Phillipe and Jorge don't normally like to lift items directly from other publications, but we need to repeat a few bits from The Week, which is one of our go-to pubs — essentially a better version of the Utne Reader.
In its "Only in America" bit, The Week reports that "a California man has been driving alone in the carpool lane with corporation papers on the passenger's seat to test the legal principle that corporations are persons. Jonathan Frieman, 56, says that he wants to make a political point. But after he was ticketed for not having a passenger in a carpool lane, a judge rejected his argument. Frieman is appealing."
We would advise, Mr. Frieman, that you don't take the case to the Supreme Court, where legal geniuses like John Roberts, Antonin Scalia, and the mute Clarence "Frogman" Thomas have already laid down the law in the Citizens United case.
And another victory for the Catholic church's image, with The Week noting "the pastor of St. Aloysius Church in Springfield, Ill. called 911, saying that he was stuck in a pair of handcuffs he'd been 'playing with.' When the police arrived, they say, they also found Father Tom Donovan wearing a gag."
Hmmm. Now we are sure there is a very real explanation for all of this, but if you have it, please explain it to P&J. Once you get the ball gag out of your mouth, of course.
UP CHUCK
There are no more hypocritical and gutless people in Congress than those who are opposing the nomination of Chuck Hagel, a Vietnam war vet, as Secretary of Defense.
All of these armchair generals, who never had the guts to be in the line of fire, should be put in a Marine training camp at Parris Island for a week.
Obama has made a wise choice in tabbing Hagel, as he has with his choice for Secretary of State, John Kerry. These men have seen the disgusting and despicable carnage of warfare up close and personal, and unlike the draft-dodging little nancy-boy, Dubya Bush, they feel no need to raise "Mission Accomplished" flags.
The argument is that Hagel is too soft on Iran and too hard on Israel, the latter led by the despicable Bibi Netanyahu. Listen senators, if you want our bravest young men and women wrapped up in a war as bogus as that of our invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, sign onto the anti-Hagel crusade. But put your own sons and daughters on the line in that case, instead of sending them to Sidwell Friends School.
MORE HAGELIA
P&J are not the biggest fans of Michael Moore who, outside of his films, tends to be a very churlish nag. But we did enjoy his recent post directed at Bill Kristol, the silk panty-wearing editor of GOP rag The Weekly Standard who has led the fight against Hagel.
Kristol is best known for having disgraced himself as a columnist for The New York Times, after the number of corrections they had to print for his pieces outstripped their length.
Seems Kristol thought a Hagel quote suggesting that we were "fighting for oil," not peace or democracy, when we invaded Iraq was "vulgar and disgusting." Moore, in his post, pointed out that many conservatives acknowledged oil was at the root of the war — former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, the hideous Ann Coulter, and Midge Decter, one of Kristol's father's acolytes, among them.
