Big Fat Liar Award To the CHENEY/Rove/bush administration for WMD, torture, rendition, secret prisons, and spying on Americans. If you do nothing else this week, listen to the Condi/Tim interview (Internet Explorer only - another Microsoft attempt at monopolization) http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032608/ and decide for yourself if the CRb administration is telling the truth about spying on its fellow citizens. If you want to do two things, read Senator Robert C. Byrd’s December 19th speech on the floor of the Senate (click on article under Previous Posts to the left)

Questions of the Week
1. Isn’t it a shame third world countries awash in money aren’t able to root out corruption, separate government from religion, and protect government from the undue interference by the wealthy thus ensuring a government of, by, and for the people?

Swift Kick in the Ass Award To South Korean Hwang Woo-suk NOT for fabricating stem cell research, which he did, BUT for falsely raising the hopes and dreams of the World’s afflicted. The scientific community should stop worrying being damaged (Damaged? It is not you who are damaged. Get off your collective PhD asses and get on with your research. Please.).

If You’re So Smart: Please explain the new drug plan to the rest of America, or, is it, as all of us suspect, so darned complicated that no one can explain it, despite Carol Burnett being suckered in by some little b ‘bushie’ to make us think it’s a good deal. Here’s a simple solution: everyone in America gets exactly the same healthcare and prescription plan that federal government employees get. Too expensive? Legalize and tax the other drug lords’ (Columbia, Afghanistan, etc.) products.

WalMart, Say “Guilty” 8 Million Times Real Fast Somewhere back in medieval England the courts decreed that kids under four could no longer work and employees were allowed to eat. Jump in the time machine to the year 2005 and it seems Good King WalMart violated the eating part eight million times and got whacked with a $172 million fine. That’s about $21.50 a head, or three times the hourly minimum wage that most WalMart employees earn…forget about working; demand longer lunch hours.

Our Friends in Washington Update
1. In what may be the most honest thing he’s ever done, super lobbyist Jack Abramoff, the cause of many congressmen to veer from the paths of righteousness from money’s sake, is talking deal. (Crooks always talk deals.) Tom DeLay and his many tarnished brethren can’t be happy. So we’ll light candles.
2. I don’t like Rick Santorum’s (Republican Senator from Pennsylvania) religion, but I dislike even more his lack of loyalty to a championed albeit unconstitutional cause, intelligent design, that got flushed down the toilet, hip-hip-hooray, by a court ruling stating it nothing more than a pretext to promote religion in schools. So how’d you like him covering your back?

DeLay’s Delay The Texas courts aren’t shooting their legs in the air and exposing their bellies so big bad Tom can kick them with his pointy boots. No sirree Billy-Bob. An appeals court told him and his legal battalion to go back to the lower court from whence they came. Next stop: the state’s highest court, The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which, I guess they figure, is more familiar with the misdeeds of Republican no-goodniks.

Big Buck Housing Discrimination So you think you might want to live on Country Oak Lane in Alamo, CA. Guess again. After 29 of his old money (we’re filthy rich, but we don’t want anyone to know it so we live in crappy, small houses) neighbors came a knocking, David Duffield, billionaire founder of PeopleSoft, had to scale back his plans for a 72,000 square foot home to a meager 10,000 square feet and if that wasn’t enough, had to scrap his plans for a twenty-car underground garage. New money Aaron Spelling (Tori Spelling’s can you give my daughter the type of life to which she’s grown accustomed father) has a 62,000 square foot shack somewhere in the Hollywood environs. Maybe the Dufster can buy a neighboring property.

On a Personal Note Carnegie Hall, though only half full because of the transit strike, played host last evening to a lilting Handel’s Messiah eloquently performed by the Masterwork Chorus of one hundred voices and Orchestra.

A Tip of The ExtraWry Hat To GCM in Fort Macleod, Alberta, Canada, (for you movie buffs, Brokeback Mountain was filmed in Fort Macleod) for steering me to the Robert C. Byrd speech and to PJH in St. Lucie, Fl, for kicking my starter pedal.