or spend tens of thousands on hookers. Or gay masseusses. Or hit on underage males. No, wait, those are Republicans ...

Democrats masters at losing battles

Leave it to my Democrats to find new and novel ways to lose a presidential election.

Here's the worst: The convention this time around was delayed until August, as a showcase for the fall campaign. But we have a deadlock, so we have months left for Hillary and Obama to tear each other to shreds while McCain stands above politics as usual.

You have McCain standing up with Bush and with a preacher who hates Catholics and Jews as much as Satan, and the Dems say nothing.

Or worse than nothing. Hillary is saying she and McCain are better on foreign policy, and Obama will no doubt respond by saying we need a maverick like him or McCain.

This should be a slam duck, with Bush's ratings in the toilet and McCain promising to continue Bush's war and his economic policies, same ol' same ol. It will take some effort to screw this up.

But it looks like we Democrats will manage.

Is Obama tough enough?

So Hillary wins the key races, but the folks over at Air America were talking this morning about how she should step aside anyway. They're shocked (shocked!) at her recent tactics; she's not playing nice.

They're missing the point of primary season.

Much as I support Obama, if he can't stand up to Hillary, how will he stand up when the voices of Rove, Coulter, Limbaugh and the rest rally behind McCain and get nasty, as they inevitably will?

And McCain may not have stood with them in the past, but this is a once-proud man who now hires a talking head to introduce him with insinuations about Obama's race and religion, then distances himself from his own introduction. The straight talk express is now the hate talk express.

Once of the best things about Hillary is her toughness. Republicans have gone after her and Bill with throngs of political hacks, legions of supposed journalists and armies of special prosecutors, and been beaten every time.

Obama's talk about a new era of cooperative politics is certainly inspirational. But can it hold up against the old politics of rip their throats out and grind them into the dirt?

Demoats lost with Gore and Kerry, who declined to fight back and lost races they should have won. We actually once nominated Walter Mondale, who slogan was "Jimmy Carter's vice president.' And then there was Michael Dukakis, who vowed to try to be nice if someone raped his wife.

Obama is being tested, and frankly, if he can't stand up to Hillary, he would lose to McCain. This is why we have primaries.

McCain's own Farrakhan

Well, it's just a few days since Louis Farrakhan endorsed Obama, Obama denounced, Clinton said he needed to renounce, and he did so there. Or something like that.

But certain GOP nominee John McCain has thus far accepted the endorsement of his own religious hate-mongering fan, a guy named John Hagee.

If you haven't heard of him, he's the evangelical spokesman for God's wrath not just against pro-choicers and gays, but Catholics. He's said, among other crazy nonsense, that Catholic school birthed Hitler's hatred toward Jews.

Folks looking for McCain to denounce Hagee include those not-so-flaming-liberals at Catholics United. But so far, McCain says he's happy to have Hagee on board, and frankly he's in a tough spot.

Catholics are critical to any victory, according to Karl Rove, among others. But so are evangelicals, and denouncing this rootin'-for-armageddon pastor would step on their toes.

Imagine the uproar if Obama had accepted Farrakhan's endorsement, and rightly so. He's said lots of crazy, hateful things, and believes those who don't side with him are bound for hell. It would cost him the Democratic nomination.

But McCain can't denounce Hagee, who's also said lots of crazy, hateful things, and believes those who don't side with him are bound for hell. GOP true believers are indeed a different bunch.

Bush, the zero-percenter

0%.

Yes, that's zero-freakin' percent.

That's the entire gain of the stock market, as determined by the S&P 500, from the end of January in 2001 through today. As you try to decide if it's better to put a Republican or Democrat in the White House, consider the simple fact that the market does better under the left.

And more importantly, that today's president -- with a Republican Congress for most of his term -- has the worst stock market return of any chief exec since there was a stock market. Zero. Zip. Nada.

Now, it wouldn't matter so much if I hadn't dutifully put a significant part of my income into my 401(k) every week for years on end, like so many busy American workers, confident the market's historic 8% return would mean a decent retirement fund all day. Skip even a few years, they say, and you lose the magic of compound interest and will end up picking up scraps of aluminum on the highway.

Yet the same thing happens when the market skips a few years. And with most Americans now relying on 401(k)s instead of the quaint notion of working for 40 years to earn a guaranteed pension, it matters a whole lot.

Of course, lots of money was still made on Wall Street in the past few years. By Wall Streeters who got commissions when we bought and sold stocks, for managing those 401(k) contributions, for planning IPO busts, for conjuring up subprime loans and CDOs and lord knows what else.

And that's the reality of investing. As in Las Vegas, the house gets its cut up front. They don't care if we win or lose, only that we keep playing.

Laugh or Cry?

http://www.theonion.com/content/video/diebold_accidentally_leaks

Tracy Flick for president!

If you've seen the movie "Election," you'll be delighted with this video from Slate that compares Reese Witherspoon's obsessions as a school candidate who "works very very hard" with what can only be described as Hilary's recent whining about how Obama is Just. Not. Ready.

Check it out here: http://slatev.com/player.html?id=1377935786

Nader. 'nuff said ...

In theory, there's nothing wrong with a well-meaning American standing up and declaring he or she wants to be president 'cause everyone else who wants the job is a bootyhead.

But we don't live in a theory.

Right now, you cannot win the presidency outside of the two major parties. Anyone who tries is delusional and/or running to make a statement. The parties (which are economic entities unto themselves, as well as conduits for national and international economic interests) control the electoral system.

What it will take for the demolition of the two-party system is not a Ralph Nader or a Pat Buchanana screaming at it from the outside. What it will take is a politician who will seduce the party machine, then once in power, turn around and bite it in the ass. Someone like former California Speaker of the Assembly Willie Brown, who knew how to get things done from the inside. As Willie once said:

"Hey, if you can't take people's money and then screw `em, then you've got no business being in the business."

Pinning a label on Obama

Well, the swift boats have set sail. Seems Barack Obama was once photographed with his hand not over his heart during part of a playing of a national anthem. That, and the fact he doesn't wear a flag pin on his lapel, make him unpatriotic, right?

MSNBC even has some conservative activists saying that the act of hating America by not wearing a pin will stand in sharp contrast to 'war hero' John McCain. An interesting comparison, since some conservative activists have also accused McCain of betraying the country while a POW.

But hey, that's the way these folks are. This will indeed be an interesting race, since -- if the press reports are right -- McCain has done with a lobbyist what they impeached Clinton for.

They'll no doubt find some way to support Old John if he gets the nom. Perhaps it'll be lapel-pin betrayal. Or the sentiments I see today in articles on quiet fears someone will shoot a black president.

The conservatives don't hate Osama because he's a dem, a liberal or a black. They're just worried about his safety.

Reading is not fundamental anymore

So I read in USA Today that the president's budget cuts funding for Reading Is Fundamental. And I cannot figure out why. There's some chatter he wants to privatize it, but this is a cheap program; $25 million sends 16 million books to poor kids. That's wouldn't cover the postage from Amazon, even though a $25 mil order would qualify for super-saver shipping.

Is it one of those programs Republicans just hate for being government? Well, his wife has read for the cause. So has his mom. So apparently not.

I can only conclude this: it's the terrorist menace. The last book the prez read to kids was "My Pet Goat." And the twin towers fell as he did. Probably no connection, but why take a chance.

After all, Saddam wasn't connected to 9/11, either, and Bush cut his funding.

Toot toot, rudy, goodbye

I won't bother with a long farewell to America's mayor, as he wasn't a factor in the presidential race for some time, if at all.

But his rapid descent from front-runner status shows just how out of touch the American media is. Simply the fact that this New York guy had a few good moments during 9/11 didn't make him the mayor of Boise or Dubuque, no matter what the media based in New York and Washington, D.C. said.

And while I've never been a big fan of conspiracy theories about a left-wing media -- I've never gotten even a single check from George Soros, damnit -- it's pretty clear the media leaders have not a clue about the GOP or the religious right.

Sure, the Moral Majority crowd will look the other way at slavery for global business, Abramoff-style corruption or the simple government ineptitude exemplified by Katrina.

But they impeached Bill Clinton for getting a bj, and they'd love to campaign against his wife this fall because he got said bj.

Giuliani is a twice-divorced guy who once left his wife in the mayor's mansion so he could bunk with two gay friends and openly date his mistress. That might make him a good side character on "Will & Grace," but he was not going to be the right wing's standard bearer.

That the media could not recognize this says less about Giuliani's campaign than it does America's out-of-touch media.

United States of Unconsciousness

So apparently there was a "State of the Union" speech by the prez. From what I can tell, here are the high points:

- Everything is fine, it just doesn't look that way.

- You can't judge my decisions until I leave office, by which time you will blame my successor.

Carry on ...

Score! $1,500 citizen bucks

Predictably, Congress has upped the president and I'm counting $1,200 for being a tax-paying working couple and another $300 for the kiddo.

That's $1,500 just for agreeing to not holding the souring economy against the president or congress, and looking the other way at the no doubt much larger giveaways to business. (The Wall Steet Journal's lengthy article on the givebacks devotes about four sentences to this part of the fine print. Who says we won't get fooled again?)

What a deal. If Jimmy Carter had thought of this, he'd have gotten re-elected.

Ah well. We're all welfare cases now. I know they call it a rebate, but most of the people getting cut check either didn't pay taxes or didn't pay that much in taxes. Who needs bread and circuses when we have gov'ment checks?

Don't blame Canada for this!

I'm heading north to Canada in a few weeks, which always gets me thinking about just how far we've fallen and how gullible we are.

The government and the Fed always churn out numbers saying inflation hasn't robbed us hardly at all, and the media dutifully reports the numbers. By now, we probably all know how they mess with things -- for example, excluding "volatile" prices like what we pay for gas and food. I mean, shoot, it's not like you have to buy those things. Wait for the price to drop.

But cross a border and you see just how little you get for a buck these days.

My regular trips to the Great White North started right about the time GW took office. For five George Washingtons you could get more Canadian dollars than you could stuff into your wallet. You were greeted at the border with a necklace of wadded-up Canadian bills, placed around your neck like a Hawaiian lei.

College boys fled there on weekends because, well, the drinking age is somewhere around 15, and waving a US hundred-dollar bill in a bar there attracted almost as many local women as it would in a bar in Bangkok. That they called their dollar the loonie pretty much said it all.

These days, the tides have turned. The loonie kicks George Washington's butt. A hotel room that used to go for $100 US goes for twice that. Instead of American shoppers going there for bargains, they come here. What used to be a $20 Cuban cigar goes for $40, hardly worth the effort of smuggling it across the border.

And this has been policy. The Bushies have spent years trying to make the greenback less valuable, on the logic that that it helps US business. Smaller dollars must be easier to stuff into offshore accounts in the Caymans when CEOs are trying to avoid US taxes.

Canadian wages are rising faster than ours, too. And they get health care for their tax dollars; we get Iraq. If this keeps up, I swear, Washington state will soon be Canada's version of Tijuana. They'll come her to get plastered, win our women with their hard currency, then flee across the border before the police close in.

Before you know it, mounted bands of Canucks will be policing their border while pressuring their government to build a wall and stop illegal aliens from stealing their jobs.

After all, they can pay US migrants in cheap little dollars. Canadians won't work for those things.

These are a Few of My Least Favorite Things

Congress.
Steroids.
Baseball.

BORING!!!

Maybe part of the problem is not that professional baseball players use performance-enhancing drugs. Like I care - personally, I'd like to see the All-Drug World Series, where pitchers throw 270 mph fastballs and batters hit 500-yard home runs.

Maybe part of the problem is that, in light of everything else they should be doing, our representatives have decided to spend time doing this.

Rubbin' is Racin'

So I've read yet another "poll" story about the presidential race. I know the candidates have posted position papers and statements on their web sites. Would it be too much to ask our "daily" media to talk about that stuff occasionally?

Actually, it would. Positions tend to stay stable - "on message" is the term. Daily "news" can be defined as "what is different than yesterday." Therefore, the different, no matter how trivial, takes precedence over further analysis of what we already "know."

Besides, each candidate has an economic plan they say will work. They've each got a mountain of experts who say the plan will work. I'm supposed to trust a journalist who went into journalism because "there's no math in it" to tell me which of the competing economic proposals has the best shot at working?

We're so screwed.

I get students who are from other countries from time to time, and they tend to monopolize my classroom discussions about U.S. journalism. As one woman exclaimed this week, "You've given up the right to have any real information from the news!"

"Yeah," I told her. "But at least we all know who's banging Jennifer Aniston."

where's my dang check already?

yea, I only posted a moment or two ago. but I have to add this.

Hank Paulson, the president's money man, says in a press conference the economy is strong, they just want it to stay that way. Hang on a minute. Japan's economy was in the tank for a decade, and no one got checks. Are we the most spoiled nation ever?

I'm hoping for a full blown recession. Then maybe they'll send 16 grand.

Rather than point this out, the next question from the press was "what americans really want to know is, when do we get our checks?"

I am so proud to be a member of a thoughtful, analytical media.

Uncle Sam wants you -- to take $1,600

Who says government never solves problems? My problem lately has been trying to convince my wife we need a 42" plasma. The $1,600 the president and his minions want to give every American family to buy our way out of recession should just about cover it.

Of course, it'll likely be made overseas and the only American economy stimulated will be a commission to some guy at Best Buy. But I digress.

The story so far....

The big banks came up with clever schemes to loan money to people without a prayer of ever paying it back, and then resell those loans like they were as secure as lending a five-spot to Bill Gates. (ie, they schemed.)

Those loans were used by a bunch of would-be yuppies to buy minimansions they couldn't afford but, hey, figured they could get better loans before they really had to make the payments. (ie, they schemed.)

So now, the pyramid scheme is falling apart and we, as taxpayers, are going to have to refund all these schemes so the banks can keep their profits and the yuppies can keep their houses.

Can I get a deal like that? Say, I'll rent a private jet, dash off to Vegas, drop a bundle on a suite at the Bellagio, pick up drinks for the crowd at the Palms, all the while banking on the grand I drop onto 33 black to pay for it all. And when it doesn't happen, I'll call on you to bail me out. You're good for it, right?

Notgonnahappen. But the bankers are too big to fail, and the yuppies will keep their houses -- mind you, the plan isn't to bail out the poor who can't pay, just those sacrificing their third car to keep their payments current. At our cost.

So I suppose to keep us happy, the Shopper in Chief wants to cut us a check. Shopping seems to be the Bush economic plan. Remember how, after 9/11, he called on the nation to sacrifice for the war effort by going shopping? Terrorists on the horizon: charge!

Of course, this still has to go through Congress, which will try to muck it up. The Democrats will only want to send money to the poor. Republicans would rather see tax cuts for the very rich. They'll fret about the deficit. You know. Blah blah blah.

Since Reagan took office, we've already borrowed more than my generation can ever pay in taxes. Or the next generation. Or the next generation. We're no longer stealing from our kids. We're stealing from creatures that, after a dozen more decades of evolution, probably aren't even recognizably human.

So let 'em do what they want. Long as my piece of the latest economic plan gets HD and has an anti-glare screen.

A nation of mumbling idiots

This is a disturbing phenomenon: Untold numbers of Americans bumbling and mumbling about the hallways of American barely attentive and apparently talking to one another, with only an electronic paper clip on one ear to suggest they're actually on a phone call.



If they are. Really, how do we know. You could slap a bluetooth onto your average schizophrenic, clear out the asylums and who would know.



I'm getting tired of turning around to answer because someone's talking to me, and they're actually talking to their broker about a leveraged buyout. If Sir Edmund Hillary (rest his soul) had conquered Everest these days, he'd probably have done it while gabbing online about the 20-pack wool sock deal he just scored at Costoco.



Inevitably, you get a "how dare you listen" look when you turn. Honey, I didn't want to know about your yeast infection, don't stare at me because you made me listen.



We've all chuckled at TV from the Mideast where there's always a crowd yelling "lalalololalolalalololalala." A videotape from the average Pentacostal church tongues session would be just as silly to anyone who isn't in the spirit.



Imagine, though, how the world laughs when it sees video of Christmas shopping in America and see hundreds of people with blue glowing ears babbling away to anyone but each other?

Laugh or Cry?

This is the kind of thing that makes me afraid to even try to write fiction. Basically, we've got two things happening here:

- An intelligence community that's incapable of doing what most working stiffs in the country do, which is paying bills on time; and ...
- A corporation mindset that's willing to cut off the wiretaps that allegedly keep us "safe" from terrorists because, well, the "safety" of Americans is one thing, but screw that if they aren't getting paid ...

And I'm supposed to trust the intelligence community to keep me safe, and Corporate America to do the right thing for my welfare. Uh, yeah ...

FBI Wiretaps Dropped Due to Unpaid Bills
By LARA JAKES JORDAN – 5 hours ago
WASHINGTON (AP) — Telephone companies have cut off FBI wiretaps used to eavesdrop on suspected criminals because of the bureau's repeated failures to pay phone bills on time.

A Justice Department audit released Thursday blamed the lost connections on the FBI's lax oversight of money used in undercover investigations. In one office alone, unpaid costs for wiretaps from one phone company totaled $66,000.

In at least one case, a wiretap used in a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act investigation "was halted due to untimely payment," the audit found. FISA wiretaps are used in the government's most sensitive and secretive criminal and intelligence investigations, and allow eavesdropping on suspected terrorists or spies.

John McCain, agent of wrong changes

I just heard the senator proclaim on tv he's been an agent of change for 35 years.

Sorry, but if you've been bringing the changes we've seen since the 1980s began, you're actually an agent of the changes that got us into this mess.

Now, I respect him as a former POW. But as a Reaganaut, you're one of the people who made the country believe you could have all the goodies and tax cuts, too. You made our motto, ask not what you can do for our country, ask what our country can give you on our grandkids' dime.

You're an agent of the changes we need to reverse.

Hillary's best move: Dump Bill

Okay, this isn't PC, but I'll say it. If Hillary wants me to believe she's a woman who can run the country, she needs to dump Bill.

And not just because the White House makes women hot, and I worry about what he'll do there with even more time on his hands.

Hillary Clinton wants to be the first woman president from a generation that taught us females could be fierce, independent equals capable of leading a company, a state or a nation. Yet she let herself be cheated on and publicly humiliated just to hold onto her man.

She's been just as a much a doormat when it comes to giving GW permission to invade Iraq, and then Iran. She seems to be simply blind to what men do -- be it with interns and cigars or troops and waterboards.

I mean, if Bill and Hill weren't rich and running for office, they could be the average couple on Jerry Springer. Bill would be the guy who fails the lie detector test and the paternity tests and still insists he didn't sleep with either of those women. And Hill would be the sadsack who says "Aww, maybe not. And I know he still loves me down deep."

Now, I know her excuse is that she had to stay for the kid. Maybe that was true in Arkansas, but by the White House years, Chelsea wasn't going to have to grow up without a father. She was pretty much what she was going to be -- a smart, independent woman who I'll bet wouldn't put up with such crap from any man.

But Hillary, despite her education and experience, is still at heart the marginally attractive girl in coke-bottle glasses who'll do about anything to get a man and take just about anything to keep him. Pretty much like a Monica or a Paula with a law degree.

What's going to happen when a Republican politician like former footballer Steve Largent meets her, say, in the Senate and says "Hon, I can't buy this health care thing, but I would like to buy your purty self a steak." Will she play hardball, or bend over backwards to keep his attention?

And as we've all seen Russian hunk and modern czar Vlad Putin without his shirt, I have to wonder if Hillary won't be too forgiving if he says he "cheated, but only a little" on some arms treaty. "I did not sell nukes with that country, Iran."

I mean, there are women in politics who could stand up to any man. Nancy Pelosi could emasculate the whole field of Republican presidential contenders in one fell swoop. Anne Coulter is colder than Putin's best vodka.

Sorry, but the first woman president should not be a doormat.

The dictatorship of Dixville Notch

Well, we're just a couple days now from the incredibly compressed primary season of 2008. Votes get cast on Thursday and the nominations will be wrapped by the end of February and before any sane people even start paying attention to who'll be the next president. (My whole sane state of Washington won't even bother until much too late.)

The candidates themselves will have nothing to do for eight months or so other than courting big money and polishing their attack ads, neither of which is something I want my next president spending that much time on. We either need to lock them up in cells for the next few months or move the national vote to March (which, unfortunately, seems more likely.)

Another cycle or two, and they'll have it down to something I predicted years ago -- the dictatorship of Dixville Notch.

That's the tiny New Hampshire village where a handful of people vie to be the first to vote, and release those votes, on primary night. Voting first, of course, gives the Granite State more clout than it deserves, and you have to think Dixville has the most clout at all.

So compress things a little more, and I see it something like this:

Jan. 1, 12:01 a.m. -- On New Hampshire's primary day, Dixville release its votes even as the ball drops in Time Square. Surprise! Mayor Jenna Bush, a recent emigre to the burg, is the clear winner.

6:01 a.m. -- As most New Hampshirites go the the polls, CBS and NBC based on Dixville data declare the statewide race for mayor Jenna.

7:23 a.m. -- Iowa's coffee caucuses swing Bush's way after Katie Couric announces a 'nationwide tide' in her favor. The 18 other Republicans in the primary all concede the nationwide race.

12:01 p.m. -- Voters head to the polls in 21 other states as 'Super Noontime' kicks in. With Jenna a lock, most grab a Democratic ballot and write her in as well.

1:43 p.m. -- ABC and Fox, stung by their delayed call on New Hampshire, declare the nationwide race for Jenna.

2:12 p.m. -- With 0.00071% of votes cast, Democrat Lyndsay Lohan becomes the first candidate from her party to concede, saying "OK, I'll do spring break instead." By 2:30, all Democrats but Dick Gephardt have declared "What's the point?" And he never wins anything.

Thus by the end of primary day one, the election will be wrapped up. It'll be over before most Americans have a day. We'll be like Pakistan without the assassinations.

Which doesn't mean candidates will stop courting the key voters. Four years later, all 37 Dixville residents will have passed Bill Gates on the list of wealthiest Americans.