Roy Blunt, who was tapped to head the GOP Health Care Task Force said that if an adult has preexisting conditions then they shouldn't be covered. That proves the point Alan Grayson made when he said---don't get sick and die quickly...OK, you know what I mean.

Blunt: ...but access for adults who've done nothing to take care of themselves, who actually will have what I have described every incentive not to get insurance until the day you know you're going to have medical expenses, that's a very different kind of story.

How does Roy Blunt and the Republican party draw the line when people are considered to be "taking care of themselves?" Is he going to have regulations that tell people how to live? The health care industry would love to have a whole host of rules that a person would have to follow before they would be eligible to be covered. Most people don't get sick, but when they do they need health care. If they can't buy it when they need it then what good is our health care industry?

How tough it is to be the adult. Click here for larger. Open thread below.

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Houston Chronicle:

CNN said it shouldn't have used a former U.S. attorney who quit his job after allegedly biting a stripper as an analyst about New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer's prostitution scandal.

No mention of Kendall Coffey's past was made when anchor Tony Harris interviewed him Tuesday on the legal questions surrounding Spitzer's case. Coffey quit his job in May 1996 after being accused of biting a topless dancer on the arm during a visit to an adult club after losing a big drug case.

Coffey talked on CNN about what kind of charges the New York governor could face. Spitzer is accused of having a high-priced call girl visit his hotel room during a visit to Washington last month.

While Coffey's past is known to CNN's booking department, it wasn't to the person who set up Harris' segment. CNN spokesman Nigel Pritchard blamed a "miscommunication."

"Coffey has been a guest on CNN in the past but was probably not the right one for this story," Pritchard said.

Oopsie! It's a little like having Bill "Phone sex with a loofah" O'Reilly lecture you about moral rectitude.

Via The Columbian:

State Rep. Richard Curtis, R-La Center, admitted to having sex with a man he met at an adult video store in Spokane last week, according to a police report released Tuesday afternoon.

The police report offers a far different version of events from the brief account Curtis gave Monday to The Columbian, one that seems likely to threaten Curtis' political future.

The police report contains an account of how Curtis allegedly donned women's clothing, red stockings and a black sequined lingerie top before engaging in a sex act at the store. He then continued to wear them throughout the night under his clothing, the report says. Read more...

I couldn't care less about a person's sexual preferences, but as Howie puts it, Curtis is a hypocrite of the highest order. Staying true to form, Washington Republicans have thrown him under the bus and he has resigned. You think he was a Rudy Giuliani supporter?

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There's some doubt as to whether Einstein ever actually said that if honey bees died out, mankind only had four years left to live. But no matter the authorship, the truth is that we are very dependent upon bees for our food product and agricultural industry. And bees are dying, at a dangerously fast pace. By some estimates, a full 1/3 of the bee population has died off, in a phenomenon known as "Colony Collapse Disorder":

(A) mystery malady, dubbed "Colony Collapse Disorder," is sweeping through the apiaries, leaving many hives almost completely devoid of adult bees, which appear to abandon their hives and disappear. Apiculturists are looking at a number of potential culprits, from bad weather to bad corn syrup to genetically modified corn to pesticides to miticides, and many suspect the problem is compounded by the presence of the varroa mite, which weakens colonies so that invading pathogens pack a particularly destructive punch. (Scientists suspect the 2005 die-off was exacerbated by a viral event.) While Miller's bees have not, so far, been affected by the colony collapse, beekeepers in 24 states have reported losses as high as 80 and even 90 percent, and many of the afflicted bees have been in the almonds, rubbing shoulders with Miller's relatively healthy ones.

60 Minutes' Steve Kroft looks at the phenomenon with the apiarist credited for sounding the alarm, David Hackenberg. Full transcripts and video available at their website.

Via YoursDaily.com:

In Alabama, you can sell guns on any street corner but you can't sell sex toys.

That's right. Alabama is a vibrator-free state!

Well, technically you can go across state lines and buy sex toys in Georgia and Tennessee and carry them home. But the Alabama Legislature, in its infinite wisdom and in the spirit of protecting citizens from moral turpitude, a while back banned the sale of sex toys (or "marital aids" as some lawmakers coyly call them).

Today, the U.S. Supreme Court has shown a gleam of interest in this controversial state law, which has been challenged in Alabama courts by adult toy retailer Sherri Williams. She has been fighting the law for nearly 10 years.

Williams has been in district court three times on this issue and has won twice. But both times her victories were struck down by the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. She filed a petition to the Supremes and has hired well-known First Amendment rights attorney Paul Cambria. Also joining in the appeal petition with Williams are the Free Speech Coalition and the First Amendment Lawyers Association. Read more...

(h/t the Alabama Yankee transplant Blue Gal who refused to write this post on the grounds that to do so may incriminate her. :) )

There you go...The Aqua Teen hunger Force caused havoc in Boston...I happen to like Robot Chicken.

Turner's Statement:

The "packages" in question are magnetic lights that pose no danger. They are part of an outdoor marketing campaign in 10 cities in support of Adult Swim's animated television show Aqua Teen Hunger Force. They have been in place for two to three weeks in Boston, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, Seattle, Portland, Austin, San Francisco, and Philadelphia. Parent company Turner Broadcasting is in contact with local and federal law enforcement on the exact locations of the billboards.

We regret that they were mistakenly thought to pose any danger.

Update: Here's the story

alicublog: It's not possible that a functional adult could be as ignorant as former Bush special assistant David Frum portrays himself here.

BAGnewsNotes: Bullet

Shakespeare's Sister: Let's not forget the other Republican homobigot facing allegations that he's gay...

Harpers blog: A new book offers one of the clearest accounts available on how the Bush Administration manipulated intelligence in order to pave the way for the invasion of Iraq.

Bob Geiger: With the editorial cartoon roundup...and this
GOP SLEAZE WATCH: This Republican is leaving the party...Saddam verdict timed for election...Pimping dead soldiers...RNC-front group trying to discourage Dems from voting...Swift Boat money man backs "Brokebank Democrats" campaign...Md. Democrats Say GOP Plans to Block Voters

This is surreal and really low. NY Daily News:

"The Upstate media today is all about Tom Reynolds' bizarre press conference yesterday, at which he surrounded himself by small children. At one point, reporters asked if he could make the children leave so they could as adult questions, and he refused"

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Buffalo Geek has all the video posted. Reynolds in a shocking development blames Hastert: "I found this moment particularly damaging, though, in which Reynolds -- the third-ranking Republican in the House -- says he did what any employee would do with the Foley case: "I took it to my supervisor."

E&P:

52% of adult Americans want to see all U.S. troops out of Iraq within a year, with 19% advocating immediate withdrawal.--At present, 56% call the decision to invade Iraq a “mistake,” with 41% disagreeing.

When will the pundit class call Frist and the GOP's "stay the course agenda" out of touch with America?"