Returning to the blogosphere...

...following the Christmas frenzy. I've just returned from several lovely days in the Kentish countryside to find that Captain Codpiece's competence remains unchanged in the (thankfully) final days of his imperial reigh.

Truly shocking news

It turns out that Captain Codpiece and his evil minions had no plan to track down and capture (or murder) Osama bin Laden after 11 September 2001.

But then when have they ever had a plan for anything?

Shorter US Treasury spokesperson explaing the $700,000,000,000 price tag on the free money for US banks

"Pick a number, any number, just make sure it's a bloody big one."

And they get (handsomely) paid for this.

What's $13 billion amongst friends?

Yet another $13 billion dollars of American taxpayer money poured down the shit hole in Iraq on projects that "were not needed [or] were never built". I'm glad we have a Harvard MBA for President; aren't you?

No sex for oil!

Bush administration officials tasked with collecting billions of dollars from oil giants in royalty fees found that sex and drugs made their job more enjoyable; no word on rock and roll.

I am certain that the oil companies involved will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law; or not as the case may be.

Hero of the day

U.S. District Judge James Robertson who has told the US Treasury Department to get off its arse and stop fucking over blind people. The Treasury has been stalling this issue for ages; once suggesting that might introduce colours in order to address the problem.

You are what you eat...

...and you probably wouldn't want to be a Hot Pocket Pepperoni Pizza anyway so it's just as well that Nestlé Foods is "recalling approximately (sic) 215,660 pounds" of the tasty treats which you will note are reassuringly marked with the "USDA mark of inspection". Apparently Nestlé believes that these frozen convenience "foods" might contain unidentified "foreign materials".

Have a nice day!

Why do the Republi-cons think that they are qualified to run a country...

...when they're clearly not capable of running an Exchange server. It now seems that the White House is missing at least 225 days of emails and that these are unlikely to be found before Captain Codpiece and his evil minions decamp in January.

Hey - free oil!!! (This is not spam)

But only if you're an oil company and don't really need it!

Attack of the K Street tomatoes

Remember those pesky salmonella tainted tomatoes not so long ago. You remember, the ones no one has as yet figured out where they came from. Well it seems that the reason non one has as yet figured out where they came from is due to the unstinting efforts of highly paid lobbyists for the food industry who wanted to make sure no one could know where they came from reduce unnecessary and costly paperwork.

And the incompetence continues!

Let's get tough on Iran by ensuring that, during the reign of Captain Codpiece, US trade with Iran increased 10 fold! Well done everyone.

Finally after 7.5 years Captain Codpiece and his evil minions get something right!

And then fucking go and apologise for it! After the White House gave out a biographic sketch of Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi, lifted directly from the Encyclopedia of World Biography, that quite truthfully states, and I paraphrase here, that Berlusconi is a sleazy and corrupt opportunist (with a fetish for giving himself immunity from prosecution as soon as he gets into office).

Well I have a few words for deputy White House spokesmodel Tony Fratto the bio that you released may not reflect the opinion of Our Great Leader or the US government but they certainly reflect the opinion of any American who has any grasp of what is happening in the wider world! You, Mr. Fratto, do not speak for me!

Your tax dollars at work

That institution most beloved by American neo-cons, the British Broadcasting Corporation, has investigated the huge scale fraud and waste that is American "aid" to Iraq and found 23 billion USD "missing". Unfortunately if your American your government won't let you know this as most of the fraud and incompetence is covered by gag orders obtained by the Pentagon.

US officials sacked for incompetence!

Let us hope that the sackings of Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne and the service's chief of staff, Gen. T. Michael "Buzz" Moseley, for their incompetence in nuclear affairs is the start of a trend. Just think how much money the government could save if every one of the incompetent officials appointed by Captain Codpiece had their employment terminated. It would probably cover a couple of hours of the illegal occupation of Iraq!

Pot, met kettle

From the administration that gave us "heckuva job Brownie" comes this compelling proof that Americans do not in fact have any sense of irony. The following is a quote from US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Scot Marciel about the response to the cyclone in Burma:

"Every day that goes by and more people suffer, increasingly the blame falls on the government."

He is of course correct; both in the case of Burma and the American gulf coast where there are still families living in toxic trailers nearly three years after Hurricane Katrina. Our thanks to Mr. Marciel, a suspiciously French sounding name, for confessing the administration's failings!

When you have no shame you have no shame

Crooks and Liars has a clip from a 60 Minutes piece about the shameful conditions in which the US government "houses" asylum seekers and other immigrants.

I couldn't help but noticing that the government organisation that provides, or more often fails to provide, health care to these detainees goes by the moniker Department of Immigrant Health Services (DIHS). Funny how those discussing the lack of adequate care provided and their questioners keep spelling out the name as D-I-H-S rather than attempting to pronounce the acronym. I don't know about you but I would probably pronounce it, perhaps appropriately, as "DIES".

Nothing succeeds like failure!

Balfour Beatty and Atkins, who were partners in the failed Private Finance Initative enterprise to maintain and upgrade London's underground that left the taxpayer holding a £2 billion bill, have been awarded a £5 billion contract to widen the M25.

Nice doing business with you.

Just how incompent and corrupt do you have to be...

...to get sacked by Captain Codpiece for incompetence and corruption? At least as incompetent and corrupt as (former) head of the GSA Lurita Doan. Somehow I think there must be something else that we don't, as yet, know because, as the record of the administration of George W. Bush clearly demonstrates, mere incompetence, corruption and illegality has never been reason enough before!

This fills me with confidence, this does

One would think that in replacing disgraced and under investigation former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Alphonso Jackson in a time when the country's housing market is, at best, in turmoil and when record numbers of American families are losing their homes it would be important to pick a replacement based on experience and competence, or not.

Instead Captain Codpiece has picked a man with no housing experience whatsoever, current head of the Small Business Administration Steve Preston formally of Steve's Roach Away Lawn and Pest Service.

Feeling safer yet?

The US government's General Accounting Office does think you should. The title of their report?

"The United States Lacks a Comprehensive Plan to Destroy the Terrorist Threat and Close the Safe Haven in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas."

I don't think I'll even bother reading it!