The Simple Simon Follies

The saga of Bill Simon, the clueless Republican candidate for California Governor continues.

Price cut on Bush’s fund-raiser for Simon  Ticket sales haven’t heated up, but debate over the reason for the new cheap seats has.

 Meanwhile, the normally restrained George Skelton of the L.A. Times asks,

The question political junkies are asking is: Has there ever been a worse campaign for governor of California than Bill Simon’s? 

Has there ever been a worse candidate? 

That is, a sorrier gubernatorial nominee of either the Republican or Democratic party?  Can’t think of any, is the consensus of political pros I’ve talked to in both parties. Not at this point anyway–this close to Labor Day, the traditional kickoff of the November race.

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The Granola Ayatollah of Canola!

Biodiesel fuel comes from plants like corn or can be reprocessed from used cooking oil.  It’ll run your truck just fine, doesn’t pollute, lubricates the engine better than regular diesel, and freezes at a lower temperature (important for truckers in cold weather).

The Granola Ayatollah of Canola, aka Charris Ford, slides behind the wheel of his 1980 International Scout truck and turns the key. The truck burbles to life and off we go, cruising down the gravel roads that divide the aspen groves of southwestern Colorado’s Horsefly Mesa. It would be just a standard evening joyride, except that Ford’s truck doesn’t run on gasoline. Or diesel. Or electricity, or even the sun. This truck is powered by grease, all of it drained from restaurant deep-fryers in the nearby resort town of Telluride.

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Valley / Hollywood secession poll

From the LA Times

Valley secession
Citywide:       29% for, 53% against
In the Valley: 52% for, 37% against

Hollywood secession
Citywide:       24% for, 61% against
In Hollywood: 25% for, 59% against

So, while Valley secession barely passes in the Valley, Hollywood secession does not pass even within Hollywood.  And both get stomped citywide.

It appear the secession movements are deader than Bill Simon’s quest to be governor of California.

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Your tax dollars at work: Rigged war games

The biggest war game in the history of the United States, staged this month at a cost of $US253 million with 13,000 troops, was rigged to ensure that the Americans beat their “Middle Eastern” adversaries, says a leading participant.

General Paul Van Riper, a retired marine lieutenant-general, told the Army Times that the sprawling three-week millennium challenge exercises, were “almost entirely scripted to ensure a win”.

He protested by quitting his role as commander of enemy forces, and warning that the Pentagon might wrongly conclude that its experimental tactics were working.

Note that this criticism comes from inside the military, not from outside it.  Also, parenthetically, this news item comes from the amazing Sydney Morning Herald, whose international coverage equals that of the Guardian UK.  I frequently find important news about the US on these sites first.  Seriously.

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The emperor has no clothes

The Bush Administration huffs and puffs a lot, threatening to blow the evil-doers houses down.  Lots of macho-strutting and big threats, but really, what have they actually accomplished?  Yes, they bombed Afghanistan back to the, uh, stone age most of the country was already in.  How impressive.

Bin Laden hasn’t been caught, no terrorist networks have been smashed.  The only thing they’ve done is alienate our allies.  Iraq?  They’ve sent up so many conflicting trial balloons on this that I doubt they have an actual plan.  But, caught in a bad case of testosterone poisoning, they no doubt feel they must invade because to do otherwise would be to back down and lose face.

Of course, if they weren’t such ignorant provincials, they wouldn’t have found themselves in this situation in the first place.

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Israeli Diplomat Warns of Deteriorating EU-Israel Ties

BRUSSELS: Israel’s Ambassador to the European Union, Harry Kney-Tal, is worried and frustrated over the widening gap between Europe and the Zionist state. Kney-Tal, 58, who completes his term in Brussels in a few weeks, told the Israeli paper Ha’aretz, that political and intellectual gap between Israel and Europe is widening.

Without corrective steps, Israel is liable to end up boycotted as a pariah state, like South Africa in the days of apartheid, Ha’aretz quoted Kney-Tal saying on the paper’s English-language website on Wednesday.

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