The Wednesday ‘BushWhack’ing

Hump day, let’s get a humpin’…

• It begins…
• While Sen. Clinton won the South Dakota primary and Sen. Obama won Montana’s primary, the real story of the night was Obama passing the needed delegate threshold, making him the presumptive nominee.
• “The Giant Slayer”… seriously?
• Clinton’s speech was not a ceding to Obama, nor did she even congratulate him… listening to the pundits last night, you could feel the hostility towards her for not making a play to heal the party last night. I’m not a Clinton apologist, but I say give her a day or two to think things out in her head before she makes the right decision and accepts the realization that Obama won…
• Even Sen. McCain recognized that Obama is the presumptive Democratic nominee as he made a point to slam Obama in his speech last night in New Orleans with him rejecting Democratic strategy that ties him to “President” Bush by noting his opposition to Bush's initial policies in Iraq, his energy policy and his climate change policy… (I can sum up McCain’s attempt to distance himself from Bush in 2 words; Epic. Fail. The 2000, and perhaps 2004, version of McCain opposed Bush’s policies, but in the last four years he’s pandered to the conservative base and embraced Bush’s policies. Get this straight, a vote for McCain is a vote for Bush Episode 3…
• Yes, there are other political going-ons besides the election… The Department of Homeland Security reported yesterday that travelers from England, France, Germany, Japan and two dozen other “Visa Waiver” countries are going to have to register electronically before travelling to the United States… (some experts don’t think the program will do much to prevent ‘unsavory characters’ from entering the country, but the problem is that it’s hard to measure how this works… so for now, I withhold judgment until it’s actually in place…)
• The administration’s beating of war drums towards Iran took another step forward yesterday in a speech by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. In a speech at AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) yesterday Rice escalated the administration’s anti-Iran rhetoric and said; “We would be willing to meet with them but not while they continue to inch toward nuclear weapons under the cover of talks. […] The real question isn’t why won’t the Bush administration talk to Iran. The real question is why won’t Iran talk to us.” (Hmmmmmm… interesting question, but I have a feeling that if the US offered talks, Iran might accept. But that would require abandoning the plan to attack, and Bush will have none of that… he’s so focused on attacking Iran, I think it will happen sooner rather than later…)
• Sen. Byrd is still in the hospital…
• “Actress” Gina Gershon is demanding that Vanity Fair magazine issue a retraction after the magazine reported that former President Clinton “has been seen visiting” her in California… (Meh)
• Economists are saying that prices have been “soaring long enough and fast enough” that the US is now at risk of a self-reinforcing cycle of inflation like the 70s… (Lovely…)
• And have we mentioned? That the US is being left in the greenhouse gas emission dust by European G8 nations? While the European Union has made a pledge to cut emissions by 30% by 2020, the chief climate negotiator for the U.S. told Reuters that “It’s frankly not do-able for us.” (Not doable... or unwilling to do? Knowing this administration and this party, I have to go for the latter…)