Thanks for nothing, Bill Maher, for planting the image of Palin as Carrie's Mom in my head. Click here for larger. (h/t Heather and BG)

Also recommended tonight: this online episode of Murphy Brown. Fourteen years ago and it was all there: Limbaugh, Gingrich, looking stuff up on "the Internet", the "Liberal Media Elite", all afloat in a wishful fantasy that somehow both sides were equally wrong and we could all work together if only the Left bent over a little further.

Open thread below...

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There is an old saying that it is better to stay silent and thought the fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. I suspect that there are many on TV who would be wise to take that advice.

Take for example, Meghan McCain. I actually kind of like her, because she's shown a rare independence, refusing to simply spew the same talking points of other Republicans and some sass when dealing with the hackiest of the right wing hacks who take cheap pot shots at her. But there's no doubt that she is very young and perhaps needs a little more historical perspective before opining on national television.

It all got started during a discussion of George Bush, who McCain acknowledged was a less than perfect president. But McCain also pointed a finger at the Obama administration in Bush's defense, saying she felt that the Obama administration "has to stop completely blaming everything on its predecessor." When Maher asked McCain if she really thought this is what Obama is doing, McCain said "I do to a degree." A clearly annoyed Begala immediately shook his head and said "not to enough of a degree, I'm sorry not nearly enough." He then began to explain how President Reagan blamed Jimmy Carter for years, to which McCain responded blithely "you know I wasn't born yet so I wouldn't know." Going in for the kill, Begala fired back "I wasn't born during the French Revolution but I know about it."

McCain then reverts to the tried and true Republican tactic of playing the victim:

You clearly know everything and I'm just the blond sitting here.

Meghan, Meghan, Meghan...you can stand up to Laura Ingraham and yet you just wilt in front of Paul Begala and play victim? Is it having facts and an actual historical perspective instead of just making crap up to play to the lowest common denominator that intimidates you?

First Draft: How Karl Rove played politics while people drowned.

Our Future: The Department of Defense (DOD) now employs contractors to keep contractors in check in Iraq, under a new framework for war industry management solidified last month.

No Comment: Where's the Maher Arar report?

The KC Blue Blog: Attention values voters! Yet another Republican child molester added to the endless list of GOP criminals. Maybe asshats like this guy are part of the problem?

ANNALS OF JOURNALISM: National Conference for Media Reform in Minneapolis...One of the "smartest people" Fareed Zakaria knows...The incredible, shrinking newspapers...Hatred for sale...The press takes a look at the Strange World of Black People...Millionaire pundit values...Video and transcript of E&P's Greg Mitchell on Moyers last night...Rush says McSame isn't a real man...NPR's lazy, clueless coverage of Gitmo trials...Speaking of clueless coverage...

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Host Bill Maher speaks to Jeffrey Sachs, author of Common Wealth, about the very critical need that we must acknowledge to find alternative fuel resources and focus on sustainable energy. That need is made more critical because with the priorities for funding placed by the Bush/Cheney White House, we're now eight years behind in terms of research.

Let me tell you, you know, if we put a little bit of thought to it, a small part of the Mohave Desert could provide more than half of the electricity needs of the United States without emitting any carbon dioxide, just using the solar power that’s available. Africa could be powering itself with the tremendous amount of solar power. But how much are we investing in this, Bill? We’re investing basically an hour or two of what we spend on the Pentagon for the whole year of our federal research budget right now. The total research budget of the Bush administration on sustainable energy resources has been between 2 and 3 billion dollars, which is 1 and 1 ½ days of what we spend on the Pentagon. So it’s been all war, no sustainability. And look where we are right now, right back into a corner and that’s the problem.

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Keith Olbermann speaks with retired Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift (whose successful representation of the Hamdan case brought to light many of the atrocities happening at Guantanamo) about the sad and disturbing news that Canada has placed the U.S. on a watch list--along with Iran, China, Syria and others--for being a country that tortures its prisoners, due in no small part to our criminally shameful treatment of Canadians Maher Arar and Omar Khadr (imprisoned in Guantanamo at the age of 15).

What a proud legacy Bush and Cheney will leave this country with.

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Obviously, the Republican leadership has gotten to Sen. Kit Bond with the message: You're. Not. Helping. Our. Cause. by likening waterboarding to swimming. So Bond goes on C-Span's Washington Journal and tries to clarify his comment with increasing incoherence.

Apparently, he meant that there was as much variety in waterboarding techniques as there are swimming strokes--still not helping, Senator Bond. The kind of waterboarding the Japanese did to our soldiers in WWII--bad...the kind we did (?--have we stopped?) to our soldiers in training--fine. Not particularly sure that's helpful either, Sen. Bond. Unfortunately for those of us who actually understand the issue at hand, he doesn't specify which kind we've done to detainees like Maher Arar, or if it's acceptable. That glaring omission is certainly helpful to the Republicans torture apologist platform.

However, he does feel a blanket banning on waterboarding--such as the one in the Geneva Conventions that we signed--is bad, because it then prevents us from using it in an extreme national emergency--the Jack Bauer scenario raising its ugly head again. Bingo, Sen. Bond! You found the party line. How amoral of you.

Watching Maher Arar's Congressional testimony last week -- via satellite from Canada, because the Bush administration still refuses to allow him entry to this country despite being acquitted of all terror charges -- made me sick to my stomach. Putting aside what the administration has done to this wholly innocent man -- which is deplorable and cringe-inducing enough in and of itself -- for Rep. Dana Rohrbacher the ends justify the means. He has the audacity to defend the rendition and dismiss the subsequent torture of a family man who was guilty of nothing but having a similar name with a suspected terrorist and being in the wrong place at the wrong time as a "mistake." Absolutely shameful.

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Is this the transformation our country has undergone? Have we really gone from the world's #1 human rights crusader to a nation of torture apologists? How do these people sleep at night?

Republic of Sestakastan: Presents, "No Such Agency" (h/t Blue Gal)

Whiskey Fire: To state that the US military is not necessarily or even remotely the primary, best, or even appropriate mechanism of guaranteeing American liberties, much less spreading them around the globe, is to utter a kind of secular blasphemy.

Jesus' General: We don't have time for facts or reality. They are merely crutches for the weak. We will build our own reality.

THE NEWS BLOG: driftglass doesn't need six months to dismantle Friedman

Matt Zeitlin: No matter how much coal you stick up congress' ass, you still aren't getting a diamond

The Reality-Based Community: Can't anyone here play this game?

Quote of the Day: "Only George Bush could fight a war for oil, and not get any." --Bill Maher

Frameshop:

A "con," a "scam," a "grift," a boo-boo, a bunko, a flim flam. All these are synonyms for what street crime experts call the "Confidence Trick."

I will add one more synonym to the list: The Luntz.

The Confidence Trick has many names: Three-Card-Monte, The Spanish Prisoner, The Protection Scheme, The Free Pet Scam, Pig-in-a-Poke, Lottery Fraud by Proxy, The Pigeon Drop, Psychic Surgery.

The list is long long, but the lure of the Luntz is always the same: easy money. Relieve the mark of his cash. And it works just about every time.

This weekend, Bill Maher was the mark and HBO's Real Time was the venue for a scam being run coast-to-coast by the grand master grifter of American Politics: Flim Flam Frank, who runs this scam under the name "Frank Luntz."

The name of the Luntz? Let's call it the "Advice to Democrats Scam" or even better: "The Angry Dem Flim Flam" Posing as a expert on winning elections, give advice to Democrats about winning elections by not being "angry." Insulting by nature, the advice leads to contentious arguments the end goal of which is to create a ruckus that drives book sales.

Bill Maher documents the exploits of Phillip Perry. Not protecting our chemical plants seems to earn a big payday for Elizabeth Cheney's husband.