Earth to Joe Biden

I guess Biden wants to be the Joe Lieberman of 2008. He will be the pathetic, beltway C.W. candidate that is shocked that real people don't like him as much as DC pundits do.

And why do they like Biden? Because he sounds serious, is/was chair of an "important" committe, foreign relations, and makes good copy by canibalizing his own party members.

Look, readers of my blog know I am not a great fan of HoHo, and that I thought he shoots a bit too much from the hip. But there is no need for a safe senator from the blue state of Delaware to critique, nor is there one from a never contested super-liberal district in San Francisco (paging Minority Leader Pelosi). If it was Ben Nelson, I would understand. Or even Harold Ford, Jr. I get, but Joe "MBNA" Biden?

The majority of the GOP's base and elected officials are white and christian conservatives. There is no two ways about it. They get lots of support from Cubans, but that is about the only minority supporters and elected they have besides a smattering of African-Americans and non-Cuban Hispanics nation wide.

I hope this brings in big bucks for the DNC like all the people on DailyKos and MyDD say it is, but those places are filled with Deaniacs and the echo chamber twists your perspective.

So I end with this: Joe Biden, you will fail miserably and like Lieberman only win Delaware if you run for president. No one likes you in the party. You are a blow hard. Why don't you just retire so the council on foreign relations can hire you and you can pontificate to people that care to hear self-important pompuous know-it-alls? And then on the side you can lobby for your beloved credit card companies and banks that are impoverising and endebting the nation.

Oh and Delaware annoys me, get rid of that terrible toll bridge.

The most unbelievable lie of the day

CoinGate: the scandal the keeps on ticking in Ohio. For those who do't know what is going on, GOP appointees invested state pensions and other taxpayer money into rare coins and other memorabilia which "just so happened" to be owned by a major campaign contributor to OH and and National GOPers (including Bush/Cheney 2004). Of course, the coins lost lots of money, and President Taft's great-grandson looks like he is done with politics, whether he wants to be or not.

"'For the second time in two weeks' a memo surfaced that contradicts when Gov. Bob Taft's (R) office said they learned about investment losses at the OH Bureau of Worker's Compensation. Ex-bureau admini. James Conrad (who recently resigned) had informed the GOV office in a 10/26 memo that the loss was as much as $225M. Taft exec. ass't for business and industry James Samuel 'recalls receiving the memo...but said he did not forward it to Taft,' but Taft spokesperson James Rickel 'couldn't say why.' Taft 'didn't learn the full details' until 6/6. 'The governor is 'disappointed' that Samuel didn't share the memo' and plans to create a 'special liaison' to the bureau to 'inform him of day-to-day issues.'" (Niquette/Hallett, Columbus Dispatch, 6/9).

Great! So they will waste more taxpayer money and get another politcal appointment out of a sham job to continue the lie that the governor had no idea what was going on.

This story is great because Mr. Noe (the coin collector/fundraiser/contributor) has lots of connections to 2006 OH Gov candidates like Secretary of State Ken "conflict of interest" Blackwell (R), who was at the center of the Ohio recount that never was. The Toledo Blade has been leading the pack on this story from the get go, but the Dispatch is a more influential paper. Here's the Blade's version of the story.

Most embarrassing headline ever

" What's up with Hispanics? Learn Spanish and find out Ogden Standard-Examiner.

I know the author means well, but the whole thing comes off as ignorant white Americans. After reading the article, it gets better:

A few years ago, I attacked Utah's pathetic "English as the official language" bill and got a pile of letters that were, to be frank, racist. Writers saw the bill as a way to prevent Hispanic gangs and illegal aliens, although it did nothing about either problem. If all else failed, the letters just ranted about "them."

But "them" are not going anywhere. Like my German immigrant grandparents, "them" are "us." That's America.

Indeed, I like the idea and tone of the article-- get to know another language and don't jump to racist stereotypes. But whomever wrote the headline needs to be slapped. Although I guess it did get my attention.

When was the last time I read anything in the Ogden Standard-Examiner? Maybe in 2002 for the coverage of the First District Race which I thought was going to be much closer than it was.

Proof that I was at the Red Sox Game too 

I have got the ticket to prove it. Don't try and copy this, they change the colors etc all the time. Plus, it is illegal. 

State of Utah v. Mark Hacking

Today was pretty slow, so all the law clerks who where there went to go see Mark Hacking, the man who lied to his family about graduating from college and Medical School Admission...which lead to him murdering his wife Lori, get sentenced this afternoon.

It was a very intense, emotional proceeding, with Mark's brother's and sisters and mother and father pleaing for his life, whiping away tears. Some of them were still in denial how their brother had constructed an elaborate web of lies, including studying for college and applying and getting into medical school.

Mark himself got up and said that "It doesn't matter if I get life [in prision] or less...I guess I deserve [a] life [sentence]." He appologized to Lori's family. He also admitted for the first time that Lori was pregnant and that he was a de facto double murder under "Laci's Law" but now of course it was too late for the death penalty. "She didn't do nothing but love me unconditionally, even when I didn't deserve it. She was the greatest thing that ever happened to me, but I killed her, and took the life of my unborn child and put them in the garbage and I can't explain whey I did it," Hacking said.

Lori's mother and step-mother really laid it into Mark (her father was OK and another male relative talked too quietly to hear, only the judge's mike was working) rhetorically asking "Did you love her when you lied to her about medical school, costing her money she didn't have to fly out to your fake interviews?... Did you love her when you shot her in the back of the head while she was sleeping? Did you love her when you threw her body and that of her unborn child in garbage bags and tossed them in dumpsters? Did you love her when you told the world that she was missing while her body and her baby's body rotted in the city dump for 2 months?"

Lori's mother regailed us with all the things people had sent her, all the calls and letters, and emails she has gotten, how Mark has thrust her into the national and international spotlight. The tensest moment of the whole day came when she turned away from the judge and looked Mark dead into the eyes and asked, "How could you do that, Mark? How could you do that to me?" "I'm sorry," Hacking replied, dabbing his eyes.

The judge sentenced Hacking to the maximum 6 to life, but in reality he won't even see a parole board for 25-30 years. The judge will recommend that, which is pretty standard for 1st degree murders. In all likilhood, Hacking will never breathe free air.

It was an interesting experience to sit behind Salt Lake Tribune reporters and watch them fill their notebooks. Here's their version of what happened.

T-minus 12 days

So my lack of posting is for a reason: I am busy at work and then when I get home I have to dedicate myself to aiding my bride as much as I can in finishing up wedding planning. The event is occurring in 12 days as you might of guessed.

Some other things are also on my mind however. And so in no particular order and in typical roving mind manner, we begin with my weekend roundup.

What's said in Vegas, should stay in Vegas: "Half of you will fall asleep, 25 percent of you will drift off into some sexual fantasy, and the other 25 percent of you are going to pay attention."-- Rep. Jim Gibbons (R-NV) on giving a speech after lunch, Las Vegas Review-Journal, 6/6 (By the way, this man is running for Governor and Sen. Reid will only lukewarmly endorse the Democrat per the non-aggression pact.)

And what's with the Media's obsession with white women? I feel like we are back in the day when all of western society was built around trying to "protect" white women from men, especially black men. Women of other ethnicities and races go missing every day, but they don't get round the clock coverage on the cable news networks. But Chandra Levy, Laci Peterson, the Runaway Bride, and that woman lost in Aruba all do/did. There is a more subtle version of racism today than in turn of the last century, but this coverage just shows that our society hasn't progressed as much as we would like to think it has.

Either that, or the media thinks this is what we want to hear: Michael Jackson trial coverage, a lost middle-class white woman, and political "balance." To me it shows just how out of touch and arrogant the media have become, especially with the memory of the last bit of real reporting-- Watergate resurfacing with the name of Deep Throat.

On to Political Balance. Many have said, and I agree, that if Watergate had happened today (Bush had ordered a snooping on Terry and Kerry with idiot goons and gotten caught) that Bush would not have the same fate as Nixon. One reason is the media is filled with the Right Wing Noise Machine, GOP loyalist who will tout talking points to save their party figurehead and not the principles of their party. Another reason is that the GOP controls congress and it would take a long time for those clowns to get off their duffs and investigate the crime. A third is that Bush has a lot of more charisma than Nixon ever did.

And really this is so true because in my opinion sending our nation off to a optional war based on lies and deception is much worse a crime than trying to bug the DNC and then trying to cover it up (and is certainly much worse than having oral sex with an White House intern). When will congress investigate WMD-gate? When will the media care? Well again the problem is that they are co-conspirators/willing accomplices in the whole mess (paging Ms. Miller).