There have been enough scary stories about George W. Bush to fill a book. Every day, it’s clearer that the Commander Guy is a few battalions shy of a surge. Then, I read something like this, ponder that Bush has another 18 months in office, and I cringe:

Friends of his from Texas were shocked recently to find him nearly wild-eyed, thumping himself on the chest three times while he repeated “I am the president!” He also made it clear he was setting Iraq up so his successor could not get out of “our country’s destiny.”

Turn on your inner brain YouTube for a moment, and cue the imaginary video of The Decider stomping around the Oval Office in the midst of a messianic hizzy fit, while a group of associates gasp in shock and awe. Or better yet, in the Presidential Bedroom, wearing a Napoleon hat, boxer shorts, and black socks as Laura lays in bed reading a book, looking disapprovingly over the rim of her reading glasses: “Time for nappies, George…”

Columnist Georgie Anne Geyer doesn’t disclose who spilled the beans on Bush’s tirade, but a pundit like Geyer doesn’t write words like that without good sourcing. So, you can believe that the scene actually happened pretty much as described. It just jibes with prior accounts of Bush tantrums.

The guy has gone Queeg on us. He has a wide array of nuclear buttons at his disposal. Couple this with the alzheimer’s patients in the regime who have a bad case of CRS (can’t remember shit) under oath, and suddenly the tin foil prognostications regarding National Security Presidential Directive 51 look a little less Reynolds Wrap-ish.

Well the tenuous state of the economy just elbowed its way back into the spotlight amidst the ogling over record highs in the stock exchanges. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grew by a paltry .6 percent during the first quarter of 2007…less than half of the estimate. If this slow growth were to persist throughout the year, GDP will end the year with total growth of less than 2.5 percent.

My goal isn’t to strike the economic alarm bell, but I suspect that the state of U.S. commerce may not be as rosy as many had hoped…especially when one factors in declining home values and the associated rise in foreclosures. One must also consider the nature of the loan products that are attached to a huge number of these homes as well as the overall shift in credit strategies that can be summed up in the oft heard term “subprime lending”.

Let me share some information from a few sources and you can draw your own conclusions as to the economic prospects in the coming months.

From The Associated Press – 05/31/07:

WASHINGTON (AP) — The economy nearly stalled in the first quarter with growth slowing to a pace of just 0.6 percent. That was the worst three-month showing in over four years.

The new reading on the gross domestic product, released by the Commerce Department Thursday, showed that economic growth in the January-through-March quarter was much weaker. Government statisticians slashed by more than half their first estimate of a 1.3 percent growth rate for the quarter.

The main culprits for the downgrade: the bloated trade deficit and businesses cutting investment in supplies of the goods they hold in inventories.

“We are still keeping our head above water — barely,” said economist Ken Mayland of ClearView Economics.

For nearly a year, the economy has been enduring a stretch of subpar economic growth due mostly to a sharp housing slump. That in turn has made some businesses act more cautiously in their spending and investing.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke doesn’t believe the economy will slide into recession this year, nor do Bush administration officials. But ex Fed chief Alan Greenspan has put the odds at one in three.

So to begin with, the former Fed Chairman estimated that there is a 33% chance of a recession…before the first quarter GDP figures were released. Perhaps his prediction has changed?

The economy, unlike many other measurable statistics, depends in some part on the confidence of the consumer; hence consumer confidence is regularly calculated and reported. At the moment, consumers remain relatively positive about the economy…though I suspect that is driven in large part by the low unemployment figures and the stock market’s recent run of record breaking closings.

I’m of the opinion that gas prices, the drop in home values, rising foreclosure rates, and a looming bear market will soon facilitate a downward shift in confidence…which will likely initiate a compounding effect with regards to the factors that figure into this first quarter dip in economic growth.

From The Elliott Wave Theorist - 05/18/07:

There is an important event for believers in perpetual inflation to explain: the trend of yields from bonds and utility stocks. In the 1970s, prices of bonds and utility stocks were falling, and yields on bonds and utility stocks were rising, because of the onslaught of inflation. But in the past 25 years bond and utility stock prices have gone up, and yields on bonds and utility stocks have gone down. Once again, this situation is contrary to claims that we are experiencing a replay of the inflationary 19-teens or 1970s. Those investing on an inflation theme cannot explain these graphs. But there is a precedent for this time. It is 1928-1929, when bond and utility yields bottomed and prices topped in an environment of expanding credit and a stock market boom. The Dow Jones Utility Average was the last of the Dow averages to peak in 1929, and today it is deeply into wave (5) and therefore near the end of its entire bull market. All these juxtaposed market behaviors make sense only in our context of a terminating credit bubble. This one is just a whole lot bigger than any other in history.

Some economic historians blame rising interest rates into 1929 for the crash that ensued. Those who do must acknowledge that the Fed’s interest rate today is at almost exactly the same level it was then, having risen steadily—and in fact way more in percentage terms—since 2003. So even on this score the setup is the same as it was 1929. Remember also that in 1926 the Florida land boom collapsed. In the current cycle, house prices nationwide topped out in 2005, two years ago. So maybe it’s 1928 now instead of 1929. But that’s a small quibble compared to the erroneous idea that we are enjoying a perpetually inflationary goldilocks economy with perpetually rising investment prices.

As to whether the Fed can induce more borrowing by lowering rates in the next recession, we will have to see, but evidence from the sub-prime and Alt-A mortgage markets suggest more strongly than ever that consumers’ and investors’ capacity for holding debt is maxing out. I see no way out of the current extreme in credit issuance aside from the classic way: a debt implosion.

When thinking about the ability of consumers to absorb more debt, there are several factors to consider. First, Americans are addicted to credit and credit card debt is a key component of that debt. In the month of March alone, consumer credit debt rose by $13.46 billion dollars…and total consumer debt stands at $2.425 trillion dollars. More importantly, consumer debt is anticipated to rise 6.7 percent this year.

At the same time, mortgage debt has evolved to include new products…many that leave homeowners vulnerable to interest rate fluctuations…and others that actually extend the amount of credit beyond the actual value of the home predicated on evidence of the borrowers prior positive credit history (occasionally called 125% loans). The bottom line, as I view the situation, is that much of the recent run of strong economic data is a result of debt spending…debt born of easing credit standards coupled with rising home values and the ability to borrow and spend this perceived paper equity.

From Contrarian Chronicles at MSN Money - 02/26/07:

Meantime, the big question remains: When will folks be forced to connect the dots? Unknowable though the answer may be, my friend in London provided a clue, via a recent e-mail:

“You and I and a select group of others have been all over subprime for months now. But today (last Wednesday) is the first day where equity managers have been in to us, asking questions about subprime. Until today, most of the equity managers knew something bad was happening in subprime, but were prepared to assume it was not going to be a problem for the wider credit market, the economy, and so on.

“Slowly but surely, people are starting to get it, and slowly but surely, I am starting to think that the tipping point in credit — via a subprime-generated shambles in CDO (collateralized debt obligation) land — is closer than anybody imagines.”

Behind the scenes in the land of financial black boxes, the time bomb is ticking.

Lastly, I would like to share a quote from Easy Al, taken from a speech dated April 8, 2005 (not so very far from the zenith of the real-estate market). I don’t talk much about Al Greenspan anymore, mostly because he’s gone from the scene, and I spilled so much ink on him before he left. But if you had to pick one man responsible for the imbalances in America and the financial hangover coming our way, it would be Al, who said:

“Innovation has brought about a multitude of new products, such as subprime loans and niche credit programs for immigrants…With these advances in technology, lenders have taken advantage of credit-scoring models and other techniques for efficiently extending credit to a broader spectrum of consumers…Where once more-marginal applicants would simply have been denied credit, lenders are now able to quite efficiently judge the risk posed by individual applicants and to price that risk appropriately. These improvements have led to rapid growth in subprime mortgage lending…fostering constructive innovation that is both responsive to market demand and beneficial to consumers.”

Note that Greenspan was singing the praises of subprime lending while working to keep the economy moving forward…calling it “innovation” and defining it as “advances in technology”. Excuse me, but when a lending institution alters its credit standards based upon the need to compete with other lenders in a tightening market that has been in an extended period of acquisition and consolidation…whereby smaller banks and lenders are acquired based upon total assets and growth projections…is there any doubt that “innovation” and “technology” are simply code words for the mechanisms that have been instituted to serve the players that stand to benefit most from merger mania?

If one accepts the rhetoric, one would have to conclude that lenders have been able to magically extract reasonable risk borrowers from the trash heap of bad credit scores. Don’t get me wrong, the extension of credit ought to cut both ways…meaning that there are clearly borrowers who deserve a second chance and there ought to be a means to allow as much…but the historical take on bankers has been that they like to lend money to those who don’t need it. If I understand the new dynamic, the prevailing momentum is to create the rationale to lend more because size and sales have supplanted stability as the gold standard.

From Bloomberg.com - 05/29/07:

May 29 (Bloomberg) — Home prices in the U.S. dropped last quarter for the first time in almost 16 years, as 13 out of 20 cities reported declines in March.

The value of a house dropped 1.4 percent in the first three months of the year from the same period in 2006, according to a report today by S&P/Case-Shiller. Prices last fell during the third quarter of 1991.

The retreat may deter owners from tapping into home equity for extra cash, economists said. Combined with record gasoline prices, lower home prices raise concern consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of the economy, will slow.

The decline in prices may not be large enough to concern the majority of home owners, economists said. The drop in prices in the 12 months ended March pales in comparison to the 157 percent gain over the previous 15 years.

A recovery in housing is being held back by a wave of subprime mortgage defaults, which is throwing homes back onto the market and prompting banks to tighten lending standards for borrowers with poor or limited credit histories.

“These data are probably only just beginning to reflect the impact of problems in the subprime mortgage market,” said James O’Sullivan, a senior economist at UBS Securities LLC in Stamford, Connecticut, in a report to clients. “Further declines seem likely.”

Again, I’m convinced that economic insiders are hesitant to acknowledge the full breadth and depth of the growing list of negative factors. Keep in mind how consumer confidence works when reading that declining home prices “may not be large enough to concern the majority of home owners […] in comparison to the 157 percent gain over the previous 15 years.” I view the prior fifteen years of growth as the dam that is holding back a rising tide of reality…a reality that once released from its state of anesthetization will rapidly catapult consumer confidence in the opposite direction.

Human nature is such that we prefer to ignore the obvious if the obvious has the potential to disrupt the status quo. At the same time, our human nature tends to lead us to panic once reality escapes its domicile of denial. Word of mouth about the family down the block that is in foreclosure along with the neighbor that has dropped the price of their home for the fifth time as well as the number of for sale signs mom sees while carpooling the kids to school have a way of breaching our built in barriers to bad news. Once that happens, it’s a new world…one that seemingly emerges overnight. I used to have a saying that went, “Everything’s shit…until it isn’t”…and in this instance, the reverse may well hold true.

There may not be a comparable match for the relationship between perception and reality that exists within the construct of consumer confidence. These two forces have a tremendous impact on the actual direction of our economy…which is a direct byproduct of the economic decisions we make. As it now sits, if today’s perceptions cannot withstand the growing body of evidence that foreshadows economic tumult, we may be fast approaching an all too dreadful day of awakening.

Cross-posted at Thought Theater

Here’s a blast from the past:

“No nation can negotiate with terrorists. For there is no way to make peace with those whose only goal is death.”

- G.W. Bush, 4/4/2002

Of course we negotiate with terrorists. We always have. Negotiation with the opposition (which is a synonym for “terrorists”, both foreign and domestic, in the Bush regime vernacular) is exactly what countries do when they find themselves in untenable diplomatic situations and unwinable wars. The last two major conflicts that the U.S. has been involved in, Vietnam and Korea, were no different.

It should not come as any surprise, then, that the U.S. is sneaking around the back alleys of Iraq trying to find a solution to the quagmire through negotiation with resistance forces, tribal leaders, street vendors, mimes, car bomb mechanics and anyone else who will listen:

U.S. military commanders are talking with Iraqi militants about cease-fires and other arrangements to try to stop the violence, the No. 2 American commander said Thursday.

Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno said commanders at all levels are being empowered to reach out to militants, tribes, religious leaders and others in the country that has been gripped by violence from a range of fronts including insurgents, sectarian rivals and common criminals.

“It’s just beginning, so we have a lot of work to do in this,” he said. “But we have restructured ourselves … to work this issue.” …

The last sentence above is interesting - “restructured ourselves” - what in the heck does that mean? Removing images of violence by banning photography? Downplaying actual Iraqi casualty figures? Sending Joe Lieberman to a Baghdad market to buy a rug?

Long time readers of ASZ know that I was a barfly at Billmon’s Whiskey Bar back in the day. During an instance in 2005 when it was revealed that the Bush regime was talking to the insurgency leaders even back then, I think Billmon summed it up most appropriately, and his words have a ring of currency even today:

And so we arrive at the heart of the problem: To salvage any ending short of total defeat in Iraq, the Cheney administration must act like those spineless, flip-flopping liberals. They have to negotiate with the terrorists, listening to their demands, trying to understand their grievances and goals — shit, offering them therapy sessions for all I know. But at the same time, Bush also has to keep up the never-give-an-inch macho act, lest the silent majority finally grasp the dismal truth: Their sons and daughters must go on dying in the quagmire so the neocons can find a way out that doesn’t involve losing too much face…

What the current Democratic majority in congress just doesn’t seem to be able to understand is that the Bush regime and elected GOP representatives are in the process of branding the Democratic Party as supporters of the regime’s approach. About the strongest position the Dem leadership has taken to this point in its majority is threatening to send strongly worded letters - to someone.

The neocons way out of losing too much face (as Billmon put it) is to smear the Dems with the same dirty rag that they’ve been using to cover up the quagmire for the past four years. The bodies continue to fall. The bodies will continue to fall.

“Negotiating with terrorists.” The regime still doesn’t get it. It’s impossible to negotiate a way out of a quagmire when the U.S. is the buffer between two warring factions in a civil war, and most importantly, is not considered (by the warring factions) as an honest broker.

The only thing the warring factions in Iraq hate more than each other, is the Bush regime’s occupation of their country.

I’m not sure how to make this look any more stupid. Really. This is insane. Bush will make his mark on history, but Iraq is not like Korea, and this ludicrous plan to treat Iraq like Korea, where we’ve stationed US forces for 57 years, isn’t workable. Iraq’s is a religious divide, not a political one, as in Korea. Iraq is a civil war characterized by dozens of factions, not like Korea, where it was one faction against one other faction. The analogy simply doesn’t fly, but that isn’t surprising. It was George Bush weilding the analogy, after all. He is a man with a magical touch that turns all he does to utter failure.

Man, he wants US forces in Iraq for over 50 years, and he thinks this is a good thing, too. Read Tony Snow fumble about in explaining Mr. Bush’s statements likening this war to the Korean. Amazing. It leaves one at a loss for words.

Is Bush drinking?

He wasn’t wearing a bathing suit when he visited Alton, NH. He talked to veterans in the town and reaffirmed his support of Bush’s surge, but didn’t do his usual in the area near where he summers. His usual is to simply enjoy the summers in New Hampshire, and. . . umm, the talk to the veterans didn’t go so well. . .

That wasn’t quite the case Monday, when a Laconia man complained that he hasn’t been able to get adequate medical care since returning from Iraq in January 2005 because he is neither an active duty soldier nor a veteran.

“His foot has been broken since last July and he can’t get it fixed,” said Denis Joyal of Belmont, a friend who spoke on behalf of Army National Guard Sgt. Brian Roy. “No veteran, no person, deserves to walk around with three tendons holding his foot together for over a year.”

Romney questioned the man’s status, wondering why the military wouldn’t help him if he is active duty.

“He’s in the window,” Joyal said, before Romney cut him off.

“Don’t give me, ’he’s in the window,’” Romney said. “He’s either active duty or not.”

Romney said the story illustrated his argument that Washington is broken. But the only solution he offered was urging Roy to contact one of his U.S. senators.

“If you’ve done everything you can do and nothing does any good, what do you think we should do?” he said. “An elected official is probably the best place to go.”

That answer appeared to frustrate Roy and his wife, Darlene, who said she already had contacted numerous state and federal officials.

“I keep getting these cards from different people but no one does anything,” said Darlene Roy.

On Iraq, Romney repeated his support for President Bush’s plan to send more troops, saying he predicts signs of success by the end of the year.

“If it’s working well, we’ll be able to start bringing back our troops because the surge will have worked and established the ability of the government to provide security for themselves,” he said.

Seems to me Mr. Romney’s All-American and squeaky clean image took a bit of a hit with his snapping at the veteran, his “can do” businesslike image took a bit of a hit with his passing the buck, then he tries to pass himself off as supporting the vets by supporting the failed Bush policies in Iraq. I can find only 24 google news hits that report this ugly performance in front of veterans, but I can find Veterans who have put out a press release on the subject.

And I can find Mitt Romney chatting up Republican Jews, and even find him saying he is not “anti-gay.” In each case there’s lots of skepticism, of course. Hey, Ben Affleck is predicting Romney gets the nomination. Affleck was a big supporter of another politician from Massachusetts, and we know how well that worked out.

That’s an MSNBC poll.

Hope he whines and sputters on his way out.

Listen, I know that obesity is a national health problem - it truly can be life threatening when considering the fact that most Type II diabetes cases occur primarily in overweight people. There’s no question that in cases where proper healthcare and nutrition guidance, counseling and support is available, the chances of taking off weight (and keeping it off) is enhanced.

But I don’t think that a state-level government should be using taxpayers dollars to establish an agency that is specifically chartered to deal with with this problem:

New Jersey’s health department is escalating the battle against the bulge by starting a new Office of Nutrition and Fitness to better coordinate programs to prevent obesity.

The agency is particularly needed in New Jersey — possibly the first state to create such a government body…

…the new agency will begin operations within weeks, and may be able to win more federal and private grant money and will coordinate spending of more than $2 million in nutrition and fitness programs, including promoting physical activity at all ages, providing fresh fruit and vegetables to eligible women, children and senior citizens, and encouraging breast-feeding, which can reduce the baby’s chances of a weight problem later…

It’s not that I’m lacking compassion for those who are obese, anymore than I would lack compassion for someone with any chronic disease. But it seems to me that obesity-related education and nutrition programs could be easily tucked into existing agencies without creating another layer of bureaucracy.

I’m the first person to champion social safety nets and programs. This new agency in New Jersey does not meet the “social safety net” test, though. Does NJ have an Office of Cancer Prevention or Department of Broken Bones? Of course not. The money for NJ’s Department of Fatness could be better allocated to existing programs, with the same (or perhaps even better) results.

OK, it is probably more to the point that no evidence of any ethical lapses were found. The State Senator is Pam Roach, and her son was sent away a while back for selling Oxycontin. (Oxycontin seems to be the drug of choice for Republicans, eh?) He went to jail, but was released early under questionable circumstances. Here’s the Seattle P-I on the subject from last October:

Washington Department of Corrections administrators ordered the release of state Sen. Pam Roach’s son, who was in prison on drug-trafficking charges, more than 100 days early — despite warnings from community corrections officers that such a move would violate agency policy.

Two street-level officers assigned to the case raised serious concerns — verbally and in writing — weeks before Stephen Roach, 26, was freed May 1. They argued that the inmate had been misclassified as having a lower risk of reoffending because a prior assault hadn’t been taken into account.

Roach was released anyway, and some of the officers’ written complaints were deleted from the department’s official record of the case, according to interviews and records obtained by the Seattle P-I.

Three days after Roach was back home with his parents in Auburn, Corrections reversed itself and reclassified Roach as posing a higher risk to the community — as the community corrections officers had recommended.

Now the verdict is in, that there is no evidence Ms. Pam Roach pulled any strings on her son’s behalf. At l;east as reported by the Seattle Times:

Corrections supervisors may have had their own “desire to avoid conflict with a state legislator,” the ethics board said. But there is no evidence that Roach tried to influence the agency’s decisions about her son, officials said.

I guess the phrase they’re using is that “there are no facts which suggest (Roach) used her position to benefit her son.” Though she may have been a tad arrogant in not letting parole officers visit with her son at her home. . . . it seems Ms. Roach was so worried about her white carpet that she wouldn’t let the officers do their job.

The report, signed by board chairman Wayne Ehlers, notes that Sen. Roach and community corrections officers were involved in a “confrontation” when the officers went to inspect her home prior to placing her son there.

“At some point, the Respondent (Roach) became aware the CCOs had not removed their shoes. The home has white carpets and a sign or signs are apparently posted requesting visitors to remove their shoes. The CCOs have expressed `shock’ at the `hostile’ nature of the `Senator.’ They refused to remove their shoes. CCOs are armed at all times and can never be sure how home inspections may unfold. They cite issues with regard to personal safety and/or the safety of others if they were to conduct inspections while barefoot.”

They left after Sen. Roach’s “offensive” behavior, the report says. Roach promptly called their supervisor to complain about the shoes, identifying herself as “Senator Roach.”

The next day, she phoned Clarke, complaining about incident and suggesting that the officers be issued booties.

“Clarke states he listened to Respondent’s complaints over the phone but said little. He later delegated the question (of) whether booties were a viable option for DOC (Department of Corrections) to an assistant. It appears from the investigation that the use of booties is now an option for DOC personnel.”

After the confrontation, one of the officers involved reviewed Stephen Roach’s criminal history in-depth. He concluded that Roach had not been properly classified and should be released 100 days later than planned. The officers say a supervisor told them not to share that information; the supervisor denied it.

Man, she sounds like some kind of piece of work, badgering our fine public servants because they don’t have booties to wear on their shoes when comeing into her house to check on her criminal of a son. Yes, that qualifies as Republican arrogance. It may not rise to the level of Republican corruption. . . but only because they haven’t as yet found the evidence for it.

I’m sure Rush Limbaugh will be featuring this story today, what with the Oxycontin angle and all.

When it became apparent that the war effort in Iraq was going to take far longer than anticipated, a debate ensued as to whether or not the strategy employed from the outset was sufficient. Early on in that debate, several observers as well as one high ranking active duty officer, General Shinseki, suggested that we lacked the necessary troop levels to win the peace. Shinseki and others argued that we would need at least 300,000 troops to achieve some progressive level of order in Iraq.

Time and again, the President, Vice President, the Secretary of Defense, and other members of the administration routinely dismissed criticism and the calls for more troops. At the time, they argued that we were building an Iraqi military that would soon “stand up so we could stand down”. Time and again, the number of fully trained Iraqi forces has been modified. One most recent assessment suggests that just over 6,000 Iraqi soldiers are capable of functioning fully independent of U.S. oversight…which then led to arguments about the definition of independent.

I recall that before the 2004 presidential election, the administration touted that the Iraqi security forces numbered nearly 200,000…though it was never clear if they were fully trained to assume the primary role in policing the country…and the number seemed to change from day to day. John Kerry suggested that we focus on training these forces as soon as possible in order to facilitate the reduction of American troops…and the president countered that those efforts were already underway and progressing as expected.

The most recent assessment states that the Iraqi security forces now number 337,000…of which 143,000 comprise the Iraqi military and 194,000 are members of the Iraqi police force. Discussions are also underway to increase the total security force to 365,000 by the end of the year.

While I’m no mathematician, when one takes a look at the chronology of the increasing numbers of Iraqi security forces along with the recent surge of American forces in comparison to the level of insurgent and sectarian violence, something just doesn’t add up.

If General Shinseki was wrong, then the Iraqi security force alone exceeds the number of troops the administration ever believed would be needed to prosecute our efforts in Iraq. The combined security forces in Iraq now number right at 500,000…far greater than the number the administration ever stated would be needed and well beyond the number that led to Shinseki’s forced resignation. At the same time, there is speculation that the U.S. troop surge could soon approach 200,000 American soldiers.

The only conclusions one can draw from this recent information…along with the four plus years of ever changing rationales…is that we are still being fed inaccurate assessments by an administration that places more weight on reconstructing its rhetoric than restoring security and rebuilding a functional Iraq.

If our efforts in Iraq were a theatrical production, it would no doubt have been billed as an epic tale of good versus evil…but the reviews would be more apt to characterize it as a poorly crafted and executed dramatic offering turned farcical comedy…one that left the audience scratching its collective head while wondering if it should succumb to satirically inspired laughter or simply acquiesce to the tears that are born of the Bush administration’s propensity and pattern of offering the far more familiar and formulaic tragedy.

Cross-posted at Thought Theater

I dunno, but this is pretty sick:

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands (AP) — A 37-year-old woman suffering from an inoperable brain tumor wants to donate a kidney before she dies and will choose the recipient from among three contestants on Dutch national television, a TV network said Tuesday, claiming it wants to highlight a crisis in organ donations…

…The scheduled broadcast of “The Big Donor Show” reached the floor of parliament after a member of the governing Christian Democrats, Joop Atsma, questioned whether a public contest for a lifesaving organ would cross the boundary of merely objectionable to actually illegal…

The reality show is actually produced by the same company that does “Big Brother”. Ostensibly, they want to highlight a shortage of organ donors, but you know as well as I do that there’s more to it - cold, hard cash.

I’m sure there will be no lack of viewers for the show. And, just as “Big Brother” started out on the other side of the Atlantic ocean, the concept will make it stateside soon enough.

Who Wants a New Kidney?, though, just doesn’t quite have that “ring” to it. No doubt that some TV PR wonk can work on it. Maybe the concept could even be extended for Dick Cheney: Survivor - Cardiac Care Unit. Or even, Rearrange Me ‘Til I’m Sane, a reality show offering frontal lobotomies for lucky contestants - seems like a natural for many in Wingnuttia, and there’d be no lack of competition for open spots. Hell, by the end of the Bush regime, there are many on the left who might want to participate in Liver Let Die, an organ donor competition for those who have been drinking too much over the past 8 years.