heart

Including their deficit:

This month the state's part-time legislature goes back into session, and the state is starting at potentially a $25 billion deficit on a two-year budget of around $95 billion. That's enormous. And there's not much fat to cut. The whole budget is basically education and healthcare spending. Cutting everything else wouldn't do the trick. And though raising this kind of money would be easy on an economy of $1.2 trillion, the new GOP mega-majority in Congress is firmly against raising any revenue.

So the bi-ennial legislature, which convenes this month, faces some hard cuts. Some in the Texas GDP haveadvocated dropping Medicaid altogether to save money.

And the most important part of the article?

So why haven't we heard more about Texas, one of the most important economy's in America? Well, it's because it doesn't fit the script. It's a pro-business, lean-spending, no-union state. You can't fit it into a nice storyline, so it's ignored.

True dat! This isn’t some blue state like California or Illinois. This is the heart of red state America and God forbid the “liberal” media makes them look bad!

Now that the oil is reaching the Louisiana marshes and wetlands, we are getting more heart wrenching video of the mess caused by BP

With less than two weeks to go before the start of hurricane season, we are seeing New Orleans main protection buffer from the fierce storms being destroyed before our very eyes. God help us if there’s another Katrina style hurricane.

Here’s Fred today:

"It really doesn't matter how President Obama divides the Afghan baby, how he splits the difference between McChrystal and Biden. Because the war has been lost," Thompson said on his radio show today.  "I say this because of one sad and simple fact. The president does not have the will and determination to do what's necessary to win it. His heart's not in it, and never has been. The Taliban knows it. Al Qaeda knows it. Our allies know it. And the American people know it.

"Our enemies are now emboldened and our friends are discouraged. We cannot prevail if the American people are not willing to make the sacrifices necessary for an extended effort. The case has not been made to them to justify this effort. The case can only be made by the president. This president is unable or unwilling to make that case," Thompson said.

I’m going to join the right in the outrage over a post that appeared on Huffington Post for a short time yesterday. Allahpundit captured a screen grab of it:

The author, Erik Sean Nelson, decided to poke some fun at Palin while also insulting the mentally retarded. How does the HuffPo handle something like this? They quietly just delete the post. As mater of fact the author gave Bloggasm a less than sound reasoning for it:

Simon,

No story, I pulled it down. I got some emails from offended loved ones of the retarded. No one was seeing the absurdity of Palin hiding behind her children, so my piece was not accomplishing anything good. That’s all that happened.

Best,

Erik

Not only should Nelson’s account on HuffPo be deleted, but the editors of the site should also post a very heart-felt apology. This is absolutely appalling and if I was Arianna I would be fuming. Right now Nelson has put HuffPo in the same category as Limbaugh and FOX News, but a strong response from the site editors can quickly right that wrong. Time is ticking boys!

UPDATE:
I had misspelled Nelson's first name. It is Erik, not Eric. Thanks to Eric S. Nelson from the University of Massachusetts Lowell for pointing this out.

Condi rice decided to pull out a tricky Dick line when talking about torture:

So if the President is above the law, then will Bill Clinton get his law license back?

What if President Obama decides to lock up all members of the previous administratoin without a trial? I guess that would be legal also.

Maybe President Obama should declare the Republican Party a terrorist organization and lock up everyone who identifies as a Republican. That would be legal under Condi’s thinking.

The fact is the President is not above the law, and for people like Condi. who was only five heart beats away from the oval office,  to sit out there and make such egregious claims is an insult to our nation and what our founding fathers fought for. 

In the heart of what was once dubbed "the reddest place in America", a school bus full of second and third graders started chanting "assassinate Obama". Children at this age are very impressionable and I'm sure it was started by a single child, but the question needs to be asked where that child heard this. My instinct tells them to look at home.

The school board isn't taking any serious action, just informing employees how to handle the situation with a lecture of right and wrong. Perhaps that's the way to go, but it might be better to look into it a little further to find out who started this chant. Once they do, head to that kids home and ask the parent some questions. If it turns out the kid learned this from their parent then child services should get involved.

It amazes me how we so quickly denounce the actions of countries like Pakistan when it comes to killing their leaders, yet we have people here that push that idea onto their children. This makes the parents who taught their children about this the same as the extremists in the Middle East. Perhaps we should call these parents terrorists also.

From the proposed bailout:

Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.

Do we really trust the administration that brought us Katrina and Iraq to handle this problem with the actual interests of the American people at heart (and not just the corporations)? Again we see Bush and Co. trying to dismiss the entire notion of oversight that helped build this country.

(h/t Atrios)

McCain is introducing his VP pick today at the Nutter Center in Dayton. The Nutter Center holds about 12,000 people, but look at this:

Tickets are still available for Sen. John McCain's Friday, Aug. 29, rally at Wright State University's Nutter Center in Fairborn.

McCain and his wife Cindy will appear at the event, dubbed the "Road to the Convention Rally." Doors open at 9 a.m. and the event begins at 11 a.m.

Tickets are being given away at county GOP offices in southwest Ohio and in Indiana and Kentucky.

This event is being held in the heart of a red state tri-fecta, yet McCain hasn't been able to sell out (or give out actually). But red state isn't the only thing the Nutter Center is situated in. Dayton is also home to Wright Patterson Air Force Base, which has about 6,000 military and 9,000 civilian personnel. You would think such close proximity to a military base would give McCain's speech a boost, and it may very well have, but he still has tickets available.

John McCain has no enthusiasm there.