Not a lot going on this morning, I don’t think. St. John McCain says he doesn’t want Obama to fail. Gee, that’s big of ya, John. Used to be that kinda went without saying, but I reckon now that the dittoheads are running the GOP (maybe they ought to change that to BFP), I guess everybody’s gotta get on the record. Just watched a fascinating story on the lo-cal news. Turns out, people aren’t paying with checks as much as they used to, and are using debit and credit cards instead. Talk about breaking news.

Got an invitation to join a new local Meetup group to “meet with local fans of the nationally syndicated talk show host, Glenn Beck.” I can’t think of anything more enlightening than wasting spending time with a group full of Glenn Beck fans. It would totally be worthwhile. Too bad I’m busy whenever it is they’re meeting.

I think this loss of an hour caught up to me this morning. I’m fwiggin’ tired.

I’m not a churchgoer (other than weddings and funerals, I haven’t been since I was a kid), and I reckon that’s a good thing, ‘cuz church seems to be a pretty dangerous place these days. I don’t know what this guy’s story is, but I can’t help but think it’s all part of the hatred fomented by the Limpricks and savage Weiners (not to mention the Falwells and Pat Roberts) out there. “As ye sow, so shall ye reap.” Hey, I guess I actually did get a little something out of church, after all. Too bad so few of the Kristians out there don’t seem to have been paying attention.

So, looks like the octomom is shopping her birth tape around for seven figures (I know this, because it the single most important thing going on in the world). Really? Somebody would pay to see that? You’d have to pay me to watch that. If that’s something you want to see, just turn on Animal Planet and sooner or later you’ll find a Great Dane or something giving birth to a litter of pups. Same thrill, I would think (and a lot cheaper).

“Save Rocky, the Snakehead Fish” t-shirts will be available soon. I don’t know if they’ll keep Rocky out of the frying pan, but Rocky’s dad says the money will be going to benefit animal rescue groups. I see no reason why the DEC feels compelled to execute a ten year old pet fish that lives in a 200 gallon aquarium. Certainly, they could look the other way or give him a special permit or something. This is the same DEC, you may recall, that tranquilized a poor harmless little black bear to death last May. Bastids.

Friend-o-swift boaters T. Boone Pickens (who also worked to get Bush selected over Al Gore, and who admitted to voting for John McCain and the “Drill Baby, Drill” party on Bill Maher this week) says it’s not about Political Parties. Glad to hear it, Boonie, and, while I’m on board with the whole wind thing, I have to say “fuck you very much” for eight years of Bush – that, thank goodness, didn’t turn into 8 – 16 years of McCain/Palin.

Lots of rain around here over the weekend. Walking on it, the ground feels as though you’re walking around on a big wet sponge, and there’s lots of flooding all over the place. If it would stay in the 50’s, I wouldn’t mind so much, but 38 degrees and rain just plain sucks. I’d rather have snow. Especially since I just ordered new Gore-Tex^® gloves and an Elmer Fudd (or maybe Floyd R. Turbo) hat. By the time they get here, it’ll be too warm to wera ’em. Now I’ll have to try not to lose them before next winter.

Oh well, time to be a happy idiot, and struggle for the legal tender. Have a happy Monday.

On Press the Meat, l’il Lindsey Graham lusts in his heart for Chuck Schumer. Then it’s a roundtable with CNBC’s Erin Burnett, disgraced former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich, and U.S. News & World Report’s Mort Zuckerman.

Faze the Nation has Poppa John Boehner, White House Director Of Office And Budget Management, Peter Orszag, columnist Kathleen PArker, and the WaPost’s Michael Fletcher.

Weaselface Wallace has St. John McCain and Tim Kaine on Fux News Sunday, plus the usual fuxheads.

At the Goebbels network, George Snufalufagus has Claire McCaskill, Evan Bayh, dickface Richard Shelby, and the head of the US Chamber of Commerce, Thomas Donohue. The it’s a roundtable with Cokie “the hag” Roberts, George :jerk: Will, Davey the douchebag Brooks, an EJ Dionne.

Later, on 60 Minutes, Scott Pelley tells you what to do when your bank fails, and LEsley Stahl tells us why eyewitness testimony lands so many innocent people in jail.

Well, I reckon I better go and set the blog’s clock ahead an hour, or we might miss Big Love tonight. Have a good one.

It’s a beautiful day. The sun’s out, it’s 47 degrees and the snow is quickly vanishing. It Looks like it’s going to be nice to get outside.

The Wingnuts, meanwhile, seemed to have been stung by the idea that folks don’t believe they have a plan of their own and so now they have one: a spending freeze. And, like so many wingnut solutions,this one will make things worse. They really need to forget that stuff about creating their own reality and instead of just making stuff up, read a little history. Perhaps then they wouldn’t be so gung-ho about channeling Herbert Hoover. (J. Edgar either, for that matter.)

In Red Hook there is the 2nd oldest housing project in NYC. It was opened in 1933 to house the dockworkers and their families who were made destitute by the Great Depression. With the opening of Red Hook Public Housing, the Hooverville, a shanty-town 2 blocks away, was demolished and turned into a park. But many Hoovervilles persisted, named for the president whose spending freeze helped create them.

I hope we don’t have to live through another depression. People who did never could shake the experience.

It’s already 45 degrees out there this morning, and if the sun comes out, we could get near 60! Whatever will I wear to the park?

I dunno, there’s just something disturbing about Rachel Maddow being on The View. Leno? Kinda odd, I guess. But The View? And getting “praise” from that twit Elizabeth Hassebeck? Oy.

Speaking of disturbing, why doesn’t Michele Bachmann just shut the fuck up? I mean, she’s stupid, even by Republican standards. Minnesota, dude, what were you guys thinking?

Oh well, the morning seems to be slipping away from me here, so I better get ready to get going. Happy Friday, y’all.

Remember grumpy old grampa McCain, who couldn’t use a BlackBerry by himself and didn’t have a clue about the Intertubes? Well, the times they are a-changin’ I guess, and now gramps is in a Twitter fight with Oregon congressman Earl Blumenauer over a measly $951,500 for the “Oregon Solar Highway.” Apparently St. McCain doesn’t see the benefits of using highway right-of-way to generate solar power. Well, why would he? It’s not like Arizona gets much sunshine, right?

Here’s a shocker: turns out bad marriages take a heavy toll on women. Men? Not so much.

Looks like fellow SU alum and current VP Joe Biden will be coming back to town to give the commencement address at the SU graduation in May. He gave a very entertaining commencement address at the SU College of Law when I was working there (his second of three), and I expect his address in May will be equally fun to watch.

Norm Coleman says he wants a new election in MN, but Harry Reid says “no way.” If anybody actually gave a shit what Harry Reid says, I guess I’d feel better.

Speaking of whores, everybody’s favorite patron of prostitutes (well, female prostitutes, anyway; Ted Haggard – the guy who prayed himself straight – is probably the overall #1), David Vitter, continues to champion family values, and is offering an amendment to the omnibus spending bill that would forbid the distribution of any public money to Planned Parenthood. Because, hey, when you knock up your prostitute, she should do the right thing and raise your bastard child on her own (surprise, surprise, Senator Family Values voted against expanding SCHIP, too). And no money for child care while she’s out walking the streets trying to keep a roof over their heads, either, damnit!

Speaking of health care, looks like Barbara Bush is recovering nicely from heart surgery (I was a bit surprised to hear she actually had one, personally). Ol’ Bar’s just as good looking at 83 as she was at 60. I’m just glad to know that Medicare covered all her bills at the Methodist DeBakey Heart & Vascular Center. 🙄 I sure do hope she’s signed up for Part D, ‘cuz those meds can be awfully expensive.

Speaking of expenses, time to get out there and earn some money to pay for mine. Have a good day, eh?

The “stimulus” money has hit the streets, so it’s time to get out there and spend it. I’m hoping that the proposed high-speed rail system becomes a reality, since it really seems it’s about time.

Otherwise, another day of below-average temperatures here, but it’s supposed to warm up and be in the 50’s before you know it (also the case with me, though I’m not quite as excited about that).

Have a good hump day.

Yesterday, the owners of the oldest TV station in Syracuse – Channel 5 – called its employees together, told ’em they were great, and then told them to pack up their shit and hit the road. Well, 40 of them, anyway. After more than 60 years on the air, Channel 5 will now be run and operated out of the studios of another station, owned by Granite Broadcasting, which already operates two local channels and owns another 20 or so in the US. Network TV won’t be affected of course, but it’s one more blow for diversity in local news. And a pretty sad day, really.

Today is the day that geeks have been anticipating since 2/2/04: a day when the month and day are both the square root of the year (well, the last two-digits of the year, but who could possible need a four-digit year, anyway). Yep, 3/3/09. And if you think it’s no big deal, just remember this – it won’t happen again until April 4, 2016. How can this possible not be a national holiday? Oh, that’s right. We honor magical fat guys in red suits that fly around handing out presents (sounds like a goddamn socialist to me; NORAD ought to shoot the bastid down), old dead white guys, magic (socialist) rabbits, and genocidal Italians who “discovered” a place where millions of people were already living, but math and science? Pshaw.

Speaking of square roots, I believe my retirement money is now the square root of what it was a year ago. The market took another dump yesterday, closing below 7,000 (way below), and at a 12-year low. I’m getting pretty tired of the whiny friggin’ “market,” personally. “Wah, wah, we don’t want regulation. We want taxpayer money.”

Well, screw you, you whiny pieces of crap. It’s just too bad you seem determined to take me down with you. But I got you fooled; with my blood pressure, I’ll be dead long before I could ever retire. I was watching a couple of minutes of the Today Show yesterday, and Matt “the rat” was grilling the CEO of AIG pretty hard. I thought, gee, Matt, you rich fuckers sure get touchy when the market drops. Too bad you didn’t give a crap when Bush was invading Iraq for no good reason.

Another cold day here. It’s in the single digits, but with the wind it feels like twenty below. This is the time of year when winter really starts getting old. Oh well, at least we set the clocks ahead this weekend (which always seems to irritate Granny). I hate to lose an hour, but the more daylight at the end of the day, the better. Now if it would just get a little warmer.

It’s kinda interesting to see a snow storm heading up the coast that we don’t have to worry about here. At least, as things stand right now. It’s also kinda funny to see southern cities shut down by “nearly a half foot of snow.” People bitch about the taxes here in NY, but all those snow plows and all that rock salt costs money. Here, it’s just cold. And it looks like we’ve got a few more days of cold weather before we get a little break.

We’re still trying to recover from two days of moving the kid, here. I am, anyway. Damn, I must be getting old. All my shit hurts from furniture wrestling. Next time somebody moves, they better hire somebody.

Another $30 billion for AIG. I’m not really sure who the hell they are, but I’m sure this is all in my best interest, so that’s cool. As long as there are no strings attached, because that would be bad for the free market, and the invisible hand and all that. Except, how come the invisible hand keeps giving us the very visible finger?

After moving junior yesterday, pretty much everything I’ve got hurts like hell today, and I’m still beat. So this is gonna be a quickie

Press the Meat has SecDef Robert Gates and a roundtable with Harold “where’re the white women” Ford, Jr., asshole Republican (I know, that’s redundant) Mike Murphy, Dee Dee “sure, I’ll have another one” Myers, Mornin’ Joe Scarborough.

Faze the Nation has Rahm Emanuel.

Fux News Sunday has Joint Chiefs Chairman Mike Mullen, Krazy Jon Kyl and Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan, along with a bunch of fuxheads.

On the Goebbels Network, it’ Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag and Republican Whip Eric Cantor. Then a roundtable with Pillsbury Dough Nazi Karl Rove, Katrina vanden Heuvel, Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg and George :jerk: Will.

Later, on 60 Minutes, Bob Simon reports on Harry Markopolos, who told the SEC about Bernie Madoff, and they blew him off. Anderson Cooper reports about drug cartels in Mexico. And Morley Safer profiles liar and hypocrite, Bobby Jindal.

Me? Jusot gonna see if I can stay awake long enough to catch Big Love. Have a good one.