The Supreme Court didn't mitigate Obama's shitty week with the 5-4 decision in Citizens United v. FEC or at least you can draw that conclusion from his reaction. Frankly, the Department of Justice shouldn't have taken it that far. Obama's DOJ took one for the team, though, the team of Democrats and Republicans that have been limiting speech (money) in politics for as long as they've had control of government (what are campaign finance laws written by the two parties if not to limit the rise of a third?). The poor progressives who haven't already jumped off a bridge, succumbed to catatonia or just tuned out are worried that the Republicans will somehow use corporate dollars to buy the Democrats out of their half of the franchise. C'mon, do you really think George Soros will let that happen? Or, the trial lawyers, or the unions, or even corporations? Obama raised over 1 Billion dollars in the last election cycle. Remember how he went without government matching funds in keeping with the ridiculous and, thankfully, now anachronistic McCain Feingold campaign finance law? He got a lot of that from small donors, yes, and large donors alike. Really, a billion fucking dollars last time around. Do you think he's sweating the next election for want of money? What he and Republicans all worry about is the possibility of money going to an independent or third party candidate that will fuck up the two=party franchise they've crafted for over a century.

If you still don't feel any better check out OpenSecrets.org, good people that keep track of such donations. Witness how the top donors are equally corporations and unions alike. This and sites just like it are now more important than ever. As before, we will want to know who our politicians are beholden to, won't we? If you don't like from whom a candidate has taken money you don't have to vote for that candidate. You don't have to give them your money, either. In fact, what's to keep the disaffected from pooling their money into a third party rich enough to pull along side and change the political discourse once and for all? Nothing, now.

The sky fell Tuesday when soft-core porn model (kidding) cum politician Mark Brown beat Martha Coakley, heir apparent to Ted Kennedy for his Senate seat, or so it seams she thought. Now, the Democrats no longer have their filibuster proof 60 seat majority and, since the Republicans promise to be as obstructionist as possible, Democrats are beside themselves. Obama repopulated his populist repertoire with another threat to punish banks or bankers. The DJIA rightfully finished the week in a free-fall. And everything had just been going so well. Maybe floating the idea of national health care before anyone felt the warm breeze of economic recovery after the winter chill of our worst recession wasn't such a good idea after all.

Passion84Autos@flickr

GM is making big news on the plug-in hybrid called the Chevy Volt they promise to make someday. None of the splashy stories (read press release touch-ups) today mention when it is supposed to go into production but they all have the same laser like focus on the 230 miles per gallon GM claims the Volt will achieve. The car will go 40 miles on the batteries, has a 300 mile range and gets 230 miles on a gallon of gas. 230+40= roughly a one gallon fuel tank? Both of the vessels in this picture look like they hold a few gallons so why isn't the range even more? If there were ten gallons of gas on board wouldn't the car have a range of 2300 miles or more? I'm guessing the engine doesn't do the job of an overnight charge. Hey, who am I to ask?

Good on GM if they really pull it off. Let's hope they have more going on than press releases. Otherwise, we'll never get that money back. Then again, if they can't make money selling cars they already have a foot in the door with the government. They could probably work out a deal to sell these things to the defense department for 30 million each. It works for fighter jets.