brainiac conspiracy

Your Liberal Media, v2.7.1

From Wednesday's GOP YouTube debate: You can just guess what kind of fun the Whackjobosphere is going to have with this one.

CNN was caught by surprise when one participant in the open-forum event turned out to be a member of a steering committee of gays and lesbians for Democratic candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton.

So freaking what? So . . . apparently, some horrendous breach of campaign ettiquette occurred here, since, after all, GOP debates should only be open to audience members who march in ideological lockstep with the candidates. At least that's what CNN's Washington bureau chief seems to think:

But had CNN known beforehand of Kerr's Clinton connection, he would have been passed over in favor of someone else with a similar question, [David] Bohrman added. "I wish we had known," he said.

Gee, and I thought debates such as YouTube's were supposed to be a public forum where candidates could be tested by fielding and parrying a range of questions from the voting public at large, i.e., where voices of opposition would be equally welcome as voices of support as a means of exposing the candidates' views to broadest scope of examination possible. And yes, this was, technically speaking, a primary season debate, and hence only relevant, to the greatest degree, to GOP voters. But Mitt or Rudy or even Mike Huckabee could very well be the next President of the republic, and for that reason, the interest of the greater public should of necessity take precedence over the more parochial interests of the party faithful. Otherwise, why not just limit the broadcast of the debate to Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina? Whatever happened to the concept of free exchanges of information between persons of opposing views?

Silly me. We no longer inhabit the kind of world where liberal and conservative worldviews merit an equally unbiased airing . . . or more correctly, the Washington Mediatariat no longer does, if they ever really did.

And check out that AP headline. A guy who sits on a panel that counsels Hillary on gay rights issues is an "adviser"---just like Lanny Davis or Sandy Berger, huh?---despite the fact that he's not even the committee chair, and has given no money to the Clinton campaign. Nothing leading or suggestive about that lede-in, no?

---Vitelius

They Don't Call Her Boxer for Nothin' . . .

What do you know: A Democrat with cojones!

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), through a spokeswoman, now acknowledges she is blocking former Rep. James Rogan's (R-Calif.) nomination to the federal bench because of his role in impeaching former president Bill Clinton.

Of course, this being the Post, the author can't refrain from implying that Barbara Boxer is holding some sort of, shall we say, ideological grudge since, after all, Jim Rogan is a gentleman who has corresponded with the Clintons on numerous occasions since the impeachment trials---and apparently, there's no hard feelings between the two parties anymore. At least so says former Clinton counsel Lanny Davis:

[Lanny] Davis says the Clintons are forgiving, live-and-let-live kind of folks, so why can't Boxer be? "I think that Senator Boxer is also a gracious person who, if she got to know Jim Rogan since the impeachment days as I have, would reconsider her opposition," he says. "This is a man who would make a great judge."

Says who? Bush? What party does Lanny Davis work for? For that matter, what planet does Lanny Davis even live on? Oops, sorry, the Baron forgot the fact that this President has a sterling record throughout his term of appointing federal judges who are scrupulously nonpartisan. Y'know, the kinds of people who Davis thought would make a terrific Attorney General, too.

And Rogan? He was so beloved of his constituents---in a solidly Republican district---they tossed him out of office after only two terms. If he wants a job in the federal government, he can either run for Congress again, or start by looking here, just like anyone else.

And Barbara Boxer? Grudge, schmudge. The malignant sons of bitches who foisted the Clinton impeachment upon an electorate which neither wanted nor desired it should have all of their petty vindictiveness thrown back in their faces, day after day, whenever appropriate. Or even when not. You. Go. Girl.

---Vitelius

The "Mormon Question": Enough already!

Over at Slate, cranky ol’ Chris Hitchens takes the Mittster—and the mainstream media---to task for not coming clean on some of the odder elements of Mormon doctrine. Ticking off a short list of LDS teachings that most mainstream Christians would consider slightly kooky if not heretical, Hitchens then asks:

There is also the question—this one more nearly resembles the one that John F. Kennedy agreed to answer so straightforwardly in 1960—of authority. The Mormons claim that their leadership is prophetic and inspired and that its rulings take precedence over any human law. The constitutional implications of this are too obvious to need spelling out, but it would be good to see Romney spell them out all the same.

Far from it for the Baron to ride to the Mittster’s defense on virtually anything, but jeez Louise---we are nearly 50 years after John Kennedy’s famous Houston speech, and Mitt Romney has a public record as the governor of Massachusetts that we can evaluate. Chris Hitchens honestly believes this is an open question anyway? Please!

Finally, in closing, he observes:

If candidates can be asked to declare their preference as between briefs and boxers, then we already have a precedent, and Romney can be asked whether, as a true believer should, he wears Mormon underwear. What's un-American about that? The bottom line is that Romney should expect to be asked these very important questions, and we should expect him not to obfuscate and whine anymore but to give clear and unambiguous answers to them.

Yes, Hitchens is right---a precedent has been set, but it’s a bad precedent, and the question of LDS underwear is about as “important” as the question of boxers vs. briefs. We don’t make dumb questions any more intelligent by asking more of them.

Now don’t get the Baron wrong here---insofar as Mitt may be asked to reflect on Mormonism’s overtly racist past, for instance, it’s a fair question to ask in the context of a civil rights discussion. But beyond that, what really is the point of delving any further into his---or any other candidate’s---scriptural views? Because the truth is, the dominant religious faith of all our leading presidential contenders, of both parties, is filled with articles of faith that are alternately foolish, barbaric, or scientifically impossible. Chris Hitchens imports a certain dangerous looniness to the Mormon belief that the Garden of Eden is being relocated to somewhere near downtown Hannibal. And loony it may indeed be, but is it any more preposterous than the belief that the planet is only 6,500 years old, or that there is no genetic relationship between homo sapiens and other primate species? Or that consensual sexual relations between persons of the same gender is an abomination, but opposite-gender sex is not? Or that the consumption of pork and shellfish is an abomination, but eating other forms of meat is not? Or that the Lord reserves his greatest blessings for the descendants of a 7th-Century BC tribe of Palestinian nomads? Or that a human being could be born to a virgin, literally walk on water, revive from the dead after 72 hours, and levitate into the heavens a’la David Blaine?

In a world governed by sane and rational men, John Kennedy should never have needed to deliver his Houston address in the first place, and Mitt Romney shouldn’t need to explain whether he thinks the Garden of Eden is located in Israel, or in Missouri, or in the Donna Karan shop at the Beverly Center. We don’t need more analysis of religious doctrine in politics---we need to eliminate it, fully and unconditionally. It’s time to stop debasing our political discourse with the injection of metaphysics, and insist that our candidates base their policy positions---and that journalists start basing their questions---on reality-based exigencies, not prehistoric articles of faith. And if they don’t, or won’t, they should be judged---and castigated---accordingly.

---Vitelius

The Peace Conference That Wasn't, Won't Be, and Why

Dear Leader today, on his perceived role at the upcoming Annapolis Peace Conference:

. . . Bush described his role in the peace process this way: "I work the phones, I listen, I encourage, I have meetings. I do a lot of things."

Hmmm. Not exactly grabbing the bull by the horns, now, are we?

And apparently, he's also informed the principals that his participation in the proceedings will be, uh, slightly less than pro-active:

During the talks, Bush told Olmert and Abbas that their negotiations could change the course of history and that their courage would define the success of future negotiations. Bush told the leaders he was ready to intervene if they needed help: "I'm only a phone call away."

"We can cheer you on but we're not going to try and negotiate it for you," Bush told them. "You are going to have to do that."

The President's advisers, who would seem to have more authority than he has here, seem okay with this hands-off approach as well:

"And to the extent the parties think it's useful for him to have a role, he's prepared to play it, because he thinks this is a real priority, and an opportunity we don't want to miss," said the adviser, Stephen Hadley.

Now, compare and contrast to another Chief Executive who also hosted a Mideast peace talk in his time:

[The President] is driving himself mercilessly, spending most of his time either debating the Egyptians or the Israelis, or drafting and revising texts that are being submitted to him. He has single-handedly written the proposed document for the Sinai formula.

Honestly. With phrases such as "I'm only a phone call away" masquerading as a sign of leadership, does anyone believe that this President gives a rat's ass about forging any sort of peace accord between Israel and Palestine? He is now nearly seven years into his job, and he still acts as if someone else is running his shop and he's simply the hired help. Or, more charitably, the CEO of a mega-corporation who has delegated the job of negotiating peace treaties in the same manner one would delegate the job of negotiating some union contact to one of your VPs. Either way, it's not exactly a sterling example of "growing into" his job, and if you need any additional reason why a man with an MBA should never, ever, ever be allowed the privilege of serving as President of the United States, 43 has provided it in gross and reckless abundance.

Then again, one imagines this is to be expected to a great extent---not merely because Bush has largely acted like a passive spectator during his own presidency but because the "terms" of this conference have already been more-or-less dictated to the negotiators ahead of time. To wit:

"One of the powers of having a [Palestinian] state defined is that it'll serve as a catalyst to marginalize extremists who have no vision, at least they don't have a positive vision," [Bush] said. "What you're watching is the development of a state which becomes something that people like Abbas and reasonable moderate people can say `Support us and this is what you'll end up having, support the other bunch and you'll have war.'"

Errr, not to put too fine a point on it, but the last time the Palestinians had a chance to choose their leaders in a democratic election, they booted Abu Abbas out of office, no?

And who wasn't invited to Annapolis? . . . Yeah, you guessed it.

Seems to me the message is pretty unambiguous here. To the Palestinians: Give us the leaders we want, or we'll kick your ass. To the Israelis: If the Arabs don't behave, kick their ass for us.

Compare and contrast, again, to the method employed by another Chief Executive in past peace discussions:

The president was really very, very actively engaged, and he played the critical role, the essential role. He was genuinely the mediator. And secondly, he established his credibility by being fair and balanced; not by being an advocate of one side against the other, but of really trying to find a formula that would accommodate in some fashion the conflicting interests of the two parties.

But of course, Jimmy Carter was a grown-up, a former Naval officer, a student of nuclear physics and a well-read and learned man who had achieved measures of career distinction before he ever got involved in politics. For all his flaws, he was, in short, everything that GW Bush is not and has never been, and methinks we are meekly biding our time until 2009 until anything resembling a genuine discussion of conflict resolution in the Middle East gets underway in Washington. What we will witness at Annapolis in the coming weeks will be nothing more than the diplomatic equivalent of "Mission Accomplished."

---Vitelius

Support our Troops: Stand With Air Force Amy!

As the Baron alluded in a posting the other day, despite Ron Paul's numerous policy positions that one might find problematic (abolishing the Frederal Reserve, for example), one can't help coming to the conclusion that given the current bland crop of presidential candidates from both parties---and their equally tepid policy positions---the man looks better and better each day.

But even the Baron had no idea how much better he's looking . . . until now!

Reno, Nevada -- Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, an underdog Texas congressman with a libertarian streak, has picked up an endorsement from a Nevada brothel owner.

Dennis Hof, owner of the Moonlite BunnyRanch near Carson City, says he was so impressed after hearing Paul at a campaign stop in Reno last week that he decided to raise money for him.

Hof and two of his prostitutes, Brooke Taylor and a woman who goes by Air Force Amy, attended a Paul news conference.

Now I am fairly certain that Ron Paul is not exactly going to trumpet this kind of endorsement too loudly, but consider the alternatives: Rudy's got Pat Robertson, Mitt's got the guy from Blackwater, Huckabee's got Nature Boy Flair, and Paul's got Air Force Amy. Who would you want in your corner if you were running for President? That's an easy question for the Baron to answer, and because of that, I am busy making plans for my Nevada Primary election-night party next January. Anyone want to join up?

---Vitelius

Against Quotas Before He Was For Them

Aren't conservatives always bashing affirmative action programs as thinly disguised quota systems?

If that's the case, how to explain this bit of quota-tion from the Mittster?

I asked Mr. Romney whether he would consider including qualified Americans of the Islamic faith in his Cabinet as advisers on national security matters, given his position that jihadism is the principal foreign policy threat facing America today.

He answered, " ... based on the numbers of American Muslims [as a percentage] in our population, I cannot see that a Cabinet position would be justified. But of course, I would imagine that Muslims could serve at lower levels of my administration" . . .

Okay, let's see here: according to the most recent census data, Muslims make up only 0.6% of the US population and hence don't meet the Romney demographic threshhold to serve as the head of a Cabinet ministry or as a foreign policy adviser. Mormons, by contrast, comprise a whopping 1.4% of the population, and more than qualify to serve as Leaders of the Free World.

One thing you can say for sure about Mitt: the man is a real piece of work, ain't he?

---Vitelius

Doughballs of Mass Destruction

Word to the O'Reilly Faction: be very, very afraid:

. . . the FBI sifted through customer data collected by San Francisco-area grocery stores in 2005 and 2006, hoping that sales records of Middle Eastern food would lead to Iranian terrorists.

The idea was that a spike in, say, falafel sales, combined with other data, would lead to Iranian secret agents in the south San Francisco-San Jose area. The brainchild of top FBI counterterrorism officials Phil Mudd and Willie T. Hulon, according to well-informed sources, the project didn't last long . . .

A check of federal court records in California did not reveal any prosecutions developed from falafel trails.

---Vitelius

A Bird in the Mitt

From Time today, a bad day for the Mittster, on the defensive for appointing some lefty liberal judge:

The man accused of committing the Nov. 17 murders, Daniel Tavares Jr., was released in July by Massachusetts Superior Court Judge Kathe Tuttman, whom Romney appointed in 2006, when he was still governor of that state. Tavares had just finished serving a 16-year sentence in a maximum security prison for stabbing his mother to death, and local prosecutors had urged that he be kept locked up because he had allegedly assaulted two prison guards near the end of his term. Judge Tuttman instead ordered that Tavares be released on his own recognizance, and shortly thereafter Tavares apparently moved across the country to Washington State, where he is now accused of shooting Brian Mauck, 30, and Beverly Mauck, 28, execution-style, perhaps over a $50 debt.

Since we're talking about the Governor of Massachusetts here, of course a historical parallel is suggested:

The seriousness with which [Romney] has responded suggests that his advisors, like some political observers, see the Tavares case as similar to the 1988 Willie Horton incident, which famously hurt former Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis in his run for the presidency.

Perhaps. But since an appointed official (i.e., a judge) is involved, those of us in the Golden State might be forgiven if we call this the Mittster's Rose Bird Moment instead.

Bird, as some of you may recall, was a controversial Supreme Court Justice in California in the late '70s and early '80s who earned the wrath of wingnuts everywhere by, among other things, (a) her unwavering opposition to the death penalty; (b) her antipathy toward populist ballot initiatives of dubious constitutionality such as Proposition 13; and (c) her close personal relationship with her benefactor, Moonbeam Brown who appointed her to the court in the first place. Eventually, she became the first Supreme Court justice in California history to be taken off the court by the voters, and for a long and nasty season, her name became synonymous with "judicial activism" and all the other hollow buzzwords the assorted members of the wackjobbocracy like to throw around when they're lobbying for the appointment of judges who don't believe you should have the right to sue a corporation if it turns your neighborhood into an EPA Superfund site where all your neighbors' children are born with fins and fur.

Now, there was precious little in Rose Bird's career that suggested any judicial impropriety, and the Baron would be willing to bet there's very little to nitpick in Judge Tuttman's ruling in the Tavares case. And if memory serves, the particulars of Willie Horton's work release were all handled strictly by the book. But since the Giuliani campaign is sinking its teeth into this like a hungry mutt, well heck, we're happy to do our part to spread the love, too, because as far as we're concerned, it couldn't be happening to a better guy.

It also makes me wonder how long Rudy, or Mitt---or some other equally malign GOP hopeful---will wait before ambushing Mike Huckabee with his, er, somewhat infamous foray into judicial activism. Which, by comparison, makes the Horton case look like an innocuous example of a plain ol' bureaucratic slip-up.

---Vitelius

The Huckster-Driven Life, and Other Spiritual Pursuits

An interesting news piece amongst the Postblogs today---specifically, some musings on the role of religion in the public practice of politics. From across The Pond:

According to London newspapers, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair will soon become a Roman Catholic convert. There have been rumors for years that Blair intended to leave the Church of England for the Church of Rome, which Henry VIII abandoned in order to marry Anne Boleyn, but Blair never discussed his faith while in office. When Blair's press secretary Alastair Campbell was asked about his boss's religious beliefs, Campbell replied, "We don't do God." Can you imagine an American politician or government spokesman making a similar statement?

Well, hope springs eternal . . . but compare and contrast to the latest GOP Presidential poster boy, expertly profiled this week by the ever steadfast and resolute Matt Taibbi:

Huckabee gave an even more damning glimpse into his inner batshit self in a recent appearance at the Preston Wood Baptist Church near Dallas, where he told audiences that Christians are sitting in the pole position of the race to Armageddon. "If you're with Jesus Christ, we know how it turns out in the final moment," he said. "I've read the last chapter in the book, and we do end up winning."

Good to see that the Republican faithful are flocking to a guy who sees the annhiliation of, oh, say, four billion people in the End Times as a positive outcome. And remember, this is the guy who is being touted as the compassionate conservative.

On the other hand, as Matt alludes in the paragraph above, the Huckster should have a fairly easy time of cornering the batshit voting bloc, and it looks like the proof is in the . . . endorsements?

Huckabee picked up some other big, or at least unorthodox, endorsements: Wrestling legend "Nature Boy" Ric Flair came on board Tuesday.

"Like I always say, to be the man, you've got to beat the man and Mike Huckabee is the man. Whoooooooo!" the former 16-time world heavyweight champion said.

So, he's got Chuck Norris, the Nature Boy, and Jesus in his camp---not necessarily in that order. He denies the relationship between humans and other primates, despite all scientific evidence to the contrary, and won't categorically dismiss the cretin-level notion that the planet is only 6,500 years old. In another place, and another era---and I don't think we need to travel very far back in time here---such a candidate would have been relegated to the extreme ultra-fringe of American political life, somewhere between Lyndon LaRouche and Gus Hall. In 2007, this same candidate is not only not considered crazy but is portrayed as a sensible and sympathetic person who may very well be the next GOP candidate for Vice President. All further proof of how far to the Batshit Right (thanks, Matt) the state of political discourse has lurched in this country over the past quarter century.

---Vitelius

Name That Leftist Appeaser . . .

Quick: Which Democratic presidential candidate was the subject of this recent Q&A session?

Q: What do you make of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and current U.S. posturing toward Iran?

A: He's a loudmouth, and he hurts their cause. But we help his cause when we gang up against him. When we pass sanctions against him, the dissidents in Iran who would like to get rid of him rally around him for nationalistic reasons. We get hysterical over a guy who doesn't have a single weapon, and nobody's proven that he's ever violated the arms-nonproliferation treaty. Matter of fact, the International Atomic Energy Agency is going to have an agreement with him by the end of the year. That's why you have all of this warmongering going on: It is to try to find an excuse to start bombing him before they prove that he doesn't have a chance of having a weapon. That's exactly what we did with Iraq. I'm scared to death they're getting ready to do that with Iran.

Q: The Bush administration says Iran is supporting the Iraqi insurgency. How much can we trust that assessment?

A: About as much as what we heard about Iraq before the war. What was true about that? Very, very little, if anything. They're capable of telling us anything if they want to go to war. And that's what they want.

That's easy, it's gotta be Kucinich . . . well, nope. Okay, Mike Gravel . . . uh uh.

Chris Dodd? . . . Sorry. Bill Richardson, of course! . . . Nope.

Actually, it was, uh . . . this guy.

---Vitelius

Snark of the Day . . .

This one is simply mahvelous:

The strikes by Broadway stagehands and Hollywood writers are cutting into our consumption of entertainment that doesn't require brain activity.

As the author points out, if the writers' strike remains unresolved, it could have dire consequences for the upcoming Oscar and Grammy telecasts:

What shall we do if there is no delightfully mollifying banter between presenters? No zingy insults of the A-list stars? Hosts might have to resort to juggling.

Or writing their own gags for a change. Or just cut out the banter, hand out the hardware and wrap up the entire Oscar show in 90 minutes flat. Hey now, there's a novel idea. Huelga, huelga!

--Vitelius

Swift-Boating the Constitution?

From TPM today, a solid roundup on the latest in the on-again, off-again effort by a group of deep-pockets Giuliani backers and ex-Swift Boaters to change the way California chooses its presidential electors. You've probably heard of it by now, but in case you haven't, it's a fairly straightforward initiative statute that does away with the state's current winner-take-all system of awarding electoral votes, replacing it with, essentially, a winner-by-district allocation. It sounds eminently fair---and it surely is, so long as you're a Republican presidential candidate who can count on picking up 20 or so electors in California even if you lose the state in a landslide.

Much has been written about this latest GOP effort at legal election fraud, but unless I've missed some relevant commentary, it seems as though one important point has been overlooked: on its face, the initiative is unambiguously unconstitutional.

Read the text of the initiative here. As you can see, the proposed selection of electors involves the the state's political parties (who pick the electors), the voters (who pick which elector gets to cast their presidential vote-by-Congressional district) and the Secretary of State, who supervises the whole shebang. The state Legislature isn't mentioned in the text.

Now, compare and contrast with the second paragraph from Article II, Section I of the US Constitution:

Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of Electors, equal to the Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in Congress . . . (Empashis added.)

Now, the Baron admits to being no legal scholar, but could this ballot initiative pass the most rudimentary constitutional challenge, or am I just missing something here?

---Vitelius

Freddienomics, in Theory and . . . Only in Theory

From Bloomberg today, Gipper 2.0 provides his prescription for an ailing economy: More tax cuts!

"We have the second highest tax rate in the industrialized world,'' Thompson, a former actor, lobbyist and senator from Tennessee, said in an interview for Bloomberg Television's Money and Politics program. `"I look at our international competitors and see that 28 percent would be the norm."

Is it really true that we have the second-highest corporate tax rate in the developed world? As it turns out, it is true---but only in theory.

In general, however, the share of corporate profits that is ultimately taxed is much lower than the maximum statutory rate of 35 percent. According to a new Congressional Research Service report, since 1993 (when the top statutory rate was set at 35 percent), the effective corporate tax rate---that is, the share of total corporate profits that is paid to the federal government in corporate income taxes---has averaged 26.3 percent for non-financial corporations, or about one-quarter lower than the 35 percent statutory rate. CRS notes that the effective tax rate is "a better measure of the true burden of the [corporate income] tax."

And of course, we haven't even considered the influence of tax shelters---which by their nature are difficult to quantify, though we can hazard an educated guess:

For instance, a study by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy used the annual reports of 250 major corporations between 1996 and 1998 to examine both these corporations' incomes and their tax payments. These annual reports typically include the income that companies shelter from the tax authorities but include in their reports to shareholders. The study found that of these 250 large corporations---which together pay about 30 percent of all corporate income tax in the United States---one in six paid no corporate income tax whatsoever in at least one of these years. The effective tax rate of these corporations declined over the three-year period from 22.9 percent to 20.1 percent.

Well heck, them's bottom-end rates---about the same as Croatia's or Slovakia's. But if that's the case, then we'd be right to expect that corporate tax revenues as a percentage of GDP, and of the economy in general, would be at pretty doggone low levels. But that can't be the case, can it, as overburdened as corporate America is beneath the yoke of excessive taxation?

As it turns out, yup. Historically low levels, in fact.

Of course, stubborn fact things like that are going to deter a fella like Freddie, who believes in the good ol' fashioned bootstrap theory. Hey, it worked for him, right?

"The Democrats always want to focus on the redistribution of wealth,'' said Thompson, a onetime factory worker who grew up in a working-class family in rural Tennessee. "They don't recognize the fact that people come up through the system in our country, and they come from the lower end often times to the higher end.''

Or, in some folks' cases, they simply marry into the higher end, and leave all that bootstrap stuff for some other poor foo' to mess with.

"In a growing economy people have an opportunity to make a determination for themselves as to how far they want to go economically,'' Thompson said. "That's not to say there aren't some people that don't need some help,'' but "you can't just say the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer.''

Sure you can. Why? Because it's true. The chart on the right shows the share of capital income earned by the top 1% and the bottom 80% between 1979 and 2003.

---Vitelius

Snark of the Day . . .

The ever-prescient Froomkin, on our Unitary Executive's penchant for hyperactive stage management:

You might think that a presidential speech on Thanksgiving would be open to all comers. But no, even when President Bush is talking about something as uncontroversial and inclusive as the essential goodness of our country, he wants his audience prescreened for obsequiousness.

And here's the un-snarky kicker:

Bush has adopted a tactic that is barely acceptable during a political campaign and made it standard practice for his taxpayer-funded visits around the nation. (Emphasis added.)

---Vitelius

Our Father, Who Art in Sambo's . . .

We're all familiar with the Shroud of Turin and other venerable objects said to bear the likeness of Our Lord. But are we really prepared for the Special of the Day from the International House of Jesus?

The grainy image emerged from a batch of Great Value pancake mix, bought at Wal-Mart for $1.25---a suitably humble beginning for a wanna-be apparition.

Port St. Lucie resident Dana O'Kane said she discerned the outline of Jesus and Mary in the mottled pancake and took it as a reassuring sign from her recently departed father.

Her mother, the cook, thought it looked more like a bedouin and Santa Claus.

Read the whole story, then ask yourself what's really stranger: (1) Seeing the face of the Savior in a flapjack, (2) keeping it around your kitchen for two weeks afterward, (3) putting it up for sale on eBay, or (4) actually bidding $300 for it?

---Vitelius

Holiday Cheer Blog: Write Your Own Caption . . .

"I looked into his soul and saw the spirit of Turkey,
a good and trusted ally in the War against Terror."

---Vitelius

Madmen Makin' Mad Money

As Josh Marshall at TPM has noted this week, intrepid reporters looking to get to the bottom of the Giuliani-Kerik symbiosis would be well advised to comb the Internets for crumbs of knowledge about Giuliani Partners, the consulting firm Rudy put together after leaving the NY Mayor's office. And while there is much about this outfit that is murky and unknown, there are plenty of facts to be dissected and analyzed that are already on the record. This article from Forbes, while slightly more than a year old, is chock-full of, shall we say, interesting revelations of what might be called the Giuliani Style of Management®. And at first read, it would seem that the Mayor of 9/11 sure as heck wouldn't win many elections for the Mayoralty of Wall Street:

In November 2003 Bear Stearns Merchant put down $100 million in a $210 million leveraged buyout of CamelBak, a Petaluma, Calif. maker of a hands-free canteen, popular with Marines in Iraq and weekend warriors. In the fiscal year ended June 30, 2004 it recorded $31 million in operating profit (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization). In March 2004 Giuliani Partners announced it was becoming a "strategic investor" in CamelBak . . .

Bernie Kerik, then a Giuliani Partners vice president, hopped on CamelBak's board. It was the start of a steep decline. In 2005 Bear Stearns Merchant got CamelBak to pay owners a $24 million dividend, saddling the company with unsustainable debt; in fiscal 2006 operating profit dropped to $18 million. This year CamelBak replaced its chief executive and broke loan covenants; its second-lien bank debt fell in price to 80 cents on the dollar. Standard & Poor's recently pointed to CamelBak as an example of how LBOs, combined with debt-funded dividends, put companies "in danger of going belly-up."

The most controversial deal ever made by Giuliani Partners was struck in mid-2004 with Applied DNA Sciences, then backed by Richard Langley Jr. Its main asset was a licensing deal with a Taiwanese outfit that could supposedly outsmart counterfeiters by inserting plant genes into products such as cosmetics and pills. In 2002 the company had done a reverse merger with ProHealth Medical, an OTC bulletin board stock, that resulted in Langley's RHL Management getting 5.5 million shares.

For a while Langley worked as Applied DNA's vice president in charge of P.R. He left that job but was still the company's largest shareholder when Giuliani Partners signed on to help develop and market the technology. The firm accepted $2 million and promises of stock; Applied DNA's shares traded for as much as $1.89.

But in March 2005 USA Today reported on Langley's sordid past: In 1999 he had pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and commercial bribery in connection with a penny stock called Pollution Controls International. Court documents show Langley had tried to bribe a law enforcement official posing as a broker willing to pump up Pollution's shares. It also turned out that Applied's investment bank, Vertical Capital, had twice been fined by the National Association of Securities Dealers. Giuliani Partners quietly deep-sixed its contract but still collected $1.3 million through June 30, 2005 . . . Applied DNA's stock now trades for 10 cents.

Well heck, bum investments are a dime a dozen---everyone who plays the markets gets snookered every now and then. Then again, not everyone gets to walk away from bad business deals with a cool million in pocket. And everyone certainly doesn't get to bleed failing companies for millions of dollars in added costs:

Some of Giuliani Capital's most lucrative work has been providing financial advice to failing airlines. The firm deploys 11 employees at Delta Air Lines, which has been operating under bankruptcy protection since September 2005; for eight months of consulting, ending May 31, Giuliani Capital pocketed $3.2 million. It billed $2.3 million last year, when it worked on the US Airways bankruptcy.

But its contract with Aloha Airgroup, parent of the distressed airline, has brought angry charges of greed. Cutting a deal with Aloha Chief David Banmiller in December 2004, Giuliani Capital agreed to work for a flat fee of $125,000 a month and what amounted to a $1 million restructuring bonus if the company got out of bankruptcy court alive. Seven Giuliani advisers, led by Marc Bilbao, obtained a $65 million loan and helped negotiate the sale of the carrier to a group led by billionaire Ronald Burkle.

Then last November, on the eve of Aloha's exit from Chapter 11, Giuliani Capital decided it deserved a bigger payday. It persuaded Banmiller to amend the original contract in order to give Giuliani a $1.5 million restructuring bonus and a total compensation of $2.9 million. Giuliani Capital argued that it all added up to a mere $369 an hour. No way, cried the flight attendants union, which was in the process of persuading 420 members to accept deep cuts in wages and benefits. The union petitioned the court to "soundly condemn" the request. Backing that position was Steven Katzman, a U.S. Trustee. Judge Faris awarded the flat fees and the $1 million bonus. But he deferred making a decision on the extra bonus. In February 2006 Aloha withdrew the request. Giuliani Capital says it acted appropriately.

With this kind of track record of managing other people's money, doesn't it make you feel a lot more secure knowing the Rudester might hold the keys to the US Treasury one day?

--Vitelius

Iran: Cold Hard Logic

From Haaretz via Laura Rozen's site, a startlingly sober conclusion from the Council of Foreign Relations, which held a "strategic dialogue" conference in New York last week with the Israeli Institute for National Security Studies. On the subject of Iran, the CFR participants had some blunt advice for their Israeli colleagues:

The message of the American participants in the meeting was clear: Neither the US nor Israel has a military option against Iran. Bombing the nuclear facilities would cause oil prices to skyrocket and would only strengthen the extremists in Tehran. In their view, Iran would respond by hitting the American soldiers stationed in Iraq and the oil facilities in the Gulf, and would begin terrorist operations in America. The year 2008 is already lost, they believe, and one should wait quietly for the end of President Bush's term of office since he conditions dialogue with the Iranians on delaying their nuclear plans. Whoever comes after Bush, certainly if he is a Democrat, will throw these conditions into the trash and will strive for a quick dialogue with Iran.

Well, one would hope so. Unfortunately, this kind of level-headed reasoning is in short supply when one surveys the Iran policy positions of the Big Three frontrunners of the Democratic Party. All three of them, as you can read here, take the same hardnosed tack, refusing to rule out the military option while proclaiming that Iran must henceforth and forevermore be denied a basic national right---the right of self-preservation by means of deterrence---which we would never forswear ourselves, and which we seem to have no trouble recognizing in a fascist police state that's served as an incubator for all manner of anti-Israeli, anti-American terrorist activity and weapons smuggling through the years, i.e., Pakistan.

Perhaps Barack, Hillary and John are simply posturing, that they don't really believe their own rhetoric at all, that they're merely trying to avoid being out-hawked on Iran by Rudy, Freddie, Mittster, and the rest of the charlatans and psychotics who comprise this year's GOP field. If that's the case, the Baron thinks they are making a serious miscalculation. Why? For the simple reason that the American people don't want another war. They want us to leave Iraq--and most likely, Afghanistan too---in fairly short order. And any Democrat who takes this "get tough on Iran" position in the 2008 is going to be perceived---correctly, in my view---of a pandering of the most insincere type. And in the long run, it will hurt, not help, their chances of defeating the GOP next year.

But as noted so pointedly here by the CFR---whose directorship could hardly be considered a gang of lefty appeasers---there really is no such thing as a military option to exercise against Iran. Not without the unleashing of some cataclysmic political and economic fallout, that is. Perhaps someone should ask Hillary or Obama if they would indeed be willing to subject the American consumer to $5 gas, and bomb blasts in Amtrak stations and bus depots across the country, for the sake of achieving an impossible goal.

The Baron has written on this before, but it bears repeating either way, and it's a good sign that the CFR has taken this commonsense stand. As unpalatable as it may be in some quarters, it is simply the only rational and intelligent conclusion to work from when formulating future Iran policy, and the sooner we all can wrap our brains around the concept, the sooner we can negotiate some meaningful nuclear concessions from Tehran, and get their nuclear program aboveboard and transparent to the outside world.

---Vitelius

Deranged and Derangerest

Battle of the media nitwits. In the blue corner, Terrible Tom, on Barack Obama's foreign policy ethos:

When negotiating with murderous regimes like Iran's or Syria's, you want Tony Soprano by your side, not Big Bird. Mr. Obama's gift for outreach would be so much more effective with a Dick Cheney standing over his right shoulder, quietly pounding a baseball bat into his palm.

Nice work. Meanwhile, in the red corner, Fanatical Fran, to her beloved Dear Leader on her way to the Heritage Foundation:

In 1937, the playright Maxwell Anderson wrote of President George Washington: There are some men who lift the age they inhabit, till all men walk on higher ground in their lifetime.

Mister President, you are such a man.

Both providing yet additional evidence that 9/11 has made a lot of Americans very, very stupid . . . Wait a minute, didn't someone else already write that?

---Vitelius

Oh, the Irony

This is rich. Rudy calls for energy conservation at a NASCAR event:

Homestead, Fla. -- As pit crews made last-minute inspections to their cars Sunday at NASCAR's Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani stressed the need for America to break its dependence on foreign oil.

. . . Giuliani said the U.S. needs to focus on domestic sources of oil, as well as oil from friendly countries like Mexico and Canada. He said conservation also will have to play a role.

And how well does NASCAR do its part in the struggle for energy conservation?

According to NASCAR, about 6,000 US gallons of fuel is consumed during a typical Nextel Cup weekend . . . At race speeds, Nextel Cup cars get 2 to 5 miles per gallon.

Sometimes, you really can not make this stuff up.

---Vitelius