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Immigration was the topic of the week. 

That got me thinking  about numbers.  There are 12 million illegal workers in the country now.  Bush wants a guest worker program to legalize them.

In 2008 millions of baby boomers will start cashing in their chips. We'll get a new crop every year until 2025.  Unfortunately, boomers haven't produced enough replacement taxpayers to see them through their greedy geezer years.

The obvious answer is go outside the farm system and sign Mexican free agents.  The president should call them guest taxpayers.

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The French don't much like to work. 

A 36 hour strike began Monday night because of a new law that would allow employers to fire workers under the age of 26 without cause.  The strike was one hour longer than the average French work week which is 35 hours.  (Bush's 37% approval rating beats both.  Ha ha just kidding.) 

The current French unemployment rate is 9.6%.  For those under 26, the rate is over 20%. The point of the firing law was to make employers less afraid to hire new workers. 

Apparently, the average 20 year old in France has the same workplace security as a tenured professor at Yale.  And you know what that gets you:  Taliban undergrads.

So while the original lumpen French chopped off the heads of their betters, and modern Chinese stood up to government tanks, France's current best and brightest demand a return ticket to the government womb.

Freedom fries, anyone?

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A government report claims Russia gave classified information to Iraq before the 2003 invasion.  Foreign Affairs says that Saddam thought France and Russia would prevent an invasion out of economic self interest.  The battle plan information may have influenced Saddam to avoid direct resistance and instead follow an insurgency strategy.  William Arkin in the Washington Post thinks it's all a Spy vs Spy game.  Both sides spy.  The U.S. knows it so it lets the Russians steal bad information hoping it will get passed along to Saddam.

Not exactly soul searching is it?

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Coalition forces rescued the 3 surviving members of Christian Peacemakers Teams in Iraq.  The 4th member was murdered by his captors.  CPT was in Iraq to comfort the opressed, many of whom happen to be insurgents.  CPT people take Jesus at his word and love their enemies.  It seems to be an unrequited love.

They couldn't find it in their hearts to thank the GIs who saved them.  James Taranto thinks they think the enemy is us.  If they love their enemy, he says, you'd think they'd at least say thanks.

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if you are Muslim in Afghanistan don't plan on any big life changes.

A man there wants to convert to Christianity and the court says that under Sharia he will be executed.  What is it with these people? The man wants to change religions.  Free people do it all the time. 

I'm told Islam is tolerant. First cartoons now this.  What's up?

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The Milosevic trial in the Hague came to a halt when the defendant went toes up. Saddam seemed to be taking his cues from that circus trial so I thought it would be nice for him to follow suit.

The trick was to get the dynamic dictator duo into the same scene for the same fate.  In Hollywood terms, Milosevic's people claimed he was poisoned. I thought the Meg Ryan line, "I'll have what she's having," from the movie When Harry Met Sally might make the connection. 

It's a little contrived but hey, it's a cartoon. 

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The Senate came up with a $2.8 trillion budget.  The House approved $92 billion for Iraq, Afghanistan, and hurricane relief on the Gulf Coast.  To make room for that kind of spending they had to  raise the roof.  Congress jacked up the federal debt ceiling to $9 trillion.

Even Carl Sagan was modest enough to keep things in the billions.

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Isaac Hayes did the voice of Chef on South Park.  I think South Park is  great.  It is witty and insulting to the the many mindless things in life that we accept for granted.  It does this in such an honest way that it is shocking but you would have to be a humorless loser to complain.

It turns out Isaac Hayes is a humorless loser.  South Park made fun of his religion, Scientology, so he took his balls and went home.  He had been a great hit on the show and, as The Guardian points out, "He embraced the show's ethic so fully that he reached number one in
the UK in 1999 with an innuendo-laden South Park song entitled
Chocolate Salty Balls."

The guardian goes on to say, "He drew the line at an episode in which a central character, Stan, is
hailed as the successor to L. Ron Hubbard, who started the cult in 1952."

So now the science fiction writer and huckster, L. Ron Hubbard, is a prophet beyond reproach.  Watch for Tom Cruise and John Travolta to burn an embassy near you.

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For a bunch obsessed with not humiliating Muslims, the Bash Bush crowd sure went out of it's way, by teaming up with America First Republicans, to give the Abu Ghraib treatment to one of the more civilized places in the Middle East . 

The website, MEMRI, has excerpts from a great Al Jazeera interview, with Dr. Wafa Sultan, an Arab-American psychiatrist.  Dr. Sultan doesn't believe we are in a war of nations or religions. She believes, "we are in a clash between civilization and backwardness…between barbarity and rationality."

Tom Friedman of the NY Times calls Dubai a "A bridge of decency that leads away from the failing civilization described by Dr. Sulitan"  He quoted an Arab businessman who said, "you could not have a better friend and more of a symbol of globalization and openness."   Friedman wrote, "Unfortunately we just told Dubai to go to hell."