Plus, no jury trials in treason cases either -- the accused will face a tribunal of judges instead, all on The Motherland's dime, of course.

Compare Iraq's advancement to Russia's backsliding towards full-on totalitarianism. Kinda puts things in perspective, eh? It is not precisely easy to fashion a decent state where none has existed before (or where one hasn't existed in modern memory, at least). Iraq is attacked by the left because security forces roughed up (maybe) someone who assaulted a visiting American president. But meanwhile, the NYT and WaPo fail to even note that Russia took the next-to-last-step towards officially becoming the Soviet Empire XP.

Posted by: Ace at 08:44 AM | Comments (22)
Post contains 126 words, total size 1 kb.

LauraW gets a fan site.

Thanks to Michael at Innocent Bystanders. For the tip, I mean. The site's creator is unknown.

Posted by: Ace at 08:36 AM | Comments (32)
Post contains 29 words, total size 1 kb.

There was an item in the sidebar about Obama selecting Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inauguration. Today, Right Wing News has a round up of the lefty-sphere's reaction.

"I've been willing to swallow a lot of distaste for some of Obama's choices in the transition phase, but this is really going too far. The Inauguration Committee just announced that Rick Warren, charlatan pastor of Saddleback Church, who lied his face off about the so-called cone of silence during the presidential debate he hosted, is going to deliver the invocation.

...I've left aside that they shouldn't really even have a religious invocation at the inaugural because it's become a tradition now. But my friend Capt. Fogg left an excellent comment that I urge to read in full. The main point being, "Religious rituals have no place at all in government. It's the law. Belief in God or gods is not part of public policy: that's the law, and if no religious test may be imposed for office, which is the law, why then are we asking a president to demonstrate his private religiosity in public, as part of his inauguration?" -- The Impolitic

This is one of my favorites because it combines rabid intolerance in the guise of tolerance and combines it with abject stupidity (the Cone of Silence was a metaphor idiot, get over it). Most of the rest of them, including Trig Truther Andrew Sullivan, are upset because Warren supported Proposition 8.

So the lefties are unhappy about the invocation, big deal. They'll be plenty happy when Obama starts spending 800 billion to one trillion dollars on their favorite programs. Personally, I'd trade one invocation for control of the budget for the next 4 years but that's just me. Still, it's fun to enjoy their discomfort no matter how small and fleeting it will be.

More [ace]: RWN adds:

I don't think his selection is a telling omen about Barack's governing philosophy. Same goes for the supposedly "centrist" advisers Obama's selecting. If you're going to veer way off to the left, making some largely symbolic and inconsequential gestures towards the middle to provide cover makes a lot of sense.

It also tells you a bit about the netroots. A meaningless gesture towards "outreach" of a very weak nature is made, and still they freak out.

The left portrays the right as eternally outraged and freaking out (and, in fact, masturbating with delight at being outraged; one of their favorite braindead lines is "fap fap fap fap" after, say, the announcement of a jihadist plot -- see, we love hate so much we actually take sexual pleasure in terrorism).

In contrast, of course, they imagine themselves as pretty cool customers, very centered, having a good bead on things and well-nigh unflappable, thank you very much.

Compare the right's complaints that Norm Minetta, who opposed any element of ethnographic profiling in airport security post 9/11, with the left's outrage that Rick Warren will speak at an inaugural. One involved policy; one involved window-dressing.

Eh. Fashionableness means a lot more to these guys I guess.

Posted by: DrewM at 07:07 AM | Comments (55)
Post contains 538 words, total size 3 kb.

Helen Jones-Kelley, Ohio's Director of Department of Job and Family Services, has quit, along with two others involved in digging through Joe the Plumber's confidential information. I feel like this is old news, but can't seem to find it on the main page, so...

In a four-paragraph statement, she said, "it is with sadness and clarity that I have decided to resign...This decision comes after having a time of pause, in which I realize that I continue to be used as a political postscript, providing a distraction from urgent state priorities.

"My professional career, and the legacy of service I have established, has been, and continues to be, far too important for me to allow my reputation and my commitment as a servant leader to be disparaged. I also remain concerned for the safety of my family and myself."

Self-serving and revisionist. She didn't have much concern for turning Joe the Plumber's life into a political postscript, did she?

Thanks to Dave in Texas who got the link (I think) from commenter Kestrel.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 06:47 AM | Comments (70)
Post contains 185 words, total size 1 kb.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 06:31 AM | Comments (15)
Post contains 8 words, total size 1 kb.

This makes two years in a row that snow, actual frozen water falling from the sky, has been seen in Malibu. Last year about a half an inch stuck:

Last year folks freaked about it since the only ways into and out of Malibu except PCH are canyon roads. This year I'm told there wasn't enough snowfall to matter (although the rain can sometimes make things interesting).

And while I'm thinking of it: more...

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 08:04 PM | Comments (147)
Post contains 330 words, total size 3 kb.

Because you can't really screw it up any worse than you did last week.

Or can you?

Anyway, Thursday night game so don't forget.

Also, I suckered about 50 of you knotheads into the college bowl thingy. See here if ya want some.

...

Homos.

Group id 35232, password paulanka, who we all hope gets better real soon like. First game is this Saturday, the Eagleshizzle Bowl, Wake Forest vs. the Midshipmen. 10am CST cause I don't do shit in the eastern time zone, suckit eastern time zone nazis!!!

It's 51 degrees here in Texas tonight. For those for whom it ain't, heh.

I don't suffer from remorse either.

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 07:45 PM | Comments (14)
Post contains 115 words, total size 1 kb.

A new metaphysical question for a new age...can Obama make up a number so big even He can't spend it? Early indications are, apparently not.

Anxious to jolt the economy back to life, President-elect Barack Obama appears to be zeroing in on a stimulus package of about $850 billion, dwarfing last spring's tax rebates and rivaling drastic government actions to fight the Great Depression.

Obama has not settled on a grand total, but after consulting with outside economists of all political stripes, his advisers have begun telling Congress the stimulus should be bigger than the $600 billion initially envisioned, congressional officials said Wednesday.

...Obama aides also pointed to recommendations by Mark Zandi, the lead economist at Moody's Economy.com and an informal McCain adviser who has been proposing a $600 billion plan.

"I would err on the side of making it larger than making it smaller," Zandi said in an interview. "The size of the plan depends on the forecast — the economic outlook — and that is darkening by the day."

"Even a trillion is not inconceivable," he said.

Call me when we start to count in Quatloos.

Seriously though, if shoving money out the door as fast as you can print it is the key to prosperity, shouldn't Zimbabwe be the most prosperous country on the face of the Earth?

I wanted to get a preview of the next few years so I just started reading The Forgotten Man by Amity Shlaes. Suffice it to say, I'm scared out of my mind.

And before Republicans get too indignant over this idea, we should remember that federal spending was already off the charts this year under a Republican president before the bailouts hit.

The government's spending commitments exploded by 25 percent in 2008, putting taxpayers more than $1 trillion in the hole even before the astronomical costs of the economic bailout were taken into account, according to an annual report released Monday by the White House.

A joint report by the White House budget office and Treasury Department said that much of the increase in obligations came from an unexpected jump in veterans benefits liabilities, while revenues remained mostly flat because of the recession that began a year ago.

Jim Nussle, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, called the report "sobering."

Sobering? Hell, it makes me want to get drunk.

Posted by: DrewM at 06:26 PM | Comments (76)
Post contains 412 words, total size 3 kb.

They aren't waiting for the bailout.

Chrysler says it will close all 30 of its manufacturing plants for a month starting Friday.

The company needs to match production to slowing demand and conserve cash.

...Operations at the 30 plants will be idled at the end of shift on Friday, Dec. 19, and will not come back online until Jan. 19, 2009, or later.

Not sure how much, if any, of their wages the UAW folks get in situations like this but I'm guessing those roll-backs Sen. Corker was talking about are looking pretty good about now. According to this UAW members will get the month off with 95% pay. I'll be in my bunk...sobbing and reevaluating why I didn't become an autoworker.

As for the bailout, it looks like Friday might be the day.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said automakers would soon get emergency loans but the department is still asking detailed questions of automakers before it allocates any money from the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP. GM and Chrysler are seeking up to $15 billion in emergency aid to keep them afloat through the beginning of next year.

President Bush has signaled he'll provide money to the automakers and a decision is going to come soon.

The Treasury, however, wants to ensure that it has enough money in reserve so it can inject liquidity into banks in the remaining month the Bush Administration is in office.

"The autos will get the money as quickly as we can prudently do it," Paulson told CNBC.

Bush said Tuesday he was still considering "all options" to prevent a disorganized bankruptcy by automakers.

The Bush Administration plans to impose tough conditions -- including most of those worked out in a deal with congressional Democrats last week. They are weighing additional conditions.

"We're told that the (automakers) are teetering here or teetering there, and obviously (we're) taking in their concerns and taking in the concerns of all the stakeholders and we'll try to get this done in an expeditious way," Bush said.

Merry Christmas!

More: In checking around on this, it looks like most plants across the industry close for a week or two around this time of year for maintenance and such, so it's really an extra couple of weeks not something entirely out of the blue.

Posted by: DrewM at 01:33 PM | Comments (106)
Post contains 403 words, total size 3 kb.

Drew Peterson is, of course, suspected complicit in his third wife's murder and his fourth wife's disappearance.

I'll give his bride-to-be props: A lot of songs claim it, but she really is willing to die for love.

Drew Peterson, 54, recently proposed to his 23-year-old girlfriend of four months, his publicist confirmed to ABCNews.com, but he will not reveal her identity in an attempt to shield her from the media.

"Yes, Peterson is engaged," said Glenn Selig, Drew Peterson's publicist, who added the proposal occurred "in the past few days." "But we're not saying to who. He's entitled to his privacy and so is she."

Drew Peterson garnered media attention after his wife, Stacy Peterson, 24, went missing Oct. 28, 2007. He was widely criticized for his blase attitude toward his wife's disappearance, even alleging to the press that his wife's PMS had led her to run off with another man.

..

Drew Peterson told ABC News in an interview last year that the search for Stacy Peterson was a "waste of time."

On the anniversary of Stacy Peterson's disappearance, Drew Peterson told ABC's "Good Morning America" that he hopes she one day turns up.

"I hope someday she pops her head up and shows herself," he said.

...

But because Drew Peterson is still legally married to Stacy Peterson, a divorce will be necessary before he can set a date to walk down the aisle with his mystery bride.

"He's legally married still," said Selig, "so I guess in order to get remarried he'll need to get a divorce first."

According to the Chicago Tribune, Drew Peterson met with a high-profile divorce attorney to look into how to get granted a divorce on the basis of abandonment.

Extreme abandonment.

In lieu of flowers, well-wishers are asked to send quicklime, bleach, and a bone saw. And also, another wife.

Thanks to Circa.

Posted by: Ace at 12:25 PM | Comments (116)
Post contains 362 words, total size 2 kb.