Christy Hardin Smith

Sometimes, there are no words. Some amazing acoustic guitar to start your day. Sit back, hit play. Enjoy. Feel the stress just slough right out of you. What's up in your neck of the woods? Let's take a little time to catch up with each other and life outside the political sphere.

The Siegelman case has been rife with appalling and politicized conduct.  But it gets worse. Much, much worse....

President Bush recently spoke with CNN about his regrets (a little too much yeehaw language in the bring it on arena, and that those doggone folks on the USS Abraham Lincoln put up that "Mission Accomplished" banner), his triumphs (Americans sure are swell and polls are meaningless, so there), and that he's headed back to Texas after January 20th. (Sorry Lone Star State.) Bush also announced he intends to write a book about his presidential experiences. Oh, frabtacular reading joy....so we're having a contest to name the Bush book!

The RNC has launched self-help for republicans needing egoboo. Lame. John Cole sums up recent GOP failures: In short, America got seduced by the Republican sweet talk, we took them home into our bedroom for some good times, and instead of performance, it turns out the Republicans have a serious case of electile dysfunction....

This Veterans Day consider what it is to return from service with a woefully underfunded VA. With a government which has yet to fully plan for aftercare for the returning wounded.  And with the prospect of yet another deployment despite PTSD and other issues because of stop-loss orders.

I've been waiting for this juxtaposition. The NYTMag had a great piece this weekend on governance after the Imperial Bush presidency. Just a taste: ...Come January, the current administration will pass on to its successor a vast infrastructure for electronic surveillance, secret sites for detention and interrogation and a sheaf of legal opinions empowering the executive to do whatever he feels necessary to protect the country....

I was paging through our DVDs last night and I realized that there are some damned good movies out there for kids. And for adults. Stuff that really makes me laugh or smile or just check into the movie and out of the real world for a while. So, I thought I'd share a few with you that I like, and hope you'll share your favorites in return.

The preamble to the US Constitution refers to "establish[ing] justice" as a primary purpose and guiding principle of the establishment of the set of laws as the foundation on which our government was to rest. Rule of law, not of men. We have strayed from this purpose the last few years -- shamefully so. Nowhere more corrosively than at the Office of Legal Counsel at the DOJ.

Buried in the usual K Street conundrum piece of who to suck up to next after the election was this little schadenfreude-licious nugget: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers, National Association of Chain Stores, and Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America are all led by Republicans. And the list goes on and on.

One cannot have watched the folks all across the nation, standing in line to cast their ballots for the last few weeks from the start of early voting through the last ballot at the close yesterday without a bit of a smile.  And some understanding of the genius of national renewal in each election of the "for the people, by the people" mandate on which this nation has run since its Founding. However, anyone think after the overwhelming turn-out numbers and voting participation across the country that the voter suppression tactics of the GOP are now a bygone era remnant?  A little reminder of the Hans Von Spakovsky anti-voter access trial balloon from September...