The best news this week is that with this issue of the HFR, we get to raise a tin cup of moonshine and say adios to 2008.  Come what may in 2009, it is such an incredible relief to get this sucker over with. It is, of course, not good news that during Christmas, millions of Americans have been stranded in airports and train stations due to massive winter storms all across the country.  Yet being stranded gives one time to think - and hopefully one thought that will occur to them is that global warming is laughably ridiculous... ... By the way, out of every 100,000 molecules of air, how many do you suppose are molecules of CO2, the evil gas environuts say causes global warming?  39.  How many are man-made molecules of CO2?  1.  That's one-onehundrendthousandth.  Man-made greenhouse gas emissions are irrelevant to the world's weather... ... So now Blago is going to subpoena Zero's chief of staff.  Watching this scandal unfold is almost as much fun as seeing Princess Caroline Kennedy's assumed royal prerogative of being anointed US Senator from New York crashing and burning... ...But now let's focus on what is truly good and uplifting news this week.  For the first time ever, Christmas was celebrated as an official holiday in Iraq.  And let's close this last HFR of 2008 with this heartwarming thought.  Christmas yesterday was celebrated by more people in more places on all seven continents (even scientists in Antarctica) - by far - than any other celebration of any kind, religious or otherwise, in the world.

Our government now owes more money than all of us in the country put together possess. As of Sep. 30, federal financial statements showed approximately $56.4 trillion in debts, liabilities, and unfunded promises for Medicare and Social Security, the Peter G. Peterson Foundation reported.  The Federal Reserve estimated total household net worth at that time at $56.5 trillion.   Since then the stock market has crashed, tens of billions of dollars of personal wealth have evaporated, and the government has committed $700 billion to bail out financial institutions. A government which long has been morally and intellectually bankrupt is now financially bankrupt too. I used to infuriate my English teacher in high school by declaring that all anyone needed to know about life could be found in the works of Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936).  She was not a fan of the bard of the barrack-room.  But the more I see of the world, the more sure I am that this is so.  We need the wisdom of his poem below.  You can be sure that the poem to be read at Mr. Obama's inauguration will be its antithesis.

There hasn't been an HFR since November 4 since it's too depressing to raise a glass that's completely dry and empty.  Lately, however, so much fun stuff has been filling the HFR full liter stein that it's like the Munich Oktoberfest in December. Let's start with the biggest silver lining of November 4:  we didn't end up with President Pain-in-the-ass McCain.  Once again, he reminded us this week of what an insufferable jerk he is.  The only reason he got the nomination is because the Stupid Party allows Democrats to vote in its primaries.  It's such a relief we never have to pay any attention to him ever again.  Jindal-Palin 2012! Next we move to Blagogate, which is serving to bring into clear focus that corruption is the Democrat Party's middle name - and that for the next four years we'll have a Chicago White House, the operations of which will be run by Blago buddy Rahm Emmanuel... ... Now on to the substantial benefits of the US/global recession. ... We'll close this edition of the HFR by raising a glass of sacramental wine to a great American patriot and founder of the modern conservative political movement, Paul Weyrich.

The collapse of oil prices is having a devastating impact on our enemies in Iran and Venezuela, and our sometimes enemies in Russia. The Iranian economy was a mess even when oil prices were high.  The mullahs maintain a tenuous hold on power through massive subsidies for food and energy, subsidies they can no longer afford to pay now that oil revenues are a third of what they were in the summer. Hugo Chavez's situation is even more dire.  Germany's Deutsche Bank estimated in October Venezuela needed an oil price of $95 a barrel to keep its budget in balance.  Venezuela had food shortages and raging inflation before oil prices collapsed.  If Mr. Chavez has to cut subsidies -- as he must -- he could be toppled in a matter of months. But except for Venezuela -- where nothing but good can come from Mr. Chavez' misery -- we should temper our schadenfreude (pleasure in the misfortune of others) with caution.  Because desperate circumstances cause desperate men to do desperate things.

Obviously - it's a gift subscription to To The Point!  It certainly has the best value-to-cost ratio of any alternative.  And you don't have to go to a store, search aimlessly for something cool, gift-wrap it, or undergo any other hassle.  Just a minute to fill out the info form at TTP Gift Subscriptions and you're done. You can of course go the whole nine yards and pop for a full year at $95.  That would have to be for a really good friend!  Or you could opt for the most economical route, a single month for $9.99.  There's a really attractive third choice, that we've just made available in time for Christmas:  three months for $24.99. You know the value of To The Point  for yourself.  Why not provide it to a friend for Christmas - enabling him or her to take refuge in the Oasis for Rational Conservatives as the craziness of 2009 unfolds? There's no better Christmas present you could give a friend than To The Point.  Clicking on TTP Gift Subscriptions is all it takes.  It's a wonderful way to wish someone Merry Christmas!

One of my fond childhood memories is that whenever we had guests over for dinner, my father would always offer his favorite toast, the famous Spanish one:  Salud, amor, y pesetas - y el tiempo para gozarlas.  (May you have) Health, love, and wealth - and the time in which to enjoy them. It is appropriate that the most important of this triumvirate comes first - health.  When we are young, it is easy to take natural good health and vitality for granted - and it becomes progressively less easy as we get old.  Which it is why it is wise to start preserving one's health when young (just as it is wise then to start saving money). I'm 65 now and as you know, 12 days ago (12/05) underwent serious abdominal surgery.  My doctors are amazed at how rapidly I am recuperating.  One reason for this is that I have taken nutritional supplements in "life extension" amounts for over 30 years.  Another is that I am taking specific nutritional formulas to promote healing and recovery. Almost exclusively, they are formulas designed by famed life extension scientists Durk Pearson and Sandy Shaw - dear friends for 40 years - and produced by our mutual friend Will Block's company Life Enhancement. I think that such nutrition is the best Christmas present you could give to yourself.

What does Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich have to trade for a lighter sentence? Pondering this question is, I suspect, keeping many prominent people in Chicago awake nights. Mr. Blagojevich is accused of conspiring to sell government favors for personal benefit. But his great crime, in the eyes of many politicians, is that he has made "pay to play" all too easy for ordinary people to understand and too ugly for them to ignore. "Hot Rod" Blago tried to sell Barack Obama's seat in the U.S. Senate. He held up an appropriation for a children's hospital to extort a $50,000 contribution from a hospital executive. He tried to have journalists at the Chicago Tribune fired for writing editorials critical of him. The FBI has Mr. Blagojevich on tape, incriminating himself in vulgar, profane language. Hot Rod's brazen overreach is shocking, which is one reason why this scandal is likely to have longer legs than any since Monica Lewinsky's trysts with President Bill Clinton. The other big reason why this scandal has legs is, of course, the relationship between Hot Rod and the president-elect.