Christmas must have been a blast in this household

How bad did things get if this man intentionally robbed a store at knife point to avoid having to spend New Years with his family? Read the rest of this post...

The lost decade for American workers

It's not much of a surprise, though unfortunately it does once again raise the question of why Obama and the rest of Washington are saying the course with the same old broken system. To allow the architects of this lost decade to continue holding a leadership position and betting the future on Wall Street is a real head scratcher. The Republican policies under Bush exacerbated the poor Clinton (and Robert Rubin) decisions to let business do whatever it wanted. Let Obama and Democrats in Congress continue this insanity but don't expect me or many others on the left to go along with it. Enough is enough.

There has been zero net job creation since December 1999. No previous decade going back to the 1940s had job growth of less than 20 percent. Economic output rose at its slowest rate of any decade since the 1930s as well.

Middle-income households made less in 2008, when adjusted for inflation, than they did in 1999 -- and the number is sure to have declined further during a difficult 2009. The Aughts were the first decade of falling median incomes since figures were first compiled in the 1960s.

And the net worth of American households -- the value of their houses, retirement funds and other assets minus debts -- has also declined when adjusted for inflation, compared with sharp gains in every previous decade since data were initially collected in the 1950s.

Read the rest of this post...

Danish police shoot alleged attacker at home of cartoonist

Very creepy.

Danish police shot and wounded a Somali man with al-Qa'ida links when he tried to break into the home of a cartoonist whose 2005 caricatures of Prophet Mohammad sparked global Muslim outrage.

The 28-year-old man, armed with a knife and axe, failed to get into Kurt Westergaard's home in the town of Aarhus late on Friday and was shot in the leg and hand after he threw the axe at a policeman, a police spokesman said.

Read the rest of this post...

Limbaugh says Hawaii proves America's health care system doesn't need reform... except that Hawaii already adopted its reforms

He just lies. He knows he's lying. But he also knows that his audience isn't up on enough of the topic of the day to know that he's lying. Case in point: Rush Limbaugh's recent emergency room visit for chest pains. He survived, and he says this proves that America doesn't need health care reform. What Limbaugh doesn't tell you is that Hawaii already instituted many of the reforms that are included in the health care reform bill before Congress. So what Limbaugh is really saying is that health care reform works. Read the rest of this post...

Obama: Al Qaeda responsible for attemped airline bombing

In the weekly address, Obama made some news. He confirmed that the guy who tried to blow up the flight to Detroit was trained by Al Qaeda in Yemen. This was another attempt by Al Qaeda attack on the United States. From the text received by email:

Meanwhile, the investigation into the Christmas Day incident continues, and we're learning more about the suspect. We know that he traveled to Yemen, a country grappling with crushing poverty and deadly insurgencies. It appears that he joined an affiliate of al Qaeda, and that this group-al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula-trained him, equipped him with those explosives and directed him to attack that plane headed for America.

This is not the first time this group has targeted us. In recent years, they have bombed Yemeni government facilities and Western hotels, restaurants and embassies-including our embassy in 2008, killing one American. So, as President, I've made it a priority to strengthen our partnership with the Yemeni government-training and equipping their security forces, sharing intelligence and working with them to strike al Qaeda terrorists.

And even before Christmas Day, we had seen the results. Training camps have been struck; leaders eliminated; plots disrupted. And all those involved in the attempted act of terrorism on Christmas must know -- you too will be held to account.

The full address can be seen here. Read the rest of this post...

Saturday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

Well, it's the last weekend of the holiday season. Washington really slows down over the holidays -- and the city is actually bearable. It's back to business on Monday.

For today, it's more football -- for those who partake.

For some fun, check out a couple more haikus from KarenMrsLloydRichards. On the Rove divorce:

Karl slumps, jowls in hands--
All Turdblossom's sacrifice
Destroyed the marriage . . .

And on airport security:

Halt bodyscanning!
Checking out my "endowment"?!
And they're unionized!

Let's get threading... Read the rest of this post...

MIA Paper Planes

I'm still trying to find my morning coffee after a late night following the Rose Bowl. My Buckeyes finally got things back on track after a few horrible BCS games. I was really hoping Northwestern could come back for the win yesterday but wow, still impressive. Even that other slow, plodding Big Ten team from Pennsylvania managed to win. Pretty good day overall. It's chilly out there today but at least the trees are calm so that should mean no wind. Onto the bike. Read the rest of this post...