Death at WalMart

The LAT has a story on today's front page that describes the scene on Black Friday as a rioting crowd charged a WalMart store in a New York suburb, killing a store worker. The story is detailed and well written. What happened is disgusting. People in the crowd behaved like animals, which suggests that humans aren't far removed from the animal kingdom.

LAT: Obama team crafts ambitious stimulus plan

The LAT reported that this morning, before Obama's radio address. According to the LAT, the Obama team was considering some ideas that appeal to special interests.

Pelosi reversal

The LAT reports this morning that the carmakers may get $14 billion from the previously authorized $25 billion Energy Department advanced technology fund. They could have had that before Thanksgiving if Pelosi and Harry Reid had not blocked it. The Bush administration urged Congress to take that approach in mid-November.

Lexington: Obama outlines his stimulus plan

In the December 4th issue of The Economist, the left wing columnist who opines under the Lexington pseudonym wrote that Barack Obama has outlined "his proposed stimulus plan. A lame-duck Congress may even pass a version of that plan before Mr Obama comes to office."

Must have missed it. Where is it? What is it? And how, with their one-vote margin in the Senate, will the Democratic Congress pass Obama's nonexistent "proposed stimulus plan?" Does Lexington write the column from Europe?

Today, in a weekly radio address, Obama did outline a stimulus plan with, according to the Washington Post, "no price tag and few details." Maybe Lexington can reuse the December 4th column.

The carmakers

If a company is 30 days from being unable to pay its bills, as GM says it is, the discussion should be about how to end it, how to liquidate, who gets assigned to turn off the lights. The party's over. The end is near. Hoping an angel will appear who will save the company is fantasy.

With only 30 days left, management has waited too long. All the nonessential assets that are salable should already have been sold, especially the corporate jets and the headquarters building. The home office should be like a ghost-town. It should be possible to fire a shotgun through the office and not hit anyone.

With only 30 days left, remaining employees should be shredding documents, auctioning off office equipment. Bankruptcy lawyers should occupy the remaining desks and chairs. The liquidation plan should focus on salvaging as much as can be salvaged for shareholders, if anything can be salvaged.

With only 30 days left, the rats should be deserting the sinking ship. The company has no future and employees know it, and they know they have no future with the company. Resumes will be polished. Job interviews will be arranged. Next month, employees will be collecting unemployment.

GM is either in this situation or its CEO is lying to Congress. Either way, he needs to be canned.

Parker: Republicans need less God

On the WaPo op-ed pages today, Kathleen Parker returns to a question she raised in a previous column: What's wrong with the Republican Party. She claimed then that Republicans have a religion problem. Today, she tries to reinforce that argument, or restate it:

Reacting to Ramesh Ponnuru, who wrote in National Review "that social conservatives 'could present themselves more attractively,' and 'pick their spokesmen more wisely,'" Parker replied:

"That's a start, but let's take it another step. How about social conservatives make their arguments without bringing God into it? By all means, let faith inform one's values, but let reason inform one's public arguments."

"That was and remains my point. It isn't so much God causing the GOP problems; it's his fan club."

"The broad perception among centrists, moderates, conservative Democrats, renegade Republicans, etc., is that the GOP is the party of white Christians to the exclusion of others, some of whom might also be social conservatives."

Well, she certainly cleared up that.

There's a perception that Republicans are white, either that or they're Christian or they're both white and Christian. And the perception is caused by social conservatives bringing God into their arguments, which Parker forbids. Why? It offends her. Why does it offend her? It isn't clear.

But it isn't God that offends Parker so much. As she says, "It's his fan club." They turn her off. Why? It isn't clear.

Got it?

OCR: California's voters could break budget deadlock

A column on today's Orange County Register op-ed pages argues that California's budget crisis could be solved by putting it up to a vote of the people. They could be presented with alternatives -- say a tax increase or a spending cut. The people could vote for one or the other and the winning strategy would be employed to break the deadlock.

It's a dumb idea. Voters would be pleased to increase someone else's taxes, just not their own. Or to cut someone else's favorite governmental program, just not their own. TV ads would misrepresent the issues. Voters would get confused. It makes no sense.

In the November 4th election, despite an $11 billion budget shortfall (and growing), California's voters approved a $10 billion bond issue for a high speed rail line connecting northern and southern California. Why would we expect better judgement from voters in the future?