Signs of the times...

First, we saw this on Facebook today. Couldn't help ourselves...



We’re from the government and we’re here to help: BP Oil Spill: As Pay Czar Promises Money, Workers Turned Away From BP Claims Center (ABC News)


Hi-ho, hi-ho...

We’re from the government and we’re here to help, Part 2: Hundreds of Construction Workers Forced Into Unpaid Leave to Accommodate Obama Photo Op. (JammieWearingFool)

We’re from the government and we’re here to take your money: Obama v BP - America’s justifiable fury with BP is degenerating into a broader attack on business. (The Economist)

We’re from the government and we’re here to take your money, Part 2: Obama Admin. Argues in Court That Individual Mandate Is a Tax. Remember when we were told that the individual health insurance mandate is not a tax. The Obama Administration just appealed to the courts, “…the individual health insurance mandate is a tax.” (American Spectator)

Oh, oh! - Campbell Soup recalls 15M pounds of SpaghettiOs (apnews.myway.com)


Maybe the problem is that Spaghettios and chlorine don't go together...

Why did I get rid of my sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads? - U.S. Testing Pain Ray in Afghanistan. (Wired/Danger Room)

If only there was a way they could legally “take” money from tourists to help pay for things -Nevada's unemployment rate tops in nation, 14%. (Las Vegas Review-Journal)

Casinos - aka: Nevada's personal ATMs...

I always love it when people say “communism works, it just hasn’t been done right.” Tell me, does anyone do it like the Norks? - North Korea Turns To Private Markets In Effort To Avert Second Famine (Outside the Beltway)

Take a guess where people and money go…where government takes less of their money, intrudes less on their lives and where opportunity exists. Surprised? America as Texas vs. California: Who’s Moving Where Edition. (The Enterprise Blog)

It’s always interesting when you have a press secretary who doesn’t understand the media (and its audiences): Robert Gibbs Defends Obama, Takes Shot At Cable News. (New York)

Bonus: As we approach the November elections, Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire pegs the biggest mistakes of the run-up. Here they are –

Top Ten Campaign Gaffes of 2010

"The year is not even half over and First Read already has a pretty good list of political gaffes made so far on the campaign trail" -

1. Gordon Brown's " bigoted woman" remarks

2. Martha Coakley says Schilling is a Yankee fan

3. Sue Lowden and Chickens for health care

4. Vaughn Ward's Puerto Rico is a country

5. Arlen Specter and the College Republicans

6. Carly Fiorina's hairy situation

7. J.D. Hayworth's history lesson

8. Jim Gibbons -- the mistress and the airplane

9. Jerry Brown and Nazi propaganda

10. Bob Etheridge gets too close for comfort


He's No. 9 on the list but at the bottom of many others...

“Victory has a thousand fathers”

Last week, Joe “Plugs” Biden appeared on CNN’s “Larry King Live” to talk about all of the wonderful things the administration is doing.

Among the accomplishments Plugs said Team Obama deserved credit for was…wait…wait…wait…Iraq! Yes, that dusty killing field that General David Petraeus & the Surge essentially cleaned out despite opposition from…wait…wait…wait…the Democrats.


Coupla great guys...

According to the LA Times, here’s what Joey Plugs had to say:

“I am very optimistic about -- about Iraq. I mean, this could be one of the great achievements of this administration. You're going to see 90,000 American troops come marching home by the end of the summer. You're going to see a stable government in Iraq that is actually moving toward a representative government. I spent -- I've been there 17 times now. I go about every two months -- three months. I know every one of the major players in all the segments of that society. It's impressed me. I've been impressed how they have been deciding to use the political process rather than guns to settle their differences.”


Larry King in better days...

Pretty amazing. Especially since the previous administration handed the success to the current one on a silver platter (on the way out).

BTW, during the interview with The World’s Oldest Living Fossil, Biden did not elaborate on what all the administration's other "great achievements" were so far.


Joey Plugs visits Mesopotamia...

What’s really interesting, though, was what happened shortly thereafter when the White House Press Corpse called the administration on Plugs’ claim.


Telling it like it is...

The following is supplied by a source within the Press Room who asked to remain unidentified. (The “Robert” and “MR. GIBBS” is Press Secretary Robert Gibbs. The “Q” is an unidentified journalist in the Press Room.)

Q: Robert, the Vice President last night said that Iraq could end up being one of the President's great achievements. Given that the Vice President was in favor of a partial partition of the country and the President opposed the surge that helped stabilize it, how is that one of the President's great achievements?

MR. GIBBS: Well, putting what was broken back together and getting our troops home, which we intend to do in August of this year.

Q : But the Status of Forces Agreement to bring troops home was signed before the President took office.

MR. GIBBS: Something that -- something that I think the political pressure that the President, as a then-candidate, helped to bring about.

Look, I think that we will long debate Iraq. We will long debate whether at a very important moment in our efforts to root out terrorism particularly in Afghanistan and on that border region with Pakistan, whether we took our eye off the ball. I think historians will debate that long after we're gone. I think they will come likely to the conclusion that no single event took our eye off of what needed to be done in order to -- in order to occupy a country that, until we got there, didn’t have a single member of al Qaeda.

So, look, obviously -- look, the Vice President has been deeply involved in fixing the political process there so that elections can be held and so that our troops can come home as scheduled this summer.

Obviously.

Weekend odds & ends...

It's a three-day weekend so you're getting your nightly edition of The Bliss Index© between sips of our favorite adult beverage...and a tad later/earlier than usual. We present this collection of tidbits gathered from all over...

Enjoy!

About that promise of transparency? Yah, not so much.


Well, he's pretty transparent...

“Come with me if you want to…be taxed more.”


The Taxinator....

It’s a miracle! The NY Times’ Maureen Dowd manages to get through an entire column without mentioning a Hollywood movie/celebrity/scandal/plot device/line.

Teddy…they hardly remember ye.


"Explain how this is going to work..."

This might just be the definition of “amateur hour.”

She’s gone from an object of pity to one of disdain.

Looks like the loser might end up being a loser.


A couple of winnahs? (Photo: Christian Science Monitor)

Add Massachusetts and the U.S. Senate: Feel free to ignore the wishes of voters.

During this year’s Super Bowl, Chrysler will present a 60-second television ad. (30-second spots are going for approximately $3 million each.) Can you guess who paid for it? If you guessed you and me, you move to the front of the line.

Enjoy your ad!

A hero for our time: “Dr. Sanjay Gupta has more courage and dedication than the United Nations, who abandoned patients out of fear.” (h/t: fark.com)

Gupta does the right thing...

Charter member, Idiots Hall of Shame: Pat Robertson. He gets a letter from you-know-who.

Pat Robertson: idiot, evil...or a lot of both?

A little infighting never hurt anyone, right?

Just another day at DNC headquarters?

Al Franken (D-Minn) shuts down Joe Lieberman (D-Conn). Nothing like a little in-house squabbling, eh?


The esteemed U.S. Senator from Minnesota...




The guy who is taking all the heat these days...

Who was White House spokeshole Robert Gibbs talking about when he said this? – “I don't think any rational person would say killing the bill makes a whole lot of sense at this point." Was it, a.) the GOP leadership; b.) Rush Limbaugh; c.) Dick Cheney; or, d.) the former head of the Democratic National Committee and former Dem presidential candidate Howard Dean…? (If you picked d. Howard Dean, you win.)


The Scream Machine unleashed - again...

I can’t believe those dolts are attacking the president, again! Wait – what?...They’re liberals?
This is interesting – a Democrat lauding George W. Bush’s leadership and decrying his own party’s lack of such...and the U.S. Americans...

What if they held a fight and only one side showed? Well, now they’re fighting...each other.


Here's to the winners...

Words mean things

A man on a horse...

Whoever thought the last elections would usher in a new era of civility, politeness and generally cordial relations ‘tween one and all was sadly mistaken.

We haven’t even completed our first year of Hope (fulfillment) & Change (can you spare some?) and we’re at each others throats like the next election is tomorrow. We can be comforted knowing that Americans have always gone toe-to-toe with each other over political, cultural and other subject matter – great and small. It’s just that today’s 24/7 news cycle, the speed and immediacy of the Internet, talk radio, cable TV and a host of other venues make the discourse seem louder/ruder than ever.

Over the course of the last week, we’ve seen the relationship between the White House and Fox News go from worse to “down the rabbit hole.”


Do the hustle...

Meanwhile, conservative talker Rush Limbaugh continues to – depending on your political views – lick his wounds from the NFL’s cold shoulder/make hay out of being pushed aside because of pressures exerted by people like the race-hustling Reverends Jesse Jackson, Jr. and Al Sharpton. Sure, he doesn’t have a minority ownership in the St. Louis Rams to brag about (like anyone would, anyway), but he has a whole new platform to stand on…and a new megaphone to yell with. He’s not just someone who can talk about “how the Left silences its critics,” he’s someone who stands as an example of it. No one thinks Rush is poor (or middle class…or even wealthy…he’s uber rich), but in getting swept aside by a government-like entity (the NFL) for expressing his views – and being slandered along the way with accusations of non-existent racist remarks – he’s become a symbol for many an aggrieved.

Feeling the heat for being called out for the false accusations of racism, numerous news outlets have either given half-hearted corrections (no apologies) or even taken to a renewed pursuit of Limbaugh. Earlier, a reporter who has been staking out the Limbaugh beat for CNN engaged a psychologist in attempt to gauge the talk show host’s “state of mind.” Needless to say, it wasn’t a favorable assessment. Limbaugh’s response? He “called Costello[the reporter] his ‘stalker’ before suggesting she ‘go sit on a fire hydrant and improve your day’.”



Shhhh, be vewy qwiet. It's Fox season...

Add words: If you’ve been watching what’s come out of the White House lately, you’ve got to wonder: who is the enemy…Iran or Fox News? Did the White House actually urge other networks to disregard Fox News? Interestingly, those rallying first – and loudest – to the Fox journos’ aid…have been other news people.

Add Fox dust-up: Perhaps the best push on this came from from ABC News Senior White House Correspondent Jake Tapper. Here’s the transcript from his ABC News blog, Power Punch:

From this morning’s gaggle in White House press secretary Robert Gibbs’ office:

Tapper: It’s escaped none of our notice that the White House has decided in the last few weeks to declare one of our sister organizations “not a news organization” and to tell the rest of us not to treat them like a news organization. Can you explain why it’s appropriate for the White House to decide that a news organization is not one –

(Crosstalk)

Gibbs: Jake, we render, we render an opinion based on some of their coverage and the fairness that, the fairness of that coverage.

Tapper: But that’s a pretty sweeping declaration that they are “not a news organization.” How are they any different from, say –

Gibbs: ABC -

Tapper: ABC. MSNBC. Univision. I mean how are they any different?

Gibbs: You and I should watch sometime around 9 o’clock tonight. Or 5 o’clock this afternoon.

Tapper: I’m not talking about their opinion programming or issues you have with certain reports. I’m talking about saying thousands of individuals who work for a media organization, do not work for a “news organization” -- why is that appropriate for the White House to say?

Gibbs: That’s our opinion.

Last add Fox vs. White House add: Ruth Marcus at the Washington Post puts it this way: ”There’s only one thing dumber than picking a fight with people who buy ink by the barrel — picking a fight with people who don’t even have to buy ink.”



Hello to my friend, Anita!...

Speaking of White House words: Megan McCardle over at “Radical Chic,” gives her view on White House Communications Director Anita Dunn’s ridiculous statement about Mao Tse-Tung being a philosophical touchstone: “I thought that this must be some kind of grotesque conservative exaggeration, but no, White House Communications Director Anita Dunn really did tell a graduating high school class to emulate Mao Tse-Tung's bold and imaginative attitude during his takeover of China. Most of us look at the tens of millions who died and maybe think twice about trying to imitate the late Chairman, but hey, think different!”



He's gaffetastic!

It's always nice to close with a Joe Biden gaffe: from “The Gaffe-inator”– “The U.S. is in a depression. The U.S. is in a depression.” (I'll bet the prez was thrilled with that revelation.)