Weekend Vittles: Treasury Paulson's Company Is Begging Portland's Working Class Taxpayers For Millions To Make It a Good Investment; Oh, and Somebody Rescue Lobo's Brother!

Homegrown
Rock to the rhythm and bop to the beat of the radio
You ain't got the slang but you've got the face to play the roll
You can play with me -- "Fans" by Kings of Leon

Here's what will be eating away at my brain all weekend --

* Do I even have to comment on this one?

I mean, you guys know how I feel about incredibly rich, well-connected sports team owners who beg the public for money and below-market-rate loans on the working class taxpayers' backs. But this one is oh, so, much worse...juicier...infuriating...This is the son of the single most powerful, well-connected person on the planet - Hank Putin, nay, Paulson, himself -- and he's begging taxpayers to provide below market loans in hopes that they might someday make it back in tax revenue that might somehow trickle down from this billionaire's son back to the local government which then would supposedly do right be the working class taxpayers' back and give projects and employment back to the taxpayer's neighbor. Oh, it gets better. Hank owns 20% of the company doing the begging!

I repeat -- HANK PAULSON'S COMPANY IS BEGGING WORKING CLASS TAXPAYERS FOR AT LEAST $85 MILLION IN LOANS DURING THE VERY DOWNTURN THAT HE SAYS WILL BE SO BAD THAT HE NEEDED ABSOLUTE CONTROL OF OUR MONETARY AND BANKING SYSTEMS.

Feeling better about the outlook for economy and the credit crisis now? No, not so much?

I can't stop my leg from shaking as I type this. My hands too. I can't fathom that Hank Paulson's got the nerve to do this. I must have something wrong here, right? Right?! Hello, is this thing working???

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* Nice rally today. Hope you took off the shorts and or are just on the sidelines for now. Wait for the next fat pitch of a huge rally or huge sell off. More pitches to come, that's for sure.

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* Though I've heard of 'em I'd never heard of a song by Kings of Leon until I discovered the Kings of Leon this week on an iPod lent to me by an Icelandic friend. I'm addicted to the song "Fans". Listened to it twenty times this week. The crossed guitars and thumping baseline remind me of another most-played song on my iPod -- "Why Can't I Touch It?" by the Buzzcocks.

Listening to this song now as I type this paragraph and I'm not so upset at the fact that Hank Paulson's company is begging taxpayers in Portland for tens of millions right now for a stadium for him and his little son, Merritt, who is so cutely named after his grandfather. Okay, I'm shaking again. Breath.

Those rainy days they ain't so bad when you're the King, the King they wanna see

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* I showed up way understated and low-key at this incredible Dogcatemy award ceremony last night for North Shore Animal Shelter. Lobo and I took a stroll down the red carpet, and oh, man he was terrific. Watching just my hand signals as I "worked the cameras" (ha! I was just trying to be the two most important words in life "be cool"), he stood up on "two legs" on command, he leaped high into the air as I said, "Superman" and he also just sat there for about two minutes for the cameras as they flashed after I'd told him "Sit. Stay."

What a terrific dog I have.

So listen up! Guys, Lobo's brother, Hula, is still up for adoption, all these months after he was there when I got the best blessing of my life in NYC thus far, my best friend and confidant, Lobo, the city cattle dog. Somebody for the sake of all that's humane in this world, rescue Lobo's brother, Hula!

Wonder if any part of the "$40 million in family money" that Merritt Paulson's daddy gave him was going to go towards rescuing a dog to become a mascot in for his little professional soccer team that would be worth tens of millions of dollars to him and his daddy if only it could get taxpayer-subsidized.

I'm shaking again.