Another Obama appointee under fire: did Blair lie to Congress?

President-elect Obama is expected to name his intelligence team today: Leon Panetta for the CIA, John Brennan as a key White House adviser, and Admiral Dennis Blair as Director of National Intelligence.

 Blair, as Allan Nairn reported on Democracy Now!, was implicated in backing the perpetrators of church massacres in East Timor in 1999.

Award-winning investigative reporter Allan Nairn has revealed new information that indicates he may have lied to Congress.

The last thing Obama needs is problems with his appointees. We'll have to see what happens today. If Obama doesn't appoint him then we have a clue why. 

 

Marvel Comics Produces Special Barack Obama edition

How cool! I've been a Marvel Comic fan since I started reading their comics in 1965. Spider Man has always been one of my favorite characters. I've got to make sure to get a copy of this one for my collection.

Marvel editor-in-chief, Joe Quesada, said the idea for the "Spidey meets the President!" edition came from a statement from Obama's campaign listing 10 little known facts about the Democrat who will be America's first black president.

In recent years I've enjoyed the resurgence of Spidey in the movies. I never thought I'd see the day that Marvel's superheros would go mainstream. A whole new generation of readers seems to be as enchanted with the Spider Man character as I am.

There's one thing you can be sure of, Spider Man will be there on Obama's Inauguration Day to make sure no bad guys cause trouble!

Supporters fear retaliation for voting against Prop 8

Supporters of the ballot measure that banned gay marriage in California have filed a lawsuit seeking to block their campaign finance records from public view, saying the reports have led to the harassment of donors.

"No one should have to worry about getting a death threat because of the way he or she votes," said James Bopp Jr., an attorney representing two groups that supported Proposition 8, Protect Marriage.com and the National Organization for Marriage California.

 "This lawsuit will protect the right of all people to help support causes they agree with, without having to worry about harassment or threats."
The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in federal court in Sacramento, asks the court to order the secretary of state's office to remove all donations for the proposition from its Web site.

Click here to read the full story in today's LA Times.

Cheney claims no one saw the financial crisis coming

I've heard it all now. How come numerous financial experts were predicting a market crash two years ago but Cheney claims no one knew?

Cheney says no one saw it coming, but that's crap of the highest order! Just like Bush, he was too busy looting American taxpayers money for a war that should never happened to watch the unregulated antics of Wall Street. Both of these morons had to be aware their were holes in the financial dike built by speculators, and traders.

Of course his company Haliburton has been doing a bang-up business during the last eight years, ripping the military off, and any civilians in it's area of operations.

In an interview with the Associated Press today, Cheney said he and Bush have done nothing to be sorry for, or to apologize for during their regime.

I don't want to spend the time listing everything from their war crimes, to treason, because it would take up valuable space here. History will be their judge, and it's going to be a harsh judgement.

AP photo

Silly signs of the times illustrate diverse concepts

images above via Sally Lentz, Warren Ellis, Slurpy

images via

photo of Ann Arbor, Michigan "Robert Supply & Repair" shop, by Andy.

Obama warns that stimulus package must be passed!

President-elect Barack Obama warned of dire and long-lasting consequences if Congress doesn't pump unprecedented dollars into the national economy, making an urgent pitch today for his mammoth spending proposal in his first speech since the election.
"In short, a bad situation could become dramatically worse" if Washington doesn't go far enough to address the spreading crisis, the Democrat said as fresh economic reports showed an outlook growing increasingly grim.

Click here to see more in late breaking news from the LA Times (photo by Charles Dharapak / Associated Press)

Proof that bears don't always go potty in the woods!

Lately, here in Humboldt County, there have been alerts about rabid foxes attacking people in broad daylight.

Naturally everyone is a little on edge and some of the rabid animal reports coming in about bears just didn't sound right.

That is until an alert camper, while in a public restroom, spotted this black bear taking care of business. Sure that he had to be rabid, the camper called the cops.

The only proof of the bear's violation of the men's room is this photo. Otherwise people would have said he was crazy because when the cops arrived the bear was gone.

Animal experts said that while this is not normal bear behavior, it doesn't mean he's rabid. Especially interesting, was the camper's claim that he saw the bear wash his paws afterwards!

photo from Google funny images

Squirrels Gone Crazy: British 'Save a Squirrel by Eating One' campaign coupled with massive hunting efforts attempt to save the Red ones from the American Grays

 

With literally millions of squirrels rampaging through England, Scotland, and Wales, locals felt something needed to be done.

The Red squirrels are locals, but the cute little Gray one's have been imported from North America. The British are not new to eating squirrel, but it's not like they haven't, especially during WWII. Now squirrel is enjoying a popularity that it's never experienced before and is being featured on the menu's of fancy restaurants. How times change. This Save A Squirrel campaign seems kinda strange to me. Do the hunters just kill the Grays? Because if they don't, and also kill the Reds, It's hard to see how they are saving the Reds! Take a look at this feature story in today's New York Post by clicking here.

                                                                   Andrew Parkinson/Getty Images

China losing taste for American debt: what's next?

The Chinese are carrying over a Trillion dollars in American debts and their policy makers have been hinting for weeks that something has got to be done.

In the last five years China has spent as much as one-seventh of their entire economy output buying foreign debt, mostly American.

The Chinese economy has slowed down and now their looking at a 600 billion stimulus package for their people.

I often wondered what would happen if China called in it's markers from America. If they do now, you can be sure it's going to further rock our crippled economy.

To read more about this situation click here and see what The New York Times had to say about it.

 

Percy had to wake up Paul before the hunters arrived

"C'mon you big galoot! Wake up! We got to get out of this place," Percy pleaded.

"There's some hunters out there just looking for polar bear hair!" he shrieked.

Gertrude had packed her bag and wasn't going to wait and see if Percy could wake Paul.

She heard that Penguins made a good stew, and wasn't going to hang around and find out.

Joe the Plumber Goes to War as Reporter for Conservative's

JOE THE WAR CORRESPONDENT.... Samuel "Joe" Wurzelbacher ("Joe the Plumber") hasn't had too much to do since the election, and it's not as if he's been missed. He popped up about a month ago to bash John McCain.

Now, it appears the unlicensed plumber/campaign prop, looking for a 16th minute of fame, has a new gig lined up.

Joe The Plumber is putting down his wrenches and picking up a reporter's notebook.

The Ohio man who became a household name during the presidential campaign says he is heading to Israel as a war correspondent for the conservative Web site pjtv.com.

Samuel J. Wurzelbacher (WUR'-zuhl-bah-kur) says he'll spend 10 days covering the fighting.

Wurzelbacher isn't a journalist, has no background in reporting, and has no background in foreign policy. His most substantive thought on the Middle East was his stated belief on the campaign trail that Barack Obama would mean "death to Israel," lunacy that even Fox News was uncomfortable with.

And yet, PJTV.com, a project of Pajamas Media, thinks Wurzelbacher is a great choice to be a correspondent to cover a war in Israel. For the entire article by Steve Benen and featuring Hilzoy of Political Animal, click here.