How Star Trek Voyager Saved the World

Or Seven of Nine, specifically. Seriously! What a wondrous world. In a nutshell: Lady wants to be an actress (Jeri), gets a variety of jobs, nothing special. Marries a handsome investment banker, has a kid. Finally gets her big break in acting, landing a role on Star Trek: Voyager. This required her to travel far more frequently from home, perhaps causing then Mr. Ryan to get.... antsy.

Anyways, Mr Ryan is now married to a TV sexy star, so he gets into parading her around, and then, trying to take her to sex clubs. Jeri is not down with that, even though Mr. Ryan tries several times. (Read here ). Mrs. Ryan has had enough, and files for, and is granted, divorce and custody. The records, however, are sealed.

Flash forward to 2004, and now Mr. Ryan is running for one of the vacant US Senate seats in Illinois, as a Repuglican. He wins the primary, he's on his way to face the Democrat, a young, clean, articulate man with a bright future, you might know him, Barack Obama.

The Chicago Tribune sues the state of California to release the divorce records, and after some back and forth, they do. And now the world, and specifically the voters of IL, know Mr. Ryan likes forcing his wife - against her wishes - into sex clubs, and getting her to perform. Obviously, controversy ensues, Mr. Ryan tries to fight it for awhile, but finally drops out of the race, after it was demanded by the state Repuglican party. This same party then appoints Alan Keyes (you know, cuz of his long-standing IL ties) to run as the Repuglican nominee, and he is resoundingly thrashed by one Barack Obama. The rest of the story you probably know.

So there you have it: How Seven of Nine saved planet earth. Crazy, eh?

Sign o' the Times

From the Kos, a listing of who's giving money via well known PAC's:

Distilled Spirits Council of the United States (lead sponsor)
2008: 59% Dems, 41% Reps
2006: 48% Dems, 48% Reps
2004: 39% Dems, 61% Reps
2002: 32% Dems, 68% Reps

National Association of Chain Drug Stores
2008: 66% Dems, 34% Reps
2006: 24% Dems, 75% Reps
2004: 22% Dems, 78% Reps
2002: 40% Dems, 60% Reps

ClearChannel
2008: 54% Dems, 46% Reps
2006: 40% Dems, 60% Reps
2004: 38% Dems, 62% Reps
2002: 38% Dems, 62% Reps

Federation of American Hospitals
2008: 54% Dems, 46% Reps
2006: 35% Dems, 64% Reps
2004: 40% Dems, 60% Reps
2002: 31% Dems, 69% Reps

Duke Energy
2008: 39% Dems, 61% Reps
2006: 26% Dems, 74% Reps
2004: 24% Dems, 76% Reps
2002: 30% Dems, 70% Reps

National Association of Home Builders
2008: 45% Dems, 55% Reps
2006: 45% Dems, 55% Reps
2004: 33% Dems, 67% Reps
2002: 38% Dems, 62% Reps

US Chamber of Commerce
2008: 39% Dems, 61% Reps
2006: 18% Dems, 82% Reps
2004: 24% Dems, 76% Reps
2002: 10% Dems, 90% Reps

American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (Coal industry front group)

Lockheed Martin
2008: 57% Dems, 43% Reps
2006: 42% Dems, 58% Reps
2004: 41% Dems, 59% Reps
2002: 39% Dems, 61% Reps

Daimler
2008: 48% Dems, 52% Reps
2006: 35% Dems, 65% Reps
2004: 32% Dems, 68% Reps
2002: 41% Dems, 59% Reps

AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals
2008: 45% Dems, 55% Reps
2006: 28% Dems, 72% Reps
2004: 30% Dems, 70% Reps
2002: 30% Dems, 70% Reps

Amgen
2008: 45% Dems, 55% Reps
2006: 34% Dems, 65% Reps
2004: 27% Dems, 73% Reps
2002: 25% Dems, 74% Reps

Verisign
2008: 47% Dems, 53% Reps
2006: 21% Dems, 79% Reps
2004: 37% Dems, 63% Reps
2002: 55% Dems, 45% Reps

Kos seems to think this indicates a bad thing. I think it indicates the true trend of this election, where people speak with money, and money seldom lies. As with our good friend T.Boone, here's another macro level trend that speaks much more informatively than the daily tracking polls.

2008 v. 2004

No, not Dick Cheney, but the way he's been acting lately, he better watch out the next time he shares a blind.

This fine gent is T. Boone Pickens, Billionaire oil man and a fine example of the differences between the 2004 and the 2008 election.

In 2004, Mr. Pickens used a small, very small portion of his enormous wealth to fund various 527 groups, including the infamous "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" -- aside: Almost anytime you see a group using the word "truth" in their name, odds are they are lying.

In 2008, however, Mr. Pickens picked the wrong horse early (Mr. 911 Rudy Guliani). When that dog didn't hunt, Mr. Pickens apparently had something of an epiphany. To quote the Wiki:

Pickens "said he has stopped giving to political campaigns and renounced his previous Republican affiliation in his drive to focus the nation's attention on the need for immediate, drastic action on energy" such as solar and wind. The Washington Post says that "perhaps the strangest role" Pickens "has fashioned for himself is his current one: the billionaire speculator as energy wise man, an oil-and-gas magnate as champion of wind power, and a lifetime Republican who has become a fellow traveler among environmentally minded Democrats -- even though he helped finance the 'Swift boat' ads that savaged" Sen. John F. Kerry's presidential campaign. In an editorial, the New York Times reports Pickens "has decided that drilling for more oil is not the answer to the nation's energy problems. President Bush should listen to his fellow Texan and longtime political ally."

I can think of fewer more potent symbols for the change in America since the folly of 2004. As Mr. Pickens says in his commercials supporting his efforts at getting the USA off foreign oil,


"This is one crisis we can't drill our way out of."


Hear that, McCain?