5/30/2008:   In his new book, "What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception," Scott McClellan says President Bush told him he had authorized the leaking of Plame Wilson's identity to the press, and in response to Rep. Robert Wexler's suggestion that McClellan be subpoenaed to testify in front of Congress under oath, McClellan welcomed the opportunity.

Wait... did you hear a great big "boom"? Y'know, like a bombshell being dropped on the head of an evil administration?

So I wonder if Nancy Pelosi will try to save both her career and her legacy by putting impeachment back on the table? Nah, probably not... It's too late now anyway. She'd have to impeach both Bush and Cheney in order to do less damage rather than more, and by the time it was over, we'd have a new president anyway. No, I think the window of opportunity for her to do the right thing closed sometime last year. But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Nancy "Spineless Chicken" Pelosi will surprise us all...

5/29/2008:   "They're not being nice to the Dalai Lama, who is a friend of mine. And then all of this earthquake and all this happened and I thought, is that karma? When you're not nice, that bad things happen to you?"

And with that statement at the Cannes Film Festival, Sharon clarified whether she bears any resemblance at all to fundie whack jobs that say that New Orleans "deserved" Katrina, or U.S. soldiers "deserve" to die in Iraq, or people "deserve" to die of AIDS. She also proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that the only words she should speak publicly are those that have been written down for her by someone with intelligence.

Y'know what? China is a impressively huge country with monumental solidarity, crushing nationalism, and an oppressive, iron-fisted government. They abuse anyone within their borders that don't conform. They commit human rights abuses as a matter of standard policy. They're rightfully a little scary to the rest the world. But to claim that some higher force bitch-slapped gave them some kind of comeuppance by killing tens of thousands of people with that massive earthquake is just two-bricks-shy-of-a-bridge stupid.

I'll bet even Richard Gere is cringing on this one.

5/29/2008:   Nancy Pelosi said that she might step in and settle the matter of the Democratic nomination.

Well isn't that nice. She took impeachment of the worst president in U.S. history, a liar, a traitor, a warmonger, off the table, but she's ready to flex her muscle where it isn't needed. I understand Howard Dean is the head of the DNC, he's already handling the situation under the rules, and I doubt he appreciates Nancy's interference.

So now, not only is she a do-nothing Congressman, she's taking credit for things she has no real control over. On a hunt, she'd be the one that would put her foot on the head of the lion killed by the guide and have her picture taken holding a huge double-barrelled gun she can hardly lift. And when she got back home, she'd regale everyone with stories of tracking the brute beast through the tall grasses of Africa...

5/29/2008:   Clinton's latest political ad states: "She's the only one in this campaign who voted against the Bush energy bill against six billion dollars to the oil companies, the only one taking on the insurance companies to guarantee health coverage for every American and she's the one who'll end fifty five billion dollars in giveaways to corporate special interests and cut taxes for the middle class instead."

Energy bill: No, she wasn't the only one to vote against the energy bill. She's saying she's the only one that voted against it *because* of blah, blah, blah. So now she's trying to convince you that she not only opposes graft, she's a mind reader. How nice. Unlikely, though.

Insurance companies: Yes, she has a record of attempting to rectify the problems with health care coverage that plague those that can't afford insurance. No, she's not the only one with a plan for covering everyone. Simply not true. Obama's got his own flavor of universal healthcare coverage that differs only slightly from hers. McCain, on the other hand, wants private accounts, which is the same as forcing insurance on people. They still can't afford it, but now they have to pay anyway? Same old Bush policies, as with everything McSame stands for.

Corporate welfare: This is what burned me, though. She says she'll cut subsidies and tax loopholes for corporations, but she has also said she'd throw out the H1B visa cap on hiring skilled foreign workers. In other words, "Hey guys, I'm going to have to cut off the direct deposits into your bank accounts, but you can make it up by firing all the Americans you're using and hiring foreign workers locally. You don't even have to offshore! Yeah, okay, the middle class will get tax cuts, but they'll shrink to zero anyway when they can't get jobs! The government will still get its money, you'll still get your money, and the middle class will continue going broke exactly the way it has been doing under Bush! Aren't you excited?!"

5/23/2008:   Obama said in his speech in Grand Rapids, at the event where John Edwards gave Obama his endorsement, that, "We haven't been going after [Al Qaeda]... because we've been distracted."

No, sir. "We" have not been distracted. In fact, I'd be willing to bet that if you ask a person, point blank, were you distracted, I think you'd find that most people would not say they were distracted. They would say they were misled, lied to, defrauded, betrayed, but "distracted"? No, I don't think that's how they would describe themselves.

Don't waste time handling Bush with kid gloves. There's really no need, and calling the American people distracted is just insulting.

5/23/2008:   There was debate on the 'net today about who Obama might pick as VP, and someone actually suggested Nancy Pelosi. I nearly spit coffee all over my monitor.

The VP spot will not go to Pelosi. She marked herself as a do-nothing Democrat when she took impeachment off the table. It could be Clinton, but only because she has such a huge following now, and the Clinton's have such huge clout, that melding the two into one ticket would create a machine that would roll over McCain handily. But they'd both have to swallow their pride and make publicly nice before anyone would buy it, and even then, upon close examination, it would just doesn't sound like a good match. Clinton has really dirtied herself during this campaign, and Obama would share the taint. What about Feinstein? Stabenow? Mikulski? Landrieu? If you want a woman on the ticket, there are other experienced, intelligent, driven, powerful women that would each have a multitude of skills that would make them fine additions to any cabinet and who could be groomed to run for election when Obama's second term is completed.

Some argue that picking a woman VP will seem like pandering. I think there's a greater danger of making his claims of change ring false if he locks women out of another presidential election. The benefits of picking a woman running mate are absolutely huge, and the stands to gain little by picking a man. Someone said that Richards was a good bet, and I'd agree, based solely on the minority vote. But again, if Obama picks a qualified woman, he's a shoo-in.

5/23/2008:   So do you think Barney Frank ever calls up Larry Craig and just sort of laughs into the phone?

5/22/2008:   McCain, dropping his 100 year war prediction like a hot rock, decided to pick a year -- albeit no specific day, month, or even quarter -- after the next four year presidential term, as the year he thinks he can extract our troops from Iraq.

What crap. He didn't say how he'd do it. He didn't propose a phased approach, or suggest what our involvement would be with Iraq after that point, or how he would stabilize that region when he refuses to talk to the nations that neighbor Iraq. He just picked a year that would allow him the next president

5/22/2008:   John McCain, never one to back away from his prejudices, looked Ellen Degeneres in the eye on national television and said he wished her well, but was going to continue to see her as a second class citizen.

50 years ago, you'd have thought I was talking about segregation and black people mixing with white people in public institutions. Today it was about segregation and same-gender couples getting married.

I can remember as a kid seeing a mixed race couple for the first time. I was shocked. Not in a bad way, but I had just never seen that before. It was a black man and a white woman, holding hands and walking down the street. I think I even pointed it out to my Mom. Now, it's not something I even think twice about, and if I do, it's to kind of chuckle about that first reaction so long ago.

I have no doubt that, given the time that he grew up in, John McCain probably started out with a certain amount of racial prejudice. I'm assuming that he has long since gotten over that, gotten it out of his system, and grown to be a better man as a result. Yet homosexual marriage is not something he's willing to give in on. He bases his argument on religion, but back in the day there were plenty of people that swore up and down that the Bible precluded the mixing of races.

Ellen handled his crusty determination to not give in with grace and humor, but as he's telling her, point blank, that he doesn't support her right to live her life with the same rights as everyone else, you could almost see the frustration and hurt in her eyes. "There is this old way of thinking that we are not all the same. We are all the same people, all of us; you're no different than I am, our love is the same... [applause]..." Y'know, I'll be glad when the old people that feel the way John McCain does all die off. Sometimes that's what it takes; for the hate to die off to let the new generation live free.

And yeah, he looked uncomfortable, and damned well he should. Stupid old bastard.

Who cares if he's a war hero? He's a day-to-day coward. A real American would want to protect the rights of law abiding adults to join in consenting, loving, long-term, binding relationships. And a real man would stand up for what's right. And a president should be a real man (or real woman), and a leader in all things.

5/22/2008:   Principal or Irmo High School, Eddie Walker was ordered to allow the formation of a Gay And Lesbian Association club. Rather than do that, he resigned, citing his professional and religious beliefs.

Of course, that's crap. Let's not let professionalism get the in the way of treating other people with un-Christian-like disdain and even hatred. GALA clubs give gay and lesbian young adults the chance to feel accepted and understood, and this "man's" interpretation of his religious tradition is a metric formed to allow him to treat icky gays badly. I'll bet every time he sees a gay student, his butt puckers so hard and fast it squeaks. If he was really a professional and cared about the students, he wouldn't be judgemental about their sexual orientations. No, let's put the blame where it belongs: on the "man" himself.

Of course, ignorance rarely lacks for company. One parent, Brendia Enoch, went on record with, "We're not putting them like, 'Ugh, you know, you're lepers,' but we got to stand for what our foundation of our nation was all about." She isn't terribly eloquent, but she does a fine job of communicating her prejudice and ignorance. I feel bad for her kids, having a mother like that, I really do. Brendia honestly thinks this nation was founded to be a Christian nation, not a religiously free nation. It's a critical failing in our school system that we let people exit it with this delusion.

"It's a shame that the principal at Irmo High School in South Carolina decided to place religion-based bigotry and discrimination over his former commitment to his students and staff," said Executive Director Brent Childers.

Yup. Pretty much.

5/21/2008:   Following Chuck Hagel's scathing comments about McCain, Rudy Guiliani crawled out from under a rock and lisped his way through the Limbaugh speaking points on CNN, bashing Hillary and Barack. Flag lapel pin shined up and firmly in view, he regurgitated the falsism that Obama wants to meet with terrorist states "without preconditions." When asked what a precondition is, he stuttered a bit and then said, "Well, it's the opposite of what Obama wants."

Uh huh. Well. That just cleared that right up, didn't it? You ask a moronic GOP puppet to define one of his talking points, and he can't do it. Kind of rips away the mask of intelligence and exposes the rank stupidity underneath, doesn't it?

And before he was done, he made sure to get in the "inexperience" spin, trying to make Clinton, the GOP pick for Democratic nominee based on her polarizing effect on the electorate, seem like a better choice than Obama.

If Guiliani is the best McCain's got, November is a done deal. Might as well save everyone a lot of money and aggravation and just concede the race now.

One last swing: Guiliani maintained during the interview that George Bush hasn't been given a fair shake, and that he will be viewed very differently in the history books. Even when asked point blank about Iraq and reminded that Iraq wasn't waged to fight terrorism, he accused the interviewer of injecting her own opinions and argued that we are not only safer because of the Iraq War, but that we are, right now, succeeding at... who knows?... and it's making John McCain look really good right now. He even had the gall to take credit for being one of the first, along with McCain, to predict that destabilization of Iraq would lead to a civil war.

Hey Rudy: Don't be an ass. George Bush is the worst president in history, bar none, and all the major non-partisan-paid historians agree on this. The Iraq War has exploded the number of terrorists with us as their primary goal, swelled the ranks of Al Qaeda, and been the biggest military and foreign policy in U.S. history. And your comment about recognizing the possiblity of civil war in Iraq was a damned lie. You were right there with McCain spewing the crap about how we'd be hailed as liberators, you damned liar, while the real Middle East experts were screaming at us to not go into Iraq because it would completely melt down once Saddam was deposed. So bite me.

5/20/2008:   Vito Fossella Jr., Republican member of the House of Representatives running for a seventh term, has joined the ranks of perverts and freaks that make up the reining members of the GOP. Found out when his lover and mother of his bastard child, Laura Fay, bailed him out of jail for DUI, the story grew legs less than three weeks later he was bailing out again, this time from the election, to "concentrate on healing the wounds" that getting busted has caused his wife, Mary, and their three children.

Of course, that wasn't his immediate position. Being a Newt Gingrich"Contract On America" Republican, he desired power for power's sake and, once he had his greasy fingers on it a little thing like shredded dignity or exposed lack of character weren't going to shake him lose, oh no. He was going to press on. His family would either be there with him or not. But then it became clear that he'd lost all political currency and that his reelection prospects had completely evaporated, well, then it was okay to dedicate all the spare time he was obviously going to have into trying to make sure he didn't lose everything. So now he's probably in therapy and counseling and rehab and whatever else it would take to convince one's wife that you're not a complete frikkin' lost cause.

His mistress had a baby, for cryin' out loud, that he never bothered to mention to his wife, but he's going to try to "heal the wounds"?! Are you kidding me?!

This jackass is really getting to me, not on his own, but as only the latest straw testing the spinal integrity of the camel of public credulity. Why is it always Republicans that are doing this crap. Yeah, I know, Bill Clinton blah blah blah. But in the last year it's like the GOP has imploded, and it suggests a trend, a personality type, that seems to collect under the red banner.

I detect a direct correlation between the self-centered elitist attitudes of the GOP towards the Democrats and even their own constituents and the way they abuse the trust of their wives. Everyone, even their own families, mean nothing to them. Does George Bush really love his kids? I doubt it, or global warming, utterly bankrupting the nation for decades to come, a broken education system, the rape of our natural resources, the wholesale loss of our reputation, the sale of our ethical and moral standing, the Frankenstein monster that the military has become, the repeated violations of the constitution, the erasure of the checks and balances between the branches -- all these things would bother him at least a little. But they don't. He sings the song and dances the dance that distracts and deludes and entrances the public while, behind him, his elitist corporate buddies engorge themselves on the treasure of our nation.

Whew... slowing down... gotta watch the ole ticker...

5/19/2008:   Alright, dang it, I'm tired of waiting for one of our candidates to suggest the bleeding obvious, so I'll do it. I didn't want to take credit for this idea; I wanted, frankly, to see Obama slam McCain to the mat with it during their first debate, but here goes.

As I write this, the ratio of ground troops to "security contractors" (read "mercenaries") is one to one. I would inform the Iraqi government, which is making billions off oil and not paying a single dime for their reconstruction or even our ongoing presence there, that we'll be starting a phased pull-out immediately, and that we highly recommend that they retain the services of Halliburton, Blackwater, and all the other private "security" firms that we've been utilizing while in Iraq.

We don't need to wait for them to stand up. They don't need to build an army. There's a private one already working for them. Our underpaid, under-equipped troops do not need to spend another minute in harm's way. They have more than done their jobs, and they are long overdue to come home. The Iraqi government needs to be put in the position of survival, and they can put their vast monetary resources towards rebuilding their own country now.

We turn over our contracts with Blackwater to the Iraqi government, sell some of our ground equipment to Blackwater at bargain prices, rent out our facilities, like the "Green Zone," to Blackwater at a reasonable per month rate -- in other words, we sell off our stake in the war business in Iraq and get out. The shorter the time frame, the more likely the Iraqi government will play nice and hire Blackwater, especially if we pre-emptively freeze their international assets until we're gone.

Iraq is happy: no more occupation.

The U.S. is happy: a fraudulent war is brought to an end, trillions in forecasted expenditures averted, and a small revenue stream leasing our facilities to Blackwater.

Blackwater is happy: lots of new toys and a new multi-billion dollar a year contract with no foreseeable end.

You're welcome.

5/19/2008:   Yesterday, 75,000+ people showed up to an outdoor Obama rally.

75,000.

We have rock concerts at Shoreline that don't pull that many people. The aerial view showed a sea of people fanning themselves in the heat waiting for a glimpse of the most important candidate in U.S. history.

Can you say, "Rock Star?"

5/19/2008:   Obama fired a heater across the bow of the GOP: "Lay off my wife." Tired of hearing her lambasted for her "proud of America" remark, he has decided to draw a line in the sand and tell the mud-slinging kings of negative campaigning and Swift-boating to find a different target. He made it crystal clear that his family was not to be grist for the political mill.

Amen, brother!

I think that, given Cindy McCain's past, they'd better get smart and change the topic.

5/19/2008:   Huckabee, the failed presidential candidate and right wing whack job nominee, has said he'd accept an invitation from McCain to be his Vice Presidential candidate.

Well wouldn't that just complete that ticket? McCain, the fearmongering, warmongering, admitted economics idiot and domestic issues dolt coupling with the Bible thumping, science-rejecting, gay-bashing, second amendment fundie. Yeah, they should be able to mop up every last one of the people that aren't yet ashamed that they voted for Bush in 2004.

Oh brother...

5/19/2008:   Not only is Ferraro a bit racist, but now that it's clear that a woman will not be getting the Democratic nomination, she's going to take her ball and go home. She'll show all us other Democrats, and especially that big mean Obama bully, that being black will never trump having ovaries. She has said outright that she will not vote for Obama because Hillary didn't get the nomination. Which is like saying that the sanctity of our constitution, the lives of our soldiers, and the future of our grandchildren all mean nothing next to having a president that can get away with wearing makeup and a dress in front of the press.

So you can add "coming out as a sexist" to her list of recent accomplishments.

Mrs. Ferraro, get over yourself.

5/18/2008:   Yesterday, George Bush urged Arab leaders to give their people more rights.

This from the man that has spent his entire tenure in office trampling the rights of his people, violating any law that got in the way of his vision of supremacy.

So after I stopped laughing, it occurred to me that Bush sounds like the wolf advising the fox, "I prefer to fatten up the sheep first..."

5/18/2008:   There was an online poll today asking people if they thought halting shipments to the U.S. oil reserve would affect oil prices.

Of course not. That's stupid.

People, the point of halting shipments was so the country would stop buying oil at its most expensive price in history. The idea being that summer prices are always high, and that the oil reserve is there for emergencies, not price fixing.

Look, if you want to fix oil prices, here's how you do it:

Yeah, that's pretty draconian, but it's a plan that would snap the gas of price back down to about $2.50 a gallon and would give us the missing hydrogen fuel cell and solar power infrastructure by the end of next year.

Look, this mess we're in is what you get when you let the oil companies set your fuel and emissions standards the way Cheney did. I think the fix should hurt the oil companies as much as the problem has hurt the U.S. consumer.

5/16/2008:   Yesterday the California Supreme Court handed down its decision that the same sex marriage ban passed a few years ago violates the state's constitution.

Foaming-at-the-mouth neocon right wing whackjobs immediately starting screaming, "Activist judges!" all over the AM dial. For those of you that are new to the political pundit cycle, "activist judge" is code for "a judge that adheres to the law and subsequently makes decisions I don't agree with." See, the court is, contrary to religious whackjob opinions, not supposed to make the laws based on the Bible. It's job is three-fold: to interpret the law, to decide on the constitutionality of the law, and to determine penalties for violation of the law per the law violated. Simple.

Yesterday the California Supreme Court, guided by the text of the California constitution, overturned the same-sex marriage ban as an illegal form of discrimination. Specifically, drawing from my personal copy of the California constitution:

The way I see it, the ONLY part of this that draws the whole thing into question would be the word "licentious." According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary:

Correctness not being a definable legal term, we'll center on disregard for sexual restraints, and gay sex between consenting adults is not currently recognized in California as in violation of moral codes or, in and of itself, outside the bounds of sexual restraint.

So.

Ann Coulter can kiss my butt. So can Rush Limbaugh and Michael Savage. No, scratch that -- Michael Savage's special brand of crass stupidity has to have an organic component of some kind, I'm sure, so just in case he's contagious, I'll pass on his bouche de mi cul.

Homosexuals in California, according to the state constitution, have the same rights as heterosexuals. Period. End of story. Have a nice day you religous whackjobs.

5/14/2008:   No. Not just no, but Hell No.

I just watched some pundits on CNN saying that the delegates for Michigan and Florida will be seated at the Democratic national convention. Why in the world would they do that? Obama has steamrolled Hillary in the popular vote, he's wrested away the superdelegates, and he's created a commanding lead. The rules were proposed and passed by the DNC leadership to bar Michigan and Florida if they went ahead with early primaries. They violated those rules, knowing what would result. Obama wasn't on the ballot at all in Michigan, and he did not campaign in Florida. The results, therefore, are skewed at best, not representative at a minimum. There is no good reason to reinstate those primary results.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: If those primaries are reinstated, if the delegates from those states are seated, if Hillary wins based on the violation of the rules, I will support her through the 2008 election, and then I'm dropping my membership in the Democratic Party. I will join any party that forms to fight them, and I will do whatever I can to ensure that the Democratic Party falls. I will fight them, I will punish them, I will never forgive them.

Heck, I'll start a new party myself.

Do not throw out the rules. Follow the will of the people. Keep the election fair.

5/14/2008:   Can I just say that, regardless of whether you think Hillary should have the nomination for Democratic candidate for president, you have to be impressed with Chelsea. She gives off a cement-strong persona; a quiet, level-headed confidence and intelligence that is her own. She doesn't remind me of either Bill or Hillary. She is uniquely radiant.

What makes her more impressive is the dichotomy between her experiences and the influence they've had on her. Growing up in the White House has given her that unique experience, but hasn't given her an air of entitlement or privilege. Living with the embarrassment and dishonor of her father's philandering, she holds her head high and deflects references to it, gently at first but with increasing disdain for the crassly determined. She bears the name and genes the of the most powerful couple in politics, but she does not come across as elitist.

If she continues to maintain her individuality and class, should she choose to enter politics, she would certainly be a welcome addition.

There were never any WMDs in Iraq.
No links to Al Qaeda.
No ties to 9/11.
Bush, Cheney, and Condie lied to you.
You ignored the facts.
You re-elected a liar and a murderer by proxy.
But now it's time to show your support for the troops.

5/9/2008:  

5/9/2008:   Anyone remember Katherine Harris, the scumbag that helped defraud Florida voters and then obstructed recount attempts until Bush could run his case up to the Supreme Court to have the election called? Remember how she lost her completely pathetic bid for U.S. Senate?

Yeah, me too.

Hey Katherine Harris! You're a loser!

Couldn't have happened to a better person.

5/7/2008:   Today, a company called Embarcadero Technologies bought CodeGear from Borland for $23M. And all I can say is, you have got to be frikkin' kidding… This sounds to me like final nail in Borland's coffin. Borland had become a company just dying to be killed off. What curse was it that made a company with such technological strength try so hard to screw up as often and reliably as possible? They screwed up every other release of Delphi, changed their name from the most recognized name in PC computing to "Inprise," finally changed it back, then let Delphi languish, eventually picked it up and dusted it off enough to release several half-assed versions, then finally spun off the core business as a separate company, and now they've sold that off.

Imagine Jaguar selling off their car line to, oh I don't... some *really* godawful crap car company... let's say Ford... What would Jaguar be after that? It wouldn't be Jaguar, would it? What would be the purpose of leaving the name on it? The name and reputation would go with the cars, and unless the crap car company managed to maintain the quality of Jaguar, they'd end up killing off the line.

Oh, wait...

Anyway: Borland, the company that managed at long last to puke itself out of its own skin. Rest in peace.

5/7/2008:   Mrs. Clinton, with all due respect, it's time to stop. Stop wasting time and money on a nomination you can't win. Stop beating up a candidate we need to badly. For love of your country and your people, end your campaign and turn the reins of your party over to Obama. Throw your support and considerable clout behind the candidate the majority of the people in your party have chosen. Urge your supporters to stand strong behind the man that can stop the evil that the GOP has become.

Please.

5/2/2008:   A while back John McCain took Wolf Blitzer of CNN to task, telling him he needed to "catch up" on the situation in Baghdad, saying that there were neighborhoods that an American could walk through unprotected, and that General "Betray Us" Petraeus regularly traveled around Baghdad, unescorted in an unarmored Humvee. Wolf next turned the show over to CNN's correspondent in Baghdad, Michael Ware, who had been there for four years. Mr. Ware ripped McCain a new one about how off base and disconnected from reality he was, that Baghdad was incredibly dangerous, that there were no neighborhoods that were even remotely safe, and went so far as to say that McCain's credibility had been "hung out to dry." He related how military personnel, when told of McCain's description, said that "there was laughter all the way down the line."

That was months ago, and yet McCain is no better equiped to handle the situation in Iraq in a realistic fashion than he was then. Unless you want McCain to deliver on his promise to have the U.S. fully engaged in Iraq for the next 100 years, you need to send him packing.

And he's not just out of touch with the war, he's out of the touch about everything here at home:

5/2/2008:   Shirley Golub is body slamming Nancy Pelosi over and over, and rightfully, for taking impeachment off the table, for failing to hold Bush accountable, for failing to do anything effective about Iraq, and for failing, utterly, to live up to the mandate that put the Democratic Party in control of Congress. Ms. Golub is running specifically against Nancy Pelosi, and the Democratic Party needs that slap in the face. Here's Ms. Golub's latest volley:

Yeah, it's a bit low budget and amateurish, but y'know what? That spot is dead on. I didn't ask the Democratic Party to stand by and let Bush get away with his crimes. I was pissed off and I didn't want to take it anymore. I wanted my elected representatives to win, to take office, to take over, to take the mantle of presidency from Bush's shoulders, and to take his liberty away as he sat in jail.

And what did I get instead? A RUBBER CHICKEN! 'Nuff said.

5/2/2008:   Bush's job disapproval rating set the record this week at 70%. That's 70% of Americans that think that Bush's policies and achievements suck. Bush is a larger than life moron with a smaller than life regard for America and everything American, especially the American people.

So why would you put a man that is a slightly faded mimeograph of Bush back in the White House?

5/2/2008:   Okay, so that this doesn't get lost, I'll say it first: I'll vote for anyone over McCain. He's dishonest to the bone and he supports Bush's policies even while trying to distance himself from the man and his blackened legacy. If Clinton ends up cheating Obama out of the nomination, I'll jump in with both feet to support her presidency, make no mistake.

But I hope that she doesn't get it. Again, McCain's bad, but Hillary is right up there with him:

5/2/2008:   Darrell Roberson came home to find his wife getting freaky with her lover, Devin LaSalle, in his pickup parked in the Roberson driveway. His wife, Tracy, seeing her husband coming to the truck, thought fast and yelled rape. Roberson, seeing red the way only a real man will when his wife is sexually attacked, grabbed his gun and put four bullets into LaSalle as he tried to drive off. LaSalle died.

Charges against Roberson were dropped once investigators got the story straight. Seems Tracy had phoned and text messaged LaSalle, creating the situation that her husband walked into, and then throwing LaSalle under the bus when her husband came home early. So it was Tracy Roberson that was indicted instead. Today she was convicted of murder.

Man, that is just beautiful. The cheating, self-centered skank gets the slammer for murder, and the first victim of her evil, her husband, goes free. Of course, he has to live with the fact that he married such a terrible person, and then was so easily abused and manipulated by her to the extent that he took the life of another one of her victims, but at least she gets to do the time. I think that's great.

5/2/2008:   Oil prices keep rising to record highs, and yet Shell's profits were up 12% to $7.8 billion, and BP's profits were up 48% to $6.6 billion.

Did you get those numbers for BP? Up 48% to $6.6 billion.

And, Rush Limbaugh's ignorance aside, we don't need to drill in ANWAR to increase supply. Supply is not down. The prices are being driven up by speculation alone. Yes, that's right, you're paying more because speculators got it wrong and paid too much for the oil coming from all over the world, including domestic oil. How's that feel? Tell Rush to stick up his Oxycontin slurping butt when he talks about opening up our national resources to unnecessary development and pollution for a mere 1 million barrels a day.

Look, in spite of what the ANWAR.ORG list of lies is saying, both the building and subsequent operation and maintenance of the oil production and support systems, the infamous Alaskan Pipeline built in the 70's, has had a huge negative impact on the land, water, and animals in Alaska. There are areas that were affected solely by the building of the pipeline that have never recovered. This is a matter of public record; you can look it up. Imported oil is costly, but domestically produced oil goes into the same market, and the price to you, the consumer, stays high. If oil companies wanted to bring the costs down, don't you think they could apply those massive profits to the problem and still come out with healthy paychecks for the executives? Of course they could.

What we need is regulation of the oil companies and a national dedication at all levels to abandoning oil -- and coal for that matter -- as sources of energy. We have the means and the technology right now to do exactly that. All we lack is the resolve.

Oh, and a good president that's not in bed with the oil companies. That's pretty key...

5/2/2008:   I must have missed this clip when it first came out. In it, the absolutely fabulous Helen Thomas takes the White House spokes-liar, Dana Perino, to task over Bush's admission that his administration knew about and okayed the use of practices that are seen as torture by every country on the planet. Perino actually stands there and denies the blatantly obvious. Nothing like being lied to right to your face.

You wonder if Perino feels ashamed of herself as she lies, bald faced, to a spectacularly intelligent woman old enough to be her grandmother? Nah, probably not; this isn't the first time Thomas has spanked little Miss Dana.

I commend Mrs. Thomas for holding little lying Dana's feet to the fire. Nicely done. But next time, would you mind telling her point blank that she should be ashamed of herself? That would be beautiful!

5/2/2008:   Tiffany Shepherd, a high school biology teacher, has been fired for looking good in a bikini. While the school board says the primary reason for her dismissal is excessive absences, they made the mistake of mentioning "moral terpitude." See, Mrs. Shepherd works part-time as a hostess on a deep sea fishing boat. As a hostess, she serves sodas, teaches the customers how to fish, and chats with the customers. And she's wearing a bikini while she's on the fishing boat. She's not nude, she's not in a thong, and the job requires that she look good in what she's wearing. Granted, the job description says specifically that the women working on the boat "must look hot in a bikini," but there is no moral degradation going on. As Mrs. Shepherd points out, if she was on a public beach, she'd be wearing a bikini as well, and her students might be on the same beach.

Even though Mike Gelanos, the news reporter for "Prime News" that ran this story, had his head up his butt enough to stutter his way through the story and actually state that he would have a problem with Mrs. Shephard teaching his children, I have to take Mrs. Shepherd's side. Exactly what "moral terpitude" could they point to? Say I had a job as a shirtless bartender at a Hawaiian-themed club in which I was hired based on how good I looked with no shirt on -- not something that's going to happen anytime soon, at least not without a HUGE number of situps first -- would I be fired for "moral terpitude?"

The school board overreacted and, frankly, did something really stupid. She should sue them, and they should get their butts collectively handed to them for interfering with her private life unnecessarily.

5/2/2008:   "After we went in to brief [Donald Rumsfeld], he just shut us down. 'This is not going anywhere,' he said. 'Oh, and by the way, leave all the copies right here and don't talk to anybody about it.'"

Ricardo Sanchez hangs Donald Rumsfeld out to dry in his book, "Wiser in Battle: A Soldier's Story." He makes it utterly clear that Rumsfeld was incompetent to be serve as Secretary of Defense, and that he attempted to cover up his incompetence in the months prior to his dismissal. But even juicier is his clear description of how Bush's administration was advised per DoD policy, of the need for a postdeployment plan and how Bush, the so-called "Commander in Chief," and his administration, failed to create a plan for the proposed twelve to eighteen month operation to wrap up our involvement in Iraq. Now why do you suppose they decided to ignore any plan to get us out of Iraq once we were done?

Why, Sparky, it's because there was money to be made! A nation to build! A middle east to attempt to restructure! Money to be made! No-bid and no-accountability contracts to award and profit from! Big business contacts to be made! Political currency to convert to hard currency! And did I mention the money to be made? This has been a boondoggle that puts Vietnam to shame.

I commend Frmr. Gen. Sanchez for his bravery and patriotism in commanding our troops and, in publishing this book, attempting to protect them by exposing the crimes our president has committed against his troops by leaving them in harms' way for years longer than was necessary.

And tell me again: What is Nancy Pelosi waiting for? Why is impeachment not on the table, even now?

5/2/2008:   Deborah Jeane Palfrey, known as the "D.C. Madam," decided to take the coward's way out (her own characterization) rather than go to prison.

Hey, you play with the bull, you get the horns, and she definitely played with the one very big bull when she decided to pimp out young women to high paying clients. And then she decided to cash in her chips when it came time to do the time for doing the crime. I have no sympathy for her, and neither should anyone else. Seems to me that going to jail is, the prostitution industry, one of the risks and eventual costs of doing business.

5/2/2008:   The foaming at the mouth right wing whack job pundits (Limbaugh, Hannity, Savage) are up in arms about Rev. Wright's latest foaming at the mouth oppressed minority whack job diatribe and saying that it will kill Obama's presidency, that he's no longer electable, that it will taint his campaign, blah, blah, blah.

Dorks.

What it did was give Obama a golden opportunity to finally distance himself from Wright's racism and inflated ego. Yeah, I've had people in my own family that have uttered racial slurs, and while I certainly don't echo them, there are some folks where you just sort of gloss over it and let it slide because it's family, and the comment is a rarity, not the rule. But Wright has certainly gotten drunk off the attention and has decided to get his 15 minutes of fame by throwing Obama under the bus, so Obama rightfully returned the favor, slamming Wright's positions and comments, and distancing himself.

I think it wrapped up nicely.

5/2/2008:   She's still on TV? Whatever.