Obama listens in

The cartoon is taken from the film "The Lives of Others" which I recommend.


Meanwhile, the allegations that the Trump Tower was wire-tapped (how 20th century) seems to have some feet. Let's pretend that it's true, as a thought experiment.

If true (and as of this typing not a lick of evidence has been brought forth) this truly would be bigger than Watergate. Nixon's goons weren't (necessarily) spying on the DNC, but was looking to see where the leaks were in his White House - in which "the Plumbers" were much more concerned about the Brookings safe, and the evidence that Nixon's negotiations could have ended the conflict in Vietnam earlier - but yes, this would be worse.

If the sitting President, or anyone in his Administration, were wire-tapping the opposition party candidate? Okay, what could the wire taps have been legitimately been authorized for and who signs off on that?

To get a FISA warrant, first off the Executive Branch can request the order, but can't actually order anything. So that request has to come in independently. Then the Feds must demonstrate not just probable cause but that the phone lines are undermining US interests (AKA foreign powers, Boris Badenov). That's a tough one to get at Trump Tower because you might get third-party conversations. So IF those warrants were carried out, and all the requirements met the evidence that someone or people in the Trump campaign had enough ties to foreign powers...

...it's not Obama or Obama Administration officials that ought to be worried.

Either side of the aisle you look at this - it's probably the biggest scandal *since* Watergate, and we're only at the very beginning. Go to Costco and pick up some popcorn. This reality show just got a second wind.

Presidential Sports

VIDEO: Foul ball lands near President Bush:

Former President George W. Bush just missed getting hit by a shoe, a baseball and A.J. Pierzynski.

A pop foul at last night’s match up between the Rangers and the White Sox landed near the Rangers dugout, which was a few inches below former President's seats were. White Sox catcher A.J. Pierzynski made a valiant effort to catch the popup, only to find himself almost in W’s lap.

“I told him just ’cause he was the president doesn’t mean I wouldn’t jump on top of him,” Pierzynski said later.

Meanwhile, Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron play ping pong against a pair of students from Globe Academy.

Their ping-pong game looks a lot like their war in Libya.

The Week In Review - Sunday Comics

Here's the end of the week round up...
First, NPR - meet FOX. What did everyone expect to have happen?
The bed bug craze is getting kind of nuts... which is hilarious, until you see one.
Foreclosures continue to be about as controversial as the loans themselves.
Taliban 'leadership' are sitting down to 'talk'. Who the hell knows what that means?
Obama's thrown out Hope and Change and is changing lanes to spew Fear. I've been saying since he picked Biden as his Veep he was going to get his ass handed back to him in 2010.
Puppet masters...
Corporate influence in this campaign is a little more, er -transparent, perhaps - obvious this cycle?
And when Mr. Obama lashed out upon the Chamber of Commerce for spending against him- it rang a just a tad hollow and hypocritical. It was definitely not presidential.
Well gang, we made it through another week. Hope to see you again next week!

A Spanking in November

The Democrats are sensing that they're going to lose the House in November. Mr. Obama, in full campaign mode, has already singled out Republican minority leader John Boner, er, Boehner (R-Ohio) in his attack speeches - you know, 'cause everyone knows who he is... and assumes that Nancy won't be running the chamber any longer. That's 39 chairs to 'flip' the house. The American Political Science Association predicts 50.

The dailybeast.com ran an article about how President Obama himself can make a difference between now and Election Day. Mellen looks at the impact of presidential campaign appearances on behalf of House candidates in midterm elections. (...) The improvement has to do with the so-called enthusiasm gap. The dire predictions for the Democrats in November don’t necessarily assume a defection of voters from the Democratic Party to the GOP. Rather, Republican voters, riled up by being out of power, are more likely to turn out in the midterms; Democrats, resting on their laurels after the 2008 landslide, are much more likely to sit this one out.

The Republicans and the Independents don't care about 'being out of power,' they're opposed to how the country is being run. It's a policy - not racial - or some ridiculous power grab. Typical, there's not one thought to why the Democrats are going to lose or why the TEA party exists, or even what they're saying. It's just easier to lift their fingers and laugh at them.

Sending Obama on the campaign trail will be the best thing they could do - for the Republicans. Sure he might spark a little more enthusiasm in the Democrat faithful, but it has historically gotten more Republicans to the polls.

But it's the independents who have been thrown under the bus by the Democrats - not the other way around. The electoral problem facing Democrats isn't that they won't vote, it's that independents have abandoned the Democrats wholesale.... because the Independents feel duped. Of course the Republicans could still lose their elections - especially if they offer no value or fail to recognize that the voters don't want a party of 'no' - but a party that would halt what angry voters see as a power grab by the remaining Democrats who are taking what they can off the sinking ship.

I'd like to see someone roll up their sleeves and start bailing.

Doctored Image, No Bias?

On the right, Larry Downing/Reuters President Obama on the magazine cover and in the original photograph with Charlotte Randolph, president of a Louisiana parish, and Adm. Thad W. Allen of the Coast Guard.

A metaphor for a politically troubled president? Fun with Photoshop?

There was President Obama on the cover of the June 19 issue of The Economist, standing alone on a Louisiana beach, head down, looking forlornly at the ground, presumably at a pile of garbage, perhaps the flag.

The problem was, he was not actually alone in the picture. The photograph was just edited to make it look that way. So what? It's cover art. Just ask OJ and Time Magazine, right?

The unaltered image, shot on May 28 by a Reuters photographer, Larry Downing, shows Adm. Thad W. Allen of the Coast Guard and Charlotte Randolph, a local parish president, standing alongside the president. But in the image that appeared on The Economist’s cover, Admiral Allen and Ms. Randolph had been scrubbed out, replaced by the blue water of the Gulf of Mexico. Oh, that's what everyone's pissed about. It wasn't tar brown.

When it comes to its own photographers, Reuters has stringent standards regarding photo editing. “Reuters has a strict policy against modifying, removing, adding to or altering any of its photographs without first obtaining the permission of Reuters and, where necessary, the third parties referred to,” Thomson Reuters said in a statement on Sunday.

Editors from The Economist had no comment when asked on Friday about the cover image.

Reuters has had a photo-editing controversy of its own in 2006 after one of its freelance photographers altered images of the Israeli military incursion into Lebanon to make the damage from Israeli warplanes appear more severe. Reuters later stopped working with the photographer and removed his images from its photo archives.

Emma Duncan, deputy editor of The Economist, said this about the cover,

"I was editing the paper the week we ran the image of President Obama with the oil rig in the background. Yes, Charlotte Randolph was edited out of the image (Admiral Allen was removed by the crop). We removed her not to make a political point, but because the presence of an unknown woman would have been puzzling to readers.

We often edit the photos we use on our covers, for one of two reasons. Sometimes — as with a cover we ran on March 27 on U.S. health care, with Mr. Obama with a bandage round his head — it’s an obvious joke. Sometimes — as with an image of President Chavez on May 15 on which we darkened the background, or with our “It’s time” cover endorsing Mr. Obama, from which the background was removed altogether — it is to bring out the central character. We don’t edit photos in order to mislead.

I asked for Ms. Randolph to be removed because I wanted readers to focus on Mr. Obama, not because I wanted to make him look isolated. That wasn’t the point of the story. “The damage beyond the spill” referred to on the cover, and examined in the cover leader, was the damage not to Mr. Obama, but to business in America."

So settle down, ya'll. It's not political. It's just a crappy cover! Okay? It's not like they broke a story about a General who's shining light on a war that's all but forgotten about in America even though it's costing us a Trillion dollars to fight it. Rolling Stone, people! Can we get back to cat pictures now?

Caption This Man In The Mirror

Caption Contest: What's Mr. Obama Thinking?

Internet Kill Switch

Meanwhile, while you were watching soccer...

A US Senate committee has approved a wide-ranging cybersecurity bill that some critics have suggested would give the US president the authority to shut down parts of the Internet during a cyberattack.

Senator Joe Lieberman and other bill sponsors have refuted the charges that the Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act gives the president an Internet "kill switch." Instead, the bill puts limits on the powers the president already has to cause "the closing of any facility or stations for wire communication" in a time of war, as described in the Communications Act of 1934, they said in a breakdown of the bill published on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee website.

The committee unanimously approved an amended version of the legislation by voice vote Thursday, a committee spokeswoman said. The bill next moves to the Senate floor for a vote, which has not yet been scheduled.

Goodbye free speech. It was fun while it lasted.

The Week In Review - Sunday Comics

Yesterday there was a protest against oil in Washington DC and also "hands across the sands" which was a bunch of white people holding hands on their beach front property. Many of them had green hard hats on, which meant they wanted 'clean' energy. Of note, were the green hard hats which were made of plastic. Which is made of petroleum. Goddamn it people.

And why does America need 20 million barrels of oil A DAY?
Yeah, it's a joke about the sweatshop that made the iPhone 4, but the reality is that it's our waiting-in-line attitude and cult-ish worship of the newest and shiniest new gadget rolled out on top of the pile of pointless consumerism and one-up-manship of the Joneses. But on the bright side, this lifestyle is completely unsustainable. Just ask everyone looking for employment.

That recovery is going great! Right?! I mean, every country in the world is following Mr. Obama's advice and driving their countries into crippling debt and dependence? What? they're not? They're standing up to him? Oh, Greece scared the living crap out of everyone? Really?

And as the G8 gets around to condemning North Korea for continuing to fight the Korean War, with a mildly worded letter, the good old fashioned protesting in Toronto is being led by Tyler Durden... no, really.

No. I mean, really. That's not shopped.

What a week. See you next time.

I asked for the Olympics, I got a prison. How's that for being born under a bad sign?

U.S. to Pick Illinois Prison to House Some Guantánamo Detainees

The Obama administration about to announce that it has selected a prison in northwestern Illinois to house terrorism suspects now being held at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. It's a big step toward shutting down the military detention facility in Cuba.

Now when we say 'selected' does that mean there really were other bids, or did they just collect the papers and give it to Illinois anyway? How hard was the bidding process there?

An administration official said President Obama had directed the federal government to proceed with acquiring the Thomson Correctional Center, a maximum-security prison in a rural village about 150 miles west of Chicago. Much to the delight of the impoverished state that Mr. Obama left behind.

My guess, on the stage that conducts Illinois political theater, this is a breadcrumb thrown to the cronies in Springfield that hadn't gotten any love from Mr. Obama.

I'd really support this plan if former Governors George Ryan and Rod Blagojevich (when they convict him) get to stay there too.

Fort Hood

Fort Hood suspect shouted 'Allāhu Akbar' or 'God is great!'

The death toll from the shooting rampage at Fort Hood has risen to 13. The "suspect" in the killings, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, (Major Pile) remains hospitalized on a ventilator with gunshot wounds. Witnesses allege that Hasan shouted "God is Great" in Arabic when he opened fire on fellow soldiers. Relatives say the 39-year-old Army psychiatrist fought his scheduled deployment to Iraq later this month.

Mr. Obama says, 'Don't jump to conclusions on Ft. Hood gunman.' Okay, well maybe he'll invite the gunman and the female cop who shot him over to the White House for a beer? Nidal will probably have a near-beer, since he's nearly-dead.

My initial reaction, like so many after hearing the Major's name, was that Nidal was some kind of a sleeper agent laying in wait... much like the hijackers who perpetrated the 9-11 attacks and the London bombings... or 24. Well, it is legit, and it's another lesser known version of Holy Jihad. It's a fitnah which is Arabic for “trial” or “test.”

In the Islamic tradition, trials or temptations that test the unity of the Muslim community. The term may be used to describe insurrection or civil warfare or, more specifically, to define a tribunal over doctrinal issues. But, look, that's just mild speculation and on the fringe of reality. It is the ledge of conspiracy-think. The idea that he was a sleeper agent deep-deep under cover, and using his position to help shell shocked Army veterans is much more romantically diabolical. Make the Army question their resolve when in the weakest members of the ranks - that's Dr. Mindbender kind of thinking. Make the Joes question their mission.

But his mission changed, and now he was going to the front. Oh, oh - time for plan B.

Or he was just bat shiat nuts. Or, shiat, why can't he be Both?

But what's really been on my mind about it, is the lack of discussion about it.

Obama's comment was so short it - it was shorter than a weather report. The media completely disregarded the story and also the idea of the greater storyline.

Also, in my tiny two celled mind, there's a strange correlation between six Muslim men wanting to attack Fort Dix.

The plan to attack the Fort Dix Army Base in New Jersey just two years ago. They wanted to "kill as many soldiers as possible!"

Those Five Muslim immigrants accused of scheming to massacre U.S. soldiers at Fort Dix were convicted of conspiracy in a case that tested the FBI's post-Sept. 11 strategy of infiltrating and breaking up terrorist plots in their earliest stages.

Maybe Maj. Pile was - maybe he wasn't. Shouldn't we look into it?

Happy Veterans Day.

UPDATE: Joe Lieberman agrees with me.

Sen. Joe Lieberman called the Fort Hood massacre an act of "Islamist extremism" - even as top Army brass warned Sunday against guessing at a motive, fearing backlash against Muslim soldiers.

"There are very, very strong warning signs here that Dr. Hasan had become an Islamist extremist and, therefore, that this was a terrorist act," Lieberman (I-Conn) told Fox News on Sunday.

"If the reports that we're receiving of various statements he made, acts he took are valid, he had turned to Islamist extremism." Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2009/11

Thrilled.

Not So Fair Use, Fairey

Obama poster artist Shepard Fairey paints himself into a corner.

After he admitted that he was lying about which Associated Press photo he used for his 'Hope' poster, his lawyers say they're withdrawing from his copyright case over fair use. Dang.

This has been an important case about fair use, based on artist Shepard Fairey's claim that he had the right to use a news photo to create his Barack Obama "Hope" poster - but he lied, and now his Hopes have collapsed.

His attorneys -- led by Anthony Falzone, executive director of the Fair Use Project at Stanford University -- said that they would withdraw from the case and that the artist had misled them by fabricating information and destroying other material. Oh, was that wrong?

Fairey, 39, a Los Angeles-based street artist with a long, often proud history of breaking rules, admitted that he didn't use the Associated Press photo of Obama seated next to actor George Clooney he originally said his work was based on -- which he contended would have been covered under "fair use," the legal claim that allows exceptions to using copyrighted work without having to pay for it.

Instead he used a picture the AP has maintained was his source -- a solo photo of the future president that is seemingly closer to Fairey's red, white and blue image of Obama, with the caption "HOPE."

Fairey said he first made an error, then tried to cover it up by submitting false images and deleting others.

The distinction over which photo he used is crucial because fair use can sometimes be determined by how much a new work altered the original.

Fairey sued the not-for-profit news cooperative in February, after it said that it owned the copyright and demanded credit and compensation. He said he didn't violate the copyright because he dramatically changed the image.

The AP countersued in March, saying uncredited, uncompensated use of an AP photo violated copyright laws and threatened journalism.

"Shepard Fairey has now been forced to admit that he sued the AP under false pretenses by lying about which AP photograph he used," said Srinandan R. Kasi, AP vice president and general counsel. "Mr. Fairey has also now admitted to the AP that he fabricated and attempted to destroy other evidence in an effort to bolster his fair-use case and cover up his previous lies and omissions."

Kasi said Fairey's admission struck "at the heart" of the artist's defense that he was protected by fair use. Kasi added that the AP would continue to pursue its countersuit alleging that Fairey willfully infringed the AP's copyright.

It was not immediately clear from the statements issued and from Fairey’s lawyers’ motion to amend whether Fairey would continue with his case, but a person close to Fairey said that the artist would. The person was not authorized to discuss the case and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Falzone said in a statement that the legal team's decision to withdraw had nothing to do with the "underlying merits" of Fairey's case.

"We believe as strongly as ever in the fair-use and free- expression issues at the center of this case, and believe Shepard will prevail on those issues," Falzone said.

Laurence Pulgram, an intellectual property lawyer who represented the online music-sharing service Napster in a copyright fight with the band Metallica, said Saturday that Fairey's case was in trouble.

"This was a brain-dead move by Mr. Fairey, and it could be the turning point. His lawyers will still be able to argue that he made a 'fair use' under copyright law, but it's a whole lot less likely that the court or jury will think that what he did was actually 'fair' if he has lied and tried to mislead the entire world about what use he made," Pulgram said.

Fairey said in a statement Friday that he was wrong about which photo he used and that he tried to hide his error.

"In an attempt to conceal my mistake, I submitted false images and deleted other images," Fairey said. "I sincerely apologize for my lapse in judgment, and I take full responsibility for my actions, which were mine alone."

He said he was taking steps to correct the information and regretted that he hadn't come forward sooner.

Although he said he was "very sorry to have hurt and disappointed colleagues, friends, and family," Fairey said that the real issue was "the right to fair use" so artists can create freely.

Most of this article, it should be noted, has been cut'n'pasted without any permission.

Obama Wins A Prize

Barack Obama Wins Nobel Peace Prize

The U.S. president Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international
diplomacy and cooperation between peoples..."

I'd be a little excited for him if he'd actually, you know, actually accomplished something.

He's trying to dismantle the American Empire, weakening the force of market capitalism, and place more people to be dependent on the government dole. However, as far as success rates - Maybe We Can? I guess the extremely liberal and populist Nobel Committee are expecting something out of this guy?

Meanwhile, George Clooney must be crushed for not getting it for Darfur. And that one guy who created Doctors Without Borders is snubbed again.

Read More:

Posters Put Panties in Bunch

The outrage de jour is over a couple of posters in LA showing President Barack Obama as the Joker.

It's unclear who created the image and who is posting it across the city. No one has taken credit so far. They don't want to be killed by the Obama groupies, no doubt.

Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable President Earl Ofari Hutchinson is calling the depiction, politically mean spirited and dangerous. Wha?

Hutchinson is challenging the group or individual that put up the poster to have the courage and decency to publicly identify themselves.

"Depicting the president as demonic and a socialist goes beyond political spoofery," says Hutchinson, "it is mean-spirited and dangerous. We have issued a public challenge to the person or group that put up the poster to come forth and publicly tell why they have used this offensive depiction to ridicule President Obama."

Urban - made up - Roundtable non-profit so I can draw a salary and get quoted on the news Hutchinson... What?! A witch hunt to find the Joker? Come on, Earl! You can't have it both ways! Oh no. You want the first amendment - you got it. Because you don't like it? Waaaah. It's not like they made Obama to look like Curious George (hehe, remember that one?)

So where was Earl when we made all that anti-president Bush propaganda stuff? Oh, it was okay then because Bush was not in Earl's camp. Earl gets to decide when the spiggot of free speech is fine and dandy and when it's 'mean-spirited and dangerous'? I love hypocrites and that's why...

Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable President Earl Ofari Hutchinson is BLASPHEMES HIPOCRITE OF THE WEEK!

Congrats Earl! Just send me $50.00 to me so I can ship your free T-shirt. Meanwhile, here are some more 'mean-spirited and dangerous' sh*t that didn't bother Earl.

Barack Spock?

President Barack Obama said in a report Sunday that he saw the new "Star Trek" film recently -- and not just because it was last week's top-grossing movie.

"Everybody was saying I was Spock," said the US leader, known to have a wonkish command of the minutiae of policy -- not unlike the dispassionate movie Vulcan to whom he has been compared.

Newsweek gushed however that Obama's version of the character would be "Spock with global sex appeal."

The latest in the "Star Trek" sci-fi franchise beamed up to the top of the North American box office last weekend, but slipped this week to second place.

Revealing a bit more about his leisure time viewing, the president told the magazine that he refuses to watch cable news, opting to stick to televised sports.

Live Long and Hand Over your Prosperity

Give Back. Give Back What?

Michelle Obama tells students to “give back”

by Doug

Yesterday Michelle Obama giving a commencement speech at the University of California, Merced’s graduation ceremony. Of course, there were the obligatory brief self-bio that every commencement speech-writer inserts about his or her own life, and Michelle Obama was no different. She talked about where she came from, and what she has achieved. And she encouraged those who will become successful in their careers to “give back” to society. This coming from the family who gave less than 5% of their income over the past ten years to charitable giving, but who has no problem raising taxes on the wealthy in the name of “public good.”

Michelle Obama is an idiot. I’m sorry, I’m being mean. She’s not really an idiot, she’s probably just ignorant, can’t make basic observations about U.S. society and culture, or ignores what is strikingly obvious in most instances because her bias against the wealthy and successful blinds her to what actually goes on in an economy.

Her first assumption is that when somebody becomes successful in America, it is at somebody else’s “expense.” Unfortunately, Michelle, we live in a society primarily based upon freedom of choice (something I believe she touts with regards to some topics such as abortion, but not others). That means that if somebody wants to be successful by acquiring other people’s money (legally), they must offer something in return (it’s why you say “thank you” to the owner of the coffee shop as he says the same back to you when you buy a cup of coffee). If I want what you have (sounds kinda greedy, doesn’t it?), I have to provide you something in return (perhaps the best way to handle the notion of greed in society). If you don’t like what I want to provide you, I can’t have your money. In general, this is how things work legally. It’s how our legal structure is setup.

So when these successful businesspersons provide great things for society such as home construction, cabinet manufacturing, automobiles, quilts, or even family counseling, they are engaging in trade—both parties inherently become wealthier. If that were not true, the trade wouldn’t take place (why would I trade something that I believe would make me “poorer”?). The only instance this doesn’t take place is through coercive methods; anytime one is coerced to do something he wouldn’t do voluntarily, there is not a “mutual gain.”

Michelle Obama believes that “giving back” is not voluntary generous giving (though she may accept this). What Michelle is doing is subtle: get young minds to believe that (1) what they are doing is not in and of itself a service to society, therefore (2) “giving back” means later being okay with some of your markers of success (i.e., money) to be taken from you in the name of “public service” (with or without the voluntary giving piece). If I were trying to get society to be okay with coercive generosity, I’d say this is a great way to redefine taxation into some quasi-voluntary activity.

The Obamas may believe that private charity can have positive impacts upon society. They may also believe in businesspersons who are generous and do not take advantage of “the little guy,” and therefore provide something good for society. So along those lines, Michelle’s admonitions are acceptable. But knowing where she comes from, her advice is at best laughable and at worst hypocritical. But they act as if they believe that the government is the source of all (at least most) good in society, and that top-down planning of an economy and society is the best way to achieve nirvana in this life.

Feel free to visit Doug @ An Unquiet Voice on the link

Don't Touch the Queen!

The Daily Mail, for one, called it "an electrifying moment of palpable majesté: A breach of centuries-long protocol ..."

While generally approving, reports noted that protocol "has been set in stone for generations. 'Whatever you do,' courtiers are apt to warn, 'don't touch the queen.'"

Instead of kissing her ring, she put her arm around her! Her Majesty’s jaw dropped. The Queen looked sightly overawed at first but quickly put on a dazzling smile so that Michelle wouldn’t be embarrassed. And after a few seconds she pulled away.

The Queen seemed to be socked at how tall Michelle was and asked her how tall she was. When the Queen heard that she was over 6 feet tall she said “No wonder your so good at playing Basketball”

Quick Question

Just got this in the mail bag. Perfect for Blasphemes:

First Lady Michelle Obama showed up as a surprise and welcome volunteer at Miriam's Kitchen, a soup kitchen for homeless poor people not far from the White House.

She brought with her some food donated by White House staff. The first lady served up mushroom risotto and broccoli to a long line of homeless men and women during part of her lunch hour and in these photos poses for a picture by one homeless diner obviously excited to be in the first lady's presence.

It doesn't detract from the first lady's generous gesture or the real needs she seeks to highlight to ask two bothersome journalistic questions about these news photos:

1. If this unidentified meal recipient is too poor to buy his own food, how does he afford a cell phone?

2. And if this gentleman is homeless, where do they send the cell phone bills?

Thanks from Kim

Blago gets Peached [part 15]

In part 15 of ABC's hit TV show Illinois: A Dra-ma Over By Dere, battered and beleaguered Governor Rod Blagojevich plans to speak at the final moments of his Senate trial, as the Lt Gov warms up his Bible. (11:00 AM CST)

Now, if you've been following this excellent new drama, Rod had just gotten off the plane from his trip to New York to meet the girls on The View. Rod was on The View because it is now America's premium forum for geo-political round table discussion and debate. Rod was pleading his case that he's being treated unfairly and that the fix is in. He's also been secretly developing a strategy to create one juror who believes he's either innocent, or criminally insane. It only takes one juror to blow up the criminal complaint against him. My guess is that this will be resolved in Season Two - it ought to be quite a good cliffhanger!

Meanwhile, crafty backhanded Lt. Gov Patrick Quinn has gotten his Bible is ready. The oath has been prepared. The lieutenant governor and his family are on their way down to Springfield. This scene is interposed while Rod's belongings are boxed up and waiting to be picked up at the Executive Mansion. Man, it'd be quite a twist if a trucker who bought his license from Convicted Former Governor George Ryan crashed into the Quinn family on their way! No spoilers - just a suggestion to the writers.

In the preview yesterday, Lt. Gov. Patrick Quinn said, 'I definitely plan to be in Springfield and I will be ready.' Quinn said he has been careful not to be 'presumptuous' over the last seven weeks as the Legislature has marched toward today's expected impeachment and removal from office of Gov. Blagojevich."

A spoiler warning - Mr. Quinn's contract hasn't been picked up for next season, so don't get too attached to him being the new Gov. Be looking for Attorney General Lisa Madigan to be filling the role by Season Three. (Lisa, daughter of Speaker of the House, Mike Madigan - natch)

And I wouldn't be too eager, Mr. Quinn. Old Rod still has some tricks up his sleeves, and might try to pull down you and Mr. Obama and all the other highly connected folks with him. The Senate is offering him 90 minutes. One can imagine the open sewer that will open on that nice clean carpet in the Senate chamber. One can imagine. Looking forward to the Season Finale today!

The Fix is in!

Obama, you're no Lincoln

The Obama-is-Lincoln Love Fest, sponsored by HBO[bama] aired yesterday. Maybe you saw it?

The Lincoln Memorial to be replaced with giant Obama head as soon as possible

I, for one, am a little tired of the commemorative plates and pre-inauguration concerts.

Why? Because he hasn't even been inaugurated yet. He has not accomplished anything of positive substance - even while holding office. And in holding - I really mean leaving - in search of a higher pay grade. Examples: In the Illinois legislature the largest accomplishment was learning the Chicago Way in order to earn friends and favors in order to be lifted into a largely uncontested Senate race. The Chicago Machine made sure to open Jack Ryan's sealed divorce papers, giving Obama a clear and easy shot at the chair. As Senator, having served a whole hundred and three days - ran for president, leaving his seat to be dusted off by Roland Burris, another Illinois piece of work by disgraced (because he had to ask) Governor Blagojevich.

Now there's the constant campaign to compare Obama to Lincoln (Republican, please note).

Let me be clear, there is absolutely nothing in common with 16th president, Illinoisan Abraham Lincoln.

Mr. Obama is no Abraham Lincoln. If you believe that he is, just go here and read a little more about the 16th, and possibly our greatest president. To be fair, let's all check back in 4 years and we'll compare Obama's legacy. I'll gladly eat crow... however, I respectfully remind you that THE MAN HASN'T BEEN SWORN IN YET!

If Obama's supporters are going to be allowed make silly comparisions to a man who hasn't finished any job that he's started - then I think that it's equally fair for me to compare him to Jimmy Carter. How about the 15th President of the US? James Buchanan? (Faithful readers will remember that article)

One more note - There was also a lot of talk of comparing Obama to JFK as well - which has kind of quieted down. Perhaps someone in the PR department cracked open a history book and figured out how both Lincoln and JFK's terms ended?

Blasphemous Post for Sept 12

Rep. Steve Cohen, Democratic congressman from Tennessee, brings the idiotic
"Jesus was a community organizer, Pilate was a governor" meme to the House floor.
Double Blasphemes Bonus: He's Jewish


Dear Steve,


Maybe if you had seen Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade you'd know that, dumbass.