The several media outlets have been commenting on CAP's role in the spill aftermath:

If you want to see where President Barack Obama’s response to the Deepwater Horizon disaster is heading, try following the urgings of the Center for American Progress.

The liberal think tank with close White House ties appears to have more influence on spill policy than the president’s in-house advisers. On May 4, for instance, the CAP’s energy and environment expert, Daniel Weiss, called on the president to name an independent commission to look at the causes of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. On May 22, he did just that.

On May 21, CAP president, John Podesta, privately implored White House officials to name someone to be the public point person for the spill response. A week later, the White House announced that Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen would hold daily briefings on the spill, wherever he would be on any given day.

On May 26, Weiss said the White House needed to demand that BP immediately set up an escrow account with billions of dollars from which claims for Gulf state residents would be paid out.

Monday’s headlines proclaimed the president’s latest get-tough stand: BP needs to set up a billion-dollar escrow account.

What’s next, Mr. Podesta?

Funny you should ask! Here is Dan's latest laundry list:

Take charge of the clean up

* Put the National Guard—along with other military branches—in charge of cleaning up BP oil and begin planning for a tropical storm response as soon as possible since storm season began June 1
* Appoint the remaining commissioners to the Bipartisan National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling
* Create a comprehensive BP oil disaster information clearinghouse at Gulfrecovery.gov so that all information is in one place rather than dispersed on each separate agency website

Demand more help from BP

* Demand that BP provide more transparency to their efforts and allow media access to all contaminated areas
* Stop BP, Transocean, and Halliburton from spending money on their own or American Petroleum Institute lobbyists, ads, or campaign contributions, and instead dedicate all funds to clean up and compensation

Provide health and economic aid to people in the gulf region

* Put the government, not BP, in charge of the immediate and long-term public health response
* Establish a $10 billion escrow account for damages, which is less than half the profits BP earned in the last 15 months
* Eliminate the oil spill liability cap of $75 million for damages from an oil spill
* Establish a Gulf Recovery Fund, a nongovernmental, nonprof... [ Read More (0.3k in body) ]

Decius: I hope this post looks silly in 24 hours.

The good news is that your post doesn't look silly.

Three attempts to pump mud and 16 tries to stuff solid material into a breached Gulf of Mexico oil well failed to stop the flow, top BP executives said Saturday, and engineers and executives with the oil giant have decided to "move on to the next option."

That's the bad news.

The next option is to inject lawyers and lobbyists into the breached blowout preventer until a compromise is reached with the oil well.

Top Kill, fail.

Evangelist Tony Alamo used his stature as a self-proclaimed prophet to force underage girls into sham marriages with him, controlling his followers with their fears of eternal suffering.

But the judge who sentenced Alamo on Friday to 175 years in prison for child sexual abuse warned of another kind of justice awaiting the aging evangelist.

"Mr. Alamo, one day you will face a higher and a greater judge than me," U.S. District Judge Harry F. Barnes told the preacher. "May he have mercy on your soul."

Thus ends the story of Tony Alamo. I have a feeling that his fliers will still wind up placed on the windshields of cars in Tennessee for years to come...

Evangelist sentenced to 175 years for sex crimes - Yahoo! News

All the Nashville based folks on MemeStreams surely remember this guy... At one point or another, everyone wound up with a flier containing this nut-case's writings on their car windshield.

Jurors have found Tony Alamo guilty on all 10 counts of child-sex charges. Each count carries a minimum sentence of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Sentencing will take place in six to eight weeks. Former church members are overjoyed. No current church members or anyone who testified on his behalf, including Sharon Alamo, have commented.

Prosecutors said Alamo took five underage girls across state lines for sex as far back as 1994. They said one was as young as 9 and was "married" to the evangelist.

And now for a quick snip from one of Tony's writings, Flying Saucers are End-Time Prophecy:

Alone with her in the dark desert with no other cars around, I heard her say, "Come on Tony, let’s hold hands and pray that God will show us flying saucers." I said, "All right." She was driving and I took her hand. She prayed, "Oh Lord, God Almighty, if there are such things as flying saucers, show them to us, Father, in the name of Jesus." I said, "Amen, Lord."

No sooner had she said this prayer, and I said Amen, Lord then a squadron of flying saucers began approaching us very quickly from far in the distance. They descended from way up high down within a fraction of an inch of the windshield of the car with a speed as fast as lightning.

Will he be able to summon a squadron of flying saucers to air-lift his pedo ass out of prison...

The End of Times for Tony Alamo

The shotgun blast rips into the stray dog's midsection, sending it tumbling over and over. Agonizing yelps echo through the streets as it tries to reach and bite at the gaping wound. Minutes later, the dog is dead. Authorities have been killing the dogs since November, trying to prevent the spread of disease and attacks on residents.

This is the first headline story about Iraq I've seen on CNN in a long time... And it's about authorities shooting dogs.

wtf?

CNN.com - DOGS ARE DYING IN IRAQ!!!

I always hoped he would be one of those folks that would make it over a hundred.

Arthur C. Clarke is dead

"Did Charles Taylor order you to eat people?" Griffith asked.

"Yes, to set an example for the people to be afraid," Marzah replied.

He appeared unfazed by Griffith's blunt queries, and responded in matter-of-fact tones to such questions as "How do you prepare a human being for the pot?"

Marzah then described the splitting, cleaning, decapitating and cooking of the corpse with salt and pepper. "We throw your head away," he said.

He said the victims were usually from the ethnic Krahn, the tribe of former Liberian President Samuel Doe whom Taylor set out to topple in 1989. But they also included peacekeepers from the Nigerian-led ECOMOG, the African peacekeeping force sent to the area in 1990, and some U.N. people, he said.

"How many ECOMOG soldiers did you eat?" the attorney asked.

"We ate a few but not many. But many were executed, about 68," the witness said, and several U.N. personnel also were captured. The time and location of the incident were unclear.

"Which ones taste best?" Griffith asked.

"There was no alternative but to do it your own way," Marzah replied.

"Thank you, but I prefer it my way."

Top aide testifies Taylor ordered soldiers to eat victims

A man is comatose in a Las Vegas hospital after the deadly poison ricin was found in his hotel room, police told CNN affiliate KLAS-TV on Friday.

Police don't suspect foul play in the poisoning, KLAS reported. The FBI said it was treating the case as a criminal investigation and terrorism was not suspected.

"We don't know who [the ricin] belongs to or why it would be here at this time," said Capt. Joe Lombardo of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department.

Authorities were called to an Extended Stay America hotel around 3 p.m. PT Thursday after a man brought a bag with a small container to the manager's office. The man said he found it while retrieving items from a hotel room.

Ricin left in a hotel room in Vegas... That should raise some eyebrows.

There is some conflicting information in this article. There is this:

Tests to confirm the substance found in the room was ricin are under way.

But then there is this:

The substance is "100 percent ricin," Lombardo said.

shrug..

Report: Man comatose after exposure to ricin poison - CNN.com

William F. Buckley Jr., the erudite Ivy Leaguer and conservative herald who showered huge and scornful words on liberalism as he observed, abetted and cheered on the right's post-World War II rise from the fringes to the White House, died Wednesday. He was 82.

R.I.P.

William F. Buckley Jr. dies at 82 - Yahoo! News

Japan's Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba is considering how his Self-Defense Forces could respond to an attack by space aliens while adhering to limits on military action under the country's war-renouncing Constitution.

Ishiba said yesterday a Japanese military response, such as those in the Godzilla movie series, would require legal review and said he is studying ways Japan could deal with an attack. Ishiba said his comments represent a ``personal view,'' and not Defense Ministry policy, according to the transcript of the press conference published on the ministry's Web Site.

``There are no grounds for us to deny there are unidentified flying objects and some life-form that controls them,'' Ishiba said. ``Few discussions have been held on what the legal grounds are'' for a military response.

What can be said about this?

Bloomberg.com: Defense Minister Ishiba Considers Japan's Options in UFO Attack