WaPo article, “Bush: Clueless and Happy” by Dan Froomkin, is a very good read!

As always, Froomkin has his eye on the ball. In the preceding quote, something caught my attention; “Bush has driven the public into the arms of the Democrats.” I think there’s a lot more truth in this statement than Dan meant there to be.

Other than the obvious “anyone other than a republican!” angle, have Clinton or Obama made any (tangible) promises that screams out to you to vote for them? Do they have you “pumped up”? I’m certainly not pumped. I still have not brought myself to the point of choosing which one to get behind.

And that might also explain why John McCain is doing better than once expected. Yes, he is “Bush III“. And, yes, it will be “four more years“. But McCain does have a history of an independent following. And I fear if Clinton or Obama don’t change tactics, and soon, McCain could very well win the big prize.

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This is why America’s wealthy luvz them some Bushy:

Veto Threat Looms Over Oil Taxes Bill

WASHINGTON — If Congress passes legislation to roll back nearly $18 billion in tax breaks for large oil companies, advisers to President Bush will recommend a veto, the White House said Tuesday.

The tax legislation is scheduled to come up for a vote in the House on Wednesday.

The revenues from oil companies would be used to pay for tax incentives for wind, solar and other renewable energy sources including for ethanol produced from feedstock other than corn, and tax breaks for energy efficiency programs. [...]

Democrats anticipated House passage of the bill and hoped that the recent surge in oil prices to $100 a barrel and gasoline prices averaging well above $3 a gallon would help garner support for the measure, especially in the Senate, where it is expected to need 60 votes to overcome an almost certain GOP filibuster.

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Waxman: RNC… “has no intention of trying to restore the missing White House e-mails.”

GOP Halts Effort to Retrieve White House E-Mails

After promising last year to search its computers for tens of thousands of e-mails sent by White House officials, the Republican National Committee has informed a House committee that it no longer plans to retrieve the communications by restoring computer backup tapes, the panel’s chairman said yesterday.

The move increases the likelihood that an untold number of RNC e-mails dealing with official White House business during the first term of the Bush administration — including many sent or received by former presidential adviser Karl Rove — will never be recovered, said House Democrats and public records advocates.

A bunch of republicans lied. Let’s all put on our “big surprise!” face.

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JJ Cale
“After Midnight”

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Because…….they think this will help them? Bwaaaahaaahaaaaa

Senate Republicans have agreed to advance a bill that would cut off money for Iraq because they say it will let them tout progress in the war.

Senate Repulican Leader Mitch McConnell said that debate “would give us a chance to talk about the extraordinary progress that’s been made in Iraq over the last six months.”

The Senate voted 70-24 to begin debating the bill. A final vote was expected later this week or next week. Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid said, “It’s obvious, this is only an effort to stall.”

Earlier today, the Army’s top general said Tuesday he wants to reduce combat tours for soldiers in Iraq from 15 months to 12 months this summer - and hopes that sticks.

Gen. George Casey, the Army chief of staff, told a Senate panel he would not embrace going back to the longer tours even if President Bush decided to suspend troop reductions for the second half of the year. The Army is under serious strain from years of war-fighting, he testified, and must reduce the length of combat tours as soon as possible.

“The cumulative effects of the last six-plus years at war have left our Army out of balance, consumed by the current fight and unable to do the things we know we need to do to properly sustain our all-volunteer force and restore our flexibility for an uncertain future,” Casey said (emphasis mine)

More at the AP

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Saw this while shopping in beautiful downtown Stearns today:

Read more »

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Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results Of 2008 Election Early

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The power here surged off and right back on today……but there’s many in Florida without power today and they really haven’t said yet what has happened. The nuclear reactor near my home, Turkey Point, shut down. Street lights out…….traffic will be a nightmare if they don’t get it up before rush hour, because these people can’t drive on a good day. They’re reporting no criminal activity, but they aren’t saying what DID cause it. Oh, and when power goes out and traffic lights are out, the school buses can’t run due to a liability issue. Now what kind of sense does that make? Let’s have thousands of people running around causing more traffic to try and pick school kids up rather than having fewer vehicles on the road with school buses. Why oh why oh why oh did I ever leave Ohio. ha!

The lights went out across a wide swath of southeast Florida Tuesday, leaving up to 800,000 customers without electricity, Florida Power & Light said.

The outage struck at about 1:30 p.m. Eastern, knocking out power in towns and cities along Florida’s east coast in a corridor stretching from parts of Miami to Daytona, a spokeswoman for the company told cable news channel CNN.

She said the cause of the outage was still under investigation, adding that the company had already begun the process of bringing the power grid back on line. She declined to say when it was likely that power would be fully restored to all areas affected.

Local media initially reported that the problem may have been caused by equipment failure at a substation of Florida Power & Light, a unit of Juno Beach-based FPL Group

There were also reports that the Turkey Point nuclear power plant, a big facility near Miami, had tripped off line.

More at Market Watch

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In a WaPo op-ed, titled “McCain’s Lobbyist Baggage“, E. J. Dionne Jr. writes:

While I want to agree with Mr. Dionne on this point, it’s not being very realistic. We live in a hurried, fast food, supermarket tabloid world. People want dirt, and “journalists” are all too happy to deliver.

Mr. Dionne argues for privacy, unless there’s a “truly compelling public reason” not to. Where is the cutoff point, sir? Am I to assume you believe it to lie somewhere between John McCain and Bill Clinton? Could we have more clarification please?

And how do you feel about Sen. Craig’s bathroom antics? Should they have remained private? He says he did nothing inappropriate. Do you concur?

It’s silly to believe a man’s private life doesn’t affect his public life. Conservatives resoundly held this belief during the Clinton/Lewinsky brouhaha, and acted upon it. Were they wrong? Is our former president owed an apology? Do you think he’ll get one? Does anyone?

I think not.

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This is only news to the wealthy. The rest of us already knew things were bad.

Wholesale Inflation Rate Soars

WASHINGTON (AP) — Inflation at the wholesale level soared in January, pushed higher by rising costs for food, energy and medicine.

The Labor Department said Tuesday that wholesale prices rose 1 percent last month, more than double the 0.4 percent increase that economists had been expecting. (emphasis mine)

The January surge left wholesale prices rising by 7.5 percent over the past 12 months, the fastest pace in more than 26 years, since prices had risen at a 7.5 percent pace in the 12 months ending in October 1981.

The worse-than-expected performance was certain to capture attention at the Federal Reserve, which has chosen to combat a threatened recession by aggressively cutting interest rates in the belief that weaker economic growth will keep a lid on prices.

In other news:

- US Home Foreclosures Soar in January
- Home Prices Drop 8.9 Percent in 3 Months
- Spending on Health to Rise Dramatically

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From Reuters:

Former Democratic presidential hopeful Chris Dodd will endorse Barack Obama in his bid for the White House on Tuesday, a source close to the Obama campaign said.

Dodd, a U.S. senator from Connecticut, dropped out of the race for the Democratic presidential nomination in early January after placing sixth in the Iowa caucuses, the first nominating contest in the nation.

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