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I remember when plastic grocery bags first came out. The grocery industry made a huge deal in trying to convince the public about how plastic bags were “better for the environment” than paper because they took up less space in landfills compared to paper ones. Of course what they didn’t tell you is that these little beasties never degrade like paper does, they end up polluting our oceans and choking marine life, and blow incessantly around our urban streets in an unsightly manner. In fact the only thing they are better for is lining grocers’ pocketbooks because they are cheaper than paper bags.

As usual, San Francisco is taking the environmental lead by banning these plastic bags and forcing grocers to offer paper or biodegradable plastic instead. Grocers are, predictably, squawking and saying the newer degradable plastic bags aren’t really ready for showtime yet so they’ll just have to offer paper. Oh well!

It’s long past time we stop playing these little games that improve the pocketbook at the expense of the environment. All the rhetoric about how helping the environment is bad for industry and our economy (such as the hot air that was blown by some conservative Luddites like Sen. Inhofe last week when Al Gore testified before Congress about global warming) is a false hobson’s choice, because if we abuse the environment to the point of imperiling our civilization then our economy will have no legs left to stand on. No planet, no economy. Simple.

Looking for ways in which you as an individual can meaningfully help out the environment? Here’s one: next time you go to the store and are asked “paper or plastic,” you know the answer: paper. Or better yet, bring your own re-usable nylon ones!

Lou Dobbs says exactly what has been on my mind over the attorney general flap the last few days:

‘Showdown’ really a battle of partisan buffoons

NEW YORK (CNN) — An incompetent attorney general, who says he wasn’t fully aware that nearly 10 percent of the U.S. attorneys who work for him throughout the country were being fired and permitted the 110,000-person Justice Department that he leads to give inaccurate information at best, or simply lie about it at worst, to the Congress and the American people, has the full confidence of the president who’s lost the confidence of most people.

And this is what passes for a big-time, dramatic, historic constitutional crisis in 21st century America? You’ve got to be kidding. This is the most partisan, politically driven administration in history, and we’re all supposed to be surprised by its conduct and motivation in the firing of these U.S. attorneys? Please.

Now the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law has voted to approve subpoenas that would force chief policy adviser Karl Rove, former White House counsel Harriet Miers and other top presidential aides to testify publicly and under oath about their involvement in the firings.

Guess what? That little ol’ subcommittee can’t do much of anything to force executive branch employees to testify without the help of the very man and department at the center of this altogether silly and over-baked controversy. That’s right; Attorney General Alberto Gonzales or one of his U.S. attorneys would have to enforce any subpoenas refused by any of the president’s aides.

This is the same Democratic-controlled Congress that millions of voters thought would be so vastly different from the last gaggle of partisan buffoons in the Republican-led 109th Congress. With almost 30,000 young Americans killed or wounded in Iraq, with a half-trillion dollars spent on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, this Congress can do no better than publicly fulminate in futility and bray endlessly without effect on the course and conduct of the war in Iraq. Is there no sense of proportion and higher purpose anywhere in Washington?

While this president’s so-called free trade policies continue to bleed the nation and the economy of millions of jobs and add to a $5 trillion mountain of trade debt, and while our public schools continue to fail a generation of young Americans, this Congress chooses to invest its energy and time in pure partisan blather and cheap political theatrics.

Is there not one decent, honest man or woman in either the House of Representatives or the Senate, in either party’s leadership, who possesses the courage and the honesty to say, “Enough. The people who elected us deserve better”? So far the answer is no. Is there really any wonder that public opinion polls demonstrate that the president and this Congress share equally low approval ratings in poll after poll?

The White House is behaving with utter contempt for Congress and Congress is acting without respect or regard for this president. Could it be that, at long last, they’re both right?

You may love him or you may hate him, but nobody can deny that Donald Trump has a unique way of “telling it like it is.”

He was recently interviewed by Wolf Blitzer, and I must say I was very impressed with what he had to say and how he said it. He excoriated the Bush administration and its cronies in the harshest possible terms, labeled Iraq appropriately enough as a “disaster” and a “catastrophe,” and spoke passionately about the often-forgotten victims of the war–the innocent civilian casualties, the dead or maimed soldiers and their loving families. In doing so he showed a glimpse of compassionate humanity not often seen through his tough-as-nails “all about business” exterior.

You can find the video of the interview at this web page. It’s well worth watching.

I couldn’t help but laugh when reading a quote from Karl Rove at a recent speech regarding the unfolding prosecutor firings controversy:

“Now, we’re at a point where people want to play politics with it, and that’s fine. I would simply ask that everybody who’s playing politics with this, be asked to comment on what they think of the removal of 123 U.S. attorneys during the previous administration and see if they had the same, superheated political rhetoric then that they’ve havin’ now.”

What a cheeky bastard. This is the so-called “architect” of a feckless Bush’s election victories that didn’t seek just to win but to destroy Democrats. He has devoted his entire life to the dirtiest of dirty politics, including the character assassination of decorated combat veteran and amputee Sen. Max Cleland….and he now dares to whine about people playing dirty politics at his and his boss’s expense?

Boo-hoo. You live by the sword, you die by it..now rot in hell.

By the way, Karl, in case you didn’t get the memo: there’s a difference between a routine firing of all 93 US attorneys at the beginning of a presidential term, and selectively firing even some you appointed yourself much later in the term because they’re not ideologically pure enough for you.

In a recent interview, Marine General Peter Pace demonstrated himself to be a “paragon of virtue,” speaking expansively as to why he believed the “don’t ask don’t tell” policy essentially banning gay people in the military was appropriate:

“I believe homosexual acts between two individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts. I do not believe the United States is well served by a policy that says it is OK to be immoral in any way. As an individual, I would not want [acceptance of gay behavior] to be our policy, just like I would not want it to be our policy that if we were to find out that so-and-so was sleeping with somebody else’s wife, that we would just look the other way, which we do not. We prosecute that kind of immoral behavior.”

That’s right, General Asshat, because it’s morally upright and we are well-served to expose ourselves to further terrorist attacks by kicking out all your gay linguists, and because we’d rather order our injured troops back into combat, as long as those damn faggots don’t immorally cornhole each other under your command.

Idiot.

In the last couple of months, the largest credit card issuers like Citigroup have suddenly reversed themselves on some of their most egregious fees and policies, and have practically apologized to the consumer for them. These fees had really pushed the limits and made the lives of already debt-burdened customers a living hell. Here are some examples of the issuers’ recent activities:

–”two cycle billing” (cancelled by Chase): a practice where if you don’t pay your bill in full, not only are you charged a sharply higher interest rate on future purchases, but they also reach one month in the past and charge higher interest on those purchases too.

–”universal default” (cancelled by Citigroup): a practice whereby they check your credit report every month, and hike up your credit card interest rate if you are late on ANY bill (like your car payment or electricity)!

–”over-limit fees” (partially cancelled by Chase): instead of declining purchases when they exceed a credit limit, they allow the purchase and then slap a $40 fee every month your balance remains over the limit. Chase will now charge the fee only three times, after news surfaced of a man with a $3200 balance being slapped with the fee 47 times.

–Citigroup also rejected its terms and conditions that stated they could change your interest rate and fees “at any time for any reason.”

What accounts for the sudden largesse? Did these companies see the light or get visited by the ghost of Christmas?

Not a chance. They were about to be hauled in before Congress to account for their outrageous fees, and cancelled them just before they were required to testify. That way they could say “we don’t do that anymore.”

It’s amazing what a Democratic-controlled Congress can do for your pocketbook. Now I hope Congress isn’t fooled by these companies playing possum (you know they’ll start charging these ridiculous fees the moment they think they can get away with it again). I’m not usually much in favor of overt marketplace regulation, but there is a clear failure in the marketplace when these companies can get away with so egregiously abusing people who are already drowning in debt. As such, the Citigroups of the world deserve every bit of onerous regulation that Congress can muster.

(Don’t read what follows if you don’t want a spoiler.)

The story reverberating today through the comic book community and elsewhere is that Marvel has killed off its iconic hero Captain America as part of a larger story arc called “Civil War” that pits various heroes against each other.

Captain America arose in 1941 as the US entered World War II. He became an obvious symbol of American strength and values as he helped defeat the Axis and later the Communists. After that he didn’t do much until recently. A hero’s mistake caused a 9/11-type of tragedy, leading the government to enact a superhero registration program. Captain America resisted the new law, but subsequently surrendered to police and was to stand trial. While climbing the courthouse steps on his way to trial he was struck down and shot dead by a sniper.

The allegorical overtones of this story are obvious and tragic. After 9/11 we have been subjected to everything from the Patriot Act, to warrantless surveillance and wiretapping, to military tribunals, to the suspension of habeas corpus, to a war based on lies, to the torture and raping of prisoners and innocent civilians alike in Iraq. America’s values of freedom, privacy, democracy, civil and human rights, and leadership have been sacrificed on the stair steps of a perverted system of justice that refuses to hold its perpetrators accountable.

It is perfectly fitting, then, that the heroic symbol of the American Way is struck down in cold blood on the very stair steps of his fate. Being a comic book story, it is always possible that a hero can be brought back from the dead. Unfortunately, bringing back the America of yore will not be nearly so easy.

The disease in the mortgage subprime market is spreading to the huge number of “Alt-A” loans given to people in the “grey area” between subprime and prime. That is defined as all those people with better to good credit who took out the interest-only mortgages, negative amortization loans, “no income verification” loans, and the like. This group too is now seeing a drastic increase in delinquencies, with 2.4% of them currently sixty days or more overdue.

The more this spreads, the more danger posed to the housing market as lenders panic and drastically rein in available credit and “apply the brakes” further on an already weak housing market.

At the end of the day though, we have nobody to blame but ourselves. This quote from the WSJ article was particularly telling:

Thomas Gorman, a bankruptcy attorney in Alexandria, Va., says he is seeing more financially strapped borrowers who “probably bought more house than they could afford and then took on more credit-card debt” to furnish the house and pay for the move. When the housing market cooled, they were “caught in the middle,” unable to sell their home or refinance and make their debt load more manageable.

That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it….spending more than we can afford so we can “keep up with the Joneses,” hocking ourselves to our eyeballs in credit card and mortgage debt to pretend living a life we can’t live. Contributing to that attitude, of course, are all the corrupt economists out there serving as shills who find ways of spinning consumption spending via debt as a good thing–for the government all the way down to our individual pockets. The ultimate fault, of course, lies with ourselves.

I told someone the other day that I’m renting right now after having sold my condo, with an eye to perhaps eventually buying a foreclosed property on the cheap. “Oh, so you’re waiting to take advantage of someone’s misfortune,” I was told.

No I’m not taking advantage of someone’s misfortune. I’m most likely taking advantage of his stupidity and greed.