The Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee complains about leaks, but , according to Laura Rozen, just before the launch of “Shock and Awe” he told the press that we had people pinpointing Saddam’s location. [Sources and methods, the biggest no-no.]

Quiddity explains how Roberts is using a Zeno Paradox to avoid actually investigating the Shrubbery’s manipulation of intelligence.

You have to wonder: is Senator Roberts is schizophrenic, or just another steaming pile of elephant dung?

Proving that there is no end to the number of topics that he knows absolutely nothing about, Bill Frist wants the Senate to investigate gasoline price gouging by retailers.

First of all, there is actual competition at the retail level because of the number of retailers, so jacking up prices doesn’t work and doesn’t explain why the prices have spiked all over the nation.

Secondly, retailers are given their mark-up price by wholesalers, which is 10¢ or less per gallon. Retailers made their dime when it was $1.50/gallon, and are still making a dime at $3.00/gallon. Retailers make their money by selling more gallons, not by charging more for each gallon. The standard convenience store and gas station makes the majority of its money from the convenience store. When the price of gas goes up, people aren’t buying Slurpies. The owner makes as much or more on a liter bottle of Coke as 5 gallons of gasoline.

When the large oil companies merged, they shut down refineries. We have fewer refineries now than we had a decade ago, and we are at the limit of refinery capacity.

Last year Exxon spent $5 billion on oil exploration and $6 billion buying back stock to jack up the share price. So you can see where their priorities are. They aren’t interested in bringing down the price of oil; that would reduce their profits. They aren’t interested in building refineries; that would reduce their profits.

As long as it was about money, and government contracts, there was no need for the Beltway Bobbleheads to take it seriously. After all what’s a little influence peddling and bribery among friends?

But now there’s a real problem because the Cunningham investigation has discovered: SEX!

The DC press corps, who never questioned how a Congressman with only a military pension in addition to his Congressional pay, was living on a yacht and driving a Rolls Royce, will finally start poking around.

If people know about Panama City on the Florida Panhandle, it is probably because MTV has been going there for its Spring Break shows for several years. That bacchanal is the result of business greed overcoming the real culture of the place.

Some may have been stationed at Tyndall AFB, current home of the F-22, but to most people, Panama City and Bay County are names they hear when there’s a Gulf hurricane headed north.

If John Ellis Bush has his way with the US Senate race in Florida, as noted by Mustang Bobby, then more people will hear about Bay County.

JEB wants Allan G. Bense, Speaker of the Florida House, to enter the Republican primary against Cruella de Harris. Allan is from Panama City, and as far as most of the state is concerned, it could as well be in the country of Panama as the county of Bay.

I just wrote about Martin Lee Anderson, but every American who is arrested for a felony receives a reference to Bay County justice. When they read you your rights and get to the part about getting an attorney if you can’t afford one, you are benefiting from the Supreme Court decision in Gideon v. Wainwright, which began as a Bay County burglary.

From Karen in comments:

The press is no longer required to drink the Koolaid – now they’ll get “Snowcones”.

No one is interested in the Koolaid in Iraq.

Rumsfeld and Rice swoop in to prove that the Shrubbery cares about the situation, and the CNN imbedded reporter writes: Leaders visit; front-line troops say, ‘Yeah, so?’.

The troops are interested in staying alive and leaving, and couldn’t care less about anything else. They don’t care about the political moves in Baghdad, or the travel plans of the people at the top.

These people just can’t figure out that their script is in need of a re-write:

The appearance of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in a Web video is “an act of desperation,” according to a U.S. military official.

Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch, at his weekly press briefing on Thursday, said the military believes “that is indeed Zarqawi in his final hours.”

“He knows the people of Iraq are on the verge of forming a national unity government and democracy equals failure for Zarqawi. So he’s pulling out all stops.”

Al-Zarqawi showed up Tuesday in a Web site video defending the insurgent fight, exhorting his followers to keep the faith, urging unity among fighters, and mocking the U.S.-led effort in Iraq.

I hope everyone remembers “Darth” Cheney telling us in the Spring of 2005 how the insurgents were in their “final throes”. Even Wolf Blitzer had a hard time believing that after only a month.