Sometimes "What Happens in Vegas" Should Never Have Happened at All
Add this to the list of great ideas from the mind of Michael Jackson, right after screwing up his face, donning a single glove, sleeping with children, and having a zoo in his back yard. Like those, I'm sure this will actually happen too.

Michael Jackson is in discussions about creating a 50-foot robotic replica of himself to roam the Las Vegas desert, according to reports.

The pop legend is currently understood to be living in the city, as he considers making a comeback after 2004's turbulent child sex case.

It has now been claimed that his plans include an elaborate show in Vegas, which would feature the giant Jacko striding around the desert, firing laser beams.

If built, the metal monster would apparently be visible to aircraft as they come in to land in the casino capital.

Pet Peeve Alert
Via Kos, here's Jesse Jackson on the Congressional Black Caucus' decision to sponsor a presidential debate on Fox News:

FOX moderating a presidential debate on issues of importance to Black Americans is literally letting the Fox guard the henhouse – FOX should be rejected.

I get it - FOX = fox. But they're not literally doing that. They're figuratively letting that happen. That's, you know, the opposite of literally.

Maybe if for some reason the Democrats' mascot was a hen... then, I suppose in a roundabout way you can make the "literally" case.

On another note - I applaud Jackson, and scratch my head at the CBC. And I'm confused by otherwise smart pundits like Bill Maher who criticize Democrats for refusing Fox News for a debate. He seems to think it's a step that underscores public's impressions of Democrats as weak. No. It's an acknowledgement that Fox is not a legitimate news outlet and doesn't deserve to be treated as one. It's called a boycott. It's not a sign of weakness. It's a sign of contempt and disgust. We didn't play Sun City. And we're not gonna play Fox News.

That having been said, if they debate on Fox News, I expect them to take Bill Clinton's lead and challenge every horribly framed question with the proper amount of scorn and indignation. And who's willing and able to do that would in fact tell us something important about the candidates. But I think voters would prefer to see them debating one another, not clashing with the questioner.

McCain's in Trouble?
Apparently, flirting with switching parties back in 2001 isn't the best way to win over the GOP faithful in 2007.

Here Comes the Veto
The Senate passed the Iraq funding bill - the one requiring withdrawal by August 2008 - 51-47. Every Democrat voted for it, plus 2 Republicans, Hagel (NE) and Smith (OR). How will the White House fund the war? Doesn't Bush support the troops?

Wow
I have to admit I'm a bit surprised the Senate Democrats managed to hold it together enough to keep the House's troop withdrawal timetable in the Iraq War funding bill, just now 50-48. That means, assuming the funding bill passes, the President will have to veto as promised. Eventually, either Bush will have to sign a funding bill given him by the Democratic congress, or convince enough legislators to support a funding bill without the timetable, or the troops don't get funded. This could become like the Clinton-Gingrich shutting down the government standoff. Who blinks first? Depends on who the public blames for the stalemate.

The Primary Calendar is Out of Control
We need to re-think how we want primaries to work. If we're going to have a national primary then fine. If we're going to roll them out gradually then let's do it with a thoughtful rational fair purpose. But this crap where states are leap-frogging, pushing dates earlier and earlier, and surely wreaking havoc on campaign strategies, is a load of crap. It looked like we had something of a national primary shaping up on Feb. 5. But that's not good enough for Florida, which has now moved up to Jan. 29. I disagree with Kos. I think this will have a huge impact. For the week before Feb. 5, whoever managed to win in FL will have a huge advantage - press, perception, all the rest.

Rove's Secret E-Mails
Most of Karl Rove's emailing has been done not from his White House account, but from his RNC account. This isn't shocking. I'm sure most of you funnel your porn and illegal activity through non-work accounts yourself. But...if he was conducting government business (or coordinating the improper dismissal of US Attorneys for a lack of political loyalty) through any email address, that work belongs to the people and, it turns out, can't be used as an end-run around the archiving laws. Rep. Waxman has requested that all relevant emails be preserved that were written or received through RNC accounts. If at least one important player is unwilling to destroy evidence, and eventually turns over RNC emails that reflect government work, things could get very interesting, especially if we actually get to see what some of these jokers said when they assumed there's no chance anyone unintended will read...

Dreaming Big
Watching a replay of Meet the Press, Russert's interview with Bill Bradley, who's written a new book about...blah blah hope for the future blah blah. And I wonder...these guys who dream of being president, even the ones who clearly have no plan to enter the race, and would have no chance, really, do they nonetheless dream about their magical books somehow catching fire, leading to a groundswell of cheering unstoppable support, whisking them to the presidency on the wings of their inspiring words? Can somebody with presidential aspirations in their blood ever pass on the chance to dream about something like that?

Secondly, has anything like that ever happened? ever?

Do you think Kucinich thought that maybe, just maybe, when people got a whiff of his Department of Peace idea, that it would spread like wildfire across formerly non-voting young liberals who would carry him to the oval office on their under-25 shoulders to the strains of John Lennon? Is there a part of him that thought...this could be the idea...?

I admit to dreaming about winning the lottery...but watching Bradley got me to wondering what goes through politicians' minds when they have some free minutes to let their imaginations wander...

It Probably Won't Stick...
Because Bush will veto it or before then the Senate will kill it, but at least the House did vote for an Iraq withdrawal by September of 2008. The bill wasn't perfect, but it set a deadline and it passed. Kudos to Speaker Pelosi.

Damn
Tubby is leaving - heading for the Big Ten and Minnesota. It's a huge embarrassing mistake that he wasn't appreciated. Sounds like he had enough.

In 10 years, he took UK to the final 8 four times, won a national championship, made the tournament each year and never lost a first-round game. He won more than 75% of his games at UK. Good luck finding someone who will do better.

I wonder who they will get to replace him? Can they pry Donovan away from FL? Unlikely. Calipari in Memphis? Too many rumors about recruiting violations. Gregg Marshall from Winthrop moving up from the mid-majors? Can't take a chance on unproven talent. Steve Lavin (former UCLA) out of the broadcast booth? Maybe. John Beeline from WV? That would be an interesting choice if he is willing to leave. Rick Barnes at Texas? Or Jamie Dixon at Pittsburgh? Or here's a crazy choice: Rick Pitino. Why not?

Yikes
Edwards press conference regarding his campaign and his wife's health...

[UPDATE: Her cancer is back. His campaign will continue. On the brief reaction I saw on MSNBC, both Chris Matthews and Howard Fineman were praising the press conference (which I didn't see myself) and the Edwards' position that - this is what we do as a family, and this is what we will do for America. Matthews said it looked to him like religion in action.]

Gore on C-Span Thread [3rd UPDATE]
I forgot to mention it here but today Al Gore testifies before House and Senate committees, a 1-man panel on global warming. I won't get to watch it until replays tonight. But if you saw/heard anything how do you think he did? I'll post links to coverage here when I find it so come back and refresh later.

[UPDATE: David Roberts at Gristmill live-blogged the House hearing and has some great quotes and descriptions.

UPDATE 2: At Intersection, Chris Mooney (author of The Republican War on Science) who has not been shy about criticizing Gore when he thinks he's overstated, says that Al's performance earlier today was "stirring."

UPDATE 3: Roberts says Gore isn't doing nearly as good a job in the Senate as he did in the House. And James "global-warming-is-a-hoax" Inhofe is making this personal about Gore's own energy usage, etc. So, sadly my prediction is the only encounter that will make the news is Inhofe asking Gore if he will pledge not to use more energy than the average house... Why is there always one asshole to ruin everything? Is that some kind of impenetrable cosmic math?]

Suddenly Bush is a Constitutional Stickler
I've never understood why the people of the country stand for DC residents to be without voting representation in Congress. It's completely un-American on its face. A new compromise bill that would add 2 voting members - one in DC and one in Utah (to make the Republicans not freak out) - is set to pass the House, but the White House insists they need to veto:

[T]he administration is against the bill because the Constitution limits House representation to members chosen "by the People of the several States."

"The District of Columbia is not a State," it says, adding that congressional representation for the District would require a constitutional amendment.

(thanks to jenifer for sending the link)

Whoops
Mitt Romney + pandering to Cuban-Americans + no habla espanol = whoops.

Gonzales Watch
I posted earlier about the lack of patriots running the show at the Justice Department, that is, folks committed to the rule of law over the rules of politics. Clearly there will be no Elliott Richardson - Archibald Cox moment here. This is what a nation of men, not a nation of laws, looks like:

Fired San Diego U.S. attorney Carol Lam notified the Justice Department that she intended to execute search warrants on a high-ranking CIA official as part of a corruption probe the day before a Justice Department official sent an e-mail that said Lam needed to be fired, U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Sunday.
...
Last week, the Justice Department released e-mails showing that loyalty to President Bush and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was among the criteria used to judge U.S. attorneys' performance and that Rove and former White House counsel Harriet Miers were deeply involved in discussions leading up to the dismissals.


Roehrkasse said the Justice Department would provide additional e-mails to Congress on Monday. The documents were to have been surrendered last week, but Justice officials delayed the delivery, saying they needed more time to prepare them.

Strange Bedfellows
A newish strategy of the religious right is to use the appeal to free speech rights as a way around standard church-state prohibitions. So, military chaplains should be able to pray "in Jesus' name" at mandatory military events that troops of all faiths are required to attend. And, other ceremonial prayers like those opening legislative sessions should be able to also express sectarian viewpoints they say. That sounds nice, of course - that ministers shouldn't have their prayers dictated by the government. But you just have to follow the logical conclusion and what we would have is a military and a Congress that opens all its events with Christian invocations, instead of the generic prayers acknowledging God that the Supreme Court has allowed.

The new argument of those on the religious right is that curtailing those expressions, and those of students who want to - for example - bash gay students with rhetoric about their impending descent into hell - are violations of their free speech rights.

But this new love of free speech has forced them to get in the middle of some unexpected skirmishes. Today, the Supreme Court will hear argument in the case of a student who unfurled a banner that read "bong hits 4 jesus" at a parade for which students had been dismissed from school to participate. The principal demanded its removal and then forcibly destroyed it when the student refused. The student had his initial punishment doubled for, apparenly, quoting Thomas Jefferson to the principal. Interestingly, the Bush Administration is taking the side of the school - arguing for control of the environment and ability to censor expression that violates the central educational mission of the school. And religious groups have lined up on the other side, arguing for enhanced rights of student expression.

I have mixed feelings. I want to support the rights of schools to maintain order.

But I have to come down on the side of the student here despite his admission that the banner was not trying to say anything about anything, only tried to come up with something that would piss off the principal (it worked). Personally, I think free speech arguments for protest work better when there's actually something you're trying to protest, or something you have to say. But here, the government is over-reaching, as Marty Lederman indicates at ScotusBlog. It's a bit painful to side with religious conservatives, especially knowing that essentially the purpose of their concern is to support Christian young people in their continued harassment and demonization of fellow students. But legal arguments, I suppose, sometimes makes for strange bedfellows.

I'll read the oral arguments later today, and if anything interesting is said, will post it tonight or tomorrow.

My Prime Time Experience or...Our National Mental Health Breakdown
I don't watch many tv shows. Most of my tv watching is news, espnnews, cspan and some comedy central. But tonight, for whatever reason, after basketball, I left CBS on and watched prime time programming. 60 Minutes was a horrifying interview with a US soldier, charged with killing men, women and children in Haditha while he was in charge during the first moment of combat he had ever seen in his life. He said, essentially, that he would make all the same decisions all over again if he had the chance.

But that was a subtle emotional experience compared to the fiction. "Cold Case" solved the 8-year-old murder of a homeless mother of 2 who all lived in her station wagon after her husband died of cancer. We spend most of the episode suspecting the ungrateful daughter before guilt finally falls on the one man that had been presented as a decent human, if troubled. We follow a replay of her awful life trying to find work and improve her family while life throws one cruel trick after another her way, mainly for the purpose of generating murder suspects. A subplot I didn't understand that took up only 5 mins of the show involved another cop tracking down the trucker who killed his wife in a hit-and-run. He confronted him in a back alley and pressed a gun to his chest to kill him, before he lost his nerve. All the while there's break-your-heart music just in case you haven't picked up on the pathos.

Before I could really get started being depressed, I get to "without a trace", which followed the story of a lonely 15-year-old who goes missing after posting videos of herself online offering up her virginity. She lives with her grandfather who told her her parents died in a car accident when actually her mother died in childbirth and her father went insane and tried to kill his newborn daugher out of grief. Oh and did I mention that her grandfather is dying of kidney failure? We follow her through the attack by some high school boys, and her encounter with her eventual statutory rapist and are, I suppose, expected to react with glee over the implied abuse he suffers at the hands of police brutality. There's the meeting with the estranged father who can't care for her and the teary reunion as she's returned to her grandfather-caregiver that has about 6 months to live.

So, best as I can tell, prime time network tv is about guardians hanging on for dear life to care for their ungrateful children while the world around them is made up of threats by predators, disease, broken families and mental illness. After 2+ hours of that I already feel like not getting out of bed for the next week. Are there people that actually watch that stuff all of the time? I'm going back to ESPN, Comedy Central, C-Span, CNN and MSNBC.

Valerie Plame Wilson Testified Today
Before the Oversight and Government Reform Committee. You can read her opening statement here on dKos.

Where are all the Patriots?
I wasn't old enough to know Watergate when it was happening. I didn't hear one word about it in any class in high school or in college. (Hopefully there's enough historical perspective at this point for that mistaken omission to be fixed in today's US history classes.) I didn't learn much about it until just after college when I happened to start watching a great multi-part documentary on the Discovery Channel and couldn't take my eyes off of it. I bought the videos in fact it was so good,(though they've been lost in various moves) though I haven't been able to find it on DVD.

The part I'll never forget is the late-night press conference by Archibald Cox, holed up just outside his office in the midst of Nixon's attempts to fire him (the "Saturday Night Massacre"). The special prosecutor was trying to protect the documents and work product he had compiled. His determination to pursue the truth and be true to his country despite the President's efforts to cover all wrong-doing brought the unmistakable sound of cheers among the press, who couldn't hide their patriotism, not knowing what Nixon would be willing to do next to shield himself.

Nixon got rid of 2 Attorneys General that night in search of one (Robert Bork, eventually) who would be willing to fire Cox, who famously said "whether ours shall continue to be a government of laws and not of men is now for Congress and ultimately the American people."

Compare that to today, when we have an Attorney General in the pocket of the President, and a White House operation that systematically fired US attorneys for not being sufficiently loyal, and for threatening to prosecute corrupt Republican office-holders.

Sigh.

It's March Madness Time!
Who ya got?

NCAA Stupidity
As I was thinking about this yearly rant, I wasn't going to post it, assuming i've probably done it in past years, but a quick check of the archives didn't turn it up so here goes. This "play-in" "opening round" game of theirs - Florida A & M and Niagara played in it last night - is the worst idea they've ever had. And it's borderline racist. Kids in schools too small, or too poor, or too uncompetitive in major sports, to participate in big conferences, work their butts off all year with the hope that they get to go to the big national tournament *that starts on Thursday.* Then 2 of the schools, having won and celebrated, get told that no, they have to jump one more hurdle and play one another 2 days earlier for the right to go.

They play in Dayton, OH. And of course nobody in the country cares or watches. Why would we? The setup is cruel and avoids an obvious solution that would be far better. If there is to be a play-off game *how about we make it to decide between some of the teams the whole country is currently arguing about.* The play-in should be between at-large teams, not automatic (non)qualifiers. They have a larger fan-base - crowds would actually travel. Money would actually be made. Maybe there should be 1 play-in per region. So right now, Syracuse and Arkansas, Drexel and Illinois, Air Force and Old Dominion, could settle things on the court for the right to be the 12 seed or whatever. More teams would be involved and the cruel turn of making 2 conference tourney champions go through another unexpected game is removed.

"We are struck by the obvious fact that the Peaks are located in a desert."
That's my favorite line from a 9th Circuit decision released yesterday involving a ski resort and the religious beliefs of some Native American tribes. I've got the story over at the Baptist Joint Committee blog. Sorry for the shameless self-promotion, but thought it was interesting.

President Thompson?
Tennessee is abuzz over the possibility that former Senator and, ahem, Law and Order star Fred Thompson might run for President. I think he would actually be a tough opponent for the Republicans in the race. And since the GOP rank and file don't seem satisfied with the dozen or so choices they have so far, maybe Fred will outflank Newt and sweep in before he has the chance? And, Thompson's only had 2 wives!

One thing's for sure, with Rudy, McCain and Thompson, Republicans would have some seriously seasoned citizens in the running. 64, 72 and 66 respectively when they would become President.

McCain's withering on the vine. It will be hard for anyone but Romney to catch Giuliani. But Thompson may really shake things up.

And More Great News...
When you die and go to heaven, Jeffrey Dahmer will be there waiting! And you were worried it might be boring...

Happy Face, Everybody!
I thought we could all use this great news for a Monday.

The draft document by the authoritative Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change focuses on global warming's effects and is the second in a series of four being issued this year. Written and reviewed by more than 1,000 scientists from dozens of countries, it still must be edited by government officials.
...
"Things are happening and happening faster than we expected," said Patricia Romero Lankao of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., one of the many co-authors of the new report.

The draft document says scientists are highly confident that many current problems _ change in species' habits and habitats, more acidified oceans, loss of wetlands, bleaching of coral reefs, and increases in allergy-inducing pollen _ can be blamed on global warming.

For example, the report says North America "has already experienced substantial ecosystem, social and cultural disruption from recent climate extremes," such as hurricanes and wildfires.

But the present is nothing compared to the future.
...
_Hundreds of millions of Africans and tens of millions of Latin Americans who now have water will be short of it in less than 20 years. By 2050, more than 1 billion people in Asia could face water shortages. By 2080, water shortages could threaten 1.1 billion to 3.2 billion people, depending on the level of greenhouse gases that cars and industry spew into the air.
...
_Europe's small glaciers will disappear with many of the continent's large glaciers shrinking dramatically by 2050. And half of Europe's plant species could be vulnerable, endangered or extinct by 2100.

_By 2080, between 200 million and 600 million people could be hungry because of global warming's effects.

_About 100 million people each year could be flooded by 2080 by rising seas.

_Smog in U.S. cities will worsen and "ozone-related deaths from climate (will) increase by approximately 4.5 percent for the mid-2050s, compared with 1990s levels," turning a small health risk into a substantial one.

There's even more where that came from! Hope everyone has a great day!

NYTimes on TN Smoking Ban
For whatever it's worth, the elitists at the NYTimes think Tennessee's proposed smoking ban will "probably...pass," and that it's "expected to." In a piece today about our state's dwindling tobacco influence, their evidence is a little slim for the predictions of political victory ("because of its support — if qualified — in the General Assembly from both the House speaker and Senate president, and important business groups, including the Tennessee Chamber of Commerce."), but there you go.

I'll believe it when I see it (and cheer).

More Trouble for Rove?
I haven't been writing about the US Attorney scandal brewing for the White House and AG Gonzales. The one-sentence version is this: The Attorney General has been using his power as head of the Justice Dept. to fire US attorneys whose politics don't conform to the Republican Party. Of course, this was not all his idea. He's not that smart. Via TPM:

Allen Weh, the party chairman, said he complained in 2005 about then-U.S. Attorney David Iglesias to a White House liaison who worked for Rove and asked that he be removed. Weh said he followed up with Rove personally in late 2006 during a visit to the White House.

"Is anything ever going to happen to that guy?" Weh said he asked Rove at a White House holiday event that month.

"He's gone," Rove said, according to Weh.

And now the NYTimes has had enough.

We opposed Mr. Gonzales’s nomination as attorney general. His résumé was weak, centered around producing legal briefs for Mr. Bush that assured him that the law said what he wanted it to say. More than anyone in the administration, except perhaps Vice President Dick Cheney, Mr. Gonzales symbolizes Mr. Bush’s disdain for the separation of powers, civil liberties and the rule of law.

On Thursday, Senator Arlen Specter, the senior Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, hinted very obliquely that perhaps Mr. Gonzales’s time was up. We’re not going to be oblique. Mr. Bush should dismiss Mr. Gonzales and finally appoint an attorney general who will use the job to enforce the law and defend the Constitution.

Woohoo!
Kentucky may have lost today after a ridiculously stupid violation up 3 points with 5 seconds to go. But via Kos I see Democrats won today. There will be no Fox News debate after all. Way to go, John Edwards.

Read EJ Dionne Today
Link

[O]nly the Marx Brothers could have done justice to the manic us-vs.-them response of administration lieutenants to angry jottings that Vice President Cheney scrawled in the margins of former ambassador Joseph Wilson's op-ed piece attacking administration claims about Iraq. Imagine if these guys had spent the energy they put into discrediting an opponent into planning for the war's aftermath.

A reader once expressed his amazement that Republicans win office by saying government can't work, then go about proving it. They don't take responsibility for their failures until they have no other choice.

Even then, do they?

Calling All Reasonable Republicans
Looks like we'll get a chance to sift out the religious conservatives extremists and the war-hawks and see how many Republicans are left.

March Madness Officially Under Way
Kentucky just tipped off versus Alabama in the SEC Tournament. TubbyWatch is on. My main purpose for rooting them on this time around isn't just the typical fan-dom. I'm wanting to quiet the Tubby-haters. He's a great guy, great coach. Maybe they're not in the top 10 for a couple years in a row. Big deal. My message to Big Blue fans is simple: the coach you know is likely better than the coach you don't. It could easily be worse. Changing coaches would be a quick way to find that out. Ask me about my Boston Celtics. Follow the Kentucky score here.

Once Again, Edwards Impresses
Won't play with Fox News. Hopefully others will follow his lead.

Ann Coulter and Scooter Libby
Don't feel like spinning my disgust into an epic. Safe to say it this way: this is your modern day Republican Party. Childish, vulgar, bullying hatemongers and power-loving, criminally deceitful, unaccountable tyrants.

So long as Republicans continually refuse to denounce these figureheads, they will remain - as an organization - a black mark on the country, not just honorably incorrect on the issues. Any GOP supporter who claims to just be in it for the supposedly low-tax, small government principles should have to answer for enabling the true nature of their party: a country that's more comfortable persecuting gays and lesbians, more comfortable demonizing minority religions, more committed to war than to peace, more comfortable lying to achieve their objectives than we were 7 years ago.

That is their legacy.

Movie Recommendation: Zodiac
The advice here is take a good long piss before this - it's a long one. There was lots to like here and it's worth seeing, though far from great. The nature of the story leaves it kind of hollow in plot substance, and that becomes the story itself for much of the film - chasing one's tail and all of that. As you know, I don't like to give these things away, so I won't say more, other than that it's marginally recommended, more for how the search for the killer takes over a couple people's lives than for the actual hunt-em-down thriller aspect.

I'm either annoyed or impressed with the blatant ripoff of Charles Ives' The Unanswered Question marking most of the musical score. A music-nerd signal? (since I am one, I got it) or just a ripoff? expression of creativity or of the lack of it? I'm not sure.

The performances were great, and I'm not even counting Robert Downey, Jr. And the look of the movie was really fabulous. Thankfully, from the maker of Seven, not overly gruesome.

Also, curious - did anyone read the book?

Weekend Speeches
Hillary Clinton's is here. Barack Obama's is here. Obama was way better. Read them both.

Rant...
I'm so so sick of freaking roll-over ads. Listen - just because my stupid mouse crosses your page coordinates - doesn't mean I want to interrupt my surfing with a noisy obnoxious video covering my screen. Sometimes my mouse was just in the wrong place when I loaded the page. Sometimes I am just scrolling the page and happen to scroll the ad under my cursor, or more often I'm just trying to move the cursor from point A to point B and your points happen to be in-between, unbeknownst to me, the innocent bystanding reader. But I've never, ever said gee I'd like to roll over that ad and see more. It is easily the single most obnoxious intrusive method of advertising now that we've made pop-ups (mostly) a thing of the past. I can't believe it is ever met with any response other than fury. I have to close out the stupid things multiple times a day. I'd like to drop-kick any site that purposefully allows one to pollute its URL.

Funny Promotion
I have been anxious to see David Lunch's new film Inland Empire that is starting at the local indie theater, the Belcourt, this weekend. I notice they're running a promotion - see it 9 times and your 10th viewing is free! Clocking in at nearly 3 hours, and being a David Lynch movie, I'm not sure what signal that funny promotion is sending. Is it great or is it terrible? Have any A19 readers seen it?

I liked Mulholland Drive, though not as much as many critics did. And I really disliked Lost Highway, (at least I do now thinking back on it) maybe because I found the first half to be so interesting and promising before he descended into such self-parody (even for him) in the final half. My favorite of his is easily Wild at Heart (I like Blue Velvet less and less over time...).

Falwell: Al Gore = Spawn of Satan
The universe of good and evil is wacked-out crazy in Jerry Falwell's world.

Jerry Falwell, who has worked for decades to involve conservative Christians in politics, said Sunday the debate over global warming is a tool of Satan being used to distract churches from their primary focus of preaching the gospel.

"If I decide here as the pastor and our deacons decide that we're going to get caught up in the global warming thing, we're not going to be able to reach the masses of souls for Christ, because our attention will be elsewhere," Falwell said in Sunday's sermon at Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Va. "That's pretty wise for Satan to concoct."
...
"Now how long will the earth remain?" Falwell asked. "It will remain until the new heavens and the new earth come. And that won't happen until, well, over in the last two chapters of the Bible--after the tribulation, after the thousand-year reign of Christ, then new heavens and new earth. Why? Because the former things are passed away. The earth will go up in dissolution from severe heat. The environmentalists will be really shook up then, because God is going to blow it all away, and bring down new heavens and new earth."

Um, what?

Robert Reich Has a Blog [UPDATED]
Here it is. I mentioned it in a comment the other day, because of this kinda wacky prediction of his. But other than that post it's an interesting and informative site to follow. The two most recent posts are about Monday's stock market tumble and the importance of Democratic attempts to improve labor union laws.

[UPDATE: The House has passed the bill Reich was pushing, though it's not likely to become law because of either a Senate filibuster or a presidential veto.]