E Pluribus Unum

• Sounds like McCain thinks the Secret Service causes more problems that it solves -- and he'd eliminate much of it if he becomes president. "Why do I need it?" says he. I'll tell you why: because the office is bigger than you, you macho s*@thead.

• John Edwards confuses going on offense with going on the attack. Reed Hundt, on the other hand, knows exactly what the difference is.

• Optimist's view of Iraq: US keeps 80,000-100,000 troops in country for the next twenty to thirty years. Meanwhile when the Brits left Basra, violence dropped by 90%. Draw your own conclusions.

• Rove on How To Beat Hillary. Ara on How To Beat Any Republican Who Wants To Beat Hillary (or any other Dem).

• In the context of today's writers' strike, screenwriter John Rogers (aka Kung Fu Monkey) recalls his essay wherein he draws a brilliant parallel between 4th generation warfare and 4th generation media. The guy is good -- read today's Re-arranging the Deckchairs as well as yesteryear's 4th Generation Media.

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Categories: 2008 Presidential Election , Democrats , John Edwards , John McCain , Media , Odds & Sods , War in Iraq

• Congratulations to Al Gore. Wow -- an Oscar, an Emmy, and a Nobel all in one year. Not even Liza Minelli did that.

• 
  Why is everyone so upset with Ann Coulter? She's only said what any Christian learns from the time they start Sunday School. And another thing: if she's so heinous why does CNBC (or NBC, or CNN or FNC) put her on the air in the first place? Lastly, isn't it true that you can be a girl and still have a Y chromosome? IJS.

• "Hunh. A resolution condemning genocide. I think you gotta go 'yes' with that one. [If not], what is the right response to historic mass killings? Historic mass flowers?"

• And, speaking on behalf of the entire Armenian community, I would like to say we are thrilled that Aasif Mandvi has been named The Daily Show's Senior Armeniologist.

• I read the Wall Street Journal and I know they loooooove to complain that the richest 10% of Americans already pay 2/3 of all taxes, as though that proves their taxes are too high. What you never hear is what percentage of their total income this tax load represents. When THAT number reaches 30-50% or more (as it does for middle-class families) then we can talk about taxes being too high. Not only that: I say they should be paying 90% or more of all taxes in this country. And if they want to become tax exiles, then good riddance. They weren't real Americans after all, were they?

• George W. Bush can grow up a mean, nasty, coke-snorting drunk but once he accepted Jesus, it wiped the slate clean. Rudy Giuliani can rail against the gun lobby as Mayor of New York, but in a post-9/11world he's in bed with the NRA -- and they're on top. So what now for Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the first terrorist attack on the World Trade Center -- now that he's accepted Jesus as his Lord and Savior? Maybe he and Ann Coulter can go on a National Reconciliation Tour.

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Categories: Corruption , Environment , George W. Bush , Odds & Sods , Religion , Republicans , Rudy Giuliani , Terrorism

• Judge to Sen. Craig: You're stuck with your plea: Are Republicans stuck with Craig? [Answer: Yes.]

• Kudos to Obama: Blocks odious FEC Republican nominee Spakovsky...for now.

• Conservative "pro-family" activists would rather vote for a third party candidate than they would vote for Rudy Giuliani. I'll believe it when that candidate hands Florida to the Democrats in 2008. IJS. That said, maybe it's time for Rudy to claim he's pro-life now. After all -- 9/11 changed everything!

• Now that Pete Domenici has announced his retirement, will Bill Richardson quit his run for the White House and try for the Senate instead? His campaign says, no, they're in it to win it and they are "confident" of their chances. Right.

• Speaking of losers, do you ever get the impression that Fred Thompson is just going through the motions? What ever could he have been thinking? (Answer below.)

• Sleep-walking his way through Iowa, Thompson tries to out-Reagan the rest of the Republican field by slamming "the Soviet Union." Yes, you heard me. The Hunt For Red October is on again, baby!

• Speaking of the USSR, today is the 50th anniversary of the launch into space of Sputnik. Did you know that what the Soviets were really trying to do was draw attention to the ICBM that launched the little-satellite-that-could?

• Speaking of Sputnik, here's an interview with Arthur C. Clark (now nearing 90) wherein he remembers where he was that fateful day when his prediction finally came true.

• Props to Sergey Korolyov, the genius behind the Soviet space effort. He was called "The Chief Designer" because his identity was deemed a state secret by the Politburo.

• A new AP-Ipsos poll has Bush's approval ratings at 31 percent, the "lowest level" ever recorded in that poll's history. Not sure if they mean lowest for any president or just lowest for the Bush family.

• Surprise! People still really, really like Bill Clinton.

And here it is, your moment of Zen:

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Categories: 2008 Presidential Election , Barack Obama , Democrats , Fred Thompson , George W. Bush , Hillary Clinton , History , Odds & Sods , Republicans , Rudy Giuliani

• It's Petraeus Day on Capitol Hill. Can you stand the suspense??

• David Brooks compares OBL to ... lefty bloggers! Of course -- we're all for fundamentalist religion taking over the government.

• Gallup has Hillary with more support than the next two candidates put together. Obama is set to make a major policy speech on Iraq this week. Can these two facts have anything to do with each other?

• A sign that maybe this blogging thing is washed up: Alan Greenspan has a blog.

• Iraqis overwhelmingly say that the surge has made things worse, and they want the US out. Now. The only people left who disagree are the 70% of Republicans who give Bush a positive approval rating.

• When Petraeus is done on Capitol Hill today (giving his non-report that wasn't written by nobody at the White House) he'll take a victory lap participate in an exclusive interview on Fox News.

• Here's how bad it sucks to be Bill Richardson: Unavision would not allow Richardson to speak Spanish during the all-Spanish-broadcast of the recent Democratic debate.
  

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Categories: 2008 Presidential Election , Barack Obama , Democrats , Hillary Clinton , Odds & Sods , Republicans , War in Iraq

• OK, to be perfectly accurate, Constitution Day is September 17. But don't let that stop you from emailing a copy of the Constitution to yourself today; that way someone in the Bush Administration might actually read it. (HT to Bill Maher)

• What’s Your Constitution IQ? Take the 50 Question Expert Quiz and find out.

• Don't know about you, but I'd rather pledge allegiance to the US Constitution than to the flag. Hey, wait a minute! Aren't the President and members of Congress required to do the same thing? WTF?

• Forget about wearing a flag lapel pin; carry your own copy of the US Constitution.

• Well, if you insist: here's a gold-plated US Constitution lapel pin.

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Categories: Constitution , Odds & Sods

• Patrick Fitzgerald for ... Attorney General?
• Hillary asks SecDef Gates if he supports Under Secretary Edelman's smear of her. I think she's being far too 19th-century-polite. I would have gone all Harry Truman on his -- and Edeleman's -- ass.
• And while we're at it, let's define what a smear really is: attacking someone's reputation instead of their message.
• Colbert finally gets his free iPhone.
• Wake me up when September ends. LIke, for example, in November.
• A couple of weeks ago, dick Cheney declared there were four branches of government. Now, the White House is claiming there are only two.
• And in a related story, Sen. Leahy points out that charging Harriet Miers with "inherent contempt" of Congress would likely result in a trial in the Senate presided over by -- wait for it -- dick Cheney.
• Saturday night at midnight the last Harry Potter book will be released from captivity. Or not. The NYTimes has already gotten a copy -- from a legit source, they say -- and published a review. Sorry, no link -- Miss Julie made me promise. JK Rowling is shocked -- and saddened. Noting the tremendous costs associated with sequestering the book copies until the witching hour ($20 million, not counting Fedex shipping costs), Seth Godin has a solution, should a publishing phenomenon like this occur ever again. "Books are great at holding memories," he says, "They're lousy at keeping secrets."

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Categories: Hillary Clinton , Humor , Marketing , Odds & Sods , Politics , Technology , Television , Video , War

• Supreme Court reverses itself on Gitmo case. Why do I have a creepy feeling they're going to rule for the Bushies this time?

• No Satisfaction this Year. This year the Rolling Stones will not be performing in...Israel. Insurance costs are sky-high. I guess this means they won't be performing for the troops in Iraq either?

• Lots of first impressions of the iPhone by new owners. Here's one from TechMeme. Here's a fetishistic photo spread on the actual unboxing of a new iPhone. Here's Xeni's report (calling it the Jesusphone). Here's a guy who tears the iPhone down -- literally.

• Fred Thompson in New Hampshire: Republicans say his speech there was underwhelming. I'd say "where's the beef," but that would be so 80s. Or so Walter Mondale.

• Woz spotted in line for an iPhone. When the crowd recognized him, they stepped aside and put him at the front of the line. Awwwww.

• Prince is releasing his new CD ... in Sunday's edition of London's Daily Mail. The recording industry is pissed. I'm trying to imagine who's still reading a newspaper on any day of the week. Answer: nobody in Prince's audience.

• When I saw that that iPhones are turning up on eBay, I remembered one important fact: "i" before "e" except after "c" (for "cash").

• ...and finally, after watching the one laugh-out-loud moment of Thursday's Dem debate, I wondered: is Barack Obama a dutiful husband, homophobic, or just seeing Joe Biden on the down-low? You decide...and don't miss Al Sharpton's scowl -- it'll melt the hair off your arms:

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Categories: 2008 Presidential Election , Barack Obama , Constitution , Democrats , Music , Odds & Sods , Republicans , Technology , Video

• Karl Rove has been among a small group of Bushies visiting Presidential libraries in preparation for planning the one for his boss. When I bumped into Rove last week, the flight we were both on was going to Atlanta, which (coincidentally?) is the location for the Carter Library.

• Jane Hamsher asks the musical question, "Who Is The Scariest GOP Presidential Candidate?" Rudy's nuts so he's plenty scary. But Romney is scary because he is willing to say just about anything to get elected. [P.S. Is it just me or is Mitt Romney filling a hole left by George Allen, i.e., tall-dark-and-handsome?]

• Sen. Barack Obama's Secret Service codename is "Renegade." Hillary's is "Evergreen," left over from the Clinton White House years. The other candidates will have to wait and see if they get their own handles. This article details the codenames for past and present POTUS' and candidates for POTUS. Here's an interesting bit of trivia:

  [A]ccording to a Secret Service spokesman, all code names are chosen by military officials, suggesting that they should not be examined too closely for deeper meaning.

• NBC seems interested in Jon Stewart. Stewart's contract with Comedy Central is up in 2008.

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  Categories: 2008 Presidential Election , Barack Obama , George W. Bush , Hillary Clinton , Humor , Mitt Romney , Odds & Sods , Politics , Rudy Giuliani , Television

• If I'm Harry Reid, I guess I can always take some solace (as Reagan did) in the fact that I'm getting fire from both ends of the political spectrum. I mean come on! -- when was the last time a politician was accused by both Sean Hannity AND Keith Olbermann of being the second coming of Neville Chamberlain?

• Note to Keith Olbermann: I love you, dude, but enough with the Chamberlain references -- first Bush, now Reid? WTF?

• Is there anything more entertaining than reading Brian Williams write about The Sopranos on Slate magazine?

• Well, even my presence in Bothell, WA this week couldn't help Blake Lewis -- so Jordin Sparks becomes the new American Idol. I guess it's no surprise: how many Melinda Dolittle posters were going to get sold anyway?

• And speaking of the Democrats (and the netroots), I'm with Kos:

  The conservative movement spent three decades building up their machine and completing the takeover of their party. And some of you want to quit after one setback?

  That's embarrassing.

  Buck up. We still haven't completely lost this Iraq supplemental battle. And if we do, instead of crying and taking your ball home, resolve to fight even harder. We owe it to our troops in Iraq, to our families, to our neighbors, to ourselves.

  I have served for many years on the boards of several organizations and the politics at that level are apparently the same as the politics at the highest levels -- the stakes are just different. It's all about what you want to get done and how you work with (and against) people to get there. It's about having the votes to pass your motion, it's about building alliances (some temporary, some not) it's about winning and losing -- and surviving to fight another day. To me it's exciting but to others it's exhausting. To some it's personal, to others it's just business. So when I see what's happening with the Iraq supplemental bill, I'm not turned off -- I just see another opportunity to fight -- again, perhaps another day -- for what I believe in.

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Categories: Democrats , Odds & Sods , War in Iraq

• Bush at 28%. Old School: invoke Truman's name. New School: freedom's just another word...for nothing left to lose.

• Sarkozy wins, vowing to out-poodle The Poodle. And why not? After all...he's French!

• An Iraqi blogger visits New Orleans and is shocked at how much it reminds him of home...but not in a good way. Adding insult to injury, he observes that, after the 1991 Gulf War, the despised Saddam rebuilt the infrastructure of Iraq within months.

• Speaking of rebuilding, the reconstruction of Greensburg, Kansas, destroyed by tornados last week, likely will be delayed because a lot of the needed equipment is in...(wait for it)... Iraq.

• Religious fundamentalist murderer Ayman al Zawahri releases a tape...and the White House (and Brit Hume) agrees with what he says. Gosh, in the good old days, they at least made a show of disagreeing with him.

• John Aravosis meets John Kasich. Interesting on so many different levels.

• The reaction to Tenet's book has been interesting. So far, Douglas Feith and Bob Woodward have reviewed it in the WSJ and the Washington Post, respectively. Not surprisingly, they've been pretty critical of Tenet's account as well as his performance in office. But then, they have an agenda, no? Feith wants to deflect blame and Woodward wants to sell his own account of what really happened -- including the now infamous "slam dunk" quote from Tenet.

• Attention gamers: you are now officially middle class and you suck like the rest of us. Why? Because you can now earn World of Warcraft gametime when you use your World of Warcraft Rewards Visa card.

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Categories: George W. Bush , Hurricane Katrina , Louisiana , Odds & Sods , Terrorism

• Did you see the Moyers show on the Iraq war? If not, you can watch it again on PBS and also online.

• Christopher Hitchens has a new book blasting religion. Problem is, he's plenty cozy with the Family Research Council. What's up with that, Hitch?

• Murray Waas finds proof that Gonzalez wasn't the functioning pinhead he portrayed himself to be. Leahy's seen the article and is madder than hell.

• That jug-eared, mealy-mouthed, comb-licker Paul Wolfowitz hints that he might be convinced to step down from the World Bank after all.

• How creepily adoring of George W. Bush is Condi Rice? Plenty, folks, plenty.

• Jonathan Powers, Iraq war veteran, says Bush betrayed the troops and urges the president to sign the Iraq war funding bill. Oh, and happy anniversary to "Mission Accomplished."

• Atrios thinks George Tenet is a dim bulb. He's got a point.

• Bill Kristol wants to debunk Tenet's assertions because he got a date wrong. In return, Crooks and Liars digs up the video that shows Perle saying exactly what Tenet remembered.

• Sen. Inhofe: Media invented WMD excuse for Iraq invasion.

• Wanker of the Day: Howie Kurtz.

• Oh, no -- not again!: Fox News anchor Dick Morris named by DC madame as patron.

• Chris Weigant has some post-veto strategic advice for the Democrats: Whatever happens, make sure everyone knows this is Bush's war.

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Categories: Odds & Sods

I'm back in town long enough to do some laundry and then I'm off again. I'll be back Monday of next week. See y'all then. In the meantime, here's my take on a few things that popped up on my radar while I was gone.

• I did a double take when reading about the Green Zone suicide bomber that killed (among others) 3 Iraqi MPs. That's "Members of Parliament" not "military policeman." Holy crap. Wonder what McCain thinks of the surge now?

• Kurt Vonnegut has died. Or maybe he's just come unstuck in time. So it goes.

• Paul Wolfowitz has a girlfriend? Who knew?

• Don Imus is off the air, perhaps for good. I've always considered myself a fan. Where else are you going to go to hear an interview with Shug Knight and Orin Hatch -- both on the same morning? That said, he was capable of the most brutal (and brutally honest) commentary on the air. I believe Don Imus was the guy for whom they invented the phrase "shock jock." So I'm still trying to answer the only question worth asking: "Why now, after all he's said, after all these years?" Maybe he just finally pissed off the wrong combination of people at the wrong time. And/But maybe it isn't about women or African Americans at all, but just about harassing a group of basically decent college kids who were only minding their own business. Oh well: live by the insult, die by the insult.

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Categories: Odds & Sods

• TPMmuckrakers have swarmed the 3,000 page DoJ document dump like a bunch of hungry ants and dismantled it tout de suite. The result? Oh, baby -- lots of juicy tidbits for sure.

• Gonzalez cancels a Thursday meeting with a House committee. Will he really still be here by then...or not?

• Enough already with Web 2.0.

• Mitt's Macaca Moment? Poor baby. Let Ann kiss it and make it better.

• Obama says it wasn't anyone in his campaign that did the now ubiquitous Mac-1984/Hillary mash-up. Whoever it was, it's done pretty well -- check out the Obama logo on the girl's tank-top. Cool.

• M.J. Rosenberg cries foul when Hamas gunmen kill an Israeli electrician -- but only because he was attacked inside the pre-1967 borders of Israel. This is exactly the kind of pointy-headed intellectual drivel I so hate from otherwise sensible liberals.

• Ditto Kristof.

• Holy crap! Even more juicy tidbits from the DoJ document dump.

• Anybody here hang out at Flixster?

• Apparently Heather Mills made quite an impression last night. Anyone see it?

• That new glass-bottom observation deck at the Grand Canyon gives me vertigo just reading about it: it projects 70 feet out beyond the cliff's edge and you can see 4,000 feet straight down to the bottom of the Canyon.

• Despite what Tony Snow says, there is apparently no precedent barring White House staff from testifying in front of Congress.

• While they were rationalizing about dumping selected US attorneys, insiders at the DoJ were ready to rank Patrick Fitzgerald as "not distinguished." If any of the ones that they DID fire were half as professional as Fitz, then for sure these hacks at Justice (and the WH) were out of control.

• This is weird: among 454 likely Democratic primary voters in Michigan, Sen. Hillary Clinton leads Sen. Barack Obama 45%-29% in a statewide primary. It's weird because I know lots of people in Michigan and I haven't met anyone yet that admits to wanting Hillary to get the nomination. Ditto Louisiana.

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Categories: 2008 Election , Corruption , Democrats , Israel , Law , Movies , Odds & Sods , Republicans , Television

• Dean Karnazes ran 50 marathons in 50 days. He does 200 miles just for fun. He'll race in 120-degree heat. Here are 12 secrets to his success. [Preview: He carries a cell phone and regularly orders an extra-large Hawaiian pizza -- while running a marathon.]

• Anonymous Liberal observes that "our system attributes to people in their capacity as voters the very truth-detection skills that it assumes they do not have in their capacity as consumers."

  As a result, we end up with a system in which you have to be scrupulously honest when selling a toaster, but you can pretty much say anything you want when you’re selling the next president of the United States.

  He asks (and answers) why.

• Speaking of business and government, it's wrong to think that we'd all be better off if the government was "run like a business." Our system is precisely designed to prevent that very thing from EVER happening. Think about it: in business you have an all powerful Chairman of the Board. Where is the analgous position in our government? The president is the chief of the executive branch -- but that branch is merely co-equal with the other two branches. No business would ever try to organize itself along those lines. More on this another time.

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Categories: Business , Odds & Sods , Politics , Sports

If you don't already visit Boing Boing at least a couple of times a week, you're missing out on a lot of good stuff.

• Google Patent Search debuts. Now you can search 7 million US patents with all data coming from the US patent office. Oh, great, just what we needed: another reason to stay seated in front of your computer for hours at a time.

• Man solves Rubik's cube with his feet. See if you can guess how he did it. (Hint: he's a film director.)

• Cook cubic hard-boiled eggs with this device. OK, honestly now: you're either going to say "Wow -- cool!" or "Um, why?" Put me down in the former group. How's about you?

• Russia spy HQ has giant batman mural in floor. Seriously, where can I get a T-shirt with this design on it?

• And lastly, with headlines like these, do you really have to read the story?
  • Python found in toilet
  • World's tallest man saves two dolphins

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  Categories: Odds & Sods

• Matt craps on a bunch of ridiculous ideas about programming and code that Hollywood can't seem to stay away from. His Top 10 list include this (my favorite):

  Most code is not inherently cross platform Remember in Independence Day when whatshisface-math-guy writes a virus that works on both his Apple laptop AND an alien mothership? Bullshit! If real life were like film I'd be able to port Wordpress to my toaster using a Cat5 cable and a bag of glitter.

  Read the other related posts: Top 20 Hackers in Film History and Vibrant's Top 10 Servers in the movies.

• Speaking of films (OK this is a stretch), people are talking about Al Gore and Barack Obama as THE ticket for 2008.

• Speaking of Al Gore and war in Iraq, I have some advice for Democrats: stay the hell away from the ISG Report. It is a bag that you don't want to be left holding, if you catch my drift.

• Lastly, could there BE a funnier guy than Bill in Portland Maine? With the possible exception of John Rogers, (again, the Hollywood connection!) I doubt it.

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  Categories: 2008 Election , Democrats , Film , Odds & Sods , War in Iraq

• No wonder Scalia and Breyer have time to take their show on the road: The SCOTUS calendar has 40% fewer cases on it this year compared to last year. Given Alito/Roberts joining Scalia/Thomas, I guess that's a good thing.

• Wow! -- Selected early Kodachrome images from the 30's and 40's. And not only that: here are some additional web sites with searchable databases of images:
  • Farm Security Administration--Office of War Information Collection,
  • Library of Congress--Architecture and Interior Design for 20th Century America,
  • Charles W. Cushman Photograph Collection.

• The reviews on the ISG and its report are all over the map. And/But this comment by Walter Shapiro seems to fly in the face of the conventional wisdom: that the group is devoid of anyone that is actually, you know, knowledgeable about the Middle East -- until you read the last sentence.

  The significance of the Iraq Study Group has little to do with its actual recommendations, which Baker admitted were not a "magic formula that will solve the problems of Iraq." Rather its importance rests entirely with the luster of the former officials on the commission, including two secretaries of state (Baker and Lawrence Eagleburger), a secretary of defense (William Perry), an attorney general (Ed Meese) and its only woman, retired Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O'Connor. Baker jokingly described them as "a group of has-beens" -- but the reality is this is about as blue-ribbon an assemblage as you get in contemporary America aside, perhaps, from the front row at a state funeral.

  Wow. I'm not sure where he's going here. Irony? Respect?

• Holy crap! Three women show up at the Kennedy Center Honors reception wearing the identical $8500 Oscar de la Renta red dress -- and that's not counting Laura Bush who was also wearing it.

• Dec. 7, 1941: The survivors of that day gather one more time.

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  Categories: Constitution , Film , Funny , Humor , Law , Odds & Sods , War in Iraq

• By the time you read this, the Iraq Survey Group will have released their report. But, really, is there any incentive for their recommendations to be taken seriously? Matt Taibbi:

  [W]ith the midterm elections over, and George Bush already a lame duck, the Iraq war is no longer an urgent problem to anyone on the Hill who matters...The Baker-Hamilton report is being praised for its cautious, sensible, bipartisan approach to the Iraq problem (Time magazine even called it "genius") but actually all it is is a tacit recognition of this pass-the-buck dynamic in Washington.

• Al Gore has some advice for Bush: "[T]ry to separate out the personal issues of being blamed in history for [the worst strategic mistake in the history of the United States] and instead recognize it’s not about [you]." Ouch.

• Speaking of waking up to reality, the Wall Street Journal editorial page recently ran a short paean to John Bolton. [Sorry no link -- I got this out of the newspaper.] What a bunch of wankers:

  The announcement that Mr. Bolton will resign as US Ambassador to the UN...was no doubt cheered in Tehran, Damscus, Caracas, Pyongyang, and Christopher Dodd's Senate office.

  Right. Because it really is us against the rest of the world and if you're against John Bolton, you're a terrorist sympathiser. Whatever. Actually, what caught my eye and made me laugh was this statement about Bolton: "He has understood that the essence of realism is, or ought to be, to see the world as it is." Well then, this might come as a rude surprise to, say, George W. Bush. After all, the world changes all the time whereas we know that Bush's opinion of the world is as constant as the Northern star.

• Holy crap -- Mary Cheney is pregnant. And, just to make things more interesting, she and her partner live in Virginia:

  The [newly enacted anti-gay marriage amendment to the state constitution] ensures that Mary's partner has no legal rights whatsoever in their child, or in what happens to Mary (or vice versa), such as if one partner has to go the hospital, the other can't visit. The law may even nullify any wills that Mary and Heather write regarding each other...

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  Categories: Family , George W. Bush , Odds & Sods , Republicans , War in Iraq

• December 4th was the 13th anniversary of the death of Frank Zappa. We could use a guy like him today:

  Zappa: When you have a government that prefers a certain moral code derived from a certain religion and that moral code turns into legislation to suit one certain religious point of view and if that code happens to be very, very right wing almost toward Attila the Hun...

  Lofton: Well then, you are an anarchist. Every form of civil government is based on some kind of morality, Frank.

  Zappa: Morality in terms of behavior - not in terms of theology.

• Speaking of theology, the Dennis Prager story -- wherein he demanded that Rep. Keith Ellison use a Bible (not a Koran) to take his oath of office for the House -- has developed legs. Sorry to mix metaphors, but Prager's attitude is just the tip of the iceberg. Glenn Beck's outrageous insinuation that Ellison is some sort of al-Qaeda operative and the shameful conduct of US Airways in booting six Muslim clergymen off a flight in Minneapolis are all part of the same anti-Muslim hysteria that is becoming more and more common in this country.

• And speaking of what's just under the surface, James Wolcott makes a valuable observation about the relative moral values promoted by right-wingers:

  It is symptomatic of the moral-spiritual-political-human degradation of the right blogosphere that its receptors register more indignation over some fugitive fatuous quote from Gwyneth Paltrow than over the Orwellian torture of a prisoner and American citizen convicted of no crime, Jose Padilla, whose mind has been subjected to finest deprivation techniques American tax money can buy.(james wolcott)

• And speaking of ruthless overkill, Rudy Giuliani is riding high in the polling for '08 presidential candidates largely on the myth that he rescued New York (and the rest of America) on 9/11. But Cintra Wilson reminds us that he's really an authoritarian narcissist -- and we certainly don't need another one of those in the White House.

  His political career may have been defined by his willingness to confront scary bogeymen, but during slower periods when there were no obvious villains around, Giuliani's interpretations of who or what constituted an immediate threat became increasingly bizarre, personal, puritanical and dangerous. Before the planes hit, when he had too much power and not enough to do, Giuliani, like an old soldier who comes home and starts abusing his family in lieu of a real enemy, was pulling a Great Santini on New York, rooting around in our sock drawers with a Maglite, looking for vices to confiscate and sins to punish. By the mid-'90s, Mayor Rudy was abusing authority according to the whims of his own paranoid, hyper-defensive personality disorder in way that would have made Tiberius self-conscious.

• Carl Levin will be running for re-election in '08. And, gosh -- he's 72?? I guess we're all getting old. I remember when Carl Levin was a Detroit City Councilman. IIRC, he went straight from there to the US Senate, which has to be some sort of record. [P.S. He is the longest-serving Senator in Michigan history.]

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  Categories: Constitution , Democrats , Odds & Sods , Religion , Republicans

• The Washington Examiner editorial board thinks the 6 imams who got yanked off a US Airways flight in handcuffs (and no offer for a replacement flight home) got what they deserved. Unfortunately for the airline, the Examiner won't be the judge and jury in this case.

• Frank Rich believes that Bush isn't in a State of Denial but rather in The Final Days.

• I am not a rabid Michigan Wolverines football fan. I am, in fact, notorious for being a fair-weather fan of any of native state's home teams. That said, I think the Woverines got screwed in the BCS standings when Florida was chosen over Michigan to play Ohio State for the national title. Mitch Albom speaks for me:

  You can spin this thing any way you want. It was strictly about fresh versus familiar. In the end, Ohio State will play Florida on Jan. 8 in Glendale, Ariz., because people with votes want to see that game more than they want to see a rematch of Michigan-Ohio State. This was all about the line of thinking that says: "Give someone else a chance."

  But if the system were about giving everyone a chance, they wouldn't call it a poll, they'd call it a donkey ride

  And speaking of beasts of burden, I hope OSU beats Florida like a rented mule.

• John Bolton resigns! No, he didn't! Well, whatever you call it, he's gone. It all reminds me of that joke from "Bobcat" Goldthwaite: "I didn't lose my job. I know exactly where it is. I went back to work the other day and found it right where I left it -- except someone else is doing it now." [P.S. Remember when "pugnacious arrogance" was considered sexy? Yeah, well, neither do I.]

• And remind me again...what exactly did we do for amusement in the days before we could watch as a big octopus squeezes itself through a little hole?

• If you were in charge of creating the 2007 Official RNC Calendar, what would you put on every single month's page? That's right -- pictures of George W. Bush! Now there's the perfect holiday stocking stuffer from a party that just got socked in the jaw by an angry electorate. [Note: Actually Bush is only on 11 of the pages -- "Dick" Cheney is Mr. August. In a white cowboy hat. I kid you not.]

• I knew it, I knew it, I knew it: deep down, Ken Starr knows that Jesus hates Democrats.

• Never mind all the junior high school crap about who gets to chair a committee: Robert Reich says (and I agree) that the first real test of Democratic seriousness is over the fight between Big Pharma vs. Medicare.

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  Categories: Dick Cheney , George W. Bush , Odds & Sods , Religion , Sports , Terrorism , Video

• Economic indicators (including consumer confidence) are pointing downwards.
• Remember the Taliban? They're back.
• Jack Murtha has seen the ISG's recommendations and he is not impressed.

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Categories: Afghanistan , Economics , Odds & Sods , War in Iraq

• I was in Chicago Tues-Thurs and flew out yesterday morning just ahead of that monster storm. I understand 265 flights were canceled at O'Hare alone. It was cold in Baton Rouge last night too -- we got hit by the same cold front and the temp this morning just after sun-up was 40 degrees.

• There are a few speakers who I always want to listen to if I have the chance, e.g., Robert Reich, Mario Cuomo, Arianna Huffington, Christopher Hitchens, Bill Clinton, Camille Paglia, Newt Gingrich and Kristina Vanden Heuvel are a just a few off the top of my head. I don't always agree with them and often I am diametrically opposed to their positions; but they are always interesting, articulate and challenging. David Gergen is also in that group.

• Speaking of a collection of "Bigfoots," the Baker Commission's recommendations are due out next week and can I tell you that I have