An Impassioned Plea to President Obama

Mr. President, Sir. I understand that you have to deliver speeches from time to time. I especially understand that you have to give a crap-load of speeches to your base (as you evidently did Thursday morning - the Urban League). But, please, if it's at all possible, could you try and give these speeches after 11 AM? This, Mr. President, in that, reooww, Chris Jansing (my very favorite news chickie EVER) is presently anchoring the 10-11 slot on MSNBC and, well, it really does kind of smash my day when she gets preempted like this. If, I'm saying, it's at all possible..........................................................................................................P.S. I sincerely hope, Mr. President, that you do not take this personally. I absolutely find you to be a good/decent man, a dedicated and faithful husband/father. Hell, Mr. President, I even voted for you - you son of a gun! But, dude, we are talking Chris Jansing here. She, Mr. President, is a goddess.....Well, at least she is for a guy my age. LOL.....Oh, and, yeah, if you don't believe me, just ask Bill Clinton. He'll give it to you big time.

And People Bitch About Sarah Palin Standing in Front of a Turkey Decapitator

There are typically two types of chickens raised on factory farms; layers and broilers. The layers are bred to lay eggs. The broilers are bred strictly for meat. They have radically different bodies which have been genetically engineered to create this distinction........................................................................................................It all sounds rather simple, doesn't it? Well, not entirely so. For instance, what do we (we, as in the factory farming industry) do with all of the male offspring of the layer chickens? I mean, they're fellows, right? Dudes flat-out don't lay eggs. And, yes, since they haven't been genetically engineered to provide us with meat, what in the bluest blazes are these poor male layers good for? Yeah, that's right, they're absolutely good for nothing. And because they're absolutely good for nothing, 250 million of these male layers every year are "destroyed". They're either electrocuted, suffocated or put through a wood-chipper. Nice, huh?......................................................................................................Look, folks, I have never been what one would call a radical vegetarian. Nor have I ever been a particularly preachy one. But the more that I learn about this factory farming stuff/the meat industry; the environmental damage, the unconscionable cruelty to animals, etc., the more that I really want to be obnoxious about it. And the more that I want to hold Mr. Al Gore's feet to the fire on the issue, end his silence on the issue, etc..

Mandate This

Of all the arguments that the left has put forth against Arizona's anti-immigration law, by far the most persuasive, I think, is the one that Chris Matthews espouses. Matthews argues that by MANDATING that an officer check a person's immigration status (yes, during the commission of another criminal act), you are DE FACTO putting that officer at majorly grave risk................................................................................................He cites this as an example. You have a police officer pull over a vehicle for what is nothing more than a minor traffic violation. In that vehicle, however, you have 6-8 Hispanic-looking individuals who, because of this law, are pretty damn nervous about being stopped. They clearly don't want to be deported and so, yeah, they end up ganging up on the officer. Not good...........................................................................................................The bottom-line, folks - officers clearly need SOME discretion (IT, yes, frequently being the better part of valor). For a law such as the Arizona one to literally mandate suicidal behavior/foolhardiness ISN'T good public policy. I'm sorry...................................................................................................P.S. Just for the record, Mr. Matthews does in fact posit an alternative of sorts. He suggests that we issue fool-proof ID cards for all Americans. Here, before you can even be hired, you have to show the employer that you are in fact a citizen. It cuts off illegal immigration at its real source - the work-place. Oh and, yeah, it doesn't ruin the scenery, create a Gestapo state, send the National Guard on a big wild-goose chase, etc..

Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree With Anyone Else But Me

O'Reilly and I both tend to shade things. The difference is that I do it for nuance/an expansion of the discussion. He does it simply to confuse people and, yes, seemingly, to at least partially put forth an agenda ........................................................................................................Take, for example, his coverage of the Shirley Sherrod saga. One of the "mitigating" factors that O'Reilly (you certainly didn't expect him to give Sherrod a totally clean bill of health, did you?) is presently bringing forth is the fact that Mrs. Sherrod once upon a time sued an employer. Mr. O'Reilly evidently sees something nefarious in this. Yep, that's right, folks, Bill O'Reilly - the very same Bill O'Reilly who's always talking about suing people HIMSELF. The same Mr. O'Reilly who actually sued Al Franken (I guess that Fox in general was part of this piss-ass suit, too) for his SATIRICAL use of the phrase, "fair and balanced" (yeah, that's right, folks, he sued Al Franken over a frigging slogan). Hm. Can you say ironic/ballsy as hell?

The Liberal Learning Curve

Of all the people that Olbermann and Maddow have been putting on their show lately, far and away the most credible one is Jonathan Alter. Yes, folks, he's a liberal and, yes, he does have a tendency to agree with the hosts but, I'm telling you here, he is far from a rubberized stamp.........................................................................................................Just last week in fact, he essentially schooled Ms. Maddow. She tried to say that President Obama should personally fight back when the "right-wing smear merchants", etc. go after him. Alter (who, let's face it here, has already forgotten more about politics than Maddow herself will ever, EVER, know) responded by saying that it isn't the job of the President (assigning that task more to the DNC chairman, etc.) to get in the gutter with these folks. His job (and, yes, I totally agree with Alter here) is to lead the country and to get things accomplished...................................................................................................He also challenged Maddow on this whole Van Jones is a victim nonsense - citing specifically the fact that Mr. Jones had signed some petition saying that 9/11 was an inside job, had in fact made a huge litany of other idiotic statements, etc.. Why, Alter posited, would President Obama even want to spend a penny of political capital on him? Again, I agree with Mr. Alter.........................................................................................................P.S. This, folks, is the guy who should have his own frigging cable show. Not frigging.....

Will the Real Adult Political Party Please Stand Up

The Republicans are flat-out full of it. This, folks, in that, yes, when they were in complete power, they never, EVER, paid for ANY of their initiatives; two long wars, two large tax cuts, an expensive Medicare drug program, etc.. And, so, yes, it absolutely does ring hollow here - all of these calls of theirs for "fiscal responsibility" (the latest one being this plea of theirs that we should "pay" for the extension of unemployment compensation).........................................................................................................But the thing is here, now we have the Democrats in complete control. And I really do have to ask these people, "instead of simply going around calling the Republicans hypocrites (which I've already conceded in spades that they are), wouldn't it be a much more mature step to simply DO what they, when they had had the opportunity to, refused to do?...............................................................................................................I mean, think about it here. We still have hundreds of billions in unspent stimulus money. Wouldn't it be a great idea to take the 34 billion out of that? Unemployment compensation (whether in fact it's a disincentive or not ISN'T the point here) is an excellent economic stimulant (far better no doubt than a lot of the pork that's clearly still on deck). COME ON, folks! What do say we all get together and do this right? Call the Republicans' bluff. Call 'em on it!

Both, At the Same Time

What would be my answer to the question, "Lucy Liu or Lisa Ling?"?