Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been rather busy over the past few days. Today, he’s got lots of things on his schedule. But he knew it would be wrong to just up and leave you with nothing. So he has decided to link this neat piece from the Washington Post about bibliophiles running out of space for their book collections.

Your Maximum Leader has run out of shelf space for his collection. He is now working on a few small stacks. But he knows that before too long he’ll have to get some more shelves…

Or a bigger Villainschloss with a full-out library.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees that Dr. Rusty Shackleford (once again) has his finger on the pulse of the blogosphere. Dr. Rusty gives us a poll that combines the best of all possible worlds. Babes. Gun Porn. And killin’ bad guys.

There are pictures! Consider it your duty to check out (wink, wink, nudge, nudge) the servicewomen that Rusty has included in his post. Then vote in the poll.

God Bless the USA! (And after the USA, then bless the IDF.)

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader, in persuing the news wires, sees that a 31 year old man was arrested over the weekend for being a sucky parent. (NB to Phin: Please take note and do not emulate Mr. Killion’s example.) It seems as though Christopher Killion left his young son in the car while he was partaking of the view at a strip club. Mr. Killion told his son to stay in the car lest “monsters” come and eat him.

What a putz. Mr. Killion probably wouldn’t have been allowed to have a son in the Mike World Order. He would have failed the IQ test. We know that Mr. Killion is stupid because every man knows that strippers love little kids. They go crazy over them. That is why strip clubs don’t allow little kids to enter in the first place. The owners know that the strippers’ motherly instincts would kick in and JB’s Gallery of Gals would turn into JB’s Topless Daycare in a matter of moments. You see, Mr. Killion should have just brought his son into the club with him and handed the boy off to a stripper while he enjoyed a high-quality cold brew.

Sad…

In other news a (now former) dancer touring with the smash hit musical “Movin’ Out” is suing the producers of the show. She claims that she was sacked from her gig because her breasts grew too large. She is suing for $100 million. If she wins her suit she should consider opening a topless daycare…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader was busy Sunday morning and he didn’t catch Meet The Press. But thanks to his trusted iPod he just listened to the podcast of Sunday’s show last night. One of the featured guests was John Murtha (D-Penn).

Among the items that Murtha discussed with Tim Russert was that Donald Rumsfeld should be fired (or resign). This has been a refrain around DC of late. (Indeed the President answered questions about this subject yesterday in his press conference.) The cognocenti of DC are saying Rumsfeld needs to go. Rice needs to go. Rove needs to go. Gonzales needs to go. Pretty much it seems as though everyone in DC thinks that the President should get rid of pretty much everyone in his cabinet.

Many people would like to see Vice President Cheney leave too. But that is just completely wishful thinking. Cheney is going no where. Hell, he might even stay on into the next Administration… Frankly, neither are Rumsfeld, Rice, Rove, or Gonzales going anywhere. This sort of begs the question, should some of them go? Would the President be better served if they did go?

Well… Your Maximum Leader is of the opinion that Rove ought to go. He feels this way because Rove still has a small cloud hanging over him concerning the whole Valerie Plame thingie. (A cloud that your Maximum Leader doesn’t believe is going to do anything except blow over in a little more time.) Rove, if he leaves the White House and the President’s service would serve a few good ends. First, it would allow the President to get some fresh advice and blood in the West Wing. Second, it might allow Rove to lay the ground work for Republicans (preferably conservative Republicans… and hell, conservative Democrats are okay they are just few and far between) in future elections.

Your Maximum Leader will not join the chorus of conservatives, libertarians, and Republicans calling for Rumsfeld and Rice to go. Your Maximum Leader thought the time for Rumsfeld to go was around the time Abu Gharib was uncovered. At this stage your Maximum Leader believes that Rumsfeld leaving will not accomplish any good. By the time a new Secretary of Defense is confirmed and gets situated in the Pentagon another year or 18 months could be passed. During that time an essentially leaderless Pentagon would not serve our interests well.

Your Maximum Leader further believes that in the President’s mind sacking Rumsfeld would be tantamount to admitting that all of his war critics are right and he is wrong. Frankly, in the minds of many of the President’s opponents sacking Rumsfeld would in fact be viewed as an affirmation that they were right and the President wrong. In many ways, Rumsfeld departing would actually weaken the President politically. By giving the impression that he is changing course by dumping one of the chief architects of the one item that the President has staked his reputation upon would effectively end his presidency.

Your Maximum Leader thinks that at this point Donald Rumsfeld has got to stay on. This is not to say that the Pentagon couldn’ stand some new blood. They could. But the man at the top needs to be Don Rumsfeld. For the sake of his presidency, Bush must keep Rumsfeld.

Frankly, for many similar reasons Condoleeza Rice will stay as well.

The people who need to go, and could go, are Alberto Gonzales and John Snow. Gonzales has too much baggage from the first term. But it is low profile enough that his departure (just a few months really after confirmation) wouldn’t be too tragic from a policy perspective. Frankly, if a Supreme Court vacancy were to come available, Gonzales would be a likely pick. (Not one that your Maximum Leader would be trilled about, but one that the President would make anyway.)

John Snow is too low profile all around to make waves if he should leave Treasury. (Your Maximum Leader is willing to bet that a good number of you weren’t even sure who the hell John Snow was? Remember Bush’s first Treasury Secretary? Your Maximum Leader will give you a hint. It wasn’t Alexander Hamilton or Albert Gallatin, or Andrew Mellon…) Appointing a strong economic conservative one with a little charisma might go a long way. Your Maximum Leader knows that Jack Kemp isn’t a favourite of many in the Bush team (and frankly he seems to have generally fallen out of favour with many conservatives - for reasons passing understanding). But a few years of Jack Kemp (hawkish and fiscally conservative Kemp) would be a good and invigorating thing for the Bush Second Term.

Oh yeah… Your Maximum Leader would sack Michael Chertoff too. But that is just your Maximum Leader speaking…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been thinking to himself. Thinking about this blog. Has your Maximum Leader gotten a little too staid? Is he just focusing a bit too much on the dreamy Jennifer Love Hewitt? Is he not putting out the hard hitting political commentary that his minions love? Is his biting social commentary gone long-in-the-tooth?

Does your Maximum Leader have the blogging blahs?

Well… Loyal minions… A little bit of reflection and introspection has caused your Maximum Leader to realize that this blog needs something. And that something is…

More after the fold…
(more…)

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader decided to share a word with you all he loves.

Abattoir. Clicky here if you need pronounciation help.

An abattoir is a slaughterhouse. The word is derived from the French abattre, which means “to fell.” Of course, in French abattre has lots of different meanings. It could be used one context as to “knock down” a house. In another context it means “to cut down” a tree. When talking about wild animals it means “to shoot” or “to kill.” In the case of a domesticated animal it means “to slaughter.”

Alas, your Maximum Leader’s latin skills are particularly lacking. Thus he cannot give the Latin origin of the French word. Regardless of that, we have the Norman Conquest to thank for this wonderful word, abattoir, in English. In your Maximum Leader’s Oxford abattoir seems to be derived from the Middle English abatten - which is the derivative of abattre.

Now your Maximum Leader is sure that many of his minions are out there scratching their heads and wondering why their Maximum Leader is bringing up this rather obscure word… Your Maximum Leader mentions it here because it came to him today in conversation. He was speaking to an acquaintance about the Smallholder raising a pig for your Maximum Leader. The acquaintance asked if your Maximum Leader did the harvesting of the animal himself. Your Maximum Leader mentioned that he did not but that the Smallholder took the pigs to an abattoir. The person looked at your Maximum Leader as though he was suggesting that the pigs be taken to a beauty parlour of some sort…

Trust your Maximum Leader… As nice as the word sounds, an abattoir is not a nice place.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader would like to point out that he has updated our Sponsors links ove on the right side toolbar. He exhorts you to click through. Then click through some more. And then tell your friends to come by and click again!

Go click happy…

And here are the links if you don’t want to go over and click on the sidebar. Color Wireless Camera, Digital Still Cameras, DVD Recorder Review, Active Internet Users, Xbox Video Games.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader lied to you. His seats were 4 rows behind the Canadiens bench, not the Capitals bench. The were good seats. Indeed, your Maximum Leader is contemplating joining in with his friend on season tickets next year in those seats.

As good as the seats were, the game (if you were a Caps fan) wasn’t all that great. The Habs won 4-2.

And to add insult to injury, your Maximum Leader left with 3 mins left in the game - and missed the Ovechkin goal.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees that McPaper is running a piece called “Lawmakers Get Out of the House.” The general theme of the piece is that our Congressmen (and Women) are on track for only “working” about 97 days this year. That would put them 11 days under the infamous Republican “Do Nothing” Congress of 1948.

So, to recap… For $165,200/annum, our elected Representatives are “working” about three months of the year.

Not a bad gig if you can debase yourself enough to get it.

Now your Maximum Leader knows that there is more “work” done in Congress than might be reflected by the actual numbers of days that Congress is in session. And further, your Maximum Leader knows that Congressmen have to raise completely sinful amounts of money to get themselves re-elected every two years. So there is some “work” that is not being captured by simply looking at the number of “in session” days on the Congressional Record.

But your Maximum Leader is confused… There seems to be some equation of not being in session to not getting anything done. Were that it were so dear minions! Oh what a frabjous day it would be when your Maximum Leader could look at a calendar and exhort that Congress wasn’t in session and so nothing was getting done in Congress. Alas… There are staffers busy at work crafting laws and agreements and resolutions for Congressmen to work on when they are at work.

Your Maximum Leader asks you all to stop and reflect for a moment at how much the Congress has accomplished in their scant (soon to be) 97 days. Okay. Your Maximum Leader will only ask that you reflect on one accomplishment. Spending more money, on more stuff, than any other Congress ever! Adjust for inflation and they outspend all the Great Society Congresses of the 1960s. In just under 3 months they have managed to blow a few hundred billions dollars. (Your Maximum Leader knows that the federal budget is TRILLIONS of dollars not BILLIONS of dollars - but he readily admits that some of that money is well spent. Some of it, admittedly, is not.)

No easy feat. Indeed, your Maximum Leader will posit that if you gave any sailor in the US Navy $10 Million and 90 days to spend it - the sailor couldn’t do it.

But the sailor would enjoy trying.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader wanted to take a moment to blog about sports. Well, actually make a few quick statements about sports. (As opposed to a series of cogent thoughts that would ordinarially make up a serious blog post).

First off, if you are a hockey fan (and your Maximum Leader knows there must be a few of you left) and are watching the Washington Capitals play the Montreal Canadiens tonight on TV; look out for your Maximum Leader. He will be a few rows up behind the glass next to the Capitals bench. He will be wearing his old-style (throwback) number 15 Guy Charron jersey. Of course, when your Maximum Leader bought the sweater (so to speak) it wasn’t a throwback style one. It was the day-to-day (home) jersey. And Guy Charron was your Maximum Leader’s favourite player. That was way back when…

Reading over that last bit caused your Maximum Leader to think… If you aren’t in the DC area what is the chance of the Caps v. Habs game even being on the TV? Hell… If you are in the DC area what are the chances of the game being on TV? Humm… It might be on in Montreal… Perhaps CBC’s Hockey night in Canada? Nope… Humm… Well… Let’s just say the chances of you all catching a glimpse of your Maximum Leader are small…

So. Moving along…

It is Japan vs. Cuba in the World Baseball Classic.

To be honest, your Maximum Leader (who is a baseball fan) just can’t seem to get worked up about the World Baseball Classic. He has watched precisely zero games and has read box scores of games played precisely two times. It was a very underwhelming tourney. And your Maximum Leader is not just saying that because of the completely pathetic play of the US team. He feels as though the timing is off somehow. This doesn’t seem like the time to play some sort of big international tournement. This is Spring Training time! Not win one for your national honour time…

Your Maximum Leader will, as you can imagine, be rooting for the Japanese. He hopes that the game turns out to be very lopsided. Sort of like a toiling peasant after being whacked by a samurai sword. Or something like that.

And finally…

Your Maximum Leader isn’t much of a baseketball fan. But he is rooting on the Georgetown Hoyas and the George Mason Patriots in the NCAA tourney. He roots for George Mason out of sectarian loyalities more than anything else. He roots for Georgetown because it’s the Big Hominid’s Alma Mater. (And Georgetown was really good when your Maximum Leader was a young autocrat-in-training during the Reagan years… He has fond memories of those times… Ah… The Reagan Years…)

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader reads on The Superficial that the dreamy Jennifer Love Hewitt has a stalker. When he first read the title of the piece he was sure he’d have to start looking out for the restraining order.

Then it turns out that the stalker is some dead guy’s ghost.

Whew!

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader must make a confession.

He ate too much corned beef, cabbage & potatoes.

He may have also added a lethal dose of Guinness to the gastric mix.

He may take his iPod and go to bed now.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been contemplating this post for a while. A long while in fact. The seed that will become this pot was planted by the V-man on March 3rd. You see, on that date the great and terrible Velociman cast down the gauntlet of Colander Blogging. To be honest, your Maximum Leader is not enamored of his colanders enough to want to photograph or blog about them.

But your Maximum Leader has a skillet…

But not just any skillet… A skillet with a history.

Around 1870 or so your Maximum Leader’s maternal Great- Great-Grandmother on the shores of this great Republic. She arrived at the port of Philadelphia. (No trip through Ellis Island for her - no siree.) She arrived with her husband and a dream. A dream of leaving behind Scotland (her country) and Wales (his country) and making a new life for themselves in America.

Having arrived in Philadelphia it didn’t take her long to determine that the “City of Brotherly Love” was not the city of her dreams. So, she did what any woman with a can-do attitude and a dream did in those days. She decided to head west. She bought up provisions, tools, cookery, a few horses, a wagon, and a rifle. Among the items she purchased was a 12 inch cast iron skillet.

She took her husband, her stuff, her skillet and traveled across this great land. In a wagon. Braving weather. Braving natives. Braving all the hazards of a journey in those times. She decided to keep going until she reached Portland, Oregon. There she settled. She birthed some babies. She raised her family.

Then she got a letter. The letter informed her that a relative (her brother perhaps? foggy memory) who also came to these shores from the mother country had passed away. Passed away and left her as guardian of his now-orphaned children. But for some reason - one that passes your Maximum Leader’s understanding - the children had to stay in their hometown.

So she packed up the family. Got the wagon going again, and moved to - wait for it - Dayton, Ohio.

Life in Dayton seemed to suit her, and her brood. Eventually, one of her daughters married and started out on her own. One of the things your Maximum Leader’s Great-Grandmother got from her mother was the 12 inch iron skillet that had trekked across the country and nearly back again.

The skillet remained in Dayton for many years. But eventually new families are created by cycle of birth and marriage and skillets are passed along. After a time the skillet found its way into the kitchen of your Maximum Leader’s sainted mother. There the skillet languished in the bottom drawer of an oven for many years. Until your Maximum Leader graduated from college and moved out. At that time your Maximum Leader liberated the skillet and took it as his own. A birthright of sorts…

Today, that skillet has a position of honour in the Villainschloss’ kitchen. Your Maximum Leader and Mrs. Villain use it at least 4 times a week. The skillet now has some friends too. Another 12 inch cast iron skillet that belonged to Mrs. Villain’s paternal grandmother (who bought it after she was married in Rhode Island). And a 6 inch cast iron skillet from Mrs. Villain’s maternal grandmother (who bought it at some point in the 1930s).

One could say it is a power-trifecta of iron…

What? You would like to view the great and historical skillet? Well, here is a little photo of it. You can clicky through to see a larger one.

If you viewed the larger skillet do you see the seasoning. The old crusty layers of gawd-knows-what all over the outside. Your Maximum Leader thought of having it analyized to have it’s make-up scientifically determined. But he decided not to. It just adds to the mystery (and history) of the skillet.

If either of the Villainettes (or the Wee Villain) want that skillet they’ll have to pry it out of the cold dead tendrils of their father. He’ll never part with it. Indeed, should your Maximum Leader ever need to evacuate the Villainschloss for anemergency the skillet (along with guns and other necessities) will be packed in the Suburban along with the family…

And there you have it. Not Collander Blogging… But Skillet Blogging.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leaders says you should check out two sites that have changed their templates recently. One for St. Paddy’s day celebrations, and the other because she can…

Brian makes some morphs into Mement O’Moron.

Dawn changes Caterwauling. (NB to Dawn: Hope the new digs are all you hope them to be.)

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has a good old fashioned link dumping post to throw your way right now. First off… To those of you of Irish extraction - or those of you pretending for this one day to have Irish roots - Happy St. Patrick’s day. Your Maximum Leader’s heritage is an amalgamation of various strains of ethnicity from the British Isles. Lots of Scottish. Lots of English. Some Welsh. But, surprisingly little Irish. Regardless of that fact he has cooked up a corned beef, some cabbage and taters. He has a six pack of Guiness with his name on it in the fridge. He has even gone so far as to wear green today - mostly to make the Villainettes happy…

So… Happy St. Patrick’s Day. If you are cute, female, and Irish, let your Maximum Leader know and he will be glad to bestow upon you a kiss…

Moving along…

Who’da thunk that the Crack Young Staff will soon be celebrating a big anniversary? Your Maximum Leader hopes that he can come to the party. Doilies or no, he will do what he can to make the e-soiree classy. (Although he can’t imagine the CYS doing anything that isn’t classy…)

Your Maximum Leader sees that (Dead Sexy) Sadie (aka: Agent Bedhead) has a new friend blogging on her site. Mr Atoz, from his maiden post, appears to be cut from the same cloth as our friend Sadie. Go over and give a warm welcome to him.

(NB to all readers: This is possibly the most sucky segue your Maximum Leader has ever attempted.)

Speaking of being cut from the same cloth…

Did you all know that your Maximum Leader (like so many others his age) had something of a crush on Pat Benatar at some point between the years of 1981 and 1984? He knew that he could run with the shadows of the night and everything would be alright. Your Maximum Leader was aware that he was young, from heartache to heartache he would stand, making no promises or demands in is quiet hormonal lust for Pat Benatar. Well now Pat is 53. She is still rocking in the free world. But who knew that she had such a hottie daughter? Really. HOT-TIE! Seriously. Lookie here. (Or here if you like.) Like mother, like daughter…

Moving along…

You know your Maximum Leader sort of presumes that you all read the Wall Street Journal’s Opinion Journal daily. Well, he feels compelled to mention to you today that they have a whole battery of great essays. Check out this fine essay on blacks in the Catholic Church. You might also check out the essay on anarchy.

The best essay on Opinion Journal today is the one by Daniel Henninger on the slipping away of the American moral compass. As political discussion becomes more charged due to differing positions on sex it becomes harder to keep cultural morality operant in other areas. Some food for thought there.

Do you know what your Maximum Leader is looking forward to reading? The post that Robbo will craft using the comments appended to this post. Heh. Perhaps even double “heh.”

In closing… Have you noticed the strange path of this post? From corned beef, to hotties, to sex in politics - and how that can be bad - to composite posting… Interesting. But not interesting in the same way that your Maximum Leader feels every day when he reads WWTD and then clicks on to Charmaine Yoest. Humm…

By the way… Cookery blogging on tap for later…

Carry on.