Frank Rich, The New York Times, November 18, 2007 New Yorkers who remember Rudy Giuliani as the bullying New York mayor, not as the terminally cheerful “America’s Mayor” cooing to babies in New Hampshire, have always banked on one certainty: his presidential candidacy was so preposterous it would implode before he got anywhere near the White House. Surely, we reassured ourselves, the all-powerful Republican values enforcers were so highly principled that they would excommunicate him because of his liberal social views, three wives and estranged children. Or a firewall would be erected by the firefighters who are enraged by his self-aggrandizing rewrite of 9/11 history. Or Judith Giuliani, with her long-hidden first marriage and Louis Vuitton ’tude, would send red-state voters screaming into the night. Wrong, wrong and wrong. But how quickly and stupidly we forgot about the other Judith in the Rudy orbit. That would be Judith Regan, who disappeared last December after she was unceremoniously fired from Rupert Murdoch’s publishing house, HarperCollins. Last week Ms. Regan came roaring back into the fray, a silver bullet aimed squarely at the heart of the Giuliani campaign. Ms. Regan filed a $100 million lawsuit against her former employer, claiming she was unjustly made a scapegoat for the O. J. Simpson “If I Did It” fiasco that (briefly) embarrassed Mr. Murdoch and his News Corporation. But for those of us not caught up in the Simpson circus, what’s most riveting about the suit are two at best tangential sentences in its 70 pages: “In fact, a senior executive in the News Corporation organization told Regan that he believed she had information about Kerik that, if disclosed, would harm Giuliani’s presidential campaign. This executive advised Regan to lie to, and to withhold information from, investigators concerning Kerik.” Kerik, of course, is Bernard Kerik, the former Giuliani chauffeur and police commissioner, as well as the candidate he pushed to be President Bush’s short-lived nominee to run the Department of Homeland Security. Having pleaded guilty to two misdemeanors last year, Mr. Kerik was indicted on 16 other counts by a federal grand jury 10 days ago, just before Ms. Regan let loose with her lawsuit. Whether Ms. Regan’s charge about that unnamed Murdoch “senior executive” is true or not — her lawyers have yet to reveal the evidence — her overall message is plain. She knows a lot about Mr. Kerik, Mr. Giuliani and the Murdoch empire. And she could talk. Read More Here

Alec MacGillis, The Washington Post, November 17, 2007 The ardent supporters of Rep. Ron Paul, the iconoclastic Texas libertarian whose campaign for the presidency is threatening to upend the battle for the Republican nomination, got word yesterday of a new source of outrage and motivation: reports of a federal raid on a company that was selling thousands of coins marked with the craggy visage of their hero. Federal agents on Thursday raided the Evansville, Ind., headquarters of the National Organization for the Repeal of the Federal Reserve Act and Internal Revenue Code (Norfed), an organization of "sound money" advocates that for the past decade has been selling a private currency it calls "Liberty Dollars." The company says it has put into circulation more than $20 million in Liberty Dollars, coins and paper certificates it contends are backed by silver and gold stored in Idaho, are far more reliable than a U.S. dollar and are accepted for use by a nationwide underground economy. Norfed officials said yesterday that the six-hour raid occurred just as its six employees were mailing out the first batch of 60,000 "Ron Paul Dollars," copper coins sold for $1 to honor the candidate, who is a longtime advocate of abolishing the Federal Reserve. The group says it has shipped out about 10,000 silver Ron Paul Dollars that sold for $20 and about 3,500 of the copper $1 coins. But it said the agents seized more than 50,000 of the copper coins -- more than two tons' worth -- plus smaller amounts of the silver coins and gold and platinum Ron Paul Dollars, which sell for $1,000 and $2,000. "They took everything, all of the computers, everything but the desks and chairs," the company's founder and head, Bernard von NotHaus, said in a telephone interview from his home in Miami. "The federal government really is afraid." Von NotHaus changed the name of Norfed to Liberty Services earlier this year, but affidavits for government search warrants served yesterday continued to use the older name. News of the raid lit up Ron Paul online forums yesterday, the latest unlikely episode in a campaign that began as an idiosyncratic bid by the veteran congressman but has grown into a cause with the potential to influence the GOP contest. Paul, 72, has attracted droves of disaffected Republicans and independents to his platform, which includes ending the war in Iraq, abolishing the Internal Revenue Service and adhering to a strict libertarian interpretation of the Constitution. Read More Here

This is just horrible. Today, Adam Lisberg, form The Daily News City Hall Bureau, takes his swipe at Hillary with this story on Mayor Bloomberg's visit to New Orleans. NEW ORLEANS - Mayor Bloomberg Friday blasted the presidential candidates for being incapable of leadership - and deviated from his prepared remarks to take an apparent swipe at Sen. Hillary Clinton. In a speech to municipal officials from across the nation, Bloomberg laid out his principles of governing and seemed to attack Clinton (D-N.Y.), whose campaign was criticized this week for answering staged questions from friendly crowds. Read the rest of the story here: Link One big problem, in the rest of the story Bloomberg does not mention any of the candidates Republican or Democratic by name. Asked later if he was talking about anyone in particular, Mr. Bloomberg specifically said, "I'm referring to everybody," he said. Of course just to demonstrate how knowledgeable Mr. Lisberg is about politics, he mentions that Mr. Bloomberg is mulling a billion-dollar campaign for the presidency next year. Hey Mr. Lisberg, news flash!!! that ship has sailed. In any case, this appears a like a hit job on one candidate and a clearly biased ort of "not news." Does the Daily News have any editors left?

While many of the recalls lately have been necessary to preserve the health of our nation's children (sorry, lead is just bad for you), some things that are being recalled or banned point more to lazy parenting than to any threat from the product. One of the best examples of this is the recall on Aqua Dots. If ingested, it releases GHB. What kind of parent would give this toy to a child young enough to stick everything in his or her mouth? Because it reacts with water, it is a reasonable assumption that it contains chemicals. Since the human body is made up in large part of water, any idiot should know that this is not a good thing to snack on. Another example is the possible ban in Rogers, AR of "novelty lighters." Because a child in Russellville, two and a half hours away, burned down his parents' house with a motorcycle shaped lighter, the Rogers Fire Department is calling for a ban on both sales and possession. On the news, the spokesman admitted that there is no known correlation between these lighters and fires started by children. Maybe we should stop blaming products for bad parenting. I realize that no one can keep an eye on their children all the time, but some bans on items are just stupid. Maybe if a parent can't watch their children, they shouldn't have them. If they have them and don't watch them, maybe their children's demise is just an example of natural selection.

STUCK ON STUPID “Santas in Australia's largest city have been told not to use Father Christmas's traditional ‘ho ho ho’ greeting because it may be offensive to women, it was reported Thursday. . . . One disgruntled Santa told the newspaper a recruitment firm warned him not to use ‘ho ho ho’ because it could frighten children and was too close to ‘ho’, a US slang term for prostitute.”

Somebody said to me the other day, "So what's the problem if Frank Luntz or Karl Rove spin words to put the Republicans' best foot forward; everybody does that." Everybody does it to some extent, but here's the problem: GOP 'message man' Luntz and the sleazy Rove would market a flaming paper bag of crap left on your porch as an "organically-grown natural product packaged in an environmentally-friendly biodegradable wrapper, delivered piping hot to your door!" In fact, in their work for the Republican Party, they essentially already have. Now, most of America is choking on the stench as we try to stamp it out. As Voltaire said in the 18th century: "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities." It's still true two hundred years later and most of what the GOP peddles these days are absurdities that lead to atrocities in thought and deed. Ultimately, if you buy into this 'spin,' you end up with corrupt liars in office like Bush and Cheney, and we all pay the price with our declining health, wealth and well-being, and our military force is weakened by being sent to fight in unnecessary wars. That's the problem. Asking the Right Questions (and you can take that both ways): "If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers." -- Thomas Pynchon If the Dem presidential candidates are smart, they'll start challenging the warhawks among the GOP nominees, like Giuliani and Romney, with the questions posed in this great comment by Kurt Weldon, especially, "How much are you willing to raise taxes or increase Bush's already-staggering debt to attack Iran?" "What kind of personal sacrifices will you ask average Americans to make to wage a costly war on Iran?" and "What will you do if Iran and their allies in the region attack our troops in Iraq in retaliation for an air strike -- since Bush has severely weakened our military capability by overdeployment, will you call for a draft that includes your children or grandchildren?"

Name: Kurt Weldon Hometown: Los Angeles "When I'm not fantasizing about the Guardians of the Universe bestowing me with my own Green Lantern Power Ring, I fantasize about stupid questions like Russert's being answered along these lines: 'Tim, I assume you are a voter and a citizen, and therefore have a stake in this election beyond playing 'gotcha' with the candidates. So let me ask you a question: What are YOU willing to give up to keep Iran from developing a nuclear bomb? Will you support a sizable increase in your taxes to pay for the war necessary to prevent it? If not, then how many generations of Russerts are you willing to saddle with debt to pay for such a war? Are you willing to have your children drafted to keep Iran in line? If not, why do you expect other Americans to fill that gap? How many dead Iranian civilians do you personally consider an acceptable price? How many of our allies are you, Tim Russert, willing to alienate? How much are you prepared to pay for a gallon of gas? Do you even realize or acknowledge that you, Tim Russert, as a citizen of this nation will have obligations and burdens imposed on you if we go to war with Iran? And if not, why do you consider yourself exempt?'" -- Email to Eric Alterman's Altercation, Nov. 7, 2007.

Most of the country is aware of the current writers strike that is effecting the production of television and movies. Although I will not pretend to know the specifics of the revenue sharing that has caused this strike I can say that the writes that make it all possible are the lowest paid creative people involved in the production of what we watch. My understanding is that the writers are looking for a raise that takes into account the new digital distribution of their product. I say they are entitled to a piece of the pie. Basically, the writers are looking for a long overdue raise and those that produce the show don't want to share. I have to admit up front that I am not a huge watcher of television. My wife watches a great deal of television and we both enjoy movies. The real reason I am concerned with the strike is because, well, how much reality television can America really take. Okay I'm kidding. What is really stoking the fire to write outside my normal venues of music and politics is that my sister-in-law writes for television and every day that the strike goes on my nephew loses out. Not only does the little man have to endure the stress of a family dealing with the loss of an income, he has to go on the picket line with his mom and deal with some of that crazy Hollywood talent that has joined the writers on the picket line. Okay so maybe the little man is lucky to be in barfing range of Eva Longaria, but that ain't much when you don't appreciate what you're looking at. What is really important and what Hollywood writers want, is more equitable distribution of the money made from their labor. Without the writers there are no shows and movies. We have experienced a writers strike before and that ushered in the beginning of reality television. Television has suffered enough with the ridiculous amount reality television that is currently programmed. How many more buffoons can we watch running around some tropical island or running around the planet all in hopes of winning some cash. What the money people in Hollywood need to understand is that sitting in multi-million dollar homes and complaining about revenue sharing will not put them in a favorable light with those sitting on their couch in Wichita waiting for a new episode of Desperate Housewives. Those that are in charge need to pay the writers what they are worth. Its simple economics. No writers, no product. No product no multi-million dollar homes. It is really as simple as that.