Week #1 Wrap Up: Who's Winning; Who's Losing

President Obama is now into his second week of office and some trends are developing:

WINNER's COLUMN:

Wall Street Executives who managed to pocket over $18 Billion in bonuses, all the while trillions of dollars of stock market value evaporating. 2008's Robber Barons make Enron's Ken Lay (known to Bush #43 as "Kenny Boy") look like a rank amateur. [see http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/CEOProfiles/story?id=6778419&page=1].

Exxon Mobil - $45 Billion profit in for fiscal 2008. I'm sure this is just a coincidence after having their cronies Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld & Rice minding the store in D.C. for the last eight years. [see http://money.cnn.com/2009/01/30/news/companies/exxon_earnings/?cnn=yes]

Tomorrow's Super Bowl Winners: The Arizona Cardinals, who are going to win their first Super Bowl to honor the memory of hero Pat Tillman.

The Rule of Law in the Executive Branch.

LOSER's COLUMN:

That crazy ex-Governor of Illinois, Rob Blagojavich. Fire your barber!

Rush Limbaugh, invoking his wing-nut ditto-head listeners to root for Obama and America to fail. The sad thing, he will be laughing all the way to the bank, as listenership will go up, along with his advertisers and income, during the Obama administration, just like it did during the Clinton years.

The 1.5 million civilian residents of the Gaza strip, now picking up the pieces and trying to re-build after a six-week punitive war waged by Israel.

The hard working, tithe-paying members of the New Life Church of Colorado Springs. Their collection plate monies have gone to pay thousands of dollars in salary & severance pay to Pastor Ted Haggard. Lately the church revealed they also paid substantial sums to a young male adult volunteer who had a lengthy affair with Pastor Ted while he was still in charge at New Life and still married to Mrs. Haggard. Doesn't it give you goose bumps knowing this crack-smoking, hustler-bonking, self-hating, counselor-predator was having weekly conference calls with top white House officials, including Karl Rove, and occasionally Pres. Bush #43?

"Mission Accomplished"

ABC News: Michigan Investigates Freezing Death of 93-Year-Old

Perhaps we should take care of own elderly, homeless and veterans and stop the Three Trillion Dollar Mistake in Iraq! End the War Now!

ABC News: Michigan Investigates Freezing Death of 93-Year-Old

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Steve Clemons: Obama and Ted Kennedy See Plans Foiled as Caroline Withdraws?

Steve Clemons: Obama and Ted Kennedy See Plans Foiled as Caroline Withdraws?

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Mark Nickolas: The Pundits Who Had Not A Clue Two Years Ago

Nice summary of which so-called "experts" had it right and which ones thought there was no way Democrats would nominate a first-term U.S. Senator with a name like "Barack Hussein Obama". Your blogger was one of the latter, sadly. I figured Hillary would coast in Iowa, then New Hampshire and that would be all she wrote.

Mark Nickolas: The Pundits Who Had Not A Clue Two Years Ago

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Winners Shop at Northland Poster Collective

Rep. John Murtha: Gone-tanamo Bay: the Right Decision

Rep. John Murtha: Gone-tanamo Bay: the Right Decision

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Also check out:

The White House - http://www.whitehouse.gov/
The House of Representatives - http://www.house.gov/
The Senate - http://www.senate.gov/
The Supreme Court - http://www.supremecourtus.gov/
The Presidential Inauguration Committee - http://www.youtube.com/user/inauguration?blend=1 and http://www.pic2009.org/content/home/
President Obama taking the Oath of Office and the The Inaugural Address - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjnygQ02aW4

What A Day!

Click on the Title above for the full text of President Obama's Inaugural Address

Winners Inspire Hope !!

Winners Don't Piss on the U.S. Constitution

As posted on http://www.alternet.org/:

[Originally published in similar form February 14, 2008 and republished on Election Day. And here it is one more time, because we've only got 24 hours to go....Woot!]

So Long Bush: Good Riddance to Bad Rubbish
Posted by Melissa McEwan, Shakesville at 11:25 AM on January 19, 2009.

I'm so over Bush, it's not even funny. From Day One, Bush was my worst bloody nightmare: A right-wing ideologue with no checks or balances, left to pursue every conservative wet dream with abandon. He was the Golden Boy of modern American conservatives—a corporate shill with the affected demeanor of a country bumpkin, around whom the unholy alliance between Big Money and Big Religion could be forged, standing at the altar and giving his blessing to the crackpot marriage between the business interests who sought to get rich off the stupid sniveling sods who marched in hypocritical lockstep with the warmongers and the corporate mercenaries, as long as they were promised protection from radical feminists and kissing boys. The hideous underbelly of unfettered authoritarian conservatism—exposed by this perfect storm of cobbled-together allies, a GOP-led Congress, and a never-ending stream of media mouthpieces willing to demonize anyone who dared to dissent—has been absolutely revolting, a grotesque mosaic of avarice, antipathy, incompetence, and corruption.

And all along I've been accused of blindly hating Bush, as if there were not reasons, as if I did not watch him take this nation to war on false premises; watch him abandon the "right" war; watch him create millions of refugees; watch him play class warfare with his gilded tax cuts; watch him let an American city drown; watch his administration out one of our own spies; watch him sell We the People piece by piece in massive government-underwritten giveaways to Big Pharma and Big Oil; watch more than 1,000 signing statements undermine the law; watch habeas corpus be cast aside like day-old bread; watch the Geneva Conventions and our Constitution be treated like suggestions…You're goddamned right I hate George Bush.You're right if you think I found him an insignificant slip of a man who was unprepared for and undeserving of the presidency, whose history as a drunken dullard, constructed aw-shucks shtick, and careful positioning as the ordained man who would marry religious extremists with neocon corporatists made me want to puke from the moment I laid eyes upon his sneering visage.You're right if you think that his leadership shames me, that every heh heh which has emanated from his condescending mouth has made my skin crawl, that I am utterly unable to find the merest shadow of anything to like about him.And you're right if you think I hate him to the point of abject indifference, fervently longing for the day he takes his leave from governance and retreats to Crawford for good, where I won't give the tiniest, microscopic shit about him whether he is lost in a tragic brush-clearing accident and his body devoured by wild dogs before the search party arrives, or whether he lives out the remainder of his useless life in good health and happiness—either way, I don't care, as long as I never have to think about him for the rest of my days.Yes, I hate him. But not blindly. I have reasons—more than I can bloody well count.And I can't wait for the day when he will be gone for good, never to give me another thing to add to my list of his crimes and failures.I can't wait to see him go.Going, going…Don't let the door hitcha where Maude splitcha, Dubs.

Your blogger replies: "Amen, sister!"

We Made It! Winners Get Inaugurated Today!

While losers go home, in "W"'s case to a "whites-only" subdivision in Dallas; and Cheney's faking it in a wheelchair. Sorry, Dick, your wheelchair won't get you a "pass" from Guantanamo!

Congratulations, President Obama! You have inherited quite a few stinking piles of crap -- of such proportions that only the Bush family could have imagined. One Family's record: George H.W. & son Neil: the Savings & Loan debacle of the 1980's;

Jeb Bush: the collapse of Lehman Brothers - great advising work, there, Jeb!; George W.: a civil war in Iraq; One Million Dead, Injured, or refugee Iraqis; 4,000+ American soldiers killed in Iraq & Afghanistan; DOZENS of lies fed to the American public and Pat Tillman's family about his death by "friendly fire"; a Real Estate bubble of epic proportions; the near-collapse of the US Banking and Lending system; an almost 50% drop in the major US Stock Indices;

North Korea still going nuclear; Pakistan facing military / Islamic radical coups due to American ties; Afghanistan under mostly Taliban-control, despite our 2002 invasion and purported "defeat" of the Taliban; erosion of our civil liberties; suspension of habeas corpus; illegal us of torture against prisoners of war - torture tactics which we prosecuted our own troops for during the Vietnam War; lying about WMD in Iraq. 500,000 new unemployment claims every week;

Bush flew to Arizona to party with John "Songbird" McCain while poor folk were drowning after Hurricane Katrina (hey, they were only Black!). 'Nuf Said! Farewell Bush!

Welcome, Barack! It's Morning in America, for real this time!

Frank Rich: A Winning Columnist for the New York Times

From his New York Times column dated Jan. 12, 2009:

The Bush Era Has Been an Eight-Year-Long Madoff-Style Ripoff:

Three days after the world learned that $50 billion may have disappeared in Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, The Times led its front page of Dec. 14 with the revelation of another $50 billion rip-off. This time the vanished loot belonged to American taxpayers. That was our collective contribution to the $117 billion spent (as of mid-2008) on Iraq reconstruction — a sinkhole of corruption, cronyism, incompetence and outright theft that epitomized Bush management at home and abroad.

[Click on the title link, above for the full text of the column]

Winners Don't Wage War on Children & Civilian Populations

Shame on Israel:

[posted on http://english.aljazeera.net - click on link above]
The United Nations says it has received reports that about 30 Palestinians were killed when Israeli forces shelled a house after they had moved about 110 civilians inside it.
"According to several testimonies, on 4 January Israeli foot soldiers evacuated approximately 110 Palestinians into a single-residence house in Zeitun, warning them to stay indoors," the UN report said on Friday.
"Twenty-four hours later, Israeli forces shelled the home repeatedly, killing approximately 30."
The incident took place on Monday in the Zeitun neighbourhood of Gaza City on Monday, the report said.
The UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) called it "one of the gravest incidents since the beginning of operations" by Israeli forces in Gaza on December 27.
"Those who survived and were able walked two kilometres to Salah Ed Din road before being transported to hospital in civilian vehicles," OCHA said.
"Three children, the youngest of whom was five months old, died upon arrival at the hospital."

BCS Prediction: Tim Tebow will lead Florida Gators back into the Winner's Circle

An aside from "partisan politics": We are now less than 72 hours away from watching Tim Tebow lead the Florida Gators to victory over the "Oklahoma Sooners". Final Score: I'm thinking U.F. 41 - Oklahoma 20.

As a long-time Miami Hurricane booster, I am surprised at how much I have enjoyed watching Tim Tebow become the statewide sensation he has become. His performance over the last 3 seasons with the Gators is nothing short of phenomenal. He is a leader & inspiration on and off the field. I can't wait to continue to follow him into the N.F.L., and even if the naysayers are correct and his N.F.L. career is short, I predict big things for Mr. Tebow in the field of Electoral Politics. Can you say "Governor Tebow"? Get used to it.

Happy New Year, Winners!`

Your blogger has taken a nice sabbatical from posting, resting up from the post-election euphoria. Now it's time to bid the Bush family "adieu" as they leave Washington, D.C., and the Obamas move in from the neighboring Hay-Adams Hotel.

In the last month there seems to be no bottoming out of our economy; the situation in Pakistan after the Mumbai terror-attacks is worsening; and Israel today has launched a ground offensive into the Gaza strip.

Thumbs up to Pres.-Elect Obama for: a) picking Colorado Senator Ken Salazar to be the next Secretary of the Interior; b) vacationing in Hawaii (such a nice contrast to watching the White House reporters camped out in that hell-hole of a town, Crawford, Texas); and c) rising above the fray after the Illinois Governor was caught trying to auction off the vacant Senate Seat.

Thumbs down to Obama for: a) picking Sen. Hillary Clinton to be his Secretary of State. I predict nothing but trouble with this one. b) asking Defense Secretary Robert Gates to stay on -- where's the "change we can believe in"?; c) having mega-church Pastor Rick Warren deliver the invocation at the inauguration. Wasn't it bad enough the way Warren sandbagged Obama at the candidate's forum, where McCain was allowed to slip outside his "cone of silence" and have all the questions leaked to him via Blackberry? Truly one of the low points of the campaign.

It's shaping up to be an interesting month. We'll see how many more wheelbarrows full of taxpayer cash "W" and Cheney can manage to truck out of town before Jan. 20th!

Check back often!