Happy Birthday, Mr. President:
Oh, the Rude Pundit's been a-rackin' his brain all week about what to get George W. Bush on the occasion of today, his 60th birthday. 'Cause what do you get the man who has everything? No, no, really, seriously, the man has everything. One can be sure he has an electric razor or a snazzy tie collection. And you can't buy him a bottle of wine or whiskey (well, you could, but you'd have to give it to him on the sly, wink, wink). And there's so many things the Rude Pundit couldn't afford. C'mon, you think we mere mortals could get him the kind of watch he's used to, a Bulgari or Ebel? Perhaps a nice Fossil, but, no, nothing more. We're just gonna have to think outside the box, as it were.
The Rude Pundit thinks we should all chip in and get George W. Bush a corpse for the start of his seventh decade despoiling the Earth. But which one, which one? 'Cause there's just so fuckin' many to choose from.
Howzabout the corpse of Ken Lay? Yeah, he can prop that stony cold fucker up in a corner of the Oval Office, embalmed there in its final death grimace, that strange mixture of pain, regret, and jubilation that Lay must have felt as he sensed his vile heart was finally imploding, turning on itself and making him feel as if his entire chest was going to rip out of his body, as he suffocated on his constricted organs and viscera. What a half-smirk Kenny-Boy must have had as he realized he was not only going to cheat the prosecutor, but he also couldn't be accused of taking the coward's way out and offing himself (or at least not offing himself in an obvious way like takin' a header off Enron's former headquarters). Somewhere in the senior citizen sodomy room of a federal prison, John Rigas is moaning in jealousy and anal tearing. Dennis Kozlowski is curled up in his bunk, cursing God for not taking him, too, as his cellmate tells him to shut the fuck up 'cause talkin' ain't good while you're givin' a blow job.
Yeah, Lay's corpse could be the ideal corpse for George W. Bush, all bundled up with a ribbon. After it begins to rot, Bush could stuff it full of campaign contributions, all of which turned out to be worthless to Lay, with no pardon possible. Presidents, after all, cost much, much more than governors. And the corpse could serve as a reminder for Bush that old money provides so much more body armor against scandal than new money.
No, no, Ken Lay's skinny corpse doesn't seem quite vivid enough for George W. Bush's 60th birthday. Perhaps for a 59th or 61st. But this one oughta be really special. The Rude Pundit's got it. Let's give the President the corpse of Abeer Qasim Hamza, the 15 - maybe 16 - maybe older - but no doubt young woman who was stalked, raped, and killed by a group of American soldiers, along with her parents and 7-year old sister. Sure, it'll be hard to give the entire body, what with Abeer having been shot over and over in the head after at least three soldiers gang-raped her. And who knows how much skin is left, since they used flammable chemicals to burn her body.
What could be a more perfect gift than the nearly headless, fleshless charred corpse of a young Iraqi woman? After all, the most poignant of the savageries of Saddam Hussein's reign in Iraq, the one repeated ad nauseam starting in 2003 (with nary a mention before), was the rape room, where the women of Iraq had to fear being kidnapped and taken to, where they were raped and tortured, with videotapes of the acts being used as a way to destroy their families, who were "dishonored" by the rape (one of the more charmingly culturally-repellent aspects of many Muslim nations). And now the women of Iraq no longer have to fear rape rooms. They get to fear predatory groups of American soldiers plotting to fuck and murder women, kill their families, and desecrate their corpses. The more things change, you know...
Sure, there's tons, thousands, tens of thousands, of other corpses that could be gifts to the President - American soldiers, cancer-ridden 9/11 rescuers, so, so many others. But maybe giving the President a gift-corpse would be wrong - it'd just be re-gifting because didn't he give all those corpses to us? How could we be so ungrateful.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
American Credulity and the Attacks on the Press:
Look, here's the deal on the whole NSA-spyin', bank-record-and-rectum-probin', listenin'-in-on-yer-"Dial a Namibian Man-Whore"-international-callin', secrets-revealin' New York Times, oh-motherfuck-the-fuckin'-sky-is-fallin', national-security-damagin' bull-fuckin'-shit: Prove it. Fuckin' prove it. The Rude Pundit's sick and tired of the mad levels of credulity we're all expected to have.
Check it out: here's Jonah Goldberg today (and, remember, motherfucker writes for the Los Angeles Times, which has garnered virtually no heat for publishing its story about the financial transaction searches), writing about the NSA communications net-toss: "These revelations caused serious damage to America's ability to work with allies to fight terrorism and arguably put lives in danger." This is in a column taking the press to task for publishing classified information, where he mocks the Plame leak uproar and the Pulitzers received by reporters for revealing the NSA spying. Yet recognizing irony is not Goldberg's strong suit. Indeed, if irony bit Jonah Goldberg on his bloated ass and then waved its hands and screamed, "Look at me, I'm irony," Goldberg still wouldn't see it.
'Cause you'd think that Goldberg (even though, yes, he's a columnist and therefore allegedly not held to the same standards as "journalists") might wanna offer just a scintilla, just a little microbe of proof that any of the Times's revelations have damaged one goddamned bit of "America's ability" to "fight terrorism."
In fact, has anyone seen any evidence of this other than the words of crazed, feces-tossin' members of Congress and the slithery smirk-grunts of the Vice President telling us it's so? What's worse is the pride in ignorance that the right wing media takes in presenting us these words as facts. It's like watching macrame' day at the school for very special kids, all of them just so damn happy that they can hold the yarn steady, let alone make a knot, without stabbing each other with pins or scissors.
Hugh Hewitt, prissy wad of fuck though he is, actually takes a stab at making the Times banking story have meaning. Says Hewitt, "The Indonesian master terrorist Hambali was captured through the SWIFT program." Now, while you may sit there and think, "Mmmm, hamball," Hewitt undermines his own "argument" in the very next sentence: "He was apprehended in August of 2003, months after a general commitment to following the money was announced and even some obscure references to SWIFT had made their way into print, proving that even if you know the city is looking for speeders, it doesn’t mean every scofflaw knows where the speed traps and cameras are located."
Hewitt, of course, means that now the Times has shown the terrorists where the cameras are. But the terrorists knew that they were being watched, that every step they take has the chance of being discovered. In other words, truly, there is nothing a criminal or enemy can do that doesn't have the chance of being revealed. It's part of the game, no?
Back in World War II, cited unendingly as America's time of greatness and loyalty and unity and press kowtowing to the will of the state for the good of the good war, everyone fucking knew that messages were sent in code, through secret couriers or transmissions. In the build-up to the actual war, here's Time magazine from November 18, 1940: "Secret British information intended for Washington is usually handed to the U. S. Embassy in London for transmission in code." Look at what that reveals: the place, albeit an obvious one, where information is handed off, the fact that it's in code, and its destination.
Even during the war, after the government's censor issued dictums on a limitation of information that could be spread, Time could still publish, as it did on April 19, 1943, about America's intelligence gathering and alert system set up in China against the Japanese: "No one except the Chinese knows how many there are of these little primary posts. The secondary posts are all linked together by telephone lines. Here, at certain secret points like Mickey's, U.S. radio stations have been set up to tap the secondary and flash warning of raiders to American fighter posts in the hinterland."
What's changed is a number of things: the bar on what a secret actually is has been raised so high, that it's impossible for any information to be below it; and also that level of credulity has changed in a population made ignorant by--
Well, let's continue this tomorrow.
Look, here's the deal on the whole NSA-spyin', bank-record-and-rectum-probin', listenin'-in-on-yer-"Dial a Namibian Man-Whore"-international-callin', secrets-revealin' New York Times, oh-motherfuck-the-fuckin'-sky-is-fallin', national-security-damagin' bull-fuckin'-shit: Prove it. Fuckin' prove it. The Rude Pundit's sick and tired of the mad levels of credulity we're all expected to have.
Check it out: here's Jonah Goldberg today (and, remember, motherfucker writes for the Los Angeles Times, which has garnered virtually no heat for publishing its story about the financial transaction searches), writing about the NSA communications net-toss: "These revelations caused serious damage to America's ability to work with allies to fight terrorism and arguably put lives in danger." This is in a column taking the press to task for publishing classified information, where he mocks the Plame leak uproar and the Pulitzers received by reporters for revealing the NSA spying. Yet recognizing irony is not Goldberg's strong suit. Indeed, if irony bit Jonah Goldberg on his bloated ass and then waved its hands and screamed, "Look at me, I'm irony," Goldberg still wouldn't see it.
'Cause you'd think that Goldberg (even though, yes, he's a columnist and therefore allegedly not held to the same standards as "journalists") might wanna offer just a scintilla, just a little microbe of proof that any of the Times's revelations have damaged one goddamned bit of "America's ability" to "fight terrorism."
In fact, has anyone seen any evidence of this other than the words of crazed, feces-tossin' members of Congress and the slithery smirk-grunts of the Vice President telling us it's so? What's worse is the pride in ignorance that the right wing media takes in presenting us these words as facts. It's like watching macrame' day at the school for very special kids, all of them just so damn happy that they can hold the yarn steady, let alone make a knot, without stabbing each other with pins or scissors.
Hugh Hewitt, prissy wad of fuck though he is, actually takes a stab at making the Times banking story have meaning. Says Hewitt, "The Indonesian master terrorist Hambali was captured through the SWIFT program." Now, while you may sit there and think, "Mmmm, hamball," Hewitt undermines his own "argument" in the very next sentence: "He was apprehended in August of 2003, months after a general commitment to following the money was announced and even some obscure references to SWIFT had made their way into print, proving that even if you know the city is looking for speeders, it doesn’t mean every scofflaw knows where the speed traps and cameras are located."
Hewitt, of course, means that now the Times has shown the terrorists where the cameras are. But the terrorists knew that they were being watched, that every step they take has the chance of being discovered. In other words, truly, there is nothing a criminal or enemy can do that doesn't have the chance of being revealed. It's part of the game, no?
Back in World War II, cited unendingly as America's time of greatness and loyalty and unity and press kowtowing to the will of the state for the good of the good war, everyone fucking knew that messages were sent in code, through secret couriers or transmissions. In the build-up to the actual war, here's Time magazine from November 18, 1940: "Secret British information intended for Washington is usually handed to the U. S. Embassy in London for transmission in code." Look at what that reveals: the place, albeit an obvious one, where information is handed off, the fact that it's in code, and its destination.
Even during the war, after the government's censor issued dictums on a limitation of information that could be spread, Time could still publish, as it did on April 19, 1943, about America's intelligence gathering and alert system set up in China against the Japanese: "No one except the Chinese knows how many there are of these little primary posts. The secondary posts are all linked together by telephone lines. Here, at certain secret points like Mickey's, U.S. radio stations have been set up to tap the secondary and flash warning of raiders to American fighter posts in the hinterland."
What's changed is a number of things: the bar on what a secret actually is has been raised so high, that it's impossible for any information to be below it; and also that level of credulity has changed in a population made ignorant by--
Well, let's continue this tomorrow.
Tuesday, July 04, 2006
A Day For a Thrilling Show:
Today's Independence Day speech by President Bush at Fort Bragg was given to troops he has condemned to death or wounding, with Bush threatening the soldiers with, "I will make you this promise, I'm not going to allow the sacrifice of 2,527 troops who have died in Iraq to be in vain." Bush touted the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, saying, "At this moment of vulnerability for the enemy, we will continue to strike their network. We will disrupt their operations, and we will bring their leaders to justice."
Of course, reality, as ever, is just a motherfucker for the President, especially since the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq just told the BBC that Zarqawi's death hasn't done a whole fuck of a lot to make Iraq safer: "[I]n terms of the level of violence, it has not had any impact at this point."
So, sure, Bush can tell the Fort Bragg troops, "You are serving our country at a time when our country needs you. And because of your courage, every day is Independence Day in America," but we know that it is and it isn't. Independence Day oughta be about freedom and liberty and justice for all and those kinds of niceties of a putative democracy. Instead, it is just an occasion for saber-rattling, the mock explosions of fireworks, and promises of more war for even the unforeseeable future.
The Rude Pundit prefers, as ever, Kurt Vonnegut's take on celebrating war in Cat's Cradle. It's becoming a yearly tradition here, sort of a "Yes, Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus" for the rude:
"We are gathered here, friends," he said, "to honor lo Hoon-year Mora-toorz tut Zamoo-cratz-ya, children dead, all dead, all murdered in war. It is customary on days like this to call such lost children men. I am unable to call them men for this simple reason: that in the same war in which lo Hoon-year Mora-toorz tut Zamoo-cratz-ya died, my own son died.
"My soul insists that I mourn not a man but a child.
"I do not say that children at war do not die like men, if they have to die. To their everlasting honor and our everlasting shame, they do die like men, thus making possible the manly jubilation of patriotic holidays.
"But they are murdered children all the same.
"And I propose to you that if we are to pay our sincere respects to the hundred lost children of San Lorenzo, that we might best spend the day despising what killed them; which is to say, the stupidity and viciousness of all mankind.
"Perhaps, when we remember wars, we should take off our clothes and paint ourselves blue and go on all fours all day long and grunt like pigs. That would surely be more appropriate than noble oratory and shows of flags and well-oiled guns.
"I do not mean to be ungrateful for the fine, martial show we are about to see – and a thrilling show it really will be…"
He looked each of us in the eye, and then he commented very softly, throwing it away, "And hooray I say for thrilling shows."
We had to strain our ears to hear what Minton said next.
"But if today is really in honor of a hundred children murdered in war," he said, "is today a day for a thrilling show?
"The answer is yes, on one condition: that we, the celebrants are working consciously and tirelessly to reduce the stupidity and viciousness of ourselves and all mankind."
Today's Independence Day speech by President Bush at Fort Bragg was given to troops he has condemned to death or wounding, with Bush threatening the soldiers with, "I will make you this promise, I'm not going to allow the sacrifice of 2,527 troops who have died in Iraq to be in vain." Bush touted the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, saying, "At this moment of vulnerability for the enemy, we will continue to strike their network. We will disrupt their operations, and we will bring their leaders to justice."
Of course, reality, as ever, is just a motherfucker for the President, especially since the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq just told the BBC that Zarqawi's death hasn't done a whole fuck of a lot to make Iraq safer: "[I]n terms of the level of violence, it has not had any impact at this point."
So, sure, Bush can tell the Fort Bragg troops, "You are serving our country at a time when our country needs you. And because of your courage, every day is Independence Day in America," but we know that it is and it isn't. Independence Day oughta be about freedom and liberty and justice for all and those kinds of niceties of a putative democracy. Instead, it is just an occasion for saber-rattling, the mock explosions of fireworks, and promises of more war for even the unforeseeable future.
The Rude Pundit prefers, as ever, Kurt Vonnegut's take on celebrating war in Cat's Cradle. It's becoming a yearly tradition here, sort of a "Yes, Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus" for the rude:
"We are gathered here, friends," he said, "to honor lo Hoon-year Mora-toorz tut Zamoo-cratz-ya, children dead, all dead, all murdered in war. It is customary on days like this to call such lost children men. I am unable to call them men for this simple reason: that in the same war in which lo Hoon-year Mora-toorz tut Zamoo-cratz-ya died, my own son died.
"My soul insists that I mourn not a man but a child.
"I do not say that children at war do not die like men, if they have to die. To their everlasting honor and our everlasting shame, they do die like men, thus making possible the manly jubilation of patriotic holidays.
"But they are murdered children all the same.
"And I propose to you that if we are to pay our sincere respects to the hundred lost children of San Lorenzo, that we might best spend the day despising what killed them; which is to say, the stupidity and viciousness of all mankind.
"Perhaps, when we remember wars, we should take off our clothes and paint ourselves blue and go on all fours all day long and grunt like pigs. That would surely be more appropriate than noble oratory and shows of flags and well-oiled guns.
"I do not mean to be ungrateful for the fine, martial show we are about to see – and a thrilling show it really will be…"
He looked each of us in the eye, and then he commented very softly, throwing it away, "And hooray I say for thrilling shows."
We had to strain our ears to hear what Minton said next.
"But if today is really in honor of a hundred children murdered in war," he said, "is today a day for a thrilling show?
"The answer is yes, on one condition: that we, the celebrants are working consciously and tirelessly to reduce the stupidity and viciousness of ourselves and all mankind."
Monday, July 03, 2006
Late Night, New York Times:
In the smoky back rooms of the New York Times offices at 229 West 43rd Street (between 7th and 8th Avenues) in Manhattan, New York, Bill Keller is plotting with his loyal reporter-revolutionaries on how next to destroy America, or, certainly, at least bring down the White House. Certainly, the directives from the mountains of Pakistan have gotten more specific.
Oh, sure, sure, the Times tried to be subtle under Howell Raines. In the corner, Judith Miller, sucking on a Dunhill through a long ivory cigarette holder, still winces at the thought that her devilishly ironic reportage on the faux WMDs in Iraq was taken seriously by the White House and, indeed, the nation as a whole. It's a burden when one's dry sense of postmodern humor is misinterpreted or, even worse, unnoticed by the citizenry of hinterland USA, which would be anyone who doesn't commute between the Hamptons and the city regularly during the miserable New York summer. Still, al-Qaeda was pleased as Miller's reporting helped lead to the recruiting bounty that is the Iraq War. But, of course, she had to be castigated by outsiders, and now, alas, now Miller must enter the building, unseen, through the back elevator so she can attend the planning meetings.
Bill Keller holds court, demanding from his drooling, savage demi-human employees how next to draw blood. It's not enough that the Travel section pointed out that Cheney and Rumsfeld own homes in a Maryland vacation town. He wants the Dining section to review Dick Cheney's favorite DC steakhouse so the terrorists might learn where they could poison the Vice President. He wants his reporters to get out there and discover where George Bush's secret Crawford, Texas ranch is. When someone points out that the White House actually invites reporters there, Keller explodes, "Don't you get it? It doesn't fuckin' matter if the information is readily available in a hundred, a thousand other goddamn places. What matters is if we, the newspaper of record, aggregate it and report it in a piece. Then, then we know we will have done the bidding of our al-Qaeda masters." The reporter-goons nod, understanding their hideous mission.
Off in the corner, Miller giggles. When Keller asks her if she has anything to add, Miller spits out, slowly, through a mucus and merlot-filled voice, "It's never enough. Don't you get it? It's never enough. At some point, they're going to come after you, after your children, your wives, your lovers, if not with a subpoena, then with a gun or a camera." She laughs more loudly now as Keller asks her who she's talking about. "Does it matter who, Bill? Does it?"
Keller dismisses the fallen reporter, and turns back to his minions, ready to head out and reveal more secrets about the ultimate good that is the Bush administration.
Correction: One of the pieces of the Coulter plagiarism puzzle must be tossed. It was always the weakest example. For this passage: "A few years after oil drilling began in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, a saboteur set off an explosion blowing a hole in the pipeline and releasing an estimated 550,000 gallons of oil," Coulter does cite an August 24, 1982 Washington Post article by Jay Mathews that reads, "The worst -- and most mysterious -- break occurred on Feb. 15, 1978, when someone, in an apparent act of sabotage, blew a hole in the pipeline near here that spilled about 550,000 gallons of oil."
While no doubt some will look at this and go "A-ha, all the allegations are false," nothing could be further from the truth. The Rude Pundit stands by, and re-emphasizes, motherfuckers, every other instance of plagiarism in Coulter's work, especially now that it's been backed up by the New York Post. Coulter's plagiarism is at least as bad as that of Kaayva Viswanathan, whose book, How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life, was recalled by its publisher.
Oh, by the way, Coulter does not cite any source for her main point of the example: "Six weeks later, the birds were back." Indeed, Prudhoe Bay is more or less fucked up for the birds.
In the smoky back rooms of the New York Times offices at 229 West 43rd Street (between 7th and 8th Avenues) in Manhattan, New York, Bill Keller is plotting with his loyal reporter-revolutionaries on how next to destroy America, or, certainly, at least bring down the White House. Certainly, the directives from the mountains of Pakistan have gotten more specific.
Oh, sure, sure, the Times tried to be subtle under Howell Raines. In the corner, Judith Miller, sucking on a Dunhill through a long ivory cigarette holder, still winces at the thought that her devilishly ironic reportage on the faux WMDs in Iraq was taken seriously by the White House and, indeed, the nation as a whole. It's a burden when one's dry sense of postmodern humor is misinterpreted or, even worse, unnoticed by the citizenry of hinterland USA, which would be anyone who doesn't commute between the Hamptons and the city regularly during the miserable New York summer. Still, al-Qaeda was pleased as Miller's reporting helped lead to the recruiting bounty that is the Iraq War. But, of course, she had to be castigated by outsiders, and now, alas, now Miller must enter the building, unseen, through the back elevator so she can attend the planning meetings.
Bill Keller holds court, demanding from his drooling, savage demi-human employees how next to draw blood. It's not enough that the Travel section pointed out that Cheney and Rumsfeld own homes in a Maryland vacation town. He wants the Dining section to review Dick Cheney's favorite DC steakhouse so the terrorists might learn where they could poison the Vice President. He wants his reporters to get out there and discover where George Bush's secret Crawford, Texas ranch is. When someone points out that the White House actually invites reporters there, Keller explodes, "Don't you get it? It doesn't fuckin' matter if the information is readily available in a hundred, a thousand other goddamn places. What matters is if we, the newspaper of record, aggregate it and report it in a piece. Then, then we know we will have done the bidding of our al-Qaeda masters." The reporter-goons nod, understanding their hideous mission.
Off in the corner, Miller giggles. When Keller asks her if she has anything to add, Miller spits out, slowly, through a mucus and merlot-filled voice, "It's never enough. Don't you get it? It's never enough. At some point, they're going to come after you, after your children, your wives, your lovers, if not with a subpoena, then with a gun or a camera." She laughs more loudly now as Keller asks her who she's talking about. "Does it matter who, Bill? Does it?"
Keller dismisses the fallen reporter, and turns back to his minions, ready to head out and reveal more secrets about the ultimate good that is the Bush administration.
Correction: One of the pieces of the Coulter plagiarism puzzle must be tossed. It was always the weakest example. For this passage: "A few years after oil drilling began in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, a saboteur set off an explosion blowing a hole in the pipeline and releasing an estimated 550,000 gallons of oil," Coulter does cite an August 24, 1982 Washington Post article by Jay Mathews that reads, "The worst -- and most mysterious -- break occurred on Feb. 15, 1978, when someone, in an apparent act of sabotage, blew a hole in the pipeline near here that spilled about 550,000 gallons of oil."
While no doubt some will look at this and go "A-ha, all the allegations are false," nothing could be further from the truth. The Rude Pundit stands by, and re-emphasizes, motherfuckers, every other instance of plagiarism in Coulter's work, especially now that it's been backed up by the New York Post. Coulter's plagiarism is at least as bad as that of Kaayva Viswanathan, whose book, How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life, was recalled by its publisher.
Oh, by the way, Coulter does not cite any source for her main point of the example: "Six weeks later, the birds were back." Indeed, Prudhoe Bay is more or less fucked up for the birds.
Sunday, July 02, 2006
Coulter Blindsided By Science:
From an article in today's New York Post by Philip Recchia: "John Barrie, the creator of a leading plagiarism-recognition system, claimed he found at least three instances of what he calls 'textbook plagiarism' in the leggy blond pundit's Godless: the Church of Liberalism after he ran the book's text through the company's digital iThenticate program. He also says he discovered verbatim lifts in Coulter's weekly column."
Some of the things that Barrie cites are a "33-word passage" that "allegedly comes from a 1999 article in the Portland (Maine) Press Herald," as well as a June 2005 column that "incorporates 10 facts on National Endowment for the Arts-funded work" from a Heritage Foundation document.
Now, the Rude Pundit's not saying anything about Barrie's work or where he may have been, you know, inspired to even look into whether or not Coulter plagiarized - the Rude Pundit's happy to have some independent confirmation of what he's been saying about Coulter's plagiarism since, you know, July 1, 2005. And he doesn't wanna be a dick about it, because anything that brings Coulter down is generally karmic good news in the universe.
But, really, and, c'mon, when the time comes to burn Coulter at the stake of plagiarism, the Rude Pundit and Ron Brynaert of Raw Story (Brynaert especially so since he did far, far more legwork than the Rude Pundit on this story) deserve to hold the torch along with Barrie, let alone get some mention in the New York Post. (And especially since the plagiarism work of the Rude Pundit and Brynaert was mentioned at MSNBC, Slate, Huffington Post, and other mucho larger media outlets - in other words, just a Google away.)
(Rude thanks to Blogenfreude.)
From an article in today's New York Post by Philip Recchia: "John Barrie, the creator of a leading plagiarism-recognition system, claimed he found at least three instances of what he calls 'textbook plagiarism' in the leggy blond pundit's Godless: the Church of Liberalism after he ran the book's text through the company's digital iThenticate program. He also says he discovered verbatim lifts in Coulter's weekly column."
Some of the things that Barrie cites are a "33-word passage" that "allegedly comes from a 1999 article in the Portland (Maine) Press Herald," as well as a June 2005 column that "incorporates 10 facts on National Endowment for the Arts-funded work" from a Heritage Foundation document.
Now, the Rude Pundit's not saying anything about Barrie's work or where he may have been, you know, inspired to even look into whether or not Coulter plagiarized - the Rude Pundit's happy to have some independent confirmation of what he's been saying about Coulter's plagiarism since, you know, July 1, 2005. And he doesn't wanna be a dick about it, because anything that brings Coulter down is generally karmic good news in the universe.
But, really, and, c'mon, when the time comes to burn Coulter at the stake of plagiarism, the Rude Pundit and Ron Brynaert of Raw Story (Brynaert especially so since he did far, far more legwork than the Rude Pundit on this story) deserve to hold the torch along with Barrie, let alone get some mention in the New York Post. (And especially since the plagiarism work of the Rude Pundit and Brynaert was mentioned at MSNBC, Slate, Huffington Post, and other mucho larger media outlets - in other words, just a Google away.)
(Rude thanks to Blogenfreude.)
Friday, June 30, 2006
Hamdan, Democrats, and the Potential Constitutional Monarchy:
Here's yer summertime campaign issue, Democrats. Road test this fucker and see how it flies (and trust the Rude Pundit: he knows more than Bob Shrum and Donna Brazile genetically merged into one losing machine). Ya ready? Follow the bouncin' ball motherfuckers, and, fer fuck's sake, sing it in tune:
Yesterday's Hamdan decision at the Supreme Court basically said that Congress and the courts still have some power, despite the sick orgy of centralizing power in the hands of a rank amateur monarch-wannabe so head-thickened and brow-lowered with caste-based inbreeding that the lowest markers of general intelligence - like sentence construction and primary mathematics - are debased to a point where the poor fucktard must weep every morning in sub-mongoloid rage at that he is unable to carry out even the most basic functions of human existence and thought, like logic and ass-wiping, so he is surrounded by stewards and toadies who do it all for him, all the "If a and b, then c" (for, surely, left to his own devices, the President's logical progression would be something like, "If a and b, then tuna") and the ensuring that the Commander in Chief doesn't have a vague shit smell coming off him.
So the majority of the Supreme Court told the Executive Branch that it couldn't ignore the Legislative Branch and just make up laws. Now, as we well know, we're a Lieberman or two away from the kind of one-party rule that'd make Stalin say, "Goddamn, wish I'd've thought of that." The court's majority opinion said all kinds of cool shit, like, "Hey, you remember those Geneva Conventions? Yeah, so don't be dicks about them." But the opening that the Bush administration is gonna exploit and stretch until it's as wide as a crack whore's cooter is Justice Breyer's concurring opinion, in which he says, "The Court’s conclusion ultimately rests upon a single ground: Congress has not issued the Executive a 'blank check'...Indeed, Congress has denied the President the legislative authority to create military commissions of the kind at issue here. Nothing prevents the President from returning to Congress to seek the authority he necessary."
Now, we know that for almost every goddamn non-Mexican thing, the Republican Congress has rolled itself over and presented its ass for rough fucking by the White House, which has gladly fucked away. And, already, Bill Frist has raised his haunches and spread his cheeks for easy access, saying, "Congress should work with the president to update our laws on terrorist combatants to respond to the new threats of a post-9/11 world" as he prepares to offer a Gitmo trials bill. Surely, the mad House of Representatives is doing the same. Pretty much what you can expect is a crazy-ass dash to specifically define every little monarchical power Cheney, Rove, and Gonzalez want Bush to have put into one Omnibus "Fuck You, Judiciary" bill, and Joe Lieberman will actually blow himself in joy while Arlen Specter sighs, wondering if he should have just foregone the chemo.
Then, of course, the campaign issue for Democrats in the midterms is simple and straightforward, as it ought to be: Do you, the average voter, believe George Bush should be a king? Because if you elect Republicans (or Joe Lieberman), they will give him the powers of a king. And he will take them. You want slogans? "Don't Make George Bush the King of America" or "Republican Representative Fuckwad Wants the President To Become King George."
Remember how Karl Rove works: every setback is actually an opportunity to do more harm because of how it can be manipulated for electoral purposes. We will be inundated with worthless images of deranged Gitmo detainees set loose on the streets of Alabama to rape white children because of the big, bad five justices. It'll be more fear. Now, howzabout the Democrats use a little fear on their side? "Stop King George; Elect Democrat Not-Quite-As-Much-Of-A-Fuckwad" can fit on a bumper sticker.
Sidenote: Isn't the whole "five justices" or "five robed judges" overruling the "will of the people" device used by the right just the height of rhetorical bullshit? John Cornyn, in the nonsensical debate over flag burning, said as much, and it's just so godforsaken pathetically funny. 'Cause, like, wasn't it five justices who overruled the will of the people in Bush v. Gore? So, you know, let's just shut the fuck up about what five justices can do.
Here's yer summertime campaign issue, Democrats. Road test this fucker and see how it flies (and trust the Rude Pundit: he knows more than Bob Shrum and Donna Brazile genetically merged into one losing machine). Ya ready? Follow the bouncin' ball motherfuckers, and, fer fuck's sake, sing it in tune:
Yesterday's Hamdan decision at the Supreme Court basically said that Congress and the courts still have some power, despite the sick orgy of centralizing power in the hands of a rank amateur monarch-wannabe so head-thickened and brow-lowered with caste-based inbreeding that the lowest markers of general intelligence - like sentence construction and primary mathematics - are debased to a point where the poor fucktard must weep every morning in sub-mongoloid rage at that he is unable to carry out even the most basic functions of human existence and thought, like logic and ass-wiping, so he is surrounded by stewards and toadies who do it all for him, all the "If a and b, then c" (for, surely, left to his own devices, the President's logical progression would be something like, "If a and b, then tuna") and the ensuring that the Commander in Chief doesn't have a vague shit smell coming off him.
So the majority of the Supreme Court told the Executive Branch that it couldn't ignore the Legislative Branch and just make up laws. Now, as we well know, we're a Lieberman or two away from the kind of one-party rule that'd make Stalin say, "Goddamn, wish I'd've thought of that." The court's majority opinion said all kinds of cool shit, like, "Hey, you remember those Geneva Conventions? Yeah, so don't be dicks about them." But the opening that the Bush administration is gonna exploit and stretch until it's as wide as a crack whore's cooter is Justice Breyer's concurring opinion, in which he says, "The Court’s conclusion ultimately rests upon a single ground: Congress has not issued the Executive a 'blank check'...Indeed, Congress has denied the President the legislative authority to create military commissions of the kind at issue here. Nothing prevents the President from returning to Congress to seek the authority he necessary."
Now, we know that for almost every goddamn non-Mexican thing, the Republican Congress has rolled itself over and presented its ass for rough fucking by the White House, which has gladly fucked away. And, already, Bill Frist has raised his haunches and spread his cheeks for easy access, saying, "Congress should work with the president to update our laws on terrorist combatants to respond to the new threats of a post-9/11 world" as he prepares to offer a Gitmo trials bill. Surely, the mad House of Representatives is doing the same. Pretty much what you can expect is a crazy-ass dash to specifically define every little monarchical power Cheney, Rove, and Gonzalez want Bush to have put into one Omnibus "Fuck You, Judiciary" bill, and Joe Lieberman will actually blow himself in joy while Arlen Specter sighs, wondering if he should have just foregone the chemo.
Then, of course, the campaign issue for Democrats in the midterms is simple and straightforward, as it ought to be: Do you, the average voter, believe George Bush should be a king? Because if you elect Republicans (or Joe Lieberman), they will give him the powers of a king. And he will take them. You want slogans? "Don't Make George Bush the King of America" or "Republican Representative Fuckwad Wants the President To Become King George."
Remember how Karl Rove works: every setback is actually an opportunity to do more harm because of how it can be manipulated for electoral purposes. We will be inundated with worthless images of deranged Gitmo detainees set loose on the streets of Alabama to rape white children because of the big, bad five justices. It'll be more fear. Now, howzabout the Democrats use a little fear on their side? "Stop King George; Elect Democrat Not-Quite-As-Much-Of-A-Fuckwad" can fit on a bumper sticker.
Sidenote: Isn't the whole "five justices" or "five robed judges" overruling the "will of the people" device used by the right just the height of rhetorical bullshit? John Cornyn, in the nonsensical debate over flag burning, said as much, and it's just so godforsaken pathetically funny. 'Cause, like, wasn't it five justices who overruled the will of the people in Bush v. Gore? So, you know, let's just shut the fuck up about what five justices can do.
Thursday, June 29, 2006
Regarding Secrecy, Part 2 - the Times and the White House: America's Favorite Codependent Couple:
Okay, there's a couple of easy things here we can say about the whole kerfuffle about the New York Times "revealing" a "secret" program that the Bush administration itself had bragged about. For one, telling the world that the United States government is trying to track the bank trails and finances of alleged terrorists is about surprising a revelation as, say, that the soldiers in Baghdad are carrying guns. In other words, unless al-Qaeda is the stupidest group of terrorists ever (and we have pretty good evidence that it's not), then, really, and, c'mon, who gives a fuck?
For another, all the talk of "treason" is more worthless than a tight, squeaky fart out of Tucker Carlson's bow-tied asshole: is what the New York Times wrote "tantamount to waging war" against the United States? Was the intention to assist the enemies of the country? No and no. The intention was, actually, to inform all of us, including Bill O'Reilly and Michelle Malkin, that the government is watching every fucking thing we do. And to say, well, shit, maybe in a putative democracy, we ought to have some say in that.
But, shit, instead of wallowing in the pool of bile and spittle spewed by the right, let's take a little journey to analogy-land:
Surely, the relationship between the White House and the Times is like that of a dysfunctional straight couple: they fight, they bicker, the White House and his friends would say what a whore the Gray Lady was, how she never really loved the White House, until, after 9/11, the Gray Lady wanted to show the White House, show everyone, just how much she really loved him, so she said that the White House could fuck her any way the White House wanted to.
Oh, and in what savage ways the White House madly balled the Gray Lady, bending her over a pile of adminstration-leaked documents and using rolled up fake WMD reports to shove in her ass again and again. God, how the Gray Lady wanted more, wanted to prove to the White House that she was worthy of his love, even letting the White House's friend, the Iraqi National Congress, come over and get a luxuriant blow job from the Gray Lady while the White House kept fucking her from behind while the rest of the White House's buddies cheered on the gangbang, furiously masturbating each other at the sight. All the while, the White House's friends kept telling everyone who would listen that the Gray Lady could never do enough to pleasure the White House, that the little bitch wasn't really capable, but isn't it hot to see her try?
Yeah, from the outside, we all watched this little dance and kept shaking our heads, wondering when the Gray Lady could see that all she was good for was getting fucked - when was she gonna get her self-respect back and dump that bastard for good.
Now, now that the Gray Lady has gotten back some modicum of its self-respect, oh, how the White House and his pals have turned on her, trying to berate her, psychologically abuse her, make her be the good fuck puppet she used to be. Perhaps it'll work. Perhaps, in the run up to a war with Iran or a strike on North Korea, the Gray Lady'll cheer her man on.
But maybe, just barely maybe, the Gray Lady has remembered that she is her own woman, that she has stood on her own in other difficult times, that she doesn't need a man to make her fulfilled, and that the mutterings of the White House's pals don't amount to more than gnat shit under her toenails.
Still, what is it we've learned about dysfunctional couples through the years? That one of them is destined to try to please the other on and on. And perhaps all we can say is that you can't help those who won't help themselves.
Oh, and by the way, did the White House or Republicans say that Bob Novak committed treason back a couple of years ago? Just askin'...
Okay, there's a couple of easy things here we can say about the whole kerfuffle about the New York Times "revealing" a "secret" program that the Bush administration itself had bragged about. For one, telling the world that the United States government is trying to track the bank trails and finances of alleged terrorists is about surprising a revelation as, say, that the soldiers in Baghdad are carrying guns. In other words, unless al-Qaeda is the stupidest group of terrorists ever (and we have pretty good evidence that it's not), then, really, and, c'mon, who gives a fuck?
For another, all the talk of "treason" is more worthless than a tight, squeaky fart out of Tucker Carlson's bow-tied asshole: is what the New York Times wrote "tantamount to waging war" against the United States? Was the intention to assist the enemies of the country? No and no. The intention was, actually, to inform all of us, including Bill O'Reilly and Michelle Malkin, that the government is watching every fucking thing we do. And to say, well, shit, maybe in a putative democracy, we ought to have some say in that.
But, shit, instead of wallowing in the pool of bile and spittle spewed by the right, let's take a little journey to analogy-land:
Surely, the relationship between the White House and the Times is like that of a dysfunctional straight couple: they fight, they bicker, the White House and his friends would say what a whore the Gray Lady was, how she never really loved the White House, until, after 9/11, the Gray Lady wanted to show the White House, show everyone, just how much she really loved him, so she said that the White House could fuck her any way the White House wanted to.
Oh, and in what savage ways the White House madly balled the Gray Lady, bending her over a pile of adminstration-leaked documents and using rolled up fake WMD reports to shove in her ass again and again. God, how the Gray Lady wanted more, wanted to prove to the White House that she was worthy of his love, even letting the White House's friend, the Iraqi National Congress, come over and get a luxuriant blow job from the Gray Lady while the White House kept fucking her from behind while the rest of the White House's buddies cheered on the gangbang, furiously masturbating each other at the sight. All the while, the White House's friends kept telling everyone who would listen that the Gray Lady could never do enough to pleasure the White House, that the little bitch wasn't really capable, but isn't it hot to see her try?
Yeah, from the outside, we all watched this little dance and kept shaking our heads, wondering when the Gray Lady could see that all she was good for was getting fucked - when was she gonna get her self-respect back and dump that bastard for good.
Now, now that the Gray Lady has gotten back some modicum of its self-respect, oh, how the White House and his pals have turned on her, trying to berate her, psychologically abuse her, make her be the good fuck puppet she used to be. Perhaps it'll work. Perhaps, in the run up to a war with Iran or a strike on North Korea, the Gray Lady'll cheer her man on.
But maybe, just barely maybe, the Gray Lady has remembered that she is her own woman, that she has stood on her own in other difficult times, that she doesn't need a man to make her fulfilled, and that the mutterings of the White House's pals don't amount to more than gnat shit under her toenails.
Still, what is it we've learned about dysfunctional couples through the years? That one of them is destined to try to please the other on and on. And perhaps all we can say is that you can't help those who won't help themselves.
Oh, and by the way, did the White House or Republicans say that Bob Novak committed treason back a couple of years ago? Just askin'...
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Regarding Secrecy, Part 1: Bill Clinton vs. George W. Bush - What a Difference a Year Makes To the Consitution:
In the dying days of his second term, as the nation was lurching towards its nightmare election day in 2000, on November 4 of that horrid year, President Clinton vetoed a bill. It was HR 4392, the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2001, and Clinton said that there was a single provision in the bill that he didn't like.
That was Section 303, which read, "Whoever, being an officer or employee of the United States, a former or retired officer or employee of the United States, any other person with authorized access to classified information, or any other person formerly with authorized access to classified information, knowingly and willfully discloses, or attempts to disclose, any classified information acquired as a result of such person's authorized access to classified information to a person (other than an officer or employee of the United States) who is not authorized access to such classified information, knowing that the person is not authorized access to such classified information, shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 3 years, or both."
By massively broadening the definition of felonious disclosure of classified information, Clinton said that Congress "may unnecessarily chill legitimate activities that are at the heart of a democracy." Paraphrasing Justice Brandeis, Clinton continued, "[W]e must always tread carefully when considering measures that may limit public discussion." And the real kick in the head, considering the vicious times in which we live: "[I]t is my obligation to protect not only our Government's vital information from improper disclosure, but also to protect the rights of citizens to receive the information necessary for democracy to work."
And so, because of "one badly flawed provision," Clinton vetoed the whole thing and sent it back to the House. Oh, sure, it pissed off House Republicans, especially, including Porter Goss, who said, "To veto this critical piece of legislation now is disruptive, and may send a dangerous message to those who would harm U.S. interests." But Clinton believed that "in a society built on freedom of expression and the consent of the governed...this criminal provision would, in my view, create an undue chilling effect." The bill had been opposed by CNN, the Washington Post, and the New York Times, among others.
Flash forward to December 2001. The Congress, at the height of its post-9/11 obeisance to all things Bush, passed HR 2883, the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2002. Section 305 of the bill was the "Modification of Reporting Requirements for Significant Anticipated Intelligence Activities and Significant Intelligence Failures." It was an amendment to the National Security Act of 1947, section 502, which is about the Executive branch reporting to Congress on "intelligence activities other than covert actions."
What was the big change made in 2001? To ask for the report in writing: any report "shall be in writing, and shall contain the following:(1) A concise statement of any facts pertinent to such report. (2) An explanation of the significance of the intelligence activity or intelligence failure covered by such report." That's it. Congress wanted its report in writing. And it wanted to understand what it was being told.
After the Act was passed and signed by the President, George W. Bush issued a signing statement about part of the bill: "Regrettably, one provision of the Act falls short of the standards of comity and flexibility that should govern the relationship between the executive and legislative branches on sensitive intelligence matters and, in some circumstances, would fall short of constitutional standards." Which part? According to Bush, "Section 305 of the Act amends section 502 of the National Security Act of 1947," which he says "purports to require" that reports to Congress "always be in written form, with a concise statement of facts pertinent to the report and an explanation of the significance of the activity or failure."
Bush does not explain why this act of writing the report and explaining things is so offensive, but he asserts that the section "shall be construed for all purposes... in a manner consistent with the President's constitutional authority to withhold information the disclosure of which could impair foreign relations, the national security, the deliberative processes of the Executive, or the performance of the Executive's constitutional duties." Which, you know, is pretty much everything. The same goes for the Director of Central Intelligence. Of course, the statement does not say how such an interpretation of the section will be applied, but one can guess it's something like: "Fuck 'em."
There's pretty much all you need to know about how far we've tumbled as a nation when it comes to respect for the Constitution, when it comes to the handling of secrecy, and when it comes to the rights of citizens to be informed. Clinton could have signed the bill and taken terrible retribution on anyone who leaked anything in his last two months. He chose not to. Instead, on December 27, 2000, he signed a bill that had the offensive section removed. Said Clinton in his signing statement, "I thank the Congress for working with me to produce a bill that I can sign."
Bush could have vetoed the whole bill so that we'd have a debate over what exactly he wanted. He chose not to. One way, Clinton's way, is the path to an open, real democracy. And the other, Bush's way? Why, that's a path to...well, we're not allowed to speak of such things without sounding crazy.
By the way, that December 2000 signing statement did contain some language about how President Clinton interpreted a section of the Act. "Title VIII of the Act sets forth requirements governing the declassification and disclosure of Japanese Imperial Army records, as defined by the Act," Clinton wrote. However, he made clear: "I understand that title VIII does not apply to records undergoing declassification pursuant to the Nazi War Crimes Disclosure Act." It ain't exactly ignoring a law so he can pursue whatever policies he wants, now, is it?
In the dying days of his second term, as the nation was lurching towards its nightmare election day in 2000, on November 4 of that horrid year, President Clinton vetoed a bill. It was HR 4392, the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2001, and Clinton said that there was a single provision in the bill that he didn't like.
That was Section 303, which read, "Whoever, being an officer or employee of the United States, a former or retired officer or employee of the United States, any other person with authorized access to classified information, or any other person formerly with authorized access to classified information, knowingly and willfully discloses, or attempts to disclose, any classified information acquired as a result of such person's authorized access to classified information to a person (other than an officer or employee of the United States) who is not authorized access to such classified information, knowing that the person is not authorized access to such classified information, shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 3 years, or both."
By massively broadening the definition of felonious disclosure of classified information, Clinton said that Congress "may unnecessarily chill legitimate activities that are at the heart of a democracy." Paraphrasing Justice Brandeis, Clinton continued, "[W]e must always tread carefully when considering measures that may limit public discussion." And the real kick in the head, considering the vicious times in which we live: "[I]t is my obligation to protect not only our Government's vital information from improper disclosure, but also to protect the rights of citizens to receive the information necessary for democracy to work."
And so, because of "one badly flawed provision," Clinton vetoed the whole thing and sent it back to the House. Oh, sure, it pissed off House Republicans, especially, including Porter Goss, who said, "To veto this critical piece of legislation now is disruptive, and may send a dangerous message to those who would harm U.S. interests." But Clinton believed that "in a society built on freedom of expression and the consent of the governed...this criminal provision would, in my view, create an undue chilling effect." The bill had been opposed by CNN, the Washington Post, and the New York Times, among others.
Flash forward to December 2001. The Congress, at the height of its post-9/11 obeisance to all things Bush, passed HR 2883, the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2002. Section 305 of the bill was the "Modification of Reporting Requirements for Significant Anticipated Intelligence Activities and Significant Intelligence Failures." It was an amendment to the National Security Act of 1947, section 502, which is about the Executive branch reporting to Congress on "intelligence activities other than covert actions."
What was the big change made in 2001? To ask for the report in writing: any report "shall be in writing, and shall contain the following:(1) A concise statement of any facts pertinent to such report. (2) An explanation of the significance of the intelligence activity or intelligence failure covered by such report." That's it. Congress wanted its report in writing. And it wanted to understand what it was being told.
After the Act was passed and signed by the President, George W. Bush issued a signing statement about part of the bill: "Regrettably, one provision of the Act falls short of the standards of comity and flexibility that should govern the relationship between the executive and legislative branches on sensitive intelligence matters and, in some circumstances, would fall short of constitutional standards." Which part? According to Bush, "Section 305 of the Act amends section 502 of the National Security Act of 1947," which he says "purports to require" that reports to Congress "always be in written form, with a concise statement of facts pertinent to the report and an explanation of the significance of the activity or failure."
Bush does not explain why this act of writing the report and explaining things is so offensive, but he asserts that the section "shall be construed for all purposes... in a manner consistent with the President's constitutional authority to withhold information the disclosure of which could impair foreign relations, the national security, the deliberative processes of the Executive, or the performance of the Executive's constitutional duties." Which, you know, is pretty much everything. The same goes for the Director of Central Intelligence. Of course, the statement does not say how such an interpretation of the section will be applied, but one can guess it's something like: "Fuck 'em."
There's pretty much all you need to know about how far we've tumbled as a nation when it comes to respect for the Constitution, when it comes to the handling of secrecy, and when it comes to the rights of citizens to be informed. Clinton could have signed the bill and taken terrible retribution on anyone who leaked anything in his last two months. He chose not to. Instead, on December 27, 2000, he signed a bill that had the offensive section removed. Said Clinton in his signing statement, "I thank the Congress for working with me to produce a bill that I can sign."
Bush could have vetoed the whole bill so that we'd have a debate over what exactly he wanted. He chose not to. One way, Clinton's way, is the path to an open, real democracy. And the other, Bush's way? Why, that's a path to...well, we're not allowed to speak of such things without sounding crazy.
By the way, that December 2000 signing statement did contain some language about how President Clinton interpreted a section of the Act. "Title VIII of the Act sets forth requirements governing the declassification and disclosure of Japanese Imperial Army records, as defined by the Act," Clinton wrote. However, he made clear: "I understand that title VIII does not apply to records undergoing declassification pursuant to the Nazi War Crimes Disclosure Act." It ain't exactly ignoring a law so he can pursue whatever policies he wants, now, is it?
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
What Rush Limbaugh Should Have Said About His Penis:
God, don't you just wish that Rush Limbaugh had had some hillbilly heroin flare up in his crazed brain today and he said, on the air:
"People, let me tell you about what you've heard about last night: all I can say is I wonder how Bob Dole's luggage got on my airplane? No, no, that's not true. See, I told my doctor I was worried about the next election. Get it? Election, not erection. It's because my cock can't get hard without freebasing Viagra and mainlining that shit directly into my limp dick. Then I can raise my mighty three-inch flag pole of love. Seriously, the oxycontin has completely destroyed my ability to get a hard on. My peter just lays there, like a dead guppy, sad, flaking, and ready to be eaten by the other fish.
"Yeah, my fellow Americans, after Daryn Kagan dumped me because, as she said, 'Sex with you is like getting smacked in the pussy repeatedly with a piece of overcooked macaroni,' well, a man has to do what a man has to do. And what I have to do is fly over to the Dominican Republic in my private plane, as a man of my means would do, and have my personal assistant round up five cheap hookers to come back to my room. Then, after watching them lick and dildo each other for about twenty minutes, after I shoot the Viagra/Cialis cocktail into my pecker to get my throbbing sea cucumber ready, I go kind of loony, and I choose one especially anorexic whore, tell the others to get the fuck out, and slice open her stomach and jack off into the gaping cavity, screaming about wanting to get back to my mother's pussy while I come. It's really the only way I can even think about ejaculating.
"Sure, sure, we have to dump the body over the Atlantic on the flight back to my palatial mansion in Palm Beach, but it's a small price to pay so that this fine Excellence in Broadcasting radio host can relieve some of the semen back up in his conservative balls. My friends, one of the great things about being a conservative in America is feeling as if even when you've blown your wad into the gut of a dead Dominican hooker, you don't feel even a little guilty."
God, don't you just wish that Rush Limbaugh had had some hillbilly heroin flare up in his crazed brain today and he said, on the air:
"People, let me tell you about what you've heard about last night: all I can say is I wonder how Bob Dole's luggage got on my airplane? No, no, that's not true. See, I told my doctor I was worried about the next election. Get it? Election, not erection. It's because my cock can't get hard without freebasing Viagra and mainlining that shit directly into my limp dick. Then I can raise my mighty three-inch flag pole of love. Seriously, the oxycontin has completely destroyed my ability to get a hard on. My peter just lays there, like a dead guppy, sad, flaking, and ready to be eaten by the other fish.
"Yeah, my fellow Americans, after Daryn Kagan dumped me because, as she said, 'Sex with you is like getting smacked in the pussy repeatedly with a piece of overcooked macaroni,' well, a man has to do what a man has to do. And what I have to do is fly over to the Dominican Republic in my private plane, as a man of my means would do, and have my personal assistant round up five cheap hookers to come back to my room. Then, after watching them lick and dildo each other for about twenty minutes, after I shoot the Viagra/Cialis cocktail into my pecker to get my throbbing sea cucumber ready, I go kind of loony, and I choose one especially anorexic whore, tell the others to get the fuck out, and slice open her stomach and jack off into the gaping cavity, screaming about wanting to get back to my mother's pussy while I come. It's really the only way I can even think about ejaculating.
"Sure, sure, we have to dump the body over the Atlantic on the flight back to my palatial mansion in Palm Beach, but it's a small price to pay so that this fine Excellence in Broadcasting radio host can relieve some of the semen back up in his conservative balls. My friends, one of the great things about being a conservative in America is feeling as if even when you've blown your wad into the gut of a dead Dominican hooker, you don't feel even a little guilty."
Briefly Noted: Flag Burning:
More on this later, but the Rude Pundit has held one non-freedom of speech position on the whole torching-a-flag-makes-George-Washington's-skull-cry issue: The Rude Pundit walks to a store, maybe even an old time Five and Dime, and plunks down his cash and purchases an American flag. Once he owns it, it's his property. No one has assigned him his Bush-prescribed flag. Chances are it wasn't even made in the United States. Now that it's his, this non-living thing, is he not free to burn it, use it to wash his car, wipe his ball sweat after sex, or hang it from his pick-up until it's just tatters in the wind?
C'mon, nutzoid freeper types. Do you want the government telling you what you can do with your property?
Off to Clark Kent duties. Back this afternoon.
More on this later, but the Rude Pundit has held one non-freedom of speech position on the whole torching-a-flag-makes-George-Washington's-skull-cry issue: The Rude Pundit walks to a store, maybe even an old time Five and Dime, and plunks down his cash and purchases an American flag. Once he owns it, it's his property. No one has assigned him his Bush-prescribed flag. Chances are it wasn't even made in the United States. Now that it's his, this non-living thing, is he not free to burn it, use it to wash his car, wipe his ball sweat after sex, or hang it from his pick-up until it's just tatters in the wind?
C'mon, nutzoid freeper types. Do you want the government telling you what you can do with your property?
Off to Clark Kent duties. Back this afternoon.
Monday, June 26, 2006
Better Than Lesbian Midget Porn: Rush Limbaugh Detained at Palm Beach Airport:
Sweet fuckin' Christ, let the charges be real from the fact that "Rush Limbaugh has been detained at Palm Beach International Airport for the possible possession of illegal prescription drugs Monday evening." Herr Limbaugh was returning from the Dominican Republic. And it just might be illegal Viagra. Hell, let's get Jack Bauer to question him.
Oh, the Rude Pundit's gonna need a new monitor after tonight...
(Tip o' the rude hat to Americablog.)
Sweet fuckin' Christ, let the charges be real from the fact that "Rush Limbaugh has been detained at Palm Beach International Airport for the possible possession of illegal prescription drugs Monday evening." Herr Limbaugh was returning from the Dominican Republic. And it just might be illegal Viagra. Hell, let's get Jack Bauer to question him.
Oh, the Rude Pundit's gonna need a new monitor after tonight...
(Tip o' the rude hat to Americablog.)
A Plan That's Not a Plan in Republican Spinworld:
Sometimes following Republican logic is a little like watching a ferret that just got into a meth stash. You're watchin' that twitchy fucker spin all over the place, and you wish that it'd just die already and get it over with instead of breaking all the glass in the apartment and bleeding and shitting everywhere.
So let's just get this straight: if your opponent voted against a tax cut, it's the same as if he voted to increase taxes; if you arrest seven crazed losers in their self-storage warehouse home in Florida because they told a cajoling undercover FBI agent, "Oh, fuck, that'd be fuckin' tits if we could blow shit up like the Sears Tower," it constitutes a "conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization, namely, al Qaeda; conspiracy to provide material support and resources to terrorists; conspiracy to maliciously damage and destroy buildings by means of an explosive device; and conspiracy to levy war against the government of the United States"; if you are told that a newly declassified report lists 500 missles in Iraq with chemicals degraded to the point that sour milk is just as toxic, you can trumpet that as discovered weapons of mass destruction and crow like a cock over a defeated corn cob.
But if the general in charge of U.S. troops in Iraq has a plan to withdraw at least some U.S. troops from that nation, then, no, really, that's not a plan for withdrawal - what the fuck are you Democrats talking about? 'Cause, like, see that's kind of exactly what Democrats wanted in the most recent debate of the damned in the Senate over the war. Sure, sure, no one expected John Kerry's "Yeah, I Know It's Two Years Too Late, But, Fuck, See, I Really, Really Oppose the War Now. Please Love Me" resolution to get much traction.
But the other amendment to a defense spending bill, sponsored by Carl Levin and a handful of other Democratic Senators, called for Congress to politely request that the Bush administration "change course from an open-ended commitment and to promote the assumption of security responsibilities by the Iraqis, thus advancing the chances for success in Iraq." It said, pretty simply, that "there must be a fair sharing of political power and economic resources among all the Iraqi groups," and that "the President should convene an international conference so as to more actively involve the international community and Iraq's neighbors," and, you know, disarm the militias. Pretty inoffensive shit, even quite gutless (an "international conference"?).
Then the amendment says, "the President should--
"(i) expedite the transition of United States forces in Iraq to a limited presence and mission of training Iraqi security forces, providing logistic support of Iraqi security forces, protecting United States infrastructure and personnel, and participating in targeted counterterrorism activities;
"(ii) after consultation with the Government of Iraq, begin the phased redeployment of United States forces from Iraq this year; and
"(iii) submit to Congress a plan by the end of 2006 with estimated dates for the continued phased redeployment of United States forces from Iraq, with the understanding that unexpected contingencies may arise".
That's it. Take down some forces soon, and keep Congress informed. A total pussy of a nonbinding resolution. No timetable. Just a "pretty please, think about us." To Republicans (and a few Democrats- lookin' at you, Lieberman) in Congress, that was "cut and run," like the military was tell its soldiers to drop their equipment and dash crazy and naked back to Kuwait. And, of course, not unexpectedly, it was defeated, too.
And then comes the report that General George Casey plans to, well, fuck, begin a phased redeployment of United States forces from Iraq this year. So, like, which part of the amendment was the most offensive to the Bush administration that it left Senate Republicans looking like chief shit eaters of the crazy monkey club? The Rude Pundit thinks he knows: the amendment called for a modicum of Congressional oversight. How fucking dare the Democrats think the Constitution gives 'em that right.
Kentucky's Mitch McConnell said as much on ABC's This Week with George Stephanopoulos's hair: "[T]he Congress ought not to be dictating to the generals what the tactics are. That was the point. We want the conditions on the ground and the decisions of our commanders in conjunction with the new Iraqi democratic government to dictate the process, not the Congress trying to act like armchair generals dictating every nuance of the policy in Iraq. That was the point, and the Congress overwhelmingly voted on a bipartisan basis to reject the Congress dictating specific withdrawal time lines to the generals in Iraq."
So, keeping their collective "D'oh" in their sinister chamber of majority secrets, Senate Republicans have spun this like so many other things, by re-creating reality and saying that a plan for withdrawal is not really a plan for withdrawal. John Warner said that the plan is not a plan on Fox "News" Sunday with Mike Wallace's fecal remnant of a son: "The [defense] department's drawn up plans at all times, but I think it would be wrong now to say that this is the plan that we're going to operate under."
The Iraqis, though, they want some idea when troops are gonna be withdrawn. Warner puts the kibbosh on that thought, saying, "We will consult with [the Iraqis]. I'm confident our government will not let them make mistakes that would reflect adversely on troop withdrawals." Yep, democracy's great when you have a parent country there to tell you when you're doin' fine and when you need Daddy's intervention.
Sometimes following Republican logic is a little like watching a ferret that just got into a meth stash. You're watchin' that twitchy fucker spin all over the place, and you wish that it'd just die already and get it over with instead of breaking all the glass in the apartment and bleeding and shitting everywhere.
So let's just get this straight: if your opponent voted against a tax cut, it's the same as if he voted to increase taxes; if you arrest seven crazed losers in their self-storage warehouse home in Florida because they told a cajoling undercover FBI agent, "Oh, fuck, that'd be fuckin' tits if we could blow shit up like the Sears Tower," it constitutes a "conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization, namely, al Qaeda; conspiracy to provide material support and resources to terrorists; conspiracy to maliciously damage and destroy buildings by means of an explosive device; and conspiracy to levy war against the government of the United States"; if you are told that a newly declassified report lists 500 missles in Iraq with chemicals degraded to the point that sour milk is just as toxic, you can trumpet that as discovered weapons of mass destruction and crow like a cock over a defeated corn cob.
But if the general in charge of U.S. troops in Iraq has a plan to withdraw at least some U.S. troops from that nation, then, no, really, that's not a plan for withdrawal - what the fuck are you Democrats talking about? 'Cause, like, see that's kind of exactly what Democrats wanted in the most recent debate of the damned in the Senate over the war. Sure, sure, no one expected John Kerry's "Yeah, I Know It's Two Years Too Late, But, Fuck, See, I Really, Really Oppose the War Now. Please Love Me" resolution to get much traction.
But the other amendment to a defense spending bill, sponsored by Carl Levin and a handful of other Democratic Senators, called for Congress to politely request that the Bush administration "change course from an open-ended commitment and to promote the assumption of security responsibilities by the Iraqis, thus advancing the chances for success in Iraq." It said, pretty simply, that "there must be a fair sharing of political power and economic resources among all the Iraqi groups," and that "the President should convene an international conference so as to more actively involve the international community and Iraq's neighbors," and, you know, disarm the militias. Pretty inoffensive shit, even quite gutless (an "international conference"?).
Then the amendment says, "the President should--
"(i) expedite the transition of United States forces in Iraq to a limited presence and mission of training Iraqi security forces, providing logistic support of Iraqi security forces, protecting United States infrastructure and personnel, and participating in targeted counterterrorism activities;
"(ii) after consultation with the Government of Iraq, begin the phased redeployment of United States forces from Iraq this year; and
"(iii) submit to Congress a plan by the end of 2006 with estimated dates for the continued phased redeployment of United States forces from Iraq, with the understanding that unexpected contingencies may arise".
That's it. Take down some forces soon, and keep Congress informed. A total pussy of a nonbinding resolution. No timetable. Just a "pretty please, think about us." To Republicans (and a few Democrats- lookin' at you, Lieberman) in Congress, that was "cut and run," like the military was tell its soldiers to drop their equipment and dash crazy and naked back to Kuwait. And, of course, not unexpectedly, it was defeated, too.
And then comes the report that General George Casey plans to, well, fuck, begin a phased redeployment of United States forces from Iraq this year. So, like, which part of the amendment was the most offensive to the Bush administration that it left Senate Republicans looking like chief shit eaters of the crazy monkey club? The Rude Pundit thinks he knows: the amendment called for a modicum of Congressional oversight. How fucking dare the Democrats think the Constitution gives 'em that right.
Kentucky's Mitch McConnell said as much on ABC's This Week with George Stephanopoulos's hair: "[T]he Congress ought not to be dictating to the generals what the tactics are. That was the point. We want the conditions on the ground and the decisions of our commanders in conjunction with the new Iraqi democratic government to dictate the process, not the Congress trying to act like armchair generals dictating every nuance of the policy in Iraq. That was the point, and the Congress overwhelmingly voted on a bipartisan basis to reject the Congress dictating specific withdrawal time lines to the generals in Iraq."
So, keeping their collective "D'oh" in their sinister chamber of majority secrets, Senate Republicans have spun this like so many other things, by re-creating reality and saying that a plan for withdrawal is not really a plan for withdrawal. John Warner said that the plan is not a plan on Fox "News" Sunday with Mike Wallace's fecal remnant of a son: "The [defense] department's drawn up plans at all times, but I think it would be wrong now to say that this is the plan that we're going to operate under."
The Iraqis, though, they want some idea when troops are gonna be withdrawn. Warner puts the kibbosh on that thought, saying, "We will consult with [the Iraqis]. I'm confident our government will not let them make mistakes that would reflect adversely on troop withdrawals." Yep, democracy's great when you have a parent country there to tell you when you're doin' fine and when you need Daddy's intervention.
Sunday, June 25, 2006
Briefly Noted: David Brooks Tries To Be a Really Awful Blogger:
On Friday, the Rude Pundit wrote just about all he has to say about the Kos v. Anyone Who Has Ever Wanted To Pile On Kos dustup. But then David Brooks goes and puffs out his chest and writes what, if it was posted in Blogsylvania, would be dismissed as a "screed" or a "rant" against Markos Moulitsas, describing all of Left Blogsylvania as his mindless zombie hordes. It's kind of sad, in that way that's just past funny, like a ranting, drunken bag lady with one tit flopping out of her ripped shirt.
One little sample: "And so the Kingpin [Markos] has his relationships and his understandings and his networks and his compromises. In just a few short years he has achieved a level of self-importance it took those in the pre-blog political class decades to acquire. He has challenged his enemy and become it."
The established political system, the machine itself and those who cover the machine, desperately need Markos to be just another naif corrupted by power. Because if he's not, well, shit, then you might just have to pay attention.
On Friday, the Rude Pundit wrote just about all he has to say about the Kos v. Anyone Who Has Ever Wanted To Pile On Kos dustup. But then David Brooks goes and puffs out his chest and writes what, if it was posted in Blogsylvania, would be dismissed as a "screed" or a "rant" against Markos Moulitsas, describing all of Left Blogsylvania as his mindless zombie hordes. It's kind of sad, in that way that's just past funny, like a ranting, drunken bag lady with one tit flopping out of her ripped shirt.
One little sample: "And so the Kingpin [Markos] has his relationships and his understandings and his networks and his compromises. In just a few short years he has achieved a level of self-importance it took those in the pre-blog political class decades to acquire. He has challenged his enemy and become it."
The established political system, the machine itself and those who cover the machine, desperately need Markos to be just another naif corrupted by power. Because if he's not, well, shit, then you might just have to pay attention.
Friday, June 23, 2006
A Defense of Bloggery Against the Scolding Forces of Printdom:
The Rude Pundit has a married male friend who can't talk enough about how amazing marriage is: how monogamy is so goddamned incredible, how sex just deepens along the life path with your life partner or your soulmate or what the fuck ever, how planning for the future with someone is just, so, god, how can one describe it, but it's just...deep, see, the kind of deep you only feel in the depths of your deepest...and blah and yada and etcetera and whoop-de-fuckin-do. But every Monday, sure as shit, that friend is asking the Rude Pundit about his weekend.
Ah, and then, and then the Rude Pundit gets to let fly. About craven, desperate, sweaty fucking like the world's gonna end; about bar pickups that generally involve phrases like "Have you ever done..." or "Have you ever tried..." or "Have you ever tripped on..." or "Swallower or spitter?"; about various shapes of cocks and cunts, the delicious, breathtaking pause before plunging into another person, the way in which certain twists of tongues or fingers cause one's dick to spasm like it's got a palsy or a clit to quiver of its own volition; about mornings free of regret because, before anything happens, one is absolutely clear about the ground rules: no lies, no error, no foul. There's no pretensions to lifelong bliss, no promises of what happens next, just the time itself in all its exultantly orgasmic, vodka and ecstasy-infused glory. And the ensuing trip to the laundry.
You can bet, and it's such a certainty that no bookie in the world would offer action on it, that the Rude Pundit's friend tells his wife about the Rude Pundit's weekends. And it is just as certain that the two of them talk about how empty the Rude Pundit's life must be, how he must wish he was like them, how he must, must, must desire such security for surely he can't go on like this. And then they fuck the same way they've been fucking for the last ten years. Now the Rude Pundit's not saying there is not innate good in the committed couple life. But, even as he shakes his head at the Rude Pundit, there is behind the movement a tinge of regret and jealousy in the eyes of the friend, as if there but for the curse of God goes he.
See, the attacks on blogging by some mainstream media "journalists" or "pundits" are just a continuation of the establishment's attack on outsiders, the way in which hippies got to get their freak on under the banner of free love versus the conservative America, clinging to its disappearing heterosexual-missionary-position way of seeing the world. Joe Klein is the Archie Bunker of the crowd, waving his craven, befouled finger at bloggers as he pathetically tries to be loved by the right wing establishment, the ultimate compromised MSMer.
And then there's yesterday's broadside by Lee Siegel of The New Republic. Responding, ironically enough, to TNR's blog, the Plank, and its hyping of a non-story about Markos Moulitsas and Jerome Armstrong (and other large-trafficked lefty bloggers) daring to exert people power, here's what Siegel says about the blogosphere: "It radiates democracy's dream of full participation but practices democracy's nightmare of populist crudity, character-assassination, and emotional stupefaction. It's hard fascism with a Microsoft face. It puts some people, like me, in the equally bizarre position of wanting desperately for Joe Lieberman to lose the Democratic primary to Ned Lamont so that true liberal values might, maybe, possibly prevail, yet at the same time wanting Lamont, the hero of the blogosphere, to lose so that the fascistic forces ranged against Lieberman might be defeated." This is not to mention how much our "thuggishness" and "frivolity" upsets Siegel.
So Siegel actually spends time worrying that bloggers might be influencing voters. How fucking dare we upset the moral order, the food chain, the Great Chain of Being. Man, we should all be good little Wonkettes and write cutesy "insider" novels and not worry our widdle heads about the big bad world of real politics. Siegel can lick the Rude Pundit's scrotum.
The Rude Pundit did not attend Yearly Kos for a number of reasons, most of them related to the fact that he has a job and that he doesn't like to go to conferences where he isn't speaking (and that's across the board in the bloggy and non-bloggy world). But never, not once, did it cross his mind that Markos Moulitsas is a megalomaniacal ur-blogger who wants us all to bow down to his Daily Kossiness. In fact, having briefly met and talked to Markos (at the time he spoke to Markos, the Rude Pundit thought he was going to Vegas, but then he remembered that Vegas sucks balls), the Rude Pundit was struck by how naively optimistic Markos is, in good and bad ways. See, he actually thinks he's going to make some kind of change in the nation; that's the kind of person that people are going to follow. And that scares so many who are entrenched in keeping the influence club closed. Or who wanna get into the club where the cool kids are.
Bottom line: the Rude Pundit doesn't give a flying fuck if Markos and other bloggers have a backroom discussion list where they can chat about who the hottest candidate running for President is; the Rude Pundit doesn't give a shit if there's such a thing on the right. And you know what, MSMers? This is all pretty fuckin' new out here in the hinterlands of Blogworld. We don't give a good goddamn about your rules or traditions. We get to make up our rules as we go along - if you as a reader don't like it, well, fuck it, click over to another blog or the blogs of almost every major newspaper or magazine in the country. And, really, and, c'mon, aren't you just a little jealous at our liberatory excesses? Wouldn't you like to write that Dick Cheney's a barely human, oozing, feces-covered demi-gorgon who rips the heads off ducklings just for sport?
But take heart, young bloggers: when they start attacking you for more than just being crazed maddogs who can't get out of their mothers' basements and face the real world, well, then you truly have arrived. Even if they might be better off spending their time dealing with the real liars in this world.
(For the last couple of years, the Rude Pundit has resisted a great deal of the typical self-reflexivity that afflicts blogs. It's the same reason the Rude Pundit hates hip-hop songs that are about the rapper rapping about him or herself. This will not be an ongoing thing here.)
Update- The Horrible Truth: Markos Moulitsas looks smaller on TV than in person. He is actually seven feet tall, with hands that could crush a bowling ball. He sharpens his teeth by chewing beer bottles, and the rumor is that he shot Billmon just for snoring. He scares us all because he enters our villages and eats our livestock at night. Please help us, TNR, please end the tyranny.
The Rude Pundit has a married male friend who can't talk enough about how amazing marriage is: how monogamy is so goddamned incredible, how sex just deepens along the life path with your life partner or your soulmate or what the fuck ever, how planning for the future with someone is just, so, god, how can one describe it, but it's just...deep, see, the kind of deep you only feel in the depths of your deepest...and blah and yada and etcetera and whoop-de-fuckin-do. But every Monday, sure as shit, that friend is asking the Rude Pundit about his weekend.
Ah, and then, and then the Rude Pundit gets to let fly. About craven, desperate, sweaty fucking like the world's gonna end; about bar pickups that generally involve phrases like "Have you ever done..." or "Have you ever tried..." or "Have you ever tripped on..." or "Swallower or spitter?"; about various shapes of cocks and cunts, the delicious, breathtaking pause before plunging into another person, the way in which certain twists of tongues or fingers cause one's dick to spasm like it's got a palsy or a clit to quiver of its own volition; about mornings free of regret because, before anything happens, one is absolutely clear about the ground rules: no lies, no error, no foul. There's no pretensions to lifelong bliss, no promises of what happens next, just the time itself in all its exultantly orgasmic, vodka and ecstasy-infused glory. And the ensuing trip to the laundry.
You can bet, and it's such a certainty that no bookie in the world would offer action on it, that the Rude Pundit's friend tells his wife about the Rude Pundit's weekends. And it is just as certain that the two of them talk about how empty the Rude Pundit's life must be, how he must wish he was like them, how he must, must, must desire such security for surely he can't go on like this. And then they fuck the same way they've been fucking for the last ten years. Now the Rude Pundit's not saying there is not innate good in the committed couple life. But, even as he shakes his head at the Rude Pundit, there is behind the movement a tinge of regret and jealousy in the eyes of the friend, as if there but for the curse of God goes he.
See, the attacks on blogging by some mainstream media "journalists" or "pundits" are just a continuation of the establishment's attack on outsiders, the way in which hippies got to get their freak on under the banner of free love versus the conservative America, clinging to its disappearing heterosexual-missionary-position way of seeing the world. Joe Klein is the Archie Bunker of the crowd, waving his craven, befouled finger at bloggers as he pathetically tries to be loved by the right wing establishment, the ultimate compromised MSMer.
And then there's yesterday's broadside by Lee Siegel of The New Republic. Responding, ironically enough, to TNR's blog, the Plank, and its hyping of a non-story about Markos Moulitsas and Jerome Armstrong (and other large-trafficked lefty bloggers) daring to exert people power, here's what Siegel says about the blogosphere: "It radiates democracy's dream of full participation but practices democracy's nightmare of populist crudity, character-assassination, and emotional stupefaction. It's hard fascism with a Microsoft face. It puts some people, like me, in the equally bizarre position of wanting desperately for Joe Lieberman to lose the Democratic primary to Ned Lamont so that true liberal values might, maybe, possibly prevail, yet at the same time wanting Lamont, the hero of the blogosphere, to lose so that the fascistic forces ranged against Lieberman might be defeated." This is not to mention how much our "thuggishness" and "frivolity" upsets Siegel.
So Siegel actually spends time worrying that bloggers might be influencing voters. How fucking dare we upset the moral order, the food chain, the Great Chain of Being. Man, we should all be good little Wonkettes and write cutesy "insider" novels and not worry our widdle heads about the big bad world of real politics. Siegel can lick the Rude Pundit's scrotum.
The Rude Pundit did not attend Yearly Kos for a number of reasons, most of them related to the fact that he has a job and that he doesn't like to go to conferences where he isn't speaking (and that's across the board in the bloggy and non-bloggy world). But never, not once, did it cross his mind that Markos Moulitsas is a megalomaniacal ur-blogger who wants us all to bow down to his Daily Kossiness. In fact, having briefly met and talked to Markos (at the time he spoke to Markos, the Rude Pundit thought he was going to Vegas, but then he remembered that Vegas sucks balls), the Rude Pundit was struck by how naively optimistic Markos is, in good and bad ways. See, he actually thinks he's going to make some kind of change in the nation; that's the kind of person that people are going to follow. And that scares so many who are entrenched in keeping the influence club closed. Or who wanna get into the club where the cool kids are.
Bottom line: the Rude Pundit doesn't give a flying fuck if Markos and other bloggers have a backroom discussion list where they can chat about who the hottest candidate running for President is; the Rude Pundit doesn't give a shit if there's such a thing on the right. And you know what, MSMers? This is all pretty fuckin' new out here in the hinterlands of Blogworld. We don't give a good goddamn about your rules or traditions. We get to make up our rules as we go along - if you as a reader don't like it, well, fuck it, click over to another blog or the blogs of almost every major newspaper or magazine in the country. And, really, and, c'mon, aren't you just a little jealous at our liberatory excesses? Wouldn't you like to write that Dick Cheney's a barely human, oozing, feces-covered demi-gorgon who rips the heads off ducklings just for sport?
But take heart, young bloggers: when they start attacking you for more than just being crazed maddogs who can't get out of their mothers' basements and face the real world, well, then you truly have arrived. Even if they might be better off spending their time dealing with the real liars in this world.
(For the last couple of years, the Rude Pundit has resisted a great deal of the typical self-reflexivity that afflicts blogs. It's the same reason the Rude Pundit hates hip-hop songs that are about the rapper rapping about him or herself. This will not be an ongoing thing here.)
Update- The Horrible Truth: Markos Moulitsas looks smaller on TV than in person. He is actually seven feet tall, with hands that could crush a bowling ball. He sharpens his teeth by chewing beer bottles, and the rumor is that he shot Billmon just for snoring. He scares us all because he enters our villages and eats our livestock at night. Please help us, TNR, please end the tyranny.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Why Bill O'Reilly Ought To Be Sodomized With a Microphone, Part 1841 (With a Side Note on the Need To Drop a Nude Laura Ingraham in the Middle of Taliban Territory):
Here's a question Bill O'Reilly actually asked Laura Ingraham on his Fox "News" show this week: "Do you think Howard Dean helps the enemy?" This was followed by O'Reilly asking Ingraham if she thinks Jack Murtha and Jimmy Carter help the enemy. And how are these fine American men "helping the enemy"?
See, if Howard Dean was sending cologne bottles filled with anthrax to Osama Bin Laden and Jack Murtha was selling Kalashnikovs on the streets of Basra and Jimmy Carter was teaching the Taliban how to better fuck captured enemy asses "Deliverance"-style (it all has to do with a technique more suited to donkeys than goats), well, then we'd have somethin' to talk about. But here's the nutzoid rantings of O'Reilly on what treason Jimmy Carter has wrought: "He signs the torture ad along with the reverends, and the torture ad, as I told the reverend, shows up in the Arab press."
And then Ingraham, not to be topped in her self-immolating hatred of Democratic ex-Presidents, slithered, "Nobel Prize-winner criticizing the United States', like, torture policy, which of course, as you pointed out, we do not have a torture policy in the United States." How dare a Nobel Peace Prize winner agitate for, say, peace and justice. They should all be like Henry Kissinger or Yasser Arafat, hardcore motherfuckers who'll wave a white hankie with one hand and drive the other fist up the asses of refugees and/or children and be damned proud that they took their Nobel Peace Prizes while advocating mass murder.
No, no, Murtha, Dean, and Carter are vile fuckers, as is the Red Cross. No, really, according to O'Reilly, the International Red Cross "I submit is the reason that the three Al-Qaeda suspects committed suicide, because International Red Cross told the Americans you've got to give them privacy and tape up the window and they did. And you take up the window, you can't see in. They can go hang themselves. " That's right. According to O'Reilly, who, of course, has recently said he'd run Iraq with all the vicious force of Saddam Hussein, the reason why the Gitmo detainees offed themselves was because no one could watch them do it.
Watching O'Reilly and Ingraham "discuss" what they consider the fine line between dissent and treason (if by "fine line," you mean "no line") is a little like watching a pair of scorpions about to fuck. Male and female scorpions extend their pincers and lock together, pulling back and forth. It's a kind of dance wherein the male drops a packet o' sperm that the female will get hooked into into her scorpion cooter. It's kind of cool and sick at the same time, and, despite whatever scientific observations can be made, you just end up feeling disgusted and sad at the end.
Here's a question Bill O'Reilly actually asked Laura Ingraham on his Fox "News" show this week: "Do you think Howard Dean helps the enemy?" This was followed by O'Reilly asking Ingraham if she thinks Jack Murtha and Jimmy Carter help the enemy. And how are these fine American men "helping the enemy"?
See, if Howard Dean was sending cologne bottles filled with anthrax to Osama Bin Laden and Jack Murtha was selling Kalashnikovs on the streets of Basra and Jimmy Carter was teaching the Taliban how to better fuck captured enemy asses "Deliverance"-style (it all has to do with a technique more suited to donkeys than goats), well, then we'd have somethin' to talk about. But here's the nutzoid rantings of O'Reilly on what treason Jimmy Carter has wrought: "He signs the torture ad along with the reverends, and the torture ad, as I told the reverend, shows up in the Arab press."
And then Ingraham, not to be topped in her self-immolating hatred of Democratic ex-Presidents, slithered, "Nobel Prize-winner criticizing the United States', like, torture policy, which of course, as you pointed out, we do not have a torture policy in the United States." How dare a Nobel Peace Prize winner agitate for, say, peace and justice. They should all be like Henry Kissinger or Yasser Arafat, hardcore motherfuckers who'll wave a white hankie with one hand and drive the other fist up the asses of refugees and/or children and be damned proud that they took their Nobel Peace Prizes while advocating mass murder.
No, no, Murtha, Dean, and Carter are vile fuckers, as is the Red Cross. No, really, according to O'Reilly, the International Red Cross "I submit is the reason that the three Al-Qaeda suspects committed suicide, because International Red Cross told the Americans you've got to give them privacy and tape up the window and they did. And you take up the window, you can't see in. They can go hang themselves. " That's right. According to O'Reilly, who, of course, has recently said he'd run Iraq with all the vicious force of Saddam Hussein, the reason why the Gitmo detainees offed themselves was because no one could watch them do it.
Watching O'Reilly and Ingraham "discuss" what they consider the fine line between dissent and treason (if by "fine line," you mean "no line") is a little like watching a pair of scorpions about to fuck. Male and female scorpions extend their pincers and lock together, pulling back and forth. It's a kind of dance wherein the male drops a packet o' sperm that the female will get hooked into into her scorpion cooter. It's kind of cool and sick at the same time, and, despite whatever scientific observations can be made, you just end up feeling disgusted and sad at the end.
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Springsteen's Travels:
The Rude Pundit has long been friends with members of the seminal Argentinean theatre troupe, Diablomundo. In their early days, back in the 1970s, the performers of Diablomundo would stage theatrical events in places like soccer stadiums and subways. For instance, once they put on a mock wedding, complete with food and music and dancing in the subways of Buenos Aires, and the train riders were invited to join in. And they did. Yes, it was absurd, and it was over the top. But the point, they said, was to show that in a time of great repression - this was during the Peronista reign, when people were regularly diappeared for "subversive" activity - one needed to show people that it was possible to still have joy, to tap into something deep within the culture to bring out that joy.
Last night, in Camden, New Jersey, on the edge of the Delaware River, Bruce Springsteen was after the same goal. Despite his long fandom (although not of the slavering "gimme every bootleg" variety of scary Boss pseudo-stalkers), the Rude Pundit's had problems with Springsteen the last few years. See, during the E Street Band reunion tour (or the "Clarence Needs a Retirement Fund" Tour) and the later tour for the post-9/11 album The Rising, the theatricality of his shows seemed strained, the attempts at turning the rock concert into a religious revival so explicit as to render them pedantic, and if the Rude Pundit had to hear that fucker play "Born to Run" one more goddamn time, posing with the band like a group photo at Sears, his head was going to explode with the hope of taking Springsteen down with the skull shrapnel. In other words, the band was getting more than a little filled with shit. And the Live in New York City HBO concert and DVD made him want to burn down the fuckin' boardwalk. Sure, sure, you can say that those shows were gifts to the longtime fans who just wanted to taste a little of that Asbury Park glory one last time. And there were times it was great. But if you wanted to see a Springsteen tribute band, well, the Jersey shore's filthy with them.
Now, with the Seeger Sessions band, Springsteen was looser, more really, genuinely alive than the Rude Pundit had seen him since, well, fuck, 1984. Sure, sure, the crowd was still uncomfortably older, balder, Starbucks-scented, and white. But almost no one was there to hear "Born to Run." No, what they were there to do was to join Springsteen in a big damn singalong of the American folk songs from Springsteen's recent album, along with a couple of massively reconfigured songs from his back catalog. Moving between Dixieland jazz, Tejano music, blues, and old time rock and roll, Springsteen was the ringleader, the focal point of the energy. And that energy was about creating community and instilling a notion of joy in a shared musical heritage.
There were directly political moments, like when the band did "Mrs. McGrath," the old anti-war song in which a mother learns that her son has lost his legs in battle. When Springsteen slightly revised the last lyrics (changing the nation mentioned), singing, "I'd rather have my Teddy as he used to be/ Than the King of America and his whole navy," the audience shouted in affirmation, perhaps their thoughts filled with images of the two tortured, dead Americans we found out about that morning. And then there's all the songs that celebrate the working class and surviving the Depression, like "John Henry" or "Pay Me My Money Down," which was a rave-up with the entire audience singing, "Pay me, pay me, pay me my money down." The Rude Pundit hasn't seen such a subversive moment in a concert since Beck got a crowd to chant, "I'm a loser, baby. Why don't you kill me?"
In so many ways, the show was intensely political. Hell, just the invocation of Seeger's name is enough to give it an anti-war thrust. But mostly Springsteen used the occasion to empower the audience and say that in this time of a crushingly awful war, an abusive government, incompetence that kills people, and nature itself turning on us, it is possible - indeed, it's necessary - to throw your hands in the air and dance like a maniac.
The Rude Pundit has long been friends with members of the seminal Argentinean theatre troupe, Diablomundo. In their early days, back in the 1970s, the performers of Diablomundo would stage theatrical events in places like soccer stadiums and subways. For instance, once they put on a mock wedding, complete with food and music and dancing in the subways of Buenos Aires, and the train riders were invited to join in. And they did. Yes, it was absurd, and it was over the top. But the point, they said, was to show that in a time of great repression - this was during the Peronista reign, when people were regularly diappeared for "subversive" activity - one needed to show people that it was possible to still have joy, to tap into something deep within the culture to bring out that joy.
Last night, in Camden, New Jersey, on the edge of the Delaware River, Bruce Springsteen was after the same goal. Despite his long fandom (although not of the slavering "gimme every bootleg" variety of scary Boss pseudo-stalkers), the Rude Pundit's had problems with Springsteen the last few years. See, during the E Street Band reunion tour (or the "Clarence Needs a Retirement Fund" Tour) and the later tour for the post-9/11 album The Rising, the theatricality of his shows seemed strained, the attempts at turning the rock concert into a religious revival so explicit as to render them pedantic, and if the Rude Pundit had to hear that fucker play "Born to Run" one more goddamn time, posing with the band like a group photo at Sears, his head was going to explode with the hope of taking Springsteen down with the skull shrapnel. In other words, the band was getting more than a little filled with shit. And the Live in New York City HBO concert and DVD made him want to burn down the fuckin' boardwalk. Sure, sure, you can say that those shows were gifts to the longtime fans who just wanted to taste a little of that Asbury Park glory one last time. And there were times it was great. But if you wanted to see a Springsteen tribute band, well, the Jersey shore's filthy with them.
Now, with the Seeger Sessions band, Springsteen was looser, more really, genuinely alive than the Rude Pundit had seen him since, well, fuck, 1984. Sure, sure, the crowd was still uncomfortably older, balder, Starbucks-scented, and white. But almost no one was there to hear "Born to Run." No, what they were there to do was to join Springsteen in a big damn singalong of the American folk songs from Springsteen's recent album, along with a couple of massively reconfigured songs from his back catalog. Moving between Dixieland jazz, Tejano music, blues, and old time rock and roll, Springsteen was the ringleader, the focal point of the energy. And that energy was about creating community and instilling a notion of joy in a shared musical heritage.
There were directly political moments, like when the band did "Mrs. McGrath," the old anti-war song in which a mother learns that her son has lost his legs in battle. When Springsteen slightly revised the last lyrics (changing the nation mentioned), singing, "I'd rather have my Teddy as he used to be/ Than the King of America and his whole navy," the audience shouted in affirmation, perhaps their thoughts filled with images of the two tortured, dead Americans we found out about that morning. And then there's all the songs that celebrate the working class and surviving the Depression, like "John Henry" or "Pay Me My Money Down," which was a rave-up with the entire audience singing, "Pay me, pay me, pay me my money down." The Rude Pundit hasn't seen such a subversive moment in a concert since Beck got a crowd to chant, "I'm a loser, baby. Why don't you kill me?"
In so many ways, the show was intensely political. Hell, just the invocation of Seeger's name is enough to give it an anti-war thrust. But mostly Springsteen used the occasion to empower the audience and say that in this time of a crushingly awful war, an abusive government, incompetence that kills people, and nature itself turning on us, it is possible - indeed, it's necessary - to throw your hands in the air and dance like a maniac.
Late Posting Today:
Spent yesterday in Philadelphia. Pretended the Rude Pundit was a Justice Department lawyer and fucked the crack in the Liberty Bell. Demanded to be brought the skull of Ben Franklin to boil for soup. Ate cheesesteak.
Saw Springsteen in Camden, NJ last night. More on that in a political (and not in a geek-fan-Eric-Alterman-goddamn-do-you-wanna-blow-Bruce?) way later. For now, cream for a metal-chafed cock and sleep.
Spent yesterday in Philadelphia. Pretended the Rude Pundit was a Justice Department lawyer and fucked the crack in the Liberty Bell. Demanded to be brought the skull of Ben Franklin to boil for soup. Ate cheesesteak.
Saw Springsteen in Camden, NJ last night. More on that in a political (and not in a geek-fan-Eric-Alterman-goddamn-do-you-wanna-blow-Bruce?) way later. For now, cream for a metal-chafed cock and sleep.
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
Cutting and Running - A History Lesson:
As the frothing right madly pounces on any intimation that the United States should get the fuck out of Iraq before it engulfs us into a swirl of dusty insanity, screaming "Cut and run" with all the pathetic force of "flip-flop" before it, it would do us well to remind the right that they are, essentially, saying that Ronald Reagan was a big pussy. For history is a harsh motherfucker. It'll drag you by the short hairs into the alley and beat you unconscious before it fucks your anus raw so that you wake up, bruised, sphincter bleeding, confused, only thinking, "Goddamn, history just kicked my ass."
'Cause nobody'd accuse Caspar Weinberger of being a limp-wristed lefty when he was the Gipper's Secretary of Defense. Tough-minded son of a bitch oversaw Reagan's massive, budget-wrecking build-up of the military, wanted him some Star Wars, and kicked commie surfer ass in Grenada. Say what you will about Cap Weinberger, he had the backs of the military a great deal more than, say, Donald Rumsfeld, getting them pay raises, benefits, and outlining the Weinberger Doctrine of military intervention (later appropriated by Colin Powell). And, perhaps just as importantly, he wanted the United States to get the fuck out of Lebanon months before the Beirut barracks bombing in October 1983.
From Lou Cannon's book President Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime, page 361: With Secretary of State George Shultz and National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane "making patriotism the test of U.S. commitment in Lebanon, Weinberger was on the losing side of the national security argument. 'He [Reagan] was being told all this stuff,' Weinberger said. 'Marines don't cut and run. Americans don't run when the going gets tough. Americans don't pull down the flag. I said, "Nonsense, they're not doing any good over there." But these arguments appealed to the president.'" This was in the spring of 1983.
The Marines were in the middle of a goddamned civil war, sent there in July of 1982 to keep the peace. On February 4, 1984, months after 241 Marines were killed in that explosion, Reagan made a radio address where he said, "Yes, the situation in Lebanon is difficult, frustrating, and dangerous. But that is no reason to turn our backs on our friends and to cut and run. If we do, we'll be sending one signal to terrorists everywhere: they can gain by waging war against innocent people."
Then, quite interestingly, Reagan continued, "The men and women who patrol our streets here at home also face great dangers every day. But the greatest danger of all would be to yank those police officers off the streets and to leave our neighborhoods and families at the mercy of criminals. If we're to be secure in our homes and in the world, we must stand together against those who threaten us. This is a time for unity, not partisan politics."
Of course, Weinberger eventually got McFarlane on his side, and Reagan pulled the U.S. troops out of Lebanon at the end of that same month. Man, what a punk ass bitch Reagan was.
The script never changes for Republicans. Without fear and projected machismo, they have nothing. By instilling fear and spouting bravado, they can go on getting Americans killed for as long as they want.
By the way, Lebanon's not doing too badly these days as a kind of democracy in the Middle East. Of course, the civil war lasted for fifteen years. But the United States was only there for less than two of them.
As the frothing right madly pounces on any intimation that the United States should get the fuck out of Iraq before it engulfs us into a swirl of dusty insanity, screaming "Cut and run" with all the pathetic force of "flip-flop" before it, it would do us well to remind the right that they are, essentially, saying that Ronald Reagan was a big pussy. For history is a harsh motherfucker. It'll drag you by the short hairs into the alley and beat you unconscious before it fucks your anus raw so that you wake up, bruised, sphincter bleeding, confused, only thinking, "Goddamn, history just kicked my ass."
'Cause nobody'd accuse Caspar Weinberger of being a limp-wristed lefty when he was the Gipper's Secretary of Defense. Tough-minded son of a bitch oversaw Reagan's massive, budget-wrecking build-up of the military, wanted him some Star Wars, and kicked commie surfer ass in Grenada. Say what you will about Cap Weinberger, he had the backs of the military a great deal more than, say, Donald Rumsfeld, getting them pay raises, benefits, and outlining the Weinberger Doctrine of military intervention (later appropriated by Colin Powell). And, perhaps just as importantly, he wanted the United States to get the fuck out of Lebanon months before the Beirut barracks bombing in October 1983.
From Lou Cannon's book President Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime, page 361: With Secretary of State George Shultz and National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane "making patriotism the test of U.S. commitment in Lebanon, Weinberger was on the losing side of the national security argument. 'He [Reagan] was being told all this stuff,' Weinberger said. 'Marines don't cut and run. Americans don't run when the going gets tough. Americans don't pull down the flag. I said, "Nonsense, they're not doing any good over there." But these arguments appealed to the president.'" This was in the spring of 1983.
The Marines were in the middle of a goddamned civil war, sent there in July of 1982 to keep the peace. On February 4, 1984, months after 241 Marines were killed in that explosion, Reagan made a radio address where he said, "Yes, the situation in Lebanon is difficult, frustrating, and dangerous. But that is no reason to turn our backs on our friends and to cut and run. If we do, we'll be sending one signal to terrorists everywhere: they can gain by waging war against innocent people."
Then, quite interestingly, Reagan continued, "The men and women who patrol our streets here at home also face great dangers every day. But the greatest danger of all would be to yank those police officers off the streets and to leave our neighborhoods and families at the mercy of criminals. If we're to be secure in our homes and in the world, we must stand together against those who threaten us. This is a time for unity, not partisan politics."
Of course, Weinberger eventually got McFarlane on his side, and Reagan pulled the U.S. troops out of Lebanon at the end of that same month. Man, what a punk ass bitch Reagan was.
The script never changes for Republicans. Without fear and projected machismo, they have nothing. By instilling fear and spouting bravado, they can go on getting Americans killed for as long as they want.
By the way, Lebanon's not doing too badly these days as a kind of democracy in the Middle East. Of course, the civil war lasted for fifteen years. But the United States was only there for less than two of them.
Monday, June 19, 2006
Two Captured American Soldiers and the Implied "What If":
Chances are, maybe even by the time you read this, the two American soldiers, captured by the Mujahideen Shura Council in Iraq, will be dead, probably in some horrible way, probably with their bodies dumped like all the horribly murdered Iraqis in the blood and gore-strewn landscape that are the markers of Iraqi liberation. The Rude Pundit can't help thinking, though, about the implied "What if" of the capture, on the field of battle, of American soldiers, prisoners of war, if you will.
What if we get pictures of the soldiers, nude, cowering, screaming in a corner, shitting themselves on the filthy floors of a makeshift cell, as their captors hold snarling dogs on leashes just out of bite range of the soldiers?
What if we learn that their captors decide that the soldiers can offer intelligence that can be of use to al-Qaeda and, in order to get that information, the captors put the nude soldiers into rooms that are heated to hellish temperatures, followed by rooms that are impossibly cold with colder water tossed onto them? What if the soldiers are made to stand for days on end? Put into stress positions that fuck up their muscles and limbs? Denied sleep? Had loud music played into their cells? Kept in isolation and fed bread and water for days, weeks on end?
What if they strap one or both of those Americans to a board and hold them underwater until their drowning reflex forces them to panic, thrash, claw desperately for air, only to be brought up to breathe and then placed underwater again? And again? Until the captors get the answers they seek?
What if those captors take the nude, sleep-deprived, shit and piss-covered, nearly drowned and dog-frightened American soldiers and handcuff them to beds with women's panties on their heads, snapping photographs and laughing, talking about publishing the photos so that everyone can see the soldiers with their panty-sniffing heads and terror-shriveled cocks, so that all of al-Qaeda can laugh at what pussies Americans can be made to seem?
What if, and, really, does it need to be said, they are made to stand, hooded, with faux electrodes attached to their nuts and fingers, told that if they don't start answering questions, well, testicles only can take so much electroshock before they just pop like squeezed grapes?
What will our government do? What could it do? Could it condemn the actions as not abiding by the Geneva Conventions? Could it call the actions "torture"? Could it demand accountability? Could it demand that the soldiers be treated as POWs? Could it simply say, "Well, we don't do that shit...anymore"?
And what about the good right-wing punditry? Would Rush Limbaugh look at the photos of the nude, cowering Americans and say it looks like fraternity hazing or some such shit? Would others dismiss it as a media fabrication? Or would they just pathetically overlook everything done in our American names to Iraqis, Afghanis, and others, calling madly for the heads of the captors, not even thinking about the irony of such a statement?
It goes without saying, but, considering the times, perhaps it needs to be said: the Rude Pundit wishes none of this on Privates Thomas Tucker and Kristian Menchaca. He hopes they are found or released safe and sound. But he also wishes none of this on our prisoners, whether in Iraq, at Gitmo, or in secret prisons or countries of rendition where fuck-all can happen with no law, no regulation, no hope to bespeak our putative humanity.
Chances are, maybe even by the time you read this, the two American soldiers, captured by the Mujahideen Shura Council in Iraq, will be dead, probably in some horrible way, probably with their bodies dumped like all the horribly murdered Iraqis in the blood and gore-strewn landscape that are the markers of Iraqi liberation. The Rude Pundit can't help thinking, though, about the implied "What if" of the capture, on the field of battle, of American soldiers, prisoners of war, if you will.
What if we get pictures of the soldiers, nude, cowering, screaming in a corner, shitting themselves on the filthy floors of a makeshift cell, as their captors hold snarling dogs on leashes just out of bite range of the soldiers?
What if we learn that their captors decide that the soldiers can offer intelligence that can be of use to al-Qaeda and, in order to get that information, the captors put the nude soldiers into rooms that are heated to hellish temperatures, followed by rooms that are impossibly cold with colder water tossed onto them? What if the soldiers are made to stand for days on end? Put into stress positions that fuck up their muscles and limbs? Denied sleep? Had loud music played into their cells? Kept in isolation and fed bread and water for days, weeks on end?
What if they strap one or both of those Americans to a board and hold them underwater until their drowning reflex forces them to panic, thrash, claw desperately for air, only to be brought up to breathe and then placed underwater again? And again? Until the captors get the answers they seek?
What if those captors take the nude, sleep-deprived, shit and piss-covered, nearly drowned and dog-frightened American soldiers and handcuff them to beds with women's panties on their heads, snapping photographs and laughing, talking about publishing the photos so that everyone can see the soldiers with their panty-sniffing heads and terror-shriveled cocks, so that all of al-Qaeda can laugh at what pussies Americans can be made to seem?
What if, and, really, does it need to be said, they are made to stand, hooded, with faux electrodes attached to their nuts and fingers, told that if they don't start answering questions, well, testicles only can take so much electroshock before they just pop like squeezed grapes?
What will our government do? What could it do? Could it condemn the actions as not abiding by the Geneva Conventions? Could it call the actions "torture"? Could it demand accountability? Could it demand that the soldiers be treated as POWs? Could it simply say, "Well, we don't do that shit...anymore"?
And what about the good right-wing punditry? Would Rush Limbaugh look at the photos of the nude, cowering Americans and say it looks like fraternity hazing or some such shit? Would others dismiss it as a media fabrication? Or would they just pathetically overlook everything done in our American names to Iraqis, Afghanis, and others, calling madly for the heads of the captors, not even thinking about the irony of such a statement?
It goes without saying, but, considering the times, perhaps it needs to be said: the Rude Pundit wishes none of this on Privates Thomas Tucker and Kristian Menchaca. He hopes they are found or released safe and sound. But he also wishes none of this on our prisoners, whether in Iraq, at Gitmo, or in secret prisons or countries of rendition where fuck-all can happen with no law, no regulation, no hope to bespeak our putative humanity.
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