"Would You Like Fries With . . . I Mean, Can I See Your Passport?"

The media is having a ball with the failed Christmas-day bombing attempt, but the incident is actually making me feel safer.
The 9/11 conspirators were intelligent, competent professionals. If after 9 years, that pathetic nut-job on the Northwest airliner is the best excuse for a terrorist that al-Qaida can come up with, they must really be hurting.

Also, this incident will finally force TSA to upgrade its staff. Instead of employing minimum-wage McDonalds rejects to protect our citizens, it might now start staffing airports with trained professionals as is the policy in other vulnerable countries.

Let me wish you good luck in the new year--you're probably going to need it.

I Try To Be A Compassionate Person, But . . .

What a strange coincidence! After posting yesterday's blog I turned on the radio right in the middle of a news clip about a pedestrian being run over by a train. The story was presented as a great tragedy, as it truly was for the hapless victim and his family--but maybe not for the gene pool.
Since they can veer out of control and end up in unexpected places, people are often hit by cars. Folks have been hit by cars while standing on their own front lawns (especially when people like me are driving).
However:
Since they tend to follow a set of tracks, the whereabouts of a train is fairly predictable and consistent. Also, they are relatively large and loud, allowing them to be seen and heard at quite a distance.
My condolences to the family of yesterday's train victim, but let's be honest--if it wasn't the train, wouldn't it have been something else?

Too Bad Those Kids Weren't In A Car Or Truck

Now that some lunatic has tried to blow up an airliner just before landing, experts have advised laws restricting passengers--just before landing. (These are the same experts who recognized the danger of sharp things after the 9/11 attacks, and the danger of liquid explosives after someone tried using them.)

The logic here reminds me of the logic leading to the federal law requiring buses to stop at all RR crossings (even when no train is coming).
Ever wonder about that one?
Back in the 1950's, a bus was hit by a train and several children died. Congress instantly determined that buses must be particularly prone to being hit by trains (to the extent that they are endangered even when no train is coming) and enacted the law that is still in effect. Cars, trucks, and motorcycles, of course, cannot be hit by trains--only buses.

Yes Prudential, There Is A Santa Claus

Congratulations to the insurance industry for receiving the best Christmas gift ever: 30 million new customers--who they can continue screwing as usual. (Yes, they will have to accept the elderly and people with pre-existing conditions but there is nothing to keep them from charging these individuals, or the taxpayers subsidizing them, at several times the standard rate.)

Rather than develop the single-payer option enjoyed by every other civilized democracy in the world, Washington has chosen to stick with insurance care over health care.
Wealthy investors are already scrambling to by stock in the major insurance companies. In other words, Wall Street and the giant corporations have won again and the American citizens have lost.

Obama says he is 90 per cent satisfied with the health-care bill. This reminds me of the Los Vegas casinos that advertise "Guaranteed 90 per cent Winners!" They guarantee that for every dollar spent by the suckers they will get $.90 back. Not a bad deal compared to what just got pulled on the U.S. taxpayer.

Try Oslo For That Last-Minute Christmas Shopping

Obama might need a few Republican legislators to vote for his health-care bill.
Here's an incentive that he could offer them:
"FREE NOBEL PEACE PRIZES TO THE FIRST SENATORS OR REPS. TO SIGN UP!"

P.S.
Holiday Hint: Those prizes make excellent "stocking stuffers"!
Merry Christmas

Beware! Hard Times Are The Devil's Workshop

The "tea partyers" and the rest of their ilk scare the shit out of me--and they should do likewise for any American who has ever read a history book.
True populism has generally led to social progress. But reactionary, right-wing populism has always led to one thing: FASCISM--and this is exactly the direction in which demagogues like Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, etc. would take us.

War's Good For Business--Let's Invest Another Generation

The U.S. is the world's largest manufacturer of weapons. We have a foreign policy that absolutely insures that we will be perpetually at war. Probably just a coincidence, right?

Democracy, American Style

Obama's Afghanistan policy illustrates the madness of having only 2 political parties in this large, diverse country. If I wanted another warrior president, I would have voted for John McCain.

My representation consists of 3 people in Washington and 1 in Juneau--all of whom, nearly without exception, vote exactly the opposite as I would on every issue that comes up. (Yesterday, our lone gun-toting imbecile assclown congressman, Don Young, voted AGAINST a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives that included millions in financial aid for Alaska(!). This is the same man who wants to end funding for the NEA and National Public Radio/TV, and who proposed using tax dollars to add a bust of Ronald Reagan to Mount Rushmore.)
Ain't democracy grand!

Norwegians Attempt To Insure Their Own Protection

Well, Obama heads to Oslo today to accept his Nobel Peace Prize.

I can think of only one explanation for this travesty. Now that Obama has chosen to continue our policy of randomly attacking countries that pose no threat to our own (Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Korea, Chile, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Grenada, etc.), the Nobel judges want to stroke our president so that he will not invade Norway.

Dear Grim Reaper,

So far this year you have taken my favorite actress Farah Fawcett, my favorite actor Patrick Swayze, and my favorite dancer Michael Jackson.
I would just like to remind you that my favorite TV personality is Glenn Beck, my favorite radio host is Rush Limbaugh, and my favorite politician is Sarah Palin.

Merry Christmas,
Joe

No Comment

Many are drawing comparisons between Lyndon Johnson and Vietnam, Obama and Afghanistan.
There is one giant flaw in this comparison: Johnson could not see how the Vietnam war would end or what its consequences would be. Obama has this knowledge.

Albert Einstein claimed that doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results each time is the definition of insanity.

Tunnel At The End Of The Light

I had hoped for a change--a bright new light.

Where does fighting an idea (i.e. hating America) end? Every time we kill someone in a country we've invaded, we create a hundred new enemies. When we chase them they flee to other countries and spread their hatred there. Do we now have to attack Pakistan? Iran? Yemen? Somalia? Indonesia? Where does it end?

By escalating the Afghan war, Obama has only succeeded in guaranteeing that we will be AT WAR FOREVER.

U.S. Insurgents In Afghanistan To Instruct Afghans On How To Repel Insurgents

I keep hearing that we are needed in Afghanistan to train their soldiers. Afghan fighters are legendary. They have repulsed every invading army for centuries, including a Russian force that was as large and modern as our own.
What are we going to teach them--how to get rid of us?

U.S. To Send 30,000 More Taliban Recruiters To Afghanistan

The insanity continues. It's all politics. In his effort to please everyone, Obama has squandered an opportunity to initiate the change that he promised. What a huge disappointment.