Oscar Mayer dies at 95; long life attributed to never eating hot dogs

“Are you kidding? eat hot dogs? I saw what goes into those things. Joey Chestnut won’t make it to 50.”

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Oscar G. Mayer, retired chairman of the Wisconsin-based meat processing company that bears his name, has died at the age of 95.

He was the third Oscar Mayer in the family that founded Oscar Mayer Foods, which was once the largest private employer in Madison. His grandfather, Oscar F. Mayer, died in 1955 and his father, Oscar G. Mayer Sr., died in 1965.

Mayer retired as chairman of the board in 1977 at age 62 soon after the company recorded its first $1 billion year. The company was later sold to General Foods and is now a business unit of Kraft.

Who’s blocking a new healthcare option?

These are the worst, bought and paid for by the health insurance lobby:
Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA)

Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA). He’s taken over $2 million from health and insurance interests and opposes a public option. Last week, a constituent asked why he couldn’t get insurance as good as the senator’s. Grassley’s response: If you want quality coverage, “go work for the federal government.”

Sens. Olympia Snowe & Susan Collins (R-ME). They have taken over $2 million together from health and insurance interests (Collins a tad more), and they have opposed the public option so far. Snowe consistently has advocated a “trigger” proposal that the insurance industry wants.

Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT). He’s the chair of a key Senate committee on the health care reform issue and has taken $3.9 million from health and insurance interests. He’d hinted that he may support a public option, but when his committee’s draft plan came out, the Washington Post’s Ezra Klein reported, “There’s no public plan mentioned anywhere in the document.”

Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND). He’s taken $2.1 million from health and insurance interests and has offered one of the main proposals to dilute the public option — a local “co-op” plan. Insurers would prefer this to a strong federally backed head-to-head competitor with private insurance.
h/t AdamGreen at Daily Kos.

Sarah Palin translated

Palin would like you to see her as:
But here’s what’s really on her mind:
But notably, after her “speech,” she put on her waders, the better to keep her feet out of the bullshit she slung in her resignation “speech.” The real meaning:

In terms of personal gain for myself and my cronies, I have wrung everything I can out of this job. Now people are watching, as evidenced by the ethics complaints. The latest complaint threatens to keep me from continuing to collect a per diem while living at home. That would mean my salary of $150,000 won’t get supplemented by roughly 15,000 a year in per diems. Meanwhile, my opportunities to make money outside of government are huge, and I don’t have to learn anything or answer to anyone…all I have to do is be me, keep in shape, no prob. Why wait around? if I end up getting another government post, like President, that I can turn into more profit, fine. And I’ll quit when I want. Living well is the best revenge. Suck on that. Oh, and running for Vice President? forget it…been there done that. No financial reward.

The original per diem story broke last fall:

ANCHORAGE, Sept. 8 — Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has billed taxpayers for 312 nights spent in her own home during her first 19 months in office, charging a “per diem” allowance intended to cover meals and incidental expenses while traveling on state business.

At that, some idiot/crony in state government said Palin was “entitled to it.’
Not so much.
Now:

In February, following a Washington Post story that revealed the practice, state officials reversed a policy that treated the “per diem” allowances of $60 a day as legitimate, tax-free business expenses under the Internal Revenue Code.

In the new ethics complaint, filed with the Alaska Office of the Attorney General late Monday by Wasilla resident Zane Henning, there is no documentation showing how often Palin may have filed per diem claims in recent months. The complaint includes documents from Palin for the month of May, listing five travel reimbursement claims at $60 apiece. Henning is questioning the governor’s request since the listed activities for those days were in Wasilla and Anchorage.

“The taxpayers of Alaska should not have to pay the governor, or any other public official, $60 a night to stay in their own home,” Henning said in an interview.
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