Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees that the coast of California is being assulted by giant squids. No beachgoers are safe! Run for the hills! Check that. Run for the hills that aren’t washing into the sea to be devoured by giant squids!

Do you think that there could be a connection between parts of California washing into the sea and the presence of the giant squid? Is this mother nature trying to cull some of the human herd?

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is preparing for the State of the Union address tonight. For the first time in many years he will watch the address live. He hasn’t watched a State of the Union since the one in January 2002. He didn’t watch Bush’s speeches because he couldn’t stand to listen to Bush’s delivery. He always read Bush speeches. Your Maximum Leader has generally avoided President Obama’s speeches because they are lofty and sound magnificent, but are essentially lots of sound and fury signifying nothing. That said, your Maximum Leader is interested to hear what the President will say tonight…

Speaking of Congress (sort of)… Did you know that on this date in 1791 Congress passed the Excise Whiskey Tax. Passage of the act lead to the Whiskey Rebellion. Your Maximum Leader will have to thank a tweet from the Capitol Historical Society for that little tidbit…

Did you catch the post over on the Volokh Conspiracy about the changing Kibbutzim of Israel? No? You should. Your Maximum Leader was, in a debate on socialism, always willing to concede the point that the Kibbutzim of Israel appeared to be a successful implementation of the socialist idea. While he would quibble with anyone as to how the model would work on a wider scale, he was always willing to say that they seemed to work. (Lucky for your Maximum Leader, none of the socialists he knew - or knows - seem to care much for Kibbutzim and the subject rarely came up in a wider context of socalism.) Apparently now your Maximum Leader will no longer have to concede the point of a successful socialist experiment.

Speaking of Kibbutzim, your Maximum Leader’s mother had a good friend who’s sister married a Kibbutznik and was loving her life there. This friend’s sister came to visit in the US and brought along one of here friends from the Kibbutz. The friend was single and looking for a man. She was also up there on the list of the hottest babes your Maximum Leader has ever spent time with. If your Maximum Leader had been slightly older (he was about 17 at the time - she was about 22) and Jewish he might have tried to pitch a little woo in her direction. He would have failed of course, but he would have probably tried.

Your Maximum Leader, although he doesn’t have the money for it, was shopping around for a laptop computer for himself. The computing needs of the Villainous offspring are increasing and he would like to get a nice laptop for himself. He has been looking at a Mac. But he keeps coming back to an Alienware machine. Yesterday he was sorely tempted to make a purchase he couldn’t afford. Yesterday there was a one day sale on select Alienware machines. They had a M15X that was pretty hopped up for $360 off regular price (total cost $1500). He didn’t bite, but feels like it was a good deal. He’ll likely wait until the M11X comes out and sees how that compares in price to other models.

Apparently much hay is being made about this fellow O’Keefe. You may have heard of him a few months ago when he posed as a pimp and went to various ACORN offices and got advise from the friendly ACORN people on how to avoid taxes and such on his prostitution ring. Well now he has been (rightfully) arrested for attempting to bug a phone in an office of Senator Mary Landrieu. Talk about stupid. One would have hoped that after gaining so much acclaim he might have gotten himself an advisor who might have told him that bugging a phone is a bad idea. An illegal idea in fact. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t have much sympathy for people being stupid. James O’Keefe appears to be stupid.

That is about it…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader hopes that some of you are sitting down. You are? Okay… Here it comes…

Your Maximum Leader might (MIGHT) find himself in agreement with some of President Obama’s proposed bank reforms.

There. He said it.

Your Maximum Leader will have to read more about exactly what the President is proposing but it is possible that your Maximum Leader might agree with not only the thrust but detail of the proposals. At this point the reporting on the President’s proposals is mostly limited to how he wants the banks to have to limit risk and not grow as large. There is a lot of breathless reporting about the proposals and few details. So this “endoresment” is tenative and preliminary and easily revoked.

You may be asking yourself, “Self, what has happened to my Maximum Leader? How could he write this?” Well, allow your Maximum Leader to explain some…

As you know your Maximum Leader is a conservative with some libertarian streaks. He believes we need a government which has clearly defined powers and roles. He is a firm believer that the Federal Government has a necessary role to play in the regulation of commerce in our nation. We are not an unfettered capitalist nation. We have limits on our economic system. Many of the limits are very beneficial, some not too beneficial, and some are a hindrance. Your Maximum Leader believes that we do need to do something about our banks…

Now, your Maximum Leader is not an economist, or a finance major, or any such thing. So he admits he’ll need to grow a little more informed on some of these matters as they move forward. But let him explain where he’s coming from. Your Maximum Leader believes that the purpose of finance (and banking) is to concentrate capital to further (advance) other economic activity. Finance (and banking) is not a means to huge profits in and of itself. This is not to say that your Maximum Leader wants to limit bank profits (or paychecks or bonuses). It is to say that the goal of many finance companies (and banks) of late has seemed to be to make a big profit through investments and devices that mgiht not advance other economic activity. So your Maximum Leader is concerned that banks are behaving like regular corporations that focus on the bottom line, and not behaving like banks have behaved through history.

Take for example various mortgage devices that contributed to our current economic situation. The issuance of a mortgage is the proper role of a bank. The reselling of mortgages from bank to bank is not necessarially a bad thing. It is when you start to commoditize mortgages into instruments that become a speculative tool for investors to shift around from institution to institution only seeking a profit on the transfer that you start to have a problem. Again, don’t misunderstand your Maximum Leader here. If you want to speculate in a specialized instrument and expose yourself to risk and potential payout that is fine, but to have the same institutions involved in all aspects of this deal from the mortgage to the speculation is not wise. Your Maximum Leader isn’t fond of the “too big (and diversified) to fail” concept of a bank.

Your Maximum Leader isn’t sure we should go “back to the future” and repeal some of the legislation that allowed commerical banks and investment banks to merge and own other types of companies (like brokerages and insurance companies). But there needs to be some happy median here.

So, your Maximum Leader will try and figure out what the President is proposing and see if he actually can support the reforms. Perhaps our friend FLG will educate us a little on finance and these recent proposals…

Carry on.

UPDATE FROM YOUR MAXIMUM LEADER: Your Maximum Leader just read a piece by Judah Kraushaar in the Wall Street Journal. It touches on some of the concerns that your Maximum Leader has. You can read the whole peice here: Banks Need Clear Capital Rules. Here is the good part:

There is no silver bullet when it comes to the problem of financial institutions that have become too big to fail. Policy makers have determined that the best approach is to force a conservative capital and restructuring regimen on U.S. banks. In this context, President Obama’s proposed tax on bank assets aligns tax policy with the broader direction on capital requirements being pursued by bank regulators. The ideas he outlined yesterday about limiting proprietary trading will further reduce risk taking and will likely come at the expense of profitability.

There is nothing wrong with increasing capital requirements for the banks. Attacking excessive leverage in the banking system may go a long way toward dampening the boom-bust cycle that has become alarmingly intense in recent decades.

What we need now is clarity. What will future capital requirements look like? What is the plan to return the banks to reasonable rates of profitability? Until that architecture is put in place, banks will have little incentive to sell the problem assets currently clogging their balance sheets—let alone to lend more aggressively.

Protracted congressional hearings on the bank crisis, piecemeal new regulations, sporadic attacks on bank compensation, and an ad hoc approach to taxing banks will only compound the crisis in the American financial service industry.

Right now, investors lack conviction in the ability of the banks to move past the crisis and get back to generating profits. The stocks of the largest bank holding companies now commonly trade at a discount to book value. These discounts illustrate that investors doubt the companies’ wherewithal to earn future returns in excess of their cost of capital. Few financial companies can survive with that sort of penalty, given that attracting fresh capital is their lifeblood.

This isn’t the only concern your Maximum Leader was trying to address, but it is part of the big picture.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader lives. He was cut as planned on Wednesday. His doctor did remove a small piece of your Maximum Leader. Biopsy results will likely be a few more days. He is not worried. His side is feeling much better today than it did yesterday. Indeed, yesterday he was a little uncomfortable. He was also cranky yesterday. Funny. Those two might be related. Anyhoo… With each passing day he feels a little better. So that is good.

Your Maximum Leader feels sorry for the people of Haiti. They certainly don’t need nature piling on all of the problems they already have. But pile on nature did. He hopes the aid will help. If it is not too uncharitable to say, he fears that Haiti’s problems are so deep that no amount of aid will really help over the very long term. Aid given now can help end immediate suffering, but that country needs education, infrastructure and political change to make lasting change.

You should donate to help Haiti. It is the right thing to do, regardless of your Maximum Leader’s previous comments.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is sure this will be the last post of 2009. He plans on trying to relax some this afternoon and then getting to be early. He will travel to New York tomorrow to visit Kevin’s mom. Sadly, it will be a day trip. Up early, on the train, visit, then back on the train and home.

Your Maximum Leader has been in a funky mood of late. There are likely many contributing factors to this funk. General pessimism may be the leading contributor. Pessimissm about the economy, the course of politics, the general outlook for things if idiots continue to be elected and behave (surprise!) like idiots. Your Maximum Leader has never really played the role of Cassandra here on this blog, but he supposes he could if he could get more motivated. Since he is not motivated he’ll leave you with some interesting posts from others.

First off, you should take a moment to read Daniel Henninger’s latest on the WSJ. “A Rodney Dangerfield America?” Henninger’s piece is good, and optimistic. It is worth your time.

Then you should read the recent prodigious output by our friend Skippy. He has been on a tear recently writing good thoughtful stuff that often closely mirrors what your Maximum Leader has been thinking. You could read about Vladimir Putin, or the rule of law, or Iran or injustice.

FLG commends a piece by Jim Manzi. You can read FLG’s excerpt here or the whole piece here.

If you are just looking for some interesting things to read here are some suggestions:

Is there a new Da Vinci painting out there? And by out there we mean Boston.

You can check out Jesus’ neighbor’s pad. It comes with a place to hide from Romans.

Will Russians star in the real-life Armageddon? Your Maximum Leader was still hoping for Bruce Willis and Liv Tyler…

Check out some words or phrases that some thing should be banished from our daily dialouge.

Of course… You could just close your browser and spend some time with family and friends and enjoy yourself.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has said time and time again here that he isn’t sure what the question it, but Venice often comes up as the answer. He continues to have a hankering to go to Venice at Christmas time. Your Maximum Leader blogged last year about a peice he read in the Guardian a few years back that planted the seed of this idea in his mind. Sadly, such a trip is still not in the cards for your Maximum Leader.

Of course, for the past two years the acqua alta has hit Venice at Christmas time. The news wires have been reporting flooding in Venice as rain, snow, and high tides combine for high water over the past few days. Apparently 60% of the city’s streets are underwater. The acqua alta this year doesn’t seem to be as bad as it was last year at this time.

In the slideshow accompanying the article linked above were a number of pictures showing the high water and people going about life in the high water. But one photo caught your Maximum Leader’s eye. Before there was rain and high water, there was snow in Venice. Here is the photo that caught his eye:

It is a sculpture of the four tetrarchs on the corner of St Mark’s covered in snow. Your Maximum Leader knows this sounds strange, but he’s known of this sculpture for years and has seen photos of it before. But for some reason he made the incorrect assumption that the peice was inside St. Mark’s, not outside. He’s now been disabused of that misconception.

Anyhoo…

Your Maximum Leader would still jet off to Venice in a minute if circumstances allowed.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is still alive and well. His lower back is aching a little, but otherwise he is fine. As you may know, about 18 inches of snow fell on the Villainschloss over the weekend. As our good friend Skippy points out, he’s had less snow in Toronto than your Maximum Leader’s had in Fredericksburg VA. (NB to Skippy: Damn you Skippy! Having snowless sex with your girlfriend in Canada!)

At this point your Maximum Leader is sick of the snow. In fact he was sick of the snow on Sunday. He was sick of it after a few hours of shovelling. He is extra sick of it now. Your Maximum Leader’s street is now plowed or treated in any way. And the roads leading to your Maximum Leader’s street are not plowed or treated in any way either. It makes for fun driving!

There is not much else going on. Almost all of the Christmas shopping was done before the storm, so no worries there. We have made a run for some groceries, but we could have made it if we needed to.

Hanging over the whole holiday is what is going on with Kevin’s mom. It is not good news and it has me rather depressed. I have known how her story was going to end. But I find that perhaps I’d not mentally prepared myself for a sudden change in her situation. It is a sudden change that seems to have occured now. I don’t know what to hope for in terms of her health. I feel hollow and fake in saying that I hope whatever is “best” happens. I don’t know what “best” is in this case. I hope for strength for all of us who love her.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees that in this down economy at least one new job has been created. Well… To be honest… It isn’t really a new job created, it is more like an old job is recreated. Or even better, one old worker is coming out of retirement.

Yes Virginia, the Noid is back.

Dominos pizza is changing their recipe to make a tastier pizza, and they are bringing back the Noid. As best your Maximum Leader can remember, he’s been avoiding the Noid since about 1990. Indeed, he’s been avoiding Dominos since about the same time. He’s never been a fan of Dominos pizza. He’s prefered Papa Johns. That is until he discovered a local mom & pop place nearby that has great pizza - Miones. So, he gets is take-out pizza from Miones (and sometimes Wegmans if the mood strikes him when he is in the store).

Good luck on the recipe change Dominos. Your Maximum Leader still likely will not buy your pizza, but he hopes that it does wind up tasting better.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees on the Reuters news wire that a new poll by the Pew Center for Religious and Public Life shows that a suprising number of Americans are superstitious idiots. The article doesn’t put it that way and is actually entitled: Many Americans Haunted by ghosts; look to astrology.

Here is a juicy bit:

The poll released on Wednesday showed that three-in-ten Americans say they have felt in touch with a dead person and 18 percent say they have seen or been in the presence of a ghost.

Other Pew surveys have shown that relatively few Americans would identify an Eastern religion or New Age spirituality as their core faith. But about a quarter of those surveyed say they believe in aspects of Eastern religions.

Nearly 25 percent said they believed in reincarnation and 23 percent said yoga was a spiritual practice. Twenty six percent said they believed “spiritual energy” could be found in objects such as trees.

A quarter said they believed in astrology, while 16 percent of U.S. adults think that an “evil eye” exists or that some people can cast curses or spells on others. Among black Protestants the evil eye figure is 32 percent.

What can your Maximum Leader say about this except that he weeps for the future.

Until he read this piece he thought that the worst thing he’s read/see/hear today was the drivel that President Obama was spewing out to a room of unfortunate Norsemen (and Norsewomen) and other dignitaries while accepting his Nobel Prize.

The “evil eye!” Really now! People actually believe that people with “powers” can use the “evil eye” to cast spells and curses… Other than the eyes that Elin Nordegen Woods is using on Tiger now, your Maximum Leader is unaware of a curse laden “evil eye.”

Sad. Just sad.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been out there. By “out there” he means “on the interwebs.” Lurking. He’s been reading and ruminating. Occasionally he’ll comment.

All in all he’s not had much that he feels warrants a comment. That is one of the problems of blogging isn’t it. One might read a post (or a tweet or a newspaper/journal article) and say to oneself, “My self, that perfectly encapusates my thoughts on this subject.” But if you don’t actually write a post of your own linking the article/piece in question who the hell knows? Frankly, even if you did write a post and provide a link, who the hell cares?

Meh.

So hows about a post about nothing? Indeed… Lets…

Your Maximum Leader has been spending his free time watching hockey and football. He’s tried reading a few different books to see if something grabs him. He’s been sorely disappointed in his choices. What makes his disappointment more… disappointing is that all the books he’s chosen are recent additions to his library that he’s not gotten around to reading yet. Sadly, your Maximum Leader figures that he’s suffering from some sort of short-attention-span disorder.

Speaking of hockey… This Washington Post piece about the NHL “war room” in Toronto was interesting. The room is much smaller than he imagined. Although he does like the little detail of how the room smells of pepperoni pizza. That makes it all so real. So real. In a way knowing that the room is as small as it is makes your Maximum Leader sort of sad. He was hoping for a “mission control at NASA” feel. Or even better… Dr Strangelove… Alas, it looks like a production room at a secondary studio at a big city TV station…

Anyhooo…

Your Maximum Leader got word from his good friend, Smallholder, to let him know that the hog and steer raised for his consumption have been slaughtered and are going to be butchered this week. Today in fact. Your Maximum Leader has made three calls to the butcher to adjust his cutting instructions. Your Maximum Leader has decided that he needs to get the bacon and one ham fresh from the butcher. (Normally, the cut pieces are frozen for him.) Your Maximum Leader is going to try and make his own bacon and cure a ham this year. He’s got his pink salt in hand and will have to get to curing this weekend if he is going try his hand at ham and bacon. The bacon should be pretty easy to cure. It can be done in a large bag in the fridge. The ham is going to be more of a challenge. He needs more space and time. Your Maximum Leader isn’t sure how he’s going to manage the ham, but he’s working on it.

Actually, your Maximum Leader trying to figure out the curing of the ham at the Villainschloss has been a mentally taxing exercise.

Moving along…

Your Maximum Leader is disturbed by his use of the DVR. He feels that he is watching more tv as a result of having more control over his viewing choices and times. He records a fair number of programs. By his count he has three shows recorded daily (Pardon the Interruption, The Late Late Show and his guilty pleasure Chelsea Lately). In addition to the dailies, he records only new episodes of 8 other shows. Then there are movies as he finds them on HBO. In his defence, if he doesn’t watch one of the dailies within a day or two of broadcast he deletes them. As they are topical there is nothing like watching old news… But he has a few movies that have been on the DVR for months… Almost half of the last season of Curb Your Enthusiasm remains on the DVR. (NB - Your Maximum Leader loves Curb Your Enthusiasm; but finds he can’t watch more than one episode at a time. The humor is uncomfortable at times and has to be doled out in measured doses.)

It would likely do him well to cut down (or out) a significant portion of tv time. Your Maximum Leader supposes that compared to “regular” Americans he might watch less tv than most. But it is starting to feel like too much.

Sooo…

What the hell is up with Tiger Woods? Your Maximum Leader doesn’t get it. If you are going to be a world famous personality and you know that you like to mix it up when it comes to female company; then why do you even consider marriage? Your Maximum Leader has a certain amount of regard for George Clooney in this regard. Clooney gives off the vibe that he knows he is going to have trouble in a long-term relationship; so he doesn’t enter into one. That is a good thing in your Maximum Leader’s opinion. Know yourself and save yourself (and others) lots of heartache. Your Maximum Leader is at one level shocked and at another amazed by the scope of Tiger’s affairs. Shocked by the numbers and amazed by the efforts that went into meeting/maintaining/hiding the affairs in his schedule. One wonders if he has an assistant helping him in this… Then again, if he had an assistant to help him with these things he might not be in the mess he’s in now.

Concerning Mrs Woods. She is a very attractive woman. That said… Your Maximum Leader finds something disturbing and off-putting about her eyes in most photos he’s seen of her. He’s not saying she has “crazy eyes” or “googly eyes” or anything. There is just something wrong about her eyes to him.

In real news…

Your Maximum Leader reads that the Senate seems to be stripping the “public option” out of the Heath Care Bill. He hopes that soon the “Health Care” part will also be stripped from the bill…

This bill is a mess and just continues to linger on getting worse. One would hope that at some point the Senate would just throw up their hands and say collectively “Fuck this… Let’s pass some stimulus bills, an anti-flag-burning amendment, and declare it National Cocktail Party Month.” After putting the health care measures out of our national misery they could go home for “Winter” holidays and raise money for their re-election. That’s a good plan right? Of course it is.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader did not watch the President’s speech on Afghanistan tonight. He was eating a late dinner and then watching “Castle” on the DVR with Villainette #1.

From what he can tell by a quick check of various blogs, CNN and Fox; no one liked what the President had to say. Nary a soul seems to have much good to say…

Hummm… Very curious…

Your Maximum Leader will ruminate on this overnight…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has survived the holiday and he hopes you have as well. He feels particularly fat and slothlike. He’ll need to get out and exercise or something to try and counteract the urge to remain idle…

Apparently the sloth affecting your Maximum Leader is keeping him from writing a full blog post. So he’ll give you some banalities to occupy this space…

With some of the oysters left over from Thanksgiving your Maximum Leader made “angels on horseback” to have with dinner last night. They were a big hit. The kids kept trying to figure out if the oysters were the angels or if the bacon was. Tough call that one.

Your Maximum Leader must admit a certain fascination with the whole State Dinner crasher story. He’s not interested in the couple per se. Indeed, he couldn’t care at all about them personally. He is interested to know how exactly they got in. It continues to boggle your Maximum Leader’s mind. He’s attended presidential functions both at the White House and away from the White House. He knows that security isn’t perfect (certainly not away from the White House). But you figure that one would have to do more than just show up in a tux and act upset when your name isn’t on the guest list and act your way in. Your Maxium Leader is curious to learn how this happened and who is going to lose their job over it…

Your Maximum Leader thinks that Mrs Villain got him a Blu-Ray player for Christmas… That is a very exciting prospect. But it also means that he may have to get a new tv. His 46″ Sony HDTV is a rear projection job and doesn’t have an HDMI jack on the back. He suspects that he’ll live with the standard component connection for a while… But the urge to upgrade will be strong…

A close friend of your Maximum Leader and Mrs Villain will be getting married in March. It is likely that they will be celebrating the joyous day in Key West, FL. Your Maximum Leader and Mrs Villain are excited to go. But last night your Maximum Leader realized that March in Key West is sort of spring break time… Hummm… That adds an interesting (and often drunken) wrinkle to this trip.

Your Maximum Leader has been getting headaches with some regularity over the past 10 days. He thinks that the problem are his glasses. It has been about two years since his prescription has been adjusted… It might be time.

Your Maximum Leader wonders if a healthcare bill will actually get passed before the 2010 elections. He is beginning to doubt it. That is a good think all in all. If some bill must be passed he hopes it will be a stripped down one containing some insurance company reform and perhaps some minor tort reform. He realizes that such a bill is highly unlikely; but he hopes nonetheless.

What is up with Dubai? Your Maximum Leader isn’t sure if he should be concerned, worried, really worried or start to go crazy over what is going on with Dubai missing their loan payments. It seems like it isn’t a good thing no matter how you look at it.

Your Maximum Leader is also thinking about buying another turkey and cooking it up this weekend. He has left over gravy and needs to put it on something…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader saw an interesting headline on the wires today. Here it is:

Saudi female TV journalist gets 60 lashes.

When your Maximum Leader read the headline he thought to himself… “She must have been driving a car. Or perhaps she was out in public without a male escort. Maybe her head was uncovered by a gust of wind and her revealed hair startled a bunch of old men. Perhaps she spoke without first being spoken to?”

Then your Maximum Leader went ahead and clicked through and read the piece. Do you know why the woman got 60 lashes? Because she worked for a tv station that aired a program in which some idiot man bragged about his sex life.

You read that right. She worked for a television station that aired a show in which a man bragged about his sex life. Please note that she did not brag about her sex life (presuming she has one - which one hopes for her sake she does not). Neither did she appear on the program in question. She just worked there.

Oh… In case you are wondering, apparently the man doing the bragging got five years in prison and 1000 lashes. The female victim of Wahhabi justice seems to have gotten off easy by comparison.

Your Maximum Leader hopes to live long enough to see the Saudi legal system modernize to the 1700’s. He could send some Blackstone’s over there if it would help…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is borrowing a post title from good ole Tom Leherer. Damn that man was funny. One can suspect that he is still funny, although not performing. Sadly, this post will be neither funny nor informative. It will likely be crap.

Since it has been a few days you’ve probably been wondering, “Self, what has happened to my Maximum Leader? I feel lost without his inspired musings.” Well… Your Maximum Leader has been taking care of Maximum Leaderly things. You know like creating fake “balloon boy” stories to distract people from the real news. He has also be shuttling his handsome children from one activity to another. Damn. Those kids are doing a lot. Karate. Piano lessons. Sports. “Play dates.” It is crazy. Then when he’s had time to sit down and relax he’s been watching some early season hockey and now baseball playoffs. Blogging hasn’t seemed like a priority.

Even if blogging hadn’t seemed like a priority over the week, your Maximum Leader’s love of his minions has caused his fingers to itch for the keyboard so that he can share some thoughts about the week’s events with you all.

First off… Your Maximum Leader, as many of you know already, is not a big Rush Limbaugh fan. And when he says “not a big fan” he really means “not a fan at all.” Anyhoo… Your Maximum Leader knows that Rush has said things in his 20 years on the air that have offended people. But to cite quotes that he apparently didn’t say in order to blackball him from a group trying to buy the St. Louis Rams football team is low. Very low. It is both lazy and inexcusable for the press to use unsourced books for gathering offensive Limbaugh quotes rather than actually trying to use the approximately 14,500 hours of recorded material from his radio show to get a quote. Your Maximum Leader feels pity and distain towards the reporters who started to circulate the fake quotes and he feels a little sympathy towards Rush Limbaugh. Your Maximum Leader knows that conservative commentators aren’t given any slack or even the benefit of doubt when it comes to racial issues; but this strikes him as being beyond the pale.

Having said that, your Maximum Leader doesn’t believe that the group dropping Limbaugh from investor list is a problem. That is a business transaction. These things happen. Frankly, the NFL saying that they didn’t want Limbaugh is a little much for your Maximum Leader; but that too is a business matter. Your Maximum Leader isn’t going to get worked up about this part of the story.

Your Maximum Leader has seen the tops of Meghan McCain’s boobs this week. Your Maximum Leader thinks that Meghan McCain is sorta cute. He is a little disappointed in the hullaballoo that has ensued after that photo got around. People need to lighten up some. If a paparazzi photo of her appeared on the internet showing her in a swimsuit would she still be a slut? Doubtful on that call. Sure this was a silly thing to do; but to jump all over her (metaphorically) is crazy.

While speaking of Meghan McCain… She seems to be writing for some web site and excoriating social conservatives for being… socially conservatives. Many conservatives don’t seem to believe that there is a place in the Republican party for Meghan McCain or others with similar beliefs. Perhaps we should all think back to 1994 when the Republican’s took back the House of Representatives. The “Contract with America” didn’t contain any major “socially conservative” clauses. (The reduction of welfare spending could be considered a budgetary matter with a social component.) The thrust of the contract was to reduce the size of the government and balance the budget. Now we know that the late Republican House didn’t end well on that count; but your Maximum Leader would argue that the future for the conservative movement, and Republican party, is to get back to the macro-economic issues and broad ideas on the size and scope of the federal government. Tabling some of the more divisive social agenda and actually producing on the economic/government side of the equation has been a winning formula in the past and should be in the future. It would likely be easier to have conservatives and Republicans coalesce around a few basic agreeable principles than to demand action on all fronts. (Indeed, just look at how action on all fronts seems to be working out for the President right now.)

Olympia Snowe voted to get the health care bill out of committee. That is sad news. One hopes that the liberal House will insist on keeping the poison-pill public-option in the bill and Olympia (and Susan Collins) will decided to opt out of the final bill. If Democrats want the bill they should pass the bill. They have the votes. It is clear that they want something resembling “bipartisanship” on the bill. But it is also clear that the votes aren’t really there. Just pass a bill if you have the balls to (which your Maximum Leader doubts). Otherwise just shut the hell up and try a different approach - like tort reform and removing some of the barriers to interstate insurance competition…

Oh yes… It looks like the dreamy Jennifer Love Hewitt might be back on the market soon. Good news for some lucky guy. (NB to JLH: call your Maximum Leader. He is not your love match. Well, perhaps an unrequited platonic love type of thing. He needs to sit you down and find out where your mind is. He fears you are becoming a needy emotional wreck like Jennifer Aniston. You don’t need to go down that path. You need to be more comfortable about yourself and less emotionally dependent on losers to validate your self-image… Your Maximum Leader is the only person from whom you need approval. Just call… And send photos… Preferably in a Naked Villainy T-shirt and Thong…)

Well… That is about it for now. Perhaps your Maximum Leader will blog more later. Perhaps not. He does know that he’s got a great weekend planned. Perhaps there will be photos in it for you later…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been busy this week. He is entertaining a guest at the Villainschloss, attending some political fundraisers, and helping Mrs Villain shuttle the Villainettes and Wee Villain from one activity to another. He’s wanted to comment at length on a number of issues in the news, but is going to settle for short bullet points today…

Did you see that Somali pirates attacked the flagship of the French Navy in the Indian Ocean? Now your Maximum Leader was surprised by this headline. Then reading the piece caused him more surprise. The first surprise was that the French flagship in the region is a fueling vessel/command vessel. One would have thought that the flagship would be a destroyer/frigate/cruiser. You know, a friggin WARSHIP with big friggin GUNS and MISSLES! Alas, it apparently is not so. After that first surprise there was a second one in the piece. The second surprise is that the French vessel was attacked by two small boats - and one got away. This probably shouldn’t surprise your Maximum Leader, but it does. Afterall, if you don’t have a warship to blow things out of the water how exactly do you expect to get both pirate boats? Still, your Maximum Leader will chalk this encounter up as a win for the French navy.

Secondly… It looks like your Maximum Leader and his best buddy Kevin will have a boys-night out on Saturday and go and see Zombieland. Woo hoo!

Thirdly… It looks like your Maximum Leader will get another boys-night out later in the month and will visit Smallholder and Polymath. While visiting those two fine gentlemen, guess what he’ll do? He’ll go and see Zombieland again… Then he’ll get to go into the woods and use a shotgun to blow the heads off zombie targets. Then he’ll get to drink beer all night while stirring the apple butter being made for the town fair. Is that a cool weekend or what?

Next up… Thanks to you all who congratulated Mrs Villain on her new PC, or those who asked how the Acer laptop is working out for us. Well… After a week all seems to be going very well. Laptop runs fine. The only beef is that the bottom of the laptop seems to get a little hotter than did her Dell. But that is a minor quibble.

About all this David Letterman stuff going on… Your Maximum Leader doesn’t really care (in a broad sense) about Dave having multiple affairs over the past 20 years. His a little disturbed that no one seems to be focusing on the whole “Dave-having-affairs-with-people-who-work-for-him” part. These women are employees of Worldwide Pants. Dave is the owner of Worldwide Pants. That seems to be a problem from a sexual harassment point of view. At least that is what attorneys your Maximum Leader knows have always told him…

And finally… Your Maximum Leader has many readers who know about these things… If you receive an invitation to a Ball (as in a glittering dance that would make Cinderella proud) and the invitation notes that the ball is “Formal” should one automatically assume that suitable attire is tuxedos for men and evening gowns for women? Your Maximum Leader awaits your thoughts on this one.

Carry on.