wall street & main street got all they want...

... and we're paying. Steven Pearlstein rips corporate America today for their role in having "helped create the monsters that are rampaging through the political and economic countryside, wreaking havoc and sucking the lifeblood out of the global economy."

What started as an effort to cut their tax bill a little and maybe push back on a regulation or three has now metastasized into anti-government (not "less government," but "NO government") tea party style Republicanism. And we're all paying.

Pearlstein's column here.

go to hell glenn beck, and take your tea partying followers with you

I awoke early this Saturday morning and decided to head to an Arlington (VA) diner for a delicious albeit unhealthy breakfast. The diner was unusually full for 7:00 AM. As I settled in with my coffee I noticed some of the customers (aged 40-60) were wearing t-shirts with messages like "Restore Honor" on them.

Outside the window of the diner, local buses headed down the main drag, en route to a shopping mall near the Pentagon which includes a subway stop. The buses were unusually full for 7:00 AM on a Saturday; not just the usual folks, largely immigrants, heading to their jobs but also well-fed white folks in baseball caps and shorts, some sporting t-shirts with messages supporting gun rights and the like, carrying backpacks, looking like they were ready to spend a day on the Mall.

As I drove back up the pike towards home, I saw a bus-stop near a motel, with a bunch more of those well-fed politically-messaged-tshirt-and-baseball-cap wearing backpack toting white folks waiting for a bus to take them to the Metro station which would take them to downtown Washington where they could go to the Lincoln Memorial for Glenn Beck's stupid Restoring Honor rally.

So I'd like to give a little message to these folks. Go to hell. You're coming to the Lincoln Memorial, the taxpayer-funded monument which commemorates the man who preserved the Union and ended slavery and at least set us on the path of treating non-Christian whites as full citizens (you know, things like the 14th Amendment that some of you want to revoke allofasudden). You ride there on the taxpayer funded bus (which runs along taxpayer funded roads) and taxpayer funded Metro rail system. You probably flew to Washington on a commercial airline; taxpayer funded airports and air traffic control systems made your trip safer or even possible. Or you drove here on taxpayer funded highways.

And you are here to protest against well just about everything it would appear and wanting to "Restore Honor," which is as far as I can tell the code word for keeping middle class (aka "white") perks and tax breaks and sending everybody who wasn't born in America back to Kenya. You don't want to pay taxes and you decry socialism (let's face it, you don't really know what "socialism" means, but that doesn't stop you) but by God we better not fuck with your Medicare and by God you want your Congressman and Senator to bring more public work projects to your town in Alabama or Wyoming or wherever the hell you come from. You demand your freedoms, including your freedom to impose your religious beliefs on others, and your freedom to deny the freedom to Muslims to build a community center in lower Manhattan. You bitch about the bail-out and stimulus package (and you are insufficiently sophisticated to realize that the bank bail-out was signed by de facto President George W. Bush NOT President Obama) but you also bitch about the Obama Administration not doing enough to save American jobs. You demand the continuation of Bush's tax breaks despite the fact that they significantly benefit something like 2% of Americans who can easily afford the return to the tax levels that prevailed in the 1990s when the American economy was booming under Bill Clinton. You carry posters linking Obama to Hitler and Stalin, but you defend right-wingers like Dr. Laura or George Allen when they sling hateful words like "nigger" or "macaca" or "raghead" around. You don't want any immigrants but you were happy to eat a great breakfast at that charming little diner which is run by immigrants and the children of immigrants. You get a chubby when Sarah Palin comes out with her sexy librarian outfit and blathers incomprehensible codewords espousing racism, violence, and patriotism, despite her venal corruption and support for Alaskan secession. You are suspicious about all people with skin darker than Conan O'Brien but you rode that taxpayer funded bus driven by an African-American person who may have harbored some thoughts about the inappropriateness of a race-baiting crowd of the sort Beck will draw speaking at the Lincoln Memorial on the anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech.

Your inconsistencies and miscomprehensions are exceeded only by your ugly hatreds and narrow-minded beliefs.

So go to hell Glenn Beck, and take your crowd today with you.

king of america

Talking about the absurd demands that President Obama spend all his time punching out BP executives and cleaning oil off of seabirds, Nicholas Kristoff identifies a real problem for the American political system.

The lack of a separate head of state. For you non-political-science majors, a "head of state" is the person who is top dog in a country; this is distinct from "head of government," the person in charge of the actual governing apparatus. The easiest way to explain this is by turning to Britain. Queen Elizabeth II is the "head of state." David Cameron, the British Prime Minister, is the "head of government." Head of state can handle ceremonial duties and represent the country; head of government gets much less pomp and circumstance, and focuses on policy and governing.

A head of state does not have to be a royal or hereditary position; in Germany for example, an elected president is head of state, and a chancellor (prime minister) is head of government. The best model for a head of state is one with extremely limited powers. The British monarch is a good example, as is the German president. They can take certain actions on their own in extremely limited circumstances; otherwise, they concentrate on representing Britain/Germany as nations, not on representing the Cameron or Merkel governments.

In the US of course, the president must handle both duties, the ceremonial and the political/governmental. As Kristoff observes, this eats into a president's time. It also has the unfortunate aspect of politicizing even ceremonial, supposed-to-feel-good things the president does with his head of state cap. For example, some complained that President Obama was not going to Arlington Cemetery on Memorial Day (never mind that Reagan never went, Bush the Elder never went, and Bush the Younger usually but didn't always go. AND never mind that instead Obama was going to attend similar ceremonies at ANOTHER military cemetery in Chicago, also the final resting place for American servicemen.) The criticism was mostly from the right wing, and it was mostly just another chance to dis Obama. But if it had been an American head of state doing this, the "let's score political points" angle would not have been a factor.

I'm not a fan of absolute monarchy or hereditary power. But a constitutional monarch or similar head of state would have great advantages. Ronald Reagan I thought was a pretty poor head of government - disconnected, possibly not quite all there at the end, and overall a poor set of policies. Reagan, however, was a wonderful head of STATE. He was classy, enjoyed the ceremonial duties, could project empathy (which nowadays would disqualify him from consideration for the Supreme Court according to some Republicans). Reagan was great in consoling family members and the nation at the memorial for those killed on the Challenger.

I don't expect we will ever had a separation between head of state and head of government. But it would be nice.

another republican in lust

What do you know, another abstinence supporting family-values married Republican is quitting because he has been screwing around. Indiana Congressman Mark Souder is outtahere after admitting he was boffing a part-time staffer, Tracy Meadows Jackson. Jackson was Souder's co-host on an abstinence education video, which is sweet. (I must say from the photo on the web, Jackson is somebody it would be hard to abstain from.)

Dana Milbank has an interesting little column about the problems the Republican House of Representatives Class of 1994 has had in avoiding legal, corruption, sex and/or marital scandals. Milbanks says 15 of the 73 members of that class have had scandals revealed - so far. Per Milbank, roll call includes:

Bob Barr (sex)
Jim Bunn (marital)
Helen Chenowith (sex)
Jon Christensen (marital)
John Ensign (sex/marital and corruption)
Mark Foley (sex)
David Funderburk (legal)
Enid Greene (marital, corruption)
J.D. Hayworth (corruption)
Steve LaTourette (sex/marital, corruption)
James Longley (marital)
Bob Ney (corruption)
Mark Sanford (sex/marital)
Joe Scarborough (marital)
Mark Souder (sex/marital)

I'm not inclined to condemn people for adultery. It's a personal issue, not a scandal. But when you are a family-values pounding Christian with a capital C type politician, quick to condemn others for human frailties, it is fair to expect them to perhaps live up to that standard. Sleeping with employees is NEVER right (that applies to Bill Clinton, too). Hitting on people who are under 18 is never right (Foley). And for any politician of any party, corruption is bad, mmkay?

get knocked up and make big bucks

So who says getting pregnant before graduating high school can get in the way of a lucrative and easy career of giving speeches to high school kids about not getting pregnant before graduating? Or to be specific, about practicing ABSTINENCE - which clearly Bristol Palin and Levi Johnson were avoiding.

In Palin-land, all things are possible. $15,000 to $30,000 a pop for speechifying about keeping your zipper zipped. Quite a cushy job for a 19-year-old with no obvious qualifications, apart from being a teen mom.

But seriously, don't expect this to be a valid career path, unless your mom is Sarah Palin or somebody like that. Wonder if there will be any attempt to steer money and support towards the half-term ex-governor via her fecund daughter? Do you even have to ask?javascript:void(0)

for crist's sake

Charlie Crist will run as an independent in Florida, bailing on the Republican Party that was clearly (unless Marco Rubio was found in bed having sex with a dead boy who worked for Castro) about to kick Crist to the curb.

Republicans are shocked, shocked, that somebody would betray the people and switch parties before running. Some headlines call this an "unprecedented" move.

My, memories are short - or more realistically, memories are selective. How many Republicans are former Democrats, especially in the South? Ask Senator Richard Shelby, for one, who switched parties back in '94 when the going was good. This isn't anything new. Republicans seemed to like the idea a few years back when Joe Lieberman bailed on the Democrats after he lost that primary and ran as a GOP lackey I mean independent for Senate (and won).

court martial

Gosh, do you think the American Patriot Foundation would have supported a soldier who tried to argue that an order from de facto President George W. Bush was illegal because he wasn't actually elected?

Nah. He was one of theirs.

It is a curious thing, a soldier demanding that the President do something (in this instance, produce a birth certificate) before said soldier deigns to carry out an order. Lt. Col. Lakin should rot in the brig.

a moronic constitutional proposal from texas

So many Republicans are bent out of shape over the imposition of mandatory death at age 60 - I mean, over the confiscation of all private property and guns and our daughters - I mean, over an incrementalist health care reform package that means insurance companies can't quit insuring you if you are sick, yeah that's the one - that is is hard to keep track of them.

One particular clown, Texas Congressman Louie Gohmert has raised an idea to stop the Senate from doing anything so wrong as passing legislation with 60 votes that Republicans, tea baggers, and others on the deranged right-wing fringe don't approve of. He wants a Constitutional Convention to repeal the 17th Amendment.

No, that's not the one banning slavery or giving all Americans the right to vote, though you can bet there are some on the right, including those anti-health-care-bill protesters who yelled "n****" at Congressman John Lewis on the steps of the Capitol last week, who wouldn't mind revisiting those. It's the one that gave us Americans the right to vote directly for our Senators, instead of having them elected by the legislatures of the states.

Sayeth Gohmert's overwrought press release, since "the safeguard of State legislatures electing U.S. Senators was removed by the 17th Amendment in 1913, there has been no check or balance on the Federal power grab for the last 97 years." Not even during the years that Republicans had one, two, or three out of the Presidency, Senate, and House?

Well I'll give Gohmert some points for originality in the cause of paranoia. I've heard people complaining about the establishment of the Federal Reserve, or the introduction of the federal income tax, etc. But never before have I heard an American elected official suggest that reducing the rights of Americans to elect their legislators, in this case US Senators, would be a good thing.

Isn't that TAKING power away from the American people, Congressman Gohmert? Are you implying that you don't trust the voters of Texas or Massachusetts or Oregon or where-ever to elect Senators, and you'd rather give that power to the politicians in Austin, Boston, and Salem?

Well this is a loser on several levels. First, Gohmert's press release asserts this convention would cover ONLY the 17th Amendment. Can't do it like that: there is NOTHING to prevent a Constitutional Convention from addressing ANY issues that it wants. So the whole shebang would be open for renewal and revision.

And again, I don't think that taking electoral power away from the voters and giving it to STATE legislators is a terribly pro-democratic thing.

Finally, has Gohmert looked at the control of state legislatures. Currently, the Democrats have a 27-16 edge, with 7 states divided. So let's give the Democratic Party two senators in states they control, and split the other 7... and we have a 61-39 Democratic majority.

Control of state legislatures can change, of course. But I fail to see what Gohmert really thinks this would address.

Gohmert also refers to "the usurpation of the rights of states" in decrying the passage of health care reform.

Rights of states. States' rights. Ah, that seductive call of those who are too afraid, too devious to openly describe themselves for what they really are: supporters of the elite conservative moneyed ruling and business classes, and allies of racists.

the bush economy

For the years 2000-2009, the US economy generated zero net jobs. None, nada.

For eight of those ten years, we were enduring the de facto administration of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, friends of Wall Street and Big Oil.

It would be not entirely accurate to blame the current economic woes solely on Bush/Cheney. Our financial regulatory system is completely out of whack, due in large part to financial deregulation ("un-regulation" would be a better word) by Congress in the 1990s - mostly Republicans, but some Democratic abettors, legislation signed by Clinton.

But this does underscore the absurdity of blaming Barack Obama for the current economic climate. Not that this would stop Obama haters from doing so; there's isn't a rational opposition.

production error at fox?

Again Fox News has been accused of using footage of crowds out of context to make a Republican or Teabag event look good. This time, they made it look like former Alaska Governor/current teabagger wet dream Sarah Palin had huge throngs at her book signing. Except the crowds they showed were from the 2008 presidential campaign.

Fox claimed a "production error".

Of course, that's not true. These are intentional moves to puff Fox's favorites. We all know that, right?

fox news projects itself on the obama administration

Back from semi-retirement because of this headline from Faux I mean Fox News: Some Fear Bush Administration Could Become Target in 9/11 Trial.

The "some" that fear this includes Karl Rove. Why does Rove fear it? For two reasons. First, he knows the de facto Bush Administration was incompetent and morally corrupt in its response to 9/11 and in its policy of torturing people. (Eric Holder and company at DOJ must feel they have a very good case against these bastards that won't rely on their own testimony, since that would be badly tainted by the fact that they were tortured.)

And second, if 9/11 had happened on Al Gore's watch and George W. Bush had been elected president in 2008, Rove would have made DAMN sure that a trial of these Al Qaeda criminals would have had Gore and the Democrats as the main target. Rove and Fox News are projecting THEIR tactics upon the Obama Administration.

it was usoc, not obama

Predictably the right-wing is ecstatic, reveling in the defeat of an American city by a bunch of foreigners. They're spinning Chicago's failure to win the 2016 Olympics as a repudiation of President Obama.

Wrong. Washington Post sports columnist Tracee Hamilton nails it: this was a repudiation of the US Olympic Committee. The International Olympic Committee and USOC have been fighting over TV money, and surprise that ended up being reflected in the vote.

Plus there were other factors. Brazil's president was there too, as were the Japanese and Spanish prime ministers. There has never been an Olympics in South America, and Rio is certainly a world-class city - it's not like Chicago lost to Podunkopolis, Nowhereistan. And the US has already hosted more Olympics than any country, most recently Atlanta 1996. We don't have any natural right to host every fourth or fifth Olympics.

But the right-wingers won't let reality get in the way of a good story. No reason to expect this to be different.

olympic hype

President Obama is in Denmark, pushing Chicago's bid for the 2016 Olympics. He's received some criticism for this, especially from the right-wing who probably think this is one more step in imposing islamo-fascist-nazi socialism in the good old US of A.

I don't have a problem with it, personally. Obama's counterparts from Chicago's competitors (Tokyo, Madrid, Rio) also made the trip to Copenhagen to pay obeisance to the Olympic committee, a corrupt group of old men who no longer satisfied with booze, bribes, boondoggles and young girls, also want to be toadied to by political leaders before granting some city the privilege of hosting an orgy of over-hyped steroid-fueled athletic competition.

It's a coincidence that Chicago, Obama's adopted home town, is the US candidate, and that raises suspicions by people who are already suspicious about everything Obama does.

But if de facto President George W. Bush had made a similar trip in 2001 to support Dallas or Houston for the 2009 Olympics, OR McCain were in Denmark this week talking up Chicago, USA, I would have been fine with that. It's how the game is played, unfortunately.

missing the point

Accusing Howard Kurtz of missing the point is like accusing your old grandmother of wallowing in nostalgia for the days when Frank Sinatra was young and hot - pretty obvious.

But pretty obviously, Howie has done this again. Writing about former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge's disclosure in a book that some of the 2004 terror alerts were politically motivated, Kurtz's angle isn't about misusing government programs and scaring the public for political gain. No, it was to bemoan people for not keeping their mouths shut when they are out of office.

Is Ridge's careful, veiled disclosure ideal? No. It would have been better if he'd fought it harder. Just once I'd like to see a senior American political official have the balls to resign in protest - I can't think of one who has done so since Cyrus Vance quit as Jimmy Carter's Secretary of State. (If Ridge had done so back then, he would have been pilloried as a traitor and a secret agent of the Democratic Party by the Fox-Limbaugh-Bachman wing of the GOP...)

But disclosing this after the fact - not so much news as confirmation of many suspicions - is better than nothing.

ridge: terrorism alert manipulated for 2004 elections

From Agence France Presse (quoted in full):

Former Bush aide says politics colored US 'terror alert'
by Olivier Knox Olivier Knox 1 hr 40 mins ago

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Former US homeland security chief Tom Ridge charges in a new book that top aides to then-president George W. Bush pressured him to raise the "terror alert" level to sway the November 2004 US election.

Then defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld and attorney general John Ashcroft pushed him to elevate the color-coded threat level, but Ridge refused, according to a summary from his publisher, Thomas Dunne Books.

"After that episode, I knew I had to follow through with my plans to leave the federal government for the private sector," Ridge is quoting as writing in "The Test of Our Times: America Under Siege ... And How We Can Be Safe Again."

Some of Bush's critics had repeatedly questioned whether the administration was using warnings of a possible attack to blunt the political damage from the unpopular Iraq war by shifting the debate to the broader "war on terrorism," which had wide popular appeal.

Ridge, a former governor of Pennsylvania, was the first secretary of the US Department of Homeland Security that the US Congress created in response to the September 11, 2001 terrorist strikes.

He also says that Bush's homeland security adviser at the White House, Fran Townsend, called his department ahead of an August 1, 2004 speech to ask Ridge to include a reference to "defensive measures ... away from home" -- language that he read as being a reference to the Iraq war.

In those remarks, Ridge said he was raising the threat alert level for the financial services sector in New York City, northern New Jersey, and Washington DC, and went on to praise Bush's leadership against extremism.

"The reports that have led to this alert are the result of offensive intelligence and military operations overseas, as well as strong partnerships with our allies around the world, such as Pakistan," said Ridge.

"Such operations and partnerships give us insight into the enemy so we can better target our defensive measures here and away from home," he said at the time.

He later publicly acknowledged that much of the information underpinning the new alert was three years old, stoking Bush critics' charges of political manipulation.

Ridge also details his frustration after the White House rejected his suggestion to establish department of homeland security offices in major cities such as New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, and -- long before Hurricane Katrina -- New Orleans, according to the summary.

He also says he urged his successor, Michael Chertoff, to reconsider the appointment of Michael Brown as the head of the Federal Emergency Response Agency (FEMA), whose response to the killer storm drew widespread criticism.

Ridge also charges that he was often "blindsided" during daily morning briefings with Bush because the FBI withheld information from him, and says he was never invited to sit in on National Security Council meetings.

Nobody will be surprised by this. This stinks of Rove and Cheney. As does the entire sorry history of the de facto Bush Administration.

of social security, cheneys, and judges

First on Social Security. It won't be "insolvent". It will simply exhaust its existing buffer and have to either increase intake or decrease payments. Quite simple.

The real cure is simple: raise the cap on income beyond which people don't pay SS taxes. And means-test the benefits. No reason to continue the fiction that FDR created to get SS passed in the first place that people are getting back what they paid in; they're getting MORE. Call it what it is, a pension for the aged and disabled. Bill Gates or Warren Buffett or Michael Jordan, as hard working as they all have been, don't really need it. Neither do a lot of other less-well-known but well recompensed people.

The Cheneys, Dad and daughter Liz, are having fun bashing Obama. Ok, not very dignified but that's their prerogative; despite Dick Cheney's best efforts, it is still a free country, and thankfully freedom of speech survived the Cheney-Bush regime.

Indirectly, they are bashing Bush, too. Liz Cheney said, "One of the nice things about my dad being out of office is that he doesn't need sign-off. He is out there speaking out because he personally feels so strongly about these issues."

And not always in agreement with what was the policy of the de facto Bush Administration. Interesting...

Oh and finally on justices and candidates to replace Souter, that paragon of positive race relations Jeff Sessions, the Republican Senator from Alabama, presumes to tell Obama what will be an acceptable nominee. Sessions, speaking behalf of the Senate and you and me, said if Obama sends "a highly qualified individual with a distinguished record that demonstrates judicial restraint, integrity and a commitment to the rule of law, his nominee will be welcomed in the Senate and by the American people."

But remember GOP lingo. "Judicial restraint" means "liberal judges don't act like liberals". CONSERVATIVE judges need no such restraint. Or else Roberts and Alito and Scalia and Thomas would never have been approved.

Indeed, if conservative judges acted with judicial restraint, it's a pretty good bet the Supreme Court would have returned the Bush vs Gore decision to the State of Florida to decide however it saw fit. That my friends was a state issue, and the GOP is all for states' rights. Unless, of course, that would result in Al Gore being President. Just as the Republicans were all for seating people in Congress even during recounts. Unless of course that would mean a Democrat like Al Franken being seated...

dishonest republicans and a too-credible columnist

William Kristol, who is paid by the media to promulgate GOP agitprop, suggests the GOP go after Obama instead of gazing into its navel. Well, oppositions are there to oppose, so fine.

But Kristol wants to go after Obama on debts. MOST OF WHICH were accumulated by de facto President George Bush in times of economic PROSPERITY. Bush and the Republicans hate Bill Clinton so much they got rid of all he did INCLUDING the budget surplus.

Kristol says Obama is cutting defense spending. Well that is, what is the word, oh yes a big fat lie. Obama and Gates want to reprioritize defense spending, having noticed that the Soviet Union is no more and we are unlikely to fight big conventional tank battles in the Fulda Gap. And they INCREASED defense spending (well, have proposed to anyway). Increased, not cut.

And Richard Cohen is clearly having a Senior Day today. He wonders if Dick Cheney "the old Faithful of Nonsense" is right when he asserts that torture I mean "enhanced interrogation" really stopped attacks. Cohen notes that Cheney wants two CIA memos released, two memos that "support his contention that the harsh interrogation methods worked and that many lives were saved."

Cohen has forgotten a few things. First, he has forgotten that Cheney and the rest of the Cheney-Bush regime weren't shy about browbeating intelligence types into coming up with conclusions that supported the Cheney-Bush preconceptions of things. "Want connections between Iraq and Al Qaeda? Coming right up sir! "Proof" of WMD in Iraq? Sure, and would you like that with fries?"

And Cohen ignores the fact that the CIA upper types - put there by Cheney-Bush - would be anxious to "prove" that the perversion of American ideals, the torture of our prisoners, had SOME benefit to offset the black stain it put on our country's image and soul. So with the White House wanting it, and CIA leadership wanting it, is it ANY surprise that a couple of memos might be out there saying "Hey, we waterboarded this guy and crushed his testicles and because of that, we stopped a planned attack on a boat show in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin?"

With all those ulterior motives, any such memo should be taken with a gallon of salt. And Cohen should know better.

jack kemp

I can't imagine that I would have ever voted for Jack Kemp, who just died. His belief in supply-side economics - what George H. W. Bush correctly characterized as "voodoo economics" during the 1980 Republican Presidential primaries - was too much to take. His pushing for massive tax cuts in the early 1980s contributed to the huge Republican deficits left to Bill Clinton to sort out.

But Kemp didn't stick slavishly to the Reaganite Republican ideology. Though conservative, he supported civil rights, rights for illegal immigrants, and affirmative action.

Today I imagine that the Limbaughs and Boehners of the GOP would call Kemp a RINO (Republican in name only), like they did Arlen Specter and Jim Jeffords. Those two both left the Republican Party. Kemp was already out of politics, but his empathy for those with left would be viewed suspiciously within the party today.

glad to see congress is focused on the key issues

On Friday the House Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection had a hearing. Texas Republican Joe Barton, who has introduced legislation on the issue of the day, said "It's interesting that people of good will keep trying to tinker with the current system, and to my mind it's a little bit like -- and I don't mean this directly -- but it's like communism. You can't fix it. It will not be fixable. Sooner or later, you're going to have to try a new model, and that's why we're here today."

Strong words from Congressman Barton, who even used the "communism" card. So what system is he decrying? The practice of corporate chiefs to name their friends to their compensation committees to guarantee fat raises? Price-fixing by the oil companies? The system by which businesses and their lobbyists get special little bits of legislation passed to benefit a certain class of business, defined so narrowly that only the particular firm in question can benefit?

No, Joe Barton is complaining about the college football Bowl Championship Series.

Now look, I'm sympathetic to the Boise States of the football world. Yes, the BCS is a sour, pustular chancre on the face of college football. Yes, the big power conferences plus Notre Dame have rigged this to guarantee the vast majority of TV bowl money continue to flow into their pockets. Yes, the NCAA is a bunch of weak-willed wimps for not allowing a REAL championship for big-time college football, the way it is done for college basketball and wrestling and swimming and baseball and water polo and volleyball. The way it is even done for FOOTBALL, outside of the big Division 1-A schools.

But why is the House Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection talking about this? Ultimately, the NCAA is a private organization. Believe it or not, there is NO national interest at play in how the NCAA rigs its championship bowl games. There is NO compelling reason for Congress to be involved.

Funny, I thought the Republicans wanted the government to keep its nose out of private business.

republicans are guaranteed to be unhappy

President Obama said he would replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter with somebody who "respects the Constitution and brings "empathy" and "understanding" to the bench."

Respecting the Constitution? Empathy? Understanding? These are not Republican judicial values! They want ideologues like Antonin Scalia, who can twist the Constitution and the law to support Republican ideological goals. Understanding the Constitution? That sort of crazy talk could have allowed Al Gore to have been allowed to become President.