If I'm president, I will not only personally go to the U.N., I will go to other capitals.

And I will have my secretary of state legitimately empowered to be able to be a full secretary of state, speaking for the administration, which we now know from Bob Woodward's book is not the case.

The war within this administration over who's in charge of what and whose voice is being listened to is unlike anything I've seen in modern days.--John "F-Bomb" Kerry

Sorry, folks. This guy is one lame-assed individual. With each new book release, this guy's message changes. Not only that, he expects us to base our vote on what the latest book has to say. What about Losing Bin Laden, or Legacy? Should we believe the content of those very convincing books hook, line and sinker while the 9/11 Commission embarasses itself further than anyone could have imagined possible?

A new book proves you should vote for me? Kerry is a pretender who makes it up on the fly. You know. A waffler.

Who's scheduled for 60 Minutes next Sunday? The weekly Bush-bash. Maybe a boyhood friend of his has written a book charging that as early as the third grade, Bush had made his intention to invade Iraq known to most of his classmates and his teachers as well. There's also a book in the works written by a former girlfriend who points out that Bush was voted "Most likely to invade Iraq" by his high school classmates.

Sorry kiddies, but Bob Woodward's book, "Plan of Attack," has less names attached to it than our forum page.

This from Boortz:

In the book Woodward delivers an almost verbatim narrative of the events leading up to the invasion of Iraq. The problem is that, with the exception of President Bush and Vice President Cheney, none of those quotes are attributed. In other words ... you make a choice on whether to believe Bob Woodward, or not to believe him.

It's more or less, a bunch of anonymous dribble coming from who knows where. I knew a long time ago that Dubya's decision to keep so many Clinton staffers on the payroll would come back to bite him as reelection time approached. They are diametrically opposed to his ideology and now they are standing in line waiting for their chance to stab him in the back. I can't wait 'til next Sunday to hear the latest about whomever else has a new book about to be released as the run-up to the election presses on. Here's a likely excerpt:

Despite the seriousness of the situation and the fact that Dick Cheney was leaning towards war in any event, the president seemed more interested in playing his new Xbox title, Rodeo 2004. Colin Powell pleaded with him to pull himself away from the video and finally, an obviously angered Bush threw his controller at Dr. Rice and said, "Goll Dammit! Clinton got blowjobs in here, and I can't even enjoy a video game. What is it now?" At that point, General Tommy Franks reminded him that the time had arrived to settle on a war plan, and vote on whether to implement it. The president flew into a rage. "Jesus H. Tumbleweeds! Do I have to do everything around here? Condi, give me a quarter." "A quarter, sir?" responded Dr. Rice. "A goll danged quarter! Don't you pointy heads know what a plum quarter is?" Bush shot back. Nervously, Dr. Rice rummaged through her attache case and produced a quarter. With the quarter firmly in hand, the president was now ready to inflict a unilateral war upon an unsuspecting nation.

"Dick. You call it, fella. Heads, we invade Iran and Syria. Tails and we invade Iraq and Libya. Ready? Call it in the air."

After the quarter settled on the floor of the oval office, Dick Cheney gleefully carped, "I believe we have tails, sir."

Upon hearing that, the president lurched from his seat and seemed geuinely pleased: "Well, goll darn it! I think we have a winner. Condi, get CENTCOM on the horn. We're throwing a war and you're all invited. Yee-haw! Somebody find my Air Combat II game. I'm in the mood to bomb the sh*t out of somebody. Tommy, wanna play? I'll let you have the stealths."

***Excerpted by permission from the book, War: Crawford, Texas Style by Professor Alfred E. Neuman, President Clinton's under-secretary of something or other.

This is a fascinating read. Who knew while tripping over pallets and piles of empty cartons that folks were patronizing the German equivalent of Wal-Mart?

Rutro! The idiots of the world will soon have something else to fear and they won't even be able to take prisoners if, or when they get lucky and down one of our attack aircraft. The X-45A is on it's way.

Wowie freaking zowie! Check this interesting morsel from Editor and Publisher.com:

AAN Promises Important Iraq Story Tomorrow

By E&P Staff

Published: April 19, 2004 2:10 PM EST

NEW YORK In an unusual move for the organization, the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies (AAN) will release what it promises will be a bombshell article related to the Iraq conflict at 10 a.m. Eastern Standard Time on Tuesday. It will be made available free of charge for publication on all AAN-member Web sites, as well as for print, and more than 60 members papers have expressed interest in using it, according to Executive Director Richard Karpel.

The 3,000-word story, embargoed until Tuesday but obtained by E&P today, is based on a "closely held" memo purportedly written by a U.S. government official detailed to the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA). It was provided to writer Jason Vest by "a Western intelligence official." The memo offers a candid assessment of Iraq's bleak future -- as a country trapped in corruption and dysfunction -- and portrays a CPA cut off from the Iraqi people after a "year's worth of serious errors."

The article is titled, "Fables of Reconstruction," with a subhed, "A Coalition memo reveals that even true believers see the seeds of civil war in the occupation of Iraq."

Karpel commented, "We have no question that the memo is authentic."

Vest is an experienced investigative reporter who is currently senior correspondent for The American Prospect. He has worked on staff at U.S. News and & World Report and The Washington Post, written for The Atlantic Monthly, and was named as an "Unsung Hero of Washington Journalism" by American Journalism Review in 2002.

Hoo hoo! We shall see.

I racked up 28 miles on the Rock Stomper since Saturday, and I have also resumed my long dormant weight lifting program. Now, if only I could get my hands on some of that stuff Barry Bonds and Sammy Sosa are not taking.

A new business in downtown Wilkes-Barre? Who could have thunk it? Actually, you had better get used to it.

I happened upon one of our Parking Enforcement Dudes while out and about today, and while hangin' with him for only a matter of minutes, some pathetic soul in a swanky business suit practically begged him to ignore his car that he had just parked illegally. Why in blazes would you park illegally right in front of the guy writing tickets and then beg him for mercy? Why not cough up the three bucks it'll take to park legally all day long and be done with it? Is it me? Or is every third person only marginally cogent in any respect?

Sign Dude and I attended a meeting for the volunteers gearing up for Saturdays city-wide assault on the silt and garbage left over from McG's disasterous reign. Let's see, we took away 450 garbage bags, two dozen pairs of work gloves, and about twenty reflective vests that resemble those throw-away raincoats sold at Rite-Aid for a buck.

Marie McCormick, our City something or other (I'm kinda beat), talked to those of us in attendance about safety. Good point. Can a few of you good folks lay off the gas pedal come Saturday? We're gonna have folks cleaning stuff along the sides of, and also in the middle of some of our busier thoroughfares. Try not to kill anyone. It would be perfectly understandable if I myself somehow got crunched into the afterlife (or whatever it is that the thought police call it these days), but most of the other folks volunteering their time and sweat probably don't deserve a premature and painful death. Pretend you're Jeff Gordon on Sunday and if you're real lucky, maybe you'll get your lap back without meeting the Dudes manning Rescue 7.

Oh, and feel free to join us on Saturday. It might prove to be fun dodging all those soccer moms hurtling past at 50 miles per hour with a van load of kids.

Wyoming Street won't need to be swept and neither will Madison Street for that matter. April has arrived and that means it's paving season. The really hot stuff is now readily available, so the silly pothole complaints will dry up soon enough. Make note of that for the half-assed folks. In the future, lambast the mayor about the clutter clean-ups (reduced services), and the lack of a city calendar (reduced whatever). Call Walter Griffith. He'll be more than willing to explain to you why our mayor should forfeit his entire salary and 20% of his net worth until a calendar appears on all of our porches.

Speaking of Walter, I caught his free political ad on WILK on Friday. His appearance was replete with incorrect and consistently bloated numbers in an attempt to paint our sitting council members as being "corrupt." Not my words. He equated their enjoying health-care benefits with, I quote, "corruption." When challenged by Sue Henry, he suddenly thought better of throwing that word out there. But..if he had gone unchallenged, he would have successfully planted that word in the minds of WILK's many listeners. Good job, Suzie Q.

He seems to think that he's an investigative reporter the likes of which we've never seen based solely upon his over-used phrase he started every other sentence with: "I exposed..." He also mentioned that our council carbon-based units (gender neutral) are earning between $15,000 and $16,000 per year. He's either misinformed whereas their salaries are concerned, or, again, he's deliberately inflating numbers to paint them in a more negative light. Care to "expose" the truth on that one, Walt?

Try again, Champ. Try spewing a few facts next time.

I gotta go. I got back from that meeting tonight to find my Uncle here drunk as a freakin' skunk and whining about my dead relatives. He smoked his weight in our cigarettes and he seemed to think that my fridge was a "beer kitchen" free for the taking. We were going to call a cab and he started moaning about what it's like to sleep out of doors.

See ya! Don't let the bartender at the Leisure hit you in the back of the skull on the way out. He'll be just fine sleeping it off behind Bielecki's scrap yard as he so frequently does.

Mel Brooks' History of the World: Part I is on. Guess what I'll be doing for the next two hours.

F**K THE POOR!!!

Later