"Who moved my cheeseburger?" Julian Borger in the Guardian on the saga of Paul O'Neill:

By his own account, Mr O'Neill actually warned the president-elect and his deputy not to hire him. When he was flown in for a secret meeting in a Washington hotel, he took a list of his past pronouncements that could prove embarrassing to a conservative administration.

He had called for a petrol tax, and worse still, he believed global warming to be a real threat. But in the Washington hotel room, the book suggests, Mr Bush was not listening. Mr O'Neill was telling a long anecdote about an encounter with an environmental pressure group when Mr Bush held up his hand and asked: "Where's lunch?". The president then upbraided his chief of staff for failing to produce a cheeseburger on time.

[...]

Wall Street was less impressed. The trip [to Africa with U2's Bono] confirmed it in its view of Mr O'Neill as a lightweight, blissfully unaware that his words and behaviour had a direct effect on the markets' faith in the US economy. In his first months he had caused a small run on the exchange markets by suggesting to a German newspaper that the administration did not have a strong dollar policy. Events have since proved the remark to be true, but it broke a taboo.

[...]

The fundamental question remains as to why any of them were hired at all by an administration that had no time for their views. Mr O'Neill concludes they were there simply as "cover", to make the Bush White House appear reassuringly moderate. In that case, the president and Mr Cheney made the wrong choice in Mr O'Neill. He was never going to be happy serving as someone else's window dressing.

It's an honor to be fired by a petulant son-of-a-bitch brat. It took more testicular fortitude for O'Neill to say what he actually thinks than for Bush to thoughtlessly mouth what his speechwriters and political advisors hand him — without comprehending a word or being held accountable for the outcome.

Still no one within the administration is talking about the truth of O'Neill's remarks. The next State of the Union speech is on its way. What new lies will Bush disavow later this year?

And where's lunch?

{ 11:48 AM }

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South Park Christians.
Here's a disturbing headline: "Bush seeks billions for religious groups."

Last night I was reminded of South Park Republicans while watching a rerun in which the following exchange takes place (Kyle is questioning Cartman's motives in starting a Christian rock band):

Kyle: But you don't know anything about Christians!
Cartman: I know enough about them to exploit them.

I guess I never noticed Cartman's resemblance to Karl Rove before. Right down to his chinny-chin-chin.

{ 3:07 PM }

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Capitalist against Bush: Warren Buffett. America's leading investor is less than bullish on what's happened to the dollar. He doesn't specify a personal target but he does specify the date of his realization that, for the first time in his life, the dollar is FUBB. Meanwhile, the disengaged president goes fundraising and planning trips to Mars as the dollar continues its sustained plunge against foreign currencies (Fortune, sub. req'd.):

Through the spring of 2002, I had lived nearly 72 years without purchasing a foreign currency. Since then Berkshire has made significant investments in—and today holds—several currencies. I won't give you particulars; in fact, it is largely irrelevant which currencies they are. What does matter is the underlying point: To hold other currencies is to believe that the dollar will decline.

Both as an American and as an investor, I actually hope these commitments prove to be a mistake. Any profits Berkshire might make from currency trading would pale against the losses the company and our shareholders, in other aspects of their lives, would incur from a plunging dollar.

But as head of Berkshire Hathaway, I am in charge of investing its money in ways that make sense. And my reason for finally putting my money where my mouth has been so long is that our trade deficit has greatly worsened, to the point that our country's "net worth," so to speak, is now being transferred abroad at an alarming rate.

"In fact, it is largely irrelevant which currencies they are" signals that right now any currency is better than the dollar in Buffett's view.

"Capitalists against Bush" is one of our cherished themes here in Skimbleland, as when we talked about Seth Glickenhaus.

Link via bloggy.

{ 1:15 PM }

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"Much wants more." For those of you who come here looking for this sort of thing, today's Houston Chronicle features a good biography of Andrew and Lea Fastow.

{ 9:18 AM }

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Are they fucking nuts? Now, just when we need it most, Republicans want to ban the F-word. How else are we going share our outrage about Colin Powell's lying piece of shit son Michael and his fucking media consolidation, the stupid motherfucking $1.5 billion marriage "promotion" plan, and the goddamn asslicking cocksucking $1 trillion moon/Mars initiative?

Now, more than ever, we need the F-word. We must not relent and yield to pious hypocrites who mortgage our future while they attempt to control our speech.

We must preserve the right to public swearing for the people who will need it most — our children.

{ 10:56 AM }

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Fastow children vs. Enron children. One of the things that has consistently amazed me about the reportage on Andrew and Lea Fastow, who are expected to plead guilty today, is the implicit concern for the welfare of their two small children should their parents go to jail. The "two small children" argument is repeated ad nauseum in nearly every article about their legal situation. Here are a hundred examples.

In the past several years of following this story, nowhere did I see similar concern about the thousands of children of Enron's other employees — the crime-free mothers and fathers who were bilked out of their privatized retirement savings by these devious, conniving, rich Fastows and the Lay/Skilling Axis of Enron.

{ 9:31 AM }

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That ultra-super-top-secret map of Iraqi oil fields revealed by Paul O'Neill the mainstream media is all in an uproar about was published (i.e., borrowed from Judicial Watch) right here at skimble on Friday, July 18, 2003.

{ 1:21 PM }

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The fascist ACLU. The increasingly insane ironies of right-wing rhetoric from the likes of Bill O'Reilly and Rush Limbaugh should become obvious even to people who don't immerse themselves in these kinds of issues.

Bill O'Reilly has called the ACLU a "fascist" organization — although it is defending Rush Limbaugh's right to privacy (TalkLeft). For the ACLU to act as Rush Limbaugh's advocate, it must be guided by a higher calling than his behavior and rhetoric warrant. Unlike the monolithic right, the ACLU doesn't respond to reflexive fits of appearances of "loyalty" whenever the loyalist pecking order starts pecking (e.g., the current defamation and investigation of former Bush Cabinet member Paul O'Neill). The ACLU is acting on principle, not on the particulars of a single case.

If our law enforcement agencies also acted on principle, Limbaugh would be in jail right now. And someday maybe the ACLU will come to O'Reilly's aid when his nonsensical blatherings are no longer in vogue.

But that's one of the essential differences between Bush league conservatism and the left — we have principles; they don't.

P.S. Join the ACLU.

O'Reilly image found at Media Whores Online.

{ 11:30 AM }

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If Bush's sudden inexplicable interest in Mars is just a joke, Billmon locates the punch line: it's Halliburton.

Funny how little NASA interested him while he was governor of Texas.

{ 11:18 AM }

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Paul O'Neill: terrorist and traitor. If investigative momentum is any measure, the Bush administration is taking Paul O'Neill more seriously than 9-11 or the Plame outing.

{ 10:02 AM }

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"You can't have a war, cut taxes, have the economy in a garbage pail and spend billions going into space," said Dallas Hodgins, a 76-year-old retired University of Michigan researcher from Flint, Mich. "How are they going to pay for all this? I don't see how it's morally justifiable. In Flint, there isn't a school roof that doesn't leak."

{ 9:53 AM }

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Although there is in all likelihood some culpability, Martha Stewart's treatment is wildly disproportionate to her so-called crime (not insider trading, but lying), especially in a world where thieving corporate maggots like Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling continue to wriggle unindicted.

Marthatalks.com is her act of virtual self-defense.

{ 4:52 PM }

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Frist: "Gimme shelter." Look who's buried at the end of this long article about tax shelters for the "superrich." Senate Majority Leader Bill "Pussycat" Frist's taxes are looking a bit dodgy (Houston Chronicle):

Rich Americans are stealing billions of dollars from average wage earners through creative tax-dodging scams involving idyllic Caribbean islands, Byzantine accounting ploys and the rarefied world of high art, experts claim.

[...]

The General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, estimates tax cheats cost the federal government an estimated $11 billion to $15 billion a year.

If the cheats paid up for just one year, it would nearly cover the $18.3 billion Congress recently devoted to rebuild Iraq.

Instead, the rest of the taxpayers will carry that burden.

[...]

"The IRS always seems to be catching yesterday's hot new fraud, and today there are five or six to take its place," said Bill Allison of the Center for Public Integrity and co-author of The Cheating of America, a study of tax evasion by "the superrich."

[...]

The Senate subcommittee on investigations recently found that KPMG ignored warnings from its own staff that the shelters were bogus and concocted legal opinions to the contrary.

"I think everybody here knew what they were doing was wrong," said Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., the subcommittee's chairman.

The committee reported that KPMG, one of the Big Four accounting firms, collected fees of $124 million from 1997 through 2001 on shelter plans — saving clients $1.4 billion in taxes.

The clients included Maurice Marciano, co-chairman of Guess; Dale Earnhardt, the late race car driver; and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., according to documents filed an IRS lawsuit against KPMG.

Of course, somewhere it must be noted that "saving" KPMG clients $1.4 billion in taxes is also known as "cheating" honest taxpayers of $1.4 billion in taxes.

Another way of looking at it: For every $1 KPMG collected for its "bogus" shelters for Frist and Co., an extra $11 was taken from your pocket in the form of taxes deflected to the middle class.

Here's a peek at Frist performing for the other vast right-wing conspirators in the boardroom of anti-tax Gollum Grover Norquist. (This astonishing article on Norquist is a must-read.)

{ 9:38 AM }

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401(krazy). Slacktivist on Bush's new 401(k) contribution limits, which allow owner-manager Republicans to "sock away" more money for retirement than the employees who render their profit-making enterprises possible:

Most Americans have more debt on their credit cards than money in their mutual funds.

A tax-cut plan that increases 401(k) contribution limits beyond the means or dreams of the majority of workers is irrelevant and regressively redistributive in a nation in which this is true.

And we indeed live in a nation in which this is true, thanks to the owner-manager Republicans who are already talking about another tax cut, as if the joblessness of this jobless recovery weren't joblessly jobless enough.

{ 9:07 AM }

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New celebrity group blog. The American Street, where left-o-blog celebrities David Neiwert, Jeralynn Merritt, skippy, and Kevin Hayden live. Check it out.

{ 5:02 PM }

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"Why would I be attacked for telling the truth?" With a statement like that, Paul O'Neill may have a few things yet to learn about his old boss's pals (CBS/60 Minutes, airs tonight).

UPDATE: CalPundit locates the explanatory backstory.

{ 1:28 PM }

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