Random Thoughts

Just some musings about a few things which made the news lately.


Detroit Three Bailout:

Did you happen to see the comments made by GM CEO Waggoner last week? He was expressing disappointment about the reception he and his fellow tin-cup holding auto execs got in Washington and noted that Congress' thinking on the auto industry "was a little stale". I wonder how he would characterize his thinking about flying into D.C. on private jets while pleading poverty?

How about "a little arrogant"?


Albany Special Leg. Session:

While almost everyone would agree that our State Legislature is particularly dysfunctional, the failed special session called by Governor Paterson was especially so. There was so little chance that anything would be accomplished that one wonders why they spent the money to hold the session.

I don't think any of the "three men in the room" distinguished themselves, but I don't get the particular criticism of GOP Senate leader Skelos. It is clear that he and his GOP fellows have no stomach for taking steps to help the Democrats fix the budget, but it wasn't as though the Senate GOP stopped everything. Sheldon Silver did not speak a word in public about getting his caucus to support the Governor. Skelos could have pulled off a real coup by actually agreeing to cuts and forcing Silver to put up or shut up.

Instead we will all wait another couple months while the Albany deficit grows larger.


Obama's Cabinet:

Its really looking like Clinton redux given the majority of Obama's picks being Clintonistas. The left is chagrined. Its hard to believe that Hillary could have picked many more former Clinton aides if she had been elected. Who knows. Maybe Obama really wants to govern closer to the middle than we thought. Or, maybe, this is a feint since he knows that the liberal Pelosi-Reid Congress is going to serve up a left-wing agenda that will warm the hearts of the Kos crowd. then, if things go badly, he might have plausible deniability.


Palin's Turkey Shoot:

The left is so afraid of Sarah Palin, its amazing. The stir caused by her interview at the turkey farm was beyond belief. She did the pardon thing for one lucky bird, but as she was giving an interview, other less fortunate Toms were being readied for Thanksgiving (in the background as she spoke).

From the reaction by liberals, you'd have thought that she was a serial killer. A PowerLine reader opined that Palin should have indicated that she was sorry about the slaughter of those innocent birds and, so as to assuage the left's feelings, she'd do her next interview from an abortion clinic.


GOP "Uncivil War":

There have been a number of stories in the news about the fight for the soul of the GOP. Who will win, the moderates, the conservatives, the evangelicals? I have found it particularly funny that many people claim that the GOP was 'hijacked" by the "Christian Right".

I'm not sure how they reached that conclusion. It seems to me that in all of the years since Ronald Reagan was elected, all the evangelicals got from the GOP was a ban on federal funding for stem cell research, the "defense of marriage act", and a failed attempt at keeping a brain dead woman alive.

I guess those Christian fundamentalists need some lessons on hijacking. Maybe they could get some from Islamic fundamentalists.