Yes, McCain as President.  Yes, 100 more years of war in the Middle East.  Yes, the decline in the dollar and home forclosures.  Yes, to more natural disasters and global warming.  And yes to 6 more months of election year bs.  Following the fold some real scary stuff.....  

Todays Washington Post talks about the Rs concern about the upcoming special election in Mississippi on May 13th pitting Travis Childers against Greg Davis.  Worth checking out the article - especially the comment from VA Congressman Tom Davis........

Haven't seen this posted, but yesterday afternoon, long time E Street Band keyboard player Danny Federici passed away after a 3 year battle with melanoma.

A few days ago I had the pleasure of reading all the posts about Bruce's endorsement of Barack Obama.  Now some really sad news.  Danny played with Bruce for 40 years going back to before the E Street Band formed in the early 70s.  He played the accordian on Sandy.  He will be missed.

On Page 1 of the Sunday NYT Arts & Leisure Section there is an article/editorial from Charles McGrath asking the question "Is PBS Still Necessary?".

To me the answer is a resounding yes.  Of course we still use an antennea to watch TV over the public airwaves.  No cable guy.  And we are doing just fine.

More below the fold..........

Watched the interview with Mike Gravel this evening on The NewsHour.  Ray Suarez handled the questions.  Interesting discussion.  Do not agree with some of what Mike preaches - but it is nice to hear a politician talk the way he did tonight.  Still not sure why he is in the race, and he has a snowball's chance of getting the nomination.  But, anyone who was involved in stopping the draft during Vietnam and getting the Pentagon Papers released deserves a listen.

More Below.........

With all the attention on The Decider's speech this evening The NewsHour had Philip Zelikow, former aid to Condi Rice, and Zbigniew Brzezinski, former National Security Advisor in the Carter Admin, who recently endorsed Obama, on to discuss the Surge, the Petraeus & Crocker Roadshow and the future of US involvement in Iraq.

Zbig did us all proud and did a number on Zel....

The Republican's Playbook:  Spread Fear, "Family Values" and Cutting Taxes.

Rudy is about to utilize the Tax Gambit in New Hampshire:

New Hampshire

What will he be proposing?  According to his campaign:

1. Reduce the corporate tax rate

2. Make permanant the top personal tax rate of 35%

3. Make permanant the $1000 child tax credit

4. Eliminate the estate tax

5. Link the AMT to inflation

6. Let families deduct up to $15,000 if they buy their own health insurance.

More dough below:

Perhaps old news, but I finally caught Bill Moyers excellent program "Buying the War" last night during the begathon on my local PBS station WNET 13 in NY.  Wow.  Must see TV.  My wife and I and our younger daughter who is a currently a journalism major all watched it.  Moyers is a real pro.

More below, Again...

There have been some excellent recent diaries about the issue of income being taxed at 15% (capital gains) vs. as ordinary income.  With everything going on this week regarding the Meirs and Taylor hearings, the Moyers broadcast, vote in the House to bring our troops home, and the Home Run Derby, this shouldn't get lost...

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In Friday's NYT there were two items that caught my eye, a front page story about tax loopholes and Paul Krugman's editorial in which he states:

"A couple of weeks ago, Warren Buffett pointed out that he pays on average federal income tax of 17.7 percent while his receptionist pays about 30 percent"

More below....