Government Dirt

by Maria Fotopoulos

There’s absolutely no doubt that the W, Cheney and Rovian (WCR) Principles 101 software has been completely downloaded into the pod that is known as Sarah Palin, running mate of John McCain, the Republican presidential candidate.

This weekend, pod person Palin utilized the device of making an outrageous statement based on a perverse reading of the facts to disparage the opposition and force discussion on a nonissue in order to derail discussion on real issues. (Note that WCR software is system compatible with units that are loaded with Literal Bible Interpretation software.)

Palin stated that Barack Obama began his political career in the living room of a terrorist. She has repeated that message in other iterations, including that Obama is someone who “would pal around with, and work with, a former domestic terrorist” and Obama “pals around with terrorists” – terminology that is pure Palin, WCR-enhanced. There also was Palin’s statement in Colorado: “Our opponent ... is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect, imperfect enough, that he's palling around with terrorists who would target their own country."

Palin’s references are to Bill Ayers, a ‘60s activist. As reported in Florida’s St. Petersburg Times (Sept. 30, 2008), Ayers was a founder of the Weather Underground. That radical group claimed responsibility for bombings between 1970 and 1974, which kept Ayers and his wife on the run until surrendering in 1980. Charges against Ayers were dropped because of prosecutorial misconduct, according to the newspaper.

Ayers now is a professor of education at the University of Illinois – Chicago.

Let’s repeat that. Ayers now teaches at a university.

How cute...

The following are some of the top tax sweeteners in the Senate passed Bailout Bill. Not all the provisions are per se outrageous, but collectively are intended to help Congressional leadership get final passage of the 2008 Emergency Economic Stabilization Act. 

1. Sec. 503. Exemption from excise tax for certain wooden arrows designed for use by children
   
   

Current law places an excise tax of 39 cents on the first sale by the manufacturer, producer, or importer of any shaft of a type used to produce certain types of arrows. This proposal would exempt from the excise tax any shaft consisting of all natural wood with no laminations or artificial means to enhance the spine of the shaft used in the manufacture of an arrow that measures 5/16 of an inch or less and is unsuited for use with a bow with a peak draw weight of 30 pounds or more. The proposal is effective for shafts first sold after the date of enactment. The estimated cost of the proposal is $2 million over ten years, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation.

Thanks Maria and Steve

We created a system to make custom banners for your website for both Obama and McCain. Out of curiosity we decided to see what banners people have made to be posted on other people's websites.

To get a sense of the diversity of views that are expressed with these banners, we have posted a sampling of Obama and McCain banners:

There were far fewer banners made for McCain then there were for Obama: