For all the talk about Gerald Ford’s kindness and gentleness, he apparently could harbor venemous thoughts — for one of his own, no less.

From the Bob Woodward interview:

Q: You said it was the saddest day of your presidency when all the helicopters were –

A: I did, when they left the embassy in Saigon. Oh, to see those helicopters go out, come back, go out and come back. We saved the lives of not only our U.S. military personnel, our U.S. civilian personnel, but on my personal orders, saved the lives of South Vietnamese who had supported us, contrary to [Defense Secretary] Jim Schlesinger, who wanted to let everybody go to hell.

The Kansas City Star’s Buzz column really earns its name by asking one of the greatest trivia questions I’ve ever seen:

The Chippewa Valley Ethanol Co. in Minnesota is making extra bucks by also distilling…

a) rye whiskey
b) vodka
c) champagne

The answer
b) vodka

For some odd reason, counterterrorism expert Richard Clarke, who’s better suited for global warning than global warming, writes in today’s Washington Post about global warming, calling it a national security issue:

When the possibility of invading Iraq surfaced in 2001, senior Bush administration officials hadn’t thought much about global warming, except to wonder whether it was caused by human activity or by sunspots. Today, the world’s scientists and many national leaders worry that the world has passed the point of no return on global warming.

A flimsy connection to his expertise, indeed.  Since being a terrorism expert apparently now earns you climatology credentials, I’d like to chime in.  My connection to being able to talk authoritatively about global warming?  Simple: I’m a blogger.  And here’s what I think:

Thank God for global warming. What a warm winter it’s been so far.  Last year was pretty mild, too.  I’d much rather have 50 or 60 degree weather in January to take my three-year-old out to play than have to risk braving through freezing drizzle, icy patches, snow drifts, and other treacheries of the road.  So for New Year’s tonite, raise a glass for global warming.  Keep that warm trend going — no telling how many American lives are being saved.  How many counterterrorism specialists can make that claim?

The constantly-repeated truism of modern American media and political life that the only religious group that’s still fair game for broad attacks and ridicule is the Catholic Church got another boost recently, courtesy a Washington Post op-ed.

Columnist Harold Meyerson wrote last week:

John Paul also sought to build his church in nations of the developing world where traditional morality and bigotry, most especially on matters sexual, were in greater supply than in secular Europe and the increasingly egalitarian United States, and more in sync with the Catholic Church’s inimitable backwardness.

Inimitable backwardness?

I recently made note of this brave claim found in a Northern Virginia Asian-American newspaper called Asian Fortune:

Vietnamese American voters in Virginia helped tilt the balance of political power in the midterm election … Vietnamese Americans in Northern Virginia and elsewhere in the Old Commonwealth … flocked to the polls in greater numbers to help elect Democratic candidate James Webb in a tight-wire senatorial contest with incumbent Republican U.S. Senator George Allen.

Now we read in Gabriel Schoenfeld’s piece in the latest Commentary:

It is worth bearing in mind that in some states where the balance between Republicans and Democrats is close, Muslims are now able to serve as a decisive swing vote. In the critical and close-run Senate race in Virginia, for example, the Republican incumbent George Allen lost by fewer than 10,000 ballots to the Democratic challenger James Webb. Approximately 50,000 Muslim American voters participated in this election; according to one Muslim advocacy group, some 90 percent cast their ballots for Webb.  This is almost certainly an exaggeration. Nevertheless, a significant majority did vote for Webb. American Muslims can thus claim credit not only for sending him to the Senate but for handing over the Senate itself to Democratic control.

Vietnamese, Muslims — certainly many other ethnic groups can claim Webb’s victory as their own.  I’ve seen it plausibly argued that the influx of Guatemalans and Salvadorans into the Northern Virginia suburbs put Webb into the Senate.

Whichever group it is, there’s one stark reality about the new Virginia, neither red nor blue.  The Commonwealth is not, as pundits suggest, purple — which conjures up images of mountains majesty.  Instead, it’s become Mid-Atlantic political equivalent of the Balkans.  The birthplace of the Confederacy has now become the home to a much looser confederation of many different ethnic groups, each flexing muscular political power.

Nancy Pelosi earns a dubious distinction — top honors in Dave Barry’s humorous look back at 2006, coming out Sunday.  Six mentions of Pelosi.

A sample:

Fidel Castro is rumored to be seriously ill after publication of photographs showing worms crawling out of his eye sockets. Cuban authorities insist that the aging leader is merely recovering from surgery and that, for the time being, government operations are in the capable hands of Nancy Pelosi.

The Washington Post’s gossip column “Reliable Source” presents the craziest, wackiest local stories of 2006.  What a delicious year-in-review list columnists Amy Argetsinger and Roxanne Roberts serve up:

• Dick Cheney’s openly gay daughter Mary announces she’s pregnant and plans to raise the child with her longtime partner.
• Allen Iverson’s bad day in D.C.: His Rolls Royce gets ticketed downtown while he was being deposed by a guy who claims the baller’s security beat him up in a nightclub.
• Hilary Duff calls boyfriend Joel Madden’s hometown of Waldorf, Md., “ghetto”; later fires D.C. drummer Shauney Baby for stealing her spotlight.
• Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney attacks a Capitol Hill police officer with her cellphone when he fails to recognize her with a new hairdo.
• Jenna, Jenna, Jenna!: The blonde First Twin is psyched out by a fake proposal from her boyfriend; ditches her D.C. school teaching job for a Panama internship; parties in Argentina; and gets falsely linked in the tabs to a Buenos Aires hottie.
• Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes cut a swath through D.C. — do the hokey pokey at Six Flags with Dan Snyder and party on the Fed Ex Field; later return the favor by inviting the Skins owner to their Italian wedding.
• Karl Rove and Madeleine Albright have a historic face off in court — when they end up on the same jury.
• Entourages collide, and bottles of bub go flying, when Diddy brings a posse of 40 to downtown club Lima.
• Dozens of reporters chase Borat through the streets of Washington as he takes his guerilla press conference from the beleaguered embassy of Kazakhstan to the White House.
• Rapper DMX claims a Maryland woman who bore his child “raped” him after a night of drinking; she sues him for defamation.
• In an astonishing couture coincidence, Laura Bush shows up to the Kennedy Center Honors wearing the same dress as three other women.
• Jessica Simpson forgets the words to “9 to 5″ and breaks down onstage at the Kennedy Center during her tribute to Dolly Parton.
• K-Fed steps into a wrestling ring in D.C. to tell the world: “My name is not K-Fed!”

Vote at WashingtonPost.com for the number one story of 2006.  But also post your thoughts here.

The DC Examiner’s stunningly fantastic gossip column Yeas and Nays has this item today:

Rumors had been swirling in New York recently that former Bush press flack Ari Fleischer would challenge newly elected Rep. John Hall, D-N.Y., for Congress next year.
But Fleischer put those rumors to rest in a “Shermanesque” e-mail to the New York Observer that took a gratuitous shot at the Redskins.
“I do want you to know that I am NOT running,” wrote Fleischer to the paper’s Josh Benson. “Now that I have children, I would never do anything that could risk making them into Redskin fans.”

Pity.  So disloyal to his former boss.  The below photo with Redskins legendary cornerback was taken when Fleischer was Bush’s press secretary.

Great Nixon-Ford exchange in Bob Woodward’s Washington Post piece today:

On April 6, 1971, for example, Nixon called Ford to find out what was going on with House Majority Leader Hale Boggs (D-La.). Boggs had just taken to the House floor alleging that FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover was regularly wiretapping members of Congress, and Nixon wanted to know why Boggs was going public.
“He’s nuts,” Ford told Nixon in the call picked up by Nixon’s secret taping.
“He’s on the sauce,” Nixon said, suggesting the majority leader was drinking. “Isn’t that it?”
“Well, I’m afraid that’s right, Mr. President.”
“Or is he crazy?” Nixon asked.
“Well, he’s either drinking too much or he’s taking some pills that are upsetting him mentally,” Ford replied.

As fate would have it, both Gerald Ford and former Vermont Senator Robert Stafford died within days of each other.  What links the two, other than fierce Republican moderatism?  We go to Lee Annis — esteemed poly sci professor at Montgomery College, the world’s foremost expert in all things Howard Baker, and a spirited duelist in Extreme Trivia clashes — for the answer.   Turns out, in 1974 when Ford was looking for potential VP names, Stafford had the chutzpah to recommend himself.

Then again, didn’t Dick Cheney do the same thing?