Morning Coffee (82)

Another day, another cup o’ Morning Java. Goes well with a side of serfdom and debt bondage, no?

Congressional Oversight:

What do you think of when you hear this glorious term? Well, you might think of the Checks and Balances system, where Congress (the Legislative) is supposed to check, and be balanced by, the Executive and Judicial branches. Or you might think about Congress making sure the Intelligence Community is not doing anything too seedy. Perhaps you merely think of individual members of Congress overseeing their salaries rise every year. Who knows?

But what you probably didn’t think, was Congressional hearings on steroid and human growth hormone use in sports. You wouldn’t think that because it’s absurd. But being absurd, does not make it any less true. Next month we’ll have ample C-SPAN coverage of star-studded hearings in which our Congress will waste our tax dollars listening to a bunch of clean (or not) athletes complain about the rampant use of ‘roids and dirty athletes insist under oath that they don’t use them and don’t know anyone who does.

Senators and Congressmen from both parties have said that they will do what they’re paid (too much) to do; they will legislate the problem into oblivion. New laws will be enacted to make these evil substances more difficult to access and impose harsher penalties for abuse and distribution. Never mind that steroids are already a Schedule II drug, which, last I checked, means they’re illegal to possess without sufficient reason. Apparently, the 85 baseball players named in the Mitchell Report didn’t get that memo. Human growth hormone (HGH) will be reclassified as a Schedule II drug, making it equal to steroids and placing it under the watchful eye of the DEA. And thus grows the War on Drugs.

Two House panels will have hearings on this very important issue that deeply effects the lives of every single American that has ever lived and will ever live. The Committee on Oversight and Government Reform will “soapbox-it-up” on 15 Jan. Be sure to tune in to watch a Bunch of Bloviating Blowhards Blather away like Blithering Boneheads. I wonder if the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has ever held a hearing on a little ole government reform called “term limits.” Probably not. If they did, then the Rep Bobby Rush (D-Ill) might not still be around (since 1993) and be the chair of the Sub-Committee on Commerce, Trade, and Consumer Protection, which is holding its own hearings on 23 Jan. At least they didn’t form some sort of Performance Enhancing Drugs Commission which would eventually put out a 3,000 page book available on Amazon.com. And in the end, we’ll be secure in the knowledge that our athletes are safe, and cheat free. Until the newest designer drug is designed.

We had several months in which Congress and the President couldn’t agree on funding for the “war” (whatever that is) and we faced the looming threat of widespread layoffs of civilian Department of Defense employees right before the holidays. Partisan bickering paralyzes our government in almost every conceivable way on almost every issue, but we have hearings on the use of steroids by overpaid athletes? All this by a Congress that possesses approval ratings among the lowest in approval rating history.

Putin is the “Person”:

Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation, has just been named Time’s Person of the Year. I say “just” because it was literally five minutes ago. Just so we all know, being Person of the Year (POTY) does not mean endorses or admires the individual (or collective as was the “American Soldier” from the past); it’s merely recognition of the influence the person has had during the year. To illustrate that, Hitler was chosen once, Stalin twice, the Ayatollah once. So, being a “good” guy is not a prerequisite.

Putin had quite the impact this year. The party he leads in all but official title, United Russia, won a majority in the Russian Parliament. He dissolved his cabinet and Prime Minister and stunned Russia Watchers by naming a relatively unknown, Viktor Zhubkov, as his new Prime Minister, and then named Dmitry Medvedev, an extremely close associate since his days in St Petersburg and his current First Deputy Prime Minister, as his choice as successor. He then said that he would be okay with being Medvedev’s Prime Minister. He has seemed to have kept his word that he would honor the Constitution by not seeking a third consecutive term as President and was against amending the Constitution to allow him to do so. But don’t think that will prevent him from holding significant power in Russia, perhaps by expanding the power of the Prime Minister at the expense of the Presidency. Or, since the Constitution only bans three consecutive terms, serving as Prime Minister for a short period of time before Medvedev steps down or becomes ill or dies. Russians love him; his approval rating is consistently above 80%. Even if you assume the figures are tainted and lop off 20 or 30%, his rate is still astronomically higher than our approval of Bush and Congress combined, apparently (and throw in Britney Spears for good measure). Apples and oranges, sure. But interesting.

Spears Gets, Um, Speared:

Speaking of the Spears family, Britney’s young (16) sister Jamie Lynn has announced that she is pregnant. Twelve-weeks so, in fact. This should really do wonders for her career; she’s an actress on a Nickelodeon show. Apparently she’s going to keep it, considering she announced it to some magazine. But needless to say, her mother was shocked. I probably would be too, if I were her. Despite Britney’s abandoning a thing called reality, Jamie Lynn has, according to her mother, always been “conscientious” and has never even missed a curfew. Jamie Lynn herself says that she was shocked for both her and her boyfriend, some guy I’ve never heard of (not Kevin Federline). I guess that, because of her burgeoning acting career, she missed the health class on sex education and didn’t realize that doing that sort of thing could end so badly. She did say to her legion of fans, however, to avoid premarital sex…just like she didn’t; i.e. role model. In fairness, she did know the kid “for years” and had been dating him “since high school” (i.e. last year), so it’s okay. Or it isn’t, because in another interview she says she isn’t dating anyone, has a bunch of guy friends, and likes to keep her legs, er, options open.

A bit low-brow for the Morning Coffee, I know. But I have to use this medium to inform people that I have an alibi – I was in Dayton 12 weeks ago, I assure you. Anyway, I find it sort of funny that such a horrible “blight” can afflict our rich, coddled, and famous.

Word of the Day: Discursive (adjective): 1. Passing from one topic to another; ranging over a wide field; digressive; rambling. 2. Utilizing, marked by, or based on analytical reasoning – contrasted with intuitive. The Morning Coffee can be described as most discursive.

On This Day in History: Three ships, the Susan Constant, Godspeed, and Discovery depart England for the New World carrying the soon to be settlers of Jamestown, Virginia (1606). The Roman festival Opalia, in honor of the chthonic goddess Ops who made vegetation grow, was held.

“Things alter for the worse spontaneously, if they be not altered for the better designedly.” – Francis Bacon

“Evil requires the sanction of the victim.” – Ayn Rand