Washington generals blow big lead, again

The Times reports:

The confirmation of Michael B. Mukasey as attorney general appeared to be all but certain on Friday after two key Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee announced they would support the nomination despite complaints over Mr. Mukasey’s refusal to clarify his views on what amounts to torture.


The announcements by the senators, Dianne Feinstein of California and Charles E. Schumer...

"Democrats" abjectly surrendering to Republicans is easily predictable, but I'm curious about the process. Do they draw lots to see who will pull down their pants and lie down in the middle of the road or is there some other mechanism to determine which ones will throw the game on any given issue?

Is there any significance to the fact that New York and California "representatives" tanked on Bush's new torture guy? Do big states have to succumb on big issues?

World premier video, gratis

You may recall that chuckling on-line magazine commissioned some projects for this year's Burning Man festival in the Black Rock desert. This is a clip from the video, which was shot and produced by Dan Webster, an artist and videographer living somewhere circa de San Diego. In the coming weeks we will be premiering the rest of the video, likewise in small chunks. Fascinating stuff.

The video quality in this example, however, is not remotely as good as the original, due to fairly extreme compression necessary to show it on the web. Personally, I like the effect, but you certainly can't trust my aesthetic when it comes to photography. It does not do justice to the original.

If you missed the still photography, see it here. I had some complaints about the audio accompaniment and have made the player visible so you can turn it off.

Earth to media

The media gravely report that President Bush's nominee for Attorney General, Michael B. Mukasey, is in danger of not being confirmed by the Senate because of his refusal to acknowledge that waterboarding is, indeed, torture.

But here at chuckling on-line magazine we can see the future as though it were the fourth quarter of a Harlem Globetrotters show. Bush will stand firm. The Democrats will crumble. Torture guy will be Attorney General.

Sports note

According to ESPN, the New York Yankees are prepared to offer Alex Rodriguez a contract that would pay him $230 million over the next 8 years.

That's two hundred and thirty million dollars to a guy for playing a ball game.

If the top income tax rate were 70 percent he would still get $69 million. If it were 91 percent, like during the Eisenhower administration, he would get nearly $21 million.

$69, even $21 million? With that kind of money, a person could do whatever he or she wanted on this earth. Is A-Rod really worth a quarter billion dollars? Compared to so many normal decent people who won't make .001 percent of that over eight years?

Or are there better things that society could do with that kind of wealth. Of course there are. Time to tax those fuckwads back to reality. Well, if not reality, at least sanity. And to reality for sure for their children and grandchildren. Let them work like everyone else. They get more from America, they should pay for what they get. A Meritocracy can be a good thing.