1/30/2009:   Today the RNC, after looking around and seeing nothing but a sea of old white faces, decided it was time to make a show of letting someone besides the old guard lead them. So they voted in Lt. Gov. of Maryland Michael S. Steele, who is being hailed in part for being the first African American leader of the RNC.

He immediately took steps to make the rank and file feel as though they were going to get their money's worth by stating that, as the chairman of GOPAC, the organization would soon be back as the powerful force it once was under Newt Gingrich.

For those that don't remember GOPAC, Newt Gingrich took the organization designed to groom and finance the future major leaders of the GOP and turned into an indoctrination campus where individuals were screened for their consummate loyalty to the party and their adherence to the pay-to-play policies that Newt created.

Them's fighting words.

So Steele wants to return to the glory days of Newt Gingrich and his "Contract On America"? I got to be honest with you, if that's the direction he wants to take the GOP, it may make the neocons feel all warm and fuzzy with familiarity, but the American public had more than its fill of that crap the first time. And there is nothing that will fire up the moderates, independents, liberals, and progressives more than having some idiot, regardless of his skin color, try to take us back to the Newt Gingrich attacks on the fibre of this nation.

Screw you, Steele. You want some of this? Bring it!

1/30/2009:   Today, Rudy Guiliani stated that cutting corporate bonuses means slashing jobs.

Last week the New York comptroller reported that Wall Street bankers received $18.4 billion in bonuses in 2008. Not million. Billion. As in $18,400,000,000.00. Have you ever had that many zeroes in your paycheck? There are entire countries whose GDP is dwarfed by the bonuses given to bankers in NYC alone.

President Obama called this, "the height of irresponsibility... shameful," and pointed out that these were the same institutions "teetering on collapse" and asking taxpayers, struggling with their own finances, to bail them out.

Guiliani, lacking any shred of shame, screeched the trickle-down economics talking points. And because this is my blog, I'll comment on his talking points as we go along...

So Rudy's method for determining his budget had nothing to do with incoming tax revenue, or even on the performance reports of NYC-based corporations. It was based on the bonuses received by CEOs. That's an oddly disconnected metric...

Again with the weird metric. So the city only has a surplus if the rich are getting mind-bogglingly richer at awe-inspiring speeds?

Trickle-down economics of the most embarrassing kind. This assumes that $10 million in a rich person's hand is worth more to the economy that $10000 each in the hands of 10,000 people. It assumes that the rich person is going to spend every dollar or invest every dollar in an economy-growing enterprise. It ignores the fact that the rich person doesn't need that money, but the middle class people might and the poor people do. And Rudy is also ignoring the fact that with great wealth comes great tax shelters. The more money I can afford to save, the bigger tax-deferred and even tax-free investment instruments and off-shore havens I can afford. Rudy would have you believe that bailout money, originating from your taxes and going into some exec's pocket, will be completely spent in a way that generates more taxes, long term, than were given to the exec.

Now *there's* some fuzzy math for you...

In announcing the Wall Street bonuses Wednesday, State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said the $18.4 billion represented a stark dip from 2007's bonuses, which totaled $32.9 billion. I guess that means that some companies still base some of the bonuses on actual company performance? But then DiNapoli does the Rudy Dance:

Rudy needs to pack up his Magic Economic Eight Ball and shuffle off to some dusty corner of obscurity. We'd all be better off for it.

1/27/2009:   This is a new designation I hope to add to from time to time. So many people were so certain that Obama wouldn't make it to the White House, and now they are bitterly eating their words. Take Thomas Buffenbarger, president of the International Machinists and Aerospace Workers Union, for instance. I'm putting Mr. Buffenbarger on my Christmas list. I have the perfect present for him: Birkenstocks and a gift card for his local trendy coffee shop. Here's Mr. Buffenbarger's prediction, earlier this year, about Barack Obama:

In his defense, he said that while rallying the Clinton faithful. So he wasn't on the wrong side of the election, he was just on the wrong side of history.

Tommy old boy, Obama rolled over the "Republican attack machine" with ease. You should really stick to what you know, which apparently doesn't include the pulse of American politics.

1/27/2009:   Obama is enjoying an 80% approval rating domestically, and probably even higher worldwide. But not everywhere...

In Iran, hardliners spent inauguration day burning Obama in effigy and screaming, "Death to Obama!" Quite a lot of Iranians are hopeful that Obama will bring a change in relations between the United States and the rest of the world, but I think that if you're Iranian, with the crazy whackjob Iranian president in charge, it's hard to get hopeful about any American president.

Still, it was a shock to see people tearing up Obama pictures in anger. People all over the world are naming their babies Obama, naming culinary dishes after him, naming styles of suits similar to the ones Obama wears after him, naming streets and schools after him.

Weird...

1/26/2009:   The NeoCon media circus has really gotten a kick out of propogandizing the term "Obama's Recession" in order to hang the massive economic albatross around Barack's neck, but let's be honest, this isn't Obama's Recession, it's Bush's Depression.

The Herbert Hoover of the 21st century has saddled us with a ginormous, broketabulous depression. Still think it's a "recession"? Check out these numbers: Bush boasted that he'd created 250,000 jobs last year, failing to mention that the U.S. has lost more than that in the tech sector, and the new jobs were all service industry. Now, this year, we've already lost 200,000, with an additional 71,400 lost today alone. That means that everything George managed to do in the service sector has been lost in equivalent and higher paying jobs across the board. People aren't spending because they don't have the money. American Express alone reported earnings down 79%. How do you survive losing nearly four fifths of your earnings over a year?

Today is Obama's 6th day on the job, and he's already WAY behind. He's doing good, making smart choices in his cabinet. (If only he hadn't asked that our Constitutional right to privacy in our communications continue to be violated, and if only he had done the right thing and started the investigation of Bush et al for perjury, war crimes, and violations of various federal laws.) But he's going to need the complete trust and cooperation of Congress and the advice of all our best economists to turn this tanker around.

Good luck, Mr. Obama. And please reconsider those two points I brought up....

1/22/2009:   "He was the victim of a serious miscarriage of justice, and I strongly believe that he deserved a presidential pardon. Obviously, I disagree with President Bush's decision."

Cheney complained bitterly that Gee Dub should have wiped Libby's crimes off the books, but instead he just commuted Libby's sentence. Libby was convicted of obstructing a federal investigation into the exposure of Valeria Plame as a CIA agent, a federal crime. Libby was supposed to serve 30 months, but Bush, afraid Libby would sing like a bird, fished him out. (Cheney felt his sentence, along with the quarter million dollar fine was "excessive", but it wasn't even the maximum for obstruction of justice and interfering with a federal investigation.)

So what's the difference? If Bush had pardoned him, Libby would have not only no longer been guilty of the crime, he would have been immune from future prosecution in connection with that crime. On the other hand, if he simply commutes the sentence, Libby is still guilty and, if other related crimes are uncovered, he can be charged, tried for those charges, and punished all over again.

Pardoning sounds preferable, right?

Except that, if pardoned, he no longer qualifies for Fifth Amendment protection because he can't incriminate himself. And since he doesn't have that protection, he can be compelled to testify and answer any question put to him in connection with the commission of the crime of exposing Valorie Plame's CIA affiliation. And if he can be compelled to answer any question, under risk of penalty of perjury, then George and Dick are suddenly exposed to a highly probable investigation into their activities.

So what is Cheney whining about?

I'll tell you what he's doing -- he's making a lot of sympathetic noise. That's it. Because he doesn't really want Libby pardoned. He just wants to make Libby feel better. Because in the end, the commutation serves Cheney and Bush's primary goal of getting away with their crimes.

If Cheney wanted to repair a real miscarriage of justice, he would have said that Bush should have pardoned Ignacio Ramos and Jose Campean, the border guards that were jailed for wounding a drug smuggler that was evading arrest by running back across the Mexican border. These two heroes were jailed and left to rot while a sizeable percentage of the nation protested their imprisonment. Libby, the little turd, flaunted the rule of law in favor of an out-of-control president, and these law enforcement officers were protecting our border. Tell me now, who deserves to trade cigarettes for his life in a maximum security prison? And here's a kicker for you: Libby didn't serve a single day in jail. His commutation was immediate. Ramos and Campean don't get out until March 20th. WTF?

1/22/2009:   Is McCain honestly concerned or just a sore loser?

McCain said instead of closing Guantanamo Bay outright, he would have first continued the military commissions, which "after years of delay and obfuscation" were finally moving toward trials. "So, the easy part, in all due respect, is to say we're going to close Guantanamo," McCain said. "Then I think I would have said where they were going to be taken. Because you're going to run into a NIMBY [not in my backyard] problem here in the United States of America."

A better question might be, now that we've held them for years without formal charges, without representation, without habeas corpus, should we wait a single minute to send the message that we will be following the letter of the law, both domestic and international, in handling these POWs from this point on? Is there any salient reason not to show that we are changing our policies and will deal with our prisoners honorably and with dignity? Is there any leg to stand on in arguing that Guantanamo should be maintained without significant and immediate change?

I'm confident we will house these prisoners in "super max" prison facilities, that they will be tried to the standard you would find in a military trial, and that they will be afforded the protections found in the Geneva Convention and our own Constitution, because we *can* in fact be better than our aggressors, we *can* in fact be leaders in matters of justice and fair treatment, we *can* show that we are above bowing to animal instincts, we *can* show the world a humanistic model for strong, advanced, civilized nations dealing with individual, captured, and imprisoned enemy combatants.

I think Mr. McCain is still stuck in a VietNam era mindset. We are better than we were then, we are better than those that would attack us, we are the United States of America, the shining city on the hill.

1/21/2009:   First order of business: Chief of Staff Emanuel sent a memo to all federal agencies and departments to halt consideration of pending regulations throughout the government until the new staff can examine and consider them for legality and policy adherence.

In other words, "EVERYONE FREEZE! Stop what you're doing right now! Don't do one more thing that Monkey Boy told you to do. The damage stops immediately! Just take a breather, smoke'em if you got'em, and you'll receive new orders as soon as we can get back to you..." I love it!

Following that, a 120-day halt to Gitmo military prosecutions while they review the legality and necessity of the military commissions themselves, "in the interest of justice and at the direction of the president of the United States."

Coming soon: an executive order reversing Bush's "Mexico City" policy, which prohibits U.S. money from funding international family planning groups that promote abortion or provide information, counseling or referrals about abortion services.

1/21/2009:   And by the way, to Ted Nugent: Kiss my butt. What a whackjob...

1/21/2009:   I saw the clip of George Bush leaving the White House for the last time, and there were people cheering as first the Cheneys, then the Bushes left. And they actually waved to the cheering crowds. Really. They actually thought people were cheering for them. I guess they couldn't make out what people were singing: "Na na na na, Na na na na, Hey hey hey, good bye!" I actually found the clip:

1/17/2009:   Thank you. Fellow citizens, for eight years, it has been my honor to serve as your president.

You're welcome. It's a been a horror movie having you as president.

The first decade of this new century has been a period of consequence, a time set apart.

No, this decade has, thus far, been a decade that will have huge consequences for those that will shoulder the burden of your legacy.

Tonight, with a thankful heart, I have asked for a final opportunity to share some thoughts on the journey we have traveled together and the future of our nation. Five days from now, the world will witness the vitality of American democracy. In a tradition dating back to our founding, the presidency will pass to a successor chosen by you, the American people.

This time it will be a man fairly elected to the office rather than someone who was appointed by the Supreme Court, or whose party used illegal tactics to defraud the election and deny the American people of their chosen leader.

Standing on the steps of the Capitol will be a man whose history reflects the enduring promise of our land.

Standing on the steps of the Capitol will be a man that steamrolled over your party's pathetic attempt to hold onto power.

This is a moment of hope and pride for our whole nation. And I join all Americans in offering best wishes to President-elect Obama, his wife, Michelle, and their two beautiful girls. Tonight, I am filled with gratitude to Vice President Cheney and members of the administration; to Laura, who brought joy to this house and love to my life; to our wonderful daughters, Barbara and Jenna; to my parents, whose examples have provided strength for a lifetime.

Would you also like to thank all the people who violated the Constitution at your behest and made your attempt at establishing an imperial presidency possible?

And above all, I thank the American people for the trust you have given me.

Don't thank me, son. I never trusted you.

I thank you for the prayers that have lifted my spirits. And I thank you for the countless acts of courage, generosity and grace that I have witnessed these past eight years. This evening, my thoughts return to the first night I addressed you from this house, September 11, 2001. That morning, terrorists took nearly 3,000 lives in the worst attack on America since Pearl Harbor.

The time line up to the second attack on the World Trade Center illustrates that you had plenty of notice that such an attack would take place. Comparing it to Pearl Harbor implies that it was a surprise. It wasn't entirely a surprise, though, was it, Mr. Bush? You had the opportunity, the tools, and the intel to thwart that attack, and you defeated the measures created by your predecessor. It can be argued that you in fact made the attack possible through your rank imcompetence.

I remember standing in the rubble of the World Trade Center three days later, surrounded by rescuers who had been working around the clock. I remember talking to brave souls who charged through smoke- filled corridors at the Pentagon and to husbands and wives whose loved ones became heroes aboard Flight 93. I remember Arlene Howard, who gave me her fallen son's police shield as a reminder of all that was lost. And I still carry his badge. As the years passed, most Americans were able to return to life much as it had been before 9/11. But I never did.

Well, that's not entirely true. No one went back to their lives as usual because everyone was just a little fearful. And you used that to your advantage at every opportunity, didn't you?

Every morning, I received a briefing on the threats to our nation. And I vowed to do everything in my power to keep us safe.

You broke that vow the minute you took your eye off the ball, ceased chasing Osama bin Laden, pulled troops away from the effort to secure Afghanistan, and started trying to execute the PNAC plan to restructure the Middle East.

Over the past seven years, a new Department of Homeland Security has been created. The military, the intelligence community and the FBI have been transformed. Our nation is equipped with new tools to monitor the terrorists' movements, freeze their finances, and break up their plots.

If by transformed you mean, "Given a charter to violate the First and Fourth Amendments," and by tools you mean, "the means to tap domestic communications without a warrant, again violating the Constitution," then yes, I suppose so.

And with strong allies at our side, we have taken the fight to the terrorists and those who support them.

And we also invaded Iraq based on fraudulent reports of WMDs, which had absolutely nothing at all to do with terrorism.

Afghanistan has gone from a nation where the Taliban harbored al Qaeda and stoned women in the streets to a young democracy that is fighting terror and encouraging girls to go to school.

And because we turned our military away from the job of securing Afghanistan, the Taliban have returned, taken control of three quarters of the nation, and have surrounded Kabul.

Iraq has gone from a brutal dictatorship and a sworn enemy of America to an Arab democracy at the heart of the Middle East and a friend of the United States.

Iraq has gone from a stable country under our thumb to a destabilized terrorist training ground, at the cost of nearly 5000 of our soldiers, the lives of nearly a million innocent Iraqi civilians, the loss of homes by over a million people in that country. And while the Iraqi government maintains the facade of being our friend, Iraq is a friend that feels we've *way* overstayed our welcome and wants us out.

There is legitimate debate about many of these decisions,...

Forget the debate -- the facts show you are a war criminal.

... but there can be little debate about the results.

Terrorist ranks have increased, Al Qaeda membership is soaring, we're bleeding our military and our treasury dry, our allies hate us almost as bad as our enemies, and our economy is a shambles.

America has gone more than seven years without another terrorist attack on our soil.

And before September 11th, 2001, it had been EIGHT years since the previous attack on the World Trade Center.

This is a tribute to those who toil day and night to keep us safe -- law enforcement officers, intelligence analysts, homeland security and diplomatic personnel, and the men and women of the United States armed forces.

Except that last time, the perpetrators of the attack were caught, tried, and imprisoned, and Bill Clinton authorized missile attacks against Bin Laden on CIA advice, all without losing a single American life.

Our nation is blessed to have citizens who volunteer to defend us in this time of danger. I have cherished meeting these selfless patriots and their families. And America owes you a debt of gratitude.

You'd be more believable if you'd funded the VA properly.

And to all our men and women in uniform listening tonight, there has been no higher honor than serving as your commander in chief.

I'm sure the love flows in only one direction. The people that originally signed up to fight the attackers that originated out of Afghanistan must have wondered why they were in harm's way in Iraq. Finding out that your command in chief is a liar and that the war you're waging, the innocent people dying because they're also in harm's way because of your command in chief's actions, those things don't engender respect or adulation.

The battles waged by our troops are part of a broader struggle between two dramatically different systems. Under one, a small band of fanatics demands total obedience to an oppressive ideology, condemns women to subservience, and marks unbelievers for murder.

(At first I thought he was referring to PNAC, but then I remembered there was nothing on their web site about condemning women to subservience.>

The other system is based on the conviction that freedom is the universal gift of Almighty God and that liberty and justice light the path to peace.

Freedom is a universal right, not a gift, and it must be won, not awarded, in order to be cherished and respected. George has been drinking the PNAC koolaid.

This is the belief that gave birth to our nation. And in the long run, advancing this belief is the only practical way to protect our citizens.

Pre-emptively attacking nations that don't threaten us is not the way to advance freedom or protect our citizens. It just pisses the world off.

When people live in freedom, they do not willingly choose leaders who pursue campaigns of terror. When people have hope in the future, they will not cede their lives to violence and extremism.

Um, point of order? That's exactly what the people of this nation did in 2004, if you pretend there was no election fraud perpetrated by the GOP.

So around the world, America is promoting human liberty, human rights and human dignity. We are standing with dissidents and young democracies, providing AIDS medicine to bring dying patients back to life, and sparing mothers and babies from malaria. And this great republic, born alone in liberty, is leading the world toward a new age when freedom belongs to all nations.

Who writes this guy's speeches? Bringing "dying patients back to life"? That's not what AIDS medication does. But okay, so George wants a bit of the "healer" aura, a little sprinkle of Jesus on his way out. Whatever. And we're not leading the world when we're playing "This Old Government" with other sovereign nations.

For eight years, we have also strived to expand opportunity and hope here at home. Across our country, students are rising to meet higher standards in public schools. A new Medicare prescription drug benefit is bringing peace of mind to seniors and the disabled. Every taxpayer pays lower income taxes.

Let's be honest: No Child Left Behind cut funding to schools, failed to fund the programs it mandated, and forced teachers to cut existing programs that catered to children with extraordinary talents or special needs, and athletic programs. Teachers universally despise the fact that if they don't get all the kids to the same mediocre level, the school's funding gets cut. They hate that they are now responsible for filling seats in the school and churning out average, cookie cutter kids with remedial skills or they'll have to layoff teachers. The No Child Left Behind program punished schools and lowered the quality of the graduating classes. Schools have had to struggle to provide talented kids with the educational tools to stay interested and realize their full potential, and all because George bought into the ultra-conservative sheep-generating propoganda that schools were the cause of the kids not graduating with basic skills. Parents are the problem, and no amount of government programs can legislate good parenting.

The addicted and suffering are finding new hope through faith-based programs.

Because the separation between church and state must be blurred as much as possible, in George's opinion.

Vulnerable human life is better protected.

Code for, "Women's right to privacy in medical decisions and the right to decide what happens to their own bodies has been successfully diminished."

Funding for our veterans has nearly doubled.

Doubled so that it's only half as insufficient? We have a huge number of wounded veterans coming back from Iraq who can't get proper care or are designated as having light wounds so the V.A. won't have to spend as much for their on-going care.

America's air, water and lands are measurably cleaner.

Lie. The clean air, water, and soil standards were rolled back. Toxin measurements are further below what the standards mandate because the standards were so severely reduced. The allowances for cadmium, arsenic, and mercury, just to name three, were raised way above what they were under Clinton, so that more areas meet the standards. But the air, water, and lands are NOT cleaner. That's just a flat out lie.

And the federal bench includes wise new members, like Justice Sam Alito and Chief Justice John Roberts.

The federal bench includes ideologues carefully selected by the Bush administration to further the Neo-Con and religious whack job agenda and forced past the Democrats under threat of revision of the House rules to further oppress the minority party.

When challenges to our prosperity emerged, we rose to meet them. Facing the prospect of a financial collapse, we took decisive measures to safeguard our economy. These are very tough times for hardworking families, but the toll would be far worse if we had not acted.

If by "our" he's referring to the richest 1% of Americans, then yes, he did all that could possibly be gotten away with to make sure their prosperity was maximized and maintained. As for the middle class and poor, things are as bad as they could possibly be, and the fact that the economy could have been handled better is obvious to everyone.

All Americans are in this together. And together, with determination and hard work, we will restore our economy to the path of growth. We will show the world once again the resilience of America's free enterprise system.

On if the controls and regulations that even the playing field and control fraudulent behavior are put back in place.

Like all who have held this office before me, I have experienced setbacks and there are things I would do differently, if given the chance. Yet, I've always acted with the best interests of our country in mind. I have followed my conscience and done what I thought was right. You may not agree with some tough decisions I have made, but I hope you can agree that I was willing to make the tough decisions.

George did was what best for George. Period, end of story. He's an elitist that subscribes to the theory of social evolution and believes that the non-elites are cattle to be raised, kept satiated, and fed upon. He has never evidenced a good, sound conscience, and his decision making process is the source of material for comedians the world over.

The decades ahead will bring more hard choices for our country, and there are some guiding principles that should shape our course. While our nation is safer than it was seven years ago, ...

No, it's not.

the gravest threat to our people remains another terrorist attack. Our enemies are patient and determined to strike again.

Actually, the greatest threat to our people has been George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and Cheney's minions. The greatest threat to our people is our diminished military and our sullied diplomatic standing. The greatest threat to our people is the worldwide hatred George engendered through his words and actions. The greatest threat to our country may now actually come from other countries that see us as weakened in every possible way by a stupid president.

America did nothing to seek or deserve this conflict. But we have been given solemn responsibilities, and we must meet them. We must resist complacency. We must keep our resolve. And we must never let down our guard. At the same time, we just continue to engage the world with confidence and clear purpose. In the face of threats from abroad, it can be tempting to seek comfort by turning inward. But we must reject isolationism and its companion, protectionism.

Did anyone suggest isolationism? Is he equating getting out of the quagmire in Iraq, this generation's VietNam, as isolationism? Does he actually expect us to equate pre-emptive war as the opposite of protectionism?

Retreating behind our borders would only invite danger. In the 21st century, security and prosperity at home depend on the expansion of liberty abroad. If America does not lead the cause of freedom, that cause will not be led.

So he's asking that we continue to bleed our country dry invading countries and forcing them to set up governments they don't want. What an idiot...

As we address these challenges, and others we cannot foresee tonight, America must maintain our moral clarity.

Lying, murdering, stealing: these are the components of moral clarity?

I have often spoken to you about good and evil, and this has made some uncomfortable.

Only because you seem confused as to what good and evil really are.

But good and evil are present in this world and between the two, there can be no compromise. Murdering the innocent to advance an ideology is wrong every time, everywhere.

Um, can you say, "hypocrite"?

Freeing people from oppression and despair is eternally right.

Unless you kill most of them in the act of freeing them, and you commit people to a war they wouldn't have committed to unless you lied to them. Then it's wrong. See, it's that good vs. evil thing, that moral clarity thing you have such a problem with...

This nation must continue to speak out for justice and truth. We must always be willing to act in their defense and to advance the cause of peace. President Thomas Jefferson once wrote, "I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past." As I leave the house he occupied two centuries ago, I share that optimism.

Thomas Jefferson said a lot of things George ignored. Separation of church and state, separation of powers, coequal branches of government, etc. Y'know, the stuff that we all learned in school. But that's what you get when you elect the C student...

America is a young country, full of vitality, constantly growing and renewing itself. And even in the toughest times, we lift our eyes to the broad horizon ahead.

I have confidence in the promise of America because I know the character of our people. This is a nation that inspires immigrants to risk everything for the dream of freedom. This is a nation where citizens show calm in times of danger and compassion in the face of suffering. We see examples of America's character all around us, and Laura and I have invited some of them to join us in the White House this evening.

We see America's character in Dr. Tony Recasner, a principal who opened a new charter school from the ruins of Hurricane Katrina. We see it in Julio Medina, a former inmate who leads a faith-based program to help prisoners returning to society. We see it in Staff Sgt. Aubrey McDade, who charged into an ambush in Iraq and rescued three of his fellow Marines.

We see America's character in Bill Krissoff, a surgeon from California. His son Nathan, a Marine, gave his life in Iraq. When I met Dr. Krissoff and his family, he delivered some surprising news. He told me he wanted to join the Navy Medical Corps in honor of his son. This good man was 60 years old, 18 years above the age limit. But his petition for a waiver was granted, and for the past year he has trained in battlefield medicine. Lt. Cmdr. Krissoff could not be here tonight, because he will soon deploy to Iraq, where he will help save America's wounded warriors and uphold the legacy of his fallen son.

In citizens like these we see the best of our country, resilient and hopeful, caring and strong. These virtues give me an unshakable faith in America. We have faced danger and trial, and there is more ahead. But with the courage of our people and confidence in our ideals, this great nation will never tire, never falter and never fail.

Unless of course George and Dick have torn us so far down that we can't protect ourselves, cannot support ourselves, cannot continue to govern ourselves, and collapse under the weight of our own financial and security deficits.

It has been the privilege of a lifetime to serve as your president. There have been good days and tough days. But every day, I have been inspired by the greatness of our country and uplifted by the goodness of our people. I have been blessed to represent this nation we love. And I will always be honored to carry a title that means more to me than any Other -- citizen of the United States of America.

And so, my fellow Americans, for the final time, good night. May God bless this house and our next president. And may God bless you and our wonderful country.

And for the final time, thank God, we have put up with listening to George W. Bush. May God bless Obama and Biden, bless our country and forgive those who voted for Bush, forgive those that helped him steal the elections he could not legitimately win, forgive those that aided and abetted him in his pograms and campaigns to rape this nation, the Middle East, and the world, forgive those that did nothing to stop him, forgive those that didn't impeach him, and forgive those that continue to try to rewrite history to soften the story of his horrible tenure and his awful legacy.

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.

1/17/2009:   Everyone makes mistakes. Everyone has regrets. Anyone that tells you otherwise is trying to convince themselves they are better people than they are.

So it's a truly rare gift when you're presented with a chance to take a really huge mistake and make it right.

When life hands you such an opportunity, then, as is often the case with righting wrongs, there will be unpleasant repercussions. That's the nature of mistakes, of poor choices, of justice delayed. But it is the measure of the person as to whether they choose to embrace the repercussions, stand up straight and take responsibility, and do what's right.

It's an opportunity, and again, a rare one, to reach back and say, "That thing I did, I did wrong. I'm sorry for the consequences. I'm a smarter, better person than I was then, and I will do the right thing now to the best of my ability."

1/14/2009:   When asked by Barack Obama, in response to the overwhelming support for the request on Obama's own Change.gov to "appoint a special prosecutor ... to independently investigate the greatest crimes of the Bush administration, including torture and warrantless wiretapping," Mr. Obama gave what in my mind was the absolutely wrong answer. It boiled down to an eloquent refusal to enforce the law.

"Obviously we're going to look at past practices. And I don't believe that anybody is above the law. On the other hand, I also have a belief that we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards. And part of my job is to make sure that for example at the CIA, you've got extraordinarily talented people who are working very hard to keep Americans safe. I don't want them to suddenly feel like they've got to spend all their time looking over their shoulders and lawyering up."

Mr. Obama, I too don't want our government hobbled by the distraction of litigation. But what we're talking about here are impeachable violations of the Constitution itself. If Bush had committed justifiable excesses, the people wouldn't be so outraged about it. Lincoln exceeded his powers when he declared war on the seceding states, and he approached Congress after the fact to present himself for whatever retribution it deemed was warranted. Congress declined, recognizing that Lincoln had succeeded in preserving the union and had the overwhelming support of the people. Bush enjoys neither the umbrella of a higher cause or the support of the people, with polls showing an embarrassing 27 percent approval rating as he exits office.

I feel that the President, if he's to be the president that we all hope and expect him to be, if he's to live up to the promises he's verbalized to hold himself and the rest of government to a higher standard in which no one is above the law, then he MUST enforce the law against those who would egregiously violate that law and, in the case of Bush and his administration, their oaths of office to uphold and enforce that law. At a MINIMUM he must allow an investigation to go forward.

This should not be optional, and as a guiding principle must be stated strongly in words and actions: anyone in our government directly violating the Constitution must be held accountable, and under the weight of accountability, should indeed be looking over their shoulders and lawyering up, Mr. Obama. Frankly I'm surprised that our Constitutional Law Professor In Chief would need to have that said out loud.

"Today we begin in earnest the work of making sure that the world we leave our children is just a little bit better than the one we inhabit today."

Your quote, Mr. Obama. That's all we're asking: a precedent that will make the world a little bit, albeit a critical bit, better than the one we now and for the last eight years have inhabited.

1/14/2009:   News? Not so much... Another teacher molested another student. Because the teacher is a woman and the 13 year old she had sex with "over 300 times" was a boy, and that's why the news calls it "an affair" and refrains from calling her a child molester, but that's what she is. And when this happens, a bunch of useless noise is made about harsher sentences for child molesters, but nothing happens.

I have to tell you, the day I find out that a teacher put his hands on one of my daughters, that's a teacher that's going to be carrying his genitals in a jar for the rest of his life.

I think we need a "Safe Education" measure that makes the penalty for school staff having sex with anyone under 18 at least 10 years. That's a nice round number that has a seriously scary sound to it. A life-altering decade for abusing the teacher-student-parent trust.

I'm not saying the teachers are necessarily seducing the students. I had a math teacher whose class I remember precious little about except that she was present. I have no doubt that, regardless of the genders, students sometimes develop a strong attraction to their teachers and may even go so far as to be the initiators. But the teacher should be bound by a legal oath that they will use their maturity and respect their position and the trust that the parents have in the system to curb their own desires and reject any advances from students. You would kind of think that would go without saying, but there seems to be this constant trickle of stories about teachers that are caught in sexual liaisons with their charges. Something needs to be done. Schools should be required to have a semi-annual chat with their employees about avoiding relationships with students. No-penalty, no-questions-asked, "Before You Cross The Line" counseling and transfer of the student in question to another class. Cameras all around the campus. Whatever it takes to make sure the teachers keep their freaky hands to themselves.

I want my kids to go to school for an education that doesn't include sex-ed hands-on labs. I want them educated in a safe environment free of bodily fluids and teacher-caused distractions. I want their schools to be safe coccoons of educational excellence. I want their schools to be free of drugs, gangs, and sexual predators. I want them to graduate, and I want them to go on to a university and get a solid degree in the field of their choice with a business minor. I don't want them derailed in the course of realizing their potential.

I want my legislature to pass a law specifically to deal with the sexual predators in the educational system. Forget "No Child Left Behind" that was designed to leave entire schools behind, I want a "No Child Sexually Molested" law. Let's fund our schools fully and make sure schools are safe.

1/13/2009:   I am incensed at the way a handful of people have attempted to defend George Monkey Faced Frat Boy Bush, in part by comparing him favorably against Bill Clinton.

You have got to be kidding me!

Clinton presided over the longest period of peace-time economic expansion in American history, while Bush took the dot-com bust and managed to parlay it into 8 years of slowly spiralling downward mobility in jobs and investment market stability. Clinton cut taxes on low-income families and 90% of small businesses, raised taxes on the wealthiest 1.2% of Americans, and implemented heavy spending restraints's, all resulting in a balanced budget and a nearly $600 billion federal surplus. Bush cut taxes deeply and gave huge incentives only to the uber-rich, gave everyone else $300, and borrowed over a trillion dollars from China and Japan alone.

Clinton left office with a strong economy in place after having created 21 million jobs. Bush leaves office claiming to have created 3 million jobs, but having lost more than twice that to unregulated offshoring of jobs and an unimpeded fall into recession caused by GOP-driven deregulation of the financial industry.

Clinton failed to reform our health care system thanks to wealthy conservative and medical industry groups that propagandized, outspent, and evetually torpedoed the plan to preserve their profits. Bush failed to privatize Social Security, which given his horrible handling of the economy would have resulted in the widespread devastation of elderly people's retirement funds.

Clinton had the perpetrators of the first World Trade Center bombing captured and tried. He had programs and plans in place with the CIA to capture Osama bin Laden and other members of Al Qaeda, and even ordered missile strikes to try to take out bin Laden. He passed those plans and the intelligence on bin Laden, including the knowledge that an attack was being planned involving commercial airliners, to George Bush's team. George Bush pushed stopped the operations in play, ignored the intelligence, and outright refused to hear that a terrorist strike was about to occur while he plotted a means of justifying an attack on Iraq.

Clinton was impeached for obstruction of justice because Ken Starr, working zealously to topple the President in connection with a real estate investment investigation that yielded *no* directly related indictments, and was subsequently acquitted by the U.S. Senate. Bush tapped domestic phone calls and lied to the nation about the case for going to war in Iraq, and dodged impeachment because Nancy Pelosi and Harry Ried refused to do their jobs.

Clinton bombed Yugoslavia to stop genocide, the had the president of that country captured and turned over to the Hague for war crimes. Bush directed the CIA to fabricate justifying evidence for attacking a harmless country with no connections to terror, destroyed its infrastructure, disbanded its army and police forces, killed nearly a million of its civilians, displaced two million more, got nearly 5000 of our troops killed, and ended up with a terrorist recruiting and training center.

Clinton worked to protect our natural resources, expand our protected lands, and increase protections on air and water quality. Bush worked to scale back clean air and water protections, roll back endangered species designations, lease protected lands to industry for development, and allow oil companies to drill every inch of the United States, all while the outcry from the scientific community scaled up higher and higher that global warming and the decimation of our natural resources was out of control and threatended our future survival.

Clinton worked with educators to raise the standards of schools, test scores, the programs available to students, and scholarships available to college students. George Bush wreaked havoc on the education system by slashing educational funding across the board while forcing teachers to train students to pass tests rather than learn with his highly criticized and poorly funded "No Child Left Behind."

Clinton was a Rhodes Scholar that attended and then taught at Oxford. Bush was a C-average legacy at Yale.

Don't even get me started on the handling of natural disasters.

Clinton lied about having sex with an intern. Bush lied about everything.

Clinton left office with a 65% approval rating. Bush is leaving with a 27% approval rating.

Bill Clinton is, in my opinion, a very intelligent, good man who had a bit of a marital integrity problem. George Bush is, again in my opinion, an bad, dumb little man with a badly warped moral and ethical compass. I credit Bill's parents for his goodness and George's parents for his apocalypticly twisted stupidity, arrogance, and ignorance.

There is NO equivalence between William J. Clinton and George W. Bush. None. And anyone attempting to draw a similarity between the two has been drinking the Hannity/Limbaugh/O'Reilly koolaid.

1/12/2009:   In the "You've got to be f***ing kidding" column, George Bush said during his final press conference, "People say the federal response was slow... (hitting podium) Don't tell me the federal response was slow when there was 30,000 people pulled off roofs right after the storm passed. (long pause) Y'know I remember going to see those, um, helicopter drivers? Coast guard drivers. To thank them for their courageous efforts to rescue people off roofs -- 30,000 people were pulled off roofs right after the storm moved through. (Laughing) That's a pretty quick reponse!"

So many things wrong, so little will to correct them after 8 long years...

Okay, George, "drivers" don't pilot helicopters. Pilots do. Hence the name. You know, that thing you were supposed to be doing in jets with the Air National Guard back in Vietnam when you were AWOL instead? Tax payers paid to have you trained to pilot jets, but your Daddy got you out of it? Remember? Oh nevermind...

But as for the revisionist history, what a jackass. Even if he did get 30,000 people off of roofs, that doesn't compare to the hundreds of thousands of people trapped in the Superdome, in boats, on trees, floating on rafts, stuck on bridges, all of them fashioning makeshift flags and signs begging for rescue or at least clean water and food rations. A year after Katrina there were still thousands that were homeless, not because they were derelicts, but because they couldn't get back to their land to rebuild. And those that did go back, even after a year passed, often found the remainds of dead bodies stuck in the rubble.

New Orleans still hasn't fully recovered, and neither did Texas after hurricane Ike. Why? Because Bush didn't feel anything substantive needed to be changed in how the federal government handles disasters.

The federal response sucked, and no one is going to forget it. The fact that George either thinks we'll believe him or, quite probably, believes the lies himself, does not change the history we all watched on our televisions day after day, night after horrible night.

1/8/2009:   Obama is going to be on the cover of Spiderman. This was announced the same day that figures came out showing 2.5 million jobs lost in 2008.

Clearly Barack is going to need super powers to put the egg back together that all the king's men jumped up and down on while King George was in power.

"Unitary executive." I wonder if Bush, Cheney, and Gonzales still think that was a good idea? I doubt it. They spent 100% of their time arrogating power and showering gifts on the rich in the form of tax cuts, entitlements, and deregulation, that they forgot that their elites comprise a small sliver of the population, and that the People, the majority of the People, must be the main beneficiaries of government, not the elites.

Mr. Obama, on the other hand, seems to get it. His approach so far seems balanced. If I appear cautious, it's because I watched otherwise intelligent people vote for George Bush, and I saw the looks of shame on their faces as Bush proved over and over again that he was not worthy of the office of dog catcher, much less the President of the United States of America. I watched his catch phrases, propoganda, excuses, and sound bites turn bitter on their tongues as they realized they'd been used. And I don't want to find myself looking at the banners that Obama has inspired with proud words and thinking, "I was fooled." He sure seems like the best man for cleaning up the worst mess in history, but I hope I'm not wrong, for all our sakes.

1/8/2009:   A white BART police officer, while working with other officers to subdue and place under arrest a number of individuals on one of the BART platforms on New Year's Eve shot Oscar Grant in the back as he lay face down with his hands behind his back begin cuffed.

From the available video, it appears to have been an accident that could have been prevented with better training. A large number of people in Oakland, nearly all black, marched through the streets of downtown Oakland, and in many instances vandalized vehicles and shop fronts, attacked bystanders, and aimed most of their anger against police officers and their cars.

Those are the unbiased facts, supportable by simply reviewing the objective news reports and video that's out there on the web right now.

But what isn't mentioned is why there is violence and vandalism in response to Oscar Grant's death. It isn't because of Oscar Grant, oh no. It's an opportunity for racial hate to be expressed. I'm not just throwing stones -- I worked in Oakland for five years, during a time when a similar protest was waged against the first Iraq War. The banners read, "F*ck George Bush and his White Man's war!" Yeah, because all we white men wanted to send black men to push an invader out of a distant, sandy nation. Mm hm. Yup...

I worked there when Rodney King was beaten. By then I was smart enough to stay home until things cooled down, but even after I returned, the tension just walking down the street could be cut with a knife.

I worked there when O.J. got away with murder, and still there was nothing less than a palpable ratcheting up of the hate expressed to whites present in public.

I also got mugged there by several black men who, when they found I really didn't have my wallet, stole my black leather jacket in which I had a lot of sentimental value, and I'm honest enough with myself to admit that the majority of my bitterness towards Oakland stems from that event. But, on a regular basis, I was around people who were cold, mean, aggressive, and insulting to me, with no other obvious reason than my skin color. One mugging didn't cause me to decide, beyond a shadow of a doubt that Oakland is filled to overflowing with racism on the part of the blacks living there against whites.

The abuse was prevalent enough that I feel perfectly comfortable calling Oakland a racist town. And it looks, from what I can see, that nothing has changed. The unfortunate death of a good man had nothing to do with race, but Oakland's reaction was. But my position on Oakland is purely personal: I refuse to shed a tear for Oakland. It can burn for all I care.

1/5/2009:   "The Minnesota State Canvassing Board today certified Senate recount results that show Democrat Al Franken ousting Republican Norm Coleman by some 225 votes."

And the rest is simply commentary. Coleman will challenge blah, blah, blah. 650 absentee ballots blah, blah, blah. Lawsuit blah, blah, blah. Who cares? It's finally done. The Republicans lost yet another seat, a little more power, and became a little less relevant. The mandate for this election, handed down from the People, is that the GOP screwed up so badly over the last eight years that they nearly drove themselves into extinction. We don't like you. We don't want you. We want a party that represents us as opposed to feeding on us. Get smart, evolve, or we'll abandon you.

Congratulations, Senator Franken.

1/5/2009:   Theory #1: Blagojevich, knowing he is about to be frog-marched out of the governor's mansion, is turning to someone he actually *doesn't* like and smearing that person with the same mud Blago is dirtied with by appointing him and thereby sullying that person's political career through association.

Theory #2: Blagojevich, finding himself in political quicksand, is trying to fashion a savior out of a bystander by giving Burris a political spotlight in return for a helping hand or at least a good word. Burris accepted what amounts to a reverse bribe, and if he gets into the U.S. Senate, he'll be in a position to apply some leverage to assist Blago.

Congratulations, Senator Franken.

1/2/2009:   I honestly wonder how Ruben Navarrette, all too frequent commentator for CNN, manages to hang on to a job. Today's commentary entitled, "Thank You, Gov Blagojevich," uses Rube-Goldbergian logic to try to take a corrupt governor's insistence on selecting a replacement for Obama's vacated senatorial seat and turn it into a heroic defiance of the racist "white" establishment.

Geez, that sounds familiar, especially from Mr. Navarrette. He's become increasingly one dimensional in that regard.

First off, I refuse to thank Blagojevich for a damn thing. He's blatantly, in-your-face corrupt, known for years for being so, and he's simply unrepentant and disrespectful of his constituency and the dignity of the office he holds. Those are the facts as they currently stand.

You'll notice I did not reference his current imbroglio. I, too, believe in the principle of being innocent until proven guilty. But I also believe in the taint of compelling evidence, and I firmly believe that no good can possibly come of the governor insisting on selecting a candidate when the majority of senators in U.S. Congress have stated point blank that, no matter who Blagojevich picks, they'll fight the appointment.

Mr. Navarrette assumes you'll forget the order of events, in which Congress voice no-confidence in the governor prior to his selection of Roland Burris. He gets a lot more traction out of his "racism" charges if he pretends that the white establishment saw a black candidate and screamed bloody murder. He tries with weak logic to imply that the actions of a couple of people with questionable judgement during the nomination phase of the campaign can be used to color all white members of Congress with a broad prejudiced brush. Anyone with basic critical thinking skills is going to see the lie in guilt by association. That ploy didn't work for the GOP, and it's not working for Ruben either.

I'd be the first to agree that the governor has the legal authority, even while under investigation, to appoint a replacement senator. But Ruben is dead wrong when he states that the U.S. Congress has no legal or moral power to fight the appointment. They can legally pass a resolution disputing the validity of the appointment, questioning whether it was based on a power for value trade, begin an investigation, and give the Illinois legislature time to impeach Blagojevich and let Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn replace Burris with a different candidate.

This is all predicated on how badly the U.S. Congress wants to put everyone in their place and stand by decisions they've voiced, balanced with Burris' qualifications for doing the job. It's my understanding he's qualified, at least, although he certainly has a penchant for self-aggrandizement.

Ruben said he admires Blagojevich for doing his job. Will he also admire Congress for refusing an appointment made by a governor so clearly and thoroughly tainted by compelling evidence? I doubt it.

And y'know why? Because Ruben is a racist, and while he doesn't have a single logical leg to stand on in refusing to bestow equal job quality inspired admiration upon the U.S. Congress, you know he won't because, as he stated, it's chock-full of white people.

(heavy sigh...)

I keep waiting for the day when race won't matter, and I find it particularly frustrating when non-whites are some of the loudest contributors to racial tensions. Ruben doesn't just point out racial inequities. He creates them whole-cloth where they didn't exist before. He pulls them out of thin air, fabricating them to wave them about, dancing like a savage and screaming verbal masturbation in order to keep his following and, like Rush, Hannity, Savage and the like, also to keep getting paid.

What a schmuck...

The following people voted against the Constitution, against the Fourth Amendment, against your rights, freedoms, liberties, and protections. A version of the FISA reform bill that grants retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies that broke the law at the president's behest and gives the president the ability to grant immunity without oversight or further authorization, has passed the United States House of Representatives on Friday, June 20th, 2008. These are the people that voted for that measure. Included among them are Democrats that have betrayed their constituencies, including my own Jerry McNerney. Let us not forget these traitors at election time.