This Week: Purchase and Destroy

PHOTO by DANIEL DE BOOM
Tues | JULY 22 Who ya gonna run to?
Wed | JULY 23 George W. Bush drops the stuffy professorial façade that’s characterized the final months of his presidency and explains the sub-prime mortgage crisis to an audience at a private Republican fundraiser: “Wall Street got drunk,” he [...]

This Week: The Purpose Drive Life, Implausible Genitals and Kevin Bacon
Tues | JUNE 10 A Cypress doctor grabs a tire-iron during a confrontation with a guy who cuts ahead in the gas line during rush hour, resulting in his arrest for “brandishing a deadly weapon in a rude, angry or threatening manner,” an offense punishable [...]

This Week: Why Lie? It’s for Beer
Tues | MAY 13 Hundreds of car tires are slashed in San Pedro as part of Now You Have To Ride Your Bike To Work Day, causing thousands of dollars in damage and provoking uncomfortably mixed emotions at American Tire Co., which reported a huge influx of customers and [...]

Taking the health and care out of the “year of health care reform”
Today’s Sacramento Bee shows us what irony looks like when it isn’t funny: “Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared 2007 the “year of health care reform” in California, but thousands of children could actually lose insurance coverage in the coming months.”
If you were wondering what [...]

Going pro forma for the holidays
Two days ago, I noted that Dr. James Holsinger, President Bush’s deeply questionable candidate for Surgeon General, was reportedly telling colleagues that he would be leap-frogged over Senate objections via a recess appointment during Congress’ holiday break. Today, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced the Senate will hold pro forma [...]

Do not don your gay apparel
It seems Dr. James Holsinger, President Bush’s nominee for Surgeon General, is looking forward to a holly, jolly Christmas. Holsinger, whose combination of rightwing political views and questionable medical beliefs– particularly his previously stated desire to “cure” gays of being gay– has made his confirmation by the Senate unlikely, [...]

Education policy wonking
It should be as obvious as “water is wet”, but because religious beliefs are involved, rigorous studies must be performed to establish the obvious. And so today comes the latest study showing that abstinence-only sex education doesn’t work. The study arrives just as Congress is considering a bill that contains $141 million in [...]

A new economy blooms in Afghanistan
If you remember when we first invaded Afghanistan, there was a lot talk from the Bush administration about how this was going to be an invasion done right. There would be security, freedom, new infrastructure, and the economy would blossom. Then, after we invaded Iraq, Afghanistan ended up with little [...]