Steppin' out....

I'm doing some stuff over this weekend so blogging will probably be near non-existent. I expect to be back to regular service by Monday or Tuesday,

....so, a thought exercise while I'm gone.

How different would it all be if Hillary Clinton had won the Presidency? Would the environment be more toxic or less? (Figure more partisan and less racist.)

Would we have a healthcare bill? What would have been the tone on the bailouts? What would e the agenda now?

And, for bonus points, Imagine a McCain/Palin presidency...

Iran a year on

The Iranian government raises security as the one year anniversary of Ahmadinejad's dubious reelection rolls around.

Today

The World Cup starts today.

Because many can't watch the games live, I will not post anything about results until about 8:30 or 9:00 PM local.

A National Shame

(WaPo, USAToday) The Army has found hundreds of cases of mishandling, misplacing, or improperly buried remains at Arlington National Cemetery.

Oil now, oil forever.....

Government experts now say the BP oil spill is probably double their earlier estimates, although that only puts their estimate at 25,000-40,000 barrels a day, which, if that number has been consistent, is 5 to 6 times the size of the Valdez spill so far.

Probably more newsworthy is that BP is now saying they won't be able to plug the leak until at least August.

Too little. Very Late

The Pope finally begs forgiveness for priest abuse and promises the church will no longer tolerate it (after how many decades that they (and he) did?)

Iran

The US gets a new set of sanctions against Iran. The sanctions freeze the international assets of many semi-governmental institutions like some of the Revolutionary Guard's external businesses.

Also, these sanctions are in place prohibiting "any activity related to ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons."

That would seem to be a significant expansion.

Also, Brazil and Turkey voted no on the Security Council resolution, presumably in preference to their own proposed nuclear solution in conjunction with Iran.

N. Korea

The NYTimes takes an interesting look at N. Korea from interviews with defectors.

Thought for the Day

The media is buying this "Republican year of the woman" crap.

Did they ever cover the 170 years of the fat, white, old males?

Dead Meme

Remember three or four months ago when there was all that media about all the black candidates the Republicans had running for office?

Well, most of them lost in primaries.

So, now the media has decided that this is the year of the Republican woman, instead.

(And no one in the media seems to be talking about the rather abrupt Republican move towards the right....)

California passes "open" primaries

Without too much press, California passed a new law that would change their primary system. Every potential candidate from every party will now run in a single primary with the top two vote getters moving on to something like an election day run off.

This will really change the pre-primary process and will force the parties into strongarming potential candidates out of races so that they can guarantee one candidate makes the November ballot..

N. Korea's crisis

While I was unable to post yesterday (thanks, blogger!,) there was one event that I should probably note. North Korea underwent a rather unusual turnover in a few key government positions yesterday, installing hardcore loyalists to the Kim regime in key posts.

Kim Jong Il himself attended the meetings to insure that his presence was strongly felt (...rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated.)

Alot of this N. Korean erraticism seems to be coming in advance of a changeover of power as Kim Jong Il prepares to install his younger son as the new leader for life. It may get still uglier when the new son tries to delineate his control.

Horrible

Marines are trying to kill themselves at a record pace this year despite a 2009 program aimed at stemming the problem, according to Marine Corps data.

Despite all the rhetoric when war was "in," how much care are these guys getting? How many are suffering long term PTSD or other reintegration issues? How many are self treating with alcohol and drugs? How many are non-functional or homeless?

Blogger was down all day

Sorry for the dearth of posts, but Blogger has been down until the last hour.

Maybe later. Definitely tomorrow.

Mike
.

Thought for the Day

How much more aggressive would the coverage of the oil spill be if it had occurred under the Bush administration?

(Admittedly, it was their regulatory changes that helped it happen, but, still....)

Bobby Jindal vs. Science, again....

A lot has been made that, just a short time ago, La. Gov. and former Presidential hopeful Bobby Jindal made that speech decrying government spending (volcano monitoring!,) and that now he is asking for huge government spending to try and protect his state from the oil spill, but....

However, I don't think enough has been made on just how bad his position has been on the science of his spending positions. After Iceland, doesn't volcano monitoring make a little more sense?

And, this crazy billion dollar berm system he's been using as his political flail, in fact, is not generally perceived to be that good of an idea.

You got to wonder about a guy who thinks in such simple terms.