Quick Hits

Nearing the end of Festivus here, so let me unfurl my stocking-stuffers of news and analysis:

• This is going to come as a shock to you, but talks with North Korea ended without agreement on anything. I know, because you thought the Bush Administration was so good at diplomacy. By the way, isn't it interesting that negotiations with Syria and Iran (who was just sanctioned by the UN today) are completely wrong because they would "reward bad behavior," yet we just finished talks with the country that blew up a nuclear weapon underground earlier this year? The foreign policy of the US is currently incoherent.

• Moving to good news, Sudan has acceeded to UN demands for a peacekeeping force in their country. It'll end up being a hybrid of UN and AU troops. The US did appear to provide some diplomatic muscle to get this proposal to agreement. However, it's unclear if this force will have a clear mission to stop the janjaweed attacks.

• I got blog-spammed by the National Association of Manufacturers, who call the imminent card-check legislation "one that will allow unions to win recognition without an election, and by using coercion." Right, because manufacturers NEVER use coercion to bust unions. Tell you what, I'll go with elections for unions as mandated by the NLRA, if corporations agree to stop bringing in union busters and that the election must happen within 15 days from when it's called. Sound good? Otherwise, give me card-check. Because collective bargaining is a right and not a privilege.

• Curt Weldon, um, a federal grand jury has some questions for you. He didn't disclose a subpoena he received before the November election because he wanted to save his own ass. Also the grand jury wants access to his Congressional files. See you in the Big House, pal.

• Never to late to cash in on manufactured outrage. There are only two shopping days left until the end of the War on Christmas. It was obvious that those whining about this made-up war were doing so for political advantage; apparently they were doing it for financial advantage as well.

• This is sickening:

WASHINGTON, Dec. 22 — FEMA trailers, the cramped, impersonal housing units that have come to define the federal response to major disasters, may be on the way out, thanks to $388 million in federal grants, announced Friday, that will test half a dozen cozier, more permanent models of postdisaster housing [...]

Mississippi came out on top in the contest for the grants, receiving $280.8 million, compared with $74.5 million for Louisiana, $16.5 million for Texas and $15.7 million for Alabama.

Officials in Louisiana were furious, saying their state, which suffered the greatest losses in Hurricanes Katrina and Rita last year, had been shortchanged.

“FEMA has clearly learned very little from its mistakes, let alone basic math or a sense of fundamental fairness,” Senator Mary L. Landrieu, Democrat of Louisiana, said in a statement.

Not that Mississippi doesn't need better housing for its storm victims, but there's a political component to this. Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour is a former RNC Chair, lobbyist, and skillful plunderer of federal coffers. This looks like a case of rewarding friends and punishing enemies.

• Just go read this. Hilarious.

• Jim Webb was not the source for the exchange between him and the President at the White House that caused so much controversy recently. "This was something that emanated from the White House. I did not say anything about this for two weeks. I said nothing publicly at all." The White House leaked this out to portray Webb as an angry Bush-hater. Instead it played as Bush being callous and insensitive to a man whose son is fighting in Iraq. Nice job, Rove and the gang. And these guys are supposed to be masters of politics?

• The Boston Globe gets points in noticing that, while Keith Ellison has been singled out by the right for being a Muslim elected to Congress, nobody has said a peep about Hank Johnson and Mazie Hirono, two Buddhists elected this year. Is the country being overrun by the Buddhist menace? Are they going to rewrite the Constitution into a series of koans?

• Finally, funny stuff lampooning another symbol of intolerance.

A satirical new Web site pokes fun at Hazleton Mayor Lou Barletta by claiming he has banned Santa Claus, "the nation's most prominent undocumented worker," from the city.

Playing off the mayor's recent crackdown on illegal immigrants, the elaborate NoSantaForHazleton.com claims that Barletta has launched a campaign against the jolly old elf, who is "not an American, nor is he legally recognized for residency or occupational purposes in this country."

Appearing unlawfully for too long to remember, the site says facetiously, Santa Claus employs "hundreds to thousands of elves in what are clearly described as sweatshop or slave labor-type conditions." That undercuts the American workforce in favor of unfair foreign competition or informal domestic laborers, the site contends.

We do need to fix our severe trade imbalance with the North Pole. Why do we let these bearded, jolly illegals into the country? Into our homes? Into our chimneys? Giving gifts to OUR kids?