News Roundup for 1/12/09

You don't even get gum

-Headline of the day-
"President Barack Obama Cards Topps Lot 5 Sealed Pack."

This actually comes to us from Political Wire, but I liked the confusing Amazon.com header better.

The deal here is that, for a mere $16.99, you can get five sealed sets of Barack Obama trading cards from Topp's, the baseball card guys. Each pack holds six cards and a sticker. In all, the series will be comprised of 90 cards. According to the copy, "'The upcoming release of our tribute to Barack Obama carries on the company's proud tradition of documenting significant and newsworthy moments in time,' said Topps CEO Scott Silverstein. 'These cards will resonate with the millions of Americans whose passionate outpouring of support provided President-Elect Obama with one of the most memorable and historic victories ever. This educational, entertaining and emotional collection is destined to become an instant classic.'"

So, you've got the collectors plates, the shrinkwrapped silver dollars, the t-shirts, hats, buttons, and and now the trading cards. At this point, I think you could replace everything in your house with an "official" Barack Obama version. The thing is, there's so much of this crap that none of it's going to be worth very much in the future. These'll be worth about as much as women's gymnastics cards.

Still, you'll get "dozens of photos and words, many culled from Obama's own speeches and writings." So there's that. (Amazon.com)


-Someone stop me-
You might remember that Samuel "Joe the Plumber" Wurzelbacher is working as a war correspondent in Israel. What has Joe learned from his minutes and minutes of experience as a journalist? That journalism is bad.

"I’ll be honest with you. I don’t think journalists should be anywhere allowed war..." he says. "I think media should be abolished from, uh, you know, reporting. You know, war is hell. And if you’re gonna sit there and say, 'Well look at this atrocity,' well you don’t know the whole story behind it half the time, so I think the media should have no business in it."

So, not only shouldn't the media report on war, they shouldn't be allowed to report on war. Because it's bad for America or something. Those commies Jefferson and Madison be damned.

Of course, since Joe's a war correspondent now, he's arguing that he shouldn't be allowed to do exactly what he's doing.

You know, when you put it that way... (Think Progress)


-Of rats and sinking ships-
Jonathan Stein points out that "George Voinovich is retiring. Kit Bond is retiring. Sam Brownback is retiring. Mel Martinez is retiring." As a result, the Senate will probably be a lot less Republican in 2010.

That's right, 2009 has barely started and we're already worrying about 2010. Ain't democracy fun? (MoJo Blog)


-Bonus HotD-
"Krauthammer: Bush 'took a shoe for the country.'"

Actually, he dodged a shoe for himself. There's a difference. You'd think a neocon columnist would have more respect for the English language.

Wait, what am I saying? (Think Progress)