How can CNN ever replace Bob Novak?
Just hire Karl Rove and eliminate the middle-man
481   33.2%
Some zoo must have a weasel with Tourette’s Syndrome
451   31.1%
Train a new parrot each day with fresh GOP talking points
296   20.4%
Rick Santorum should be free after November 2006
220   15.2%

OK, but now that Bush’s approval rating has fallen to 36 percent, how will Rove’s Machine, with or without weasels, spin things?

Besides just screaming "September 11th!  September 11th!" over and over.  I mean, that’s just a given.

New poll at left.

Also a posho mill and a sugar cane farm.

My friend Ethlie’s nephew Mathieu is a filmmaker who started out trying to document the HIV/AIDS pandemic in rural Africa.  Motivated by what he has seen, however, he is now focusing more on trying to help set up basic education for an entire generation of children in a Kenyan village.

Where are these kids’ parents?  Dead, too many of them, from HIV.

Thinking long-term, Mathieu and the local leaders have figured out a bunch of businesses
they could start which would quickly become self-sustaining, with the
revenue going to educate the kids long-term.

This isn’t something where the money goes to some corrupt African
bureaucracy, or half of it goes to administration costs, or the project
is some damn thing that just makes it easier for big business to move
in.

This goes straight to the folks who need it, to do exactly what they need to get started.  And then they’re up and running.  The metaphor he’s using: they’ve built the farm.  Now they’re just hoping somebody can chip in some seeds to get started.

They don’t need much.

Doing the math, if everybody who visits this site between now and next week chips in just one dollar, once, they’ll have enough to get all three basic businesses off the ground.

I bet we can do that.

Personally, I’d love to see how much good happens if we all chip in five bucks.

What nutcase wrote the following, concerning the idea that women should receive equal pay?

Ladies and gentlemen, say hello to your soon-to-be new Supreme Court justice, John Roberts.

Tighten up those burkhas, ladies.

The people have spoken:
 

What's the best thing about John Bolton going to the UN?
At last, the red-faced insanity of Team Chimpy has an appropriate face
198   36.7%
Someone a little more experienced at perjury will be lying on our behalf
194   35.9%
America was badly trailing in the Nutjobs With Funky Mustaches Race
130   24.1%
We can finally work on the outsourcing of abused-subordinate jobs
18   3.3%

When John Bolton's head finally does suddenly explode from stress, what will fly all over the room?
A replacement head even angrier than the first, which explodes. And then another, and another…
178   38%
A small, hissing parasite from the evil Planet Of Doom
178   38%
Shredded documents
84   17.9%
Party favors
28   6%

Unfortunately, the second poll picked the wrong right-winger to go FLAM! on national TV.  At least so far.

New poll at left.

Still trying to catch up on the inbox.  Losing, but trying.

Heard back from Ashok in Bangalore just now.  I'd asked if the storms that brought killer rains and floods in Mumbai had also had any major unexpected effects in his part of India.  His response: