Required Reading

Every couple weeks, you'll see a sidebar story about "5 Sites You Should Read" or other helpful information about websites that can offer that critical piece of daily information you need.

An often-overlooked member of this category is SexyPeople.com.

A majority of readers use it to gaze into the past, but I find it most helpful to peer into the future.

For example, on the site I found my brother's future son, my own future children, and (amazingly) my dad.

The Moon Landing: 40 Years Later

A mere 40 years ago today man walked on the moon and, for a mere 39.999 years, people have been debating how and if it was possible for mankind to do such a thing in 1969.

Amidst the believers in NASA, and those vocally citing evidence of a hoax, this insightful essay asserts a third possibility:

This third position postulates that humans did go to the moon but what we saw on TV and in photographs was completely faked.

Furthermore, this third position reveals that the great filmmaker Stanley Kubrick is the genius who directed the hoaxed landings.

This may seem absurd, but you need look no farther than Kubrick's IMDB page to find a definitive answer.

07/17/09: Also Worth Noting

I refuse to believe that I'm the only one that gets really confused every time I drop someone off at the airport. As I enter the airport area I see a sign with an arrow that reads "Arrivals," and my first thought is, "Yes, I am arriving at the airport; I will go that direction." And it never works out. I can't possibly be the only person that does this.

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What is this world coming to when you can't have a voodoo high priest remove your "spiritual grime" (for a mere $621) without ending up dead. Freaking Republicans.

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Three years ago, at age 66, a woman in Spain became the oldest woman to give birth for the first time (to twins). At the time there was intense criticism over whether or not this was a responsible thing to do to the children. Today Maria Bousada definitively answered this question, and her critics, by dying. Her brother will not disclose the cause of death, but experts indicate a rare but easily diagnosable element claimed her life: Raising a pair of 3-year-old boys when you are almost 70.

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Ok, yes, the Eternal Moonwalk site is amusing.

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This story is tailor-made for cable news and, rightly so, the word "outrage" is being used with great frequency. But members of college fraternities across the country are calling it by a different name: "Tuesday."

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Reuters notes that "Four Russians, a Frenchman and a German ended a simulated 105-day space trip" in a hermetically sealed compartment. The experiment was to research how the 500 day trip to Mars might impact the human body and psyche. The real achievement, however, was how the participants survived the smell of "Four Russians, a Frenchman and a German."

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The BHB has long since warned all of you about the threat posed by both robots and monkeys. Now, however, the threat has evolved in ways that even I could not foresee -- bionic monkeys. Eventually the bionic monkeys will discover this technology, and then we are all SUPER screwed.

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There's a lot of research discussing how most of Asia and large sections of Europe traces itself back to Genghis Khan, or how much of the world descends from Mohammed, but I think this story is under-reported.

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To be fair, Obama's proposed universal healthcare plan might not be so bad afterall -- this organizational chart demonstrates how its streamlined infastructure will work when you need it most.

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If you are a woman living in an Arab country and you've grown tired of your all-black wardrobe, some soon-to-be-executed tailors are creating the exact same garment, but with some sequins snazzily glued to the fabric. Unsurprisingly, the clerics have cited this as an unforgivable abomination.

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Arguments about the legality of deploying for war for this new reason are going to become a lot more common, although they might not receive a lot of media coverage.

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Do you enjoy video games AND night vision goggles? You are in luck.

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Are you as outraged as I am about the myths the media perpetrates about proper hydration techniques? Thankfully LifeHacker.com puts this dispute to rest.

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Sotomayor's nephews are as interested in her as I am.

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Rumors of Dave Chappelle sightings are not exaggerations.

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A computer glitch sent some Bank of America customers a notice claiming they owed $23 quadrillion in fees. It's funny now, but in 10 years when Obama-nomics have raised the national debt to this level, it will be kind of depressing.

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A very angry Wes Pruden notes in his Washington Times column that it remains to be seen "whether the senorita is "wiser" than white folks, as she assures us she is, or not quite ready for prime time, as her record on the appeals court suggests."

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Finally, something else (besides a love of glass figurines and/or boxes of old gift wrap) to give junk collectors hope.

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Sometimes I wonder if io9.com was created just to absorb my spare reading time.

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White aligators! Cory music! Amazing!

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When it comes to Sea Pig (not a typo), there is a very fine line between cute and terrifying.

Saving Energy Will Cost You Money

The primary problem with the energy policies espoused by beloved scientist Al Gore and the angry four year old we call a president, is that they have very little to do with environment and everything to do with power and revenue.

The first evidence of this has shown up in Missouri, and you can be sure you'll see it elsewhere in very short order.

Some Missouri residents and businesses soon could see a new charge on their electric bills — a fee for using less energy.

Though it might seem illogical, the new energy efficiency charge has support from utilities, most lawmakers, the governor, environmentalists and even the state’s official utility consumer aadvocate. The charge covers the cost of utilities’ efforts to promote energy efficiency and cut power use.

Thus, if you actually do use less energy (like we're told we must, or the earth will explode), you must pay for the privelege of being responsible. And what are the odds that environmentalists are on board with this idea!? Afterall, it's not like these people have jobs, so you can understand their eagerness for a new revenue stream.

In case you're not aghast enough, there's another wrinkle to the story:

The commission last week approved a program in which St. Louis-based AmerenUE can offer credits to businesses that voluntarily shut down or scale back their electricity use during peak demand.

AmerenUE will be able to recoup the cost for the program that starts Thursday by increasing the rates it charges business customers.

Not only are people penalized for using less energy in their day-to-day life, they also get penalized again to pay for enegy-saving (i.e. money saving) upgrades made by the power plants to their own infastructure.

Peer into the future of a country powered by the Obama energy policy.

Affirming Action

Our president, in a completely surprising move, doesn't think affirmative action is really such a big deal.

President Barack Obama says he's never believed that affirmative action is as much of an issue as it's been made out to be.

He later added, "But it certainly is helpful to have an institutionalized way to remind America of its racist past when you're running for president on the 'If You Don't vote for Me You're Racist' platform."

But if you really want to hear someone get mad about affirmative action, I direct you to this happy guy.

The Bounty of the Stimulus Plan

Remember that horrible economic stimulus package that cost multi trillions and was going to deliver us from disaster?

Bloomberg crunches the numbers and reports some basic info:

Employers in the U.S. cut 467,000 jobs in June, the unemployment rate rose and hourly earnings stagnated, offering little evidence the Obama administration’s stimulus package is shoring up the labor market.

The payroll decline was more than forecast and followed a 322,000 drop in May, according to Labor Department figures released today in Washington. The jobless rate jumped to 9.5 percent, the highest since August 1983, from 9.4 percent.

Unemployment is projected to keep rising for the rest of the year just as the income boost from the stimulus package fades, undermining prospects for a sustained rebound. [...]

The world’s largest economy has lost about 6.5 million jobs since the recession began in December 2007. That’s the biggest drop in any post-World War II economic slump.

So after spending a trillion+ dollars, NOTHING HAS HAPPENED.

Our president insisted on spending our money on a plan that was fatally and obviously flawed and now that money is GONE.

It could have been spent on other things, it could have been spent on a better recovery plan, or it could have been applied to nearly any other endeavor -- but instead the money has evaporated.

And we have Barry to thank.

And I say "thank" because no one will ever hold him accountable.

But at least we're saving money in other places. And by "saving money," I mean that the ruling class is traveling and spending faster than ever before.

Spending by lawmakers on taxpayer-financed trips abroad has risen sharply in recent years, a Wall Street Journal analysis of travel records shows, involving everything from war-zone visits to trips to exotic spots such as the Galápagos Islands.

The spending on overseas travel is up almost tenfold since 1995, and has nearly tripled since 2001, according to the Journal analysis of 60,000 travel records. Hundreds of lawmakers traveled overseas in 2008 at a cost of about $13 million.

That's a 50% jump since Democrats took control of Congress two years ago.

That last sentence is really worth examining.

You Wanted Change? You Got it.

He kept promising it, and he certainly has delivered: Obama is changing everything we've come to expect from the White House.

From his habit of glaring like an angry four-year-old when people say things he doesn't like, to mocking reporters and causing the rest of the press corp to giggle like fools.

The one change that was uncertain to get backlash, however, was his control/manipulation of the press.

Throughout the primaries and the 2008 election cycle, the press was all too willing to accept these machinations, but now, it seems, they have had quite enough.

At a press conference yesterday, during the daily press briefing, the White House press pool learned that the upcoming "town hall" meeting with the president would only contain pre-screened attendees and pre-approved, pre-written questions.

It's worth watching.

When cornered, our president's Joey Goebbels impersonator started giggling like a fool and (taking a cue from his classy boss) tried to make lame, snarky comments to deflect attention from the obvious problem he was hopelessly trying to defend.

Change, indeed.

Media Terrorism: Beware

Despite standing for things like peace, prosperity and other things he doesn't really care about, Hugo Chavez will not stand for dissent.

Thousands of Venezuelans took to the streets holding separate protests to support and condemn private TV station Globovision, which leftist President Hugo Chavez has threatened to shut down.

Protesters aligned with the opposition called for "defending access to information." [...]

Caracas has stepped up its criticism of Globovision, the only anti-Chavez station still broadcasting on Venezuela's public airwaves, with the country's telecommunications regulator launching four different investigations into the channel for alleged violations.

What is it that protestors against the station have in mind?

As with all Left-leaning movements, their reasons are pretty clever.

Thousands of Chavez supporters also marched Saturday alongside "socialist" journalists. At their final stop before parliament, they handed a petition to the president of the national assembly, Cilia Flores, calling for "an end to media terrorism,"

What on earth is "media terrorism?" The forces trying to shut down Globovision cite outrageous behavior like reporting the occurence of a devastating earthquake before the government issued an official statement, or airing critical comments about government officials.

Please, America, just for a moment, peer into the future of Obama's second term.

Being Racist Proves You're Not Racist

The logic of the Obama Era is like no other. The finest example in recent weeks is the SCOTUS reversal of Barry's nominee for the bench.

Not willing to applaud the rectification of a racist ruling, the White House is instead celebrating the ruling using the logic that being racist proves you're not racist.

Spinning a Supreme Court decision in its favor, the White House said Monday that the justices' reversal of a ruling that high court nominee Sonia Sotomayor endorsed as an appeals court judge proves that she follows judicial precedent.

The high court ruled that white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., were unfairly denied promotions because of their race.

Presidential spokesman Robert Gibbs said the ruling should put to rest claims by Sotomayor 's Senate critics that she's an activist judge.

What? Really? What is going on?

Somewhere, the Angels Can't Get their Wallets Out Fast Enough

While still mourning the loss of Billy Mays (I'm not beings sarcastic), it's worth noting the demise of one of his competitors -- an individual Billy was intent on destroying (as he hilariously noted on this radio show) in his final, tragically shortened, days.

I'm talking about the ShamWow guy.

It turns out Mr. ShamWow, aka Vince Shlomi, beats the living crap out of hookers. To see his handiwork, check out these mugshots (which feature both the punching bag and the puncher).

The story is that ShlomWow paid $1000 for the services of said punching bag, then things turned bad when she bit his tongue and wouldn't let go and the subsequent face beating began in earnest. You can read the arrest report here.

How does something this bizarre happen? My guess is that he tried to pay with ShamWows.

Somewhere, I'm sure Billy finds this amusing.

But he doesn't have time to gloat; heaven is a huge, untapped market for must-have household products.

Rest in peace, Billy.

JUSTICE! JUSTICE! JUSTICE!!!!

In an unexpected moment of justice, SCOTUS has overturned the miscarriage of justice perpetrated against the New Haven, CT firefighters.

The Supreme Court today narrowly ruled in favor of white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., who said they were denied promotions because of their race, reversing a decision by Judge Sonia Sotomayor and others that had come to play a large role in the consideration of her nomination for the high court.

The city had thrown out the results of a promotion test because no African Americans and only two Hispanics would have qualified for promotions. It said it feared a lawsuit from minorities under federal laws that said such "disparate impacts" on test results could be used to show discrimination. [...]

"Fear of litigation alone cannot justify an employer's reliance on race to the detriment of individuals who passed the examinations and qualified for promotions," wrote Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. [...]

The New Haven case, Ricci v. DeStefano, has become the ruling that Sotomayor's critics most point to for evidence that she lets her background influence her decisions.

Kennedy's opinion referred to the judgment of Sotomayor and the other judges only by noting the short opinion.

Kennedy said the standard for whether an employer may discard a test is whether there is a strong reason to the employer to believe that the test is flawed in a way that discriminates against minorities, not just by looking at the results.

In New Haven's case, "there is no evidence -- let alone the required strong basis in evidence -- that the tests were flawed because they were not job-related or because other, equally valid and less discriminatory tests were available to the city," Kennedy wrote. [...]

The case has drawn considerable attention not just because of Sotomayor's role but because of the sympathetic nature of the claim brought by the firefighters, who said they were discriminated against simply because of the color of their skin.

For years SCOTUS has existed as a way to correct the biased, inaccurate, misinformed, under-educated and blatantly wrong decisions made by lower court judges, such as Sotomayor (who has had SIXTY PERCENT of her decisions reversed).

By elevating her to the highest court, American citizens no longer have a source of respite or last resort from her pathological mistreatment of the law.

Regardless, I haven't been this happily surprised since Ramos and Compean were set free.

It's a great, great day in America.

A Second Try at Disaster

In a perfect world, the debate about who is responsible for the economy's meltdown would be over.

The people instinctively blaming Bush would have long since realized that the President had nothing to do with the Senate committees that set mortgage rate and banking standards. It'd be nice to point out that these committees were owned and operated by democrats, specifically Barney Frank and Chris Dodd.

The only good to come out of this -- with confused blame or not -- is that the Senate, and especially those two senators, would never try something stupid again.

But, as usual, there is no end to the things the Left is willing to do wrong.

Two U.S. Democratic lawmakers want Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to relax recently tightened standards for mortgages. [...]

In a letter to the CEO's of both companies, Representatives Barney Frank, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, and Anthony Weiner warned that a 70 percent sales threshold "may be too onerous."

I can't begin to wrap my brain around this. If ever there was someting indefensible, it is this.

06/27/09: Also Worth Noting

At any given moment, we are all just one bad , meth-fueled weekend away from this.

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Barry got his feelings hurt when a reporter asked him why it took him six months (and, frankly, his entire political career) to mildly condemn Iran. But, to be fair, corrupt politicans who buy elections are wise to not throw stones at one another.

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Proof of water on Mars! Hooray?

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Drunk hecklers at the U.S. Open?! How will the sport ever recover?!

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Our fearless leader wants to spend $1 trillion on healthcare AND shut down the majority of U.S. factories due to their perceived impact on the environment. So where, exactly are we getting money from if we dont sell anything and we give away healthcare? Don't be surprised when Barry-O holds another press conference next week announcing his new plan to monetize good vibes.

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An article about the "Best Places to Buy Ice Cream in the U.S." is pretty frustrating if it fails to list a place anywhere near where you live.

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All politics aside, John Hodgman's speech at the Radio & TV Correspondents Dinner was very funny.

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Here's another news flash: The first lady is an insufferable human. I mean, who doesn't find passive aggression charming?

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I've stolen quite a few traffic cones in my day, but I've never done something this cool with them.

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In an attempt to show that they are a reasonable player on the world stage, and after an embarrassing series of murders ordered on peaceful protestors, Iran has decided to appoint a man aptly nicknamed "The Butcher" to carry out the interrogations of the people arrested at these protests. You may remember Saeed Mortazavi's other great moments, such as his 2003 order for a journalist (with dual Canadian-Iranian citizenship) who was caught taking pictures of a secret prison to be arrested and raped to death. But don't worry, I'm sure Iran will use its nuclear power responsibly.

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Clones of 9/11 rescue dogs! Hooray?

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Parents in Chicago are outraged after 60% of students in a single school did not pass the 8th grade. Amidst accusations of racism (of course) and the faults of school administrators, the parents missed this simple fact: Your children are dumb as hammers AND IT IS YOUR FAULT.

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Why would a reporter commit himself to doing mindless puff stories about our president? What's in it for him? Well, being appointed to posh committees, for starters.

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Reuters offers us this breaking news from the "No $#!&?% Sherlock" department: "New York drivers named most aggressive, angry in U.S."

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A virtual tour of the White House? Ok, I'll try it out.

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Here's a way to foster a critical, objective, insightful press corp: If our classy president doesn't like your question, he'll mock you and the rest of the reporters will giggle. I love this administration.

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Forget what you may have heard, the Evangelical Right is alive and well thanks to forward-thinking, rational programs like this.

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You've got to hand it to Letterman, he will laugh right back at you.

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It is a bad couple weeks to be a Scientologist. After weathering the declaration of war from some group of nerds over a year ago, a three-part expose (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3) has been printed in the St. Petersberg Times. Sure, the SPT isn't exactly world renowned for it's brilliant team of investigative journalists, but one of the headquarters of Scientology is in nearby Clearwater and, perhaps, this is payback for an article written by a Scientologist-sponsored publication listing the history of misdeeds (primarily racism and sexism) perpetrated by the SPT. The expose is interesting reading, if not necessarily unbiased. It even comes with a flashy multi-media landing page.

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I know the idea of 56 face tattoos is shocking, but if you are dumb enough to "fall asleep" (i.e. pass out) during a tattoo session, you deserve to look like this. If you let this guy do it to you, you doubly deserve it.

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Some blogger with pink hair got punched in the face? By the look of him, this is long overdue.

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This is a pretty impressive shot. But I want to see it happen 2 times in 50 tries.

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Sarkozy is trying to ban burqas in France. I can understand his reasoning, but why is he so desperate to be bombed? Or does he realize that France is such an insignificant piece of Western culture that the collective Islamic terrorists will overlook it indefinitely?

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Sure the Obama Era isn't exactly rational or moral, but they did pretend to be those things once upon a time. That makes their merger with ABC a bit surprising, though not unpredictable. Also interesting is that during the White House Infomercial on ABC, not only did opposing opinions get banned from the news program, but organizations that wanted to pay to have their views aired during commercial breaks were also banned. Stay classy, Barry!

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While crackpots and attention-hungry former politicians wail frantically about how hot our rapidly cooling planet is getting, they ignore real environmental problems like overfishing. Al has never burned any calories worrying about deforestation, erosion or ocean ecology, but that's only because there's no money in it for him.

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After years of worring he would one day flame out like Elvis, Michael Jackson is dead. It's very sad. We'll always have the Thriller album, and for that, I'm sure he's pleased.

Intrawebs, Please Note: You've Been Warned

Cantankerous old men are delightful (as documentaries have noted), but perhaps none more than legendary American author, Ray Bradbury.

His love of libraries is commendable, but it is made especially enjoyable when he contrasts this passion with his vintage old-man distaste for the intrawebs.

Fiscal threats to libraries deeply unnerve Mr. Bradbury, who spends as much time as he can talking to children in libraries and encouraging them to read.

The Internet? Don’t get him started. “The Internet is a big distraction,” Mr. Bradbury barked from his perch in his house in Los Angeles, which is jammed with enormous stuffed animals, videos, DVDs, wooden toys, photographs and books, with things like the National Medal of Arts sort of tossed on a table.

“Yahoo called me eight weeks ago,” he said, voice rising. “They wanted to put a book of mine on Yahoo! You know what I told them? ‘To hell with you. To hell with you and to hell with the Internet.’

“It’s distracting,” he continued. “It’s meaningless; it’s not real. It’s in the air somewhere.”

I nominate this as the single greatest old man rant of the year -- possibly ever.

A Class Reunion

Against all odds, and despite sullying the good name of The Roots, Jimmy Fallon's show is moderately enjoyable.

Granted, I only watch clips on Hulu because it isn't yet worth staying up to watch.

In recent weeks, however, he's begun to strike some gold: Pushing for a Saved by the Bell reunion.

So far this plan has incorporated four segments, which can be seen (in order) here, here, here, and, most impressively, here.

I really can't overstate how impressive that fourth installment is.

You won't believe your eyes.

The Presidency: Version 43.2

Because he totally has nothing to hide, Obama is keeping his list of (apparently creepy) visitors a secret.

This action is also known as "I'm G. W. Bush Part 2, and I can prove it!"

The Obama administration is fighting to block access to names of visitors to the White House, taking up the Bush administration argument that a president doesn't have to reveal who comes calling to influence policy decisions.

Despite President Barack Obama's pledge to introduce a new era of transparency to Washington, and despite two rulings by a federal judge that the records are public, the Secret Service has denied msnbc.com's request for the names of all White House visitors from Jan. 20 to the present.

It also denied a narrower request by the nonpartisan watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, which sought logs of visits by executives of coal companies.

Oh, Barry. Is there no end to how disappointing future generations will find you?

Taking Pride in Underachievement

BHB readers reacted with particular disregard when I noted that Sotomayor's bizarre logic about trivial matters like justice and fair compensation come about as a result of her being a product of affirmative action.

Everyone was just SO UPSET. Cry me a river.

Naysayers, be silenced!

Judge Sonia Sotomayor once described herself as "a product of affirmative action" who was admitted to two Ivy League schools despite scoring lower on standardized tests than many classmates, which she attributed to "cultural biases" that are "built into testing." [...]

The clips [videos of speeches provided to Congress prior to her confirmation hearings] include lengthy remarks about her experiences as an "affirmative action baby" whose lower test scores were overlooked by admissions committees at Princeton University and Yale Law School because, she said, she is Latino and had grown up in poor circumstances.

"If we had gone through the traditional numbers route of those institutions, it would have been highly questionable if I would have been accepted," she said on a panel of three female judges from New York who were discussing women in the judiciary.

That's fantastic.

I couldn't have written this even at my satirical zenith.

At what point do we decide to reconsider the dumbfounding amount of social engineering to which this society has succumbed? Do we draw the line at a SCOTUS nominee BRAGGING about getting into schools she was not qualified to attend? Why do we tolerate the "I'm stupid, but that's ok cuz I'm brown" reasoning -- and in many cases celebrate it?

Imagine hearing those three sentences spoken by your doctor.

Would you let him anywhere near you with a scalpel?

"Why yes, man with sub-par test scores, please cut me open and move stuff around."

But when a person with the power (and the intention) to start creating policy says it, we're supposed to be inspired by her "accomplishments" (i.e. bad grades) and her "bravery" (e.g. bravery to get bad grades).

And how convenient that she can blame her bad scores on race. What are the odds she would blame a problem on race?

Blaming test scores on race is a very old, tired tactic used to obscure the fact that a social group has created chronically underachieving students and no one to blame but itself.

Furthermore, I would expect that a wise Latina woman would regularly do better on any test than her white peers -- thus making her poor result that much more surprising.

Discovering a Whole Lot of Nothing

I seem to recall our president decrying past American foreign policy and promising not to dictate policy to other countries or demand things from our allies.

But, 2+ years of pandering from all corners can do a lot for what someone (especially if you're already an egomaniac) may expect to have happen whenever they open their mouth.

Barry discovered this over the weekend:

In defiance of US President Barack Obama's call on Israel to stop settlement activity, defiant settlers built a new outpost on Friday morning between Migron and Kochav Ya'acov.

At the outpost, which they named Oz Yehonatan, the settlers built a wooden structure they mockingly called the "Obama Hut," saying it was a sign of appreciation for the US president for his actions that had led to a dramatic rise in the number of outposts. [...]

One of the activists said of Obama, "He's an Arab Muslim and a gentile, he is fighting against the Jewish people and has declared that he will continue to do so. We already stated our intention to continue to build, no matter who is fighting us - Egypt, Germany or the US."

[BHB note: OK, that last sentence was a bit much.]

When I say "discovered," I mean, of course, that this reaction occurred, not that Barry noticed, acknowledged or will learn from it.

The Inherent Evil of Eye Color

On the ever-growing list of "Things that Were Said While Our President Sat Somewhere Obliviously Smiling," is this little gem that occurred during the BHB's hiatus:

Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Thursday blamed the global economic crisis on “white people with blue eyes.” […]

Speaking in Brasília at a joint press conference with Gordon Brown, the UK prime minister, Mr Lula da Silva told reporters: “This crisis was caused by the irrational behaviour of white people with blue eyes, who before the crisis appeared to know everything and now demonstrate that they know nothing.”

It's a good thing that only white people can be racist, otherwise the crackpot leaders of Brazil would be in danger of getting labeled.

And, considering that making crackpot claims is the top way for a foreign leader to rise to international prominence, it’s interesting to consider what Mr. Silva’s motive is for this statement.

The FT also notes:

Brazil, which has long campaigned unsuccessfully to be given a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council…

Ahhh, there it is. Nothing catapults a career at the UN quite like blaming America for your problems.

It’s kind of like the requisite global warming jargon you have to choke down in Hollywood, or the very loose relationship with the facts needed to write this blog.

06/06/09: Also Worth Noting

Paleontology has never been a field of science that has benefited mankind very much (other than in the passing "That is AWESOME" sense of the word when you're wandering through the dino exhibit at the museum), but reading these headlines makes it clear that they are not even trying to be productive.

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Sure he's a busy guy, but that doesn't mean our president doesn't have time to try and grow a sweet mustache. However, if I were Efren Ramirez, I would be pissed.

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What's that you say? After a checkered, multi-century history, Roman Catholicism is no longer hip? I beg to differ.

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No one complained when they did this to Napoleon. But I think the reason was because they did it to Napoleon.


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Life has some never-before-seen color photos of the Third Reich. It's pretty eerie to see this stuff in technicolor. Also check these and these.

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USA Today notes that currently "one of every six dollars of Americans' income is now coming in the form of a federal or state check or voucher." Our president's reaction to this horrific news? "What can I do to get the other 5 on the payroll?"

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The laws of attraction are a remarkable thing.

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Legislators in Britain are staging a plan to get a significantly large number of members to lobby the Prime Minister to step down. Is this really beyond the ability of our current lawmakers? Couldn't we find a way to make this happen? Answer: No.

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I wish network news was actually like this. Imagine the ratings! Maybe even Couric would crack 1 million viewers. Well, maybe not.

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It's been 12 years, and this song is still pretty great.

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Isn't our president and his scary wife hip and cool? Aren't you excited we get to pay for their $24k nights out on the town? And you know things are bad when even his Joey Goebbels impersonator can't come up with an explanation for it. A man with shame might have waited for a meeting or political event in NYC so he could justify the cost. But no, for a man without shame, morals or conscience, an empty weekday in the midst of an economic meltdown is reason enough. And, note that two additional planes full of ego-jamming entourage were part of the night out.

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It's funny to consider that it was barely six months ago that our president vociferously decried the arrogance and wastefulness of the auto execs that visited Washington D.C. because they had the temerity to travel via private jet. News outlets like Reuters, CNN, ABC, Bloomberg, and the WSJ lined up to report his righteous indignation.

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What impact has MM had on our standing in the world? The Muslim world is now completely comfortable dictating terms to the U.S. Sure, they don't exactly have any plans to change, but at least they know they have a comrade that's willing to roll over.

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I respect consistency, and for that, I must tip my hat to the Left. Rather than admit their leader has nominated a sub-standard partisan stooge (the same way many in the GOP did when their leader nominated Harriet Miers in 2005) they are going to fight this one to the death. Their weapon of choice in this battle? Also predictable: Calling anyone who disagrees a racist.

* * *

Sure, squirrels are just rats with better PR, but at least they're patriotic. I'm willing to bet it didn't take a series of press inquiries and several videos showing a refusal to take part in the pledge of allegiance to make this happen.

* * *

While the U.S. keeps looking for diplomatic ways to turn the tide in Afghanistan, it's nice to know that the president, Hamid Karzai, is willing to be a figurehead for a rational, modern, law-abiding society country long plagued by pre-medieval ideas about gender roles and marriage.

* * *

In case anyone has forgotten: The government is still working on a way to control your salary. In addition to controlling your bank. Somewhere Alexander Hamilton is going bonkers.

* * *

Sure, it's never good news to hear that hostile countries have developed a aircraft carrier kill weapon designed especially for U.S. ships, but I'd feel better if the military would respond with news to the effect of, "Yeah, but we got one, too, and it is WAY better."

* * *

On the list of things I will never let the Obama administration forget: This.

* * *

Thinking of visiting Africa? You'll need more than armed guards.

* * *

Why is America in decline? I'm willing to believe it's because people have lives that are so empty that they set aside time to organize and vote for "Best Public Bathroom in America."

* * *

I think this site is supposed to disgust people, yet I read it like a cook book. This may explain why my heart will someday explode.

* * *

While still basking in the refractory afterglow of the "First 100 Days" celebration, it's important to examine a few additional pieces of information. First, this AP story that details his claims about how he is saving us, and the grizzly facts to the contrary. It's important to note it's the AP that's running this story -- at this time last year they were a mere wing of his campaign. Also of note is this list of other notable events during days 1-100, and this breakdown of other significant achievements.

* * *

There are a lot of sheep-related jokes to be made about this.

* * *

A once mighty species is about to be wiped out due to low birthrates and an influx of breeding by aggressive foreigners. It's up to you to decide if this is a story about rhinos or Western Europeans.

* * *

Another thing the BHB will never let Obama forget, this. And all the more so since he rescinded the plan only when the public backlash reached his doorstep, not out of any realization that his actions were morally depraved.

* * *

Scientists believe that a massive tsunami hit NYC about 2,300 years ago. If you've ever walked the streets the day after St. Patrick's Day or any of the 738 parades, you know that a tsunami would be a welcome upgrade.

* * *

What a remarkable surprise: After a two year campaign wherein everyone started shouting words like "racist" whenever Barry's Muslim roots were mentioned, he is now speaking at length about the great impact Islam has had in his life. Interesting. Totally interesting. Also of note, he thinks Iran should keep up their nuclear research. The research which, according to every advisory and intelligence service on earth, is not related to power production.

* * *

I've eaten some really good dinner rolls in my life, so perhaps this isn't entirely unbelievable.

* * *

Reports that Microsoft is on the decline amidst the rise all the other technology companies is a vastly overstate rumor.

* * *

Truman Madsen died this week. That is very sad.

* * *

I don't understand why Queen Elizabeth is so upset about being left out of the D-Day commemoration. The chief role of England on 06/06/44 was, in technical terms, "a whole lot of nothing while they waited for us to save them." French president Nicholas Sarkozy will be at the event, however. That's odd. It's important to note, in a roundabout (albeit unintentional) defense of the Queen, that although it was an invasion of France, the French role in the Normandy landing was, in technical terms, "a whole lot of nothing while they waited for us to save them, and everyone in the southern half of the country collaborated with the Nazis.

With that in mind, today is the anniversary, and each one of us ought to be incredibly grateful.

Hallmarks of the Obama Era: When the Laughable Laugh at You

Just days after Russia pointed out how Marxist he is, Hugo Chavez has made a note of how socialist our president is.

"Hey, Obama has just nationalized nothing more and nothing less than General Motors. Comrade Obama! Fidel, careful or we are going to end up to his right," Chavez joked on a live television broadcast.

But don't worry, Barry has only taken over about 70% of GM -- and, to hear him tell it, that's not such a bad thing.

And, besides, that's nothing like the madness Chavez has unleashed in Venezuela, right?

Reuters notes,

During a decade in government, Chavez has nationalized most of Venezuela's key economic sectors, including multibillion dollar oil projects, often via joint ventures with the private sector that give the state a 60 percent controlling stake.

I am without speech.

Dwindling Commodities: Shame

As noted earlier, the problem with those who claim the media is not chronically infatuated with Obama is that they have to explain away why major networks keep producing lovefest infomercials about him and labeling them "investigative reports."

A blog at the NYT notes,

There was a time when such cross promotion between a network news division and its corporate entertainment sibling – during a presidential interview, no less — would have caused rebellion in the newsroom.

Keyword: WAS.

North Korea's Family Business

There have been some big decisions made in North Korea. The transition of power in the world's only communist dynasty is a pretty difficult thing to pull off.

Considering the fact that everyone is desperate for the tyranny to stop, it's an ideal time for an uprising.

Luckily North Korea has effectively shielded its people from knowing much about the world around them and, therefore, their comparatively awful situation.

But now that Kim "Crazy Pants" Jong Il's health is on the decline, he has had to choose between his three sons to decide who will assume this important role.

The Washinngton Post reports he's going with son #3, 26-year-old Kim Jong Un.

For years, Kim Jong Il's eldest son Jong Nam, 38, was considered the favorite to succeed his father until he was caught trying to enter Japan on a fake passport in 2001, reportedly to visit the Disney resort.

Kim considers the middle son, Jong Chol, too effeminate, according to the leader's former sushi chef.

Jong Un, however, is the "spitting image" of his father and the leader's favorite, the chef, who goes by the pen name Kenji Fujimoto, wrote in a 2003 memoir.

I come away with a few thoughts from this story:

1) I've never met a sushi chef I couldn't trust.
2) Imagine the stress of trying to decide which of the children you've emotionally demolished (by virtue of simply being their father) will make the best totalitarian madman?
3) Can you imagine having this guy call you effeminate?

Furthermore, how much money would you have paid to hear Kim Jong Il hash this one out with one of his cronies (the President of the Supreme People's Assembly, Kim Yong-nam, for example)?

--Kim: I'm thinking I gotta go with Jong Nam
--Yong: Wait, the Mouseketeer?
--Kim: He's not a Mouseketeer...
--Yong: I know a cop at the Customs desk in Tokyo who would disagree.
--Kim: We've been over this, he told me he was only in Japan to murder someone. And I trust him. He wouldn't do something like that.
--Yong: Like visit that whorish mouse kingdom? At least the Palestinians offer a fresh perspective on the subject. Japan just hands that duck some sushi and suddenly everyone forgets about Hello Kitty...
--Kim: Speaking of that [shows HK charm bracelet].
--Yong: He went to Disneyland!!!!!
--Kim: Ok, ok, Nam is out. Jong Chol could be good. I'm sure he could murder and crush spirits admirably.
--Yong: But isn't he a little... you know, ummm... I don't want to say that he's...
--Kim: What are you getting at?
--Yong: Well, I think his iron fist might be more of a pink glove...
--Kim: WHAT???
--Yong: Ummm... he prefers the comrades.
--Kim: You have GOT to be kidding...
--Yong: That leaves us with Un.
--Kim: Whatever.

Light Candles and Send Positive Energy

A stunned nation waits on the verge of panic, as one of its national heroes battles for his life.

Rapper Tone Loc, who performed the 1980s hits "Wild Thing" and "Funky Cold Medina," was released from the hospital Friday after collapsing during an outdoor concert in Florida, officials said.

A spokesman for the Escambia County Sheriff's Department told The Associated Press it appeared Tone Loc collapsed and had a seizure because of overheating.

While tragic, you can understand how this may have happened.

Tone Loc (onstage): Ahh, man! I am sweating so bad! Oh,
man...

Crowd: Yeeeeeeah!

Tone Loc: No, for reals y'all, I'm burning up...

Crowd: [Believing this to be a comment about smoking marijuana, they
begin to cheer]

Tone Loc: It's getting hot in here...

Crowd: [Singing] "So take off all your clothes..."

Tone Loc: [Collapses]

Crowd: [Believing him to be intoxicated, begins cheering]

I had the opportunity to watch him perform live in the early 2000s when he came to my college as a part of the "Back to the Old School" weekend. It was delightful.

Get well soon, Tone. You gave us Funky Cold Medina, and for that, you have our gratitude and best wishes.

The Big Squeeze

Just days after Barney Frank criticized the morality of SCOTUS Justice Scalia (while discussing a topic in which Scalia stated he was unwilling to apply his morals -- or anyone's -- to the question of gay marriage) the flagship of ideological stupidity, the Obama administration has announced another fantastic idea.

With a totally straight face, Barry-O announced a new plan for mandatory volunteerism.

The House passed a bill yesterday which includes disturbing language indicating young people will be forced to undertake mandatory national service programs as fears about President Barack Obama’s promised “civilian national security force” intensify.

The Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education Act, known as the GIVE Act, was passed yesterday by a 321-105 margin and now goes to the Senate.

Under section 6104 of the bill, entitled “Duties,” in subsection B6, the legislation states that a commission will be set up to investigate, “Whether a workable, fair, and reasonable mandatory service requirement for all able young people could be developed, and how such a requirement could be implemented in a manner that would strengthen the social fabric of the Nation.

What is the Democrats' fascination with enforcing morality?

A mandatory program of volunteerism would be odd enough, but these programs will be Obama-approved and Obama-approved only.

Is there a more damning facet of the Democratic Party -- and the Commander-in-Chief in particular -- than the fact that they are so terrified of the decision making of individuals that they are willing to legislate the personal time of private citizens.

It reminds me of that paragon of Leftist virtue promising,

Never again will you be capable of ordinary human feeling. Everything will be dead inside you. Never again will you be capable of love, or friendship, or joy of living, or laughter, or curiosity, or courage, or integrity.

You will be hollow.

We shall squeeze you empty and then we shall fill you with ourselves.

And now, after a very long wait, that goal is within reach.

Taking Quick Action Takes Time. A Lot of it

A pair of intraweb videos are encapsulating both the angst and the source of the angst amidst the economic meltdown.

In a refreshing turn of events, parliamentarians in Britain are starting to say the types of things you wish someone in the Senate or House would stand up and say.

Follow that link and then ask why there isn't a single U.S. legislator of any renown with the testicular fortitude to stand up and recite these same remarks.

And while things continue to spiral out of control here in the States, our leader makes no attempt to hide his annoyance when asked why he has been so slow to react and/or condemn the the actions of his political benefactors.

His reason: He wanted to be sure who to blame or what to be upset about.

If it were my job and millions of people depended on it, I could learn to speak conversational Mandarin in two full days.

How long does it take to look at the culture of government-enabled and federally-mandated of thieves running Wall Street to grab a sycophantic microphone and say, "Yeah, this sucks."

The Obama turnaround time for pointing the finger at an obvious problem is two days?

If he'd been at the helm, we would have taken a position on WWII in the early 70s, and the Cuban Missile Crisis would be one of the things he'd be promising to solve with "Hope and Change" during his second term in office.

From the Home Movie Collection of Hu Jintao

The Chinese government is debating the veracity of a video (seen here) showing government forces beating a Tibetan monk to death.

The explanation of the Chinese government is convincing, however.

Translated, their response reads: "Wait, you think this video is real? No way. Our videos of the [real murders] are much better quality."

Scouring the Dictionary for a Word Scarier than "Nightmare"

The BHB fans over at Rolling Stone have echoed some of my finest sentiments and written the single best piece on the financial meltdown, surpassing even this round table discussion on the topic.

The entire piece is required reading, but here are a few critical elements.

Consider this opening and basic overview of the crisis:

It's over — we're officially, royally f#cked.

No empire can survive being rendered a permanent laughingstock, which is what happened as of a few weeks ago, when the buffoons who have been running things in this country finally went one step too far.

It happened when Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was forced to admit that he was once again going to have to stuff billions of taxpayer dollars into a dying insurance giant called AIG, itself a profound symbol of our national decline — a corporation that got rich insuring the concrete and steel of American industry in the country's heyday, only to destroy itself chasing phantom fortunes at the Wall Street card tables.

The latest bailout came as AIG admitted to having just posted the largest quarterly loss in American corporate history — some $61.7 billion. In the final three months of last year, the company lost more than $27 million every hour. That's $465,000 a minute, a yearly income for a median American household every six seconds, roughly $7,750 a second.

And all this happened at the end of eight straight years that America devoted to frantically chasing the shadow of a terrorist threat to no avail, eight years spent stopping every citizen at every airport to search every purse, bag, crotch and briefcase for juice boxes and explosive tubes of toothpaste.

Yet in the end, our government had no mechanism for searching the balance sheets of companies that held life-or-death power over our society and was unable to spot holes in the national economy the size of Libya (whose entire GDP last year was smaller than AIG's 2008 losses).

So it's time to admit it: We're fools, protagonists in a kind of gruesome comedy about the marriage of greed and stupidity. And the worst part about it is that we're still in denial — we still think this is some kind of unfortunate accident, not something that was created by the group of psychopaths on Wall Street whom we allowed to gang-rape the American Dream. [...]

Edward Liddy, the company's CEO, made AIG sound like an orphan begging in a soup line, hungry and sick from being left out in someone else's financial weather.

He conveniently forgot to mention that AIG had spent more than a decade systematically scheming to evade U.S. and international regulators, or that one of the causes of its "pneumonia" was making colossal, world-sinking $500 billion bets with money it didn't have, in a toxic and completely unregulated derivatives market.

To explain just how specifically bad the crisis is, RS notes:

People are pissed off about this financial crisis, and about this bailout, but they're not pissed off enough.

The reality is that the worldwide economic meltdown and the bailout that followed were together a kind of revolution, a coup d'état.

They cemented and formalized a political trend that has been snowballing for decades: the gradual takeover of the government by a small class of connected insiders, who used money to control elections, buy influence and systematically weaken financial regulations.

The crisis was the coup de grâce: Given virtually free rein over the economy, these same insiders first wrecked the financial world, then cunningly granted themselves nearly unlimited emergency powers to clean up their own mess.

And so the gambling-addict leaders of companies like AIG end up not penniless and in jail, but with an Alien-style death grip on the Treasury and the Federal Reserve — "our partners in the government," as Liddy put it with a shockingly casual matter-of-factness after the most recent bailout.

RS also has an interesting insight on what this crisis is and isn't, and its practical impact beyond the theoretical problems tossed around on CNN.

The mistake most people make in looking at the financial crisis is thinking of it in terms of money, a habit that might lead you to look at the unfolding mess as a huge bonus-killing downer for the Wall Street class.

But if you look at it in purely Machiavellian terms, what you see is a colossal power grab that threatens to turn the federal government into a kind of giant Enron — a huge, impenetrable black box filled with self-dealing insiders whose scheme is the securing of individual profits at the expense of an ocean of unwitting involuntary shareholders, previously known as taxpayers.

So how did this whole problem start?

Finally, some proper finger pointing!

The best way to understand the financial crisis is to understand the meltdown at AIG.

AIG is what happens when short, bald managers of otherwise boring financial bureaucracies start seeing Brad Pitt in the mirror.

This is a company that built a giant fortune across more than a century by betting on safety-conscious policyholders — people who wear seat belts and build houses on high ground — and then blew it all in a year or two by turning their entire balance sheet over to a guy who acted like making huge bets with other people's money would make his d#ck bigger.

RS examines Patient Zero of the worldwide meltdown: An AIG manager named Joseph Cassano, described as "a pudgy, balding Brooklyn College grad with beady eyes and way too much forehead...a greedy little turd with a knack for selective accounting who ran his scam right out in the open, thanks to Washington's deregulation of the Wall Street casino."

Just as remarkable as the individual financial manager racing the problem to a tipping point, is the institutional machinery which was created to make real the wildest greedy imaginings of Wall Street come true.

The meltdown, RS spells out at some length, was facilitated by a financial tool called a collateralized-debt obligation which is basically a pile of different loans (cars, houses, credit cards, etc.) and sold to investors as a package. The banks then convinced the government to give the CDOs a AAA rating, meaning it could be considered an ultra safe investment. This rating then drew in the huge investors like pension funds and other banks -- institutions that were only allowed (by government regulation) to purchase ultra safe investments.

To get AAA ratings, the CDOs relied not on their actual underlying assets but on crazy mathematical formulas that the banks cooked up to make the investments look safer than they really were.

"They had some back room somewhere where a bunch of Indian guys who'd been doing nothing but math for God knows how many years would come up with some kind of model saying that this or that combination of debtors would only default once every 10,000 years," says one young trader who sold CDOs for a major investment bank. "It was nuts."

Now that even the crappiest mortgages could be sold to conservative investors, the CDOs spurred a massive explosion of irresponsible and predatory lending.

In fact, there was such a crush to underwrite CDOs that it became hard to find enough subprime mortgages — read: enough unemployed meth dealers willing to buy million-dollar homes for no money down — to fill them all.

To make the purchase of this many bad CDOs possible (and, remember that the sellers knew they were terrible) a kind of insurance policy had to be created to give the buyers the illusion of safety.

To accomplish this, AIG's Patient Zero created something called a credit-default swap (CDS). The functionality of CDSs are even more boggling than CDOs. RS explains,

In its simplest form, a CDS is just a bet on an outcome.

Say Bank A writes a million-dollar mortgage to the Pope for a town house in the West Village.

Bank A wants to hedge its mortgage risk in case the Pope can't make his monthly payments, so it buys CDS protection from Bank B, wherein it agrees to pay Bank B a premium of $1,000 a month for five years.

In return, Bank B agrees to pay Bank A the full million-dollar value of the Pope's mortgage if he defaults.

In theory, Bank A is covered if the Pope goes on a meth binge and loses his job.

With this apparatus in place, Patient Zero was able to back up other people's money without necessarily having to demonstrate that AIG had the necessary money available to cover what the insurance was intended to protect.

When a $100 corporate bond is sold, for example, someone has to show 100 actual dollars. But when you sell a $100 CDS guarantee, you don't have to show a dime. So Cassano could sell investment banks billions in guarantees without having any single asset to back it up.

Cassano was selling so-called "naked" CDS deals.

In a "naked" CDS, neither party actually holds the underlying loan.

In other words, Bank B not only sells CDS protection to Bank A for its mortgage on the Pope — it turns around and sells protection to Bank C for the very same mortgage.

This could go on ad nauseam: You could have Banks D through Z also betting on Bank A's mortgage.

Unlike traditional insurance, Cassano was offering investors an opportunity to bet that someone else's house would burn down, or take out a term life policy on the guy with AIDS down the street.

With this charming system in place, Patient Zero earned countless billions for AIG, and over $280 million for himself. His 400 employees took home $3.5 billion.

But none of this could have happened if the government hadn't done its part. In the late 90s, Sen. Phil Gramm (who would later be one of the McCain campaign's top advisers) helpfully engineered "the most dramatic deregulation of the financial industry since Emperor Hien Tsung invented paper money in 806 A.D."

For years, Washington had kept a watchful eye on the nation's banks.

Ever since the Great Depression, commercial banks — those that kept money on deposit for individuals and businesses — had not been allowed to double as investment banks, which raise money by issuing and selling securities.

The Glass-Steagall Act, passed during the Depression, also prevented banks of any kind from getting into the insurance business.

But in the late Nineties, a few years before Cassano took over AIGFP, all that changed.

What happened to these safety nets? The democrats got greedy.

The Democrats, tired of getting slaughtered in the fundraising arena by Republicans, decided to throw off their old reliance on unions and interest groups and become more "business-friendly."

Wall Street responded by flooding Washington with money, buying allies in both parties. In the 10-year period beginning in 1998, financial companies spent $1.7 billion on federal campaign contributions and another $3.4 billion on lobbyists.

They quickly got what they paid for.

In 1999, Gramm co-sponsored a bill that repealed key aspects of the Glass-Steagall Act, smoothing the way for the creation of financial megafirms like Citigroup.

The move did away with the built-in protections afforded by smaller banks. In the old days, a local banker knew the people whose loans were on his balance sheet: He wasn't going to give a million-dollar mortgage to a homeless meth addict, since he would have to keep that loan on his books.

But a giant merged bank might write that loan and then sell it off to some fool in China, and who cared?

The very next year, Gramm compounded the problem by writing a sweeping new law called the Commodity Futures Modernization Act that made it impossible to regulate credit swaps as either gambling or securities.

The long series of loopholes allowed Patient Zero's operation to be supervised by (wait for it...) an advisory agency of his choosing.

The one he chose was burdened with hundreds of other organizations and, a Government Accounting Office audit noted during this hay-making period, the advisory body "had only one insurance specialist on staff — and this despite the fact that it was the primary regulator for the world's largest insurer."

It wasn't just the outside organizations that weren't paying attention. AIG didn't' care either.

AIG might have been OK had it not been for a complete lack of internal controls.

For six months before its meltdown, according to insiders, the company had been searching for a full-time chief financial officer and a chief risk-assessment officer, but never got around to hiring either.

That meant that the 18th-largest company in the world had no one checking to make sure its balance sheet was safe and no one keeping track of how much cash and assets the firm had on hand.

The situation was so bad that when outside consultants were called in a few weeks before the bailout, senior executives were unable to answer even the most basic questions about their company — like, for instance, how much exposure the firm had to the residential-mortgage market.

Amazingly, the thing that eventually stopped him was AIG's own terrible internal accounting -- a series of errors that "trigger[ed] clauses in the CDS contracts that forced Cassano to post substantially more collateral to back his deals."

But by the time anyone noticed, Patient Zero could protect himself, and by the time enough people noticed it was too late, and around the time everyone noticed, AIG made a decision to keep paying him:

By the fall of 2007, it was evident that AIGFP's portfolio had turned poisonous, but like every good Wall Street huckster, Cassano schemed to keep his insane, Earth-swallowing gamble hidden from public view.

That August, balls bulging, he announced to investors on a conference call that "it is hard for us, without being flippant, to even see a scenario within any kind of realm of reason that would see us losing $1 in any of those transactions."

As he spoke, his CDS portfolio was racking up $352 million in losses.

When the growing credit crunch prompted senior AIG executives to re-examine its liabilities, a company accountant named Joseph St. Denis became "gravely concerned" about the CDS deals and their potential for mass destruction. Cassano responded by personally forcing the poor sap out of the firm, telling him he was "deliberately excluded" from the financial review for fear that he might "pollute the process."

The following February, when AIG posted $11.5 billion in annual losses, it announced the resignation of Cassano as head of AIGFP, saying an auditor had found a "material weakness" in the CDS portfolio.

But amazingly, the company not only allowed Cassano to keep $34 million in bonuses, it kept him on as a consultant for $1 million a month.

In fact, Cassano remained on the payroll and kept collecting his monthly million through the end of September 2008, even after taxpayers had been forced to hand AIG $85 billion to patch up his f#ck-ups.

When asked in October why the company still retained Cassano at his $1 million-a-month rate despite his role in the probable downfall of Western civilization, CEO Martin Sullivan told Congress with a straight face that AIG wanted to "retain the 20-year knowledge that Mr. Cassano had."

When the collapse finally hit AIG, it was -- amazingly -- a shock to the company.

What sank AIG in the end was another credit downgrade. Cassano had written so many CDS deals that when the company was facing another downgrade to its credit rating last September, from AA to A, it needed to post billions in collateral — not only more cash than it had on its balance sheet but more cash than it could raise even if it sold off every single one of its liquid assets.

Even so, management dithered for days, not believing the company was in serious trouble.

AIG was a dried-up prune, sapped of any real value, and its top executives didn't even know it.

One of the most wealthy companies in the world had been cannibalized by the very practice which made it rich. It was the grandest, most complicated con ever devised -- much less executed.

But it wasn't simply a get-rich-quick scheme. The types of people brilliant enough to create this scenario are smart enough to know there are things more valuable than truckloads of money during an economic crash.

So that's the first step in wall street's power grab: making up things like credit-default swaps and collateralized-debt obligations, financial products so complex and inscrutable that ordinary American dumb people — to say nothing of federal regulators and even the CEOs of major corporations like AIG — are too intimidated to even try to understand them.

That, combined with wise political investments, enabled the nation's top bankers to effectively scrap any meaningful oversight of the financial industry.

In 1997 and 1998, the years leading up to the passage of Phil Gramm's fateful act that gutted Glass-Steagall, the banking, brokerage and insurance industries spent $350 million on political contributions and lobbying. Gramm alone — then the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee — collected $2.6 million in only five years.

The law passed 90-8 in the Senate, with the support of 38 Democrats, including some names that might surprise you: Joe Biden, John Kerry, Tom Daschle, Dick Durbin, even John Edwards.

At this point in the story, RS makes an astute observation about where AIG's remarkable shortcomings ended, and the shortcomings of those in power in D.C. took over.

During the pre-bailout meetings with AIG, the CEO of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein, had been one of only 4 people present -- the other attendees being the CEO of AIG, the Chief of the Federal Reserve of New York (Obama's current Treasury Secretary), and Bush's Treasury Secretary, Henry Paulson.

Three of those people make sense, but not the extra CEO. Why? RS has a pretty plausible theory, although it doesn't come out and say it:

Goldman jumped into the housing craze just like everyone else on Wall Street. Although it famously scored an $11 billion coup in 2007 when one of its trading units smartly shorted the housing market, the move didn't tell the whole story.

In truth, Goldman still had a huge exposure come that fateful summer of 2008 — to none other than Joe Cassano.

Goldman Sachs, it turns out, was Cassano's biggest customer, with $20 billion of exposure in Cassano's CDS book. Which might explain why Goldman chief Lloyd Blankfein was in the room with ex-Goldmanite Hank Paulson that weekend of September 13th, when the federal government was supposedly bailing out AIG.

When asked why Blankfein was there, one of the government officials who was in the meeting shrugs. "One might say that it's because Goldman had so much exposure to AIGFP's portfolio," he says. "You'll never prove that, but one might suppose."

Market analyst Eric Salzman is more blunt. "If AIG went down," he says, "there was a good chance Goldman would not be able to collect." The AIG bailout, in effect, was Goldman bailing out Goldman.

Eventually, Paulson went a step further, elevating another ex-Goldmanite named Edward Liddy to run AIG — a company whose bailout money would be coming, in part, from the newly created TARP program, administered by another Goldman banker named Neel Kashkari.

Oh my...

Not only is all of this pretty creepy, but it was done entirely in secret. Not because it had to be, and not because it needed to be, but because a general lack of understanding made their jobs safer and kept the common folk from getting in the way. It is the same theory that led the Catholic church to (debatably) encourage its members to not read from the Bible so that the peasants wouldn't get any ideas about doctrine or the wisdom of allowing the local priests to have a hand in the regulation of day-to-day affairs.

The people who have spent their lives cloistered in this Wall Street community aren't much for sharing information with the great unwashed.

Because all of this s#it is complicated, because most of us mortals don't know what the hell LIBOR is or how a REIT works or how to use the word "zero coupon bond" in a sentence without sounding stupid — well, then, the people who do speak this idiotic language cannot under any circumstances be bothered to explain it to us and instead spend a lot of time rolling their eyes and asking us to trust them. [...]

This whole process would be done in secret, away from the prying eyes of NASCAR dads, broke-@ss liberals who read translations of French novels, subprime mortgage holders and other such financial losers.

In order to maintain this stranglehold without suffering a coup at the hands of people furious that no progress has been made on this problem, the financial sector has created a lot of "solutions." These solutions, however, are predictably impossible to translate into English.

A whole series of new government operations had been invented to inject cash into the economy, most all of them completely secretive and with names you've never heard of.

There is the Term Auction Facility, the Term Securities Lending Facility, the Primary Dealer Credit Facility, the Commercial Paper Funding Facility and a monster called the Asset-Backed Commercial Paper Money Market Mutual Fund Liquidity Facility (boasting the chat-room horror-show acronym ABCPMMMFLF). For good measure, there's also something called a Money Market Investor Funding Facility, plus three facilities called Maiden Lane I, II and III to aid bailout recipients like Bear Stearns and AIG.

And, of course, these programs send money in directions no one understands, to destinations no one knows about.

While the rest of America, and most of Congress, have been bugging out about the $700 billion bailout program called TARP, all of these newly created organisms in the Federal Reserve zoo have quietly been pumping not billions but trillions of dollars into the hands of private companies (at least $3 trillion so far in loans, with as much as $5.7 trillion more in guarantees of private investments).

Although this technically isn't taxpayer money, it still affects taxpayers directly, because the activities of the Fed impact the economy as a whole. And this new, secretive activity by the Fed completely eclipses the TARP program in terms of its influence on the economy.

No one knows who's getting that money or exactly how much of it is disappearing through these new holes in the hull of America's credit rating.

Moreover, no one can really be sure if these new institutions are even temporary at all — or whether they are being set up as permanent, state-aided crutches to Wall Street, designed to systematically suck bad investments off the ledgers of irresponsible lenders.

These programs were supposed to disappear after serving their purpose as a short-term solution, but each gets quietly renewed each time it is due to expire.

Every lawmaker who has stood in front of this freight train of greed and malfeasance has paid a price -- likely the reason many legislative critics speak in entirely unactionable generalities about "the problem" and "the crisis and "the problem with this crisis."

None other than disgraced senator Ted Stevens was the poor sap who made the unpleasant discovery that if Congress didn't like the Fed handing trillions of dollars to banks without any oversight, Congress could apparently go f#ck itself — or so said the law.

When Stevens asked the GAO about what authority Congress has to monitor the Fed, he got back a letter citing an obscure statute that nobody had ever heard of before: the Accounting and Auditing Act of 1950.

The relevant section, 31 USC 714(b), dictated that congressional audits of the Federal Reserve may not include "deliberations, decisions and actions on monetary policy matters."

The exemption, as Foss notes, "basically includes everything." According to the law, in other words, the Fed simply cannot be audited by Congress.

Or by anyone else, for that matter.

Stevens isn't the only person in Congress to be given the finger by the Fed. In January, when Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida asked Federal Reserve vice chairman Donald Kohn where all the money went — only $1.2 trillion had vanished by then — Kohn gave Grayson a classic eye roll, saying he would be "very hesitant" to name names because it might discourage banks from taking the money.

"Has that ever happened?" Grayson asked. "Have people ever said, 'We will not take your $100 billion because people will find out about it?'"

"Well, we said we would not publish the names of the borrowers, so we have no test of that," Kohn answered, visibly annoyed with Grayson's meddling.

Grayson pressed on, demanding to know on what terms the Fed was lending the money. Presumably it was buying assets and making loans, but no one knew how it was pricing those assets — in other words, no one knew what kind of deal it was striking on behalf of taxpayers.

So when Grayson asked if the purchased assets were "marked to market" — a methodology that assigns a concrete value to assets, based on the market rate on the day they are traded — Kohn answered, mysteriously, "The ones that have market values are marked to market."

The implication was that the Fed was purchasing derivatives like credit swaps or other instruments that were basically impossible to value objectively — paying real money for God knows what.

"Well, how much of them don't have market values?" asked Grayson. "How much of them are worthless?"

"None are worthless," Kohn snapped.

"Then why don't you mark them to market?" Grayson demanded.

"Well," Kohn sighed, "we are marking the ones to market that have market values."

In essence, the Fed was telling Congress to lay off and let the experts handle things.

If the CEO of Boeing or Ford talked to a Congressional committee like that, we'd all be riding bikes for the next 60 years. But the financial sector has no fear of reprisal. They've effectively created a system wherein they are a very scary law unto themselves.

When one considers the comparatively extensive system of congressional checks and balances that goes into the spending of every dollar in the budget via the normal appropriations process, what's happening in the Fed amounts to something truly revolutionary — a kind of shadow government with a budget many times the size of the normal federal outlay, administered dictatorially by one man, Fed chairman Ben Bernanke. [...]

And the Fed isn't the only arm of the bailout that has closed ranks. The Treasury, too, has maintained incredible secrecy surrounding its implementation even of the TARP program, which was mandated by Congress.

To this date, no one knows exactly what criteria the Treasury Department used to determine which banks received bailout funds and which didn't — particularly the first $350 billion given out under Bush appointee Hank Paulson.

The situation with the first TARP payments grew so absurd that when the Congressional Oversight Panel, charged with monitoring the bailout money, sent a query to Paulson asking how he decided whom to give money to, Treasury responded — and this isn't a joke — by directing the panel to a copy of the TARP application form on its website.

Elizabeth Warren, the chair of the Congressional Oversight Panel, was struck nearly speechless by the response.

The collapse of these massive banks, and their subsequent lack of remorse at the damage they caused (but it's hard to look sorry when you get a bonus), was an opportunity to reinvest in smaller banks -- the kind with straightforward ledgers and an incentive to be competitive.

But, not so much.

The lion's share of the bailout money has gone to the larger, so-called "systemically important" banks. "It's like Treasury is picking winners and losers," says one state banking official who asked not to be identified.

This itself is a hugely important political development. In essence, the bailout accelerated the decline of regional community lenders by boosting the political power of their giant national competitors.

Which, when you think about it, is insane: What had brought us to the brink of collapse in the first place was this relentless instinct for building ever-larger megacompanies, passing deregulatory measures to gradually feed all the little fish in the sea to an ever-shrinking pool of Bigger Fish. [...]

Instead, federal regulators closed ranks and used an almost completely secret bailout process to double down on the same faulty, merger-happy thinking that got us here in the first place, creating a constellation of megafirms under government control that are even bigger, more unwieldy and more crammed to the gills with systemic risk.

In essence, Paulson and his cronies turned the federal government into one gigantic, half-opaque holding company, one whose balance sheet includes the world's most appallingly large and risky hedge fund, a controlling stake in a dying insurance giant, huge investments in a group of teetering megabanks, and shares here and there in various auto-finance companies, student loans, and other failing businesses.

Like AIG, this new federal holding company is a firm that has no mechanism for auditing itself and is run by leaders who have very little grasp of the daily operations of its disparate subsidiary operations.

In other words, it's AIG's rip-roaringly sh#tty business model writ almost inconceivably massive — to echo Geithner, a huge, complex global company attached to a very complicated investment bank/hedge fund that's been allowed to build up without adult supervision.

This situation leaves us with a lot of unbelievably awful questions:

How much of what kinds of crap is actually on our balance sheet, and what did we pay for it?

When exactly will the rent come due, when will the money run out?

Does anyone know what the hell is going on?

And on the linear spectrum of capitalism to socialism, where exactly are we now?

Is there a dictionary word that even describes what we are now?

It would be funny, if it weren't such a nightmare.

What are the odds Obama is going to save us? You know things are bad when RS isn't too hopeful (excuse the pun) about our chances:

The real question from here is whether the Obama administration is going to move to bring the financial system back to a place where sanity is restored and the general public can have a say in things or whether the new financial bureaucracy will remain obscure, secretive and hopelessly complex. [...]

Most of Geithner's early moves reek strongly of Paulsonism. He has continually talked about partnering with private investors to create a so-called "bad bank" that would systemically relieve private lenders of bad assets — the kind of massive, opaque, quasi-private bureaucratic nightmare that Paulson specialized in.

RS wraps up with a series of sentiments expressed in the BHB many times:

As complex as all the finances are, the politics aren't hard to follow.

By creating an urgent crisis that can only be solved by those fluent in a language too complex for ordinary people to understand, the Wall Street crowd has turned the vast majority of Americans into non-participants in their own political future.

There is a reason it used to be a crime in the Confederate states to teach a slave to read: Literacy is power. In the age of the CDS and CDO, most of us are financial illiterates.

By making an already too-complex economy even more complex, Wall Street has used the crisis to effect a historic, revolutionary change in our political system — transforming a democracy into a two-tiered state, one with plugged-in financial bureaucrats above and clueless customers below.

And, after all this, RS bids the only farewell possible. Here's what we have to look forward to:

The most galling thing about this financial crisis is that so many Wall Street types think they actually deserve not only their huge bonuses and lavish lifestyles but the awesome political power their own mistakes have left them in possession of.

When challenged, they talk about how hard they work, the 90-hour weeks, the stress, the failed marriages, the hemorrhoids and gallstones they all get before they hit 40.

"But wait a minute," you say to them. "No one ever asked you to stay up all night eight days a week trying to get filthy rich shorting what's left of the American auto industry or selling $600 billion in toxic, irredeemable mortgages to ex-strippers on work release and Taco Bell clerks.

Actually, come to think of it, why are we even giving taxpayer money to you people? Why are we not throwing your @ss in jail instead?"

But before you even finish saying that, they're rolling their eyes, because You Don't Get It.

These people were never about anything except turning money into money, in order to get more money; valueswise they're on par with crack addicts, or obsessive sexual deviants who burgle homes to steal panties.

Yet these are the people in whose hands our entire political future now rests.

Good luck with that, America. And enjoy tax season.

It is scary to consider just how scary this is going to get before it's over. And, when it's over, what will our frame of reference be to decide it's all back to normal?

Another Successful Faith-Based Initiative

One thing you have to admit about the global spread of radical Islam, at least they have the best interests of their people in mind.

Nowhere is this more true than the already completely sane country of Nigeria.

The AP notes:

In 2003, imams in northern Nigeria promoted a boycott of polio vaccinations, claiming they were a Western plot to make Muslims infertile or infect them with AIDS.

The result: The number of newly crippled children rose by more than double the following year, and there were fears that the disease would spread into a dozen neighboring countries. [...]

Last year's spike has raised fears that the disease could be exported again to surrounding polio-free countries and threaten a multibillion dollar effort to wipe the disease from the globe.

This seems completely rational.

03/21/09: Also Worth Noting

A gunman in Miami has apparently been attending the same family get togethers that I have.

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As noted last week, putting Obama on your food packaging is not a guarantee it will taste good.

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Scientists at the University of Virginia have discovered that the degeneration associated with "old age" begins at age 27. Crap.

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The totally bonkers media watchdog group Media Matters is asking CNBC to reevaluate its staff of financial reporters in light of their bad economic predictions. But it's not the reporting that bothers Media Matters, its the fact that the reporting is critical of liberal policies. The "monitoring" they do of unfair news focuses almost entirely on AM radio, FOX News (who, yes, are total clowns) and the token conservatives on other networks. They completely ignore the bigoted rants of Olberman, Matthews, Maher, etc. But, after all, a watchdog can only watch so much.

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MSNBC reports that swarms of Gen-Y kids are receiving mountains of unemployment checks. Am I supposed to be surprised? They planned for this.

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Holding modern-day Tea Parties is a clever way to protest, but don't expect any news coverage. If ever there were people less likely to receive media coverage, I can't think of it.

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Ron Silver died last weekend, and that is sad. Few televised characters have ever been as intriguing as Bruno Gianelli.

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I love me a good article about ancient super predators! But is this new aquatic nightmare any scarier than the frilled shark? Answer: No.

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Obama has a March Madness bracket. I'm pretty sure I can beat him.

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A cop in Nebraska who is 5'9" and in excess of 300 pounds has successfully sued to return to his job. As long as you live in an area infested with criminals weighing in excess of 350 pounds, consider yourself safer.

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Want a baby? Want to skip the hassle and cost of marriage? You are quite en vogue!

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Let's play a game of presidential word association!

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Some of the pages at NBC are starting to grumble about their job prospects. What would Kenneth say!

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Garden enthusiasts are going to love this news from D.C.: "First lady Michelle Obama is scheduled to break ground Friday on a new garden near the fountain on the South Lawn that will supply the White House kitchen." Michelle doesn't seem like the type to eat garden food like us proles; I see her more likely eating baby carrots that were irrigated with Evian.

* * *

This headline is just awesome: "Fed to pump another $1 trillion into U.S. economy." And, yes, I doubt there's anything we can do to stop it.

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Oh, Vlad, you sneaky dog!

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Former President George W. Bush, who once famously called himself "The Decider," is writing a book about decisions. I have no joke for this.

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The BHB's planned laptop signing in Tehran has been called off.

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The argument that illegal immigration is a victimless crime is not very strong.

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It looks like Rick James' estate has decided to auction off some of his flatware.


* * *

This list of Obama's 10 finest presidential moments is fantastic. It's even more fun than the list from campaign season.

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Goodbye, Seattle P-I. I spent my childhood reading you while I ate breakfast or avoided doing homework. It was nice.

New Achievements in Slime Baggery

I really enjoy watching the Democratic party turn on itself. The West Wing articulated the sentiment that watching democrats fighting amongst each other is D.C.'s favorite bloodsport. Indeed.

No one ever placed the blame for the the current economic crisis at the very guilty feet of Senator Dodd, but he is finally being blamed for something -- helping the banks get rich off the bailout.

While the Senate was constructing the $787 billion stimulus last month, Dodd added an executive-compensation restriction to the bill.

The provision, now called “the Dodd Amendment” by the Obama Administration provides an “exception for contractually obligated bonuses agreed on before Feb. 11, 2009” -- which exempts the very AIG bonuses Dodd and others are now seeking to tax. [...]

“I can't point a finger at someone who was responsible for putting those dates in,” Dodd told FOX. “I can tell you this much, when my language left the senate, it did not include it. When it came back, it did.”

Well that seems odd. You'd think the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee would have more control over what he writes.

If I were the suspicious type, I'd assume that Sen. Dodd was looking us right in the eye and lying...

Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) looks like he may be facing a fresh political firestorm.

Dodd just admitted on CNN that he inserted a loophole in the stimulus legislation that allowed million-dollar bonuses to insurance giant AIG to go forward – after previously denying any involvement in writing the controversial provision. [...]

Dodd had previously said that he played no role in writing the controversial language, and was not a part of the conference committee that inserted the language in the bill. As late as today, Dodd’s spokeswoman denied the senator’s involvement.

Like any proper slime bag, Dodd is pointing the finger elsewhere, of course.

He effectively used this tactic to avoid being blamed for the current financial collapse, so you can't blame him for trying again.

The surprising thing is who he's pointing at.

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd said the Obama administration asked him to insert a provision in last month’s $787 billion economic- stimulus legislation that had the effect of authorizing American International Group Inc.’s bonuses.

And showing their own ability for slime baggery, the White House has already responded.

An administration official said last night that representatives of President Barack Obama didn’t insist on the change, though they did contend that the language in Dodd’s amendment could be legally challenged because it would apply retroactively to bonus agreements.

So how did this even happen in the first place?

Who allowed the creation of the kind of laws that caused this mess, and who has allowed the creation of new laws to make them even richer amidst financial collapse?

Here's a hint: The top two recipients of AIG political contributions.

The Dude from the EU has an Announcement

Multi-national organizations have a long history of displaying extraordinary decision-making powers, and the EU is among the most impressive of all.

I had always figured the EU had set the bar out of reach when it tried to create a series of laws mandating the legal shape and curvature of bananas, but they may have outdone themselves again.

Using 'Miss' and 'Mrs' has been banned by leaders of the European Union because they are not considered politically correct.

Brussels bureaucrats have decided the words are sexist and issued new guidelines in its bid to create 'gender-neutral' language. [...]

This also means Madame and Mademoiselle, Frau and Fraulein and Senora and Senorita are banned.

What is the solution for this? Does the the EU just expect everyone to start referring to each other as "Dude?"

Amnesty International Fights the Forces of Evil

Breaking news out of Gambia: A series of abductions by witch doctors (and subsequent detention in secret facilities) has sparked outcry from human rights groups.

No, this is not a case of a story about China and a story about Nigeria being mixed together in some tragic newsroom vs. blender accident. The BBC reports:

Up to 1,000 Gambian villagers have been abducted by "witch doctors" to secret detention centres and forced to drink potions, a human rights group says.

Amnesty International said some forced to drink the concoctions developed kidney problems, and two had died.

Officials in the police, army and members of Gambian President Yahya Jammeh's personal protection guard had accompanied the "witch doctors" in the bizarre roundup, said witnesses. [...]

The London-based rights group said the witch hunters, said to be from neighbouring Guinea, were invited into Gambia after the death of the president's aunt earlier this year was blamed on witchcraft.

Cancel your plans to the Horn of Africa!

Careful readers of this story will be impressed that Amnesty International's activism on behalf of human suffering is so comprehensive that it now extends to abuses perpetrated by (arguably real) voodoo practitioners.

Survivors have grim reports of these abductions:

Amnesty spoke to villagers who said they had been held for up to five days and forced to drink unknown substances, which they said caused them to hallucinate and behave erratically.

Hmmmmm... let's look up the standard definition for "hallucinate and behave erratically." For example, this definition.

The Govt. Solution to Bad Money Management: Handing Out Money

The outrage continues over how all the financial institutions are spending Barry's money.

Who would have thought giving free money to terribly managed companies would result in truckloads of wasted money?!

The GOP is not in the habit of making good points, but here's one:

“Two weeks ago, the president’s spokesman said they were confident that they knew how every dime was being spent at AIG,” House Republican Leader John Boehner of Ohio told reporters yesterday. “They didn’t know what they were talking about,” Boehner said.

The problem with Barry getting righteous about this is that now the GOP can turn that wrath back at him for being so dumb in the first place.

That is a rookie mistake. What is this, the guy's first job?

I'm a bit disappointed that the modern day American messiah is this stupid.

The Golden Touch

I've accused Obama of being a shameless opportunist on many occasions. I've also accused him of saying what needs to be said, regardless of if he believes it -- something we often miss because it sounds so nice when he says it.

A great example of this was his campaign pledge to eliminate earmarks, followed by the 9,000 earmarks in his pork bill.

Now we have another fine example:

The economy is fundamentally sound despite the temporary “mess” it’s in, the White House said Sunday in the kind of upbeat assessment that Barack Obama had mocked as a presidential candidate. [...]

During the fall campaign, Obama relentlessly criticized his Republican opponent, Sen. John McCain, for declaring, “The fundamentals of our economy are strong.” Obama’s team painted the veteran senator as out of touch and failing to grasp the challenges facing the country.

But on Sunday, that optimistic message came from economic adviser Christina Romer. When asked during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” if the fundamentals of the economy were sound, she replied: “Of course they are sound.”

Well isn't that convenient. The economy sucks until he's the one in charge of it -- and then, suddenly, it is healed.

I've excoriated Barry for his "everything I touch turns to gold approach" before -- but now he's doing all the work for me. I can take the rest of the night off.

Priorities

Yes, he's very busy, and, yes, he should be meeting with experts -- but our president has his priorities.

While publicly identifying with the nation's have-nots, the Obama administration has been cultivating the Beltway social elite behind the scenes.

Earlier this year, the Obama administration invited top editors of three of Washington's local luxury lifestyle magazines — Capitol File, DC magazine and Washington Life — to a meeting where they discussed, among other things, how President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama can embrace Washington's glittery social scene.

At this rate, the economy may rebound just on the sale of pitchforks and torches in the D.C. area.

Unfortunately, There Will Not Be a Make-up Test

People who understand how money works and/or who own companies continue to criticize the economic policies of a president who has neither of those items on his own resume.

To make their distaste clear, economists from around the country have participated in a WSJ survey and assigned him and his clown-like Treasury Secretary failing grades.

U.S. President Barack Obama and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner received failing grades for their efforts to revive the economy from participants in the latest Wall Street Journal forecasting survey. [...]

On average, they gave the president a grade of 59 out of 100, and although there was a broad range of marks, 42% of respondents rated Mr. Obama below 60. Mr. Geithner received an average grade of 51. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke scored better, with an average 71. [...]

The economists' negative ratings mark a turnaround in opinion. In December, before Mr. Obama took office, three-quarters of respondents said the incoming administration's economic team was better than the departing Bush team. However, Mr. Geithner's latest marks are lower than the average grade of 57 that former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson received in January.

But, in his defense, Barry expected a different teacher to be grading his work.

Bringing the Fight to the Sharks

With great pride I offer Craig Clasen the "BHB Award for Excellence in the Pursuit of Greatness" for his victorious two-hour fist fight with a shark (seen here).

The life-and-death struggle took place off New Orleans when Clasen, filmmaker Ryan McInnis and two friends were hunting tuna.

Suddenly McInnis found himself cut off and the shark began circling. [...]

During the underwater struggle, Clasen speared the shark seven times and even attempted to drown it before finishing it off with a long-blade knife.

Congratulations, Craig. Your trophy now stands in the hallowed halls shared with squirrel-suit skydivers, bare-knuckled grizzly bear fighters, and people who race jets.

If You Don't Like the Law, Prosecute Those Who Uphold it

The problem with enforcing the law is that mentally handicapped members of the U.S. House of Reps may want you to be prosecuted FOR ENFORCING IT.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has launched an investigation of the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office in Arizona following requests by congressional Democrats and allegations by liberal activists that the department has violated the civil rights of illegal aliens.

Reps. John Conyers (D-Mich.), Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), and Robert Scott (D-Va.) requested the investigation, and activists groups such as National Day Laborer Organizer Network and ACORN launched petition drives and rallies in support of the probe. [...]

In a letter dated March 10, 2009, Loretta Smith, acting assistant attorney general at the DOJ, detailed what her department would be investigating:

"The investigation will focus on alleged patterns or practices of discriminatory police practices and unconstitutional searches and seizures conducted by the MCSO, and on allegations of national origin discrimination, including failure to provide meaningful access to MCSO services for limited English proficient (LEP) individuals."

Let's examine that last sentence for a moment.

Accusation: Discriminatory police practices.
Barf: Does this mean that the Maricopa Sheriff's department is deporting people that meet the criteria of 1) being Mexican, 2) not speaking English, 3) breaking the law in our country, 4) were caught climbing over or under a fence. None of the above is a crime -- it is law enforcement against an easily identifiable perpetrator. Let's be clear: Illegally entering the U.S. is a crime. Thus, illegally entering the U.S. makes you a criminal, regardless of your reasons for doing so.

Accusation: National origin discrimination.
Barf: The law says that if you come from another country and want to live in America you can do it if you follow an established process. That process does not involve climbing over a fence. If you choose the latter option, that makes you a criminal. A criminal in a foreign country. This is not an interpretation of the law -- it is THE law. Your nation of origin is not an issue of discrimination but incrimination.

Accusation: Failure to provide meaningful access for limited English proficient individuals.
Barf: I want to believe this was thrown in as a joke. The sheriff is expected to provide -- at all times, apparently -- translators for each cop rounding up the criminals caught entering the country? Do I have an expectation for encountering English-speaking cops the next time I get caught making trouble in Guadalajara?

What bass-ackwards criminal justice philosophy reallocates law enforcement resources to accommodate the needs of criminals?

Answer: Somoene who has never lived in a border area. Somoene (or a group of someones) who have never lived in Arizona -- a state that, thanks to the surge of illegal entry, has jaw-dropping rates of kidnapping, murder, human trafficking, and every vice that follows.

Yes, Representatives, let's shut down the operation in Maricopa; we'd hate to make any criminals uncomfortable.

And, of course, let's not forget that ACORN is behind this -- an organization that has consistently proven to have our best interests in mind.

How Badly Will the Government Mess this Up? Time Will Tell

Now that U.S. citizens are getting killed by illegal immigrants, Obama has been reluctantly forced to confront the issue.

I emphasize "reluctantly."

President Obama weighed in Wednesday on the escalating drug war on the U.S.-Mexico border, saying that he was looking at possibly deploying National Guard troops to contain the violence but ruled out any immediate military move.

"We're going to examine whether and if National Guard deployments would make sense and under what circumstances they would make sense," Obama said. [...]

Obama was cautious, however. "We've got a very big border with Mexico," he said. "I'm not interested in militarizing the border."

Not interested in militarizing? No crap -- the National Guard had better be careful; the government has shown a zero tolerance policy for any law enforcement official who tries to apply "law" or "enforcement" towards armed illegals.

Economy? What Economy? Can't You See I'm Busy?!

This is brilliant. And my "brilliant" I mean "it makes me want to barf."

President Barack Obama Wednesday paid poignant tributes to the grandmother who raised him and his mother who died of cancer, at the launch of a high-level forum to advise him on women's issues.

Obama also held up the life story of his wife and "rock" Michelle and the example of his foe turned ally, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, as he signed an executive order creating the White House Council on Women and Girls.

"The purpose of this Council is to ensure that American women and girls are treated fairly in all matters of public policy," Obama said.

The council will meet regularly, he said, and will include Clinton, Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Attorney General Eric Holder among other members, Obama said.

This is another nominee for "Absolute Dumbest Thing I've Ever Heard Of."

It's nice to see what the busiest men in D.C. will be doing with their time.

At this rate, the next bill will ensure that all fat kids with no coordination are guaranteed to be picked first for kickball, and an additional piece of legislation will make it illegal for people that work out a lot to take their shirt off at the beach and make the rest of us feel bad.

Forbes Ranks Those Best Able to Stack Dat Cheese

Forbes' list of the richest people on earth is keeping it real this year. Very real.

Mexico's most wanted man Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman, blamed for thousands of deaths in a drug war, has made it onto the Forbes Magazine list of the world's richest people with an estimated $1 billion fortune.

Guzman, who is just 5 feet tall (1.55 metres), escaped from prison in 2001 to set off a wave of killings across Mexico in an attempt to dominate the country's highly lucrative drug trade into the United States.

"He is not available for interviews," Luisa Kroll, senior editor of Forbes, said on Wednesday. "But his financial situation is doing quite well."

Now that the underworld is having their wealth compared equally to that of legitimized international businessmen (a creepy precedent, if you think about it -- and, arguably, a strange first step toward tacitly acknowledging acceptance of the drug trade), it's worth wondering how the personal fortune of Tony Montana or the Corleone family might have stacked up.

I'll be conducting a movie marathon this weekend to try to get some answers.

A New Word in the Presidential Vernacular: "Sike!"

A lot of people laughed at Hugo Chavez (he is laughable, after all) when he made an impassioned plea for our president to come with him "on the path to socialism."

Readers of the BHB were not surprised, however, when Obama got pretty excited about the generous offer.

But, alas, the Manchurian Messiah has smart handlers, so he called back the reporters, from the Oval Office, and promised that he was "just totally joking, guys" about wishing he could "get rid of this whole capitalism and democracy thing."

Numbers Can't Lie, But Not for Lack of Trying

If the AP knows what's good for it, it'll avoid writing any more articles like this:

The election of Barack Obama offered the promise of a new set of fixes for the financial crisis and the economy, a do-over that might help nurse the stock market back to health.

Since then, the market hasn't just gotten worse — it's turned in its worst performance ever for a new president.

The Dow Jones industrial average has fallen 21 percent during Obama's first seven weeks in office. Count back to Election Day and the results are even bleaker: That afternoon, the Dow closed at 9,625. Now it stands at 6,547, a loss of 32 percent.

Who are the racists writing this kind of stuff?

Who's the finance writer at the AP, Jim Crow?

But even the Obama administration's go-to rebuttal may not be enough, soon. The Financial Times notes that the White House has done so much damage in such a short time, that digging back out of this may not be possible within a single presidential term.

And I don't foresee Barry getting a second one.

Making Gitmo Look Like a Vacation

Remember when China was awarded the 2008 Olympics with the expectation that such an honor would prompt them to correct their historic record of terrible human rights abuses?

Many people were very excited about the prospect of China's new leaf, and the International Olympic Committee couldn't stop congratulating itself for doing the Chinese people, and the planet, such a great service.

The only wrinkle in this otherwise infallible plan was that China had no intention of doing anything of the sort. In fact, getting the blessing of the IOC reassured Chinese officials that everything it had done up to that point was acceptable. And, now that it had the Olympics, it had no incentive to change.

But, surely the increased scrutiny of the games has changed some things, right?

This story from the IHT is compelling:

They are often tucked away in the rough-and-tumble sections of the city's south side, hidden beneath dingy hotels and guarded by men in dark coats. Known as "black houses," they are unofficial jails for the pesky hordes of petitioners who flock to the capital seeking justice. This month, Wang Shixiang, a 48-year-old businessman from Heilongjong Province, came to Beijing to agitate for the prosecution of corrupt policemen. Instead, he was seized and confined to a dank room underneath the Juyuan Hotel with 40 other abducted petitioners. During his two days in captivity, Wang said, he was beaten and deprived of food, and then bundled onto an overnight train. Guards who were paid with government money, he said, made sure he arrived at his front door. [...] According to the state media, 10 million petitions have been filed in the last five years on complaints as diverse as illegal land seizures and unpaid wages. The numbers would be far higher but for the black houses, also called black jails, the newest weapon local officials use to prevent these aggrieved citizens from embarrassing them in front of central government superiors. Officially, these jails do not exist. [...] Rights advocates say that black houses have sprouted in recent years partly because top leaders have put more pressure on local leaders to reduce the number of petitioners reaching Beijing. Two of the largest holding pens, Majialou and Jiujingzhuang, can handle thousands of detainees who are funneled to the smaller detention centers, where cellphones and identification cards are confiscated.

How does this system operate? Why does it operate? The IHT explains,

In China's authoritarian state, senior officials tally petitions to get a rough sense of social order around the country. A successfully filed petition — however illusory the prospect of justice — is considered a black mark on the bureaucratic record of the local officials accused of wrongdoing. So the game, sometimes deadly, is to prevent a filing. The cat-and-mouse contest has created a sizable underground economy that enriches the interceptors, the police and those who run the city's ad hoc detention centers. Human rights activists and petitioners say plainclothes security officers and hired thugs grab the aggrieved off the streets and hide them in a growing constellation of unmarked detention centers. [...] The police in Beijing have done little to prevent such abuses. They are regularly accused of turning a blind eye or even helping local thugs round up petitioners. That raises suspicions that the central government is not especially upset about efforts to undermine the integrity of the petition system. The petition system provides people with the semblance of an appeals process that top leaders hope will keep them off the streets. But for officials at all levels, it seems, the appearance of order — measured by reducing the number of petitions — is an acceptable approximation of actual order. [...] The authorities insist that there is no such system. During testimony to the United Nations Rights Council last month, Song Hansong, a representative of China's Supreme People's Procurate, said, "There are no such things as black jails in our country." But over the past year, rights workers have been gathering evidence of what they say is an underground network of jails, first established in 2005, that was aggressively expanded in the months leading up the Olympics.

Sounds fun, right? So how does this typically play out?

The story of Wu Bowen, 61, a retired shop clerk from Zhejiang Province, is typical. On Feb. 25 she came to the capital to file a petition seeking more compensation for the demolition of her home. The next day, as she sat on the curb, a policeman told her that as an out-of-towner, she had to register at the precinct. Once there, however, the officer phoned the Zhejiang Province liaison office in Beijing. A short time later, a clutch of retrievers escorted her to a hotel not far from the city's main tourist attractions.

And this is what happens when you offer concessions or bargains to a party you cannot trust or hold accountable.

It's worth considering as our president prepares to roll over and meet every demand made by Russia, Iran, North Korea, etc.

Shameless: The Obama Approach to Foreign Affairs with First World Nations

Those pesky Brits just keep griping about things, e.g. the American president and his scary wife publicly disrespecting the British PM and his family.

If only they'd realize that even being in the same room as Barry-O is a privilege not afforded to many (besides the occasional celebrity or mobster), maybe they'd be a bit more reasonable. As is, they are teetering on the brink of blasphemy.

Consider this reaction to the British PM's recent trip the the White House:

His handling of the visit of the Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, to Washington was appalling. First Brown wasn't granted a press conference with flags, then one was hastily arranged in the Oval office after the Brits had to beg.

Obama looked like he would rather have been anywhere else than welcoming the British leader to his office and topped it all with his choice of present for the PM. A box of 25 DVDS including ET, the Wizard of Oz and Star Wars?

Oh, give me strength.

We do have television and DVD stores on this side of the Atlantic. Even Gordon Brown will have seen those films too often already.

This was coupled with Michelle Obama's casual choice of gifts for the Brown sons - matching models of the helicopter which ferry her husband around.

While Sarah Brown had spent time choosing gifts for the Obama girls, Michelle had clearly sent an aide to the White House gift shop at the last moment. [...]

But what's this? Something, suddenly, seems to have made the Obama White House perk up and start to take an interest in the Brits. The Queen has invited the President to tea when he's here for the G20 in April. [...]

Note how the coolness of Team Obama disappears when a bit of regal glamour is introduced into the equation. He might not like the Brits, but he can recognise a global superstar when he encounters one. He wants to be associated with her.

He's shameless.

Be careful Britain -- pointing out the Manchurian Messiah's glaring character flaws is an easy way to get labeled a racist.

One Trillion Dollars: A Visual Guide

It's remarkable what visualizing a problem can do for your understanding of it.

Regarding the multi-trillion dollar spending bill Obama is about to unload on the next four generations of Americans, a visualization of this much money is pretty helpful.

I'd like to think that taking a moment to think of a problem like this is one of those reasonable business practices our Executive should be applying to this problem. But he's never had a job. And he's never been responsible for money or ROI. And he's never been in charge of anything before. And he's never been confronted with an opposing fact he couldn't simply dismiss by calling it racist.

I wish I could just read him these words: An acre of double-stacked pallets of $100s.

The Impact of Reggae on the 2012 GOP Ticket

Romney won the CPAC straw poll for the 78th time last week.

After seeing the best the GOP could trot out, this moderately (but not really) influential PAC again chose Romney as their pick for president, and for the ticket in 2012.

Amidst an intensely competitive field, Mitt received 20% of the vote.

Also in the running: Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal with 14 percent, Texas Rep. Ron Paul with 13 percent, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin with 13 percent, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich with 10 percent and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee with 7 percent, Mark Sanford 4%, Rudy Giuliani 3%, Tim Pawlenty 2%, Charlie Crist 1%, and 9% said they were undecided.

But, alas, the lunatic Evangelical Right will makes sure this doesn't happen -- because their zany logic reasons that 8 years of Barack is better than 2 seconds of a Mormon.

Brilliant stuff.

Just how brainless are the opponents to the most qualified man available to the GOP?

Consider what they'll resort to in order to justify disqualifying him:

You’re all heard lots of great stuff about Mitt Romney, no doubt. He’s quickly become the darling of the East Coast elite media establishment. And why not? He’s rich, handsome, successful, more stable than Giuliani, and….not all that conservative.

He makes himself out to be a family values kind of guy, but if you look at the name of his pet, you’ll see that 60s hippie values still have a strong hold on him: his dog, who recently passed away, was named Marley.

As in Bob Marley. As in pot-smoking, America-hating, Jamaican radical.

No offense to anyone who likes Bob Marley’s music. But it’s one thing to listen to a man’s songs on the radio and quite another to endorse his values by naming a pet after him.

This ought to be the final nail in the coffin of Romney’s supposed appeal to social conservatives.

No, I'm not making this up.

It's reasonable to assume that this blogger is just another moron with a laptop, but consider the reader comments:

-- Bob Marley was an evil, evil man. The body is the temple of God, and he filled his with poison and sin. I’m glad he is in Hell for that.

-- I hope Mitt burns in hell for naming his dog after a pot smoking Islamohippy. Bob Marley was a well known terrorist (and probably from the Middle East). Kudos to this God-fearing site for exposing Mitt for his real sins.

-- Not only did Mitt Romney endorse Anti-American Radical Terrorism when he named his dog Marley, he also endorsed Violent Crime. Bob Marley was a musical forrunner of todays Rap Music and Gangs.

-- Why won’t Mitt answer questions about it? Why is he so evasive? What is he trying to hide?

-- Mitt Romney is has bad family values. Not only does do drugs but he also is a polygamist. I cannot support anyone for president that has more than one wife.

You have to get almost to the bottom of the list before you find this.

-- I appreciate your complete inability to use simple logic and reason, as it provides me with a regular laugh.

Democracy and the marketplace of ideas -- it's FANtastic!

I've Watched this Trailer 7,339 Times. I'm Going Bonkers.

I mean, seriously. SERIOUSLY.

Ugly -- But in the "Not Completely Ugly" Sense of the Word

Have you ever wondered how shows find an actor that is morbidly obese, with bad skin and a lazy eye? And, especially when those feature are noted in the script's dialog, the actor comes into the production knowing that his glaring physical problems are going to be a major plot point. Where (and how) do these people come from?

Look no farther than Ugly NY, a modeling agency that trafficks in unusual looking people.

Of course, because it is a modeling agency, the definition of ugly is, "Someone who's attractive, but has one thing that is weird."

MSNBC.com reviews 27 of the models, and, for the sake of science, it's worthwhile for the BHB to analyze each of them:

1 -- Not actually altogether bad looking, it's just the Frankenstein tattoo that might be a little off putting if you happened to be scouting talent for the Sears catalog.

2 -- Also not bad looking. In fact, if you were an agent looking to start an all-Asian Red Hot Chili Peppers cover band, you'd have a dead ringer for Anthony Kiedis -- but with the tattoo on the wrong side of his torso.

3 -- "We need someone completely stupid for this..." silence. "Umm... call Ash."

4 -- "We're casting a sitcom about a group of girls in drama club." ..."Call Anna."

5 -- Appearing in the new video "Chest Beards & You" -- Lou Valentine.

6 -- Once again, not ugly.

7 -- Appearing with props is cheating. I want to see this guy in a leather jacket, straddling a bullet bike. Then we'll see who's laughing.

8 -- Why is this guy playing Xbox?

9 -- OK, he's pretty rough. But if he's not an actor, he's probably sitting in a van near a public school.

10 -- If this guy gets a modeling gig, who's going to cover his shift at Hot Topic?

11 -- I hardly recognized this guy without Puxatony Phil nearby.

12 -- His resume reads, "Left eyeball already capable of shooting lasers." That's a bargain.

13 -- Is this agency defining any woman without fake boobs as "ugly?"

14 -- "We need someone willing to work exclusively with jungle foliage..."

15 -- Looking to staff a Sebastian Bach cover band?

16 -- Either he is very small, or that guitar is 13 feet tall.

17 -- This guy works at the Starbucks across from my building.

18 -- Malcolm Gladwell's little brother.

19 -- This is particularly impressive: Fitting eight feet of crazy into just three feet.

20 -- What is uglier: The clothing, expression or hairstyle?

21 -- I was roomates with this guy my junior year of college. I have some stories.

22 -- This is the finest one in the stack.

23 -- Oh my... oh dear... this is... oh no...

24 -- This looks like the slow cousin of [insert name of boy band member].

25 -- This would easily be amongst the best this agency has to offer if not for... well, a lot of things.

26 -- As with photo #1, not ugly, but lots of scary tattoos.

27 -- American Idol season 3, right?

Conclusions: There weren't a lot of normal looking people on this list -- the talent was either ridiculous or good looking.

Therefore, if this whole "having an awesome website" thing doesn't work out, I can set my sights on operating a modeling agency named "Just OK." JOK's niche would be pretty simple: A roster of talent who score as a solid 5 on a scale of 1 to 10.

Our motto: "No lookers, No shockers, Just OK."

This is a pretty good idea...

02/28/09: Also Worth Noting

Spread the good news -- the Ace Man is still broadcasting.

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This is pretty amusing in a William Shatner sort of way.

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What do those kids in Drama Club do when they graduate high school? They save up their money for surgery.

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Salman Rushdie doesn't like Slumdog Millionaire? I call for a new death sentence to be imposed.

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Random actors are getting personal meetings with the President. That's awesome. And not only do they get to meet with their own personal executive, their causes are put at the top of his list. I assume that means Barry's other priorities are: Playing basketball, avoiding Michelle, whatever it was Clooney asked for, trying to look competent, lunch, that thing about the economy.

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The pride of Washington is about to make us proud in D.C. And by "pride" I mean "barf," and by "proud" I mean "barf some more." Nothing says, "You'll do a great job, Gary!" quite like being also saying, "And you were our 3rd choice."

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It's always compelling to see life imitating art. In Greece, life imitates crappy FOX crime dramas.

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What is President Obama's drink of choice? I can't explain to you how much I don't care.

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Very few PSA's are actually helpful. This one is definitely... something.

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Unsubstantiated claims out of Guantanamo state that prisoner abuse has radically increased since the election. Reuters' unnamed source notes "beatings, the dislocation of limbs, spraying of pepper spray into closed cells, applying pepper spray to toilet paper and over-forcefeeding detainees who are on hunger strike." As you might imagine, this makes me feel awful.

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Everyone is bashing Bobby Jindal's speech from Tuesday night -- calling it sophomoric and worse. Yes, it was awful. But saying stupid things, making un-keepable promises and promising a future you can't deliver worked really well for Obama, so you can understand why Bob felt comfortable giving it a shot

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Just as an FYI to people who use cloth diapers: You are the stupidest people on earth. Now that regular diapers are completely biodegradable, your fettish for getting back to nature is no longer interesting but indicative of mental illness. Thirty-years ago it might have been a better option, but now the total output in used water, gallons of detergent dumped into the system and general grossness is more harmful -- it all adds up to you being a moron. I will not argue about this.

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A cult of personality is one thing; an international cult of personality is quite another. Notes the AP photo bank: "A carnival float depicting a flying U.S. President Obama with Europe being dragged along." Dragging Europe to where is the question. And, will they get there first or are we meeting them there?

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Want to take advantage of the stimulus plan, but not in an overtly sleazy way? HotJobs offers this list of the six fields that will benefit most from the waste, pork and general misappropriation of tax money coming from Washington. Nice one, HotJobs.

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Coming on the heels of his stunning success in Microsoft's hip, savvy response to the Mac vs. PC ads, NBC is giving Seinfeld a reality show.

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Out of all the jokes made at Christian Bale's expense, this is by far the best.

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In an interesting piece of urban planning, the mayor of NYC is closing off traffic along Broadway from 47th to 42nd (Times Square) and 35th to 32nd (Herald Square). The plan is to turn these areas into outdoor pedestrian malls. It's an interesting concept, and it's always nice to see a parking lot turned into a park.

* * *

Bobby Jindal's speech was a bunch of crap, but it wasn't nearly as lame as the VP's rebuttal to the rebuttal the next day. Biden claimed that Jindal's own state was losing hundreds of jobs a day, and thus he shouldn't be giving out advice about the economy. (No one thought to ask why a President and VP who've never had private sector jobs, never owned a business and never held any level of executive power should get to decide how the American workforce should operate.) But Joe has to put his foot back in his mouth, again. According to Patty Granier of the Louisiana Workforce Commission: "In December, Louisiana was the only state in the nation besides the District of Columbia, according to the national press release that added employment over the month." Snap.

* * *

Training for a mission to Mars sounds pretty fun, except for the part about being locked in an isolation chamber with a Frenchman, German and four Russians for 520 days. Furthermore, you have to figure the Russians are still pretty upset about being invaded by both countries (1812 and 1941, respectively); that could get awkward.

* * *

This single news article exposes a broad range of people who have no business sharing a planet with me.

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It's funny how the people demanding apologies are the ones least like (but most needing) to offer them.

* * *

It came and went, and, despite my best intentions, I missed it.

* * *

So long, Paul Harvey. While driving back and forth between Seattle and WSU, across remote, radio-barren areas of Washington, your voice, attached to some struggling AM frequency, was often the only thing to keep me company. It was nice.

Lessons from the Eastern Front: Half a Day of Anything is Likely to Kill You

Here's another addition to the "you've got to read the whole article to believe it" collection, courtesy of our friends in Russia.

Headline: Man, 28, Dies After 'Guzzling' Viagra During 12-Hour Romp

A Russian man died after guzzling a bottle of Viagra to keep him going for a 12-hour orgy with two female pals.

The women had bet mechanic Sergey Tuganov $4,300 that he wouldn’t be able to follow through with the half-day sex marathon.

But minutes after winning the bet, the 28-year-old died of a heart attack, Moscow police said.

“We called emergency services but it was too late, there was nothing they could do,” said one of the female participants who identified herself only as Alina.

As is usually the case with these stories, there are so many questions.

Primarily: What series of factors create a scenario wherein TWO women dare a mechanic to have sex with them for 12 hours?

What kind of secrets do they teach nowadays in community colleges? Have the makers of Spanish Fly made an arrangement with Pennzoil?

Behavior like this was once relegated to the Rick James', Wilt Chamberlain's and Richard Simmons' of the world -- but now it extends (excuse the pun) even to Ruskie grease monkeys and associated skanks. Wow.

Furthermore, doesn't the implausibility of this story make it all seem a bit too plausible? The details, although remarkable, seem to fit together a bit too well, e.g. sex + 12 hours + chugging Viagra = heart explosion.

We're left to choose between two conclusions: Either Alina's account is either one of the most bizarre events of the new year, or one of the most elaborate homocides ever perpetrated. It's a toss up.

Also: "Guzzling" Viagra? Does this mean he was holding an open bottle of the bills to his parched mouth, or have Russian mad scientists created a hyper-potent liquid version of the drug? I've been bomarded with enough commercials about liquigel caps (thanks, Robitussin), that I will be quick to believe that Sergey has a bonafide wonder drug on his [ahem] hands.

Problems and Solutions: The Senate is Running a Deficit

Well look who's talking tough. Robert Byrd -- the former KKK leader and user of the term "white n#####s" to refer to white trash -- is speaking out against Obama.

It's the very definition of "too little, too late."

Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.), the longest-serving Democratic senator, is criticizing President Obama’s appointment of White House “czars” to oversee federal policy, saying these executive positions amount to a power grab by the executive branch. [...]

While it's rare for Byrd to criticize a president in his own party, Byrd is a stern constitutional scholar who has always stood up for the legislative branch in its role in checking the power of the White House.

Thanks for taking a stand, Bob. Now that you are on no committees, wield no power and have zero ability to make an impact, I'm glad you felt comfortable speaking your mind.

You are indicative of the cause of the problem and not its solution.

With the Executive office buying friends and paying debts, Byrd can speak out only because he has no reason to expect a payout.

Modern American statesmanship -- it's FANtastic!

Birds, Barry and Bankrupcy

Is California the canary in the mine? I sure hope note. But I'm not optimistic.

From the WSJ editorial board:

As California goes, says an old cliché, so goes the nation. Oh my.

These days, the Golden State leads the nation on economic and fiscal dysfunction, from the empty homes spread across the Central Valley to the highest state budget shortfall in the nation's history. [...]

California could soon be back in line to mark another first -- state bankruptcy. In anticipation, Standard & Poor's this month downgraded its bond rating a notch below Louisiana's.

Even discounting for the impact of global recession, the most populous state's ills are unique and self-inflicted -- and avoidable. In the last three decades, California expanded the public sector and regulation to Europe-like dimensions. Schools, state employees, health care, even dog kennels, benefited from largesse in flush times. Government workers got 16 official holidays, everyone else six. The state dabbled with universal health care and adopted strict environmental standards. In short, California went where our new president and Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco want America to go.

Now there's much to recommend the Old World. California brings to mind my last home, France -- God's country blessed with fertile soil for wines, sun-blanched beaches, and a well-educated populace. Amusingly, both states are led by bling-bling immigrants married to glamorous women and elected to shake up the status quo. In both departments, the governator got a head start on Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris.

The parallels are also disquieting. The French have long experienced the unintended consequences of a large public sector. Ask them about it. As the number of people who get money from government grows, so does the power of constituencies dedicated to keep this honey dripping. Even when voters recognize the model carries drawbacks, such as subpar growth, high taxes, an uncompetitive business climate and above-average unemployment, their elected leaders find it near impossible to tweak the system. This has been the story of France for decades, and lately of California. [...]

California is in a French-like bind: unable to afford a welfare-type state, and unable to overhaul it. [...]

Some Democrats and Republicans privately say the best option may be failure. The rough scenario is fiscal insolvency, followed perhaps by federal receivership. No precedent or legal avenue exists for a state to reorganize its affairs under a form of Chapter 11 protection, but that striking suggestion sounds better by the day. [...]

For the nation, California is the what-might-be.

But at least Obama's Pork-o-Rama stimulus bill will save us!

And by "save," I mean "demolish," and by "us," I mean "pretty much everything."

Considering Crazy Pills as an Antidote

You know things are really going badly when only the angry, hysterical and unlikable make any sense.

Whatever happened to the era of the classically trained, eloquent statesmen? The fairly depressing fact is that such an era never existed.

Kevlar Braids: The Latest Anti-Crime Accessory

Some stories must be read in their entirety.

Other than having a bit of a headache, a Kansas City woman was uninjured after a bullet fired at her ended up tangled in her hair weave.

Police said the 20-year-old woman was in a convenience store parking lot late Wednesday when a man flagged her down and told her that her ex-boyfriend still loved her.

She replied, "Well I dont love him," then heard gunshots. She said she looked behind the vehicle and saw her ex-boyfriend firing a handgun at her. She stomped her accelerator and fled, then turned into another parking lot and called police.

She told officers she recently had ended an eight-month relationship with the suspect.

Police arrested the ex-boyfriend and his friend in a car.

Truly great writing creates a vibrant picture in your head. Truly great stories create a full-blown Hollywood production.

This story is greatly served by both -- but primarily the latter.

02/22/09: Also Worth Noting

I think I'll wait to see this movie at 3 a.m. on TNT.

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I'm sure this won't happen again.

* * *

A Dunkin Donuts employee has been arrested for slashing the tires of a customer. His lawyer says they are waiting for the trial because "the truth will come out in the legal process." My guess, this will be what comes out: "Umm... yes, I slashed that guys tires."

* * *

Two guys caught white sturgeons in the same day?! Wow! Who cares!

* * *

Police in NY have arrested a NY man for driving 137 mph in his '93 Honda Civic. While the local PD are concerning themselves with the enormous public safety hazard this incident poses, the rest of us can focus on what an achievement this is. Pushing a Honda beyond 85 mph is nothing short of incredible. A ticket? This man deserves a medal!

* * *

Big news out of Tehran: Iran says it has built an unmanned spy plane. That's a pretty strange way to describe the new-found national pastime of raising pigoens.

* * *

Raising 14 kids on food stamps and student loans? I think Obama has found his new commerce secretary.

* * *

If there's one thing that can be said for the British and French, it's that they can't find their butt with both hands and a flashlight. Now, add "sonar" to that list.

* * *

I award Michael Phelps the Gold Medal for "Getting Baked and Getting Away with It." The formal medallion will be presented later this month by Snoop Dogg.

* * *

North Korea continues to do its very best to develop a 20th century version of the "kick me" sign. But, in this case, it's a "bomb the crap out of me" sign. And all this for better moon access? Sounds suspicious.

* * *

I don't think photo collections like this will ever stop being a lot of fun.

* * *

Some things need to be taken seriously. Sometimes it happens.

* * *

Finally, some financial analysis I can understand.

* * *

This video was pretty entertaining -- but primarily because of the Rocky 4 overtones.

* * *

After making this statement, Obama added, "Sike."

* * *

This video will make you smile. Then it'll make you wonder, "What happened to the days when there used to be news on the news, and why didn't anyone examine [insert name of political candidate] this closely?" But you'll still be smiling.

* * *

Commissar Pelosi met with the Pope and was encouraged to pursue "a just system of laws capable of protecting human life at all stages of its development." I imagine it was a pleasant meeting. The AP notes that in the election Barry-O "won a majority of the Catholic vote despite differences with the Vatican on abortion." In reaction to his request for more Pro Life-friendly legislation, Pelosi reportedly responded, "That's enough out of you; why don't you keep those comments under your silly hat."

* * *

I keep saying that pictures like this of Barry-O are not accidental. Here is some proof.

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I know this has come up 5,578 times before, but the oft-touted tolerance of the Left has a nasty habit of extending to only those who share their point of view. This is interesting to note because the KKK is also very accepting of people who share their values. Not a coincidence.And the World

* * *

Record for "Dumbest Thing I Have Ever Seen" goes to... this.

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One thing to keep in mind whenever you get too excited about how fresh and different our current administration is.

Who Needs Flags? Oh, Wait....

His supporters get upset whenever the Manchurian Messiah's political opportunism is exploited, but there's rarely very much to offer as rebuttal.

After years (I can't believe it's been "years" already) of refusing to sully his image by wearing or appearing near an American flag, he now can't get enough of them.

Notes the (fairly bonkers) Washington Times:

Mr. Obama has had some banner-based troubles in recent years. The issue arose in 2007 when he chose not wear a flag pin, defending his decision by saying that flag pins had become a substitute for "true patriotism."

There was another partisan ruckus when Mr. Obama neglected to salute the flag during "The Star-Spangled Banner" at a campaign stop, and again when an American flag disappeared from the tail of his campaign jet, replaced by an attractive red, white and blue "O."

Apparently after a lifetime of spent without any reason to "be proud" of his country, MM is suddenly very excited about the country now that he's in charge of it. How convenient.

For topics such as these, we turn to America's angriest man:

"Neo-Marxists recognize the power of Old Glory as they steadfastly pursue their agenda," said talk-radio host Michael Savage.

Ultimately, the use of flags has far less to do with America, and much more to do with the deliberate cultivation of a cult of personality.

Boats, Tuxedos, Helicopter Fly bys

If there's one thing regular BHB readers know about me, it's that if I had access to three tuxedos and a yacht, this video would be the natural result.

Emerson commented, "In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty."

Perhaps not "rejected," but I certainly was beat to the punch this time.

But, to be fair, where was SNL when I discovered the National Book Foundation's new stationery or when someone needed a pan-lingual document to explain the pros and cons of vasectomies.

I rest my case.

Equitable Chore Assignments: There is No Justice, Just Us

I remember being seven and really hating chores.

At the time, I often considered the things I would do to get out of doing chores, and I pondered why my little brother was tasked with jobs like dusting or folding towels, while I was busy cleaning the garage or unclogging gutters.

One thing I never considered was this: If I still lived at home as an adult, along with my brother, what would happen if both of us were still forced to do chores?

How would the dynamic change? What would I do to avoid vacuuming the basement?

Were it not for the esteemed residents of Salt Lake City, we might never know:

One brother was arrested and another treated for minor cuts after a dispute over chores turned violent.

The two men got into a disagreement about chores at their house, just before 7 p.m. Saturday, said Salt Lake police detective Dennis McGowan.

The disagreement became heated, and one brother attacked the other with a kitchen knife, McGowan said. The victim received only minor cuts.

This brings up a lot of questions.

First, who brings a weapon to take out the garbage? It sounds like this isn't the first time chores have led to combat.

Second, what job was the stabber instructed to do before this argument? If he'd been told to spend six hours weeding the garden again, while brother #2 polished the silver, I think this case is going to get thrown out of court.

If necessary, the BHB Legal Defense Fund is ready to spring into action.

And So it Begins...

America's next 75 years has been decided.

It was decided by an assembly entirely unaware of what legislation they were passing.

If no other element is remembered from today, it should be these 36 seconds.

The key line: "1,100 pages that not one member of this body has read. Not one."

And that's the really scary thing: No one knows what this "plan" will look like. No one can guess at the full breadth of its ramifications. And the people that passed this legislation didn't care. Serving a master other than their electorate, the proponents of this bill took their orders along party lines without any thought for their constituents.

Part of the problem is that the media refuses to assign any real blame, preferring instead to speak in abstractions about problems and robber barons. TIME Magazine made a comically incompetent attempt to target the 25 people behind the meltdown, but, predictably, left the real culprits off the list. Probably because political contributions from TIME employees lead directly back to these champions of America.

With no idea what we're getting, can we guess at what it will look like? Perhaps.

It's likely we'll see a lot more people like this and criticism will be responded to with action like this.

What are the dangers of electing a paper tiger president?

Now we know.

Obama's Bailout: An Unnecessary Number of Kitchen Utensils

How bad are things for Obama right now?

The Financial Times’ op-ed page is wondering aloud (several weeks after the BHB started the trend) if his presidency is already a failure.

And for good reason.

Has Barack Obama’s presidency already failed? In normal times, this would be a ludicrous question. But these are not normal times. They are times of great danger.

Today, the new US administration can disown responsibility for its inheritance; tomorrow, it will own it. Today, it can offer solutions; tomorrow it will have become the problem. Today, it is in control of events; tomorrow, events will take control of it. Doing too little is now far riskier than doing too much.

If he fails to act decisively, the president risks being overwhelmed, like his predecessor.

The costs to the US and the world of another failed presidency do not bear contemplating.

But, to be fair, the Manchurian Messiah was elected under the “I’m not Bush or McCain” banner more so than “I’m Capable of Leading a Superpower” mantra. Only the most detached Obama supporters believed the latter, but 52% of the country scrambled at the ostensibly bright future promised by the former.

It would be easiest to excoriate MM for the requisite arrogance it takes to believe oneself capable of leading during a crisis despite never serving in an executive capacity before, but now he plans to simply rubber stamp whatever bill Commissar Pelosi and her friends dream up.

And, in a classic case of a Legislative hit-and-run, the Democrats have stretched the stimulus bill to 1,071 pages -- ensuring that the opposition won't have time to read and object to it before is pushed into law. Certainly this is a tactic used by both parties in the past, but not with a bill leveraging the finances of the next three generations, and certainly not with a president that campaigned on a platform of bipartisanship. As Krauthhammer noted, MM has regularly spoken about how we must use "hope over fear" -- until, that is, you need fear to pass a bill.

But wait -- why won't Republican legislators have time to review the bill? Because the Dems have reneged on their promise to allow their fellow lawmakers -- and the public -- review the bill for 48 hours before voting. This too ensures that opponents will have little time to draw attention to outrageous spending allotments, but also because it will limit the number of Democrats that get cold feet at the thought of passing such a "legislative abominiation."

The other reason for the rush: The Speaker of the House is leaving on a trip to Italy and doesn't want to miss her flight.

The biggest problem now is that Obama believes he is so smart that whatever he approves will simply be successful. If it’s not, he’ll accuse the suffocating national debt and rampant unemployment figures of being racist. You may think approaching a problem that way is absurd, but look where it’s gotten him so far.

The greatest current danger are the architects of this solution: A president with no leadership or financial experience, and the same senators (Frank, Dodd, etc.) who were brains behind the current fiasco.

In a recent article detailing the history of recessions, James Glassman notes that the biggest obstacle presented during crises like this are the "expert" opinions of those tasked with solving the problem.

On being presented the Nobel Prize in economics in 1974, Friedrich von Hayek devoted his Stockholm lecture to acknowledging the severe limitations of his profession.

“It seems to me,” he said, “that this failure of the economists to guide policy more successfully is closely connected with their propensity to imitate as closely as possible the procedures of the brilliantly successful physical sciences—an attempt which in our field may lead to outright error.”

Government simply cannot know enough to direct an economy successfully, and when the President claims that his fiscal stimulus plan will create (or save) at least three million jobs, he is taking a wild, and dangerous, leap. Said Hayek:

If man is not to do more harm than good in his efforts to improve the social order, he will have to learn that in this, as in all other fields where essential complexity of an organized kind prevails, he cannot acquire the full knowledge which would make mastery of the events possible. He will therefore have to use what knowledge he can achieve, not to shape the results as the craftsman shapes his handiwork, but rather to cultivate a growth by providing the appropriate environment, in the manner in which the gardener does this for his plants.

But this kind of thinking – regardless of what kind of awards it has won – runs diametrically to the governing philosophy of the majority party.

This philosophy is the same one community organizers/leaders like Sharpton, Jesse and, yes, Barack, have used for decades: “You can’t be successful alone; only with MY help can you hope to overcome or suceed in life.”

This tone and this mindset serves only to expand the power of the figurehead and incrementally enslave those receiving their "help.”

As a governing ideology, this approach has never been successful.

Glassman notes,

Americans have undergone a financial calamity and…we need time to adjust; we cannot, like a car battery, be shocked back to life.

In fact, stimulus may be precisely the wrong metaphor.

Rather than getting jazzed up, we need to be calmed down and to take the time to learn from the Great Depression, a time when government did too much, not too little.

But MM isn’t going to allow the private sector to correct the market. He keeps pointing the finger at greed, rather than the government mandated programs that allowed criminal financiers to operate with impunity. To assume that Wall Street could somehow benefit from creating its own long-term collapse is so absurd it doesn’t need a metaphor to assist in clarifying how inane the notion is.

Instead, it was the government programs enacted during democrat administrations that forced housing loans be granted to ANYONE who wanted one that allowed a criminally negligent speculation bubble to rise, burst and collapse.

What kind of programs? It started with Carter's warm, fuzzy, disastrous Community Reinvestment Act -- a piece of legislation that, out of a sense of fairness, forced banks to provide loans to people who would otherwise not qualify. Using the CRA as a basis, a young Barack Obama teamed up with ACORN to sue Citibank to make even more of these bad loans to financially disadvantaged inner-city families. The resulting win forced Citibank to make thousands of additional sub-prime loans, most of which were never repaid. As late as September 2007, Barry-O was still saying, "Sub-prime lending started out as a good idea, to help Americans buy homes, who previously couldn't afford to." It's a statement he has still not retracted or amended.

To say nothing of the fact that the smartest man in America is ending a sentence with a preposition, how is the government paying for things people can't afford (by forcing private lenders into bad deals and then bailing them out) a good idea? If that's the idea, what about my yacht?

Should we trust the Congress that created this problem to fix it? Should we trust a president that won’t acknowledge this chain of events to authorize the solution?

The CRA was followed by the Clinton policy of shoving lending rates so low that banks and lenders could then afford to give loans to people that would have otherwise been an insurmountable risk. This led to the birth of blackholes like the National Fair Housing Alliance and other similar organizations anxious to give away homes without accountability.

But the real crime, notes Bloomberg, is the fact that the politicians who were in a position to stop the collapse had been bought by the institutions causing it.

Fannie and Freddie provided mounds of materials defending their practices. Perhaps some found their propaganda convincing.

But we now know that many of the senators who protected Fannie and Freddie, including Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Christopher Dodd, have received mind-boggling levels of financial support from them over the years.

Throughout his political career, Obama has gotten more than $125,000 in campaign contributions from employees and political action committees of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, second only to Dodd, the Senate Banking Committee chairman, who received more than $165,000.

An op-ed in Wednesday’s WSJ – a paper far more impacted by fiscal realities than philosophy – looked back at another economic crisis.

In his inaugural address, President Barack Obama said, "The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works -- whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified." […]

Unfortunately, this rhetoric is not true. Mr.

Obama's economic policy is following not what has been proven to work but liberal ideology.

The WSJ outlines four straightforward policies Reagan applied to jump start an economy in far worse straights than we are now.

-- First was across-the-board reductions in tax rates to provide incentives for saving, investment, entrepreneurship and work.

-- The second component was deregulation to remove unnecessary costs on the economy. In today's world, that would especially mean removing the onerous restrictions on energy production

-- Third was the control of government spending. In 1981, Reagan forced through Congress not only his famed, historic tax cuts, but also a package of budget cuts close to 5% of the federal budget -- equivalent to roughly $150 billion today

-- The fourth component of the Reagan recovery plan was tight, anti-inflation monetary policy, which was spectacularly successful. Inflation was cut in half to 6.2% in 1982 from 13.2% in 1980, and cut in half again to 3.2% in 1983.

The critical difference with these policies, compared to the ones MM and Congress have in store, is that each of the above mentioned items takes control away from the government and puts it back into the hands of people and businesses. MM’s plan will permanently but control of the market, banks, and business in the hands of a centralized bureaucracy.

But let’s consider, just hypothetically, what might happen if MM wasn’t so dead set on joining the vaunted ranks of his heroes.

The WSJ continues,

We know such policies work because they turned around in just two years an economy far worse than today's. We were suffering from multiyear, double-digit inflation, double-digit unemployment, double-digit interest rates, declining incomes, and rising poverty.

In fact, what we suffer with today is not the worst economy since the Great Depression, but the worst economy since Jimmy Carter -- the last time liberals were dominant politically and intellectually.

The Obama administration's economic policies do not include any of the four Reagan components. In fact, the stimulus plan is the greatest increase in government spending in the history of the planet.

Meanwhile, the Fed is furiously reinflating, sowing more havoc down the line. Mr. Obama is still promising future increases in tax rates by letting the Bush tax cuts lapse, because for ideological reasons he thinks even current rates are too low.

And instead of deregulating for more energy production, he is still promising massive increases in regulatory barriers -- through global warming cap-and-trade legislation -- to increased production from proven energy sources to serve an extreme environmentalist ideology.

This is why America seems so hopeless right now, and so depressed. We are stuck going in exactly the wrong direction on economic policy because of currently dominant ideological fashions.

But rather than providing leadership, the Democrats are in frantic CYA mode.

The senior senator from NY is trying to convince us that the average citizen doesn’t care about the glut of pork in the stimulus bill, so why should we? His colleagues are taking a different approach: Senator Durbin (D-IL), Senator Stabenow (D-MI), Senator Harkin (D-IA), and even Bill Clinton (D-BJ) have each begun talking about the need to control AM talk radio.

It’s almost like a bad joke: At this point in time the democrats’ biggest concern is conservative talk radio?

This is appalling for two different reasons. First, MM and each of his 290 cronies in the legislative branch are shifting blame for this crisis onto the media outlets who are pointing out their colossal folly. It’s chapter and verse from the Goebbels handbook. And all this rather than actually solving the problem. Second, trying to use the law to remove or drown out your critics is a shameless act of self preservation that is below anyone except our president.

Often, at times like this, we start thinking back to how the Founders might have handled things.

Ben Franklin wouldn’t be much help right now, but the Founder of capitalism would. Oddly, satirist P. J. O’Rourke has already consulted the architect of American wealth, Adam Smith.

Whenever the market expires people want to know what Adam Smith would say. It is a moment of, “Hello, God, how’s my atheism going?”

Adam Smith would be laughing too hard to say anything. Smith spotted the precise cause of our economic calamity not just before it happened but 232 years before – probably a record for going short. [...]

How then would Adam Smith fix the present mess? Sorry, but it is fixed already. The answer to a decline in the value of speculative assets is to pay less for them. Job done.

We could pump the banks full of our national treasure. But Smith said: “To attempt to increase the wealth of any country, either by introducing or by detaining in it an unnecessary quantity of gold and silver, is as absurd as it would be to attempt to increase the good cheer of private families, by obliging them to keep an unnecessary number of kitchen utensils.”

We could send in the experts to manage our bail-out. But Smith said: “I have never known much good done by those who affect to trade for the public good.”

The thought of the cancer about to be unleashed on the next three generations of American taxpayer has chased away the would-be Commerce Secretary and, in an even more stunning move, earned the wrath of liberal champion Michael Moore's next movie -- a film that characterizes MM's bailout as “the biggest swindle in American history.”

Consider this clip, and then ask if you side with Phil Donahue or Milt Friedman.

Which one is right?

In a few more months, it won’t really matter.

OH PLEASE OH PLEASE OH PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Could it be? Could it be true?!?

The Seattle Times reports,

The return of Ken Griffey Jr. to Seattle, nine years after he departed for Cincinnati, appears to be imminent.

Baseball sources confirmed that talks between the club and Griffey, a free agent, have heated up in recent days. The parties appear to be on course for a one-year contract that could be announced next week, provided Griffey passes a physical examination.

Ahhhhhhhh!!!!!!

Can I start a pledge drive to help raise money for this?

Yes, there was an extended period of time when he was dead to me, but such things have passed.

I am having flashbacks to being nine years old all over again.

Not every city gets to have a bona fide sports hero, and in the early 90s, Seattle was an unlikely place for one to emerge. Luckily for me, one did.

MLB.com adds, this:

Griffey comes into the season -- his 19th in the Major Leagues -- as the active career home run leader with 611. The first 398 home runs of his career were hit with the Mariners, from 1989, when he was known as The Kid, through 1999.

A 10-time All-Star during his 11 seasons with the Mariners, Griffey reached superstar status in the early 1990s, when he helped put Seattle on the big-league map, and the mid-90s, when he hit 49, 56, 56, 48 and 40 home runs during a five-year stretch. [...]

Gone from Seattle but never forgotten, Griffey returned to the city in June 2007 for a three-game Interleague Play series.

It was a virtual love-fest as fans filled Safeco Field for all three games and presented Junior with numerous standing ovations.

Before the series-opening game, the Mariners honored him with a 15-minute presentation that included a highlight reel of his playing career with the Mariners and a presentation of a "The House that Griffey Built" memorial by club president Chuck Armstrong, which drew a four-minute standing ovation.

Griffey hit two home runs in the final game of the series and in a TV interview broadcast on the local FSN affiliate following the series finale, Griffey emotionally expressed an interest in returning to the Seattle ballclub in the future should circumstances warrant it.

Griffey said during the interview that he would like to end his career as a Mariner and felt that he owes it to the fans of Seattle.

"I think for the simple reason that this is the place where I grew up and I owe it to the people of Seattle and to myself to retire as a Mariner," he said.

Seriously, let's get this one done.

The Age of Obama: Grant, Harding, Nixon and Bush -- All Rolled into One

Charles Krauthammer is the heinous alarm clock about to wake everyone up from the Obama pipe dream.

In an excoriating column in the Washington Post, Krauthammer lays out a series of facts that even the lunatic fringe will have a difficult time rebutting.

It turns out that America's greatest, newest Hope is simply the most recent incarnation of very old corruption.

Krauthammer begins by quoting the Manchurian Messiah's Feb. 4 remarks regarding our pending doom: "A failure to act, and act now, will turn crisis into a catastrophe."

So much for the president who in his inaugural address two weeks earlier declared "we have chosen hope over fear."

Until, that is, you need fear to pass a bill.

Predictably (I mean really predictably), that's not the only thing MM has failed tremendously at doing.

And so much for the promise to banish the money changers and influence peddlers from the temple.

An ostentatious executive order banning lobbyists was immediately followed by the nomination of at least a dozen current or former lobbyists to high position.

Followed by a Treasury secretary who allegedly couldn't understand the payroll tax provisions in his 1040. Followed by Tom Daschle, who had to fall on his sword according to the new Washington rule that no Cabinet can have more than one tax delinquent. [...]

At least Tim Geithner, the tax-challenged Treasury secretary, had been working for years as a humble international civil servant earning non-stratospheric wages. Daschle, who had made another cool million a year (plus chauffeur and Caddy) for unspecified services to a pal's private equity firm, represented everything Obama said he'd come to Washington to upend.

This isn't just an angry conservative writer grousing about the second coming of the Grant administration, even the former groupies at the AP have found themselves unable to ignore the obvious.

Headline: PROMISES, PROMISES: No lobbyists except ...

Barack Obama promised a "clean break from business as usual" in Washington. It hasn't quite worked out that way.

From the start, he made exceptions to his no-lobbyist rule. And now, embarrassing details about Cabinet-nominee Tom Daschle's tax problems and big paychecks from special interest groups are raising new questions about the reach and sweep of the new president's promised reforms.

Maybe he shouldn't have promised so much, some open-government advocates say. They're willing to cut him some slack — for now.

On Jan. 21, the day after his inauguration, Obama issued an executive order barring any former lobbyists who join his administration from dealing with matters or agencies related to their lobbying work. Nor could they join agencies they had lobbied in the previous two years.

However, William J. Lynn III, his choice to become the No. 2 official at the Defense Department, recently lobbied for military contractor Raytheon. And William Corr, tapped as deputy secretary at Health and Human Services, lobbied through most of last year as an anti-tobacco advocate. [...]

That was a big step back from Obama's unambiguous swipe at lobbyists in November 2007, while campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination. "I don't take a dime of their money," he said, "and when I am president, they won't find a job in my White House."

Apparently, hell hath no fury like a scorned wire writer.

All of this is not boding well for the Chosen One. The blindly amorous support of his followers will undoubtedly by him time, however.

[For example, his Press Secretary, Robert Gibbs explained MM's decision this way: "Even the toughest rules require reasonable exceptions," and Melanie Sloan, director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, added, "I think the Obama folks' intentions were great here. But sometimes you realize you can't actually govern on just what you campaigned on." Unbelievable.]

But Obama's inevitable spiral is already showing signs of its anticipated Rossby number. Krauthammer continues,

And yet more damaging to Obama's image than all the hypocrisies in the appointment process is his signature bill: the stimulus package. He inexplicably delegated the writing to Nancy Pelosi and the barons of the House.

The product, which inevitably carries Obama's name, was not just bad, not just flawed, but a legislative abomination.

It's not just pages and pages of special-interest tax breaks, giveaways and protections, one of which would set off a ruinous Smoot-Hawley trade war.

It's not just the waste, such as the $88.6 million for new construction for Milwaukee Public Schools, which, reports the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, have shrinking enrollment, 15 vacant schools and, quite logically, no plans for new construction.

It's the essential fraud of rushing through a bill in which the normal rules (committee hearings, finding revenue to pay for the programs) are suspended on the grounds that a national emergency requires an immediate job-creating stimulus -- and then throwing into it hundreds of billions that have nothing to do with stimulus, that Congress's own budget office says won't be spent until 2011 and beyond, and that are little more than the back-scratching, special-interest, lobby-driven parochialism that Obama came to Washington to abolish. He said. [...]

A bottom-up, grass-roots participatory democracy. That is what made Obama so dazzling and new. Turns out the "fierce urgency of now" includes $150 million for livestock (and honeybee and farm-raised fish) insurance.

MM's surplus package is not about stimulating the American people's bank accounts, it's about paying off his debts.

Buying an election is very expensive. And now, with $1 trillion of our dollars, he's going to settle his debts.

If you find this shocking, you shouldn't; if you find this unbelievable, consider this:

The Age of Obama begins with perhaps the greatest frenzy of old-politics influence peddling ever seen in Washington.

By the time the stimulus bill reached the Senate, reports the Wall Street Journal, pharmaceutical and high-tech companies were lobbying furiously for a new plan to repatriate overseas profits that would yield major tax savings.

And that is just one example out of thousands.

As the BHB has stated before, this stimulus is not a short-term solution, or even a long-term solution -- it is a permanent governmental philosophy that we are not allowed to help create or approve.

Concludes Krauthammer,

After Obama's miraculous 2008 presidential campaign, it was clear that at some point the magical mystery tour would have to end. The nation would rub its eyes and begin to emerge from its reverie. The hallucinatory Obama would give way to the mere mortal.

The great ethical transformations promised would be seen as a fairy tale that all presidents tell -- and that this president told better than anyone.

I thought the awakening would take six months.

It took two and a half weeks.

Yes, change indeed.

Everyone assumed that when MM decried government waste, it was because he wanted less of it, not more.

His countless speeches bemoaning outrageous government spending were really his plea to show us how a real pro does it.

When he assailed corruption, we had no idea his primary complaint was that he wasn't in on it yet.

In an Alternate Universe: What the President is Currently Saying

Ok, I'll come out and say it: I love me some Mitt Romney.

Sure, he can't seem to finish a sentence without reminding us he spent his life "in the private sector" as one of the most successful businessmen of our generation, and he doesn't have the pulchritudinous streak I enjoy so much in Ron Paul (but, maybe, that's a good thing), and his hair is so perfect I'm intimidated by it -- but all this aside, the BHB is a fan.

Romney's ability to fix the rapidly collapsing auto industry has been discussed here before. Now, Mitt sets his sights on saving the economy.

In remarks adapted from a speech delivered to the House Republican Conference (a group of clowns, to be sure), CNN.com offers a distilled account of his remarks.

First and foremost, Mitt lays bear one obvious, odius truth:

These are extraordinary times, and like a lot of Republicans I believe that a well-crafted stimulus plan is needed to put people back to work.

But the Obama spending bill would stimulate the government, not the economy. We're on an economic tightrope.

The package that passed the House is a huge increase in the amount of government borrowing. And we've borrowed so much already that if we add too much more debt, or spend foolishly, we could invite an even bigger crisis.

Although he doesn't say it explicitly, Mitt notes that Executive Powers to fix this problem currently reside with a man entirely incapable of solving it.

It's his job to set priorities. I hope for America's sake that he knows that a chief executive can't vote "present." He has to say yes to some things and no to a lot of others.

Obama, as we already know, has zero executive experience. He's never been in a position to make executive decisions, at any level of business, civics or politics. The rebuttal that he "led" his campaign is ludicrous because whenever he tried to act, think, or speak extemporaneously, he made uniformly poor choices. The credit for his campaign "leadership" rests with the army of handlers, not the puppet.

Yet, the man that has never led a lemonade stand, and who has spent his adult life living the soft life of a Marxist law professor, is now planning to save the day.

It's like expecting an arsonist to fireproof your house.

It's a plan so bad that the VP is already preparing Democratic Senators with the news that they will likely be attacked during their next election cycle for supporting such a plan -- but that they should still vote for it.

Rather than trying to nationalize major industries or regulate salaries, the solution can be a lot more straightforward:

As someone who spent a career in the private sector, I'd like to see a stimulus package that respects the productivity and genius of the American people. And experience shows us what it should look like.

First, there are two ways you can put money into the economy, by spending more or by taxing less. But if it's stimulus you want, taxing less works best. That's why permanent tax cuts should be the centerpiece of the economic stimulus.

If some elements of the stimulus are cut out in favor of other things, what should stay, and what should go?

Mitt:

Any new spending must be strictly limited to projects that are essential. How do we define essential?

Well, a good rule is that the projects we fund in a stimulus should be legitimate government priorities that would have been carried out in the future anyway, and are simply being moved up to create those jobs now.

As we take out nonessential projects, we should focus on funding the real needs of government that will have immediate impact. And what better place to begin than repairing and replacing military equipment that was damaged or destroyed in Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan?

Mitt also emphasizes the need to offer actual tax cuts rather than sending rebate checks -- two financial options that are very different. The former causes long term spending and consumption habits, the latter produces a brief, albeit intense, spike in disposable income, but nothing of any tangible economic benefit.

Mitt fails to note, however, that the idea of receiving a "rebate" check is mildly insulting because it assumes the money you receive in the mail isn't yours already.

Tax money it is held by the government to perform essential services and provide protection, but, it is always our money.

Because all the money possessed by the government has been gathered through taxation, referring to that money as a "rebate" implies it belongs to the Feds and isn’t your own.

This is the kind of arrogance that leads Obama to use taxpayer money to pay off his personal debts to Hollywood, fill his cabinet with the lobbyists who bankrolled him, and use a “stimulus” plan to implement a broken, demagogic education plan.

There is also the question of how the national debt will spiral out of control during a period when the U.S. has cut taxes (its income) while broadly expanding its range of social programs (its expenses).

Barry's cake degree from Columbia might not have included a lot of math, but Mitt's not only a lawyer, he also has an MBA (both from Harvard), which means he had to take Business Calculus -- and that class SUCKS. It does allow him, however, to look beyond MM's teleprompter and do some basic math about what happens when your expenses outstrip your income by 10-to-1.

If we're going to tax less and spend more to get the economy moving, then we have to make another commitment as well.

As soon as this economy recovers, we have to regain control over the federal budget, and above all, over entitlement spending for programs such as Social Security and Medicare.

This is more important than most people are willing to admit.

There is a real danger that with trillions of additional borrowing -- from the budget deficit and from the stimulus -- world investors will begin to fear that our dollars won't be worth much in the future.

It is essential that we demonstrate our commitment to maintaining the value of the dollar. That means showing the world that we will put a stop to runaway spending and borrowing.

The comment that many will find most radical, however, is Romeny's concluding remark.

With 67 million sycophants -- on Main Street, Wall Street and Fleet Street -- waiting for their savior to do something, any thought of allowing the market to correct itself has been completely forgotten. But the dialog has changed to instead wait for our fearless leader to give us a solution, rather than working to find one ourselves.

Don't you wish your President could be saying this right now:

In the final analysis, we know that only the private sector -- entrepreneurs and businesses large and small -- can create the millions of jobs our country needs. The invisible hand of the market always moves faster and better than the heavy hand of government.

Instead, our President is excited about this cool hole he keeps hearing about.

Passing the Blame: It's Your Fault, No Comebacks

With public opinion about the Manchurian Messiah's "stimulus" plan tanking fast, the beauty school dropouts over at Salon.com have determined the cause of this public discontent.

But first, the party line:

Obama is the most remarkable Democratic communicator of my lifetime, I think, and even he's not rising to the task, yet. He needs to lay out his priorities, clearly.

Who's to blame for MM's inability to explain his horrible economic plan in more alluring ways? Who's at fault for America slowly coming to the realization that this "stimulus" plan ought to be tossed off a very high bridge?

Answer: Anyone but the democrats!

Obama is stumbling in the stimulus debate -- and public support is dropping -- because for 30 years Republicans have lied about the role of government.

Of course. No mention of how Chris Dodd and Barney Frank "lied about the role of money" in regards to the long-term health of a nation.

To be fair, however, I think Salon.com is planning to re-brand itself as a source of short fiction, rather than a news/commentary site.

By Comparison, this is Just Another Boring Weekend for the Kennedys

While the rest of us are distracted by the financial meltdown and the current occupant of the White House, we've been missing some real problems.

Notably, the unchecked reign of terror perpetrated by the infamous John "The Impaler" Sharkey. Brace yourself:

A self-described "vampyre" and former fringe political candidate faces charges for threatening a teenage girl who tried to break off their relationship by telling him she was actually a vampire hunter. [...]

Sharkey, who calls himself the "The Impaler," ran as the Vampyres, Witches and Pagans party candidate for Minnesota governor in 2006, when he listed Princeton, Minn., as his address.

The criminal complaint says he was running for president in 2007 when the 16-year-old Rochester girl wrote a message of support on his MySpace page.

She told police they began dating online, and the threats began when she tried to break off the relationship.

She told police that "in a desperate attempt" to get him to leave her alone, she had e-mailed him that she was a member of an elite vampire hunter society and that continuing their relationship would put him in danger.

What else were we doing when society called out in need? Where else have we applied ourselves while we might have been joining these elite vampire hunting societies?

And, yes, Johnny Impaler's political party actually exists.

The only good news to come out of this is that I can now rest comfortably knowing that I am no longer responsible for the most elaborate/lamest break up excuse ever.

Cancel Your Normal Breakfast Plans and Make New Ones!

Attention readers of the BHB:

If you are reading this on Monday night, do whatever it takes to be near a Denny's tomorrow morning.

The reasoning is simple: Free pancakes.

Learn more here, and, in case you missed it, this is what got America so excited.

The Super Bowl of Super Bowl Food

Looking for a way to make your Super Bowl party a little more Super?

Considering that only Thanksgiving surpasses Super Bowl Sunday as single highest day for food consumption all year, no greater endeavor can be undertaken than the construction of The Stadium.

It is an endeavor unlike any other, and, if you build it, Super Bowl glory will be yours forever.

Key stats:

Total Calories: 24,375
Total Grams of Fat: 1,285
Total Cost: $86.47
Total Deliciousness: 1 Billion trillion, dude. One billion trillion.

In other words, the 8th Wonder of the World.

01/30/09: Also Worth Noting

Say what you will about some of the things you've seen on the BHB, none of them belong on this list. Yet.

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I'm glad I'm not the only one getting random e-mails from the writers of iconic fiction.

* * *

Due to the fact this application insists on using numbers, I have no idea what any of it means. However, I do recognize that it is probably very interesting.

* * *

Why is it that ads for mops and tampons use basically the same script? Absorbency, ergonomic design, new and improved functionality -- it gets kind of repetitive.

* * *

How on earth is someone as mighty as Obama calling out AM radio talk show hosts? Is this really his biggest worry right now? As you might expect, the target of the Manchurian Messiah's wrath, Rush "I Love Myself!" Limbaugh is fighting back.

* * *

Oh, Michael Phelps, you bong hitting fiend! I award you the Gold Medal of "Getting Baked."

* * *

The BHB-beloved William Kristol has challenged Matt Damon to a duel. The feud arises from an article wherein Damon calls Kristol "an idiot" thanks to his regular insights on the NYT's op-ed page. Now a challenge has been extended for the two of them to hold a public debate on a broad range of political issues. Who will win? If Jason Bourne arrives, it will be a short contest. If it's Just Damon vs. Kristol, I'm not sure fans of Good Will Hunting will be pleased with the outcome.

* * *

What ever happened to Levar Burton? I loved that guy. Yeah, he's on Twitter, but has time to read that crap? He did randomly show up on The Soup (seen here, fast forward to the 50-second mark), and that was pretty awesome.

* * *

This list of bad predictions about technology is pretty interesting, but this much broader list of all-around bad predictions is even more fun.

* * *

What's that you say? With an eye on 2012 Sarah Palin started her very own PAC? Isn't that cute.

* * *

Is this the lamest video on YouTube? Maybe.

* * *

It turns out that because Israel is so evil, it is using a secret weapon that localizes a bomb blast to the specific area of the target without the typical shrapnel and peripheral collateral damage. It's a slightly more humane method of warfare compared to the Palestinian preference for school buses.

* * *

Considering that this used to be the best entertainment television had to offer, I can't believe people even bothered to buy TVs.

* * *

I will die of morbid obesity before I take these measures to lose weight. I may be 739 pounds and unable to take a crap without help, but at least I'll have my dignity.

* * *

Just in case you'd forgotten, Google is still well on its way to owning the planet. Next up the Google Web Drive.

* * *

Why do I dislike the symphony? The scrotal injuries.

* * *

Apparently were about to see the "dark" side of the sun for the first time ever. What do scientists expect to see? Probably a bunch of hot gas. What do I expect to see? A new Pink Floyd album.

* * *

How cool is your job? Probably not this cool. Also, your job is probably not that tedious, either.

* * *

You're telling me that Tampa, site of Super Bowl 43, has the highest per capita number of strip clubs in the U.S.? I'm sure that won't cause any problems in a town suddenly deluged with testosterone charged gorillas. To make things even easier for out-of-towners in search of a good time, the classy fellas over at the Tampa Tribune even created a special section of their website to help "visitors to search for such information as the cover charge and dress code." I am totally shocked by this.

* * *

I love that a disgruntled software engineer at Fannie Mae tried to reenact the plot of Debt of Honor. I mean, who doesn't hate Fannie right now?

* * *

I've asked on a number of occasions if a current video full of celebrities promoting Obama is the dumbest video ever made. Now that Barry-O is in office, Hollywood has pooled its resources to make the dumbest video yet -- their coup de grâce.

* * *

You might catch yourself enjoying this song if you weren't so distracted by who's performing it. Maybe.

* * *

Forget your lame tour of America's ballparks or the plan to visit all the state capitlas, set aside the time and frequent flier miles necessary to get a picture in front of the city hall in each of these towns.

* * *

Apparently Seattle enjoyed an earthquake early this morning. I slept through it.

A Look Inward: Finding Yourself on Beachfront Avenue

A group of scholars have concluded a study that elaborates on a series of facts I could have explained for free.

The primary thesis of the journal Psychology of Music? Thinking about a particular song can cue vivid memories of the past.

This may seem obvious, but consider the song generating an enormous number of memories: 26 percent of participants had strong memories associated with Vanilla Ice's song "Ice Ice Baby."

Amen.

Why does the Iceman's greatest hit (and others listed in the study) resonate so much? The findings indicate that "music is autobiographical and people can remember events from a long time ago, with strong emotion associated with the songs played at the time."

This leads me to consider how much "Ice Ice Baby" applies to my own life.

Answer: A lot.

I have memories attached to not only the song, but to specific lines within each of the three verses. Furthermore, I have additional memories attached to specific scenes within the music video. I can name times, places, people and context.

I could go on about this for an hour. And I'm proud of it.

Creating the Perfect Country

The Manchurian Messiah keeps talking about how his stimulus plan is going to address our infrastructure, but he never told us that the internal workings he was concerned with were our reproductive organs.

Much ado has been made of Pelosi's remarks about the burden of children and the obvious implication about what currently pregnant poor women ought to do to relieve the nation's present economic troubles -- but she isn't the first to have these ideas.

Even MM can't stop praising the way that Planned Parenthood can help solve this problem. He's a smart guy, however, and if he were honest (stay with me; just use your imagination) he wouldn't be such a fan of this institution. Because, at its core, Planner Parenthood has been more interested in eugenics than sexual health.

To be clear, the organization, which was formed in 1916, has had some very specific goals.

It's founder, Margaret Sanger, was a major proponent of eugenics, which Wikipedia very kindly describes as, "A social philosophy which claims that human hereditary traits can be improved through social intervention."

In other words: In order to save purebred white people, the government must kill, abort, sterilize or outlaw the reproduction of anyone or any group that is considered to be inconducive to the best interests of those with the power to make such a decision.

The last person to really run with this idea was a very charismatic, oratorically gifted, popularly elected leader in his mid/late 40s. No, not Barack; this guy took power in Germany in 1933.

Amidst her calls for a radical implementation of socialism, Sanger personally organized and managed The Negro Project, a concerted effort to decimate America's black population before it became big enough to outgrow the white population.

This project called for all "scourges" (her word for minorities, especially "the negroes") to be given the choice of forced sterilization or mandatory segregation from the "more advanced" races.

She saw racial minorities as "human weeds" and "reckless breeders" that haphazardly spawned "human beings who never should have been born."

Despite being presented as a "health service," Sanger feared that the people effected by the program would easily identify what the Negro Project was really meant to do. To counteract this, Sanger sought out patsy local preachers who would speak on the program's behalf. She wrote:

We do not want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten that idea out if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members.

And also: "Our failure to segregate morons who are increasing and multiplying . . . demonstrates our foolhardy and extravagant sentimentalism."

The people that elected Hitler knew that he wasn't planning to carry out his plans peacefully. He spoke at length about forcing the Hebrews into subservience, and the glorious day when the heartland of the Ukraine and western Russia could be emptied of the sub-human Slavs and liberated to feed the Aryan race for the next 1,000 years. Sanger, on the other hand, spoke in terms of her ideas being a great, kind gift to the population of planet earth.

She called her plan to eradicate non-Caucasians "racial hygiene." -- something that sounds only minutely less ominous than "the final solution."

She explained,

A stern and rigid policy of sterilization and segregation to that grade of population whose progeny is already tainted or whose inheritance is such that objectionable traits may be transmitted to offspring.

And also,

It is a vicious cycle; ignorance breeds poverty and poverty breeds ignorance. There is only one cure for both, and that is to stop breeding these things.

Stop bringing to birth children whose inheritance cannot be one of health or intelligence. Stop bringing into the world children whose parents cannot provide for them.

Herein lies the key of civilization. For upon the foundation of an enlightened and voluntary motherhood shall a future civilization emerge.

Regarding the "uncivilized peopled" of the world, she wrote,

It is said that a fish as large as a man has a brain no larger than the kernel of an almond. In all fish and reptiles where there is no great brain development, there is also no conscious sexual control.

The lower down in the scale of human development we go the less sexual control we find.

It is said that the aboriginal Australian, the lowest known species of the human family, just a step higher than the chimpanzee in brain development, has so little sexual control that police authority alone prevents him from obtaining sexual satisfaction on the streets.

Her organization, she argued, would address a the most terrible crisis facing humanity: "The most urgent problem today is how to limit and discourage the over-fertility of the mentally and physically defective."

But her thoughts behind how she saw Planned Parenthood impacting the world are the most chilling.

"Organized charity itself is a symptom of malignant social disease…the surest sign that our civilization has bred, is breeding, and perpetuating constantly increasing numbers of defectives, delinquents, and dependents. [...]

Such a plan would…reduce the birthrate among the diseased, the sickly, the poverty stricken and anti-social classes [i.e. black], elements unable to provide for themselves, and the burden of which we are all forced to carry."

Indeed, in her estimation, things like "charity" ought not to be wasted on the scourge races -- they were not worthy of the hope and change future politicians would eventually offer them.

It [charity] encourages the healthier and more normal sections of the world to shoulder the burden of unthinking and indiscriminate fecundity of others; which brings with it, as I think the reader must agree, a dead weight of human waste.

Instead of decreasing and aiming to eliminate the stocks that are most detrimental to the future of the race and the world, it tends to render them to a menacing degree dominant. [...]

The most serious charge that can be brought against modern “benevolence” is that it encourages the perpetuation of defectives, delinquents and dependents. These are the most dangerous elements in the world community, the most devastating curse on human progress and expression.

But none of this really matters to the MM. His biggest concern is finding a way to convince the rising generation of children that his administration's careful oversight of American economic ruin wasn't really his fault.

By that time, eugenics will start to sound like a pretty good idea -- if only to limit the number of would-be detractors.

Attention 2008 Voters: 52% of You are About to Get What You Paid For

Oh my...

Mr. President, it seems all those dramatic hand gestures and pedantic inflections just don't make the numbers dance around quite like you expected.

After stocks took their biggest Inauguration Day plunge ever the day you flubbed your lines in D.C., the people who actually deal with money (not the politicians that theorize what to do with it, but the actual financial pros) are the first to see through the golden haze.

Speaking of your all-out-bonkers "stimulus" package, the WSJ noted today,

The stimulus bill currently steaming through Congress looks like a legislative freight train, but given last week's analysis by the Congressional Budget Office, it is more accurate to think of it as a time machine.

That may be the only way to explain how spending on public works in 2011 and beyond will help the economy today. According to Congressional Budget Office estimates, a mere $26 billion of the House stimulus bill's $355 billion in new spending would actually be spent in the current fiscal year, and just $110 billion would be spent by the end of 2010.

This is highly embarrassing given that Congress's justification for passing this bill so urgently is to help the economy right now, if not sooner.

And the red Congressional faces must be very red indeed, because CBO's analysis has since vanished into thin air after having been posted early last week on the Appropriations Committee Web site. [...]

In addition to suppressing the CBO analysis, Democrats have derided it. Appropriations Chairman David Obey (D., Wis.) called it "off the wall," never mind that CBO is now run by Democrats.

In other words, now that the GOP is out of your way, your solution to problems has become, "Blame the democrats!"

This might seem comical if your potent brand of narcissism and self-worship hadn't already demonstrated that you now see yourself as a political institution unto yourself -- an entity which has transcended and is now capable of criticizing everything in its midst, without actually absorbing blame.

But I'm sure the WSJ (and the rest of the financial sector) are only saying these things because they're using that "business as usual" mindset you keep complaining about.

And by "business" you mean "capitalism," and by "as usual" you are referring to the economic engine that has transformed the modern world.

But, then again, you buy into that obscure school of thought that sees capitalism as a necessary step on the way to better things.

But it's not just your plan to redistribute the wealth that is so screwy, it's how you think it's going to happen. After paying for the presidency with "hope," "sunshine" and "rainbows," you think that money actually does come from thin air.

The WSJ explains,

The stimulus bill is also a time machine in the sense that it's based on an old, and largely discredited, economic theory. As Harvard economist Robert Barro pointed out on these pages last Thursday, the "stimulus" claim is based on something called the Keynesian "multiplier," which is that each $1 of spending the government "injects" into the economy yields 1.5 times that in greater output.

There's little evidence to support this theory, but you have to admire its beauty because it assumes the government can create wealth out of thin air.

If it were true, the government should spend $10 trillion and we'd all live in paradise.

The problem is that the money for this spending boom has to come from somewhere, which means it is removed from the private sector as higher taxes or borrowing. For every $1 the government "injects," it must take $1 away from someone else -- either in taxes or by issuing a bond.

In either case this leaves $1 less available for private investment or consumption.

So what's the solution? Let me guess... Hope? Change? Maybe some advice for everyone to get a second and/or third job? "You, brothers and sisters, are the stimulus you've been waiting for!"

Ultimately, this "stimulus" isn't about the economy at all; it's about you. It's about short-term solutions to justify the promises you made during the campaign (hoping no one will remember them by the time the "long term" rolls around) and your insatiable need to satisfy your vanity.

The spending portion of the stimulus, in short, isn't really about the economy. It's about promoting long-time Democratic policy goals, such as subsidizing health care for the middle class and promoting alternative energy.

The "stimulus" is merely the mother of all political excuses to pack as much of this spending agenda as possible into a single bill when Mr. Obama is at his political zenith.

So how on earth is this going to work? Unfortunately, I think your old tricks will probably keep working.

The volume of popular votes you received in November (a little over 52%) demonstrates the willingness of many in this nation to choose a lot of style over a stunning absence of substance.

Apart from the inevitable waste, the Democrats are taking a big political gamble here. Congress and Mr. Obama are promoting this stimulus as the key to economic revival.

Americans who know nothing about multipliers or neo-Keynesians expect it to work.

The Federal Reserve is pushing trillions of dollars of monetary stimulus into the economy, and perhaps that along with a better bank rescue strategy will make the difference.

But if spring and then summer arrive, and the economy is still in recession, Americans are going to start asking what they bought for that $355 billion.

But, by Spring, I'm pretty sure you'll be leading us to something else that's so glorious we won't even notice we're selling kidneys and eating pets to break even.

Mr. Gore Goes to Washington. And Tries Not to Freeze to Death.

Oh no! Beloved scientist Al Gore has been thwarted again!

Al Gore is scheduled before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday morning to once again testify on the 'urgent need' to combat global warming.

But Mother Nature seems ready to freeze the proceedings.

A 'Winter Storm Watch' has been posted for the nation's capitol and there is a potential for significant snow... sleet... or ice accumulations.

I feel badly for you, Al. Normally when the mentally ill (I define this term as applicable to someone who would say, for example, that the world is getting much colder due to the fact it is getting much hotter) are subjected to public ridicule, there is outcry regarding the exploitation of such a terrible disease.

But, in every regard, you keep bringing this upon yourself.

Winning a "Lifetime Achievement" Award at Only 14

Somewhere in Chicago, a new hero for the rising generation holds his head high with pride.

A 14-year-old aspiring police officer donned a uniform, walked into a Chicago police station and managed to get an assignment — patroling in a squad car for five hours before he was detected, police said Sunday. [...]

Assistant Superintendent James Jackson said the ruse was discovered only after the boy's patrol with an actual officer ended Saturday.

Bravo, young man. Bravo.

I Can't Wait for this Scenario to Show Up in a DMX Song

A wave of vigilante fervor is sweeping through the nerd community.

It turns out a lifetime of wedgies and swirlies are considered mitigating circumstances for a heinous crime.

A man convicted of manslaughter over a "wedgie" has been sentenced to probation.

Erik Kurtis Low, 40, was sentenced Monday here in 3rd District Court on a charge of reckless manslaughter, a second-degree felony. Court records show a one-to-16-year prison sentence was suspended, and the judge imposed a 36-month probation term. Low also was ordered to pay restitution, write an apology letter and complete 100 hours of community service.

Low was charged in 2003 with murder after he shot and killed 38-year-old Michael Hirschey. Low claimed it was self-defense after being teased and given a wedgie by Hirschey. He was convicted of manslaughter, but it was overturned by the Utah Supreme Court.

As I've warned BHB readers many times before, please take stock of the hit lists which feature your name, and then take appropriate action. We've seen what can happen if you don't.

Hello, Kettle? Hi, this is the Pot... Oh, Nevermind

And the saga continues.

Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), a bona fide clown, is getting very upset about Obama's selection of a TV doctor as the Surgeon General.

Conyers states:

Citing a lack of experience, Rep. John Conyers Jr. is leading an effort to thwart Barack Obama’s expected nomination of CNN’s Sanjay Gupta to become surgeon general. [...]

In his letter, Conyers wrote, “It is not in the best interests of the nation to have someone like this who lacks the requisite experience needed.

Conyers may very well be right, but where were these sentiments back in November?

Change You Can Believe In, But Can't Read About

Our President-elect is definitely interested in changing things. By announcing Arne Duncan as his Secretary of Education, Barry-O has shown an interest in making sure the rising generation won't read about the historic collapse of his much-anticipated presidency.

Why won't they read about it? Because they can't.

Since his appointment was announced in December, I've been waiting for his nomination to be retracted, but it hasn't happened.

To anyone listening to the nomination press conference, everything sounded fine.

Barry-O offered his usual drone of fluffy superlatives: "[He will] take the lessons he learned in Chicago with him when he moves to Washington."

Duncan added: "I'm also eager to apply some of the lessons we have learned here in Chicago to help school districts all across our country."

So what's the problem?

After 6+ years as the CEO of the public school system in Chicago, "only 17 percent of eighth graders tested at or above grade level."

In addition to reading, only 23% of Chicago public school students were at or above grade level in writing, and only 16% in science.

Fantastic.

How does this nomination, based on this track record, happen? On a scale of "1" to "Chernobyl," how filthy is Chicago politics?

On the positive side, 1% of Chicago students tested as "advanced," and Duncan did charter a special public high school for gay students.

Freezing to Death on a Hot Planet

The northern half of the globe is buried in snow and, after several Snowmageddon days here in Seattle, I'm tired of it. It's even too cold for Alaskans to do things which is like saying someone is too obnoxious to live in NYC.

The culprit? You guessed it, global warming.

If there were ever a theory that had legs, it is anthropogenic climate change. When things are hot and miserable, it's because of global warming. When everyone is freezing to death, it's because of global warming. And when temperatures are moderate, it's actually just global warming playing it cool until we let our guards down again.

This is much akin to my theory of Fruit Roll-Ups being the cause of Third World illiteracy. In those countries where no one can read, I insist that if there were less Fruit Roll-Ups, kids would not be distracted by tightly rolled fruity goodness and could instead hit the books. In areas where everyone can read but Fruit Roll-Ups wrappers blanket the ground, I bemoan the sugar rush which has powered these children through marathon reading sessions. I also point out how more countries need to sign the Sheboygan Mandate (our version of Kyoto) to ensure kids eat less fruit snacks or risk paying a mandatory subsidy (and/or credits) for the Explodin' Blue Rasperry they will consume.

So, now that I'm freezing my [bleep] off, it's the same problem as the 87 straight days I spent sweating last summer.

How dare you, Al Gore.

Unfortunately, the financial empire Al has built up around his climate change movement is showing some fatal flaws (as the BHB has reported many times).

The first crack in his greenish armor came in October 2007 when a High Court magistrate in the UK ruled that his film contained nine purposefully misleading errors and that the unscientific basis of its claims necessitated that any Department of Education institution (i.e. schools) showing the film must preface its viewing with a disclaimer about this lack of integrity.

I bet you didn't hear about that on the news.

Furthermore, if ever there were proof these green initiatives are a pet project rather than a viable resource, consider that during the recent financial meltdown companies focused on green technologies have lost twice as much value as actual business enterprises.

Another major thorn in the side of Al's cash cow is the Science & Public Policy Institute. Although derided for its research on climate change (shocking) and its benefactors (Al won't reveal his, however), the thoroughness of SPPI's rebuttals have not been challenged.

In fact, major publications from SPPI, like its "35 Inconvenient Truths" about Al's movie have led many decision makers (such as the judge in the UK) to take another look at his real motives and his strange claims about "consensus."

Other tenets of Al's new religion are also under attack:

Claim: Holy crap! We only have ten years left!
Rebuttal: "Twenty years ago, the UN’s climate panel said that humankind had 'only ten years to avert climate disaster'. Today, Gore says we have 'only ten years'. This Messianic tone is calculated to divert his audience from the seldom-reported but readily-verifiable truth, which is that for seven years the planet has been cooling."

Claim: Oh no, there are droughts all over the place!
Rebuttal: "Drought in the Sahara has declined so much that the extent of the desert has shrunk by 300,000 square kilometers in the past 30 years. The greening of the desert has been so widespread that nomadic tribes have returned to settle in lands they had not occupied in living memory. Gore mentions 'evaporation from the soil' arising from 'global warming', but, since there has been no 'global warming' for more than a decade, there is no scientific basis for his claim that the latter caused the former."

Claim: Everything is getting hotter (unless it's snowing, in which case, everything is getting colder for the same reason!)!
Rebuttal: "Global temperatures have been rising for almost 300 years, since the end of the 70-year-long Maunder Minimum in 1715. During that period, there were almost no sunspots on the surface of the Sun. Temperatures stopped rising towards the end of the 70-year solar Grand Maximum in 1998. " Not only is the earth not getting hotter, it's slowly getting colder. Why? "It is a chilling thought that the Earth is 5000 years overdue for the next Ice Age."

Claim: Unless C02 is reduced, we're all going to fry! But that's a good thing, because going green will create jobs!
Rebuttal: "If America and Europe, dominated by the international Left, carry out their threat to close down 80% of their economies in the name of 'global warming', their workers’ jobs will be taken away and transferred to inefficient, Third-World economies such as China, India, Indonesia, Russia, and Brazil, where the 'carbon footprint' per unit of production is considerably higher than it is in the well-regulated West. An increase both in carbon dioxide emissions and in global pollution will be the inevitable and pointless result." Genius ideas like this are currently being proposed by President-elect Barry-O. In addition to the promise that his proposed legislation will save the world, Obama has also renewed his pledge to give puppies and rainbows to everyone.

Claim: The chaos theory proves the global climate will spiral further and further out of control.
Rebuttal: Even the creator of the chaos theory, Edward N. Lorenz, stipulated that it is impossible to predict long-term climate change because by any method "because it is not possible for us to know the initial state of the climate at any chosen moment with sufficient precision to identify the moment of onset, the duration, the magnitude, or even the sign of any 'phase transition' – a sudden change or bifurcation in what had appeared to be the previously-steady state of the object. Scientists do not, therefore, predict that we are coming close to any 'tipping points', because Lorenz’s formal proof demonstrates that they cannot credibly make any such prediction."

Claim: Glaciers are melting all over the place (unless they're growing, in which case, we must stop them!)!
Rebuttal: "Gore says glaciers in the Rockies are melting, but – in common with other mountain glaciers around the world – they have been melting since at least 1880, long before humankind could have been responsible. [...] There has been no trend in the extent of winter snow cover in the Northern Hemisphere since records began half a century ago. Indeed, there was a record extent of snow cover in 2001/2, but that record was easily surpassed in 2007/8, and may well be surpassed again in 2008/9. Gore also fails to point out that nine-tenths of the world’s 160,000+ glaciers are in Antarctica, which he fails to point out has been cooling for half a century."

No amount of religious zeal can overcome this many facts.

And, yes, it's very religious; and that's on purpose.

Consider the case of Princeton physicist Dr. Will Happer, who was the Director of Energy Research for the US Department of Energy in the early 90s until he ran afoul of then-Vice Prez Al in 1993.

In 1993, he testified before Congress that the scientific data didn't support widespread fears about the dangers of the ozone hole and global warming, remarks that caused then-Vice President Al Gore to fire him. "I was told that science was not going to intrude on public policy"

Only the blindness of a zealot causes him to rely on his faith to overcome the gap between the facts which face him and the actions he takes.

But it's a delusion he has effectively fed the entire world, and his scientific critics do not have his platform. The very thing which can hopefully bring this ideology down has, heretofore, been the secret of its success:

Gore and his unthinking followers have...assumed that, precisely because climate science is so complex, they can get away with fabricating and then exaggerating the imagined “threat” of “global warming”, because ordinary people will be unable to understand the science, and because young people can be relied upon to favor projects that are Left-leaning and that exploit their idealism.

It is absurd to think that a group of scientists who do see a crisis coming would dedicate their lives to hiding a fact that, if ignored benefits no one. But it is not beyond the dark reaches of human nature to use something as ostensibly malleable as climate science to obfuscate facts and, in short order, consolidate power and control under the guise of altruism.

In the meantime, everyone buried under snowdrifts can thank Al for providing one last, unforeseen, way to keep warm.

Thriftway: You are Safe, For Now

The BHB points out a lot of things that are absurd, but this new law is all out ridiculous. In fact, the sheer ridiculitude of it (yes, this deserves a new word) is mind boggling.

Consumers who rely on secondhand shops for low-cost children's items might face bare shelves next month. [...]

The new rules, which impose stricter limits on lead allowed in children's products, also make it illegal to sell recalled products. But it is difficult for thrift shops to verify whether the items they sell comply with safety regulations, says the National Association of Resale & Thrift Shops, which represents 1,000 stores in the multibillion-dollar secondhand retail industry.

Stores can be fined up to $100,000 per violation. And many shops are in danger of going out of business or suffering significant losses when the standards go into effect on Feb. 10, says the group.

Luckily, the CPSC has backed off this plan.

This has to be one of the dumbest laws of all time, right? It is indefensible to to ask the public to believe this law was meant to do anything except drive thrift stores out of business and clear the way for other Pacific Rim markets to monopolize the low cost clothing and children's goods market.

This is indicative of why so many reasonable people see low-level conspiracies everywhere they look, and why the legislative branch has an approval rating of -11%.

Don't Feed the Animals

Australia has long-since demonstrated an ability to find innovative ways to do things (e.g. koalas), but this story demonstrates their particularly unique take on crime prevention.

The headline reads: "Driver warned of jail's sexual gorillas."

This certainly leads us to ask a lot of questions.

Are the jails in Australia in zoos? Are the zoos in Australia in jails? Why are the gorillas so [ahem] aggressive? Are all prisoners assaulted by apes? Is this punishment just for traffic violations? Who do they leave the violent criminals with? Rhinos?

Not wanting to act as the inspiration for another documentary, Reuters implies the meaning of its headline in its article's first three sentences, but waits until paragraph six to use the word "gorilla" again.

An Australian court has issued a blunt warning about the sexual predators a young driver faces in jail if he does not stop speeding, as authorities struggle to stop teenagers street racing.

"You'll find big, ugly, hairy strong men (in jail) who've got faces only a mother could love that will pay a lot of attention to you -- and your anatomy," said Magistrate Brian Maloney.

The 19-year-old male appeared in Sydney's Downing Center Court on Monday charged with driving without a license, failing to stop at a police alcohol check point and driving dangerously.

The lesson to be learned here: Avoid sharing a cell, apartment or continent with any Australian primates or ex-cons.

And, just to be safe, throw away all your Paul Hogan movies.

It Doesn't Even Look Good on Paper

How serious is our next President about changing the future? As the BHB has noted before, he's leading us into a bright new future; a brand new, original vision of the future that is untouched by past failure or documented historic collapse.

He's been leaking the details slowly so that he can keep our excitement at peak levels, but the most recent kernels of wisdom include adding 600,000 additional government employees.

A lot of buzzkills are probably going to point out a few problems with this idea, such as:

-- In a cash-strapped, over-taxed country, who will pay the salaries of 600k extra federal employees?

-- Anyone who has ever driven by a construction project on an Interstate knows that there are already more than enough people at work for Uncle Sam. What exactly will these new 600,000 people be doing?

-- If there are suddenly 600,000 additional people doing government work, that means the government will need to expand its traditional role and begin operating in areas typically maintained by the private sector. This will happen despite the fact that the government has repeatedly shown that it is less capable of handling projects typically driven by the free market.

-- And, most devious of all, this fact: There's no way you'll ever question, demonize or demand accountability from your government if you, first and foremost, rely on it for a paycheck. Why responsibly perform the duties of your office in a manner that will qualify you for reelection when you can indirectly buy the votes of 600,000 people?

But we all learned a long time ago that regardless of how bad an idea sounds, if Barry is on board, it's all going to be ok.

General Contractors of the Absurd

In a previous life (1999 to 2000), I spent a considerable amount of time working with Habitat for Humanity, and, because of that, this story comes as no surprise.

Residents of a model housing estate bankrolled by Hollywood celebrities and hand-built by Jimmy Carter, the former US president, are complaining that it is falling apart.

Fairway Oaks was built on northern Florida wasteland by 10,000 volunteers, including Carter, in a record 17-day “blitz” organised by the charity Habitat for Humanity.

Eight years later it is better known for cockroaches, mildew and mysterious skin rashes.

Anyone who has ever worked with Habitat has come away with two very distinct feelings:

1) I'm really glad I helped out with this.

2) I would never live in this death trap.

Like far too many other organizations or causes that can be described as the “darling of liberal social activists” (as Habitat is in this article), this ostensibly great idea is planned, executed, argued for, and maintained with the delicate precision of a wrecking ball.

Only the hype and promotion surrounding the cause are delivered flawlessly -- and the momentum of this perceived victory will propel its organizers to their next big project to free Mumia, lobby in Gaza or chain college dropouts to trees.

Squeezing in Some Last-Minute Scandal into an Otherwise Quiet Life

I recognize that some couples have to resort to some pretty far-fetched measures to keep the waning days of their [ahem] physical relationship "interesting," but this is absurd.

The Multnomah County Sheriff's Office said an 88-year-old woman fended off a naked intruder by grabbing the man's crotch and squeezing.

Deputy Paul McRedmond said the man got into the house Tuesday through a sliding door. He backed the woman into her living room and pushed her face down onto a chair.

That's when the woman reached behind and squeezed.

The cops haven't figured out that this is not what it seems. I mean, the gentleman in question was using a pretty obvious fake name.

12/23/08: Also Worth Noting

This is painfully biased, but still entertaining.

I catch myself watching those clips along side this and this.

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Why do I (and whatever deity you believe in) hate the Yankees?

There are limitless answers, but here's another.

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This is enjoyable if not entirely encouraging about the future of the media.

Sure, Chris Matthews is a clown, but I think he stole the crown from even more deserving players like Nancy Gibbs and Lee Cowan. Matthews win, it seems, comes from his body of work, rather than any single moment.

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Bailouts aren't just for sleazy bankers and brain dead automakers; cheese makers are also benefiting. The government now has a stake in Parmesan production?! What does this mean?! The answer is simple: Crusted Italian dishes are ruined!

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For the Non-Denominational Winter Holiday I asked for gift cards to some fine Seattle clothing stores, but I'm pretty sure even my best efforts will not turn up a pair of these jeans.

Maybe next year.

If Your Mail-Order Bride Service Won't Take a Check, Consider This

The media is gorged with stories about old men contracting assassins to kill family members, but last week we finally stumbled across a twist on this tired tale:

A Delaware man has been arrested after being accused of arranging a bizarre plot that involved castrating his ex-son-in-law.

Wilbur Eichman has been charged with one count of criminal solicitation after he paid a man cash to beat up his ex-son-in-law.

Police say Eichman paid 34-year-old Charles Pernot $1,200 to beat up the victim and even offered up a $3,000 bonus if Pernot cut off the victim's genitals. [...]

Investigators said Eichman even wanted his ex-son-in-law's genitals brought to him.

This may at first seem barbaric, but it is a story as old as recorded history.

The famed King Saul of Israel was a well known aficionado of male genitals, and, on one historic occasion, offered the hand of his daughter in marriage to David for the price of 100 foreskins.

Yes, foreskins.

Showing the kind of overachieving zeal that had already slayed a giant and would later lead him to the throne, David returned with 200 freshly scalped prepuces and promptly claimed his wife.

Think I'm making this up? I encourage you to read verses 25 to 27 here.

What does all this mean? Perhaps Wilbur is in the market for a spouse.

By ancient Israelite standards, she's a bargain.

Myths About Success

If just .01% of the people who an extensively quote someone like [fill in the name of pop musician or reality TV star] could boast the same knowledge of thinkers like Malcolm Gladwell, I think we'd all be a bit better off.

Bat Country

If you're prone to having days that require seven or eight minutes of solid laughing or your head will explode, bookmark this link for future reference. Sure, owning the book might help make some of this make more sense, but it's a good place to start.

Key passage: We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something like "I feel a bit lightheaded; maybe you should drive..." And suddenly there was a terrible roar all around us and the sky was full of what looked like huge bats, all swooping and screeching and diving around the car, which was going about a hundred miles an hour with the top down to Las Vegas. And a voice was screaming: "What are these [bleeping] animals?"