"Money is the root of all evil"

Fox News reported this morning that Buckingham Palace's security had been breached when a reporter paid off one of the queen's chauffeurs to sit in her vehicle and gain entry to the residence ... all for around $1,600.

If this journalist has been a terrorist posing as a journalist, the queen ... indeed, the entire royal family ... could be dead today.

That made me think back to the saying, "Money is the root to all evil," and it certainly seems to be true in almost every case I can think of including this one. The saying is a variation of Timothy 6:10 from the King James Bible:

For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

For a mere $1,600, a member of the queen's staff was willing to compromise lives and national treasures. Is anyone safe?

Katie Couric says Queen Elizabeth "requested" iPod

Am I to believe that heads of state put in requests -- purchasing orders, if you will? -- for gifts from visiting heads of state?

And is it just me ... or does an iPod seem a bit tacky as a gift to present to the Queen? Who is in charge of presidential gift-giving these days?

Rush Limbaugh played the sound bite of Ms. Couric gushing over the Obamas during their trip to Europe

COURIC: He presented the Queen with a video iPod -- something she actually requested! -- loaded with classic show tunes like My Fair Lady and Camelot, also a songbook autographed by Richard Rodgers, the master himself. The moment that was really noticed was when Mrs. Obama, as you mentioned earlier, placed her arm around Queen Elizabeth!

SMITH: Mmmmumph!

COURIC: Touching, I guess initiating touching is a no, no.

SMITH: Yeah!

COURIC: But her majesty seemed to welcome Mrs. Obama's overture, so people here are just eating it up!

Rush added his commentary to the Couric clip:

RUSH: Oh, yes, American royalty meets British royalty. So now Katie Couric says Queen Elizabeth asked for the iPod. She asked for it. Now, I heard -- and I don't know, but I heard -- that she already had an iPod. She asked Obama to bring her an iPod. What did he do, stop at the Duty Free Shop when he landed at Stansted and go in there and pick one up? No, obviously, because it was preloaded with stuff. It's another thing about an iPod. You give somebody an iPod so they can load their own stuff on it. The touchy-feely... This is one of the protocol things that people were worried about. Here is the audio of Obama's chat with the Queen. Now, what this is, is Obama and Prince Philip. They had this quiet exchange yesterday at Buckingham Palace.

These media hypocrisies bother me. The Bushes could do nothing right in the eyes of the mainstream media ... but when Michelle Obama touches the Queen, a definite no-no, it's okay to Ms. Couric. If Mrs. Bush had done the same, the press would be talking about it for days claiming the Bushes must have been brought up in a barn and were horrible representatives of the U.S. for daring to break protocol and touch the Queen.

In the words of Miss Katie -- "The Perky One," as Rush calls her -- "But her majesty seemed to welcome Mrs. Obama's overture, so people here are just eating it up!"

"Eating it up"?

Oh, to have Lexis-Nexis to research what Ms. Couric said about President and Mrs. Bush.