Tails on Palin, Lindsey Graham's Choice, Iranian Joe Biden

Kathleen Parker
Nancy Pelosi
John Stossel


"It's crazy for a group of mere mortals to try to design 15 percent of the U.S. economy. It's even crazier to do it by August." - John Stossel

Ahh, good old Sarah Palin, I knew that she would keep finding ways to stay in the news. From the UPI: "Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin says a trust fund that has come under state scrutiny is perfectly legal and is not under her control.
Palin released a statement calling the Alaska Fund Trust a standard fund, similar to ones used by other politicians, as a repository for private donations to help pay her legal bills and not something she could dip into.

"I am informed that this fund was created by experienced attorneys in D.C. and was modeled after other similar funds established for senators and others," the statement said. "The fund itself was not created by me nor is it controlled by me."

Palin attorney Tom Van Flein told ABC News Wednesday that the fund is controlled by trustee Kristan Cole, a personal friend of the former Republican vice presidential candidate.

The Washington Post had reported that an investigator for Alaska's Personnel Board had concluded in a report this month that Palin likely benefited personally from the fund. Van Flein said disbursements from the fund had been put on hold pending the outcome of the board's inquiry." This is standard procedure for members of Congress to set up these kind of trusts, more unusual for a governor to do it, unless you are anticipating legal problems... I wonder if the Senators Ensign and Sanford had set up a defense fund for affairs, in Ensign's case it would be a gift from his parents, and in Sanford's it would be one for foreign affairs...

CQ Politicsreports that, after all of the mean spirited grilling during Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation hearing: "Sen. Lindsey Graham Wednesday became the first Senate Judiciary Committee Republican to announce he would support Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination to the Supreme Court.

Graham’s move came as Judiciary Committee Republicans began lining up for and against her nomination.
The South Carolina senator could provide some cover for other party conservatives to vote to confirm her as well.
Graham said while he found some of Sotomayor’s speeches troubling, the record she complied during 17 years as a federal judge reassured him.

“I believe that she follows precedent, that she would not be an activist judge,” Graham said.

And he decried the Senate’s long-running partisan battle over judicial nominations.

“The politicization of our judiciary has got to stop, for the good of this country for the good of the Senate and for the good of the rule of law in America,” Graham said." Just proves what a funny world we live in. So, the vote on the 28th should be interesting. Or not.

And weird news from afar, well it's good to know that Iran has their own Joe Biden, as reported on MSNBC: "President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stuck by his controversial appointment for a key top deputy on Wednesday in an unusual defiance of Iran's supreme leader, who reportedly ordered the man's removal. His move deepens the dispute among the country's hard-line leadership.

Ahmadinejad's defiance will likely outrage his fellow conservatives and could cause an outright rift between him and his close ally Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The wrangling within the hard-liners' camp comes as Khamenei is trying to keep them all together in the face of a strong opposition challenge after the disputed June 12 presidential election. Khamenei's order for the removal of Esfandiar Rahim Mashai was a stinging humiliation for Ahmadinejad — seen as the leader's protege — but Khamenei appeared to judge it necessary to preserve hard-line support."

" Mashai angered hard-liners in 2008 when he said Iranians were "friends of all people in the world — even Israelis." Also, the guy's daughter is married to Ahmadinejad's son, so there's a strong bond right there. By dumping the man, it would probably mess up the takeover of somebody else's successful business so the lovebirds will have a nest egg, oh wait, isn't that how it's done in Saudi Arabia and the UAE?

late night jokes:

"The tag Republicans kept throwing to hang around Sonia Sotomayor's neck was 'reverse racist.' They said, you know, it's reverse racists like her that give regular racists like them a bad name." --Bill Maher

"It looks like healthcare reform really is gaining momentum and is going to happen. Now of course Republicans say the plan is too confusing, too convoluted, but you know, these are the same people who say they can make sense out of a Sarah Palin speech." --Bill Maher

"I know where I'm going to go on my next break. I'm going to the C Street House in Washington, D.C. You know what this is? It's kind of a frat house for Christian congressman, where they live and pray together and counsel each other on how to adhere to the nine commandments." --Bill Maher

"I say the nine commandments because Gov. Sanford hung out there, John Ensign, the Senator from Nevada who was banging his chief of staff's wife, he lives there. And now a third alumnus, a former Republican congressman named Chip Pickering, has also been exposed for cheating on his wife, apparently actually in the house. It kind of makes you miss those innocent days when Republicans just tried to blow a stranger in an airport bathroom." --Bill Maher

"President Obama recently said that the best way to pay for his health care plan is to raise taxes on people like him. As a result, the government is raising taxes on all half-Kenyan, half-Kansan presidents who were born in Hawaii." --Conan O'Brien

"This weekend, it's very cool. It's the fortieth anniversary of the moon landing, considered by some to be mankind's greatest achievement. ... Unless, of course, you count the time we put the cheese inside the pizza crust." --Conan O'Brien

"Yesterday, Sonia Sotomayor's questioning finally came to an end. Sotomayor said that she had received a 'gracious and fair' hearing. Her exact quote was, 'Thanks a lot, you old honkies. I'm outta here. You can kiss my a**.'" --Conan O'Brien


"Experts say the video game industry has been dramatically hurt by the economic downturn. Which explains the popularity of the new Nintendo game, 'Wii Job Interview.'" --Conan O'Brien

"Forty years ago, Apollo 11 left for the moon. ... The whole thing was delayed. Do you remember the delay? They had to go through Newark." --David Letterman

"President Obama, he's the kind of guy with a lot of foresight, a lot of vision. He says that he would like to put another man on the moon. He's thinking about maybe Joe Biden." --David Letterman