What you all really want to see

By the way, this has nothing to do with this picture, but it's been reported that Keanu Reeves and Diane Keaton are an item. Didn't think it was worth it's own post, but I still wanted to put it out there. Now read the political stuff!

Growth = Bad? Not in America, you Commie!

Here's an interesting read that takes all those neoclassical-economists-who-live-in-a-bubble-where-growth-is-the-ultimate-goal-despite-the-fact-that-their-mathematical- models-are-purely-hypothetical-and-really-do-not-take-into-account-the-real-world (they ignore a little something I like to call "reality") to task. You find the article here.

Speaking of credit cards

Guess who just got the final nail in the coffin that is his political career due to not one, but two of those little plastic babies?! Why, Tom DeLay of course! Thank you, Washington Post:

The airfare to London and Scotland in 2000 for then-House Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) was charged to an American Express card issued to Jack Abramoff, a Washington lobbyist at the center of a federal criminal and tax probe, according to two sources who know Abramoff's credit card account number and to a copy of a travel invoice displaying that number.

DeLay's expenses during the same trip for food, phone calls and other items at a golf course hotel in Scotland were billed to a different credit card also used on the trip by a second registered Washington lobbyist, Edwin A. Buckham, according to receipts documenting that portion of the trip.

House ethics rules bar lawmakers from accepting travel and related expenses from registered lobbyists. DeLay, who is now House majority leader, has said that his expenses on this trip were paid by a nonprofit organization and that the financial arrangements for it were proper. He has also said he had no way of knowing that any lobbyist might have financially supported the trip, either directly or through reimbursements to the nonprofit organization.

Let's see if your God helps you now, asshole!

Click this link. . .

to see polling statistics detailing Bush's failure in the eyes of the American people. Personally, I don't put much stock in polls, especially ones done by newspapers, but hey, if it's your bag, by all means click here.

He's Baaaaaack!

Just when you thought the Gannon/Guckert controversy had been successfully swept under the rug by the GOP and the MSM, the Secret Service has just been forced to release the security logs pertaining to the male escort/WH reporter, and it ain't pretty. From The Raw Story:

Guckert made more than 200 appearances at the White House during his two-year tenure with the fledging conservative websites GOPUSA and Talon News, attending 155 of 196 White House press briefings. He had little to no previous journalism experience, previously worked as a male escort, and was refused a congressional press pass.

Perhaps more notable than the frequency of his attendance, however, is several distinct anomalies about his visits.

Guckert made more than two dozen excursions to the White House when there were no scheduled briefings. On many of these days, the Press Office held press gaggles aboard Air Force One—which raises questions about what Guckert was doing at the White House. On other days, the president held photo opportunities.

On at least fourteen occasions, Secret Service records show either the entry or exit time missing. Generally, the existing entry or exit times correlate with press conferences; on most of these days, the records show that Guckert checked in but was never processed out.

In March, 2003, Guckert left the White House twice on days he had never checked in with the Secret Service. Over the next 22 months, Guckert failed to check out with the Service on fourteen days. On several of these visits, Guckert either entered or exited by a different entry/exit point than his usual one. On one of these days, no briefing was held; on another, he checked in twice but failed to check out.

How are the Democrats so ineffectual that haven't been able to capitalize on this shit at all?

Gays, in the military?

I missed this article in the NY Times last week, but I'd like to take this opportunity to address/make fun of it.

Here's a little excerpt for those of you who still have not registered with the Times (go to bugmenot.com, they have usernames and passwords for just about every free site you can think of).:

The office of the general counsel at the Pentagon has proposed decriminalizing consensual sodomy among adults, a change to its 55-year-old policy on sodomy that would bring the military legal code more in line with laws that govern civilians, according to a memorandum sent to Congress.


Under Article 125 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, it is a crime to engage in "unnatural carnal copulation with another person of the same or opposite sex," even with mutual consent.

The changes proposed by the Pentagon's lawyers would narrow the definition to prohibit acts of sodomy with a person under age 16 or acts "committed by force." Their memorandum says this would "conform more closely to other federal laws and regulations."

Recent rulings by the Supreme Court and the United States Court of Criminal Appeals for the Armed Forces have raised questions about the constitutionality of the military's ban on consensual sodomy.

While the change would not alter the military's policy against gay men and lesbians in uniform, advocates for gay rights said that recent court decisions and the proposed changes to the military code could have broader implications for gay men and lesbians in the armed forces.

"Pentagon leaders can no longer justify banning gays because of private, consensual conduct if the military sodomy statute is repealed," said Steve Ralls, a spokesman for the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, a gay rights group.

If you ask me, the whole thing is a backhanded set-up by the Army. They know that they need more soldiers, and they lose a number of damn good ones to this little "don't ask, don't tell" policy each year. By changing one law under the pretense of updating to the common standard in our society at large, they know that they are laying the groundwork for any semi-intelligent lawyer to use the law to overturn the Army's ban on gays in general. Therefore, they can get more soldiers without pissing off the Christian right because they can just shrug and point to those hated "active" judges as the real culprits. It's a smart move, I'll give them that.

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

Back from the dead

I really should be doing work right now, but I've decided to return to my old haunts and put up some interesting and often frustrating articles. Check them out, they'll blow your mind. BLOW IT!!!

According to Slate, Americans may be actually be wising up. No, no, they haven't called for Bush's impeachment, that would be too wise. No, they have begun to pay off their credit card debts at a growing rate. What? Americans actually curbing their spending and taking their futures into account? That's simply not the American way! We should be spending and wasting, giving nary a thought to where we'll be five, ten, fifteen years from now!

. . . All is not tulips and nectar over at MBNA, the largest independent issuer of credit cards. Yesterday it reported a poor quarter and ratcheted down earnings expectations for the year. Its stock sank to a two-year low. Credit card giant Capital One Financial had a better quarter, but its stock has been slumping lately, too. Bad news for the credit card companies may be better news for us. There are signs at both companies that consumers may be responding to higher rates by doing something almost completely unexpected and practically un-American: paying down credit card debt.

The credit card industry presumes, based on happy experience, that Americans will borrow more money each quarter to support their spending habits, regardless of the direction of interest rates, and that enough consumers will be happy simply to pay off just enough debt to allow them to borrow more. But last quarter MBNA, to its apparent shock, found that "results were further impacted by unexpectedly high payment volumes from U.S. credit card customers," and that "the payment volumes were particularly higher on accounts with higher interest rates."

In other words, customers didn't respond to rising rates by continuing to pay the minimum and going deeper into debt; they paid down the principal more rapidly than expected. A detailed breakdown of MBNA's business shows that between the fourth quarter of 2004 and the first quarter of 2005 (i.e., between Dec. 31, 2004, and March 31, 2005) domestic credit card loan receivables—balances outstanding—fell from $13.9 billion to $10.9 billion in the U.S. alone. Meanwhile, U.S.-managed loans—balances outstanding plus receivables that MBNA has securitized and sold—fell sharply from $80.2 billion to $74.8 billion, down 6.7 percent.