Legislators are supposed to the “public servants.” They work for us; we pay their salaries. So why do so many of them think it’s the other way around. One citizen had a chance to explain that to Rep. Don Young (R. Alaska).

One wouldn’t have expected Lieutenant Pike, the pepper spraying cop, to show up at CNN’s GOP debate. But he made a last minute decision to come to the debate and appeared in the wings during the Pledge of Allegiance, keeping an eye on Ron Paul.

With the holiday coming up, we’ve asked one of our excellent commenters, fatster, to suggest stories and links for a morning post.  Our regular readers have been enjoying fatster’s contributions for a long time, so why not put them in a post?  So . . . here are fatsters hotlinks for today. Goldman Sachs might [...]

By the time you read this, I’ll be on a plane. So here’s something for your reading pleasure. Happy Holidays,

Good news everyone…there isn’t another Republican Presidential Debate for you to follow through the posting of horrific quotes for more than two weeks. Apparently the candidates will be busy fighting the War on Chanukah (“C” vs. No “C”) amongst other things — although I’m just going to throw it out there and say Rick Santorum [...]

Chuck Prophet and The Mission Express — You Did.

I wonder if O’Reilly and his foodie friend would be as brave as this young lad.

Senator Wyden’s going to be reading names of censorship opponents from the floor of the Senate during his expected filibuster of the PROTECT IP Act. You can ask to have your name read — and ask your Senators to vote no.

Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber, M.D., in an announcement today at the state capital, said he will put a temporary reprieve on executions in the state, including the pending execution of Gary Haugen, convicted of two murders in 1981 and 2003. The governor, in an unexpected addendum to his announcement regarding Haugen, also said he will not sign any death warrants while in office.

In which the various clown car passengers each attempt to prove that their Bush administration foreign policy advisers are more hawkish and bloodthirsty than their opponents’ Bush administration foreign policy advisers!