Saturday morning digest

- Last night, I received a cheque for some back pay which I was owed by my employer. Much to my chagrin, I was taxed at a rate of 53%. This article makes a clear case against the economic myths that have given rise to punitive taxation schemes and excessive redistributionism.

- In France right now, young adults are rioting against the deregulation of the labour market. It's in the interests of new workers to allow employers more freedoms to hire and fire because it will reduce to risk of being saddled with a costly, unproductive, lackadaisical employee that they can't get rid of. No wonder youth unemployment rates across the EU are so astronomical.

- WFB says it's time for other countries to step up to the plate on Iran, here.

- Satire from Blame Bush!:

Leaked Videos Shatter Bush’s Clever Façade of Bumbling Incompetence

They called me an idiot. They said I was crazy. They filed a restraining order prohibiting me from coming within 500 feet of them. But now my right-wing grandparents are eating some serious geriatric crow, for recently obtained videos prove once and for all that Bush not only knew about the existence of Hurricane Katrina days in advance, but personally steered the storm into New Orleans to kill as many poor, inner-city Blacks as possible.

Up until now, the Shrub has maintained a false façade of bumbling incompetence as an obvious insurance policy against future indictments. In these leaked videos, however, members of Bush’s administration can be seen orchestrating every minute detail of the deadly hurricane; plotting its size, the path it would take, the amount of rain that would fall, and even the speed of the winds.

“The strong winds, the heavy rains, and the tornadoes will spread well inland, along this path that you see here,” Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center, assures the dark, smoke-filled room. "We've got it going about, you know, 10 knots, about 12 miles per hour. Once it makes that turn to the northeast, it's going to start accelerating. But right now, we're talking about the center, you know, the actual center being on the coast tomorrow morning. I mean, the storm force winds are going to be there, you know, later this afternoon and this evening.”

You can almost hear the giddy elation in his voice as he promises the "greatest potential for large loss of life" in the "coastal areas", typically Democratic strongholds. The videos are shockingly candid, and at times it seems as if the participants are completely unaware that their twisted plans are being recorded.

“We expect considerable precipitation with Katrina over the next 48 hours,” adds NHC Consigliere, Jim Hook with a satisfied puff of his cigar. “Fortunately, the storm is expected to move quickly once it makes landfall and move up through the central part of the United States.”

This seems to totally contradict Bush’s steadfast assertion that the hurricane was an uncontrollable force of nature. After the guffaws and high-fives die down, the Don himself appears live via satellite from his Crawford hacienda, lounging in a hammock and sipping on a margarita.

“I want to thank everybody involved in this effort,” Bush says with a wink, speaking calm confidence of a man whose insidious plans are finally coming to fruition. “I appreciate the long hours you're keeping. I expect you to keep more long hours until we've done everything we can in our power to [turn New Orleans into a cannibalistic orgy of blood and violence].”

A President Clinton or a President Gore would be engaged with the members of their disaster response team. President Kerry would still be in that room today. Yet Bush leaves quickly - almost too quickly - allowing his henchmen to continue their diabolical scheming unhindered, never bothering to ask them a single question. Why should he? Everything is going off exactly as he had planned.

No need to horrify you with the rest of the details. Suffice it to say that the small, soundbite-sized chunks of information the media has been spoon-feeding you are even more insidious than the truth, and Bush's guilt is obvious to anyone who hasn't read the transcripts in their entirety. None of it would have been made public had it not been for the testimony of ex-FEMA chief Micheal Brown, either. Thank Goddess he isn’t defending Bush as strongly as Bush defended him. I’m sure we’ll all be watching his transformation from Satan Incarnate to Heroic Whistleblower of Truth with hushed anticipation.