This Week In The News
This week, China loudly entered the family of capitalist economies. While many experts have doubted China's commitment to free markets over the past decade, recent events demonstrate that China must be considered one of the preeminent practitioners of American style capitalism. More precisely, the head of China' food and drug administration was caught taking bribes from Chinese drug companies who wanted their drugs exempt from price controls. Said China expert Paul "Wally" Zong of Goldman Sachs, "This week's events demonstrate that China is well on the road to junking the idea of the state as the protector of the common man and transforming it into a tool for commercial interests. One more generation and they will believe that tax cuts for the wealthy enrich everyone. Two generations and the idea of a government regulators actually regulating will be an anachronism. I'm bullish on China."
This week, eulogies for deceased moralist Jerry Falwell continued. While the loudest praise has come from Republican presidential candidates hoping to flash their religious credentials, the common man has also mourned the passing of the great prophet. As Zeke Brenner of Homestead, Alabama noted, " I have followed Jerry since the beginning. Before him, I was just a guy who hated on fags and jews. Wanted to keep womenfolk in line and preggers as much as possible, and mistrusted anybody who was different than me. I figured the poor was poor because they were stupid and lazy and that the Lord loved America a little more than them other countries. Before Jerry, folks called me an ignorant bigot and I was just about suspectin' they was right. But then Jerry came and he said, I wasn't just ignorant or bigoted. Hell no, what I was a devout christian and what's more, I was being ignored and persecuted in my own country by a bunch of lispy liberals and egg heads from the west coast. He set me straight, put a start in my step and I shall never forget it. Before Jerry, guys like me had no place to go but the Klan."
This week, GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney continued to battle the impression that he is a soft headed opportunist whose positions change with the political wind. His message may be getting traction. Ted Littlespoon of Manchester NH attended a Romney event and said, "I think Mitt is getting a bum rap. He is just a normal guy from a really wealthy Republican family who unfortunately has few achievements to call his own.* He campaigned for Governor in Massachusetts as a moderate who would unite -- not divide-- the state's warring factions, While some people criticized him for not being the sharpest guy around, he won that election by raising sick amounts of money from friends of his family and emphasizing and talking about religious faith in a vague and unspecific way. Now he is running on conservative positions while calling himself a centrist. What is so bad about that.?"
This week, President Bush called for 15 nations including the US, to set goals to cut carbon emissions over the next fifteen years. The President has been on record as a global warming doubter and refused to enact the 1997 Kyoto Protocol or agree to any specific targets put forth by European nations. Asked about the President's rather rapid about face, White House Press Secretary Tony Snow noted. "Two things. First, we have to go to Germany next month and we want to preempt the whole"why-is-the-world's-biggest-polluter-not-doing-anything-about -carbon - emissions' thing. Two, its legacy time. If the books were closed today this President would be known for waging an unnecessary and failed war in Iraq, enacting tax cuts that exacerbated the gap between the wealthy and the rest of us, running up a huge deficit, screwing up the response to Hurricane Katrina, presiding over the most scandal ridden Department of Justice and Department of Interior in history, and ignoring global warming. I mean... we gotta shake loose something he can tell his grandchildren."
This week, former Sen Fred Thompson released a 40 second video on YouTube in which he makes fun of filmmaker Michael Moore while smoking a strikingly macho cigar. While Thompson has played it coy about his political ambitions many believe he is setting the stage for a presidential run. Asked what would define such a run, the avuncular Thompson answered: "The straight talking tough guy that I have always played. My ability to mouth folksy aphorisms. I mean, you gotta go with your strengths. In my life I have been a government lawyer, a lobbyist for foreign governments and corporations and a Senator. I am on my second marriage to a women twenty five years my junior and spent a lot of time telling people about my hijinks as a divorced actor. Although there has never been a war I did not loudly support, I avoided service in all of them. Given that record, I think I'll stick with the characters I have played rather than the man I actually am. Now I just have to think of how to call myself an outsider. Real outsiders scare people. Look at Howard Dean. But insiders who call themselves outsiders -- there's the thing. "
(*I know, Romney organized the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake. So now we want an Event Planner to be our President?)
Lest we forget, it is now slightly over two years since Vice President Cheney assured us the insurgency was in its "death throes." May 2007 was the bloodiest month on record for US soldiers in Iraq.
If you have not done anything to stop this folly, now may be the time. Write a letter. Drop a dime. Get a yard sign. Get a bumpersticker. Write a check. Sign an internet petition. Get creative with bodypaint. Lose the right eyebrow.
This week, eulogies for deceased moralist Jerry Falwell continued. While the loudest praise has come from Republican presidential candidates hoping to flash their religious credentials, the common man has also mourned the passing of the great prophet. As Zeke Brenner of Homestead, Alabama noted, " I have followed Jerry since the beginning. Before him, I was just a guy who hated on fags and jews. Wanted to keep womenfolk in line and preggers as much as possible, and mistrusted anybody who was different than me. I figured the poor was poor because they were stupid and lazy and that the Lord loved America a little more than them other countries. Before Jerry, folks called me an ignorant bigot and I was just about suspectin' they was right. But then Jerry came and he said, I wasn't just ignorant or bigoted. Hell no, what I was a devout christian and what's more, I was being ignored and persecuted in my own country by a bunch of lispy liberals and egg heads from the west coast. He set me straight, put a start in my step and I shall never forget it. Before Jerry, guys like me had no place to go but the Klan."
This week, GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney continued to battle the impression that he is a soft headed opportunist whose positions change with the political wind. His message may be getting traction. Ted Littlespoon of Manchester NH attended a Romney event and said, "I think Mitt is getting a bum rap. He is just a normal guy from a really wealthy Republican family who unfortunately has few achievements to call his own.* He campaigned for Governor in Massachusetts as a moderate who would unite -- not divide-- the state's warring factions, While some people criticized him for not being the sharpest guy around, he won that election by raising sick amounts of money from friends of his family and emphasizing and talking about religious faith in a vague and unspecific way. Now he is running on conservative positions while calling himself a centrist. What is so bad about that.?"
This week, President Bush called for 15 nations including the US, to set goals to cut carbon emissions over the next fifteen years. The President has been on record as a global warming doubter and refused to enact the 1997 Kyoto Protocol or agree to any specific targets put forth by European nations. Asked about the President's rather rapid about face, White House Press Secretary Tony Snow noted. "Two things. First, we have to go to Germany next month and we want to preempt the whole"why-is-the-world's-biggest-polluter-not-doing-anything-about -carbon - emissions' thing. Two, its legacy time. If the books were closed today this President would be known for waging an unnecessary and failed war in Iraq, enacting tax cuts that exacerbated the gap between the wealthy and the rest of us, running up a huge deficit, screwing up the response to Hurricane Katrina, presiding over the most scandal ridden Department of Justice and Department of Interior in history, and ignoring global warming. I mean... we gotta shake loose something he can tell his grandchildren."
This week, former Sen Fred Thompson released a 40 second video on YouTube in which he makes fun of filmmaker Michael Moore while smoking a strikingly macho cigar. While Thompson has played it coy about his political ambitions many believe he is setting the stage for a presidential run. Asked what would define such a run, the avuncular Thompson answered: "The straight talking tough guy that I have always played. My ability to mouth folksy aphorisms. I mean, you gotta go with your strengths. In my life I have been a government lawyer, a lobbyist for foreign governments and corporations and a Senator. I am on my second marriage to a women twenty five years my junior and spent a lot of time telling people about my hijinks as a divorced actor. Although there has never been a war I did not loudly support, I avoided service in all of them. Given that record, I think I'll stick with the characters I have played rather than the man I actually am. Now I just have to think of how to call myself an outsider. Real outsiders scare people. Look at Howard Dean. But insiders who call themselves outsiders -- there's the thing. "
(*I know, Romney organized the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake. So now we want an Event Planner to be our President?)
Lest we forget, it is now slightly over two years since Vice President Cheney assured us the insurgency was in its "death throes." May 2007 was the bloodiest month on record for US soldiers in Iraq.
If you have not done anything to stop this folly, now may be the time. Write a letter. Drop a dime. Get a yard sign. Get a bumpersticker. Write a check. Sign an internet petition. Get creative with bodypaint. Lose the right eyebrow.
posted by Jack Reed at 3:36 PM
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