Another Republican Culture of Corruption Episode

ABC News reports on yet another corrupt Republican:

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - U.S. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, a California Republican, pleaded guilty on Monday to felony conspiracy and tax evasion for taking money from a defense contractor in exchange for help in securing Defense Department contracts.

What a surprise! Not. (Related stories from Google)

Eat, Sleep, Work, Consume, Die

Hey, life now is no different than the early 1850's - ya eat, sleep, work, consume, and die.

Civilization took a definite nose dive when the merchant princes grew ascendant at the expense of the artists and thinkers; when the notion of liberté, égalité, fraternité gave way to "I've got mine; screw you" (an attitude that existed in Voltaire's day, too, you might recall, with unfortunate results for the blue bloods). In the Big Picture, the dead white guys -- Rousseau, Thoreau, Mill -- cared a lot more about your well-being than the live ones like Gates or Jobs or Ellison ever will.

Though for what it's worth, at least Gates Sr has spoken out for the Estate Tax: Dozens of the Wealthy Join to Fight Estate Tax Repeal (more search results).

Out of a Bad Spy Novel

From an Op-Ed column in the Washington Post about the secret American jail in other countries:

Our ideals are the heart and soul of this nation. We are not an ancient nation united by language or blood. Our ideals, rather than ethnicity or even territory, hold us together and make us a nation. When we betray those ideals, we weaken America.

In other words, giving up our ideals to fight the terrorists just hands the victory to them.

Here's a cached copy if the original article expires.