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Pardon my colloquial tone, but Republicans, New York Times' columnist Paul Krugman put yall's junk out there Friday. Yup, he called ya'll "a party of whiners." I mean, dang, that's tantamount to playing the dozens, isn't it!?

Bad luck brought a string of disasters on Bush's watch. The economic implosion was masterminded by an evil Democrat. The dog ate my Iraq post-invasion plan. (OK, I made up the last one.)

But seriously, here is the gist of Krugman's column:

The fault, however, lies not in Republicans’ stars but in themselves. Forty years ago the G.O.P. decided, in effect, to make itself the party of racial backlash. And everything that has happened in recent years, from the choice of Mr. Bush as the party’s champion, to the Bush administration’s pervasive incompetence, to the party’s shrinking base, is a consequence of that decision.

Is Krugman right about the right?

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Hill as the face of American detente?

No doubt about it. Hillary Clinton is brilliant, but Secretary of State? Pulease!  I'm not feeling it. She has traveled the globe. But she's hard as nails and has a lot of public baggage. I suspect few of us would use the words "Hillary" and "diplomatic" in the same sentence. I mean, the woman is like a bull in a china store.

Whether you agreed with Condoleeza Rice's politics, she exuded a cool, calm but authoritative decorum when she represented the U.S. across the globe with the world's leaders. Hillary brings too much drama for such a high-profile role.

I had pegged the senator from New York for the court, the Supreme Court. It's an important, but out-of-the-limelight gig. (And there are no young women to speak of at the court to get Bill in trouble!) But my buddy Kev, a conservative whose opinion I much respect, says no way. He says the court can't afford a politician, and Hill is a straight-up politician.

Kev also says if you put Hill at State, it keeps her out of Obama's way on the domestic front---where she bombed in Bill's first term.

What do you think?

Cal Thomas is right.

But this time he is.

Sorta.

In a word, the syndicated columnist says what has driven the auto industry to its current state are unions. I've been saying that for years. In a column last week in the Wall Street Journal, Pulitzer Prize-winner Paul Ingrassia suggested ripping up the existing contracts with the unions. Read more »

Oh gimme a break.

Today's lead story is gun owners snapping up every weapon they can find. They're afraid an Obama administration coupled with a Democratic Congress will trounce on their gun rights.

Got news for ya: This time, you're not the center of the universe. The nation is too busy trying to save itself from an imploding economy, collapsing automakers and the laughable state of health coverage.

Dr. Stephanie Nagy-Agren's e-mail popped into my mailbox Tuesday afternoon.

It read almost like a physician's shorthand on a prescription.

"Calling HQ until got thru. did it. got to drive voters early this morning."

At 5:47 p.m., Tina Williams kept one eye on the clock at Dyon's Barbershop on Peters Creek Road in Roanoke and one eye on her client's hair. She had exactly one hour and 13 minutes to drive to her precinct and get in line to vote.

Later, as election results suggested Barack Obama was on his way to a historic presidential victory, Del. Onzlee Ware slid an Obama poster across the conference table in his Gainsboro law office and asked the small group of guests to sign it.

The tentacles of the momentous election touched Roanokers in different ways as they eagerly participated in democracy. Tuesday was no ordinary Election Day because this was no ordinary election. Read more »

...President-elect Barack Obama

From hockey mom to clotheshorse?

According to Politico.com, veep nominee Sarah Palin and her family are rockin' $150,000 worth of couture, with half of the bill coming from Neiman Marcus in Minneapolis.

The Republican National Committee is Palin's sugar daddy, picking up the tab for sprees that dropped $49,425 at Sak's Fifth Avenue in St. Louis and New York; $790 at Barney's New York; and nearly $9,500 at Macy's in Minneapolis. And we can't forget the $4,700 on hair and makeup.

What's up with these people? Do they lose their mind once they reach the rarefied heights of national politics? I teed off on John "Hair Boy" Edwards last year when he pulled that little $400 haircut stunt-twice. Hill Clinton took some heat for two visits to the styling salon at a cost of $3Gs.

As for Palin: Needless Markup, as my friend calls Neiman Marcus, was always out of my league. But Sak's was my store years ago. They used to have great sales! But I'm guessing Her Honor wasn't rifling through the 75-percent-off racks.

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Recently, Dotti Bull discovered that fearmongering can be slickly produced, packaged and delivered through the U.S. Postal Service.

After receiving the unsolicited DVD "Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West" in the mail a few weeks ago, the Roanoke woman learned that some of her friends, co-workers and 28 million other Americans also had gotten it.

As recently as Monday, a news release in my electronic mailbox trumpeted that the DVD also has gone to more than "325,000 rabbis, priests and pastors in every Jewish and Christian congregation in America."

A spokesman for the group behind the DVD said it merely wants to inform the public about radical Islam. But come on, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why a 2-year-old DVD is being heavily distributed a few weeks before a pivotal presidential election in swing states, including Virginia.

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