NEW YEAR FRIDAY FAUXLOSOPHY ON WEDNESDAY

It is indeed a sad thing for relationships, especially family ones, when someone is totally and accurately able to assess when they have been treated with a lack of respect but are just as unable to recognize when its time for the resentment to end.

“MAMMA HE HIT ME BACK”

I’ll never forget that cry, it was issued by a boyhood friend and the “he” in his complaint was me. What had happened is probably evident; my “friend” had hit me, (who can remember what we were fighting about) and I immediately swatted him back with intentional force. There was no great fallout and as kids did and do we went on and forgot. What’s happening in the Gaza strip, alas, is a grown up version of my boyhood incident with of course real human fallout. For days, Hamas which doesn’t recognize Israel’s right to exist but does recognize its right to take rocket fire broke the cease fire and with said rockets attacked Israel. Then Israel of course, finally hit back in response to conduct which has even been condemned by the Palestinian Authority. That would be like Fox news questioning the conservatives judgment (not that they ever would) for pushing Sarah Palin on John McCain as the VP nominee. There’s a lot to play out here but yes Hamas you will get hit back, the operative word being “back” and there simply must be a translation for that in your dialogue. And again regarding the word “back” when Israel doesn’t have to watch hers, you know from her history you won’t have to watch yours.

A TAXING FAUX FACTOID

It turns out that players sports agents are limited by the various players associations as to what percentage of an athletes contract they are allowed to receive. In baseball the amount is 3% of their clients renumeration but they can obviously have many athletes under contract while the player has only him (or her) self and the limited window that comes with the territory. 3% of a (possible) Manny Ramirez contract of say 21 million dollars a year for 3 years would net his agent Scott Boras a tidy $630,000 per year but of course under Mr. Obama's tax plan Mr. Boras might have to pay more taxes. But, and its an important but, in no other country do as many athletes get paid a fraction of what those playing for US sports teams do. So could any taxation system be more fairer? or as Irving Berlin (composer; G-d bless America) maintained nothing is more patriotic than paying your taxes the very subject of a song he wrote during earliest and darkest days of WWII. And since Sarah Palin is not Vice President we're allowed to appreciate not only the great engine of government which has made America run but the necessity of fuel to that end.

A sporting P.S. We at the Faux predicted that the Yankees would not get what they wanted done in the off season beginning with the signing of C.C. Sabathia. We were R O N G (wrong) and they went further with signing A.J. Burnett and the gifted Mark Teixeira...Yankees fans have to be pleased. By the way, if your spelling and scoring at home the way to remember the correct spelling of the Yankees new first baseman is in both syllables, I before E except for position "3".

LEARNIN' ABOUT SPEAKIN' PROFESSOR PALIN'

There are many many Americans of influence, who absolutely believe we, make that they, need Sarah Palin to remain front and (well, right of) center on the national political scene. But we'll talk about late night TV and Comedy Central news programs later on. But let us say, we at the Faux appreciate not only Ms. Palins approach to politics in general, but the way she handles the English language and for that matter the alphabet itself. One specific example comes to mind. When she was asked about running in 2012, she said that seems "like years away." You think? Then there's her approach to the alphabet, particularly the rather common syllable "ing." When she's speakin' or addressin', or dare we say it (if she ever does again) interviewin', she doesn't seem partial to using her "g's," but we have a theory that she's saving her "g's" for some reason. Is it because she plans to use many in repeating GOP, GOP, GOP, or invoking G-d as the reason she'll run again? Maybe she's planning to hire as a political advisor G. Gordon Liddy and doesn't want to give it away. Aw gee, we'll see.

BEEN BIDEN HIS TIME

What has Vice President-elect Joe Biden been doing since election night? It turns out quite a bit. He's "been in the room for every major appointment" the President-elect has made, and believably says they have been in agreement. And almost every major source credits him with helping bring Hillary Clinton into the fold as the future Secretary of State.
He stands by his opinion that Dick Cheney may (may?) be among the most dangerous of Vice Presidents ever. Plus, as Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee he can knowledgeably question/dismiss Cheney's assertions tat when the Democrats know "what we know they will come around" regarding what we've done interrogating prisoners in Guantanamo et al. Mr. Biden correctly concludes as do all our intelligent agency experts that Guantanamo and the like have been, are, and will be the greatest recruiting tool anti American terrorists have going for them. Will Cheney get criminally prosecuted, in this world at least, Joe Biden obviously can't answer yet. But the new administration has a lot more timely economic matters on their plate and even those who loathe Cheney know its best to be (we'll say it again) "biden their time". Oh, and Vice President-elect Biden hasn't been making any noteworthy verbal gaffes at all recently, and should he do so only our senses of humor or syntax will get tortured.

FOR VETERANS AFFAIRS, A VETERAN WHO FOUGHT BUSH AND RUMSFELD WITH THE TRUTH

In 2003 before a senate panel, then Army Chief of Staff General Eric Shinseki made a fatal (career-wise) decision when answering questions. That is he told the Bush administration and Donald Rumsfeld what they didn't want to hear. His flimsy excuse was that he happened to be telling the truth. The question was how many soldiers would he need to effectively occupy a post-war Iraq and his answer was "Something on the order of several hundred thousand would be required." History has proven him correct. To Rumsfeld this made him unacceptable and rumors of his early (forced) retirement were leaked and he became effectively a lame duck due to the bunch of quacks who ran this war. Smart, intelligent, and accurate, that is what President Elect Obama seems to want and thus his appointment.

We are beginning to appreciate just how much material Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and company supplied us with, and in news of the Faux sense, we'll miss them.

DARWINISM, THE OPIATE OF THE (RIGHT) MASSES

Senators Bunning, Corker, Selby et al always proclaim their opposition to evolution, just ask them and their evangelical base. No siree, we’re not descended from any baboons or monkeys (it may be sea urchins), their here to tell ya’. They don’t believe in that their Darwinism, you betcha; and their always consistent, well almost always. Because when it comes to Darwinism of a capitalist kind…that they believe in. They will not allow a bailout for the automakers, no matter how many good peoples lives get wrecked in the bargain. If a company “deserves” to fail they say let it, survival of the fittest. The big three automakers must have deserved to fail if they weren’t “intelligently designed”, sorry, we couldn’t help it. We’ll give them this; such a theory applied politically would certainly explain the recent election trends of the Republican party and we hope future ones.

WHEN THERE WAS A WILL, THERE WAS A WAY, SAYS WILL, BY THE WAY

Regarding the automaker bailout, this week's "By the Way" award goes to conservative pundit George Will on "This Week With George Stephanopoulos." He allowed (he never states he was wrong, way wrong) that the 1979 Chrysler bailout that he and the conservative community condemned Jimmy Carter et al for not only worked but get this: it actually made the government money. How bad was Jimmy Carter as a leader? Americans don't even realize that some of what he did politically worked, as did the Americans on the Chrysler assembly line.

MAD ABOUT MADOFF

50 billion dollars is a lot to make go away even in the papa of all Ponzi schemes, but that's what Bernie Madoff has apparently done. The question for his investors who got duped is not only what to do but what to tell. Such an involvement will not go down on many "maven's" resumes. We at the Faux have 2 predictions. First, Mr. Madoff's victims won't see virtually any of their money ever again. And second, on some YouTube, MySpace or elsewhere a full and complete list of all the financial damage will appear and make those names again want to disappear. One whimsical thought which given Madoff's area of concentration probably didn't happen, we wish he had duped a real life Tony Soprano, than to plagiarize ourselves...he too would be sleeping with the Gefilte fishes.

THE REAL MCCAIN

Fair is fair. 46% of the American electorate voted for John McCain and his is a voice that should still be heard. He appeared this past week on "This Week" and he looked great. Really, this time around his calm voice actually sounds calm. The RNC on the other hand is renewing attacks on the President-elect for not focusing on the Blagojevich matter more fully. Senator McCain logically says that with all due respect to the RNC, "let's concentrate on where the concentration of our problems lay, in the economy." He expects to be part, sometimes, of the senate opposition, that emphasizes it will be the "loyal opposition." McCain sounds very real, unlike when he was running for President and people in the RNC were running him. And listening to his now qualified support of Sarah Palin as a future Presidential candidate we're wondering just how much of that idea was actually his.

DRILL BABY DRILL

If nothing succeeds like success then nothing prepares like preparation and that's exactly what the city that never sleeps is doing. Namely they're not sleeping. That's right, NYC is doing anti-terrorist drills, a mock exercise including re-enactments, rescues, arrests and casualty aid. Luxury hotels most definitely are (as they were in Mumbai) likely targets. Kudos to NYC police commissioner Ray Kelly for leading the way, and in a way that makes sense, deciding to drill, baby, drill.

IF IT AINT BROKERED?...

There is a definite similarity between what brokers and airplane pilots do, but there is an eerie difference as well. Your airplane pilot is figuratively and actually in the plane with you...your broker is not.

SOME (MORE?) POLITICAL ILL IN ILL.

While the NY Yankees were failing (at least as of Tuesday) to financially induce pitcher C.C. Sabathia to sign with them, another far less legitimate pitch was being made. That was regrettably by Illinois Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich pronounced according to the NY Times Bluh-GOY-uh-vich, whose middle initial maybe "R" but his political affiliation is "D" as in Democrat. As is now widely known Blagojevich was scheming to sell the US Senate being vacated by President-elect Barack Obama. Let's be clear here, even if the "clear channels" bunch proves not to be, no one, but no one including the FBI investigators armed with stacks of evidence and hours of tapped tapes is even hinting that Mr. Obama had even the slightest bit of culpability, much less knowledge of what was going on here. In fact it is known in Chicago circles that Mr. Obama has long been estranged from Mr. Blagojevich.
Briefly, the plot the Governor had hatched involved many anticipated nest eggs including getting millions in bribes, eventually a non-profit funded (in his mind, in his scheme) by such people as Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, and revenge against reporters who had criticized him in the bargain. While millions or more words are sure to be sent and spoken on this matter, we at the Faux hope that complete truths will be the norm rather than just complete sentences. We would hope they would emphasize the fact that to repeat this scandal has nothing whatsoever to do with our President-elect and that in fact Democrat Blagojevich replaced a disgraced Republican Governor George Ryan. Mr. Ryan's claim to fame, or should we say infame, is that he is now in prison for racketeering and federal fraud. This prison (we're guessing) and even maybe his cell, has room for a new roommate.

WE PLAGIARIZE IN ADVANCE AGAIN; THIS TIME IN THE NY TIMES

Most if not all of you loyal Fauxvians know that since our inception (when was that?) we have compared President GW Bush to another stubborn, folksy aristocratic commander, Captain Edmund John Smith. In review, Captain Smith was a self-assured, from the gut leader whose writing contained the phrase "I never met an obstacle I couldn't personally overcome." Alas, he was also a bit lazy and when he wasn't at his best he wanted his rest and got it, no matter what the circumstances. This lead to his leaving the bridge of his ship despite reports they were in an ice zone and leaving a novice on watch. His ship of course was the Titanic, bad job reviews followed. So when this past Sunday the NY Times featured a cartoon by Mike Luckovich of the Atlanta Journal Constitution we were "caught again," plagiarizing again. What is depicted is a ship named the "Bush Presidency" illustrated very much like the Titanic, sinking in ice filled waters. At the front of the now doomed vertical craft is Mr. Bush in a captains outfit proclaiming his regret that the iceberg chose collision. It stopped short of saying if we don't keep shopping the iceberg wins.
Link: http://projects.ajc.com/gallery/view/opinion/luckovichdec08/

IN MEMORY OF RIVKA AND GAVRIEL HOLTZBERG

In India, the world's largest democracy (yes that's right), it became very unsafe for the first time in a long time. For the first time in virtually any time it became unsafe to be Jewish in India. The Chabad center in Bombay it seems was one of the specific targets of the terrorists and a number at the Jewish center there were wantonly murdered including Rivka and Gavriel (known to his friends as "Gabby") Holtzberg. They left behind a two-year old son who will never know his wonderful special parents. He is not and will never be alone however because his community, or should we say communities of Jews, the Chabad group to name one, will be there for him. We at the Faux grieve for the Holtzberg family and we encourage you to donate to help support them at www.chabadindia.org