Let the commentary begin...

Looks like John Boehner has been paying visits to Wall Street bankers lately, trying to figure out how close the Congress can bring the government to hitting the debt ceiling before they all freak out and sell America to China.  Or, more likely, freak out and stop donating money to Republican candidates for national office.

The Republican budget will wreak havoc on hard-working Americans. They have proven, once again, their unwavering commitment to taking trillions of dollars from the pockets of the middle class and giving ever more generous windfalls to millionaires and large corporations. They want to throw seniors off Medicare. Their slash-and-burn tactics will throw hundreds of thousands of people out of work. They will eliminate health care for children and those with disabilities.

Krugman today captures the fear that's been gnawing at me all weekend about Obama.  I get that he's in a rough spot and I get that losing the House had serious consequences for our side of the debate.  I get that the President might have to give up $38 billion in spending that he didn't want to give up.

But does he have to act like he's enjoying it?

FRIDAY FOLLIES: Maine again. Gospel Teens, Homeless Artists, and all that's Rich

Oh, man! Maine's rookie Tea Party governor, Paul LePage can't get a break.  He's still getting all kinds of flack for taking down those nonessential murals showing nothing but the damned hoi polloi, but on top of that, he got word that 63% of the  mural was paid for by a Federal grant and the Feds aren't looking kindly on his hotshot actions.  Seems  he broke an essential clause in the contract that clearly stated he was supposed to notify people and give them a good reason for pulling those murals from those walls, and then those essential people would have to agree.   So if the Feds demand their money back at current market value, which would be higher now with all the attention, it's the taxpayers who would have to foot the bill.

But once again, Big Business demands the action and the taxpayers get stuck.  Life just keeps imitating life.

Israel supporters rejoiced on Friday after international jurist Richard Goldstone recanted some conclusions from his investigation into Israel's military actions during the Gaza war two years ago.

"If I had known then what I know now," Goldstone wrote in a Washington Post op-ed, "The Goldstone Report would have been a different document."

...

The Israeli government and its supporters have long denounced the Goldstone Report as deeply flawed and complain that it has tarnished Israel's reputation. On Sunday, in fact, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced plans "to reverse and minimize the great damage that has been done by this campaign of denigration against the state of Israel."

But while Israel's supporters and detractors alike often take the importance of the Goldstone Report for granted, it's worth considering the extent of the "great damage" done to the state of Israel since the report was released and questioning what such investigations, accusations and condemnations actually accomplish.

Read the full article at CNN.com

The deficit was caused by the financial crisis and the resulting recession, which will cost the U.S. $500 billion a year in tax revenues going forward.  Absent the recession, the "trillion dollar deficits" we're worried about now would be half trillion dollar deficits and we'd be talking about how to grow our way out of them.

Absent the recession and absent two wars (one justified but mismanaged so as to still be ongoing even though it should have been a short military operation, one that didn't have to happen at all) those half trillion dollar deficits would be even smaller.

Late last year, as The Daily was setting up for its launch, I wrote a few sample columns that never saw the light of day beyond the various product testers and decisionsmakers within News Corp.  This was my first one, about Paul Ryan, who just today came out with a plan to "fix" Medicare by killing the program and moving future retirees back into the private insurance market that was historically so bad for retirees that we needed Medicare to fix it.

PIERRE, S.D. — South Dakota governor Dennis Daugaard signed a bill into law on Tuesday that requires a man to wait 72 hours after his first doctor's appointment to be allowed to masturbate, the longest waiting list in the nation.

Barack Obama's re-election bid has launched and I guess that means the silly season is upon us.  We all have to band together to beat Michele Bachmann or some such nonsense.  So how are you all feeling about this, Daggers?  Too soon?  I know it's too soon for me.

Once again I'm drawn to the story of the Maine Labor Murals.  They're safely hidden out of sight where no one will be corrupted by those images for a while, but that doesn't mean they won't be talked about. Judy Taylor, the artist who painted the murals is offering to hang her father's war medal on one of the empty walls:
  

The New York Times takes a look at the contract disputes that have been delaying production of Mad Men. (But Deadline Hollywood suggests that the show is now a go, even though the fight with series creator Matt Weiner is not over.)

A couple weeks ago, I wrote a post at Alan Colmes Presents Liberaland where I attempted to strongly point out that Donald Trump's talk of running for Presidency was a ploy and that Trump had no interest in holding any political office, let alone the Presidency.

While I have more or less been clear about my feelings toward war, I am nonetheless a realist. I understand that the War in Libya is happening and won’t end until all objectives are met.

Thus, when President Barack Obama gave his speech this week explaining the humanitarian reasons for the U.S.-led UN-Approved No-Fly Zone War on Libya, I, like many liberals, stood behind my President 100 percent. And while Obama did not lay out any type of exit strategy, I have my own modest expectations on how this humanitarian war effort will proceed:

I took a chance with my column this week and wrote about something other than Libya.  I'm always more comfortable with social and financial topics anyway as I totally hate relying on my B.A. in Theatre with an emphasis in dramatic writing when people ask my what qualifies me to bicker with generals over combat strategy.

On Friday I wrote about Maine's new Tea Party governor's decision to remove murals depicting aspects of LABOR from the LABOR department offices.  He didn't wait long.  Over the weekend, workers (Yes, laborers) removed them and they're now in storage somewhere.  This is what the walls look like now:

One of the frequent talking points about the Libyan rebels is that they only have about a thousand trained soldiers in their ranks. As the meme went around, it sometimes turned into only 1000 soldiers, period, which is clearly not true. And the "1000 men" meme has been used to shore up certain anti-intervention talking points, even though it undermines others.

I am a feminist. I understand that some may argue with that or claim I am a poor example of a feminist - I am far from perfect in this self-assessment. But I do understand the movement, and at very least work to be a feminist ally.

Elizabeth Taylor was the most beautiful human being on this earth for so many years you had to wonder if her not-of-this-world violet eyes didn't have something to do with it.  Because, honestly, who else on this earth ever had violet eyes?  But beyond her beauty, she had something else that most incredibly pampered child stars never had: an ability to look outside herself and see the other half of the world.  She worked tirelessly to bring attention to HIV/Aids, bringing honest a

"I think everyone agrees with the goal of reducing abortion by encouraging consideration of other alternatives," [North Dakota governor] Daugaard said in a written statement. "I hope that women who are considering an abortion will use this three-day period to make good choices."