Continuing America's neverending drama of corruption among the powerful and secretive, the Boston Globe today carries a story on the Orthodox Church in America (described as an offshoot of the Russian Orthodox Church). The church's former treasurer says church officials misappropriated millions of dollars donated by retired chairman of Archer Daniels Midland Co., Dwayne Andreas, US military chaplains, and ordinary parishioners across the country.

Scotland's the Scotsman has the details from the police report on President Bush's fall from his bicycle while in Scotland last July for the G8 meetings, a fall which caused him to crash into a Constable who had to be sent to the hospital.

Part of the story:

After a hard day's discussion with fellow world leaders, the president was looking for some relaxation. Instead, he ended up the subject of a police report in which the leader of the free world was described, in classic police language, as a "moving/falling object".

I swear. We need a new category here at WTW, something we need to call "Gee, didn't I tell you this was a load of....?"

Remember all the Republican outrage over the sale of six American ports to a UAE-owned company?

Lots of analysis has already gone into Cheney's shotting of Harry Whittington, but I haven't seen anything about trying to recreate the events as described by Cheney and the other witnesses.

But Thom Gunn undertook that dangerous task and describes the results in the Whidbey News Times.

Once a year the people who own and run everything hold a little shindig somewhere, present lots of speakers on lots of economic topics, then present summaries to the peons of the world (and the press, if you think that's different).

This year's World Economic Forum (WEF) annual meeting was in in Davos, Switzerland, where Stephen Roach, Chief Economist for Morgan Stanley, called the American Consumer the "weakest link" in 2006's global growth prospects.  There were plenty of other statements and opinions, too.

I am wondering to myself how long it takes before moving aroud and posting on this lovely but confusing (to me) site gets easier.

There's a phrase one hears bandied about these days...

"Jumping the shark."

According to an article in the Washington Post, Gov. Timothy Kaine (D) of my new home state of Virginia issued an executive order banning discrimination against gays and lesbians in state employment. Attorney General Robert F. McDonnell (R) has issued an opinion that the order violates the state constitution since the state supreme court has never given gay people protected status and the state legislature has voted against non-discrimination legislation that applies to gay people. Kaine's order, according to McDonnell, oversteps his constitutional boundaries and usurps the power of the legislature. For now, Kaine's order holds as McDonnell's opinion holds no legal weight. However, this is probably only the beginning of challenges to the order.

This is also the type of incident which proves that the Republicans aren't just "protecting marriage," but rather promoting the wholesale oppression of LGBT people. The major gay rights organizations, from the early 90's onward, have failed to do anything substantial to stem the tide of anti-gay legislation or to assist in the passage of vital pro-gay laws.

The "born-again" concept is generally applied to Christians who experience a conversion to strict fundamentalist Christianity in their adulthood.  My very unscientific take, based on several born-again Christians I've known, is that many of them discover Christ after leading fairly dissolute lives: drinking, lots of sexual partners, maybe drugs, maybe theft, maybe violence.

But who says that this phenomenon must be limited to Christians simply because it began there and takes its name from biblical text?

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