I don't post news items like I used to a few years back but there are two things in the news today that I've got to comment on.

The first is GM's announcement that they're closing four North American plants manufacturing SUVs and looking at selling the Hummer brand so they can focus instead on more fuel efficient cars. The NY Times has a pretty good article on it but the GLARING OMISSION is that they don't mention anything about the CAFE standards. The American auto industry and their Republican lackeys have been fighting increases in the fuel efficiency since 1999. It seems like the US auto execs were the only people who didn't see Peak Oil and the end of the SUV coming... sure they'll tell you they've got hybrid SUVs the only problem that you can't buy them, they're just a PR device. I'd love to see some shareholder action to clean house and put some execs in place that have half a clue.

The second is Hillary and her Terminator impression. I'd defended her right to stay in the race until all the states had voted--even though it was obvious back in February that she wasn't going to be the nominee. But as of tonite this has gotten silly. Obama now has the delegates but she still can't quite let go and concede. Shit, I'll donate $20 to help pay off her campaign debts if she throws in the towel this week.

"There was a saying around the White House that if a place was too small, too poor, or too dangerous, the President couldn't go, so send the First Lady."

And Sinbad... and Sheryl Crow... and the First Daughter? Yeah, let's talk about experience and judgement some more.

I was shocked to read today that Steve Gilliard, author of The News Blog, my favorite blogs for the past few years died on Saturday. He did an amazing job summarizing the news of the day with biting commentary. Before I found his site, I'd do several hours of news surfing each day. Once I started following it, I didn't really bother surfing news anymore, if Steve didn't post about it, it probably wasn't that interesting. Since he fell ill, I've pretty much stopped reading the news. Sure I'll take a look at Daily Kos every now and then but without Steve's wonderful commentary, it's just not worth the time. My deepest condolences to his family and all his other readers.