I'm going on a business trip; probably no posts until Friday.

Speaking of Instapundit, he has a great link to this story about Neil "Fredo" Bush encouraging Saudi Arabi to improve its image through lobbyists. Asks Instapundit, "Er, who did you have in mind, Neil?"

On the same day, four Republican governors, including Jeb Bush, are backing off of tax cut pledges they made. "Although President Bush says postponing installments of his tax cuts would be a tax increase, four Republican governors back just such delays in their states to cope with the recession." But... but... they promised... that's raising taxes... (head explodes).

Note to presidential contenders: kill your siblings now.

I got mentioned on Instapundit! I got a Golden Ticket, I got a golden chance to something, something...

I realized this morning that in my last Enron post, I missed a wonderful opportunity to link to Chubby Checker's insane web page. He had an open letter to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, which appears to be taken down, where he was demanding a statue to himself in front of the Hall of Fame, because he invented "Dancing Apart to the Beat." “What is ‘Dancing Apart to the Beat’? Dancing Apart to the beat is the dance we do when we dance apart to anybody’s music with a beat and before ‘Chubby Checker’, It could not be found!”

It ended by asking, "Where is my more money? Where is my more fame?"

If you want to help Chubby Checker get his more money, you can chip in by buying some Chubby Checker beef jerky. Enjoy “Invisible Strength Hickory- Flavor of the Forces”, “Young People’s Flavor- Young Hickory” or “Young People’s Flavor- Sugar Twist.”

I swear that this page must be a prank.

Andrew Sullivan just wrote to say that this bashing on Paul Krugman is not ideological or anything, it's just a matter of journalistic integrity.

"I’ve banged on about Krugmangate because I feared no one else would. It’s not ideological. My criticisms would apply to anyone of any politics on the take from Enron and not disclosing fully, including the fee."

Where in the would I have gotten the idea that he's just using a flimsy excuse to pound an ideological rival? Hmm... maybe from this, posted three days earlier?

"We’re all used to Paul Krugman’s insistent attacks on the Bush administration’s economic policies, his suspicion of big business, his love of high taxes and greater government spending, and his withering scorn for idle corporate bloat and what he recently called the “crony capitalism,” epitomized by Enron."

I really don't get it. The only reason Andrew Sullivan knows about any of this is because Krugman disclosed it, and now he's knocking Krugman for not disclosing it often enough. He writes about Krugman as if he's a Nader leftie, but he's not; I've read one of his books. Even though he criticizes Bush, he's a free market hardliner. His Fortune piece looks naive now, but he's wasn't exactly alone in the chorus of Enron supporters before this summer; you couldn't read the business press without coming across a love song to Enron in 2000. It was the genius of the market that put the stock at the $90 range. I think that it's time for Sullivan to put this one to bed.

This is from the Sunday Herald:

"Enron traders owned million dollar homes. They played polo and received seven figure bonuses. They went on safaris and skiing weekends with Lay . Once a year they were invited to pick out any car they wanted from a selection that included Jaguars, Porsches and luxury Oldsmobiles. The parties were legendary; former employees describe sex free for alls in glass-walled executives offices."

"Wait, no, that was 'Boiler Room'", the article doesn't add.

What the hell is this? I worked for Enron, and I didn't get any of this! Where's my Jaguar? Where's my sex free-for-all? That's it, I'm going on strike.

Akron has just changed the definition of public urination from "indecent exposure" to "littering". "Customers and employees find it annoying when they come upon human waste,'' says bank spokeswoman Dixie Vinez. Is "annoying" really the right word here?

I'm impressed. The Wall Street Journal editorial page is one of the most conservative publications out there. Here's a handy fun quiz:

Which of the following events did the Wall Street Journal editorial page blame on Bill Clinton?

a. the fatal shooting of a protestor at the WTO meeting in Genoa in 2001
b. the collapse of Enron
c. the September 11 atrocity
d. the current recession
e. all of the above

(Answer: e)

However, even they don't buy Andrew Sullivan's furious efforts to tar Bush-bashing economist Paul Krugman. Krugman got paid $50,000 for serving on an advisory panel for Enron in 1999, where he made a speech and served on some panels. He also wrote a positive article in Fortune about Enron in 1999, in which he disclosed his relationship with Enron. He disclosed it again in 2001, so it's hard to see where the scandal is. Here's Krugman's own defense.

If you can't get the Wall Street Journal excited about the opportunity to bash a leftie, there's no opportunity there.

Headline at Ironic Times: "Enron scandal expands to include all mankind"

Ann Coulter: Mad dog? Leftist plant sent to destroy the credibility of hard-right pundits? Space alien?

Whatever the case, these are all quotes from one column by Ann Coulter.

"Liberals love erasing the truth."
"Liberal race demagogues so love goading white men, they can't get their story straight on the American flag."
"Liberals simply assume that blacks would have wanted to hoist the American flag at Ground Zero."
"Liberals constantly want to have it every single way."
"They hate the American flag."
"What they'd really like is a memorial showing a diverse group of Americans burning the flag."
"Liberals are, at best, indifferent to America winning the war in Afghanistan."

Why is this woman a public figure?

Here's why self-interested Gen Xers ought to favor the cancellation of Bush's tax cuts: The Baby Boomers should be responsible for paying for their own retirements.

The baby boomers will enjoy the benefits of the tax cuts more than anyone else. They're in their peak earning years. They make up the lion's share of the top tax brackets who will be recieving the large majority of the benefits from Bush's tax cuts. It's no wonder that they're supporting him so strongly. There's the old Winston Churchill line, which I'm surely butchering: "Any man who isn't a liberal when he's young has no heart. But any man who isn't a conservative when he's old has no brain." To people earning big bucks, it's appaling to see how much of their money goes to taxes. It's absolutely no wonder that the Republican tune of "smaller government- less taxes- not over my dead body" seems so appealing.

Now fast forward a few years. The Baby Boomers are finally retiring in large numbers. They're ready to collect the benefits of Socail Security and Medicare, which they've been paying into their whole lives. If we had been smart, this wouldn't cause an unbearable strain, because we would have been saving the Social Security surplus for just this entirely forseeable reason. But Bush gave away the surplus, and then some, on this stupid tax cut. Not only are we not preserving the SS surplus, we are now diverting 30 cents from every Social Security tax dollar to general spending. Even if we keep Social Security at the same level, medical expenditures have been rising rapidly with no sign of stopping. We can expect that Medicare expenditures will continue to grow at a horrific clip. (Much more on that later.)

When the baby boomers start to retire, and become net benefitors from the government instead of net payors, I predict that Democrats become the dominant party for a long time. But I'm not looking formward to it. Keep in mind that the AARP is commonly percieved as the most effective lobbying organization in the country. Old people vote, and every politician knows it.

Mark my words: Baby boomers will not turn around and say, hey, we recieved most of the benefit from the tax cuts, we still believe in small government, so it's OK if you want to reduce our benefits. They will be writing their congresspeople en masse and say, we've been paying into the system our whole lives- we want greater Social Security benefits, total medical coverage, etc. And they will get it. We will have to either going into deep deficits or raising taxes through the goddamn roof. The Baby Boomers will have succeeded in enjoying the lowest taxes in decades during their peak earning years, and then the highest level of post-retirement benefits, on our backs. Pretty neat trick.