This is the third high-level Obama nominee that had to withdraw due to financial dealings that the vettng process should have ferreted out long before they were official named. I appreciate that Obama wanted to hit the ground running, but Obama's credibility on wanting to change Washington's political culture has taken a major hit. While the nominees withdrew themselves, the problem is that Obama publicly supported them up untl the minute that they withdrew/were asked to withdraw.

Either you have a situation where the vetting process has completely broken down and they are not doing the background checks that they needed to, or that the Administration is willing to let things slide in order to get the slots filled quickly. Either one of these is an unsavory prospect, given Obama's pledges for integrity, selecting personel on merit and cleaning house.

Something has definately gone off track here and considering that this is only the first few days of his administration, Obama needs to start living up to his pledges. If Obama wants to stop the lobby money from being such an issue, he needs to start being more forceful on the issue and stop stating that he stands behind his nominees. If something like this crops up again, Obama needs to withdraw the nomination himself and withdraw his support for his candidate. Right now, the team around Obama looks at the very least incompetant and at worse, has its own ethical problems.

If someone wants to pay me $500K to run a bank that isn't doing too well, I'd be happy to take the job. After all, I may not be a Harvard educated business major, but I hardly think that I could do worst at the job than these clowns.

I lost my cat this past November at the ripe age of 18 1/2 years old. Freebee had been a shelter kitten from a stray littler. When I got her, she was just 8 weeks old. For over 15 years she was the picture of perfect health. Then she began to lose weight rapidly while her appitite increased dramatically. A vet visit confirmed what I had suspected - she had a hyperactive thyroid. The course of treatment that my vet recommended? A daily dose of methathimazole that she was able to have made into a cat treat. The cat treat meds were twice as expensive as the pills, but it made giving her the medication a pleasure for both of us instead of a struggle.

I got to enjoy the companionship of my cat for another three and a half years. We went to the vet every three months for blood work to see how Freebee was doing, and while it was never easy to pay for those vet visits, I never thought twice about missing one. After seeing the vet in August and getting relatively good marks on her tests, Freebee began to show some physical deterioration. By November, she had nearly stopped eatting completely and had lost weight. I made an emergency appointment and we got the news we'd been dreading. Freebee had developed a tumor in her abdomen that the vet had not felt during her last visit, but was not easily palpable. She had lost nearly a third of her body weight. We spoke about options and the vet said that while surgery might buy her some time, we'd be talking a matter of months at best. We decided that it was time to say goodbye to Freebee. I held her in my arms while the vet administered the shot. I had decided long ago that I wanted Freebee cremated so I could bury her in our yard and didn't mind the expense.

It didn't matter to me that she was a mutt cat that I got for nearly nothing at a shelter - she had been my dearest companion for many years. All in all, I figure that between Freebee's vet visits the last few years, her medication and special dietary food and her final disposal ran me around $3000, but I consider that money well spent. Sure, I could have bought things for myself with that money, or taken a vacation, but I cherished Freebee's presense in my life even more. I was willing to go without things for myself on occasion because Freebee was more important than my temporary wants.

And now? Well, a week after saying goodbye to Freebee, I visited our local shelter and came home with a little black kitten that I named Luna. I never went for the fancy status breeds, and while my brother kept trying to steer me towards a breeder with a litter of Russian Blue kittens, I knew that at the shelter there was a cat waiting for me. She's now nearly six months old, healthy and happy.

Luna wouldn't know a diamond-studded Hermes collar or a custom made litter box concealer. What she knows is that when I come home from work, she gets fed and cuddled. At night she had a spot on my bed next to me to sleep. And that whatever might happen in life, she will always be with me. Caring for an animal when things are tough economically can be difficult, but when I get woken up early on a Saturday morning by Luna playing with my hair, or when she curls up next me my on the couch and wraps her paws around my arm and cuddles close... how can I put a price on that?