Ephedra Ban Today, the FDA today banned Ephedra, a substance that has no documented beneficial effects and some documented side effects: Manufacturers of the supplement insist their product is safe when taken as directed. But FDA and Health and Human Services Department officials have been saying for months that they would like to ban ephedra […]

Sugar Farmers are Morally Superior to Candy Cane Makers Just as we decided, via the steel tariffs, that Pennsylvania residents are more deserving than Michigan residents (and along the way, made every consumer pay more for goods made out of steel or made with machinery made out of steel), the latest example from the Chicago […]

General Zinni From the Washington Post, a piece on General Anthony Zinni, a self-professed moderate Republican and former chief of the Central Command (U.S. Military Headquarters for African and the Middle East), now dismayed by the administration he endorsed in 2000: [Gen. Zinni] was alarmed that day to hear Cheney make the argument for attacking […]

Progressive Consumption Taxes Ruy T. has an interesting post that got me, once again, thinking about consumption taxes. At first glance, consumption taxes appear intrinsically regressive because poor and middle class households spend most of their income on consumption while wealthy households spend only a fraction of their income on consumption. Suppose there’s a consumption […]

Money and Inside Baseball Post This USA Today article contains some information that blows holes in my matching funds projections. I had projected Clark will be eligible to receive 8.7 million dollars off of $15 million in fundraising for Q-3 and Q-4. While USA Today supports the total fundraising amount, they are projecting Clark will […]

And she forced the pills down his throat too! Attorney: Limbaugh blackmailed by maid. Damn, I’m sick of whining Conservatives yapping endlessly about personal responsibility — until they’re caught with their hand (or other body parts) in the cookie jar. Then it’s “the maid did it” or “I talked to him and God forgives me” […]

Nader Update I’m not sure what this means: Ralph Nader, the third-party candidate viewed by many Democrats as the spoiler of the 2000 election for taking votes away from Al Gore, has decided not to run on the Green Party ticket next year, a party spokesman said Tuesday. Nader, who garnered nearly 3 percent of […]

It Isn’t Secretary Powell: “U.S. strategy is widely accused of being unilateralist by design,” Mr. Powell wrote. “It isn’t. It is often accused of being imbalanced in favor of military methods. It isn’t. It is frequently described as being obsessed with terrorism and hence biased toward preemptive war on a global scale. It most certainly […]

Bush is vulnerable on the Economy There has been a recent poll in which 55% of Americans approve of Bush’s handling of the US economy. Fox News from where I have gotten this poll is saying that this number will show that the Bush re-election is inevitable. However there are several major caveats that need […]

Visceral Communication I am a #1 for Dean, strong supporter and right now it will take a couple of sticks of dynamite to get me off of the Dean campaign, but with that said, I like what I have been hearing from Wesley Clark in the past couple of days. I am firmly convinced that […]