Today’s episode of the McLaughlin group was the second half of their 2008 Year-End Awards. For the “sorry to see you go” award John McLaughlin nominated capitalism as the biggest farewell of the past year:

“Capitalism… will be the ultimate casualty of the global economic crisis of 2008. Governments everywhere are implementing socialist measures. The golden age of capitalism is kaput. Managed capitalism is what rules.”

I think he’s jumping the gun a bit there. We may have nationalized banks and a promise of universal health care, but our public education system is still a joke and it remains to be seen if Obama’s going to come through with those health plans he promised.

This is why I hope the the national learning curve is about eight years shorter going forward.

Bush v. Gore Still Influencing Court Decisions [New York Times]
Bush v. Gore Continues to Haunt [Political Aminal]
Sen. Coleman’s Bush v. Gore Style Complaint in Minnesota Supreme Court [Election Law Blog]

President George Walker Bush sports the shiner he earned from the infamous pretzel incident of ‘01, identified by some as an early indicator of the Commander in Chief’s historical incompetence.

If, for the past eight years, the United States had been governed by a monkey who made decisions by throwing darts at a board labeled YES on one side and NO on the other, the odds indicate that our country would today be 50% better off. And now it’s official.

According to a Pew Research poll a majority of the American public to the tune of 56% think the best word to describe President George W. Bush is “incompetent”. The descriptor that came in a distant second is “idiot,” but it pretty much only captured the Democratic base or 27% of Americans. We analyze these stunning results after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »

Sen. Ken Salazar is fixin to bring law n order to the Interior.

Listen, Ken, it’s not exactly a secret that you’re bald. And I know that sometimes when men lose their hair they feel insecure about appearing in public without it. And we know you’re not really much of an environmentalist either, which is why you’re such a strange pick for secretary of the Interior. But we just want you to succeed and to feel good doing it so here’s a friendly fashion tip for your first four years in the executive: a cowboy hat does not make you look less silly than showing the country your hairless head.

A few more snaps of Sheriff Salz after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »

In case you’re worried that Obama’s first few months office will bring sweeping change to our badly broken country, don’t worry: the White House is spending the last weeks before the inauguration throwing together a manual for Obama, you know, just in case there’s some kind of crisis and the new president can’t get Bush on the phone.

The White House has prepared more than a dozen contingency plans to help guide President-elect Barack Obama if an international crisis erupts in the opening days of his administration, part of an elaborate operation devised to smooth the first transition of power since Sept. 11, 2001.

Unless this thing is like, “Here’s everything we did so you can do the opposite,” Obama will have plenty of nicely published memos to throw in his re-gifting pile.

Bush Prepares Crisis Briefings to Aid Obama [New York Times]