Then you won't belief in "if" anymore...

Needlenose has a great post comparing the glowing predictions made about Iraq a few years back with the current statements from official sources.

Slip sliding away

Bush's approval rating now sits at a whopping 39%. We're getting down to that small slice of the population who mistakenly check the wrong box due to visual problems and drug addictions.

Blonde and The Horse

A blonde decides to try horseback riding, even though she has had no lessons nor prior experience. She mounts the horse unassisted, and the horse immediately springs into motion. It gallops along at a steady and rhythmic pace, but the blond begins to slide from the saddle. In terror, she grabs for the horse's mane, but cannot seem to get a firm grip. She tries to throw her arms around the horse's neck, but she slides down the horse's side anyway. The horse gallops along, seemingly oblivious of its slipping rider. Finally, giving up her frail grip, the blond attempts to leap away from the horse and throw herself to safety. Unfortunately, her foot has become entangled in the stirrup, and she is now at the mercy of the horse's pounding hooves as her head is struck against the ground over and over. As her head is battered against the ground, she is mere moments away from unconsciousness when to her great fortune... Frank, the Wal-Mart greeter, sees her dilemma and unplugs the horse. And you thought all they did was say, "Hello."

Goodness, Gracias

According to some official-looking website, Scientists in London have created a mosquito with glowing green testicles in a bid to stamp out malaria. The glow-in-the-dark male testicals make it easier to genetically modified the males so that when they have that exciting mosquito-sex with females, no more mosquitoes are produced. I can just see some scientists laughing at me now. "I can't believe another ignorant schmuck fell for that one! Ha-a-a Ha-a!" Do mosquitoes really have balls? All I know, is I want to be in on the human trials when they start testing in humans. And you all thought tatoos and body-piercing was cool.

Harriet Miers blog

Come one! Come all! Harriet Miers has started her own blog!

You Gotta Love Andy

The War Machine (via Alternet Brain)

Ike Was Right About War Machine
The following is a weekly 60 Minutes commentary by CBS News correspondent Andy Rooney. It was first broadcast Oct. 2, 2005.

I'm not really clear how much a billion dollars is but the United States - our United States - is spending $5.6 billion a month fighting this war in Iraq that we never should have gotten into.

We still have 139,000 soldiers in Iraq today.

Almost 2,000 Americans have died there. For what?

Now we have the hurricanes to pay for. One way our government pays for a lot of things is by borrowing from countries like China.

Another way the government is planning to pay for the war and the hurricane damage is by cutting spending for things like Medicare prescriptions, highway construction, farm payments, AMTRAK, National Public Radio and loans to graduate students. Do these sound like the things you'd like to cut back on to pay for Iraq?

I'll tell you where we ought to start saving: on our bloated military establishment.

We're paying for weapons we'll never use.

No other Country spends the kind of money we spend on our military. Last year Japan spent $42 billion. Italy spent $28 billion, Russia spent only $19 billion. The United States spent $455 billion.

We have 8,000 tanks for example. One Abrams tank costs 150 times as much as a Ford station wagon.

We have more than 10,000 nuclear weapons - enough to destroy all of mankind.

We're spending $200 million a year on bullets alone. That's a lot of target practice. We have 1,155,000 enlisted men and women and 225,000 officers. One officer to tell every five enlisted soldier what to do. We have 40,000 colonels alone and 870 generals.

We had a great commander in WWII, Dwight Eisenhower. He became President and on leaving the White House in 1961, he said this: "We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist."

Well, Ike was right. That's just what’s happened.