Movie Idea: Mark and John's Excellent Adventure

Synopsis:

Mark Sanford and John Edwards hitchhike to Argentina. He's a Republican! He's a Democrat! They're both horndogs! Buddy-movie hilarity ensues. In Costa Rica they meet with the ex-President of Honduras and decide to stage a counter-coup, but they end up just making a sex tape.

Should I pitch it?

What the Fannie/Freddie takeover and the Iraq War Have In Common

Here's what:

No matter what they say, the Bush administration will always, always, ALWAYS use any authority Congress gives them.

Chris Dodd should have known better:

In the mortgage rescue bill, the Treasury Department was given authority to buy major stakes in the two mortgage giants — if it had to. But Paulson, until recently, predicted that the government would not need to get federal money involved in propping up Fannie and Freddie. Just the ability to do so, he suggested, would be enough to calm the market.

"We certainly accepted him at his word that this was going to be all that was necessary," Dodd said, adding that the administration has now "used that authority aggressively." Dodd said that he would be more wary of Paulson's words in the future. "Fool me once, your fault; fool me twice, my fault." [emphasis added]

Uh huh.

Now, I don't necessarily oppose the Fannie/Freddie thing. Unlike the Iraq war, something along these lines was probably necessary. But the Bush administration has this habit: they ask for a power "just in case." The war authority was supposed to bring Iraq to heel. The Fannie/Freddie legislation was supposed to do the same to the market.

I'm sure you can add your own items. How many kinds of authority has the Bush administration requested, and received, with the promise or hope that they wouldn't go down that road? Have they ever received an authority that they haven't maximized or more?

[crickets]

I thought so.

My letter to ABC News

Sent today:

So Charlie Gibson has scored the first interview with Palin after the GOP convention. Congratulations! But I wonder why they chose Gibson. Today on Fox News, a McCain spokesman said he will only release Palin to the media when he's convinced they will be "deferential" to her. If you are at all deferential, you should be ashamed of yourselves. Charlie Gibson's pre-convention interview with John McCain was a softball suck-up interview of the first order: a shameful piece of puffery. I imagine they've chosen Gibson to interview Palin because they expect the same kid-glove treatment. But the American people want some answers.

So my suggestion is this: spare us the domestic soap-opera distractions. Don't ask anything about Bristol's pregnancy. Don't ask about the First Dude's snowmobile. Don't ask about Trig's Down syndrome. Don't ask about Track's deployment.

Instead, how about this? Ask about issues.

Ask about her position on Georgia. Ask about her view of the new Pakistani prime minister. Ask about housing. Ask about her flip-flops (on earmarks, on cooperation with Troopergate). Ask about her support of creationism. Ask about her view that global warming isn't anthropogenic. Ask aobut NATO expansion. Ask about Darfur. Ask about Zimbabwe. Ask about nuclear waste disposal (including Yucca Mountain). Ask about unemployment. Ask about the estate tax (don't you dare call it the death tax). Ask about Iraq strategy. Ask about the value of the dollar. Ask about unionization.

Don't be a doormat, Charlie. Despite your history, you don't have to be.

Shorter Hillary Clinton

I'm just a heartbeat away from the presumptive nominee.

Barack Obama Has Not Hurt You

for the folks at MyDD

Barack Obama did not raise your gas prices.
Barack Obama did not ship your job to Mexico.
Barack Obama did not write your sermons.
Barack Obama did not deny your habeas corpus.
Barack Obama did not cast your primary vote
and Barack Obama did not dismiss your primary vote.
Barack Obama did not raise your interest rates.
Barack Obama did not send that letter you wouldn't open for days because you knew what was in it but thought it might go away if you waited long enough only it didn't.
Barack Obama did not foreclose on your house.
Barack Obama did not protect your perverted priest.
Barack Obama did not deny your claim.
Barack Obama did not key your car.
Barack Obama did not call you sweetie,
probably,
and if he did, he meant it to be nice.
Barack Obama did not beat up your kid.
Barack Obama did not deny your choice.
Barack Obama did not steal your lunch money.
Barack Obama did not cause the Sichuan earthquake
or Cyclone Nardis in Myanmar (Burma).
Barack Obama did not ruin your marriage,
or the marriage before that, or that one either.
Barack Obama did not vote to authorize this war.
Barack Obama did not question your sexuality.
Barack Obama did not send military recruiters to your son's high school.
Barack Obama did not make you forget your lines.
Barack Obama did not throw up at the party.
Barack Obama did not get your boss pissed at you
and Barack Obama did not make your best employee quit.
Barack Obama did not lose your mail.
Barack Obama did not borrow money from you.
Barack Obama did not paper your house on Halloween.
Barack Obama did not tell your kids not to talk to you.
Barack Obama did not close the mine.
Barack Obama did not make you an alcoholic.
Barack Obama did not privatize your pension.
Barack Obama did not cross your picket line.
Barack Obama did not question your religion
or your lack of religion.
Barack Obama did not draw a knife on you in a subway train.
Barack Obama did not give Ted Kennedy cancer.
Barack Obama did not take your place in line.

Why is the Brites shutting down? Because Galapagos Finch = Robert Marks

Well, here's a nice to-do. There is strong evidence that Galapagos Finch, humorist* at Uncommon Descent and theBrites.org, is really Robert Marks, allegedly persecuted Intelligent-Design-friendly engineering professor at Baylor University. OlegT at After the Bar Closes teased us to find a link until the following file was identified from Marks's Baylor website:

070908 Baylor University Shuts Down Professor's Private Site for Challenging Evolution

If you are not:
Galapagos Finch
please Logout »

RSS: Entries | Comments | Recent Links
© 2006 Uncommon Descent
Design by Zeit Studios
Hosted by SWT

The file was almost immediately taken down when exposed, but the text is now found here.

Today Galapagos Finch apparently closed up shop entirely. It was all done with the necessary bad humor, but the question is Why? Well, there's an answer. Earlier in the day, Galapagos Finch posted something to Uncommon Descent that linked to a PDF document. Unfortunately for him, he forgot to strip the identifiers:

<dc:creator>
<rdf:Seq>
<rdf:li>Marksb<rdf:li>
</rdf:Seq>
</dc:creator>

Again, the folks at AtBC have diligently resisted UD's amnesia.

There's nothing wrong with academics blogging. But anonymity enabled Galapagos Finch's (or rather, Robert Marks's) obnoxiousness and poor taste. Further, Marks and Dembski have made a point of painting Marks as a martyr and a productive scholar. Nobody can look at the GF materials and think that's a good use of time.

*Galapagos Finch is a "humorist" in the same sense as Denyse O'Leary is a "writer."

Shorter Bill Dembski:

Why are the evil Darwinists so much more popular than me?