Hiding in His Office to Avoid a Vote

COSTA RICA

So we have this little guest book, and here‘s Tuesday’s entry:

Hands-down this is our best vacation ever!

We had ten incredible days at Villa Exotica. We got to snorkel, zip line, horseback ride and go white water rafting. The best part of it was that every night we could relax in 5-star luxury in this beautiful villa. We have traveled all over the world as a family and hands-down this is our best vacation ever! The website made the place look nice but the reality is even better. It is like staying in the Four Seasons or the Ritz. I’ll miss waking up and drinking my coffee and seeing the beautiful landscape, watching the sunset over the ocean or relaxing in the hot tub. We’ll be back! / Finkel and Crew (Bethesda, MD USA)

OVOID MONOLITHICITY

Ken Doran: ‘That’s it! The name for my new punk-techno-rock band that I have been searching for. We will thank you at the Grammies. But I have already trademarked it, so don’t use it again.’

☞ The album cover.

McCAIN DISAPPOINTS

At least if the talk were really straight, the action really brave, I could admire the man while disagreeing with him and voting the other way. But give me a break. The Paris Hilton stuff is beneath him; the energy hypocrisy is far worse, as explained by Tom Friedman, here:

. . . Both the wind and solar industries depend on [tax] credits – which expire in December – to scale their businesses and become competitive with coal, oil and natural gas. Unlike offshore drilling, these credits could have an immediate impact on America’s energy profile.

Senator McCain did not show up for the crucial vote on July 30, and the renewable energy bill was defeated for the eighth time. In fact, John McCain has a perfect record on this renewable energy legislation. He has missed all eight votes over the last year – which effectively counts as a no vote each time. Once, he was even in the Senate and wouldn’t leave his office to vote.

‘McCain did not show up on any votes,’ said Scott Sklar, president of The Stella Group, which tracks clean-technology legislation. Despite that, McCain’s campaign commercial running during the Olympics shows a bunch of spinning wind turbines – the very wind turbines that he would not cast a vote to subsidize, even though he supports big subsidies for nuclear power. . . .