The Guild 4-27-2005 Confections of a Beltway insider

u-dailynews.com ^ | Tuesday, April 26, 2005 | Natalie Haughton

[BigWaveBetty]

JIMMY CARTER - Carter liked low-calorie desserts such as a yogurt and fresh fruit tart, but he also splurged on chocolate cake and strawberry napoleons.

RONALD REAGAN - Reagan had a sweet tooth. "He was a chocolate lover and loved a crunchy chocolate cake along with my quick chocolate mousse (with crystallized ginger) and raspberry mousse."

GEORGE HERBERT WALKER BUSH - Mesnier says Bush liked creme brulees, silky chocolate cream pie and a cheesecake served with lemon curd.

WILLIAM JEFFERSON CLINTON - Since Clinton couldn't eat dairy or chocolate, Mesnier baked special desserts for him - low-calorie strawberry cake, cherry pie, apricot sunburst and hot dried pear souffle. "He loved apple pie."

GEORGE W. BUSH - The president was a fan of Mesnier's chocolate cherry cake, cherry trifle, bananas in raspberry cream and sunflower tart.

[BigWaveBetty]

Blog Links

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NRO, the Corner and the Kerry Spot

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[BigWaveBetty]

Oh my word, I completely forgot to put The Guild in the title. Talk about getting old!

[speedy]

Great article, BWB. I need to wake the pastry chef to make me a creme brulee.

[BigWaveBetty]

Be gentle. :-)

[Timeout]

Talk about getting old!......Let's not!

In today's lead editorial in the WaPo, they provide a perfect example of what I was talking about yesterday.

Mr. Frist is really arguing that Democrats should not be able to do to Republican nominees what Republican senators only recently did to Democratic nominees, using a different set of procedural tricks.

There you go. They blithely ignore that REPUBLICANS WERE IN THE MAJORITY when Clinton's nominees were bottled up in the Judiciary Committee. Not only did Clinton LOSE his party's majority. Bush has his party in control AND has INCREASED HIS MAJORITY in each subsequent election.

These are the folks who were totally unconcerned with majority tactics for decades...when Dems controlled Congress. Now they say it should make no difference whether a president has his own party controlling congress. Or, in other words, "elections don't matter".

Grrrrr.

[mountaineer]

Mmmm, pastries! At this very moment I'm baking cookies for the town ice cream social to be held on Friday (proceeds for tsunami and local flood relief): pumpkin raisin and HLL's chocolate chip cookies. In other words, nothing quite as fancy as the former White House pastry chef's creations, but still delicious.

[lizma]

I think the Food Network did a special on this guy a few years back. After reading this, I think I'll dump the planned piece of toast for breakfast and go for the strawberry shortcake ice cream. Yummmmmmm.

[BigWaveBetty]

Arrrgh!

The other media lie that drives me around the bend is the one about how there's no more civility in DC, always with the insinuation that this kind of discourtesy is because republicans are in control.

No one with the exception of Rush has pointed out that civility took a dive in DC when dems lost power and they're the ones who have been acting like spoiled children that unless they get their way, on EVERYTHING, they'll obstruct.

[BigWaveBetty]

Yummy! I think I can smell those cookies from here.

[BigWaveBetty]

Laura looked great last night...

Don't even think about it Jay, Laura is way out of your league.

[mountaineer]

Washington Post's Mensa Invitational again asked readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition. Here are this year's (2005) winners:

1. Intaxication: Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with.

2. Reintarnation: Coming back to life as a hillbilly.

3. Bozone (c): the substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the future.

4. Foreploy: Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid.

5. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period.

6. Giraffiti: Vandalism spray-painted very, very high.

7. Sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.

8. Inoculatte: To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.

9. Hipatitis: Terminal coolness.

10. Osteopornosis: A degenerate disease.

11. Karmageddon: It's like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it's like, a serious bummer.

12. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.

13. Glibido: All talk and no action.

14. Dopeler effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.

15. Arachnoleptic fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web.

16. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.

17. Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a worm in the fruit you're eating.

And the grand winner:

18. Ignoranus: A person who's both stupid and an a- hole

[anniegetyourgun]

Oh my goodness, I knew I loved Ronald Reagan...but after seeing his favorites, I'm an even bigger fan! And, if I ate this guy's pastries, I'd be an even BIGGER fan....as in LARGER!

[mountaineer]

Both Carter's and Reagan's favorites have me drooling, but I could be persuaded to try just about anything Chef Mesnier created.

[BigWaveBetty]

A strange thought popped into my head yesterday about Syria's hasty retreat out of Lebanon. Perhaps there were additional reasons to the pull out, like... Syria needs every last soldier they have in case they need to fight a war with the U.S.? It seems the book isn't quite closed on the 'where are those WMD's' question....

The CIA's chief weapons inspector said he cannot rule out the possibility that Iraqi weapons of mass destruction were secretly shipped to Syria before the March 2003 invasion, citing "sufficiently credible" evidence that WMDs may have been moved there.

Inspector Charles Duelfer, who heads the Iraq Survey Group (ISG), made the findings in an addendum to his final report filed last year. He said the search for WMD in Iraq -- the main reason President Bush went to war to oust Saddam Hussein -- has been exhausted without finding such weapons. Iraq had stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons in the early 1990s.

But on the question of Syria, Mr. Duelfer did not close the books. "ISG was unable to complete its investigation and is unable to rule out the possibility that WMD was evacuated to Syria before the war," Mr. Duelfer said in a report posted on the CIA's Web site Monday night.

He cited some evidence of a transfer. "Whether Syria received military items from Iraq for safekeeping or other reasons has yet to be determined," he said. "There was evidence of a discussion of possible WMD collaboration initiated by a Syrian security officer, and ISG received information about movement of material out of Iraq, including the possibility that WMD was involved. In the judgment of the working group, these reports were sufficiently credible to merit further investigation." More

[BigWaveBetty]

Those are great! I love to play around with words. I found this story interesting on presidential language.

Btw, on this day in history: In 1937, the nation’s first Social Security checks were distributed. FDR's mother refused to pay SS on the "help" at her home, saying it was unconstitutional. FDR asked the new agency to send the bill to him and he'd pay it, but told them, DO NOT tell his mother he was paying it for her. Ha!

[Timeout]

Ha! I had opened a page to post that very article to you!
But the phone rang and I was tied up for half an hour. Not sure we'll ever know the truth about Syria. But at least we know one thing: the next logical repository would have been Iran and, given our presence in Iraq, that option is no longer viable. Whew!

[najida]

Oh my!

Reading this has me wanting to rummage through the pantry for anything sweet and chocolate.

[najida]

Oh my!

Reading this has me wanting to rummage through the pantry for anything sweet and chocolate.

[BigWaveBetty]

I gained 12 pounds just reading the story. ;-)