Insert a Trite Metaphor for a Corral #36

Posted on January 24, 2007 in Roundup

John Kerry — who I believe did not lose the 2004 presidential race — decided not to run for president in 2008. Bush hemmed and hawed his way through the State of the Union, which I missed — intentionally. Folks said that the Democrats did better. But you undoubtably saw that. There’s lots of other stuff that didn’t make the front pages and here’s a list of those things:

• Conservatives go to the grave feeling no regret for the damage that they have wreaked. E. Howard Hunt died yesterday. A Slate interview conducted in 2004 appears today in which he chortles over the role he played in the overthrow of various regimes, the Watergate break-in, and the assassination of Che Guevara. Hunt whines “I found out the CIA was just infested with Democrats.”
• The biggest political risk that Democrats face is going too easy on the war in Iraq.
• Britain’s director of public prosecutions, Sir Ken Macdonald, warned that the war on terror might lead to the loss of public respect for law enforcement and the courts.
• Christie’s auction house went ahead with the sale of a collection that was once the property of the Greek royal family despite the protestations of the Greek government. The actual seller is not known, but there is concern that it includes antiquities pilfered during the Danish dynasty’s stay in Hellas.
• SWAT teams have taken on routine police duties such as serving warrants. They’ve been known to force their way into the homes of innocent people. Paul Craig Roberts says this is “the empire turning the guns on its citizenry“.
• California Superior Court Judge Robert G. Spitzer could lose his job because his chambers are too messy.
• Not everyone was pleased with the Oscar nominations.
• Scientists found a way to mount electronic tags on wasps. No, not Connecticut country clubbers, but insects. Seems that unlike their Republican-voting, Lieberman-loving namesakes, real wasps live in a welfare state where they are known to buzz into nests that are not their’s to care for the grubs. We have something to learn, perhaps, from nature.
• Future energy concerns could be solved, in part, by pumping wastewater into the earth and using the steam to drive electricity plants.
• Even though parents fail to spot inclinations towards suicide in their teens 90% of the time, Representative Ron Paul has tried to block the voluntary program TeenScreen because it “might become mandatory”. Does it surprise you that he is a Texas Republican?

If you find any articles worthy of mention in these roundups, send the URL to gazissax at best dot com. And feel free to comment!