James Wolcott notes that the winger war on the AP continues, but their “intelligence” isn’t improving. Parallel Numbers is an explanation of reality for those who object to anyone not among their group using 9-11 as a point of comparison.

It is rather jarring to hear the wingers essentially saying that Iraq had nothing to do with 9-11.

From an article in the CNN travel section:

The stranded travelers were gone from Denver’s airport by Tuesday, but the stranded suitcases were not.

[snip]

Megan McCarthy, a spokeswoman at United, said the airline allows passengers to go online and enter their baggage ticket number to find out where their luggage is.

Baggage handling at the Denver airport has been a mess since the new terminal area opened, but the fact that United has established an on-line version of Where’s Waldo for your luggage makes the scope of the mess clearer.

Update: If you flew on Continental, you might start checking dumpsters for your luggage.

I realize that I’m not part of a “professional media organization”, like CNN, but I would like to think I would have noticed a problem with the QuickVote question posted at 10:01PM EST:

“Do you think driving would be safer with less rules of the road?”

Even the grammar checker in Word noticed.

Posting over at Crooks and Liars, Barbara O’Brien reports in Next: Bread and Circuses, that as much as $2 billion may have been wasted in the response to hurricane Katrina.

Scout of First Draft has been following this story since the hurricane struck and she reports on one of the problems with debris removal.

FEMA signed a contract for debris removal that pays $23/cubic yard, but by the time it went through multiple layers of subcontractors, the people who are actually removing the debris are making $3/cubic yard. That is absurd. How can someone who has no experience with debris removal win a major government contract for the service? Why is a company from New Jersey doing the actually removal, when there are companies along the Gulf Coast who do this all the time, and they needed work after the hurricane?

Would You Believe

Some people associate me with cats?

This is an actual gift I received this year. I have to say I wasn’t expecting it.

While December 26th is celebrated by a lot of people in the US in shopping malls returning gifts or taking advantage of inventory clearance sales, there are other celebrations.

It is the first day of the Kwanzaa celebration, which is explained at the link.

It is Boxing Day, a celebration of noblisse oblige when the upper classes bestow gifts on the lower and the contents of the poor boxes are distributed. Under the feudal system this was part of the “contract,” the mutual system of obligations that tied the system together.

As the feast of St. Stephen it honors the first Christian martyr, but Ireland’s Saint Stephen’s Day celebration is a bit different and is the reason for the wren on this post.

However, this post is really my complaint about “Good King Whatshisface.”

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