Afternoon Coffee at the Last Manatee

Drudge reports that Obama only met with BP executives for 20 minutes today. Pretty productive meeting since he got them to fork over $20 billion for an escrow fund for the region's victims. With additonal fines of $4,300 per barrel, this is looking better than the original Louisiana Purchase.

Newt told his Fox audience that in this case it was alright for Obama to use religious language during his address to the nation.

Haley Barbour, Governor of Mississippi, one of the states affected by the spill worried that the escrow account would affect BP's profits.

Sarah Palin said the Dutch could clean up the spill. She was referring to their skimmer technology. A little late in the day, Dutch's skimmer machines have been in the Gulf for the last few days.

The House Republicans entered an amendment yesterday to strip the health reform bill of the individuals mandates. It was defeated. Look for this throughout the next few years.

The Senate Republicans managed to block the extension of unemployment and Cobra as well as the emergency $50 billion funds for the bailout of states.

Meg Whitman put another $20 million of her personal wealth into her campaign coffers. This means she has put in $90 million of her own dough. Apparently, Meg also has anger issues, having fought an employee in 2007. The poor woman was trying to prepare her for an interview. Should be interesting if she wins the California state house.

The Christian Right is back in all its lunacy, saying that the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell would mean that God would make us lose wars. In case anyone has been watching, the United States hasn't won a clearcut battlefield victory in a long time. There has been so many statements and pronouncements by the Christian Right, you're better off checking www.rightwingwatch.com on a daily basis.

I think I've finally figured out this fascination of the Hard Right for the American revolution. It's the last "good war" in their minds that America fought. You can't embrace Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War because he was for big government, the wrong side won and the slaves were freed. You can't embrace WWII because FDR was the President and, in some minds on the right, the wrong side won again. And Vietnam doesn't do it because we lost and that was the period of the civil rights movement. And we know George W and Dick Cheney have been airbrushed out of the small government conservatives' history. The Spanish-American war is a no-no because it involves Hispanics and we want them deported.

Bill McCollum, who is running for the Republican nomination in Florida, is being successfully challenged by a hospital mongol, who has been convicted of felonies and forced to pay millions of dollars in fines. I guess the appeal is that this person was a CEO.

The final arguments for the Prop 8 trial are wrapping up today. The anti-gay lawyers are moving on another front to get the 18,000 legal gay marriages reversed. In my mind, the legal arguments have been all on the pro-gay side with the anti-gays having to invoke sociological studies done in the 1950s. But I am skeptical that the final arguments can move the current Supreme Court. Conservative lawyer Ted Olson disagrees but I believe he's naive about where the current court stands.

Jim Inhofe is doubling down on his anti-DADT repeal position. He went on the floor of the Senate yesterday saying that our armed forces simply won't fight with open gays in the military. Sort of like how it happened in Sparta and Rome.

All the polls this week except the AP poll show Republicans set to make big gains in the Congressional races. The volatility of these polls showing rapid changes in the generic congressional races and the vast ups and downs of Democrartic enthusiasm make me highly skeptical that we know anything about the state of the electorate. With jobs, the deficit and terrorism ranking as the top issues. I personally can't see how Republicans can capitalize on the jobs and deficit issue, although they talk a good game on terrorism.

Republicans have not created a job since 1990 and they have never acted as deficit hawks since Eisenhower. I can't see where they gain any credibility here, especially among independents. Unless something dramatic happens, terrorism doesn't trump the economy. As we've seen, Republicans are now embracing CEOs as their star candidates. But look at Whitman and Fiorina in California. Both of them gained their reputation by either outsourcing jobs or eliminating massive numbers of jobs nationwide but also in the very state they seek to represent.

On Taxes, Republicans claim they own the franchise in tax reduction but they opposed during the stimulus debate the largest tax cut for the middle class in history. Now they are framing the tax debate as if the financial concerns of the very wealthy are those of the rest of us. They may well pull that off with their spin machine. Most Americans don't believe Obama cut their taxes.

The fate of the free world hinges on Jack Nicholson just as it did in Mars Attacks. If Jack cheers on the Lakers well in Game 7, we will be saved. While not my favorite Laker team--Kareem and Magic--the Lakers must crush the Celtics if there is any justice in the world. As President Obama said, "the arc of history bends toward justice."

We salute Ken Griffey, who retired this past month. Finishing his career with 630 hrs, Griffey could have surpassed all homer records--natural or steroid infuenced--if his career in Cincinnati hadn't been plagued with injuries.

Yankee statisticians claim that Derek Jeter surpassed the 3,000 hit mark this week--if you include his playoff and world series hits. Hey, that's cheating. Let him do it straight. It should take two more months.

Meanwhile Nick Johnson made it another year in which he made the Disabled List. That makes every year that I have been following his career.

Shame on Brazil for only beating North Korea 2-1 in the World Cup. The North Korean team was made up of all males in the country who are given daily meals. Double shame on Spain for losing to Switzerland.

Washington is abuzz with the Rookie pitcher Stephen Strassburg, who struck out 14 in his first start and 7 of his last 10 and at one point 7 in a row. So far, he's won his first two games in the big leagues and won every start at all levels of the minor leagues. Unfortunately, the Nationals still blow.

The German austerity package if passed will trigger another Great Depression. So far the euro is barely hanging on with defaults in Greece and upcoming defaults in Spain and Portugal. As European commentators have mentioned, austerity does not necessarily lead to prosperity. So far we have been insulated from this stage of the European crisis but we can't be for long. With deficit hawks in the ascendency in the United States and Britain, these austerity programs may be this century's equivalent of protectionism in the 1930s.