Just POlitics

American oil supplies rise

The Energy Department said oil supplies rose 5.4 million barrels for the week ending March 25. The Energy Department also reported that gasoline inventories fell 2.9 million barrels and distillate supplies dropped 1.1 million barrels.

Also, OPEC decided to suspend talks on raising output by 500,000 barrels per day for the second time in a row. OPEC President Sheik Ahmed Fahd al Ahmed Al Sabah, also the oil minister of Kuwait, said the cartel no longer feels there is a crunch in supply.

"We will resume talks once oil prices increase," Al Sabah said, according to an Associated Press report.

Oil traded below $53 a barrel in May futures as a result of the news.

Pope assassination Russian backed

The Italian newspaper, Corriere della Sera, reports that documents found by the German government indicate that the KGB ordered Bulgarian colleagues to carry out the assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II. The East German service known as the Stasi was left to coordinate the operation and cover up the traces afterwards.

Bulgaria handed the execution of the plot to Turkish extremists, including Mehmet Ali Agca, who pulled the trigger.

The documents consist mostly of letters from Stasi operatives to their Bulgarian counterparts seeking help in covering up traces after the attack and denying Bulgarian involvement.

The Bulgarians have always insisted they were innocent and argued that Agca's story was part of an anti-communist plot by the Italian secret service and the CIA.

Coulter heckled in Kansas

Ann Coulter gave a lecture at Kansas University and found herself cheered and heckled.

"I think there are some people in the audience who meant to be at the sexual reorientation class down the hall," Coulter said, in response to the heckling.

When the heckling began to threaten the lecture, Coulter asked, "Could 10 of the largest College Republicans start walking up and down the aisles and start removing anyone shouting?" Coulter stated. "Otherwise, this lecture is over."

Some students did respond. However, later when the heckling began again uniformed public safety officials removed some of the more boisterous hecklers.

Coulter’s lecture was filled with her usual vitriolic invectives about Democrats and liberals. For example, she called Sen. Ted Kennedy a "human dirigible" and the Democrats' "spiritual leader."

President Bush in Iowa

President Bush once again visited the heartland trying to sell the need to fix the fundamental flaws in Social Security. Social Security was set up so that those currently working will pay for those who are currently retired -- a system that has constantly seen the need to raise taxes to pay for the disparity of declining numbers of workers.

Now, with the last bubble of the baby boomers following World War II and the Korean War, Social Security faces a looming crisis of insolvency. More importantly, the system of those working paying for those who are retired will no longer be sustainable in the future.

Today, 3.3 workers pay for one retiree. Soon, the number of workers will drop to only two workers paying for one retiree. In the not so distant future, the number will fall to 1.85 workers paying for one retiree. The only solution to this problem is for workers to pay for their own retirement and receive the benefit of higher earnings.

As President Bill Clinton said, there are only three possible solutions to the Social Security problem: higher taxes, cut benefits, or higher earnings. It is impossible to receive higher earnings when everything being paid in gets paid out.

President Bush’s trip to Iowa demonstrates that many in the nation don’t get the problem. The trip to Iowa is in part to shore up Sen. Charles Grassley, who as chairman of the Senate Finance Committee is the lead in passing any Social Security reform.

"There is not the significant momentum it takes to get a bill through the Senate," Grassley has said.

Democrats and AARP have continued to offer no alternative other than to say that personal accounts destroy Social Security. AARP was in Iowa running TV ads and holding press releases prior to the President’s forum in Cedar Rapids.

The good news for the President remains that more of the public recognizes that there is a problem with Social Security and it needs fixed.

Conservatives rallying to DeLay

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay has garnered the support of Washington insider conservative groups to combat ethics charges that are being highlighted by liberal organizations, who are beginning ad campaigns against him.

"I think in the last couple of weeks, it's become apparent to many conservative groups in Washington that this is really, in many ways, an attack on them and their ideas, using DeLay as the surrogate target," said Gary Bauer, chairman of the Campaign for Working Families, a political action committee.

"Conservative leaders across the country are working now to make sure that any politician who hopes to have conservative support in the future had better be in the forefront as we attack those who attack Tom DeLay," Morton Blackwell, Republican National Committee member from Virginia and a member of American Conservative Union's board, said.

Hanoi Jane

Jane Fonda has been interviewed by Leslie Stahl on CBS’s "60 Minutes" program for Sunday. During the program Fonda admits that her sitting on anti-aircraft guns in Hanoi that killed American pilots was wrong.

“The image of Jane Fonda, Barbarella, Henry Fonda's daughter...sitting on an enemy aircraft gun was a betrayal...the largest lapse of judgment that I can even imagine," Fonda said.

However, during the interview she states that she is comfortable with being photographed with American POWs because everyone used the POWs for propaganda purposes.

"There are hundreds of American delegations that had met with the POWs. Both sides were using the POWs for propaganda....It's not something that I will apologize for," Fonda said.

DeLay as liability

Rep. Tom DeLay is viewed by the Democrat National Committee as a vehicle that will enable them to hurt the Republican Party. Here is part of a recent e-mail the DNC sent:

Meet Rep. Tom DeLay (R-TX), the man Republicans have chosen as their Majority Leader in the House of Representatives.

Tom DeLay is at the center of a bewildering array of investigations into corruption, abuse of power, and ethics violations.

As the courts and committees investigate DeLay's misdeeds and hand down indictments, keeping track of all the scandals can be a full-time job. So we thought it would helpful to offer folks a quick and easy guide:

http://www.democrats.org/delaycasefile

People need to get to know Tom DeLay. He personifies the kind of government we're getting from Republicans -- corrupt, power-hungry, and out of touch.

They also need to know that his Republican colleagues in the House have been complicit in his pattern of sleaze. They even changed the ethics rules to protect him, and packed the Ethics Committee with a bunch of DeLay cronies for good measure.

Spread the Word

It is vital that you help us spread the word about Tom DeLay. The more people who know about his record, the more pressure he'll face.

Hillary’s plea

Hillary wants her friends to send money so she can beat off her terrible enemy’s attacks. Here is a part of her latest e-mail:

Today, I am writing to ask you to help my own campaign for re-election to the Senate. You won't be surprised to learn that Republicans have named me their "#1 target" in 2006. The right-wing attack machine is already warning that they will use the same smear tactics against me that they have used against other Democrats who stand in their way. One right-wing strategist boasts that his "Swift-boat" type ads will "bloody" me up. The New York State Republican chairman says, "We have launched an aggressive campaign to unseat Hillary at any cost."

Kristol pie’d at Earlham

William Kristol, conservative pundit, was hit with an ice cream pie while speaking at Earlham College. The student not only hit Kristol but Earlham College President Doug Bennett as well. The student, who is unnamed, faces possible expulsion.

Kristol finished his lecture.

Possibly Ann Coulter could give him lessons in ducking pies. Coulter missed being hit by a pie in one of her lecture at a university in 2004.

Berger pleading guilty

Former Clinton national security advisor Samuel (Sandy) R. Burger has agreed to plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge and give up his security clearance for three years for removing classified material from a government archive. Berger has also agreed to pay $10,000 in fines for the infraction.

Berger is suspected of sanitizing the Clinton record of embarrassing documents that would have implicated the Clinton administration’s failure to prevent the 9-11 attacks and fight terrorism. Berger admits that he illegally took five documents from the National Security archive and destroyed three of the documents.