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The only thing satisfying about the recent Olympics was seeing Time and Newsweek cover boy, Bode Miller,  suffer the Sports Illustrated Jynx.

It was hard to watch.  The network coverage was more about the lifestyles of the soon to be rich and famous than the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat.  I think the athletes picked up on that.  Bode Miller and Lindsey Jacobellis showed they had their priorities straight.  "It's only  a game, dammit, it's our cool lifestyles that really count."

I say it's "just a race" when you're 12 but when you make it to the Olympics winning is the only thing.  Or else I click the channel.

Here's a sketch I was saving for later but interest in the Olympics died out so fast I never got around to it.  Download body_miller_plays_silver.jpg

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Okay, it's not a conspiracy.  It's dubm.   But I thought it was amusing.

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Iraq doesn't have a monopoly on sectarian civil war fears.
 

Ohio is once again shaping up as a swing state for the 2008 presidential elections. 

Secretary of State Ken Blackwell launched attack ads against Attorney General, Jim Petro, Blackwell's opponent in the republican primary election for governor.

The Secretary of state is running as an outsider against scandal.  Governor Bob Taft pleaded no contest to not paying golf green fees.  Golfing partner and coin dealer, Tom Noe, is under indictment. Blackwell says, "Petro gave $129 million in unbid legal contracts and expected campaign kickbacks in return." 

If Blackwell's not careful he'll use up all the scandal charges before the democrats get a chance in the general election.

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This cartoon was  inspired by a Peggy Noonan column in the Wall Street Journal.  She is annoyed by airport security and its insistence on strip searching grandmas to prove it doesn't do profiling.  Are we safer because we make everyone in line miserable while TSA scans babushka bombers?

Here we have a moderate Islamic country that accepts civilized western values, like quarterly earnings expectations.  It just happens to be replacing a company from a country full of mad mullahs, namely Britain.  Tony  Blair has proved he's tough on terror but England supports some of the most radical Islamo-whatever-you-like-to-call-them I've ever heard of.  So I'm beginning to think why not United Arab Emirates. UAE sounds like a big American union and probably isn't any more dangerous.

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You know how they say closet homosexuals are sometimes the biggest gay bashers?  Well, Austria is the world's biggest Holocaust-denier basher. 

British historian, David Irving, says he's changed his mind. He now believes the Holocaust really did happen.  An Austrian court didn't believe him and sentenced him to 3 years in prison.

Even the crazy Mullahs don't bother you for what you think.  You have to actually draw Muhammad before they'll even consider burning your embassy, much less chopping off your hands.

Too bad for professor Irving that he had wrong opinions.  If he had actually been a Nazi maybe he could have become president of Austria, like Kurt Waldheim. 

No wonder Ahhhnold moved.

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A British company, P&O, manages 6 major U.S. ports.  There are plenty of terrorists in England.  After all, the London subway bombing was an inside job. 

But don't worry.  The Brits are out.  P&O is being taken over by Dubai Ports World, a company owned by United Arab Emirates, home of 9/11 attackers.

Congress is threatening to kill the deal.  Bush has promised to defend the Arab company with his first veto in 6 years.  Homeland Security is rescuing cats stranded by Katrina.

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In an effort to gain entry to the Chinese internet market, Yahoo's Chinese operation turned over information to the Chinese government that resulted in the jailing of a journalist. (In the U.S. the jailing of a journalist results from not turning over information to the government.)

Congressman Tom Lantos commented,  "I simply do not understand how your corporate leadership sleeps at night."

Asia Times Online
has the story.

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Cheney evokes such strong emotions there are actually those in favor of the shooting.

True, it's Alec Baldwin, but here's what he had to say on The Huffington Post: "Cheney is a terrorist. He terrorizes our enemies abroad and innocent
citizens here at home indiscriminately. Who ever thought Harry
Whittington would be the answer to America's prayers. Finally, someone
who might get that lying, thieving Cheney into a courtroom to answer
some direct questions."

Tucker Carlson takes the HUI (hunting while intoxicated) angle, "I think Cheney gets to do pretty much whatever he wants, which
is why he got to have a beer at lunch on a hunt. I’ve been on dozens of
hunts, there’s no beer served as lunch. You can’t drink a beer if you
shoot, period."

If the vice president had crystal meth for lunch we would have a problem.   But a beer? 

The Daily Kos was strictly big picture, "This shooting accident is simply a metaphor for how Cheney and the entire administration have always operated."

Liberals who opposed Justice Scalia's duck hunting trips with Cheney have reversed themselves.

I think I'll have a shot and a beer.

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Swing State Republican fund raiser and golfing buddy of the governor, Tom Noe, was indicted on 53 counts.  Noe is a scandal unto himself and not to be confused with Ney, the Ohio congressman under investigation in connection with the Abramoff scandal in Washington.

The indictment includes charges of money laundering, racketeering, theft, and making Gov. Bob Taft cry.  I made up that last one.  But Taft did shed a tear as he pleaded no contest to some Noe related midsemeanor charges last August.

Noe is a coin dealer.  He charmed the Bureau of Workers' Compensation into investing $50 million in rare coins, some of which were lost.  His wife claims the state made $10 million on the deal.

The Beacon Journal said, "Tom Noe, 51, pleaded not guilty and was jailed about five hours before posting $500,000 bail."  Whether he paid in coins is speculation on my part but if I were the judge, I would bite them.  Now that he's free, maybe Noe and Ney can persuade BWC to invest those coins in indian casino slot machines.

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White House reporters weren't happy about being scooped by the Corpus Christi Caller-Times on The-Second-Vice President-to-Shoot-a Man-While-In-Office story.  They seemed extra irate when Cheney finally gave his deposition to Brit Hume last night.

CNN, commentator Jack Cafferty called the interview "a little bit like Bonnie interviewing Clyde…".  Libby Averyt, Caller-Times editor and vice president, for her part, said, "It's not like we are some amateur paper _ we are a daily newspaper".

The 12 hour delay before White House spokesman Scott McClellan learned of the shooting was an opening for speculation.  NBC 's David Gregory got into a verbal brawl with McClellan but no shots were fired.

Dragon Fly Eye. Net Blog titled its entry, "I'm Okay, You've Been Shot".  Vice President Cheney's hunting buddy, Harry Whittington, hopes to be okay soon.