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Bob Ney has a funny name. It means mud in horse. On Monday he stepped down from the chairmanship of the House Administration Committee. The Jack Abramoff scandle is a complex mess and evidently Ney was in the middle of it. In addition to handing out parking passes, the Chairman of the Administration committee would be involved in House ethics reform. He should watch his step.

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Iran is close to building a nuclear bomb. Iran hates Israel. The president of Iran is such a whacko he makes the president of North Korea look statesmanlike. Iran is also the world's 2nd largest producer of crude oil. Maybe they know something we don't and they're just developing alternative fuels. Or maybe not. France, Germany, and Britain wasted 2 years trying to talk Iran out of the Nuke business. Now they've passed the ball to the U.N.

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Amid all the news about politician fraud last week we also had a story about author fraud. It involves yet another book I haven't read, A Million Little Pieces.  It seems the author, James Frey, wasn't as bad a guy as be made himself out to be. That isn't good for his book which apparently is about his recovery from bad guyness. There are credible reports that he was even polite and cooperative. If he lied about being bad, though, doesn't the lie actually makes him bad? In that case he hasn't gone from bad to good.  He's gone from good to bad, which I don't think fits the premise of the book. The good news is his book got a lot of free publicity which would prevent a good guy from finishing last.

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The YMCA has completed a lengthy and expensive pool renovation. Unfortunately Akron water smells really bad these days. It doesn't taste so hot either.  It is, however, considered safe for swimming.

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This cartoon was inspired by a funny front page article by Elisabeth Bumiller in Wednesday's New York Times. It was about the way the Judiciary Committee hammed it up in front of 50 + cameras in the hearing room. Senator Biden had the highest words per question vs words per answer ratio at nearly 4-1. The ratios for all the senators were presented in a spiffy graphic. Senator Hatch, meanwhile, acted like he was Alito's lawyer. Schumer responded by having a chart held near Hatch's head showing all the times Roe v Wade had been upheld.

I hit the cartoon daily double around  2pm when I checked the Washington Post site and saw that Kennedy had demanded that the committee subpoena records of Alito's membership in the Concerned Alumni of Princeton University. Specter stood up to the bullying by saying that Kennedy was making the request for the first time in public in front of the cameras. Kennedy claimed Specter had a request in writing that he had mailed December 22.  Specter told Kennedy he didn't know what he was talking about and that he was chairman, not Kennedy.

The New York Times pointed out today that it had reviewed those records in a November story and that Alito wasn't active in the group and wasn't a major donor. Kennedy must be partly responsible for declining circulation since he evidently doesn't read the paper.

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Pat Robertson offered a few words about Ariel Sharon's stroke on his 700 Club show last Thursday: "He was dividing God's land, and I would say, 'Woe unto any prime
minister of Israel who takes a similar course to appease the [European
Union], the United Nations or the United States of America.'"  He also said, "God says, 'This land belongs to me, and you'd better leave it alone."

In seperate comments, Iranian president President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad carried that line of reasoning a step further saying, "Hopefully, the news that the criminal of Sabra and Chatilla has joined his ancestors is final."

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Click image to enlarge.