Merry Christmas, Peace and Justice to All

-WHITE CHRISTMAS-

Ho Ho Ho!

Christmas Eve is a special time of celebration as we await the birth of Our Lord, Jesus Christ and ask the time-honored question: “Who would Jesus hate?” Well, our guess would be that long list of crooks and liars and swindlers that surfaced this year but some say, like the Pope -- it is the gays and that they pose as great a threat as rainforest destruction.

We beg to differ. So LWOH asks the Pope:

"If a gay sings and dances in the rainforest and nobody else is around to hear it, did the DVD never materialize?"

Anyway, Christmas Eve has got to be the most delightful holiday on earth, next to Halloween and of course, one’s birthday, and what better way for everyone to deck the halls but with song and dance?

The enchanting movie White Christmas has something for everybody! And who could ever forget the Holiday Kings of Comedy Goof -- Danny Kaye and Bing Crosby --- doing the drag version of “Sisters” immortalized by the forever dazzling Rosemary Clooney?

You?

Well here it is! Click on the above video for an instant and joyous holiday refresher.

And for all of us holiday skiers and snowshoers traveling to colder, stormier winter-wonderlands from Seattle to the Great Lakes to the northeast, lots of luck, patience and peace.

Merry Christmas Eve and Happy Holidays to you all from us at LWOH,

-2Truthy

Cross-posted at BlondeSense

That's The Way We Do It In Detroit

“ I guess this song is both a protest song and love song (toward the city) about the current criticism of Detroit's 100 year work ethic by a buncha political weasels who wouldn't know a work callus if it suddenly appeared on their forehead.”
-Stewart Francke

Click to download THAT’S THE WAY WE DO IT IN DETROIT

LWOH dedicates this song to all of our friends in Detroit, including Citizen Carrie as we pay a very cool-yule tribute to Stewart Francke’s Motor City Serenede, which has been described as the most important blue-eyed soul record in a musical generation. Detroit’s own Stewart Francke’s terrific music plays at the daring crossroads of soul and rock, mixing up an Urban R&B sound which is influenced by Marvin Gaye and Brian Wilson.

From Stewart Francke’s website:

“This song was initially called "The Auto Trade," about my own memories of growing up in the car business, but with the matters at hand regarding the survival of the Big 3 (and in effect our very area), I'm now simple calling it, as a point of pride, "That's The Way We Do It In Detroit." I guess this song is both a protest song and love song (toward the city) about the current criticism of Detroit's 100 year work ethic by a buncha political weasels who wouldn't know a work callus if it suddenly appeared on their forehead. Like many of us here in town, I’m sick and tired of hearing all this hypocrisy about Detroit and all we've done wrong--when over the years we've done far more right than wrong. I’m sick and tired of my town takin' it on the chin, like we didn’t help build a nation or feed a million families or make the most beautiful cars in the world for 75 years. This song is in protest to the ignorant derision toward Detroit, and a statement of pride in my city. I grew up in the car business, as did my father and his brothers; I worked in Steering Gear factories before I was able to earn a living as a musician. Use this song as you’d like--I hope we use it as an anthem for positivity; I hope we use it as a statement about where we've been and where we're going--a comeback anthem for Detroit and Southeastern Michigan. The Gospel choir accompaniment is courtesy of many church members in town.”

Let’s hear it for Francke’s cool yule, and for finding a pair to start kicking a few “political weasels’” tires on this corporate-welfare enabled, hijacked bus we call “Congress” to restore economic and civil justice at the community level in 2009 all across this country! We don’t need no stinkin’ Czars…

Peace and Joy,

-2Truthy

Biden to be "Working Families Czar"

Everybody is a Czar

by 2Truthy

Everybody is a czar!
Who can chase white collar jobs away
Everybody wants to arbitrage
Every last white collar job away

‘Til the Fondue Forums in Davos
When the system sells our jobs around
To elites from India
You don’t need Biden to spread the nukes around.

Ba pa-pa-pa ba pa-pa ba ba ba pa-pa ba pa-pa ba pa-pa ba ba ba, ba-pa ba-pa ba ba, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh

Everybody is a czar!
I can feel it when
When the Joe comes around
Talking up the middle class while
His CFR peeps work hard to tear it down
Ever catch a high caste lobbyist
Try to spread wealth up but just not down
Everybody is a czar
One tight circle watching the middle class drown.

Ba pa-pa-pa ba pa-pa ba ba ba pa-pa ba pa-pa ba pa-pa ba ba ba, ba-pa ba-pa ba ba, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, oohBa pa-pa-pa ba pa-pa ba ba ba pa-pa ba pa-pa ba pa-pa ba ba ba, ba-pa ba-pa ba ba, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, oohBa pa-pa-pa ba pa-pa ba ba ba pa-pa ba pa-pa ba pa-pa ba ba ba, ba-pa ba-pa ba ba, shine, shine, shine, shine(repeat and fade)

Everybody is a Czar!

(Click here to listen/Special thanks to Sly & the Family Stone)

Obama's transition team announced the new "White House Task Force on Working Families" -- a major initiative targeted at "raising the living standards of middle-class, working families in America." The initiative will be chaired by Biden, a curious pick, as this No Slaves article explains how Joe sports a track record of being anything but a champion of the middle class.

Cnn.com reports that other members of the task force will include the secretaries of labor, health and human services, and commerce, as well as the directors of the National Economic Council, the Office of Management and Budget, and the Domestic Policy Counsel, and the chair of the Council of Economic Advisors.

Last week, Rob Oak from The Economic Populist reported that the newly named DOL Secretary pushed to labor arbitrage U.S. workers by appointing Congresswoman Rep. Hilda Solis, who cosponsored the STRIVE act, the most notorious labor arbitrage bill targeting American workers, especially those in the Professional (STEM, S&T) career areas with this voting record on guest worker Visas. Oak aptly summarizes the Obama Administration’s anti-white collar American worker mandate here:

“Thanks Obama, just what we need, more displacement of U.S. workers through guest worker Visa programs and even worse, sure thing, we need to deny Americans opportunity to even higher education too because you are busy turning our university system into a glorified green card machine.”

No specific definitions were cited by CNN as to what income level constitutes the moniker “middle class” these days, nor did it list specific reforms and timelines to stop outsourcing and insourcing millions of white collar jobs for educated American workforce.

To be fair, not only Biden but all of Obama’s peeps, including the well known Hillary D-Punjab turned SOS are pro-white collar job sell out to India as this Council of Foreign Relations report explains in detail here.


Additionally, the CNN article cites an interview with ABC's "This Week," where Biden said it's a

“discrete job that's going to last only for a certain period of time."

Discreet? Biden continued:

"The one thing that we use as a yardstick of economic success of our administration: Is the middle class growing? Is the middle class getting better? Is the middle class no longer being left behind? And we'll look at everything from college affordability to after-school programs, the things that affect people's daily lives. I will be the guy honchoing that policy," he said.

How much power will Biden have in shaping the outcome of disappearing white collar jobs to India? He stated that he indeed will have the authority to get a “consensus among the task force” -- but he will use his relationship with the president if a consensus isn't reached.

What “consensus” is Biden reaching for? Joe “Bankruptcy Bill” Biden’s track record for sticking it to educated white collar Americans is disappointing, and the CNN report only mentions window-dressing “reforms” at the blue collar level, ignoring the Obama Administration’s plans to give millions of American white collar jobs to India via outsourcing and insourcing:

"Obama has set up several key goals for the task force, including expanding education and training; improving work and family balance; a focus on labor standards, including workplace safety; and protecting working-family incomes and retirement security. So what power will the new task force have in shaping policy? According to the transition team, Biden and other members "will expedite administrative reforms, propose Executive orders, and develop legislative and public policy proposals that can be of special importance to working families."
"My administration will be absolutely committed to the future of America's middle-class and working families. They will be front and center every day in our work in the White House," said Obama in a statement. "And this Task Force will be one vehicle we will use to ensure that we never forget that commitment."

Biden said the measure of economic success in an Obama administration would be whether the middle class was growing, but what specific class of jobs and income levels “define” the term “middle class” to the Obama Administration? How can economic success be achieved by millions of middle class professionals when Obama, Hillary, and Biden have all already pledged to redistribute them to foreign workers? No, the “middle class” that Obama and Friends refer to is one where the vast majority of millions of educated Americans, accustomed to earning six figure incomes in professions including engineering, computer science, information technology, finance and journalism are kicked out of the workforce to “accommodate” unlimited numbers of imported workers to take their jobs for a fraction of the pay. This practice is known as “labor arbitrage” and is the sharpest tool in the shed for greedy corporate profiteers to bleed America’s educated middle class from extinction.

When Czar Biden finally “reaches his consensus”, will the middle class purge be executed, leaving this country with the ultimate reign of elitism with a void between a Have/Have-Not caste system with no one left in between?

How fast and how far can the hubris disease spread? Look to America’s insufferable, greedy corporate “thought leaders” and our corrupt, enabling pols and above all, hail our new Czar, Joe Biden -- appointed to put the One World, shiny, happy face seal of approval on the demise of America’s white collar middle class citizens, widening the divide between rich and poor as never seen before in this country.

-2Truthy

Joy to the World! Stand by Me

Many thanks to these extraordinary musicians, filmmakers and the Playing For Change Foundation. Peace and joy to all.

Happy Friday, Loserettes!

-2Truthy

Chelsea Clinton or Caroline Kennedy for Hillary's NY Senate Seat?

Caroline Riding her Pony, Macaroni on the Rose Garden Lawn

What Qualifies Caroline Kennedy for Hillary’s Senate Seat? Is her Marriage on the Rocks?

For sometime now, LWOH knew that that marriage was a dog and Macaroni pony show.

So what is one Non-Everyman of a privileged woman who hails from the country’s last Democratic dynasty with a pulse named “Kennedy” to do with herself once the kids are grown up and the marriage goes down the tubes? Grab a senate seat! Some say Caroline is qualified here.


Is Caroline's marriage simultaneously on the rocks? Eminent Day Editor Gawker stalker Alex Pareene confirms the sad news that it’s probably true, as speculation mounts over the end of her marriage to Ed Scholssberg.


Camelot’s own beloved Caroline Kennedy wants Hillary Clinton’s NY Senate Seat, and doesn’t want the hassle of having to get elected for it, either. So what if she can raise around $70 million required to hang onto the coveted seat over the next few years?


As long as we’re talking about dynasties, why not keep that NY Senate seat in the family and give it to hedge fund manager Chelsea, a New York resident with the ultimate Clinton Camelot pedigree? We have to admit that Bill and Hillz own the market in the smarts department. Besides, Chelsea is nice, too! Plus, THE Stanford/Oxford graduate Chelsea is no slouch and could likely run rings around Caroline in an economics game of trivial pursuit. After all, when the U.S. Government Business Plan so far is to sell out every white collar job left in America to third world hustlers, wouldn’t a direct line into Dubai and Mumbai count a WHOLE LOT more on the fundraising side?


Oh those blasted dynasties...As Caroline skeptic Rachel Maddow said,

“this needs to stop or we should rename the Senate the House of Lords.”

Silly Rachel, we love ya, but...Is she just playing semantics? “House of Lords?” Mwahahahhaaa, it just goes by another name: The United States Senate. The only difference is that one doesn’t have to dress up like a bunch of dreadfully over made-up school girls.


Anyway, Caroline detractors are rearing up all over the internets in the form of “new media” attachments -- not without their own personal agendas to sniff for monetary gain from a Clinton teat tie to the One Big Money Party trough. (Granted, the Clintons would most definitely otherwise be a knock-out team if they were not dedicated to selling out white collar jobs to India.) Oh, for the good old days when Ralph Nader ran for president, like he does every four years to remind a hijacked public of the charlatans who buy this pathetic excuse of a sycophant media…


Now that investigative journalists have been kicked to the curb and we are treated instead to an embarrassing cadre of non-journalist new media One World self-promoters who market and sell the appointment of millionaires to the ultimate millionaires club, the United States Senate, look for change, people. Look high. And higher, and higher, still. See those pigs flying , yet?

Caroline? Chelsea? Heads or Tails? They’re both nice.


-2Truthy

White House May Bail Out Detroit

(Special thanks to Detroit's Own Bob Seger)

While Detroit burns, will the White House let Wall Street fiddle? Will Goldman Sachs alum, U.S. Department of the Treasury, Uncle Hank and Friends, come to the rescue? Come to Papa.


After last night’s announcement that the $14-billion emergency bailout for U.S. automakers collapsed in the Senate when the United Auto Workers union refused to accede to Republican demands for swift wage cuts, speculation today that the White House may tap Wall Street bailout funds to avert a “body blow” to the auto industry could be the next step. Congress, after all, can only amuse for so long until the man with the money, Hank Paulson, steps in.


Treasury spokeswoman Brooke McLaughlin said,

"Because Congress failed to act, we will stand ready to prevent an imminent failure until Congress reconvenes and acts to address the long-term viability of the industry."

In the meantime, Silicon Valley Venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins et al, along with an investor from Doha, QIA, has invested in luxury hybrid car manufacturer, Fisker Automotive, which has recently opened up shop in Pontiac, MI. Detroit area resident Citizen Carrie of Carrie’s Nation chronicles the Rustbelt’s emergence of Fisker here. KP has also recently announced a $75 M round in smart grid start-up Silver Spring Networks, as discussed in this Red Herring article.



More Congress kabuki…On the failure of Congress to act on the auto bailout, Democrats immediately sought to blame Republicans for the failure to aid Detroit, while a number of Republicans quickly blamed the union. But on all sides the usual zest for political jousting seemed absent given the grim economic outlook. Whether the failure to approve a Detroit bailout was purely bipartisan or driven by personal ambition, Nancy Pelosi had this to say about a few Senators:

“Senate Republicans’ refusal to support the bipartisan legislation passed by the House and negotiated in good faith with the White House, the Senate and the automakers is irresponsible, especially at a time of economic hardship,” Ms. Pelosi said in a statement.
She added: “The consequences of the Senate Republican’ failure to act could be devastating to our economy, detrimental to workers, and destructive to the American automobile industry unless the President immediately directs Secretary Paulson to explore other short-term financial assistance options. Senator George V. Voinovich, Republican of Ohio, and a supporter of the auto rescue efforts, said: “I think it might be time for the president to step in.”

Although several Democrats were opposed to the bailout, the GOP in particular was hard nosed against union workers. "We were about three words away from a deal," said Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee, the GOP's point man in the negotiations, referring to any date in 2009 on which the UAW would accept wage cuts that would approximate those of foreign car manufacturers. Senator Corker's plan (which Senator McConnell seems to support) calls for lowering American autoworkers' pay to the same levels as workers of Nissan's, Toyota's and Honda’s U.S. employees. Note that Japanese automaker Toyota has a huge plant in Kentucky, which also happens to be Senator McConnell's state.



Another European automaker, Volkswagen is building a $1 billion plant in Tennessee, which happens to be Senator Corker's state (and home state of Kleiner Perkins et al’s Al Gore, for what that’s worth.)



Despite the fact that cutting executive pay would save jobs, the GOP went after the workers, instead. Senator McConnell has been a Washington wheeler and dealer for nearly 25 years and knows which end is up. Neither is he naïve, as back in October when he voted to hand over $350 billion in taxpayer money to Wall Street executives with no strings attached. BTW, these are the same executives who had shamelessly driven their companies and our country’s economy into the lake.



At the very least, it certainly would appear that Senators Corker and McConnell and a few insider corporate cronies and constituents close to home might have an interest in seeing the Rustbelt’s auto industry drive into a brick wall like an old Pacer traveling at ninety-five mph without brakes.



Why were both of these GOP senators so apt to turn a blind eye on regulating Wall Street firms that handily took $350 billion in taxpayer money only to hard-line the U.S. automakers in lending a measly $14 billion? These ‘thought leaders’ people who make corporate spending decisions are far more interested in lining shareholder dollars into their own pockets
than in rescuing America’s dying economy. If the carmakers, for example, GM, were left to disperse their assets, would the high-end Fisker’s Karma and the mid-range GM Volt’s comparable technologies be a good place to forge an “eco-chic” clean tech marriage and kick off the New Green Engine revolution in the Rustbelt?


-2Truthy

(Why) Is the USFDA Trying to Kill Us?

(Cartoon credits/special thanks to Mike Adams/Natural News)

In addition to my previous posts on the ill-effects of woeful "free trade agreements", I also highly recommend the Natural News article below for anyone wondering why the industrial chemical melamine has been approved by the USFDA and the WHO and worse, why these two organizations would jointly approve this poison to enter the U.S. food supply. –t.t.


Article Reprint from Natural News

(Natural News) Following the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's setting of a "safe" level of melamine in foods, the World Health Organization (WHO) has announced its own safety level of 0.2 mg per kilogram of body weight per day.In other words, the WHO says that a 150-pound person could safely consume 13.6 mg of melamine per day.That's a lot of melamine. It's almost like a nutritional supplement dose. And the scary part about all this is that neither the WHO nor the FDA has any science whatsoever to back up this "safe" consumption guideline.Melamine is an industrial chemical that has sickened hundreds of thousands of children in China and killed babies and pets across the world. It has no place in the food supply whatsoever.

For these health agencies that are supposed to be serving the public to now claim that a person can "safely" eat 13.6 mg of melamine per day, every day, is simply outrageous. It is a betrayal of the very public these agencies are supposed to serve and protect.Without any scientific evidence whatsoever, the world's health agencies are essentially endorsing very high levels of melamine in foods. How high? If a 150-pound person eats just one chocolate bar per day, and that chocolate bar is a 50-gram bar that's contaminated with melamine, the WHO would allow an incredible 272 parts per million of melamine in the bar, which is 272 times the allowable level of melamine contamination that has been put forth by the FDA!

The FDA, you see, is outlining its melamine limits based on how much melamine is in the food. The WHO, on the other hand, is stating a limit of how much a person can consume, and the WHO limit is significantly higher than what the FDA limit would have typically exposed a person to.What's really astonishing here, though, is not only that both the WHO and FDA think it's "safe" for babies, children and adults to consume melamine every day, but that these agencies support the daily consumption of multiple untested chemicals in combination!For example, the FDA has declared bisphenol-A to be completely safe and has placed no consumption limit on it whatsoever.

There is no limit on acrylamide consumption, either, meaning that a U.S. citizen could be consuming large amounts of melamine, bisphenol-A, acrylamides, phthalates, perchlorates and numerous other chemicals in highly toxic combinations that are all "approved" by the FDA!I must emphasize there has been no safety testing done on melamine that could scientifically establish a "safe" consumption limit. Thus, the FDA and WHO are just blindly guessing at what a safe level might be. Consumers are guinea pigs, in other words, and if babies start dying or falling ill from all these chemicals at some later date, then they'll deal with it then (by denying they could have known the chemicals were dangerous, of course).

In other words, the health authorities of the world are now setting food safety standards in precisely the same way that a fifth-grade takes a history quiz… by guessing! I have a radical idea: How about setting a standard that would require no industrial chemicals in the food supply?And why is that so radical anyway? Shouldn't that just be common sense? Why are the FDA and WHO shoving chemicals down our throats and insisting they're all safe to eat?Why have our food safety agencies become pushers of industrial chemicals?

-2Truthy

Blago Tells Mom "I'll Never Take Bribes"

The Many Faces of Illinois Governor Rod Blagojovich

Breaking News

Chicago -- From a 2006 speech, Blago says he once told his mother that he won't take bribes because "Not only would that be dishonest, it would be illegal." Watch video here.

Recounting his first election victory as an Illinois state representative, the now disgraced Governor recalled what his mother told him in a speech to a party gathering in Chicago, hosted by party chairman Howard Dean.

-2Truthy

Blago Busted

Patti Blagojevich

Tony Soprano

Obama Addresses Blagojevich Scandal

Chicago -- CBS 2 Political Editor Mike Flannery asks Barack Obama the key question on everyone’s minds surrounding the Blago scandal: “What’s WRONG with Illinois politics?”

As expected, Barry “minced no words” and “expressed his extreme disappointment” in the Governor’s failure to understand that people who call other people a MOFO are unlikely to get favors in the form of hard cash for making an exchange with regards to an Illinois Senate Seat appointment. Meanwhile, Barry’s Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, continues to duck all reporters’ questions on Blago.:

“Emanuel was uncharacteristically absent from Obama’s news conference this morning. He was spotted two hours later in the lobby of Chicago’s City Hall. He was there to listen to his two children performing in a concert with their school, Anshe Emet.
A Sun-Times reporter pressed him to comment about whether he was the emissary named in the criminal complaint. “You’re wasting your time,” Emanuel said. “I’m not going to say a word to you. I’m going to do this with my children. Dont do that. I’m a father. I have two kids. I’m not going to do it.”

Oh, the entitlement! Rahm doesn’t have to do diddly! RESPECT!

The Feds also wiretapped the Governor’s wife, Patti, using the “F” word a few times, among other expletive deletives in order to shakedown the Tribune and remove Deputy Editorial Page Editor, John McCormick. Not a very nice thing to do, given the high unemployment rate during this economic downturn...Watch video here.

The Chicago Sun-Times reports the following timeline below:

Nov. 3: Tells deputy governor he was worried about being impeached in the Spring says Tribune will be "driving” the process. In later call, wife Patti Blagojevich can allegedly be heard in the background saying, "hold up that f- - -ing Cubs shit … F- - - them.” Gov say they should tell Tribune "we’re doing this stuff for you, we believe this is right for Illinois, this is a big deal financially.” Also says to tell Trib, "maybe we can’t do this now. Fire those f- - -ers.” In another conversation with a former adviser, gov says he plans to tell the owner of the Tribune that he will not help him fix up Wrigley Field because the Trib’s editorial board will argue he be impeached for doing so.

Nov. 4: Tells deputy governor to tell Tribune, "fire all those [expletive] people, get ‘em the [expletive] out of there and get us some editorial support.”

Nov. 11: Says "that’s fantastic” after adviser says the Tribune owner "got the message” and could target the editorial section in upcoming budget cuts.
Gov. Blagojevich has been accused of withholding state assistance from Sam Zell’s Tribune Co., which owns the Chicago Tribune, when they were trying to buy Wrigley Field. In exchange for the funds, Blagojevich allegedly asked for critical editors to be sacked. The most eye-popping accusation, however, is that the governor stands accused of shopping around for money in exchange for President-elect Obama’s Senate seat, which Blagojevich has the power to fill."

Click here for more about the story.

No fair! Why should politicians and their wives be forbidden to use profanity-laced language, the SAME language that taxpayers all across the country use to describe THEM?

Whatdya Whatdya?


-2Truthy

Larry Craig Loses Legal Appeal in Sex-Scandal

A Larry Craig Bathroom Refresher

Senate Seat or Toilet Seat

I cannot decide

I am not gay

Oh no, no way.

For Immediate Release

Idaho GOP Senator Larry “Latrine Lothario” Craig has lost his latest attempt to withdraw his guilty plea after being arrested June 11, 2007, by an undercover police sting officer for cruising gay sex at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

Wonkette’s crack team of operatives and star commenters such as yours truly provided 24/7 stall to stall coverage on the Gay Old Pooper’s attempts to “expunge all hints at his gayness” and now it’s time to take a Larry Craig refresher below:

Larry Craig: Senate Seat or Toilet Seat? (Turn up the volume and sing along!)

Larry Craig Halloween Poetry Reading: The Raven (Shudder and rejoice in the terror)

Larry Craig: The Man in the Glass Stall (Channel your inner psychologist)

IN THE SENATE
by 2Truthy

Where can you go Horatio

To give a cop felatio

Search the world for blowjobs

Behind every bathroom stall

Where can you begin to make your dreams all come true

In the can or on the sea

Where can you learn to lie

Play some footsie and jive

Study choosing toilet seats

Sign up for the Senate

Or sit in the grandstand

You’re not gay to tap your feet...

(Chorus)

IN THE SENATE

WE CAN DO WHAT WE PLEASE

IN THE SENATE

WE GET DOWN ON OUR KNEES

IN THE SENATE

IF YOUR PLANE’S RUNNING LATE

IN THE SENATE

FIND SOMEONE TO FELATE

IN THE SENATE

AND STILL GET TO THE GATE
IN THE SENATE
IN BETWEEN QUORUM CALLS
IN THE SENATE
WE GET BLOWN IN THE STALLS
IN THE SENATE

YOU CAN MAKE A QUICK CONNECTION

WITH AN OFFICER’S ERECTION

AND STILL HAVE TIME TO MAKE IT TO YOUR PLANE

IN THE SENATE

YOU CAN SIT IN THE CAN

IN THE SENATE
WHERE YOU CAN JOIN YOUR FELLOW MAN
IN THE SENATE
WHEN WE'RE DONE WITH DEBATE
IN THE SENATE
FIND SOMEONE TO FELATE
IN THE SENATE

SAY YOU'RE STRAIGHT WHEN YOU'RE NOT

IN THE SENATE JUST TRY NOT TO GET CAUGHT

IN THE SENATE WHERE’S A STRAIGHT MAN TO GO

FOR A BLOW – BLOW – BLOW -BLOW-

-Very special thanks to the Village People-




A Larry Craig Dr. Seuss Moment

A Seussian Tribute
Goes like this:
Better to have just
Gone in for a piss.

-2Truthy

Cross-posted at BlondeSense

BLAGO BUSTED! Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich Arrested on Federal Charges

(Photo credits Scott Olson/Getty Images)

“I don’t want no bondsman to post my bail
And I don’t want to spend no 99 years
Stalkin’ your stinkin’ jail…”
-David Bromberg-


Chicago is Full of Crooks

Breaking News


Chicago – A “truly new low” has hit the Windy City, as Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich embarked on a "corruption crime spree" and tried to benefit from his ability to appoint President-elect Barack Obama's replacement in the U.S. Senate, federal officials said Tuesday. Blago was arrested earlier today on corruption charges and later released on a whopping $4,500 bond. (I guess they don't think he's going anywhere...)


Legendary Plame Game U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, who succeeded in helping Scooter Libby get his prison number as LWOH reported last year, called it a “sad day for the citizens of Illinois” and alleged that the governor tried to "auction off" the Senate seat "to the highest bidder." Fitz also said the alleged behavior "would make (Abe) Lincoln roll over in his grave."


Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich of Illinois tried to “auction off” president-elect Barack Obama’s newly vacated Illinois Senate seat by “seeking kickbacks” in an attempt to “auction off” Barry’s seat so that he and his wife, Patti, could personally profit.

Fitz accused Blagojevich of "appalling conduct" and alleged that the governor wanted "tangible and up front" cash in return for appointing Obama's successor:

"He wasn't against a corrupt deal, he was against being stiffed in a corrupt deal," and that Blago “put a 'for sale' sign on the naming of a United States senator."

At the rate corruption charges blow through the Windy City, you’d think it had a “Kick Me, Please” sign on the back of City Hall.

-2Truthy

Cross-posted at BlondeSense

Chicago Privatizes Parking Meters

Way hey, tow them away,
The Lincoln Park pirates are we…
Be it Edsel or Chevy there’s no car too heavy
And we always collect our fee!
-Steve Goodman

Breaking News

Chicago – It seems that Chicago’s Mayor Richard Daley has a little problem with wanting to off-load anything to private entities, like parking meters in the City -- including Midway Airport --- that isn’t stapled to the floor, as LWOH reported here. These days, if you’re not running out of money, you haven’t arrived.

In this increasingly mixed-up, muffled-up, leased-up world, Paul Volpe, City Hall’s CFO, reportedly told aldermen that there will be “no more meter holidays” for already taxed to the gills Chicagoans, and Mayor Richard Daley (who dodges a bullet by having his limo chauffeur always pick up the parking tickets) is asking aldermen to help him further fleece taxpayers by imposing a ban on parking meter holidays.

By passing a one billion dollar deal to lease out its parking meters for seventy five years, which means that the new meter owners as well as the city can both ticket partying perpetrators and other subversives from Lincoln Park to the Lyric Opera House who neglect to feed the starving parking meters all across the Windy City. Now, residents will get 2 tickets for an expired meter violation, even on Sundays!

“Axing the meter holidays means drivers will have to feed meters on Sundays at locations where they currently do not. Ald. Tom Tunney (44th) suggested that new signs be posted to warn people that there will be no more free holiday or Sunday parking as of Jan. 1.”

The privatized company would also be allowed to raise rates every year for the next five years. Meters that now cost a quarter for an hour would increase to $1 an hour around Jan. 1.


Only one alderman voted against the proposal. Alderman Suarez (31st) ward believes that the higher rates would hurt "mom and pop" business and "blue-collar" constituents in his Northwest Side ward. Suarez predicted that people instead will drive to shopping malls where they can park for free, so Suarez came up with an ingenious plan:

“Suarez threatened to remove all meters from his ward and suggested that wards such as his have lower rates than downtown or lakefront areas with higher-income residents and bigger demand for parking.”

The news is swiftly spreading across the City faster than Mrs. O’Leary’s cow to recruit unemployed thugs to remove every last parking meter in order to avert this taxpayer crisis.

Perhaps it’s time to get a horse?

-2Truthy

Tribune Co. Goes Belly Up

Tribune Co. Goes Belly Up: Will the Huffington Post Step Up to the Plate?

Chicago -- In these hard times, when it is de rigeur to look for a bailout like GM or go bankrupt, everybody seems to be running on empty. With a firm insider grip on a tight money supply, a cadre of eastward bound Silicon Valley venture capitalists are moving investments into the Heartland and the Rusbelt.

Cannonfire chronicle’s Oak Investment Partners recent capital infusion into Arianna Huffington’s internet media playground, raising speculation as to the new media maven’s timing to set up shop in Chicago (Not to mention the L.A. Times is a stone’s throw from Brentwood.) In addition, Carries Nation today updates the State of Michigan’s relationship with GM and venture capitalist firm Kleiner Perkins et al regarding their mutual investments.

The Chicago Cubs and Wrigley Field may soon be orphaned and found standing in the Windy City’s soup lines looking for a sugar daddy just in time for the Holidays. The first major newspaper publisher to seek bankruptcy protection since the Internet began siphoning readers from traditional outlets, announced today that the media conglomerate is seeking bankruptcy protection.


The Tribune owns the Chicago Cubs baseball franchise, as well as the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, The Sun of Baltimore, The Hartford (Conn.) Courant, six other daily newspapers and 23 television stations.

“Most of the company's debt comes from the complex transaction in which the company was taken private, with employee ownership, by real estate mogul Sam Zell last year. To make a payment this year, Tribune sold the Long Island daily Newsday to Cablevision Systems Corp. for $650 million. To generate additional cash, the Chicago-based company has been looking to sell the Cubs, Chicago's storied Wrigley Field and the company's 25 percent stake in a regional sports cable channel. But a tight credit market has made it tougher for potential buyers to obtain loans.”

With credit tightening up, potential suitors for the Chicago Tribune may be on short order. Perhaps KP can buzz Doha’s Qatar Investment Authority? QIA and KP are the lead investors in Fisker Automotive, who just pulled into Pontiac, MI (see Carries Nation article link above). But with the Huffington Post up to $40 million in raised capital, giving it an estimated valuation of $100 million, says a report in PaidContent.org (see Cannonfire article link above), could all roads be leading to a flat, small, global, hot and gaseous world of ruling elites (like Tom Friedman wills) after all?



-2Truthy

Obama Vows Not to Smoke in White House

Obama, Gates in Synch on Many Defense Issues

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Ivy-laced curtain President-elect Barack Obama has vowed to not smoke in the White House, marking a major breakthrough in winning the War on Camels in the newly created “Smoke-Free White House Zone.” The news was heralded as a “breath of fresh air” by First Lady-elect Michelle Obama, who has been on Barry’s case to extinguish his nasty habit.

But Joseph Epstein, a leading antagonist of highbrow snobbery warned that some people will say just about anything to advance their agendas:

"Some of the worst people in the United States have gone to the Harvard or Yale Law Schools . . . since these institutions serve as the grandest receptacles in the land for our good students: those clever, sometimes brilliant, but rarely deep young men and women who, joining furious drive to burning if ultimately empty ambition, will do anything to get ahead."

Aided by old Bush Administration turned new Obama Administration Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, hiding ashtrays in the Situation Room will no longer be an option. The duo instead pledged to prioritize this pragmatic and bipartisan commitment to defend smoke-free transparency by installing a hookah lounge in the White House basement next to the bowling alley, instead, with a flashing marquee that reads "Hussein's House of Hookah":


“There’s more than one way to covertly skin a cat” instructed Defense Secretary “In Synch” Gates.


Although Barry admitted "there are times where I've fallen off the wagon," he challenged anyone to defy the legal distinctions behind the definition of the differences between chillum and cigarette smoke:

"I've done a terrific job, under the circumstances, of making myself much health,” "And I think that you will not see any violations of these rules in the White House," he said on Sunday's "Meet the Press" on NBC.

(Academic elites can buy Obama “Smoke-Free Zone” tee-shirts which are on sale now at Wal-Mart with the infamous trademark “making myself much health” emblazoned in green, gold and red letters for $9.95)

Smokin’!

-2Truthy
Crossposted at BlondeSense

Change We Can Choke Down

Change We Can Choke Down

Remember how the presidential election was marketed to change Washington D.C.’s super-stale status quo to cook up a new and improved brand of government, instead? Just because there are no “progressives” in Obama’s new Cabinet, who says the president-elect’s choices don’t demonstrate his supreme self-confidence to potentially end the War on Obesity?

If the new Hot Dog-in Chief doesn’t want a pantry full of like-minded, eager ‘yes men and women’ in his gourmet Cabinet, that is a hot shift in direction from the Bush or the Clinton years. Even if it doesn’t sound like the change the nation was promised, some people would like to know what President-elect Obama intends to do about the nation's growing girth.

So, starting with the little things, a think tank called the Public Health Advocacy Institute, housed at Northeastern University's School of Law submitted a hardy list of around 50 legal and policy recommendations designed to fight the nation’s obese people (in their own kitchens so we won’t have to fight them for seat room on commercial sky busses like the Canadians who give their flyers an extra seat for free) to Obama's Health and Human Services transition team:

"Public health, unlike some other national assets, cannot be 'rescued' or 'bailed out,' " PHAI President Richard Daynard wrote in a cover letter attached to the document, declaring "A sophisticated and aggressive federal approach to obesity is desperately needed."

With so much on his plate, such as jobs, access to healthcare and FDA oversight, will Obama have bigger fish to fry?

-2Truthy

A Few Things

Yours truly will be out of town today at an undisclosed location. If you need to contact me, be sure to call my cell phone.

In the meantime, enjoy these wonderful stories:

1. Did you know that turncoat Joe Lieberman's committee oversees DHS, the newly created department designed to sell out American white collar jobs to the third world? Read Patrick Thibodau's article in Computerworld here.

2. If you didn't know that pragmatism trumps change (or the difference between the two), The Real News Network explains it all for you here.

3. The Dark Wraith explains to David Sirota respectfully and with expert gravitas the important distinction between the Hope-n-Change School of Economics and real economics.

4. For a behind the scenes peek at how alternative fuel technologies bubble up, check out Citizen Carrie's Plug-In v. Hydrogen Technologies.

5. Don't forget to check out the Blondes, and absolutely make sure to click on The Jersey Cynic's hilarious post "3rd Race at the Honeymoon Is Over Downs"

-2Truthy