Rocky Mountain News – Opinion Columnists:

This inspires me to point something out to my more liberal readers. Remember that particularly clueless right-wing acquaintance of yours? The one who believes that anybody in America can become rich, because he thinks about poverty in a completely unscientific, anecdotal way, which allows him to treat the exceptional case as typical? The one who can’t seem to understand the simplest structural arguments about the nature of social inequality?

The next time you see some fat people and get disgusted by their failure to “take care of themselves,” think about your clueless friend.

Via fat-fu.

Wayne Madsen Report:

WMR has been informed by three well-placed sources that Vice President Dick Cheney, while a part-time resident of McLean, Virginia and while serving as Halliburton’s CEO, was a customer of the DC Madam.

I don’t know anything about the Wayne Madsen Report and how reliable a source they are, but dang, that would be a story. If it’s true, ABC News has a lot of ‘splainin to do, with regards to deeming the whole thing “non-newsworthy.”

‘Freedom Is About Authority’: Excerpts From Giuliani Speech on Crime – New York Times:

“Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do.”

In certain contexts, obedience to authority may be a strategic sacrifice of freedom in one context for the sake of greater freedom overall. But Giluiani generalizes that here almost to the point of Newspeak.

I think an America run by Giuliani would be a very scary place. Although if we were attacked by terrorists we would have a leader capable of appearing on camera and looking very serious afterwards. So you have to take the crunchy with the smooth I suppose.

Luckily a President Giuliani seems to be a very remote possibility at this point.

Bullshit, Indeed:

In other words, it’s written for chowderheads who’re given to repeating things celebrities tell them and people who’re too emo to listen to Rush Limbaugh but like the way he speaks truth to power.

I’m not really sure what “emo” really means, and I don’t think people over 35 should be using the words of a younger generation, so I avoid it and chastise friends who use it, but I’m giving Michael a pass on this one… and an award.

I really like Penn and Teller as magicians… they rapidly become intolerable outside that context.

Disclaimer: apparently with my hair long and no beard I’m a dead ringer for Penn Gillette. I don’t know why that needs a disclaimer, either, I just felt like disclaiming.

eXile – Issue #262 – War Nerd – Who Won Iraq? – By Gary Brecher:

The worst thing a major power can do is go to war alone for “moral” reasons. This is how medieval France wasted its huge advantages on pointless Middle Eastern crusades that did nothing but revitalize the Muslims and drive down the price of white slaves in the Cairo market.

Damn, another unbelievably infuriating deja vu deal: we end up wasting our armies in the deserts of the Middle East, just like the French. Except even the French were too smart to fall for it this time around.

The article seriously answers the question “who won in Iraq?” As usual, thoughtful, extremely snarky commentary.