Pun Salad

… but don't be fooled by everything you see:

• Sad news on the celebrity front, as Christina Aguilera is splitting up with her husband of five years. When they wed, Pun Salad predicted the young man pictured at right (who has a name, but I've always thought of him as "Hapless Bastard") was in for an estimated six months "all-expense-paid tour of Hell." So I was off by a factor of ten or so.

• Let me say something nice about Paul Hodes, Democrat candidate for the US Senate, current Congressman from NH.

  No, I'm not kidding.

  Hodes is one of only nine co-sponsors of H. R. 682, the "STOCK Act"; it would ban stock trading by House members and their aides on the basis of "insider" information unavailable to the public.

  Prof Bainbridge has a couple of articles on the STOCK Act. He outlines why the legislation is a good idea, and blames its failure to get anywhere on Speaker Pelosi.

  So: good for you, Paul Hodes. I still hope you lose, though. Sorry. (Update: he did.)

• Your quote du jour is from David Brooks:

  As I was saying, my general rule is that if the president and his advisers are going to accuse somebody of committing a crime, they should have some scintilla of evidence behind the charge. Yet Obama seems to have precisely none behind his accusation that the Chamber of Commerce is using foreign money to influence the elections.

  This is in an exchange with Gail Collins, editor of the New York Times editorial page, who doesn't seem bothered by Obama's behavior at all.