KEEP MILLEN! We Packer Fans love him in Detroit. I'm guessing the real onus is on William Clay Ford. Not such a good track record, with what's happening at Ford and with the poor, poor Lions.

I am going to take a brief moment in the new year to reinforce what I said earlier about the dangers of YouTube and related mediums, if taken too far. This article, which related to an open investigation as to whom was responsible for filming and posting Saddam's execution, is a further spark, at least in my mind. The chants of "Muqtada, Muqtada, Muqtada" you hear in the background might as well be retranslated to say "burn the witch!" And it makes me wonder if, in the official "4th branch" of government (media), there is no check or balance, what the future holds.

The holidays were fantastically chaotic. All of my family have safely returned home or, in the case of my sis and family, have safely arrived at their next stop. Now it's on to the resolutions, among them how to better handle embarrassing situations involving disrespectful behavior from an increasingly erratic friend. I'll save that subject for a later time, after I figure out a way to handle the situation personally. It is not clear to me how this is to be done.

On another (more) uplifting topic, I'm almost finished with Obama's "Audacity of Hope." My first thoughts to those who would cite executive inexperience as a disqualifier for the presidency: After six plus years of experienced neocons running the show, wisdom trumps experience in '08!

It was a war on terror, a war against "islamic fascists," and now an "ideological war." This guy plants more memes than Iowans plant corn, or Afghanis plant poppies or....something. Help me out!

Border fence firm snared for hiring illegal workers. Need I say more? Must I? Okay, I will. My entire family will be here in the Bay Area for the holidays! That includes members from Paris, Berlin and Oshkosh (ok, Paris France but Berlin, Wisconsin, not Germany). I am so excited I could just poop!

Ok, so I stand corrected about the Iraq study report. I've read about halfway and so far it's looking like 160 pages of honest accounting of the situation over there. 3,000 dead Iraqis per month? All of this talk about how 9/11 changes everything...I have to ask: 3,000 innocents here in America died on 9/11, and that same amount of Iraqi civilians have died...each and every month since 2003? Nothing has changed. It's the same old shoot first, ask questions later mentality that the Bush administration engaged in. If they were true to the maxim that a different kind of world requires a different kind of response, I wonder what would have happened had this report come out before we invaded Iraq? I wonder. All we have done is to react in the same way that nations have reacted since history was recorded, which is to kick some ass and continue the cycle of violence.

This is not to say that by us not doing that, that Al Qaeda would not continue to try and kill Americans at home and abroad. But by reacting the way we did, we've perversely given them way more power than they ever would have had.

Ok, so I stand corrected about the Iraq study report. I've read about halfway and so far it's looking like 160 pages of honest accounting of the situation over there. 3,000 dead Iraqis per month? All of this talk about how 9/11 changes everything...I have to ask: 3,000 innocents here in America died on 9/11, and more than 10x that (and that's being conservative) of Iraqi civilians have died. Nothing has changed. It's the same old shoot first, ask questions later mentality that the Bush administration engaged in. If they were true to the maxim that a different kind of world requires a different kind of response, I wonder what would have happened had this report come out before we invaded Iraq? I wonder.

Why do I get the feeling that this Iraq "study group" is about to publish a 400 page report that can be translated into three simple words: Stay the course?