Chloe's Christmas Tree

Noodle

Chloe!

Let the countdown begin...

Betsy is east-coast bound in t-minus 13 hours...stay tuned for updates!

I'm baaaaaaack...

P. Bush says something stupid
Blind reporter taunted in the rose garden

Osama joins The View
The last line of this is totally the best part.

Gore takes on Hil, Ambien
Contemplating a run for the White House in 2008, Al Gore is positioning himself as an alternative to both Senator Hillary Clinton and the sleeping pill Ambien, aides to the former vice president confirmed today

Andy Borowitz is totally my new hero!

Gold hunter digs 60-foot hole in yard
Californian gets ‘carried away’; fire officials forced to intervene, stop work
I cannot improve on this title.

Being fat saves lives
A 440-pound German man discovered that being overweight can be good for your health — if you get run over by a car.
What I want to know is what 440lb person rides a bike. I mean, I don't know any.

In the news...

I know when I'm really upset I look for the nearest fast food icon to beat up on.
Especially if it's a cartoon that's got me riled. (Don't think Grimace would take a beating like this laying down, btw.)

How you SHOULD handle things if your VP shoots someone
...and he has a heart attack.

SO GLAD our administration has time to keep tabs on a struggling pop star
If only they could then do something helpful, like, say, addressing the K-fed situation.

Willie Nelson jumps on board gay cowboy bandwagon
Mammas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys...

I'm the oldest age everrrrrr...

Happy birthday to me-
Happy birthday to me-
I'm the greatest Betsy ever...
Happy birthday to me!

To quote those who express how I feel:

The Politics of Science
"...Mr. Deutsch prevented reporters from interviewing James E. Hansen, the leading climate scientist at NASA, telling colleagues he was doing so because his job was to "make the president look good." Mr. Deutsch also instructed another NASA scientist to add the word "theory" after every written mention of the Big Bang, on the grounds that the accepted scientific explanation of the origins of the universe "is an opinion" and that NASA should not discount the possibility of "intelligent design by a creator."

The spectacle of a young political appointee with no college degree exerting crude political control over senior government scientists and civil servants with many decades of experience is deeply disturbing. More disturbing is the fact that Mr. Deutsch's attempts to manipulate science and scientists, although unusually blatant, were not unique. Just before Christmas, the federal Environmental Protection Agency issued "talking points" to local environmental agencies. These suggestions were intended to help their spokesmen play down an Associated Press story that -- using the EPA's own data -- showed that impoverished neighborhoods had higher levels of air pollution."

Political appointee with no experience censors NASA
"The Bush administration long ago secured a special place in history for the audacity with which it manipulates science to suit its political ends. But it set a new standard of cynicism when it allowed NASA's leading authority on global warming to be mugged by a 24-year-old presidential appointee who, quite apart from having no training on that issue, had inflated his résumé."

Drafting Hitler
"You want us to know how you feel. You in the Arab European League published a cartoon of Hitler in bed with Anne Frank so we in the West would understand how offended you were by those Danish cartoons. You at the Iranian newspaper Hamshahri are holding a Holocaust cartoon contest so we'll also know how you feel.

Well, I saw the Hitler-Anne Frank cartoon: the two have just had sex and Hitler says to her, "Write this one in your diary, Anne." But I still don't know how you feel. I still don't feel as if I should burn embassies or behead people or call on God or bin Laden to exterminate my foes. I still don't feel your rage. I don't feel threatened by a sophomoric cartoon, even one as tasteless as that one."

Illegal and inept: Gonzales testifies to congress
"Senator Joseph Biden suggested that Al Qaeda operatives have most likely been aware for some time that the government is trying to intercept their phone calls.

Mr. Gonzales agreed. "You would assume that the enemy is presuming that we are engaged in some kind of surveillance," he said. "But if they're not reminded about it all the time in newspapers and in stories, they sometimes forget."

Bucking Bush on Spying
"...The obduracy of the administration in continuing to refuse such open invitations to seek a clear statutory authority for this electronic monitoring is almost impossible to understand -- unless Bush and Vice President Cheney are simply trying to establish the precedent that they can wage this war on terrorism without any recourse to Congress..."

"...As for the administration's contention that Bush has "inherent power" as chief executive to order warrantless wiretaps, Graham said, "Its application, to me, seems to have no boundaries when it comes to executive decisions in a time of war. It deals the Congress out. It deals the courts out."

Bait and Switch
"...White House spokesman Scott McClellan whipped up the press corps early this morning with word that Bush would offer hitherto secret information about the plot to crash a plane into Los Angeles's tallest building...but...Why is the White House suddenly offering all these details, even though they are unrelated to the central issue preoccupying official Washington, namely whether Bush's secret surveillance plan is illegal?

Could it just be an attempt to change the subject?"

DeLay rejoins appropriations committee
"...Mr. DeLay, who was a member of the powerful committee until becoming majority leader in 2003, was able to rejoin the panel because of a vacancy created after the resignation of Representative Randy Cunningham, Republican of California. Mr. Cunningham pleaded guilty in November to charges relating to accepting $2.4 million in bribes for government business and other favors..."

"Allowing Tom DeLay to sit on a committee in charge of giving out money is like putting Michael Brown back in charge of FEMA," said Bill Burton, spokesman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, referring to the director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency who resigned after the flawed federal response to Hurricane Katrina.

Mr. Burton added, "Republicans in Congress just can't seem to resist standing by their man."

OR replacing one crook with another.

In the news...

Boccie keeps mind and body limber
Marianne Bergh, left, reacts after rolling her boccie ball, as Irene "The Terminator" VanKamerik, Anita Pierce, Mary Ellen Daly and Lois Truax look on.

This photo is priceless.

Carter, Reverand rip President's policies at King memorial service
Bushie was in the front row! ha ha ha. yeah!

Iran paper launches Holocaust cartoon contest
That will show them!

Teen falls out bus' bathroom window
How does this happen??? I'm glad he's ok, but gee wiz, I've used a bus bathroom before (unfortunately...) and am not sure how this is possible. Egad!

I'm going out the window!

Pigeon's "give" Katie C. "good luck"
I still don't think getting sh*t on is good luck.

Mouth-to-beak resuscitation saves chicken
Sick!

Aphrodisiac soda coming to a store near you
"A warning label on the can claims, "This beverage will arouse you." Turn On is sold online for $3.50 a can and will soon be available in stores..."

Good golly!

Are Guy and Madge struggling???
I don't know what to think! I always hope for the best with these things and then am dissapointed...

Special Report

Scientists discover "lost world" of unknown and rare animals
This is so GD cool!

"An astonishing mist-shrouded "lost world" of previously unknown and rare animals and plants high in the mountain rainforests of New Guinea has been uncovered by an international team of scientists.

Among the new species of birds, frogs, butterflies and palms discovered in the expedition through this pristine environment, untouched by man, was the spectacular Berlepsch's six-wired bird of paradise. The scientists are the first outsiders to see it. They could only reach the remote mountainous area by helicopter, which they described it as akin to finding a "Garden of Eden".