Reason #237 Why Obama’s Tax Plan Must Be Better Than McCain’s

When a wacko neo-con who is best buddies and a long time associate of Jack Abramoff, a guy who authored Newt Gingrich’s “Contract with America”, a guy who lobbied for the NRA and is now on their board of directors, a guy who believes in the total deregulation of corporate America (see where that has us today?), a guy who founded the dangerous “Americans For Tax Reform”, a guy who has a “decades-long” association with Karl Rove, a guy who was the “prime architect” for the idiotic Bush tax cuts (aka: “Welfare For The Wealthy”)…

In other words, when a guy who is supremely responsible for most of what is wrong with our economy today writes an “argument against Obama’s tax plan”, well, to me, that’s a vote of CONFIDENCE in Obama’s plan like none other.

Grover Norquist is a poor judge of what’s good for this country.

Palin Is Supposed To Be “Different”? Sounds Like The Same Crap To Me

Stonewalling an investigation until after Election Day. This woman and her handlers are NO different than anything Washingon has seen before.

McCain/Palin are saying that THEY are the way to get “change” in Washington? I don’t think so.

What’s the big deal, Sarah? Why the sudden switcheroo from “I’ll cooperate” to this new attitude? Too many Rovian disciples in the house?

Road Kill Roundup

I saw a letter to the Journal Star bemoaning all of the road kill being allowed to rot on the sides of our Illinois highways last week. I agree, btw, it is sad to see that we have to do this. With the price of gas, the powers that be are making the pickup crews stay in the office more, apparently, and making the rounds less. Of course, in typical Peoria-area fashion, the letter and the following comments all had to take shots at Illinois and it’s governor for this. No one blames the real culprit, but why would they? It wouldn’t be very “Peorian” to lay blame in the proper location.

Be that as it may, however, I was satisfied (can’t say “delighted”, it’s never a “delight” when an animal dies such a horrific death as being squashed by a semi tractor) to see that Illinois is not alone. There were three times as many dead deer, opossum, and raccoons dead along Iowa highways yesterday. I traveled 20 miles north of Waterloo for my son’s graduation, and was amazed at how many deer lay dead, and in various states of decay, along the roadsides.

Wonder if there’s any Peoria right wingers who’d like to blame Blago for IOWA’s problem with roadkill, too?

Look, I don’t care what you think of the governor of Illinois, obviously, he’s not the best guy to come down the pike (still, not any worse than the joker he followed), but for Pete’s sakes, people, can’t you see why the crews aren’t on the road? Gas is freakin’ four dollars a gallon! And that is NOT the fault of the governor of Illinois, or the state legislature, for that matter. Put the blame where it belongs.

You want animal carcasses picked up? Call Dick Cheney, he’s probably got plenty of spare time between counting oil dividends.

Oh, one more thing: If they WERE out picking up every dead animal every day, I’m sure some right-wingnut around Peoria would right a letter and blame Blago for WASTING gas.

“Court Supervision”…Let’s Just Call It What It Is

This morning, I was offered “court supervision” instead of having my recent traffic ticket show up on my MVR for my insurance agent to see. What is “court supervision”? It sounds serious. Do I have to come to class? Well, no. Do I have to call in and report my whereabouts? Nope. Do I have to complete some kind of test or where some kind of electronic ankle bracelet? Again, nope.

So what is it? Well, to be quite honest, it’s…extortion. Oh, you say you don’t think so? Well, let’s look at a couple of the listings under the definition of extortion:

Illegal use of one’s official position or powers to obtain property, funds, or patronage.

An excessive or exorbitant charge.

So let’s see…regarding definition #1: I didn’t see a judge, instead I met with a representative of the state’s or district’s attorney’s office, who ”made me an offer”. And regarding definition #2: For twice the amount of my ticket, I can get “court supervision” (with, as I said, no real “supervision”) to make sure the ticket doesn’t go on my insurance. I don’t know if it qualifies as “extortion” based on definition #1…although I could make the argument it’s pretty darn close as the “offer” was made by an attorney, and not the judge of the court…but it definitely qualifies under definition #2. Basically, if you’re willing to pay us a bunch more than what the ticket actually costs, you don’t have to pay more down the road. Hmmm…excessive and exorbitant? You betcha.

Naturally, I pleaded (NOT “pled”) not guilty, and I’ll be appearing before a judge (whom I did not see this morning anywhere near the courtroom, not during the “negotiating” process, I guess) next month.

More to come.

Oh, and I STILL don’t have my driver’s license…she wouldn’t give it to me today.