Good Night, sweet dreams, stay safe.

Obama's gesture on Saturday was not without precedent, however. Neither was the outrage.

U.S. presidents from both political parties often have been criticized for attempts at culturally sensitive greetings to high-ranking foreigners.

Former President George W. Bush, a Republican, was mocked for holding Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah's hand, a traditional sign of friendship in the Middle East, as they strolled together in 2005.

In 1994, former Democratic President Bill Clinton was criticized for almost bowing to Akihito. The resulting image, The New York Times wrote, was of "an obsequent president and the emperor of Japan."

Former President Richard Nixon, a Republican, can be seen in a Life magazine photo from 1971 bowing to Akihito's father, Emperor Hirohito.

Source:http://tinyurl.com/y8flkbx

1. Well, the big news is that the House passed its version of health care legislation, which had reached 2,032 pages the last time I saw a number.
   
   Two thousand thirty-two pages.
   
   When it was at 1,990 pages the Associated Press reported that the cost had reached $1.2 trillion.
   
   In this version every public option enrollee will contribute to federally funded abortion.
   
   The vote was a squeaker, with 218 votes needed. 219 of the 258 Democrats voted for it, as did one Republican.
   
   One paragraph (quoted by Politico.com):

   “(a) Outpatient Hospitals – (1) In General – Section 1833(t)
   (3)(C)(iv) of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 1395(t)(3)(C)
   (iv)) is amended – (A) in the first sentence – (i) by inserting
   “(which is subject to the productivity adjustment described
   in subclause (II) of such section)” after “1886(b)(3)(B)(iii);
   and (ii) by inserting “(but not below 0)” after “reduced”; and
   (B) in the second sentence, by inserting “and which is
   subject, beginning with 2010 to the productivity adjustment
   described in section 1886(b)(3)(B)(iii)(II)”.

   Think anyone has read all of it?
   
   Think you could read all of it? Your Representative? Your Senators? Our President?
   
   Update, November 19: The Senate version is 2,074 pages (before amendments).
   
   
2. SPANKED BY ADULTS: The administration lost its first battle after declaring war on Fox News. Fox has for a dozen years been a member of a consortium of five television news networks (CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS) in the White House Press Pool. On October 22 the networks were to be granted interviews by Obama's "Pay Czar," Kenneth Feinberg.
   
   When it was announced that all networks would be welcome except Fox News, the Washington bureau chiefs of the five news networks got together and agreed that none would participate if Fox could not. The administration had to back down, suffering its first humilitation at the hands of a unanimous press.
   
   All administrations have shown a little favoritism regarding reporters, selective leaks, etc., but none had previously attempted what amounts to censoring an entire news organization.
   
   Such clumsiness regarding the news media was never displayed during Obama's campaign and was not seen during his incumbency until *very* recently. I can only think that whoever is behind it is someone outside Obama's media communications staff, someone who has no feel for what the news media considers its own best interests, someone arrogant and vindictive. My candidate would be Rahm Emanuel, but I concede that it might be Obama himself.
   
   Update, November 19: Near total capitulation: Obama granted an interview with Fox News while in China.
   
   
3. THEY'RE BA-A-CK: General Motors Acceptance Corporation and Chrysler Group LLC, already $12.5 billion (that we know of) in debt to the US (that's us, folks) are asking for more in the way of federal bailout dollars. $11.5 billion more is needed by mid-November.
   
   Update, November 19: This has disappeared into a black hole of some kind. A search of Google News returns absolutely nothing about this after October 29.
   
   
4. In the quarter ending September 30, the economy grew for the first time in a year. Overall, that's good news. It is partially offset by the fact that much of the growth was due to federal assistance in the form of programs such as the Cash for Clunkers (now defunct) and the $8,000 tax credit for first time home buyers (due to expire any minute now). But the fact remains that the economy *did* grow for the first time in a year.
   
   I believe economists generally expect less favorable news for the next quarter, but uneverno. The biggest problem for the moment remains unemployment.
   
   Update, November 6: Unemployment has reached 10.2%.
   
   
5. The President continues to fiddle while Afghanistan burns. At the moment, the administration is blaming the controversial election results in Afghanistan, and claiming this is somehow relevant to what we should do or not do militarily. But this is a straw man, and an unusually unsteady one at that. For starters, the central government has limited influence on what happens throughout the country. That is largely determined by coalitions of tribal leaders in the various regions.
   
   And second - and conclusive - is the fact that no matter who is in power in the central government, that government will be corrupt. Those governments have been corrupt longer than any of us have been alive and they will be corrupt long after we are all dead.
   
   Update, November 2: The challenger has withdrawn and the incumbent will serve another term. There is no more electoral process on which to hang your hat. Your move, Mr. President.
   
   Update, November 19: No decision before Thanksgiving.
   
   
6. Having cut aid to tiny Honduras and having joined forces with leftists around the world in threatening not to recognize the results of the Honduran election on November 29th, Obama has at last extracted a minor (but face saving) victory over democracy. Zelaya will be returned to office for the last several weeks of his term, somewhat neutered, however, by the agreement that he will not have control of the armed forces this time around.
   
   Update, November 5: Mmmmmaybe. Those opposed seem to be stalling. The Congress has forwarded the matter to the Supreme Court for a decision on the legality of the compromise.
   
   One bright spot: the US has changed its position on the upcoming Honduran elections, and will recognize the results regardless of the current Zelaya restitution deal.
   
   Update, November 19: The stalling continues, and Zelaya may not be reinstalled as president until after the November 29 elections, if at all.
   
   
7. Hillary's Hadda Helluva Month: Secretary of State Clinton went to
   
   
   
   • Moscow, where the Russians not only would not join the US in calling for sanctions against Iran, they wouldn't even discuss it.
     
     
   • Pakistan, where students, journalists, and even people at a televised Town Hall meeting met her with hostility. 59% of Pakistanis now view the US as the biggest threat to Pakistan.
     
     
   • Jerusalem, where she was blasted by both the Palestinian government and Hamas when she called for a resumption of talks with Israel.
     
     
   I don't know about you, but I'm just tingling all over 'cuz the whole world loves us again.
   
   
8. Gubernatorial losses in Virginia and New Jersey elections have scared the socialism bejesus out of a number of Representatives and Senators. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer worked desperately to keep the number of Democrats who defected on health care below forty, and just succeeded, the final count being 39.
   
   In addition to talks with Pelosi and Hoyer, undecided Democrat Jason Altmire, a Congressman from Pennsylvania, reported that he had calls from Obama, Rahm Emanuel, Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Education Secretary Arne Duncan.
   
   Not such a cheap date: In the end, Altmire voted against the bill. This might have saved his reputation, because lemme tellya he would certainly have become known as a cheap date when contrasted with Louiasana Senator Mary Landrieu. She's "wavering" on health care, and ABC reports that Harry Reid has offered her what amounts to a one hundred million dollar bribe. His bill includes increased Medicaid subsidies for “certain states recovering from a major disaster.” The bill includes two pages of criteria to determine whether a state qualifies. Apply the criteria to each of the fifty states and only one is not eliminated: Louisiana. The $100,000,000 estimate comes from the Congressional Budget Office.
   
   
9. Presidential Speech Impediment: Apparently the President and his entire cabinet have been hit by some sort of traumatic vocal chord injury. Not one of them can say "Fort Hood" and "Muslim" in the same sentence.
   
   I'm sure there's no need to describe in detail what happened at Fort Hood. You know the story as well as I. However, the President and the "mainstream" news media are collaborating in a disgraceful situation. The President has urged us not to "jump to conclusions" about the Muslim major who went berserk, and the news commentators are doing the same.
   
   Obama is being considerably more thoughtful about a rush to judgment on this one than he was when he declared that police had acted in a "stupid" fashion when they arrested a black man a couple of months ago.
   
   We don't have to "jump" to this conclusion. We can "crawl" there.
   
   
   • The shooter is a Muslim.
     
     
   • The shooter had issued many public pronouncements critical of US policy regarding Iraq and Afghanistan.
     
     
   • The shooter had attended the same mosque - and at the same time - as two of the 9/11 hijackers. Coincidentally, the Imam there at the time was Anwar al-Awlaki, widely known as an Islamic version of Reverend Jeremiah Wright - you know, "Goddam America" and all that.
     
     
   • The shooter had made a presentation at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, saying, among other things, that non-Muslims should be beheaded and have burning oil poured down their throats.
     
     
   • The shooter had tried to contact Al-Quaeda and Al-Quaeda recruiters twenty times.
     
     
   • The shooter shouted "Allahu akbar" during his rampage.
     
     
   • And so ad infinitum.
   
   I think, Mr. President, that if you just go ahead and admit that his behavior was representative of an Islamic terrorist, you won't have to invite him to the White House for a beer to make up for it.
   
   
10. It's nice to see the Justice Department working in a good cause for a change. The former Congressman from Louisiana, William Jefferson, was convicted in federal court last August of a number of offenses. He's the one who had $90,000 in his freezer, found by the FBI when they raided his home. He'd received nearly a half million in bribes here and there, and attempted to bribe the sitting Vice-President of Nigeria.
    
    The Feds have asked that he be sentenced to 33 years in prison, effectively a death sentence for him as he's 62 years old.
    
    Update, November 13: Thirteen years.
    
    
11. Once again Obama bowed to foreign royalty, this time to Japan's Emperor Akihito.
    
    I imagine the White House won't try floating the nonsense they did last time - that Obama is so tall, that he was bending to shake hands, etc. This time around it was no longer a matter of historical ignorance, but an in your face gesture for those Americans who value tradition and criticized him last time, rather like an obstinate child persisting in bad behavior to say "I meant to do that" and show that he is unfazed by the criticisms of those who know better.
    
    The bow is a symbol not only of respect but of subservience. I'd guess that Obama is the only American politician on the national scene who feels that the Chief Executive Officer of the United States should demonstrate subservience to a foreigner.
    
    Update, November 15: A "senior administration official" has been quoted as saying “I think that those who try to politicize those things are just way, way, way off base. He observes protocol."
    
    But whose protocol would that be, exactly? Not the protocol of the last two hundred plus years for the United States, and not the protocol of:
    
    The prime minister of India, the prime minister of Slovenia, the president of Kazakhstan,
    
    
          
    

    
    
    the prime minister of Israel, the president of South Korea, or the (2005) president of Russia.
    
    

    
          
    
    
    Just the United States Protocol Pseudo-Expert-in-Chief:
    
    
    
    
    In any event, the simultaneous handshake and bow violate any royal protocol known to Japan. There is *never* touching of any kind when bowing. See that big smile on the emperor's face as Obama bows? The big smile that's not present in any of the other photos? That's polite Japanese Emperor language for "ROFLMAO."
    
    Just following protocol. Right. Back to Protocol Pre-School for you.
    
    If you're not tired of this, you can watch 46 handshakes and one bow at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5U6fL7Y4BZA
    
    
12. Harry Reid, Senate Majority Leader, has given up on Cap and Trade. He announced that the Senate will not consider it until next spring, which in this case means . . . well, never.

Child Development


As sure as prehistoric fish grew legs
and sauntered off the beaches into forests
working up some irregular verbs for their
first conversation, so three-year-old children
enter the phase of name-calling.

Every day a new one arrives and is added
to the repertoire. You Dumb Goopyhead,
You Big Sewerface, You Poop-on-the-Floor
(a kind of Navaho ring to that one)
they yell from knee level, their little mugs
flushed with challenge.
Nothing Samuel Johnson would bother tossing out
in a pub, but then the toddlers are not trying
to devastate some fatuous Enlightenment hack.

They are just tormenting their fellow squirts
or going after the attention of the giants
way up there with their cocktails and bad breath
talking baritone nonsense to other giants,
waiting to call them names after thanking
them for the lovely party and hearing the door close.

The mature save their hothead invective
for things: an errant hammer, tire chains,
or receding trains missed by seconds,
though they know in their adult hearts,
even as they threaten to banish Timmy to bed
for his appalling behavior,
that their bosses are Big Fatty Stupids,
their wives are Dopey Dopeheads
and that they themselves are Mr. Sillypants.

Billy Collins
Poet Laureate of the US from 2001 to 2003. I

Oprah Winfrey’s Exit: The Publishing Fallout
"The Wall Street Journal, November 19, 2009

Oprah Winfrey’s spokeswoman said today that the talk-show host plans to end her long-running program in 2011. The loss of “The Oprah Winfrey Show” will be missed in particular by the book publishing industry.

“It’s a blow,” said Lorraine Shanley, a partner in the consulting firm Market Partners International Inc., who earlier this week watched former Alaska governor and Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin promote her book on Ms. Winfrey’s show.

“Oprah Winfrey has supported many authors, and her book club has had a huge impact on America’s reading habits,” added Ms. Shanley. “She made Faulkner a best seller again. She also promoted an eclectic group of authors and created publishing successes for many commercial writers.”

Oprah’s Book Club, started in 1996, has selected dozens of titles over the years. The books are discussed on “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” promoted on the show’s Web site, and given a seal of approval that’s placed on the book’s cover.

Over the years, the book club has helped to bring the works of well-known writers such as Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison and Cormac McCarthy to even broader audiences. The show has also introduced writers such as Edwidge Danticat to millions of readers.

“Other than a book being turned into a popular movie nothing brings readers to a book like Oprah,” said Dawn Davis, editorial director of the Amistad imprint of News Corp.’s HarperCollins Publishers. (News Corp. also owns The Wall Street Journal.). ”She brings a variety of readers to a variety of books. Her impact is immeasurable.”

The program has not been without its share of controversies. After Jonathan Franzen’s book “The Corrections,” was picked in 2001, the author expressed some discomfort with his selection. He was uninvited from the show.

After Winfrey selected James Frey’s “A Million Little Pieces” in 2005, the author admitted that parts of his memoir were fictional. Winfrey scolded him before a national audience on her show.

“If it is the end of her daily talk show, we probably won’t see something else to match its overall potential impact on book sales in the broadcast arena any time soon,” said Stuart Applebaum, a spokesman for Bertelsmann AG’s Random House publishing arm. “She has an integrity and connectivity to her viewership that is unmatched by any other television broadcast personality. Happily she enjoys reading books and wants to persuade her viewership to enjoy them as much as she does. It’s not a characteristic shared by any other TV personalities with her persuasiveness.”

Source: http://tinyurl.com/yaydsnw

It's raining

It's pouring!

I'll be spending my time indoors pricing inventory for the Thanksgiving weekend show. It has to be delivered tomorrow.

mysteryhorse I wish we had a decent auction house nearby but alas and alack......

I don't go to the local GW or SA anymore either.....I have been finding things here and there in consignment shops. The only rummage sale I can find on Saturday is a 1-1/2 hour drive away. {Sigh!}

As an aside, I think I've written about the SA "volunteer" - the lady with 10 kids, even more grands - who prices everything as it comes in the door....except her own stuff, of course. That gets shipped out the back door.

Yesterday I saw her at the post office - picking up a car load of Priority boxes...and BTW, she's now sporting a new frosted hair do (before it was salt and pepper) and new light-sensitive eyeglasses. HAHAHA! Did I mention her disabled husband does eBay?

That certainly answers the question, "Why is the carp priced so high?" - they have to make up for what she's peeling off the back of the truck.

Oh well.

Back to work!

robbie I think rowe was referring to my grandson, Zachary, and altho we pronounce his nickname as Zack we do spell it Zach, probably because his real name starts with those letters.

clem That's a pet peeve of mine too-and a lot of other people for that matter. Don't know why it's considered acceptable by so many these days.

Something to look for at yard/book sales. Just had an auction end for a lot of 42 little Boxcar Children paperbacks- they sold for $56.99. I've mentioned this before-they always seem to sell well and the books can usually be picked up at sales around here at least for a quarter or so each. I just accumulate them until I have at least 40 and then list them. Have sold every lot of them I've listed for at least $40, usually more. Not a big sale, but an easy way to make a nice little profit.

Etymology of the Day

Cooking the books

Meaning: The deliberate distorting of a firm's financial accounts, often with the aim of avoiding the payment of tax.

Origin: Cooking seems a rather odd choice of word to convey fraud. The Oxford English Dictionary lists a dozen or so meanings of the verb 'to cook', ranging from 'prepare opium for use' to 'make the call of a cuckoo' and, of course, 'prepare food by the action of heat'. Tucked away at the bottom there is also the meaning 'present in a surreptitiously altered form' and it is that meaning of cook that was used in the coinage of the phrase 'cook the books'. The allusion appears to be the changing of one thing into another, as in the conversion of food ingredients into meals. This usage dates back to Stuart and possibly Tudor England and was used by the Earl of Strafford in his Letters and dispatches, 1636:

"The Proof was once clear, however they have cook'd it since."

The verb was in common use by the 18th century and Tobias Smollett's The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, 1751, made the link to finance explicit:

"Some falsified printed accounts, artfully cooked up, on purpose to mislead and deceive."

Apart from the expression 'cooking the books' this use of 'cook' has become less common in the 19th and 20th centuries. The preferred euphemism for the manipulation of financial statements has come to be 'creative accounting'. This is first recorded in the 1960s and is attributed to the US comedian Irwin Corey, as in this example from the Middlesboro Daily News, May 1968:

'Professor' Irwin Corey claims his CPA [Certified Public Accountant] isn't exactly crooked - but the government's questioning him about his "creative accounting".

The numerous corporate fraud cases of the 1990s turned public opinion against the semi-admiring tone of 'creative accounting' and journalists stopped using it. That, and the transformation of bookshops, which now seem to sell more coffee and cakes than they do books, has brought about a revival of the term 'cooking the books', which looks like staying with us for some years to come.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/ykmkq4f