The LuLac Edition #696, Jan. 16th, 2009

PHOTO INDEX: 1964 LOGO, WILK TALKER STEVE CORBETT, CONGRESSMAN PAUL KANJORSKI, BLOG EDITOR, DR. JOE LEONARDI AND WYOU TV INTERACTIVE HOST ERIC SHEINER. (CLICK TO ENLARGE PHOTOS)

THE BUSH YEARS

I had the opportunity to be on WYOU TV Thursday night with Dr. Joseph Leonardi, former Congressional candidate in the 11th District. We both reviewed the President’s speech and frankly when I got the invite I was loaded for bear. I was going to talk about how Bush didn’t have a mandate in 2000, how he surrounded himself with lackeys who prized loyalty over competence and how he wrecked the nation beyond repair. I was prepared to say that the unborn children’s children would be paying for the sins of this administration for generations. I was going to use my line that the only good thing Bush did was to take a Christmas holiday at Camp David and let the secret service people spend time with their families. Then I saw the speech. Bush hung on to 911 with a death grip as far as highlighting his accomplishments. Leonardi and Mrs. LuLac even pointed out that he looked tired and beaten. Callers tried to defend him but it was his place to do so and in the final analysis, all he could come up with was 911. It is true we haven’t had a terrorist attack on American soil and that’s a good thing. But Bush and his campaign minions used 911 not as a tribute to the fallen American victims in the wrong place at the wrong time but as a tool of fear. In the elections of 2002, 2004 and 2006 the GOP beat us over the head with fear. Bush had a perfect opportunity to rally a world after 911 but instead squandered that chance. It is ironic that the real thing that did his Presidency in was Katrina. Bush could not control the terrorist attack but he could control how his government handled a hurricane. When the administration failed in that effort, the emperor had no clothes. People began to question the campaign tactics of 911 and rejected them partially in 2006 and roundly repudiated them in 2008. Bush summed up 8 years in 15 minutes. He had not much of anything in terms of accomplishment, except to say he kept us safe from terrorism. But while he did that, the rights of citizens were subtracted, the cronies of big business went wild with greed and avarice threatening the basic tenant of hearth and home to average citizens and a fast decline in what the middle class was, turning them into people on the brink of disaster. I think in his heart, the hard decisions he made, I think he now realizes many were wrong. Decided by the wrong man at the wrong time. And even with the ending of this dreadful Presidency near, the most partisan of all of us take no joy in the failure of the administration and its leader.

CORBETT’S COURAGE

Steve Corbett went where no talk show host ventured this week having a full blown discussion about the Israel-Palestine conflict. He got opinions from both sides, made statements that were even handed and did not try to add fuel to the fire. Corbett once again proved that talk show hosts can show courage and balance and get both sides of an argument that has been going on for generations and centuries.

KANJO ON TV

On Monday, January 19, Congressman Kanjorski (PA-11), the Chairman of the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Insurance, and Government Sponsored Enterprises, will appear on CNBC’s Squawk Box for three hours as a co-host of the program.
Congressman Kanjorski will discuss fixing the economy and the role of financial services in the new Congress, as well as inauguration.
WHEN: Monday, January 19 from 7:00 – 10:00 a.m.

C’MON GUYS!!!

Yesterday on AOL the banner headline read: OBAMA: Third term? Jeez the guy hasn’t even taken office and right now pundits are grooming him for a third term? Crazy!

1964

United States Surgeon General Luther Leonidas Terry reports that smoking may be hazardous to one's health (the first such statement from the U.S. government). In time to come, there will be no more advertising like this on TV.

The predominantly Arab government of Zanzibar is overthrown by African nationalist rebels; a U.S. destroyer evacuates 61 U.S. citizens......Routine U.S. naval patrols of the South China Sea begin......Hello, Dolly! opens in New York City's St. James Theatre...John Glenn, the first American to orbit the earth, resigns from the space program....A day later Glenn announces that he will seek the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senator from Ohio.....In the Commonwealth, Governor William Scranton discounts any interest in the 1964 Presidential nomination……in Wilkes Barre Mayor Frank Slattery makes noises about an earned income tax for the city of Wilkes Barre but states nothing is firm……and forty five years ago, the number one song in Lulac land was “Please Mr. Postman” charting to the top as the Beatles phenomenon gets closer to the shores of the Atlantic.