Wyclef Jean has filed papers to run for president of Haiti, and Sean Penn is skeptical.

Interviewed on CNN last night as Wyclef officially announced his bid, Penn said, "This is somebody who's going to receive an enormous amount of support from the United States, and I have to say I'm very suspicious of it, simply because he, as an ambassador at large, has been virtually silent. For those of us in Haiti, he has been a non-presence," Penn said.

Penn, who has been active in Haiti since the earthquake, highlighted allegations that Wyclef mishandled $400,000 donated for the country through his Yele Haiti foundation. "He claims he didn't do it. That has to be looked into it," said Penn, who has been running a 55,000-person tent camp through the J/P Haitian Relief Organization he co-founded. "I've been there. I know what $400,000 could do for these people's lives."

He added, "I'm not accusing Wyclef Jean of being an opportunist; I don't know the man," Penn told Wolf Blitzer, who was filling in for Larry King. "One of the reasons I don't know very much about Wyclef Jean is that I haven't seen or heard anything of him in these last six months that I've been in Haiti."

Please go and see this new movie about the way the government uses the media to sell war after war after war. It's a brilliant flick that dissects the great propaganda machine which is a curse to our democracy.

War Made Easy reaches into the Orwellian memory hole to expose a 50-year pattern of government deception and media spin that has dragged the United States into one war after another from Vietnam to Iraq. Narrated by actor and activist Sean Penn, the film exhumes remarkable archival footage of official distortion and exaggeration from LBJ to George W. Bush, revealing in stunning detail how the American news media have uncritically disseminated the pro-war messages of successive presidential administrations...read on

The Whole American Hog: Joe Biden, not exactly "fitting in," in South Carolina

Brainshrub: Iraq is not Vietnam... it's worse. But that doesn't stop Bush from extending his foreign failures to the Far East .

The actor Tim Robbins has called for Bush/Cheney to resign. Maybe Robbins is jealous of Sean Penn's "Enemy of the State" award from Sean Hannity ? (h/t David E's Fablog)

Bush leads Madkane to limericks. Melanie Morgan leads Mark H to Comix.

Oh man! I forgot to download my 2007 Counterterrorism Calendar! (Why do I hate America?) h/t W. David Stephenson.

Is it too late to round-up this War on Christmas post? Nope, we're shopping 350 days early 'cause our Preznit said so.

(BlueGal is subbing for Mike through 1/22, bluegalsblog@gmail.co)