The Daily Double (Friday)

It’s No ‘Dead Girls’ Or ‘Live Boys’
But It’s Still a Scandal: Hookergate
In the wake of the revelation that Randall “Duke” Cunningham may have been plied with free limo service, hotel rooms and prostitutes by defense contractors - and the suggestion that other lawmakers might be implicated - Wonkette ventures a guess at some of the [...]

Popularity: 1%

More Fun With Lexis-Nexis:
Getting Our Priorities Straight

Sure, we sold our souls a long time ago when we first got into this journalism game. But it’s still makes you shiver when you catch a glimpse of your long-departed conscience.
Since April 1, here are the respective mentions in U.S. newspapers for the following names:
Kofi Annan: 84
Jared Paul Stern: 108
Hey, if it’s any consolation, [...]

Popularity: 1%

Pentagon’s New Iraq Flack Once Left
Classified Material at a Starbucks

The Pentagon is set to announce a new press secretary, Eric Ruff, to help the department do a more effective job at getting out news from Iraq.
One of Ruff’s qualifications? He’s got “good access” to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. That’s a bit of an understatement.
If you remember that far back, in March 2004, Ruff left a hand-drawn map to [...]

Popularity: 2%

The Daily Double (Thursday)

Bush’s SBA Nominee Has Rep
For Bullying Small Businesses
Steven Preston, the lawn maintenance executive tapped by the White House to replace Hector Barreto as the head of the Small Business Administration, could face some tough questioning at his confirmation hearings.
As executive vice president of Illinois-based ServiceMaster, Preston had a reputation for bullying small mom-and-pop businesses and [...]

Popularity: 1%

Hey, They All Look The Same…
NY Post ID’s Wrong Terror Suspect

Maybe it’s just too difficult for the anti-terror crusaders at the NY Post to tell their suspects apart.
To illustrate their story about the subway bomb plotters now on trial in Brooklyn’s federal district court, the tab wrongly ID’d this photo of suspect James Elshafay (who isn’t even mentioned in their story, which focuses solely on [...]

Popularity: 1%

A Tale of Two Back-Scratchers:
Exxon’s Raymond & Chase’s Shipley

Was Lee Raymond’s $400 million retirement package just a big return favor from ExxonMobil compensation committee member Walter V. Shipley?
After all, Raymond awarded Shipley a multimillion-dollar retirement package when Shipley left Chase in 1999 and Raymond sat on that company’s compensation committee.
All the blame heaped on Raymond for the size of his package is a [...]

Popularity: 4%

The Daily Double (Tuesday)

Venezuela’s Chavez Plans
More Oil Discounts For U.S. Poor

Venezuelan firebrand (and Bush headache) Hugo Chavez vowed to greatly expand the discounted home heating oil program he started last year for needy people in Massachusetts and other northeastern states, reports the Boston Globe.
Chavez made the pledge after meeting in Caracas with a group including Representative William D. [...]

Popularity: 1%

The Daily Double (Monday)

State Security Directors Unsatisfied
With Intelligence-Sharing by Feds
Sixty percent of state homeland security directors are dissatisfied or somewhat dissatisfied with the specificity of the intelligence they receive from the federal government. An additional 55 percent are dissatisfied or somewhat dissatisfied with the actionable quality of the intelligence they receive from the federal government, according to a [...]

Popularity: 1%

Save the Internet!
Don’t Let The Big 4 Take Over

If it was up to a few members of Congress, this lowly blog and millions of others like it could end up costing you money… or waiting for hours.
A diverse coalition of groups from MoveOn and Common Cause to the Gun Owners of America and Glenn Reynolds’ Instapundit have banded together to fight a law [...]

Popularity: 1%

Sen. Feinstein’s Husband
Scores Another Big Military Contract

Diane Feinstein (D-California) is considered a dependably liberal voice in the Senate but she’s been criticized by antiwar activists for her stance on Iraq. And the fact that her husband, Richard Blum, is an active director and major shareholder of URS, one of the country’s biggest defense contractors.
Last week, he made a little more money [...]

Popularity: 1%