A Modest Proposal for CO2 emissions.
I noticed this too. Obama is running hard for reelection already. The family Bush was always above that sort of thing. Dems are "better" pols: They understand the power game better.
11 states skeptical about the Trojan Ponies in the stim bill. Bobby Jindal on accepting stimulus money:
...here's the problem. So many of these things that are called temporary programs end up being permanent government programs. But this one's crystal clear, black and white letter law. The federal stimulus bill says it has to be a permanent change in state law if you take this state money. And so within three years the federal money's gone, we've got now a permanent change in our laws, we have to pay for it, our businesses pay for it. I don't think it makes sense to be raising taxes on Louisiana businesses during these economically challenging times. And what it shows is what we're going to do in the stimulus is we're going to look at every program, every dollar. If it makes sense for Louisiana, makes sense for our taxpayers, we'll use those programs and dollars. If it doesn't, like on Friday we said, "This doesn't make sense for us. This is not a good deal for us." It makes--my job is to represent Louisiana's taxpayers. Makes no sense for us to take temporary federal dollars and create permanent state obligations.
Some states, like some businesses and individuals, can be blinded by greed. Bobby is the Not Obama.
It's not easy to demonize a tall skinny blond-with-a-brain who has a sense of humor, but the MSM has done it - and made her a "controversial" celeb in the process. Love her or hate her, Ann Coulter serves a useful purpose. From Klavan on the Culture:
Look, I don’t always agree with Coulter. She sometimes seems to scream black whenever the media screams white (a strategy that works only about 85 percent of the time). I’m pretty sure we really did evolve from apes—myself within living memory. And I enthusiastically endorse any and all non-bloodletting sex acts done in private between consenting adults—as long as you don’t then ask me to pay for the resulting child, abortion or course of medication.
But the whole way liberals work is to redefine manners and morals in such a fashion that conservative common sense automatically becomes hateful. If you note that women and men are different, you’re misogynistic. If you denounce the destruction of marriage in black communities, you’re racist or moralistic. If you call for the defense of America against the world-wide Islamist menace, you’re a bigoted warmonger. If we take this garbage seriously even for an instant, we spend our whole lives playing catch-up, saying sorry, going on defense.
Coulter’s answering strategy is to blow all that foolishness away. She says the unsayable thing, does it with intelligence, humor and style and gets the world exactly right far more often than not. And did I mention she’s disconcertingly adorable? There’s more good, honest material in a paragraph of her work than in any entire edition of the New York Times. She may be a loose cannon now and then, but somehow the barrel always ends up pointed in the right direction.
Ann loves to stir the pot, but most important is that she keeps things "sayable" that others are too timid to say. I always get a kick out of Ann.
FYI: Van Morrison's live performance of Astral Weeks, recorded in Nov. 2008, is released this week.