I can't believe it's not a democracy!

How very brave of him:

Bill Clinton: “I Was Wrong About Gay Marriage”. Might have been nice if Bill had said this, I dunno, while he was fucking president. Or when his wife was running for office. Well, the democrats learned the game from them: ask for support from the gays, meet them in controlled settings (i.e., no media), then tell them "the time's not right" when the gays have the audacity to ask for their rights. Fuck you, Bill.

Thanks to Jim for the link.

Crazy and cheap:

Coburn's STD Lecture to Congressional Interns Put On Hold Due to Pizza Dispute. Don't click the link--it goes to Fox. That said, the long and short is that Coburn gives an annual lecture that is in danger of being canned this year. Why? Fox writes: Capitol Hill interns might miss out this summer on a famed lecture from Sen. Tom Coburn on the dangers of sexually transmitted diseases -- all because of a dispute over who will pay for their pizza.

You really can't make this shit up.

Thanks to Mr. Slice for the link.

Tim Geithner, Wall Street's whore:

Geithner, Member and Overseer of Finance Club. The New York Times tells us what we already knew....Geithner isn't going to threaten the status quo. And that means the bankers and Wall Street get to continue getting rich by stealing the pennies out of our pockets. Here's a taste: Today, Mr. Geithner is Treasury secretary, and as he seeks to rebuild the nation’s fractured financial system with more taxpayer assistance and a regulatory overhaul, he finds himself a locus of discontent.

Even as banks complain that the government has attached too many intrusive strings to its financial assistance, a range of critics — lawmakers, economists and even former Federal Reserve colleagues — say that the bailout Mr. Geithner has played such a central role in fashioning is overly generous to the financial industry at taxpayer expense.

An examination of Mr. Geithner’s five years as president of the New York Fed, an era of unbridled and ultimately disastrous risk-taking by the financial industry, shows that he forged unusually close relationships with executives of Wall Street’s giant financial institutions.

His actions, as a regulator and later a bailout king, often aligned with the industry’s interests and desires, according to interviews with financiers, regulators and analysts and a review of Federal Reserve records.

* * *

In fashioning the bailout, his drive to use taxpayer money to backstop faltering firms overrode concerns that such a strategy would encourage more risk-taking in the future. In one bailout instance, Mr. Geithner fought a proposal to levy fees on banks that would help protect taxpayers against losses.

Click, read, get depressed. As soon as I heard that Obama was going to appoint Geithner as Treasury Secretary and have that hopeless piece of shit, Larry Summers, as an economic advisor, I felt that we we were going to get screwed. Why no, it doesn't feel good to be right...again.

Funny, I don't remember Steny expressing outrage when the rest of us were having our e-mail and phone calls illegally harvested by the NSA:

Hoyer Voices Concern Over Wiretapping of Members. I hope that congress members don't expect us (i.e., the masses) to share their outrage over the feds wiretapping them. Personally, I hope they are all scared shitless. It's true: what goes around, comes around. Deal, asshole.

Link via Atrios.

Just clap harder dammit:

Bush: US is not headed into recession. Delusional? You bet. Unless, that is, W thinks we are going to skip a recession and just jump straight into a depression. Wait, did I just suggest that W thinks? Ignore that.

Yet another slimy republican looks to slither away:

Senator Pete Domenici Expected to Retire. The Fix, washingtonpost.com's politics blog, reports: Veteran Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) is expected to announce tomorrow that he will retire from the Senate in 2008, according to several informed sources, a decision that further complicates an already difficult playing field for Republicans next November.

Domenici has struggled with health problems over the last several years and has been dogged by questions about the role he may have played in the firing of U.S. Attorney David C. Iglesias in Albuquerque. As a result, he had been long been rumored as a potential retirement. Domenici's Senate office did not return a call this afternoon, but sources close to the senator say he will fly home to New Mexico tomorrow to make the announcement that he is retiring.

I wonder if Domenici thinks that retiring will stave off indictment? I don't know why he's worried. After all, I don't see the white house racing to fulfill outstanding subpoenas and, more importantly, I don't see the house or senate judiciary committees doing a fucking thing to actually enforce the subpoenas despite having the tools to do so. That said, I love the spin that is being pushed by the GOP with regard to Domenici's decision to retire: Republican insiders insist that Domenici's decision to retire had everything to do with his health and nothing to do with poll numbers or the U.S. attorney controversy.

Yep, nothing to see here, just move along.

Will wonders never cease:

Santorum eyes gubernatorial bid. Yes, little Ricky Santorum, after being handed his ass in November 2006 by that marginal democrat, the underwhelming Bob Casey, Jr., has set his sites on Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

While I look forward to the opportunity to see Santorum get his teeth kicked in again, I am mindful that we are talking about Pennsylvania, which is a state which James Carville, speaking of mendacious shits, accurately described as "Philadelphia and Pittsburgh with Alabama in between." So James Carville got one thing right, but a broken clock, etc. Look at his other judgment calls, like the thing he picked to be his wife and mother of his (sure to be homely) children. As much as I hate the democratic consultant class, knowing that Carville has to fuck Matalin from time to time almost makes me feel sorry for him. Unless, of course, she let's him do things that most proper women wouldn't consider. Just throwing that out there.

I guess this will make it difficult for Guiliani to court the family values crowd:

Giuliani Estranged From His Children -- Some Say Personal Problems May Hurt Prospects. Ya think? AOLNews.com reports: It doesn't look like Rudy Giuliani 's two children will have a role in his presidential campaign. According to press reports, the GOP frontrunner's third marriage has alienated his son, Andrew, 21, and daughter, Caroline, 18, from their father.

Giuliani's 21-year-old son, Andrew, told the New York Times that he would be too busy working on his golf game to participate in his father's presidential campaign.

"There's obviously a little problem that exists between me and his wife," the younger Giuliani told the newspaper. "And we're trying to figure that out. But as of right now it's not working as well as we would like."

Apparently Guiliani has also alienated his daughter, Caroline. I guess it doesn't help that "[t]he New York Daily News reported that Giuliani rarely spends time with his children and that he had failed to attend many important events in their lives, including Andrew's golf tournaments and Caroline's school plays."

It's interesting that this piece seems to be the first nation wide story that highlights a personal issue that will likely hurt Guiliani's run. Up to now, everything I've read suggested that Guiliani was the frontrunner among the republicans running for their party's nomination. I wonder what will happen when this story is followed by others revealing that Guiliani married his cousin (Wife #1), cheated on Wife #2, the mother of his children, married one of his mistresses (Wife #3), likes to perform in drag and lived with his gay pal and his pal's much younger lover during his separation from Wife #2.

Lieberman sure knows how to take care of his friends:

Lovefest between Bloomberg, Lieberman ends over security dollars. Newsday.com: The lovefest between New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Sen. Joe Lieberman ended Monday. Like many relationships, it fell apart in a fight over money.

Just months ago, Bloomberg was one of the senator's fondest political friends as Lieberman fought to keep his seat in Connecticut despite losing the Democratic primary. Bloomberg personally campaigned for Lieberman, raised money for him and even sent political operatives to help.

What a difference a bill makes.

On Monday, Bloomberg wrote a "Dear Joe" letter _ actually, it began "Dear Chairman Lieberman" _ to spell out his frustration with homeland security legislation recently approved by the Senate committee headed by Lieberman, who is officially an independent aligned with the Democrats.

The bill, called Improving America's Security Act, aims to revise the way federal anti-terror grants are handed out to cities and states. Bloomberg came to Washington last month to testify before Lieberman's committee, urging them to give a greater share to those cities at greatest risk of attack.

* * *

In his letter, the mayor did not remind the senator of all the campaign help the billionaire mayor gave him, but he made very clear his displeasure with Lieberman's bill.

The mayor called the bill "a major step backward," because it lumps anti-terror money in with anti-flood and anti-hurricane funds, and allocates more dollars according to population instead of risk.

New York lawmakers have long complained that a population-based approach spreads money around indiscriminately, rather than pooling it for the highest-profile, most threatened cities like New York, Washington, and Los Angeles.

Guess this will kill the rumors that Lieberman and Bloomberg might run together on a third party ticket.

And an aside: I have a friend who was a D.A. in a former life. She told me that some cops called a killing of a drug dealer by another drug dealer a "public service killing." That is, if things worked out as they hoped, the killer would be caught and put behind bars and there were two fewer drug dealers on the street. Yes, that's harsh. But I read this article and thought, does Bloomberg want me to cry because his buddy Lieberman just took a big dump on him? Because the idea that Lieberman just shat upon one of his political buddies--a man who thought it was just fine for the police to arrest peaceful protesters and innocent bystanders during the Republican National Convention--doesn't exactly bring on the tears. Except that New York City, which has to be in the top three on the al Qaeda hit list, is going to get less money under this act, and Lieberman, the Chair of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, is just fine with that. Did I mention that I live in New York City?

Link via Firedoglake.

"Straight talker" John McCain is well on his way to becoming

more delusional than Joe Biden: McCain condemns anti-surge resolution. More delusional than Joe Biden? Is that possible? Yes it is, because polls show that most Americans want the troops out from Iraq and do not support W's escalation plan, but McCain is convinced that supporting the "surge" is his ticket to the White House.