Hat-tip ametrine of DelphiForums.

With healthcare and insurance reform still topping the charts as hot topics, Jimmy Wellington of The Fake News blog posted a good bit of snarky humor: Woman Denied Health Coverage After Chance Encounter With Jack Bauer

Below are the top 12 pre-existing conditions for which someone could get denied health coverage in Jimmy's piece -- but do go read the whole thing.

1. Do you ever beam down to an alien planet while wearing a red shirt?
   
2. Does your boyfriend or relative have supernatural powers that he uses to save innocent people on a regular basis?
   
3. Do you do menial work for the Dharma Initiative?
   
4. Is your best friend a werewolf?
   
5. Are you a black person who finds themselves and their group of white friends in a scary or supernatural situation?
   
6. Do you ever find yourself between Al Sharpton and a camera?
   
7. When the entire world blacks out and sees 6 months into the future, did you see nothing?
   
8. Does your school librarian keep many books about witchcraft, werewolves, and, most importantly, vampires?
   
9. Have you recently seen a car with two good-looking FBI agents and a lot of sexual tension between them?
   
10. Are you frequently in a car driven by a member of the Kennedy family?
    
11. Have you seen a 1950’s British Police Box in your neighborhood – especially if you don’t live in the 1950s or Britain?
    
12. Did you have a dream of you and all your friends dying in a horrible accident, but told everyone about your premonition and saved most of you?

I must say, perhaps I'm a tad prudish but I wasn't overly fond of the Kennedy reference -- p'raps because of the relatively recent passing of Senator Kennedy, and need for MA residents to elect someone to finish his term. But otherwise, my favorite references were the red-shirt and Doctor Who ones...yeah, I'm a sci-fi nut.

Anywho, those ought to give folks a few moments of illusory enjoyment before the crushing realities of the day encroach on our minds once again...

As you might recall, America’s favorite loon and future resident of Bedlam, Bachmann-the-Nut last spring announced that our president, the Citizen of Kenya, Language-of-the-Koran-speaking, Closet-Muslim, socialist, magic-negro overlord and re-education camp counselor, was setting up ACORN-sponsored re-education camps to indoctrinate the youth of American into a life of depraved goody-two-shoes-ism, and probably make them all Swine Flu carriers, to boot.

Well, guess whose son, Harrison Bachmann, has joined Teach for America, which is part of the Ameri-Corps re-education camps? If you Guessed Bachmann-the-Nut give yourself a gold star!

Harrison is such a disappointment to her that I’m sure now he will fill out his Census information, too. The shame, the shame…

(Crossposted from Mock Paper Scissors.)

Just 'cuz it's funny as hell.

Hat-tip NellaSelim of DailyKos.

An amazing amount of gibberish has been uttered about swine flu 2009 H1N1 virus in recent days. I would like to share some highlights (including antics of Collins and Perry) along with links to one or two items that actually make sense.

Ellinorianne and Fish Out of Water have both written excellent diaries about Smithfield Farms possible involvement in the outbreak of flu in Mexico.

A number of organizations have been warning about the dangers of factory farming in the west, and the role farming may have played in the first outbreaks in Asia of Avian flu. The Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Production published a report a year ago warning of the environmental dangers of factory farms.  

Pandora's Pond detailed the role of contaminated water in the genesis of Asian bird flu. The gist of the article is that fish farms were located in close proximity to pigs and chickens, and human excrement was added to the water for enrichment. Humans, pigs and chickens can exchange the influenza virus. The excrement in the water spread a human strain of influenza to wild birds who then infected chickens. Pigs ate the chicken poop. The cycling of the virus between pigs, chickens and wild birds allowed an extremely virulent form of flu to pass from birds to humans. Fortunately, it was never easily spread from human to human.

I am guessing they got tired of me spamming them with applications to work for their Blogs?

Bumped and promoted. Originally posted 2009-03-16 17:59:47 -0500. -- GH

VAHALLA, NY.  Recently, there has been a stream of people quoting Ayn Rand and her novel, Atlas Shrugged as justification for the economic policies that created the current financial crisis. Ms. Rand's polemic novel which assaulted altruism and government has been quoted and promoted by CEO's, government officials, lobbyists as well as print, radio and television - and apparently, they've all got it wrong.

The source of this claim?  None other than the ghost of Ayn Rand herself, who recently appeared near her tombstone in Kensico Cemetery.  According to several witnesses, the image of Ms. Rand first appeared several weeks ago.  Initial observers assumed that the spirit was simply another CEO come to Ms. Rand's tombstone to meditate and give herself permission to lie, cheat and steal in the name of some Libertarian higher moral code.

Click image for full size.

Source photos came from ProphetBlog; text came from me.

Hat-tip luaptifer.

Caption This!

The original image came in via email; Obama image added by Roxy.

OK, folks -- here it is: a photo that seems to speak to our current political situation, and it's your job to find just the right caption for it.  Are you up to the task?

Give it a whirl...

Promoted. -- GH

"The only good union is a dead union!" Osama bin Laden stated in prepared remarks today.

DATELINE MUSCAT, OMAN: Another shocking revelation of anti-Union plotting and scheming today, but this time it was not CEO's of TARP Bailout recipient banks. 
The attendees?  Senior Al Qaeda management, including Osama bin Laden,
Ayman al-Zawahiri and over two dozen more senior managers.  It marked a
historic first time for so many senior managers from Al Qaeda to be in
one place at the same time. Under normal circumstances and for security
reasons, Al Qaeda leaders are not allowed within 50 miles of each other
but desperate times call for desperate measures.

Set in the sleepy seaside town of Old Muscat, a city that has seen
better days.  Over the centuries, Muscat has served as a seat of
government and a door way to trade between Asia, Africa and Eastern
Europe.  The walls of the old city look out over the bay like bleached
bones, preserved in the salt and dry air.  The people that remain here,
do so stubbornly, like the wild trees and bushes that eke out their
existence along the rocky shoreline, sandwiched between ocean and
desert, buffeted by wind and heat.  The old market is still here, but
only locals trade there.  Dubai, with its glimmering towers and huge,
modern port facilities has rendered Muscat into merely a side trip for
the curious.  The Al Qaeda leadership meeting here, would very much
like to avoid becoming another Muscat.

Crossposted to DailyKos.

"What's in a name" might well be answered in the phrase "a picture is worth a thousand words" -- evidence of a vast left-wing conspiracy to control the blogosphere, the internet, US politics and even the WORLD has now crept out of the shadowy depths and into the light...

Yes, that's right -- the Great Orange Satan has finally tipped its hand. Er, claw. Whatever.

No, really. And I'm sure the reich- right-wing pundits will be all over this as evidence of a nefarious, insidious conspiracy any time now.

~pause~

...any time now...

DoD approves more accompanied tours in Korea

OK, I got it, now someone needs to explain

1.) Why we're staying?

2.) What's all this about the North and Nukes?

3.) How long has it really been Over and why weren't we, the Nation, so informed?

Video from the Onion, "Should the American Government stop dumping money into a giant hole?"

Let us take a peek at last year's Bill O'Reilly news starting here, shall we?

Bill O'Reilly Says He Will "Destroy" Daily Kos Today Hotlist
by Hunter
Mon Jul 30, 2007 at 03:28:17 PM EDT

Today, Father Coughlin -- er, sorry, frog in my throat -- Bill O'Reilly is planning another in his ongoing attacks against Daily Kos and YearlyKos. Fox News has apparently been emailing the Democratic campaigns asking them for "comment" on Bill's ongoing Jihad of Jackassery: the following email was sent on to us from one of those Democratic campaigns:

Read more