Waiting for Rove. The best analyses I've seen of the Fitzgerald phenomenon are Billmon's.

{ 10:45 AM }

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The Fitzmas Song

Sung to the tune of “The Christmas Song,”
with apologies to songwriter Mel Torme

Cheney roasting on an open fire
Jury nipping at his nose
No one cares if they crucify Miers
As long as we get Karl Rove

Everybody knows that Valerie’s an agent now
Thanks to Novak and the Right
Democrats with their eyes all aglow
Will find it hard to sleep tonight

They know that Patrick’s on his way
He's loaded lots of sealed
Indictments on his sleigh
And every mother's child is gonna spy
To see if Baghdad really died for a lie

And so, I'm offering this simple phrase
To kids from states both red and blue
Although its been said
Many times, many ways
Merry Fitzmas! Merry Fitzmas! Merry Fitzmas to.. You!

Best performed in a smarmy, Bill Murrayesque voice.

Inspired by The White House Christmas Special (2004).

UPDATE: From the Dept. of Great Minds Think Alike: another Fitzmas Song, via Sideshow.

{ 9:26 AM }

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Sox sweep? I'm no baseball fan, but there is a sick satisfaction in seeing Chicago's glorious White Sox whup the city that gave us Ken Lay and James Baker.

{ 12:16 PM }

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What motivates Dick Cheney? It may have something to do with this:

Oil-field services giant Halliburton Co. said Monday that its quarterly earnings jumped as energy companies ramped up oil and natural gas exploration and production activities.

Net income in the third quarter was $499 million, or 95 cents a share, compared with a loss of $44 million, or 9 cents a share, a year ago when the Houston-based company took a large charge related to its now-settled asbestos liability.

[...]

Analysts had expected the company to post earnings per share of 82 cents, according to Reuters Estimates.

Five hundred million dollars of profit in a single quarter is, as they say, real money. How much is Halliburton squeezing out of US taxpayers? To put it into perspective, Halliburton's profits (not revenues, but profits) since June of this year break out as follows:

$ 166,333,333 per month
$ 38,384,615 per week
$ 4,101,369 per day
$ 170,890 per hour, every hour, 24 hours a day

Was the debacle of the entire Bush Junior administration really just a form of Cheney payback to Halliburton for his "asbestos liability" errors of management while he was CEO? After all, "...he orchestrated Halliburton's purchase of Dresser Industries in 1998. Few people connect this problem with Cheney, but they should, given that he was in charge at the time and got a raise as a result of buying Dresser."

{ 9:14 AM }

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Antiterrorist Fitzgerald. "In August 1998, nearly simultaneous attacks on U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania killed 224 people, including 12 Americans, and injured scores of others. Within 48 hours, Fitzgerald was on the ground in Africa. The enemy, he concluded, was bin Laden, who would later be indicted (though obviously he was never captured and brought to trial)."

Maybe the people who never captured or brought bin Laden to trial can now themselves be captured and brought to trial.

{ 3:45 PM }

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