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GOP consultant Karl Rove got directly involved Friday in Hawaii's hotly contested Congressional race between Republican incumbent Rep. Charles Djou and Democrat Colleen Hanabusa. Rove's group American Crossroads started running an ad on Hawaii television stations Friday critical of Hanabusa. The TV commercial says, "There are problems in paradise, and Colleen Hanabusa would make things worse. Hanabusa supports Nancy Pelosi's tsunami of spending. She defends the trillion dollar health care takeover that raises our costs and cuts Medicare by over $500 billion. She has said she will support the cap and trade energy tax that will raise the cost of...

Because of overstaffing, the U.S. Postal Service selects 1,125 employees daily to sit in empty “standby rooms.” They are not allowed to work, read, play cards, watch television, or do anything. This $50 million annual cost may be dumped in the taxpayers’ laps if the debt-ridden Postal Service receives a federal bailout. Stimulus dollars are being spent on mascot costumes, electric golf carts, and a university study examining how much alcohol college freshmen women require before agreeing to casual sex. Washington is spending $2.6 million training Chinese prostitutes to drink more responsibly on the job. This is the kind of...

The maneuvering behind a Harry Reid-backed sweeping new energy tax that will hit small business and the middle-class in a down economy ... " Late yesterday Majority Leader Reid re-filed a substitute to the small business jobs bill. In addition to the substitute, there is a first degree amendment relating to the modification of the expanded 1099 reporting provision enacted as part of the health reform bill. The modification is an alternative to the Republican amendment to repeal the provision. The Republican provision is offset with spending cuts. The Democratic alternative introduced by Baucus is proposed to be paid for...

The Senate sponsors of a sweeping climate change bill are drafting a scaled-back version focused on electric power plants in a bid to salvage a role for greenhouse gas curbs in the Senate energy debate. Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) this week will start circulating a draft of their narrowed plan as they try to convince Democratic leaders to include a carbon pricing component in a broad energy package that may hit the Senate floor next week. “I am very optimistic that we can pass something here that deals with energy and gets us started in the...

Democrats in Congress haven’t made any moves to extend the Bush tax cuts of 2006, so workers of all income levels can expect to see a 5% increase in their income taxes, and additional tax increases from a number of other areas. The taxes affected include the capital gains tax, the alternative minimum tax, education deductions, sales tax exemptions. They also include small tax increases, like a rollback in tax breaks for tuition expenses and donations of books to public schools. "If you believe the current consensus, we could potentially see the top income tax rate hiked back up to...

In pushing the latest attempt by liberals and RINOS (Republicans in Name Only) in Congress to get a 'cap and trade' energy bill and other legislation passed, politicians in Washington have pulled out 'the God card.' House speaker Nancy Pelosi, for example, stated that in her conversations with Catholic priests she said, 'I need you to speak from the pulpit about this issue. There are people in the pew who do not support the bill. And they need to know that is a manifestation of our living out the Gospel.' And then, Senator John Kerry, D-Massachusetts, in announcing the new...

Yet another example of the left’s promised transparency. Senators Liebermann, Kerry and Graham have taken the Obama Energy Tax Bill and skipped taking it to a committee and handed it over to Senator Reid so when he deems the time is right, Reid can ram it down our throats and take more of our hard earned money. The promises of transparency are being disregarded on all fronts and nothing but quiet on this issue thus far from either side of the aisle. Robert A. Heinlein said it best, “Secrecy is the keystone to all tyranny. Not force, but secrecy and...

(This was sent as an email alert) Senate Hides Obama's Energy Tax Bill From Debate "If we introduce it, (correctly) it'll get referred to committees," - Lieberman - Vote Expected In 2 Weeks At The End Of April Lieberman a so-called independent who caucuses with Senate Democrats and fellow co-energy conspirators Kerry, D-MA, and RINO Graham, R-SC, will NOT introduce their Phony Secret Energy Tax Bill via the normal Senate process, but will instead simply hand it over to Reid. Lieberman said "We want him to be able to work with it and bring it out onto the floor as...

Cap and trade is not that complicated. Recently Ag Secretary Vilsack has been out promoting cap and trade and touting its benefits to farmers. Well, let’s look at these benefits that Sec. Vilsack is selling to the American people. Sec. Vilsack is selling this terrible legislation by pointing out the money farmers can make from planting trees which is considered a “carbon offset.” Therefore, during a recession those in Washington would rather re-forest our land, which Vilsack said would provide “significant income opportunities to America’s farmers and ranchers.” This is absurd. When did even the most basic rules about supply...

Pollution Control: From cars to coal mines, the imposition of economy-killing restrictions is under way. Are the new EPA regulations on auto emissions the precursor to regulating carbon dioxide by executive order? In announcing the Environmental Protection Agency's first regulations on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from cars, Administrator Lisa Jackson has promised they won't be the last such rules stemming from the EPA's "endangerment finding" that carbon dioxide, six pounds of which every human being exhales every day, is a dangerous pollutant. "These are the first regulations that cover greenhouse gas emissions in the United States," Jackson told reporters in...

Some moderate Democrats still are “really anguished” over voting for the energy bill, Rep. Jason Altmire told Fox News, and they “would be reluctant now to vote for health care and take a second vote that might be unpopular in their district.”With Republicans raising the volume of their protests and House Democratic leaders uncertain if they have enough rank-and-file support, some moderate Democrats sense that passing a health care reform bill will be as difficult as the House’s energy bill, which was approved by a slim margin June. That has caused quite a bit of hand-wringing among the Democrats. Some...

For many years, Americans indulged the global-warming fantasies of Al Gore and the loopy left because it didn't cost them anything (at least directly), it didn't materially affect their lifestyles, and it made some of them feel all warm, fuzzy and green. Now warmists are in power in Washington and pushing cap-and-trade legislation that will raise energy costs for the average household, conservatively, by a few thousand dollars a year while increasing America's dependence on intermittent and unreliable energy sources but without meaningfully changing earth's climate. Not surprisingly, Americans no longer are all that hot for global warming. Actual data...

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Max Baucus said Tuesday he has "serious reservations" about climate legislation newly unveiled by his Democratic colleagues, signaling that lawmakers may have to pull back from some ambitious goals in order to line up needed votes. "I have some concerns about the overall direction of the bill," Mr. Baucus (D., Mont.) said at the start of hearings in the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. "I have serious reservations with the depth of the mid-term reduction target in the bill and the lack of preemption of the Clean Air Act." Mr. Baucus -- who's also chairman of...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A Senate committee on Tuesday launches three long days of hearings on a Democratic climate bill in a bid to further convince an international summit in December that Washington is serious about tackling global warming. The Senate's Environment and Public Works Committee will kick off Tuesday's hearing at 9:30 a.m. EDT with a panel of heavy-hitters from President Barack Obama's Cabinet: the secretaries of energy, transportation and interior and the head of the Environmental Protection Agency. Joining them will be the chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. According to an EPA statement, the officials will focus...

Sending Anita Dunn—who is probably not enjoying her proverbial 15 minutes of fame—out onto the north lawn of the White House to attack Fox News is serving its purpose. The responsibility for determining which of the national news networks are legitimate and which ones are not is something the founders did not include in the executive powers section of the Constitution. One might even argue that the inclusion of the First Amendment to the Bill of Rights is a pretty clear sign they thought that giving any part of the federal government the power to do so would not, to...

This is an excerpt from a recently obtained internal E mail written by a gleeful GE executive. “On climate change we were able to work closely with key authors of the Waxman-Markey climate and energy bill, recently passed by the House of Representatives. If this bill is enacted into law it would benefit many GE businesses.” “…benefit many GE businesses” becomes clearer by following the paper trail of “donations” from GEPAC the lobbying arm of General Electric Corporation. GE/Democrat pay to play scheme Last year most of GEPAC’s contributions went to Democrats. This year almost all of its cash bought...

WASHINGTON � Sen. Barbara Boxer left little doubt she was having a particularly good time Wednesday. Wearing sunglasses, California's junior Democratic senator made her way to a stage on the east lawn of the Capitol, then stood in front of a huge U.S. flag and waved to a throng of supporters as U2's "It's a Beautiful Day" roared through the loudspeakers. "What a great day!" enthused the senator. "This is like giving birth again!" Boxer was celebrating her alliance with Massachusetts Democratic Sen. John Kerry to introduce a long-awaited bill that, if approved, could land her in the history books....

Cap-and-trade energy tax legislation appears stalled, at least for now, in the U.S. Senate. But that doesn’t mean the cap-and-trade energy tax isn’t imminent. Senate Environment Committee Chairwoman Barbara Boxer hasn’t even introduced the bill yet; new Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Blanche Lincoln has declared the House bill dead on arrival; and there are several other cross-cutting controversies that divide Democrats on the bill. The Obama administration is unfazed. They are moving full steam ahead with an even more costly regulatory scheme in the name of global warming—shoehorning the regulation of greenhouse gases into the 1970 Clean Air Act, a...

The U.S. effort to counteract climate change is poised to not only destroy the U.S. economy, but dramatically increase global carbon dioxide levels. That was the message, on Thursday, from Tom Tripp, a magnesium specialist from Utah who gave a 45-minute keynote address in Provo at the Utah Farm Bureau Midyear Conference. Beyond magnesium, Tripp has one other distinction to his name -- he is one of 2,000 members of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change who share half a Nobel Prize, the other half owned by former vice president Al Gore. But though Tripp and Gore may share the...

On June 28, 2009, the House of Representatives, by a narrow margin (219-212), passed the Waxman-Markey bill. The so-called “cap and trade” bill has been sold as a system for cutting greenhouse gas emissions in the struggle against global warming. There’s a full-court press on the U.S. Senate to pass its version of “cap and trade”...The Obama administration’s EPA sees the increasing evidence against global warming as a threat to their agenda and has taken desperate measures. About a week before the House vote on “cap and trade,” the Washington, D.C.-based Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) released some EPA e-mails, demonstrating...

Palin Vs. Kerry (And MoveOn.org) By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Wednesday, July 15, 2009 4:20 PM The political death of Sarah Palin has been greatly exaggerated. In a devastating op-ed in the Washington Post, Alaska's governor exposes the cap-and-tax fraud that has nothing to do with earth's temperature and everything to do with government control of the economy. She also exposes the stealth socialism ambitions of the Democratic left and once again points out the availability of abundant "shovel-ready" resources under America's soil, off America's shores and even in America's rocks. Judging from the reaction from Sen. Kerry and...

Politics: John Kerry, replying to an op-ed Sarah Palin wrote on cap-and-trade, suggests the Alaska governor "check the view from her front porch." What she sees from there, senator, is energy wealth going to waste.The political death of Sarah Palin has been greatly exaggerated. In a devastating op-ed in the Washington Post, Alaska's governor exposes the cap-and-tax fraud that has nothing to do with earth's temperature and everything to do with government control of the economy. She also exposes the stealth socialism ambitions of the Democratic left and once again points out the availability of abundant "shovel-ready" resources under America's...

Climate Change: Channeling King Canute, G-8 leaders agree to wreck the world's economy, and ours, by pledging to prevent temperatures from rising more than 4 degrees by 2050. What if the Earth has other plans?Canute was the legendary king whose sycophantic followers praised his power and wisdom. He was The One of his time. He once stood on the shore and commanded the waves to halt. As the story goes, he was exercising his ego when in fact he was giving his followers a dose of reality — the power of man over nature is finite and inconsequential. We were...

The Jefferson Area Tea Party is rallying against Fifth District Congressman Tom Perriello. Thursday afternoon, the group held a protest at Perriello's office on Second Street in Charlottesville. They are upset with Perriello's support of the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009. The group says the bill, which still being debated by the Senate, is an energy tax. Those people who support the initiative say it reduces the amount of carbon that electric utilities, oil refiners, and certain industries can emit. Perriello voted for the so-called "cap and trade bill", which passed the House 219 to 212.

Sir, the candle is in full compliance with the new Cap and Trade law prohibiting bright light bulbs, but the water bottles are a felony. Please come with us.

Climate Change: A switch of four Republican votes would have defeated Waxman-Markey, the Democrats' global warming legislation. But like the Clinton Btu tax, the bill could die in the Senate and turn the House over to the GOP.What were these RINOs thinking? The GOP is supposed to be the party of low taxes and free markets. Rep. Mike Castle, one of the eight offered an explanation right off of President Obama's teleprompter. "Nations around the world are surging ahead with emission reductions and developing new energy technologies," Castle, Delaware's at-large congressman, posted on his House Web site. "The United States...

Climate Change: A switch of four Republican votes would have defeated Waxman-Markey, the Democrats' global warming legislation. But like the Clinton Btu tax, the bill could die in the Senate and turn the House over to the GOP. What were these RINOs thinking? The GOP is supposed to be the party of low taxes and free markets. Rep. Mike Castle, one of the eight offered an explanation right off of President Obama's teleprompter...Illinois Republican Mark Kirk, who has senatorial ambitions to replace the choice of impeached former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, Sen. Roland Burris, demonstrates why GOP fortunes in the Land...

Republicans on Sunday roundly criticized an energy plan passed by the House that is intended to address global warming and change the way the United States produces and uses energy. “You’re going to find signs on manufacturing doors, if this bill passes, that says ‘Moved, gone to China,’ “ Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa said on ABC’s “This Week.” Mr. Grassley, like other Republicans, said the House bill is a national energy tax that would drive manufacturers and jobs to countries with less-strict emissions standards. The bill passed the House last Friday with a vote of 219 to 212,...

One of the principal allegations against the climate-change legislation the House could consider as soon as June 26 is the charge that it would compel a transfer of wealth from Midwestern states that burn large quantities of coal to coastal states that don't. But it is more accurate to say that the bill reduces a regional disparity that allows Midwestern and other coal-dependent states to enjoy artificially low electricity prices at the expense of states elsewhere, particularly along the coasts. Rather than create a new regional inequality, the global-warming bill would lessen an existing one. The perverse pattern of today's...

As Democrats strained to win over crucial holdouts on the way to narrow, party-line approval of global warming legislation, they were dogged by a critical question: Has the political climate changed since 1993? Veteran members of both parties vividly remember when many House Democrats, in the early months of the Clinton administration, reluctantly backed a proposed B.T.U. tax — a new levy on each unit of energy consumed — only to see it ignored by the Senate and seized as a campaign issue by Republicans, who took control of the House the next year. “A lot of Democrat members got...

Fiscal Policy: The House of Representatives is preparing to vote on an anti-stimulus package that in the name of saving the earth will destroy the American economy. Smoot-Hawley will seem like a speed bump. Not since a misguided piece of legislation imposed tariffs that turned a recession into a depression has there been a piece of legislation as bad as Waxman-Markey. The 1,000-plus-page American Clean Energy and Security Act (H.R. 2454) is being rushed to a vote by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi before anyone can seriously object to this economic suicide pact. It's what Janet Napolitano, secretary of Homeland Security,...

Fiscal Policy: The House of Representatives is preparing to vote on an anti-stimulus package that in the name of saving the earth will destroy the American economy. Smoot-Hawley will seem like a speed bump.Not since a misguided piece of legislation imposed tariffs that turned a recession into a depression has there been a piece of legislation as bad as Waxman-Markey.The 1,000-plus-page American Clean Energy and Security Act (H.R. 2454) is being rushed to a vote by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi before anyone can seriously object to this economic suicide pact.

Fiscal Policy: The House of Representatives is preparing to vote on an anti-stimulus package that in the name of saving the earth will destroy the American economy. Smoot-Hawley will seem like a speed bump...As we've said before, capping emissions is capping economic growth. An analysis of Waxman-Markey by the Heritage Foundation projects that by 2035 it would reduce aggregate gross domestic product by $7.4 trillion. In an average year, 844,000 jobs would be destroyed, with peak years seeing unemployment rise by almost 2 million. Consumers would pay through the nose as electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket, as President Obama once...

President Barack Obama pushed urgently Thursday for passage of legislation to confront global warming, billing it as a job-creating machine rather than the costly ''job killer'' Republicans denounced. He telephoning wavering Democrats on the eve of what could be a historic House vote. Speaking in the Rose Garden at the White House, Obama said Washington must not miss the opportunity to work on cleaning the air, creating new ''green'' energy jobs and moving the nation away from its reliance on fossil fuels such as oil, coal and natural gas. The White House appeared concerned that momentum for the bill was...

Fiscal Policy: President Obama sends his emissaries to Congress to explain why an economy-killing tax on energy — a tax all Americans will pay in all aspects of their lives — is necessary to save the Earth....The problem is that capping emissions based on dubious climate science will also kill hopes for a rapid economic recovery. Any good that comes from the stimulus package will be wiped out by this energy tax that will be passed on to every consumer through everything we produce and consume. Money that could be spent on creating jobs will be wasted trying to save...

The House of Representatives will vote Friday(Today) on the so-called “American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009” -- a.k.a the “Waxman-Markey” global warming bill. But whatever you want to call this legislative atrocity, if enacted into law, it will go down in history as the death knell of the American standard of living and way of life. If you hate America, this bill is for you. After decades of fierce battling between rabid greens -- that is, left-wingers masquerading as “environmentalists” -- and the global warming skeptics, few Americans seem to have bought into the bill’s premise ­ that...

It appears that years of debate about climate change and energy may now come down to a vote on an actual bill, the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACES). As I write this, the vote is scheduled for Friday. If it occurs, you will be asked to vote to implement carbon rationing in the United States.   Without regard to party or ideology, I believe that the evidence is clear that this law would be contrary to the public interest. Here is why, in a nutshell: 1.  It would be a terrible deal for American taxpayers. According to the...

Last week, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released their analysis of the Waxman-Markey climate change bill that had proponents of the bill claiming Americans could save the planet for just $175 per household. That was the figure CBO estimated cap and trade would cost households in 2020 alone.[1]Both the CBO's analysis and the subsequent legislation are troubled: The analysis grossly underestimates economic costs while the legislation will have virtually no impact on climate. Overall, there are a number of basic problems with CBO's analysis: Their allowance cost numbers do not add up; They ignore economic costs such as the decrease...

WASHINGTON – America’s third largest party urged the U.S. House Tuesday to defeat plans for a $1.9 trillion energy tax hike over eight years. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is attempting to rush H.R. 2454, the Waxman-Markey energy tax bill, to a vote this week. “With unemployment rising above and beyond what President Obama said it would be with the multi-hundred billion dollar stimulus bill, now is not the time to dismantle our economy with a multi-hundred billion dollar energy tax hike,” said William Redpath, Libertarian National Committee Chairman. “Libertarians urge House members to defeat this job-killing tax hike on Americans,”...

ABSTRACT: Democratic leaders in the House have scheduled a Friday vote on a climate change bill that would establish a complex cap-and-trade system to limit the nation's greenhouse gas emissions, a priority for President Obama. The House Rules Committee unveiled the latest version of the bill, which weighs in at 1,201 pages. It features new items such as $7.5 billion in "green bonds" for a new federal financing agency called the Clean Energy Deployment Administration, extra emission allowances for politically powerful rural electric cooperatives, greater flexibility for states that want to use free allowances for mass transit, and tweaks benefiting...

Late last night, during yet another closed-door meeting in the House of Representatives, the liberal Majority maneuvered to bring the highly unpopular 946-page energy-rationing bill, better known as the Waxman-Markey cap-and-tax bill, to the House floor for a vote by the end of this week! Sponsored by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA), the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, H.R. 2454 imposes a system of "cap-and-tax" in order to combat so-called "global warming." This massive, across-the-board household energy tax is being disguised by congressional liberals and is being sold under the slogan "cap-and-trade," which...

Democrats Balking At Job-Killing National Energy Tax. "[S]everal Democratic aides noted that with the economy in a deep recession, many vulnerable Democrats might be loath to vote for anything that could be blamed for higher utility bills. 'With the economy the way that it is, I don't know that there's going to be the stomach to pass a bill that might raise people's utility and gas rates,' one Senate Democratic staffer said." (Emily Pierce & Steven T. Dennis, "House Climate Bill Facing Senate Headwinds," Roll Call, 5/18//09) No Agreement Among Democrats Despite Pressure From Obama Administration. "House Democrats still lack...

Is an imperfect climate bill (Waxman-Markey) better than no bill at all? Al Gore says yes.To bring environment supporters together, Gore will host a nationwide conference call on June 23 at 8 p.m. ET. The purpose, according to his Repower America e-mail sent to a selected audience, is “to build urgency around this bill and make sure it passes. We have to go to the grassroots – we have to continue building support in communities across the nation.”“As this climate legislation moves before the full Congress this summer, we have an opportunity unlike anything we’ve seen yet,” the e-mail concludes.Gore...

Speaker Pelosi's National Energy Tax Will Cost 2.5 Million American Jobs, Hit Every Region of the Country With Millions in Job Losses Already This Year, Is a Job-Killing National Energy Tax Really the Message Democrats Want to Send to Workers, Small Businesses? Washington, Jun 23 - Speaker Pelosi’s national energy tax is a massive job-killer. According to a National Black Chamber of Commerce study, the devastating plan will cost 2.5 million American jobs thanks to the higher energy costs it will force consumers, small businesses, and other employers to pay. The impact will be felt from coast to coast –...

Economists at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis are digging deeper into the effects of the Waxman-Markey climate change legislation that includes a cap and trade plan to reduce carbon dioxide... Today’s victim: Farmers. Our CDA analysts found that Waxman-Markey would adversely affect farmers in a number of ways: • Farm income (or the amount left over after paying all expenses) is expected to drop $8 billion in 2012, $25 billion in 2024, and over $50 billion in 2035. These are decreases of 28%, 60% and 94%, respectively. • The average net income lost over the 2010-2035 timeline is...

May 20, 2009 Waxman-Markey Global Warming Tax Kills More Jobs and Kills the Economy by heritage.org Fact Sheet #28 Cap and Tax Top Ten List 1. Cap and Trade Is a Massive Energy Tax 2. It Will Not Make a Substantive Impact on the Environment 3. It Will Kill Jobs 4. It Will Cause Electricity Bills and Gas Prices to Sharply Increase 5. It Will Outsource Manufacturing Jobs and Hurt Free Trade 6. It Will Make You Choose Between Energy, Groceries, Clothing, and Haircuts 7. It Will Be Highly Susceptible to Fraud and Corruption 8. It Will Hurt Senior Citizens,...

Gee, I thought that the Democrats were supposed to be the transparent party. Guess not. You see this whole cap and tax plan being pushed by the President and written by Congressman Waxman is being ghost written by lobbyists. That promise President-Elect Obama made at the beginning of his administration that their would be no lobbyist influence on his presidency was just a "Media Moment. Joe Biden's Chief of Staff was is a former lobbyist at the law firm of O’Melveny & Myers Ronald Klain. David Axelrod, chief campaign strategist for his campaign and the president's senior political adviser is...

The committee hosting the Democratic National Convention has used the city's gas pumps to fill up and apparently avoided paying state and federal fuel taxes. The practice, which began four months ago, may have ended hours after its disclosure. An aide to Mayor John Hickenlooper released a statement Tuesday evening saying that Denver 2008 Host Committee members would pay market prices for fuel and would also be liable for all applicable taxes. However, Public Works spokeswoman Christine Downs told City Council members just hours before that host committee members were fueling up at the city pumps. The city does not...

DECATUR - David and Eileen Wetzel don't get going in the morning quite as early as they used to. So David Wetzel, 79, was surprised to hear a knock on the door at their eastside home while he was still getting dressed. Two men in suits were standing on his porch. "They showed me their badges and said they were from the Illinois Department of Revenue," Wetzel said. "I said, 'Come in.' Maybe I shouldn't have." Gary May introduced himself as a special agent. The other man, John Egan, was introduced as his colleague. May gave the Wetzels his card,...

I warned Bush about O'Neill Posted: January 14, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com I hate to say it, but I told you so. I warned President Bush and the American people about Paul O'Neill a long time ago. Now, President Bush deserves all the flak he gets for his appointment of the former treasury secretary. Here's what I said about the appointment Dec. 28, 2000, in a column titled, "Those Cabinet appointments": One of those (disastrous appointments) is Paul O'Neill for treasury secretary. The better known right-fielder for the New York Yankees of the same name would have...