code0range.net

[Bush is a moron](http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/politics/ny-nybres294952504...)

It's old news that the Dixie Chicks have been somewhat blacklisted because of some comments they made about [President Bush](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush) at a concert in Europe. Houston, being the hotbed of liberal thought that it is (not), recently forced the Chicks to cancel a concert because there was some sort of bullshit redneck outcry/backlash. The concensus is that they alienated their fanbase by being liberal thinkers.

It's too bad that the [Dixie Chicks](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dixie_chicks) aren't as good at writing songs as they are at causing controversy. They are not great performers in my humble opinion. Natalie Maines said (in said Europe concert) that she was ashamed that he [Bush] was from Texas. He, in fact, is not from Texas at all. This whole thing could have been avoided if she had only read up on the Bush family's history. He's actually from Connecticut - born in New Haven, CT in 1946. He's a Blue Blood! His Crawford, Texas ranch was purchased in 1999! He LEASES the animals on the ranch from the previous owner. Bush is a total political and religious fabrication - he doesn't really exist.

As some of you have heard, the Fish is back on the [road](http://www.mamma-mia.com/ustour/ustour.asp) for a little while. I've also been silent as I have been concentrating lately on my food blog at [omnivorousfish.com](http://omnivorousfish.com). Anyway, we played knoxville, TN this week which is one of those places, like many in the South, that you would never want to go, but if you were already there are kind of cool. What evidence is there, you ask of Knoxville's elan? [The Great Knoxville Rubber Duck Race](http://www.knoxvilleduckrace.com/index.html). My comrades and I watched as three dumptrucks (see attachment) dropped 50,000 rubber ducks off of an overpass into the Tennessee River, with jet-skis keeping them coralled, they raced to the finish downstream. I bet on eight ducks, but I had to go to the show, so I don't know whether I won yet.

Kenneth Lay, former chairperson and head scumbag for Enron, dropped dead this morning of an apparent heart attack. Shame, mortification and fear of forcible anal sex have not been ruled out as causes. He died -- boo hoo -- at his vacation home at Aspen. No word yet on whether his insurance beneficiaries are the thousands of people he screwed out of their retirement.

I wonder if anyone -- other than his immediate family -- mourns this asshole.

OK folks. The Bushies have started to notice that outflow is a tad bigger than income. So what to do? A perfect revenue source - [sell 300,000 acres of National Forest from sea to sea](http://usgovinfo.about.com/b/a/217042.htm)! Developers Paradise! As if $1 billion makes a difference in the current and future deficit. Maybe they're planning to burn the trees to get the country less dependent on foreign oil. Fshizzlefooey.

>Calling the oil issue a matter of national security, President Bush outlined a plan Tuesday to cut gasoline costs and temporarily stopped deposits to the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

>Bush is delaying this summer's deposits to the reserve -- an emergency stockpile of government-owned crude oil -- as he faces political pressure from campaigning members of Congress and anger from consumers about high gas prices.

We all know this isn't going to do jack-squat! Did I mention that Bush's new approval rating (released today) shows that he is at an all time low of 30% approval. This guy will do anything!

Slate.com has an intresting article about the recent video tape that shows the president being briefed about Katrina.  This is a line that cracked me up:

You know you're in trouble when Michael Brown outshines you.

Ouch... Read, enjoy, and try not cry for our country.

Bush has long been criticized for being incurious. That isn't always a bad thing. A president can be uninterested in visiting the Taj Mahal if he's laserlike behind the scenes. Perhaps the Katrina briefing was an aberration. But I worry that it isn't. Those in the room with him during other briefings also say he didn't ask very sharp questions then, either. Former anti-terrorism official Richard Clarke and Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill both wrote about Bush's lack of curiosity. L. Paul Bremer's account of his 14 months in Iraq as head of the Coalition Provisional Authority inadvertently paints a similar picture. In briefings, Bush offered a pep talk—"pace yourself, Jerry"—and questions about tangential issues like whether the new Iraqi leaders would thank the Americans for their sacrifice. George Packer didn't work for Bush, but his book The Assassin's Gate paints a grim portrait of what happens when the president doesn't ask the right questions: Factions within his administration take over and pursue their own agendas.

So homeland security has decided to turn over operations at six major US ports to a company owned by a firm from the United Arab Emirates.

Brilliant. It seems to me that for 5 years now we have been hearing about how bad our security at ports is and that it's a weakness in our homeland security. So instead of doing something about it, we cede control and hand the responsability to some company???  So now we turn over control of operations in New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New Orleans and Miami to the United Arab Emirates?

Why do we need to outsource this control in the first place? Isn't this the job of the government?

Just in case you missed it, [Exxon Mobil raked in $371 billion](http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/31/business/31exxon.html?ex=1296363600&en...) in revenue (a sum larger than the GDP of Saudia Arabia) and posted $36 billion in annual income -- a move which means that they have surpassed my favorite company [WalMart](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walmart) as the biggest money maker in the United States...Time for a celebration? Not quite, it is actually their hope that no one will notice.

Fearful of raising the ire of the public, who are paying dearly for their petroleum products, is not good business practice. The Oil Barons will do anything avoid any further government regulations.

Over on [Slashdot](http://slashdot.org), pcnetworx1 wrote in about upstate NY residents alternative energy confusion:

>New York State is starting to get crunched for electricity. While other states may just say 'pop a couple more coal/oil/natural gas/nuclear power plants down', NY has decided to take the green route. NY State wants to get more power by strategically placing windmill powerplants in upstate NY to help the grid. While getting a dedicated power plant placed on your property for FREE (and being paid $3,000 a year per tower) may sounds good to some Slashdotters, the citizens in upstate NY still need some education in the safety of alternative energy.

Our upstate neighbors fear their property value will take a hit if they adopt the state's windmill initiative.