Breast cancer is the leading cause of death among women age 35-44. The people who are anguished over the suffering of those they love and want to help in some meaningful way are attracted to Komen by celebrity names like James Woods, Andie MacDowell, Neil Patrick Harris, Jennifer Tilly, John Ondrasik, Kimberly Locke, Marcia Cross, Mimi Rogers, Neil Patrick Harris, Ann Curry and Aimee Teegarden. They are racing their hearts out because they think it will help others to keep from suffering, they aren’t doing it so the money can be used as a pass-through to Joe Lieberman through his wife to block health care reform.

Please join me in asking these celebrities to call on the Komen Foundation to stop giving money to Hadassah Lieberman and sign the petition.

Developing nations want the Kyoto Protocol to continue, while developed nations want to invalidate that and consecrate a new treaty. At stake are the mandatory emissions reductions for rich nations and, to a lesser extent, the funding for the developing world to mitigate their financial burden from climate change.

What if the Senate, either through Faustian compromise, reconciliation, or nuclear option, votes out a bill that is something much, much less that what we (and by “we” I mean something like 70% of Americans) would call meaningful health care reform? Dare we let the something less than perfect but still preferred be the enemy of the maybe not good but better than what we now have?

These are sophisticated marketing techniques. And they’re being cynically run by sophisticated people (who know they’re peddling bullshit) on the not-so-sophisticated (who believe what they want to believe). The question with regard to those peddling the TANG defense is always going to be: are they they playing the role of bullshit artist, or the dupe?

A roundup of current news for the morning of Monday, December 14th, 2009.

In Great Britain the government actually seems to care about the past…America, has more wars to keep fightin’ and startin’

Matt Flinner Trio.What’s on your mind tonight?

What is the world coming to, Santa-wise? Perhaps one of these French freedom-hating sexual anarchists explains, if anyone still understands their dead language here in America.

I suppose it’s past time to start a fund to create Tony Blair’s headstone, just to have this craven, blithe admission of pretext permanently affixed to his legacy. Yes, Prime Minister, “obviously” once the justification for a war that has killed tens if not hundreds of thousands of people turns out to be disproven, one must pivot to a new rationale for its existence. What one must never do is recognize that the war is in error and work to correct it.

As we approach the one year anniversary of the Israeli Cast Lead attack, the news continues to be desperate for the people of Gaza.  We heard the promises and pledges last February of international aid and US contributions but, as with so much else we’ve heard, the reality does not match the rhetoric. And reality [...]