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"Der Mensch lebt nur von Missetat allein!" These words by Bertholt Brecht in The Threepenny Opera translate as "Man lives by crime alone." To update this thought, replace "man" with "corporate boards."

{ 10:57 AM }

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"Mine's bigger than yours!" CEOs' raises are over 16 times bigger than yours. The September 2002 issue of Mutual Funds magazine reports that, since 1990, CEO pay is up 535% while worker pay has risen only 32%. The argument that CEOs deserve more because they are involved in wealth creation (by supposedly increasing shareholder value) evidently does not apply: in the same period, the S&P 500 index rose just 297%. With their disproportionately enormous compensation packages, comfortable entrenchment in the halls of government, and complete lack of ethics, the lizards of the CEO class are simultaneously the new American aristocracy and Mafia, extorting whatever they can from their employees, their shareholders, their customers, national treasuries worldwide, and hapless taxpayers.

{ 10:59 AM }

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George W. Bush and vacation politics: Redefining "clueless." This administration's learning disabilities are becoming increasingly evident with its defense of the president's second annual monthlong vacation. W has grown to be recognized as a card-carrying member of the crony capitalist gang which includes such yet-to-be-indicted criminals as chief Bush campaign contributor (and Enron employee 401(k) annihilator) Ken Lay, as well as W's own boss Dick Cheney. Instead of addressing the perception that he is clueless and irresponsible (as we pointed out on 7/11/02, August is the anniversary month of ominous intelligence warnings), W reinforces it. The stupidity, or audacity, of this administration boggles the mind.

{ 12:42 PM }

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Mandatory sentences for corporate criminals! A presidential blow job, immoral and indiscreet, does not harm the lives of tens of thousands of people as the Enron-Harken-Halliburton mob has managed to. Now is the time to shift the focus of criminal justice in this country away from harmless first-time drug offenders whose mandatory sentences are clogging up our prisons. Instead, let's make lots of room for the Kenny Boys and our huge new class of CEO-criminals. Justice will never be reasonable in this country as long as we have a Department of Justice so lame and incompetent that it's terrified of breasts. If it scares you, put a burka on it! Welcome to Washingstan, where power, greed and religion suck each other's dicks.

{ 4:10 PM }

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Now's the time to plan to take August off. That's what George W. Bush did last year as the unheeded warnings were coming in about a planned massive attack. He spent most of August 2001 at his ranch not paying attention to ominous intelligence reports and not governing and not riding horses, either. August is National Golf Cart Month, commemorating the obliviousness of our vacationing, 1,580-acre ranch-owning, horse-ignorant, golf-cart riding unelected president.

{ 9:54 AM }

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Anthrax intrigue. Nicholas D. Kristof of The New York Times (registration required) reports on the FBI's general lack of interest in solving the anthrax killings and the mystery surrounding the known suspect, whom the FBI has been studiously ignoring: an American with ties to the Department of Defense, CIA, and the American biodefense program, who happens also to use aliases and continues to travel on government assignments to Central Asia. This person gave Cipro to people who visited the "isolated residence" he had access to last fall. But, of course, pursuing such a suspect would overturn the Bush administration's rationalizations about Iraq and the remainder of the "Axis of Evil." As Kristof points out in what may be the understatement of the year, "This is part of a larger pattern."

{ 10:32 AM }

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The problem with (the) French.

From the London Times of July 9 by way of Eric Alterman:

TONY BLAIR’s special relationship with George W. Bush is under considerable strain. Not only do the two disagree on Yassir Arafat’s tenure as leader of the Palestinian Authority, but Blair has started telling disparaging anecdotes about the President. Baroness Williams of Crosby recalled a story told to her by "my good friend Tony Blair" recently in Brighton. Blair, Bush and Jacques Chirac were discussing economics and, in particular, the decline of the French economy. "The problem with the French," Bush confided in Blair, "is that they don’t have a word for entrepreneur."

{ 10:15 AM }

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To celebrate the Cheney/Halliburton lawsuit brought by Judicial Watch, I had a couple of cocktails invented by my wife last night. Quite delicious.

The Sharona

Mix the juices of one-half orange and one lime with an equal amount of Bombay Sapphire gin. Pour over ice.

Potent and delicious. Do not attempt to operate heavy machinery. Please sip -- do not gulp!

{ 10:05 AM }

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Out of the mouths of expatriates. Back in the country to explain the state of our nation, Gore Vidal talks with LA Weekly about why the American experiment is failing. (Media, power, lying... the usual.) It's refreshing to see our Empire of Spin analyzed by someone who still has an attention span without an agenda.

{ 12:38 PM }

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Let them eat steroids. So baseball players want to strike again? We should simply ban drug testing and give them as much money as possible. That way, instead of using athletic ability and training as a benchmark, we can judge professional athletes according to the pharmacological risks they are willing to undertake to make their millions. Eventually, they'll all become evenly-matched hormonally-enhanced cybersuperhumans, the sport will become duller than it already is, audiences will vanish, and large cities will no longer have to subsidize terrorist targets (i.e., stadiums) with public money that could be better used in at least a thousand more productive ways.

{ 12:26 PM }

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Why don't we ship the Enron and Worldcom management to Guantanamo Bay for interrogation? At least they are real criminals, as opposed to many of the hundreds who've been there since last fall.

{ 12:15 PM }

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