ONLY GIVING YOU THINGS YOU JOKE ABOUT WITH YOUR FRIENDS INSIDE YOUR LIVING ROOM: DougJ breaks blog kayfabe.

Have I mentioned that the evolution of DougJ from spoof poster to Balloon Juice front pager is one of the greatest things I've ever witnessed on the Internet? No? Because that would be true.

THE SECOND TIME, BUT AS FARCE: Thoreau draws our attention to the Obama administration's version of the Hainan Island incident. Really--this one paragraph is all you need to know:

"Because the vessels' intentions were not known, Impeccable sprayed its fire hoses at one of the vessels in order to protect itself," the statement said. "The Chinese crewmembers disrobed to their underwear and continued closing to within 25 feet."

"Cap'n--they're giving us the skivvies!" "Blast--the hosing wasn't enough! Courage, men! Launch the fool moon salute!"

THE GEITHNER TIPPING POINT: Yeah. This here is the last straw of the Geithner hate stuff I've been reading lately. It's probably a bit of a stretch--it blames Geithner for mishandling the Asian financial crisis, which leads to East Asia shunning the IMF (which they have little control over or say in) and building up their foreign currency reserves, which directly feeds into the current debt-fueled nightmare. But in concert with the dithering and lack of imagination and all around lack of response months into Great Depression II: Even The Homeless Have Cellphones? There's got to be somebody better, Barry. And someone not a total high finance thrall either (though that's certainly asking for too much. But just someone who might consider putting the national interest first at some point.)

(This cellphone other thing is yards of silly, by the way. Like cellphones are any kind of a wealth marker, or like every destitute Somalian doesn't have a cellphone at this point.)