News – FEMA Scrapped?

North America

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee believes that FEMA needs to b scrapped and replaced with an agency better suited to dealing with disasters. I don’t know about going that far, but FEMA does need restructuring and better plans when it comes to what they do and when.

Bush puts in a former Fox News man into place as his press secretary. Honestly, does this man come up with all these bad ideas himself or does he have help? The comedic appeal of his surname should have been enough of a clue.

The congress refuses to strip crap out of an emergency spending bill with money for Iraq and Katrina. If it doesn’t come in under a certain amount, Bush might actually use a veto for once. Might.

Experts doubt that Bush’s plan to stop putting fuel into the national reserve and letting regulators relax environmental rules if state governors ask will have an impact on prices. What percentage of our consumption is put into the reserve. I’d bet it’s a single digit percentile, which makes it pretty negligible.

According to a new study, you’re less likely to live a rags-to-riches story in the US.

Explainer looks at why it takes a while to retire from the CIA.

Are the Republicans screwed? Personally, I think so. At least, Bush is. He’s let things fragment too much and won’t be able to pick up the pieces. Likely if the Republican’s don’t lose their grip on power, it will weaken the next election cycle. Then it will be up to whoever takes Bush’s place to put things back together.

Could Mitt Romney’s presidential run be scuttled by his Mormon faith?

Middle East

The sister of Iraq’s Sunni Vice President, Mayson Ahmed Bakir al-Hashimi, was shot and killed today in a drive-by shooting. This is especially sad as one of her brothers were murdered two weeks previous.

Norway pledges $20 million to Palestine, but not directly to the Hamas government.

Hamas and Abbas aren’t working together. This is a bad thing and will only lead to trouble if they continue to move counter to each other. Hamas defying a veto from Abbas shows that even if he were to ‘fire’ them, they wouldn’t necessarily go quietly into the night, increasing the potential for a civil conflict.

On the other hand, Israel’s government is doing well so far. Of course, such is expected of a country like Israel, just as one would expect it of the US.

Europe

Azerbaijan, an ex-soviet state close to Iran, won’t be participating in any military action against their neighbor, says their president, Ilham Aliyev.

The Children of Kyrgyzstan.

General

Globalization has helped to keep inflation down for a long time, but could it now be the source of rising inflation? If so, what future is there for globalization?

THe Blogs look at Tony Snow, United 93 and Rummy and Rice heading to Iraq.

Today’s Papers has EU investigators concluding that there have been about 1,000 undeclared flights in their airspace since 2001(how many of these were ghost prisoner flights?), Rove on the stand, the latest tough talk out of Iran and more in the one page news.

Amusements

Mark Fiore: Genocide on the March

Four motorbikes, a patrol car, a video van, two cycling constables and finally the force helicopter fail to catch a wanted man who makes his getaway in a horse-drawn cart. Robin Hood sought for questioning

Spanish Socialist Party introducing a bill to give apes the same rights as man. Charleton Heston heard shouting “You maniacs”

Elvis Presley and Dolly Parton team up in commercial to ensure that no sane human being will ever voluntarily go to Tennessee again

Maxim’s top 5 whipped atheletes

Sprint refuses to let G.I. in Iraq cancel $68/month cell phone service

Zug’s crack team of alcohol experts goes out in search of the worst-tasting bar drink. Drunken hilarity ensues

So, Iran was like, Dude, if you attack me, I’ll retaliate twice as hard. And the US was like, No way, we’ll retaliate plus one And Iran was like, uh-uhh

Secret Service alertly thwarts a threat to Bill Clinton’s life–and golf game–by shutting down a 5-year-old girl’s birthday party

Bad: Man gets kicked out of party. Worse: Man retaliates by torching front porch with flare gun. Fark: Man arrested as he leaves with his pants on fire

Russian paratrooper breaks 24 beer bottles over his head before passing out

Rocky in 30 Seconds, by Bunnies

Fark Photoshop Challenge: Snoop Dogg is writing his first novel. Give it a cover

Fark Photoshop Challenge: Give this old chimney sweep a new career for 2006

Fark Photoshop Challenge: <A HREF=”http://forums.fark.com/cgi/fark/comments.pl?IDLink=2023930″>Photoshop theme: What’s this button do?