Even the Squirrels Want Change

Here's Johnny!

It comes around the 21 second mark—McCain says horseshit during the break. Classy, John, classy.

I Want My Bailout

If Wall Street gets its $700 billion, shouldn't I be able to just write off a couple of my credit cards? Trust me, they are small potatoes compared to that disaster.

That being said, this whole situation cries out for a giant WTF. I mean really folks. I just don't know what to think about this nightmare. So let's start with what I do know.

First, I don't know crap about economics, never took a class and consider my major mathematical accomplishment to be that I do balance my checkbook. However these banks sold mortgages around to each other is something that simply escapes me. It just makes no sense. Maybe banks shouldn't do things that don't make sense to the mathematically and economically challenged individuals like me and we wouldn't be in this whole stitch. Too late, and we are, so moving on.

Second, I really don't like the idea of handing over money to the jackasses who didn't know how to deal with it in the first place. You might as well hand heroin to a junkie and tell them to enjoy. Not smart. That being said, it would seem to me after yesterday's nose diving stock numbers that if nothing else this money will make those dudes and dudettes in the ridiculous jackets chill out and stop gesturing as wildly. (Which always leads me to think of the scene from Ferris Bueller where they visit the Chicago Exchange—classic. But I digress.)

Thirdly, if giving these asshats a big, fat check is the only solution, then just freakin' do it already. Stop your dithering, Republicans. It isn't exactly like you guys have been the party of fiscal responsibility the last eight years. And you pick NOW to finally stand up to Dubya? Really, killing thousands of our men and women in uniform was something you could get behind, but handing fistfuls of cash to your Wall Street cronies and funders—that wakes you up in the middle of the night? Again I say—WTF? The GOP has been funneling money to these people with their tax loop holes and other manner of nonsense for years and god knows they have returned the favor, pouring money into your campaigns. So way to develop a conscience now you chicken shits.

Lastly, while I say better late than never on the GOP and this whole conscience thing they are giving a whirl, I still can't help but catch the faint whiff of bullshit in the air. I mean, come on! Nancy Pelosi gets up there yesterday, says vote for this and by the way, you and your monkey in the oval office got us into this mess in the first place and what do the House Republicans do? They grab up their blankies and sippy cups and hightail it out of there. So not only did you create this disaster in the first place with all of your deregulation, and you won't cop to it, but now you won't do anything to fix it because some "woman" insulted you.

Dear god. Go the fuck home and see what your constituents have to say about this. God knows I don't want to be moving my family into a refrigerator box ghetto anytime soon or (shudder) even worse, my parents basement.

Behind Blue Eyes

Leave it to Paul Newman to go out as quietly as possible and with a whole hunk of class. Thank god the man was in films, because he sure was pretty to look at. And I highly recommend his pasta sauces.

Where to Start?

Gosh, you get buried under some freelance projects (sorry gentle readers, the paying gigs come first) and the world goes to shit all around you.

As one of my fave gossip blogs so aptly reminded me the other day, when you don't know where to start, start at the very beginning, per the wisdom of Ms. Julie Andrews. You can't go wrong with Mary Poppins guiding you.

So the debate. The spouse and I were all excited about Friday night's debate. With the onslaught of cooler weather in our neck of the woods, we were dreaming of crackling fires and bowls of oyster stew to sustain us through the two hours of bullshit. Alas, the fire was not to be, but the bullshit was in abundance.

McCain seemed a bit twitchy to start, but evened out some as things went on. His shout out to Ted Kennedy came off to me as one of the lowest forms of pandering. And while I know the audience was supposed to keep their traps shut, the deafening silence that accompanied several of McCain's efforts to joke seemed telling to this little liberal lover. 

Now for my guy—I was displeased that Obama's efforts to get a word in often came off as sounding hesitant or unsure (or at least that was how my Fox News ear translators heard it). But I do think that there were some murmurs of approval/laughter for his efforts at humor.

Overall, I wasn't blown away by either one of the men Friday night, but of course I agreed with more to most of what Obama was saying. But admittedly McCain would have to start performing a lobotomy on himself on live TV for me to even begin to imagine agreeing with him on much.

And then gentle readers, sometime around 10.20 I started to nod off. I apologize, but that is just too late an hour for this delicate southern belle to be exposed to. Nothing good happens after 9pm anyway, I always say.

412

That "my friends" is the number of votes McCain has missed during his latest tenure in the Senate. That equals 64.1% of the votes taken. That is 15% more missed votes than Sen. Tim Johnson, who you may recall, was out of work for several months due to a, wait for it, a brain hemorrhage. 

This number makes McCain's recent concern about being in Washington for the bank bailout talks seem even more false than it already did.

Cluck, Cluck

McCain is playing a seriously demented game of chicken and I think he is going to lose for it. This whole will-he-or-won't-he debate thing is one of the craziest political gambits I have ever seen. Not to mention the fact that for someone who says he has suspended his campaign, he has had a lot of campaign activities going on—his own interview with Katie Couric (that Letterman is still steaming over); a fundraiser headed up by his campaign manager; and the fact that he doesn't seem to be helping with the bank bailout plan. 

Now from some of what I have read it doesn't look like the rules will allow Obama to do a townhall thing or take questions from the audience if McCain isn't there. It would be considered giving Obama time that McCain isn't getting and the election board ain't going to have that. (If I am wrong about that, feel free to correct me, but show your sources, people!)

In other news, Palin's second half of her Katie Couric interview might have tanked even worse than the first. When she started talking about Putin invading our airspace my first thoughts were that she was referring to the space between her ears. Ugh.

I think Wanda Sykes said it best on Leno the other night, "I'm a feminist, but I'm sorry ... that woman's crazy!" See more below.