Sometimes, political arguments remind me of this:

ABC News:

Scientists have found intriguing evidence that one major reason so many people are overweight these days may be as close as the seat of their pants. Literally. According to the researchers, most of us sit too much.

In most cases, exercise alone, according to a team of scientists at the University of Missouri, isn't enough to take off those added pounds. The problem, they say, is that all the stuff we've heard the last few years about weight control left one key factor out of the equation. When we sit, the researchers found, the enzymes that are responsible for burning fat just shut down.

I'm sure politicians will see it differently, but this is exactly the reason why online poker must be legalized -- and regulated -- here in the United States.

It's the most efficient way to protect American citizens -- far more so than banning something that is unbannable.

ABC News:

Online Poker Players Expose Alleged Fraud Them's Cheatin' Electrons: Players Root Out Alleged Fraud at AbsolutePoker.com

By RUSSELL GOLDMAN
Oct. 19, 2007

You've gotta know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em -- and know when to turn to the collective intelligence of the Internet to root out an alleged online poker gambling scandal.

A network of professional gamblers turned amateur sleuths followed the money in what appears to have been a series of rigged online poker games, gathering what they say is enough evidence to accuse a part-owner and former executive of the Web site Absolutepoker.com of cheating by looking at other players' digital cards.

This line from Paul Krugman's column tells you all you need to know:

One striking statistic: the cost of a traditional Thanksgiving turkey dinner was 11 percent higher this year than last year.

It's not that income isn't growing.

It's shrinking.

Housing prices fall 4.5% nationwide

This is really not very good news. Under Bush, about a third of the increase in GDP was directly attributable to higher volumes and prices of housing sales, not to mention the construction and other jobs related to those sales.

It's all evaporating.

I've posted a new video over at hillaryattacks.com: "Experience matters."

I'm planning on following it up tomorrow or Thursday with a shorter version, focused more narrowly on Hillary's recent bogus line of attack on Barack Obama's experience.

For some reason, the immigration debate focuses almost exclusively on immigrants -- not people who hire them when they come here.

Almost always, when an immigrant is here illegally, somebody has hired that immigrant illegally.

Now that the Bush Administration has proposed cracking down on these "illegal employers," they are crying foul.

Justice Seeks Delay in Court Challenge to Immigration Plan Bush Administration Says It Will Modify Crackdown on Employers Who Hire Illegal Workers

By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 25, 2007; Page A11

The Bush administration said Friday that it will modify its planned crackdown on U.S. companies that employ illegal immigrants, asking a federal judge to delay hearing a lawsuit brought by major American labor, business and farm organizations until the new strategy is completed.

In papers filed in San Francisco late Friday afternoon, Acting Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey S. Bucholtz told U.S. District Judge Charles R. Breyer that the Homeland Security Department is making unspecified changes to its plan to pressure employers to fire as many as 8.7 million workers with suspect Social Security numbers.

In it's own weird way, the Bush Administration's plan called the bluff of illegal employers.

If people were paying attention, they might realize people aren't coming to the United States for driver's licenses.

They are coming here for jobs.

Want to impact immigration? It's pretty simple. Focus on the magnet: jobs.

I just downloaded and installed ffmpeg -- it's a free video conversion application, and it's pretty cool.

I'm using it to convert DVR-MS --> WMV and FLV --> WMV.

To unpack it, I had to download and install 7-zip, which so far seems to be a relatively unobnoxious file compression utility.

What in the flying f**k is it with the Republican machine?

Now they are trying to claim that the 2006 elections make the Democratic Party the party of the rich?

Uh, no. The Republicans are the party of the rich, diptard. To wit:

Their argument goes something like this:

Actually, in the interest of further humiliating the nitwit at The Heritage Foundation who is trying to make this case, I'll show you his argument as transmitted by the Pulitzer Prize winning journalist hack stenographer Donald Lambro in the Washington Times:

Study: Democrats the party of the rich By Donald Lambro November 23, 2007

Democrats like to define themselves as the party of poor and middle-income Americans, but a new study says they now represent the majority of the nation's wealthiest congressional districts.

In a state-by-state, district-by-district comparison of wealth concentrations based on Internal Revenue Service income data, Michael Franc, vice president of government relations at the Heritage Foundation, found that the majority of the nation's wealthiest congressional jurisdictions were represented by Democrats.

...

"I just found the pattern across the board to be very interesting. That pattern shows the likelihood of electing a Democrat to the House is very closely correlated with how many wealthy households are in that district," Mr. Franc said in an interview with The Washington Times.

...

"The demographic reality is that the Democratic Party is the new 'party of the rich.' More and more Democrats represent areas with a high concentration of wealthy households," he wrote on Nov. 5 in the Financial Times of London, in a preview of his study.

Um. On what crazy-ass planet does this genius live on?

Down here on planet earth, Democrats tend to represent the bottom-end of the income scale. Take a look at 2004, when just 43% of the wealthiest third of congressional districts sent Democrats to DC, compared to 58% of the bottom third.

Even in 2006, when the Republicans dedication to needless war, terrible economic policies, and neglect of the environment led to their removal from power in Congress, most Democrats came from the bottom third of congressional districts, ranked by wealth.

In 2006, Democrats did better across the board, but their biggest gains came right in the middle, where it hurt Republicans the most.

You probably didn't need this data to know that the Heritage Foundation report is yet another package of lies, wrapped in a nice little bow for the Washington Times by one of their brain dead research analysts.

Whoever did this analysis is so stupid that he probably got his college degree from the same place that Karl Rove got his.

I mean seriously, are you kidding me? Do they really expect people to buy this crap?

This is such laughably idiotic stuff that I can't help but roll on the floor.

Even William F. Buckley probably chortled (or whatever it is that he does) when he saw it.

Franc's boss must have been on Richard Brookhiser's best stuff when he approved this "study."

On the other hand, if this is the kind of stuff they are going to be pulling out of their ass in 2008, they are going to get slaughtered.

I mean reamed -- totally destroyed.

What a bunch of joking jokers. :)

David Yepsen on 12/18/2003:

If Kerry were to upset Gephardt for second place, that would amount to one of those "unexpectedly strong finishes" that dominates news coverage on caucus night. Many in the political community "expect" Dean or Gephardt to win and the other to come in second. If Gephardt finishes second, goes this conventional wisdom, he's a gonner because he won Iowa in 1988 and will have failed to repeat the feat.

A second-place finish for Kerry would be a legitimate Big Deal and would position him as the anti-Dean candidate in the race. Kerry would become the "comeback kid" of 2004, something Bill Clinton was able to spin out of his second-place finish in the New Hampshire primary in 1992. There is much positive buzz surrounding a candidate who comes from behind to win that designation.

01/19/2004 - Des Moines Register

Organization will be key to victory

By DAVID YEPSEN

If organization is as important as caucus lore tells us it is, Howard Dean should win the Iowa caucuses tonight. Driven by youthful energy and anti-war activism not seen since the Vietnam War, Dean has assembled what his organizers claim is the best get-out-the-vote operation ever built in the state.

They are probably correct. As the campaign draws to a close today, the important story isn't the candidates and their hoopla. It's their organizations and their boring grunt work on the streets and telephones of Iowa.

So no -- I'm not worried about Yepsen's prediction that Edwards is collapsing and Richardson is surging.

(Here's some more of Yepsen-Dean 04.)