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Alaska’s rank as the state with the most welfare recipients. At 6 percent, Gov. Sarah Palin’s state had nearly triple the U.S. average, according to the new U.S. Census.

Hey conservatives, whadda think of your golden girl now!?

$2,000,000

The total that blowhard South Carolina Sen. Joe Wilson raised in the six days after he shouted “You lie!” to President Obama during his speech on health care.

Hey conservatives, what would  you have contributed if he would have added “boy!”? (Which was asserted by New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd.)

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Politicians can be so painfully predictable — and cowardly.

Congressmen, such as Sen. Chris Dodd on new financial regulation, seek more government to make themselves look good, like they did something to help their constituents.

In this case, Dodd wants a “super-regulator.” Like that is the answer. (See: Homeland Security.)

Obama, in his emerging style, is trying to rush, rush, rush legislation through to his signature, like he is changing things. (As Jon Stewart so aptly pointed out, why is this debate in the present tense? It should have been hashed out at least six months ago when the economy was in ruin.)

The cowardly part is that neither plan — not Dodd’s consolidation of regulators such as the Fed and FDIC,  or Obama’s, which in another emerging style, doesn’t have a focus – take the lobbyists and big business out of the equation and support me and you.

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“Nixon: Pull out like your father should have.”

A friend of a friend who was at Vietnam War protests in the 1960s reminisced on humor in one particular sign.

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Two Tank Milestones – This is the 201st post; and September marks the beginning of the third year of this hacky expirement.

My (very) amateur photography skills from Madeline Island on Lake Superior, in downtown Duluth and at the State Fair in St. Paul:

The lagoon on the north side of the island.

Sarah stands atop a rock ledge overlooking Lake SuperiorAs the sun set, a sailboat glides between Bayfield, Wis., and Madeline Island.

Sunflowers dominate planters in downtown Duluth.

The likely century-old police headquarters in downtown Duluth.

An August sunrise -- yep, you read that right, sunrise -- with a thin layer of fog near Pine City.

The State Fair's swinging chairs ride at dusk.

The blury skyline of St. Paul seen from the Space Tower at the State Fair.

Amid false talk of weapons of mass destruction and unfounded links to September 11, anti-war critics enthusiastically called the Iraq War a bellicose effort for oil.

Now, about six years later, Chinese and British oil companies have signed contracts to extract oil when exploiting poor Iraqi people that live in the areas, according to the New York Times. Also, 10 more oil fields will be bit out this fall.

Capitalism advocates will hoist this up as a “free market” out from under the tyranny of Saddam Hussein. But when Iraqi people remain poor and unemployed as multi-national corporations reap multi-billion profits it’s just tyranny with a different face.

The anti-war critics were right.

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The number of purple Brett Favre No. 4  jerseys spotted during a Sunday afternoon trip to the State Fair. I saw a few rubes wearing the new duds before I grabbed my first suds. So, at that point, my friends and I started keeping track over the course of a 6-hour stay at the Great Minnesota Get-Together.

In comparison, Adrian Peterson was the second most-frequent  jersey — and he only had a handful.

Can you say, “bandwagon?”

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The federal investigation into the CIA for its interrogation tactics doesn’t go far enough.

The alleged acts are horrendous and shameful, including choking prisoners, water dousing, mock executions and — worse of all – threatening the health of their wives and children.

Instead of current plan of seeking prosecution for the subordinates who acted at the direction of their superiors and under their sketchy legal jurisdiction, the inquiry should start with then-CIA Director George Tenet and go up the Bush Administration ladder.

The most egregious acts were conducted by the bosses and lawyers who authorized the interrogations, which have been reportedly ineffective and counterproductive anyway.

I agree with Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, who compared the current purview of the inquiry to Abu Ghraib, when “lower ranking troops who commited abuses were hung out to dry.”

A narrow scope on administration officials would debunk one of the main justifications for not conducting the inquiry in Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal editorial. The Journal goes to the knee-jerk conservative reaction of how it sends the wrong message to those who execute the war. If the inquiry goes after Veep Cheney and Justice lawyers who concocted the “enhanced interrogation tactics,” the CIA operatives are spared.

Regardless of finish, this inquiry is going to get ugly. It’s necessary to prosecute  those who’ve put in motion such travesties,  but it will also detract from larger, more important issues, such as health care reform.

The inquiry also doesn’t look good for the Obama administration, which previously sought to overlook the past and move on to “change.” But once the ACLU won a Freedom of Information Act request to get the 2004 internal CIA report, then Attorney General Eric Holder and other Obama called the inquiry.

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After all her lunacy, Michele Bachmann has finally spoken the truth.

The Minnesota congresswoman was following her constituents and their goo-goo affection of Brett Favre in Purple when she opined about the quarterback on Sean Hannity’s radio show Tuesday.

She had joined the giddy masses in all but erecting a Favre statue outside the Metrodome when, unbeknownst to her, she tossed out this pearl of wisdom:  ”It’s like when John Unitas came out of retirement!”

The gunslinger in Wranglers

Oh, Michele, you’re so right and you don’t even know it. Unitas, who spent a legendary career with the Baltimore Colts, won one of five games in a last-ditch season with the San Diego Chargers.

Here are some stats to preempt the statue construction: No quarterback at the age of 40 or older has led a team to the playoffs. Favre, who will turn 40 in October, is already hurt with a partially torn rotator cuff. And No. 4 is 12 years removed from his last MVP season in 1997.  

[Full disclosure: Bachmann's breath of fresh air came amid a wacko interview where she expressed how she will fight health care reform because it's "government control of her body." She soon went back to her old self.]

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Not so fast, Robert Gates.

The U.S. Defense Secretary — and, to a larger extent, the Obama administration — tried to fool you Tuesday by lauding their hard stance on the F-22 fighter jet program.

The warmongerers said the move to cut the $1.7 billion expansion showed their efforts to rein in military spending, but a day earilier they had pushed the $1 billion expansion of the army by 22,000 members.

Gates called it essentially a trade-off, but spending will increase further with a multiplier effect placed on the added “temporary” fighters.

There will undoubtedly be other authorizations to train and equip them, and who believes the Department of Defense, i.e. the Department of War, will shrink its ranks in the future?

The endless wars and the military industrial congressional complex rage on.

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Nike doesn’t do mundane. It’s latest TV ad featuring Lance Armstrong inspires. Just do it, indeed.

Goofy

I’ve watched this one three straight times and Pete Carroll and Brandon Roy continue to crack me up.

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