Regarding the Midterms, Part 1: Allow Yourself to Despair Today:
There's a line from a novel that's been haunting the Rude Pundit for the last couple of weeks. It's from Australian writer Richard Flanagan's incredible 2006 book, The Unknown Terrorist. The main character walks past a bunch of young males beating a beggar. They threaten anyone who attempts to stop them from doing so: "And behind her they kept on for a few minutes more, kicking him as if he were to blame for everything in that dirty, dead decade they were all condemned to live through, a sack of shit that had once been a man, in a place that once been a community, in a country that once been a society."
The overwhelming feeling that the Rude Pundit has this morning is utter disgust with a vast number of the people of his nation, this America, for they have demonstrated, once again, that they are selfish, vain, cruel buffoons who are scared by the wrong things and have decided that the best way to handle it is to say, "Fuck it," build isolated bunkers all over the nation, and tell everyone else to leave them the fuck alone. For what is the end result of the vaguely-conceived ideology that was affirmed last night? It is that each of us should have the right to squat in our shitpiles of ignorance, isolated from one another, coveting our precious money, fellating our guns and fucking ourselves against our 50-inch LED screens in our multi-mortgaged, soon-to-be foreclosed on hovels, and if the world outside our caves goes to hell, well, that's because people don't understand how wonderful it is to engorge your faces with poisoned food and asthmatically heave your chest through polluted air and travel on shattered roads and bridges while picking your unmedicated scabs in order to get to work at Wal-Mart for shit wages but at least there's a wall that keeps the Mexicans and the gays out because that's what pissy God and the screaming ghost of Samuel Adams would fucking want for us. Their ultimate goal is to dismantle society itself in favor of Darwinian anarchy. Thomas Hobbes in action, motherfuckers, the animalistic Yahoos gutting the evolved Houyhnhnms.
There will be time, there will time, yes, to sift through the wreckage of last night's Republican ass-kicking and look for pieces of wisdom. We know that they got here because they lied, as they always do, about what this president has accomplished, about how much he tried to work with the GOP, about how genuinely not-liberal Barack Obama is. We know that had the Citizens United decision not unleashed the floodgates of corporate cash, some of the losses might have been mitigated. We know that the shattered nature of contemporary media meant that many people got their news filtered through Rupert Murdoch's ass crack. But we also know that they made a decision: to win no matter what. If that meant giving up on things they supposedly believed (as John McCain did), so be it. If that meant putting up with the desires of a Tea Party composed of only Mad Hatters, so be it. If that meant breaking down the working of the federal government, so be it. Shit, making a bunch of poor suckers believe that tax breaks for the wealthy was good for everyone and that environmental and other regulation was bad was the easy part. The win was what mattered. It doesn't matter how much mud you're covered with as long as you put the ball in the end zone.
Here's all you need to know in two editorials from today:
Look at what noted nutzoid obstructionist Republican Jim DeMint wrote in the Wall Street Journal to welcome new Senators: "Tea party Republicans were elected to go to Washington and save the country—not be co-opted by the club. So put on your boxing gloves. The fight begins today." He may as well have titled it "A Love Letter to Rand."
And compare that to what punk-ass runaway Democrat Evan Bayh wrote in the New York Times: "We also overreached by focusing on health care rather than job creation during a severe recession...we were too deferential to our most zealous supporters...we must prove to moderates that Democrats can make tough choices." First off, can we stop saying that Obama focused on health care rather than jobs? The fucking stimulus passed (with almost everything that Republicans wanted in it) before work on health care got going. We had to wait to see if the stimulus worked, and it did help with jobs (it just wasn't big enough so it would appease the non-compromising pricks in the GOP). And, second, fuck you, Evan Bayh, who tucked his tail and his $10 million war chest between his legs and scampered away from the Senate like a whipped bitch on a rainy night.
We are heading for a dark, dark period. The Congress isn't going to get shit done as now everything will have to be approved by DeMint and Paul, even if the Senate is still in Democratic hands, or Harry Reid won't let the crazy shit passed in the House even come to a vote. There's going to be investigations of every bit of grime that Andrew Breitbart and Fox "news" can scrape from under the fingernails of even the lowliest members of the Obama administration. Impeachment will be on the table. Mike Pence, Darrell Issa, and Michele Bachmann will not be humble and cooperative with victory. They will be mad and drunk and ready for vengeance on the man who did nothing more than try to enact the will of the people who elected him by doing some of the very things he said he would do.
We the people abandoned Barack Obama yesterday. Hate what you will about him and about how he approached governing. The awful frustration of watching him compromise with a majority will seem like a happy vacation compared to what's coming. No, too many people who supported him in 2008 voted against him through their congressional races this year. And it was for the promise of a couple of extra bucks in their shrinking pay checks each week. Hope dies cheaply in this dirty, dead century.
Tomorrow: Enough despair. Let's make a plan, motherfuckers.
Tuesday, November 02, 2010
Election Night Tequila Twittering:
The Rude Pundit is about five shots into a bottle of Cuervo Gold - the cheap stuff for a bad night. And he's tweeting the shit out of the midterms. Come on over and check it out.
Note: There is no way to sound tough using the word "tweeting."
The Rude Pundit is about five shots into a bottle of Cuervo Gold - the cheap stuff for a bad night. And he's tweeting the shit out of the midterms. Come on over and check it out.
Note: There is no way to sound tough using the word "tweeting."
On the Value of Masturbation and Voting (with Multimedia Treats):
Think about it this way: at the end of the day, no matter who has broken up with you, no matter how many men or women have shot you down at the bar, no matter how many chaste make-out sessions have left you hot and bothered, no matter how many of your friends or acquaintances or classmates or workmates or enemies are getting laid, if you're not disabled in some sad way, you can always masturbate. No matter what, they can't take that away from you. Just break out your favorite inspirational material: donkey porn, soundtrack of Gordon Ramsay screaming at someone, feathered nipple clamps, whatever you like, and just go at it, yanking or fingering or dildoing or vibrating your cock or cunt or asshole into ecstasy. You do it for yourself, for your sanity, for the good of everyone around you, because, indeed, if you don't, you'll be a miserable motherfucker for the rest of the day, wondering why you didn't when you had the chance.
Is there any better way to wrap up this ridiculous election than with jerking off as a metaphor for voting? It's as if the nation has been enduring one long session of calculated self-abuse since Summer 2009. And as Democrats are told again and again by Republicans to fuck off and by the mainstream media that we're worthless, well, they've left us nothing but to say, "Why don't we just go fuck ourselves?" And you should. You should head to that voting booth and push that button because the bastards and bitches all around us have said that we're a bunch of losers who can't handle the big ol' government.
This ain't a bipartisan, let's-hold-hands moment. If you're voting Republican, the Rude Pundit doesn't want you to vote at all (although he'll defend to the end your right to do it). If you're voting Democrat and you haven't yet, get the fuck off the computer and do it. And, unless you vote, you don't get to whine about how worthless it is, how every candidate is the same, how giant companies really run things, any of that shit. Because they haven't taken that from you yet. They may fuck with it. They may be able to manipulate the electronic machines. But you can still walk into your polling place and vote. Hell, punch a Tea Party poll watcher in the groin, if that makes you happy. Whatever happens after the election is what we deal with after the fact.
No predictions here. The Rude Pundit will blog some shit tonight and probably live-tweet some reactions. On yesterday's Stephanie Miller Show, he made a forecast or two. Short version: we're fucking fucked, motherfuckers:
Instead, how about a laugh or two to get through this sure-to-be terrible day?
At this weekend's rally in DC, the Rude Pundit figured out what happened to the Democrats. They didn't run away from the legislation they passed. It ran away from them:
And, finally, to remember what awful people these sons of bitches really are, here's a shaky-cam bit from the Rude Pundit's performance at the DC Arts Center on Friday. It's a poem based on the instant messages of former Rep. Mark Foley to an underage male congressional page:
Think about it this way: at the end of the day, no matter who has broken up with you, no matter how many men or women have shot you down at the bar, no matter how many chaste make-out sessions have left you hot and bothered, no matter how many of your friends or acquaintances or classmates or workmates or enemies are getting laid, if you're not disabled in some sad way, you can always masturbate. No matter what, they can't take that away from you. Just break out your favorite inspirational material: donkey porn, soundtrack of Gordon Ramsay screaming at someone, feathered nipple clamps, whatever you like, and just go at it, yanking or fingering or dildoing or vibrating your cock or cunt or asshole into ecstasy. You do it for yourself, for your sanity, for the good of everyone around you, because, indeed, if you don't, you'll be a miserable motherfucker for the rest of the day, wondering why you didn't when you had the chance.
Is there any better way to wrap up this ridiculous election than with jerking off as a metaphor for voting? It's as if the nation has been enduring one long session of calculated self-abuse since Summer 2009. And as Democrats are told again and again by Republicans to fuck off and by the mainstream media that we're worthless, well, they've left us nothing but to say, "Why don't we just go fuck ourselves?" And you should. You should head to that voting booth and push that button because the bastards and bitches all around us have said that we're a bunch of losers who can't handle the big ol' government.
This ain't a bipartisan, let's-hold-hands moment. If you're voting Republican, the Rude Pundit doesn't want you to vote at all (although he'll defend to the end your right to do it). If you're voting Democrat and you haven't yet, get the fuck off the computer and do it. And, unless you vote, you don't get to whine about how worthless it is, how every candidate is the same, how giant companies really run things, any of that shit. Because they haven't taken that from you yet. They may fuck with it. They may be able to manipulate the electronic machines. But you can still walk into your polling place and vote. Hell, punch a Tea Party poll watcher in the groin, if that makes you happy. Whatever happens after the election is what we deal with after the fact.
No predictions here. The Rude Pundit will blog some shit tonight and probably live-tweet some reactions. On yesterday's Stephanie Miller Show, he made a forecast or two. Short version: we're fucking fucked, motherfuckers:
Instead, how about a laugh or two to get through this sure-to-be terrible day?
At this weekend's rally in DC, the Rude Pundit figured out what happened to the Democrats. They didn't run away from the legislation they passed. It ran away from them:
And, finally, to remember what awful people these sons of bitches really are, here's a shaky-cam bit from the Rude Pundit's performance at the DC Arts Center on Friday. It's a poem based on the instant messages of former Rep. Mark Foley to an underage male congressional page:
Monday, November 01, 2010
Why the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear Matters on the Day Before the Election:
Sure, there was a lot to be irritated about with the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear this weekend in DC. Obviously, the entire event was calculated to be for a stadium-sized audience of about 50-60,000 people. If you weren't well east of 7th Street, you couldn't see a goddamn thing, not even the Jumbotrons. Obviously, The Daily Show and Colbert Report organizers didn't anticipate that at least a quarter million people would show up for what was, really, an exaggerated, glorified version of the TV shows, a kind of Comedy Central on Ice. It's hard to tell how many people would have been there because the Rude Pundit saw a line of about a thousand people waiting in a line outside the Vienna Metro stop. Obviously, it was meant to be a little something for the fans at the end of a brutal, awful campaign season where Hope got raped by Hate; you could bring funny signs, dress up, and have a ball. And maybe get something out of it: irony does not denote a lack of sincerity. What it became, though, was something much more significant, something that was missed by nearly everyone covering the event.
The Rude Pundit went to the rally just to get a laugh, maybe see a decent musical act or two. Once he realized he wouldn't get to watch it outdoors, he traversed the tightly-packed mid-section of the crowd, where, yeah, there were a bunch of signs of varying degrees of funny, a lot of douchebags and smug fucks, costumes ranging from a dude who brown-faced himself to be John Boehner to full Flying Spaghetti Monster regalia, and a good many people who were just trying to listen. He watched a bit from outside the Newseum and then ended up at the Iron Horse Tap Room, which was full to capacity with every television in the joint showing the rally. And that drunk crowd (the state of which the Rude Pundit joined quickly) laughed and listened; we even clapped when John Oliver skipped around in Peter Pan drag, wanting everyone to applaud to save Stewart (just watch it online), and we went silent to hear Stewart's closing words and Tony Bennett's a cappella "America the Beautiful," even the sloshed Teletubby (it was LaLa).
Look, these are cynical, awful times right now. The shrieking noise of this nasty campaign season has us all thinking that being trapped in a mine in Chile for a while might not be a bad deal. The rally didn't exist to solve any problems. That wasn't promised and that wasn't what was delivered. It wasn't there to direct people to do anything specific. You can't fault an event for delivering exactly what Stewart said it was going to be: a nice day on the National Mall. Instead, it achieved something else. The Rude Pundit had more actual face-to-face conservations with people from all over the United States about politics than he's had in a long, long time. He met people from Texas, Kansas, Illinois, and elsewhere, all of whom seemed genuinely interested, and even surprised, at how one could communicate, face-to-face, with each other, as if public, civic discourse, unmediated and un-interneted, was a rare commodity nowadays.
The Rude Pundit's not some naive rube. He doesn't think that a couple of hours of facetious Kumbaya changes anything for tomorrow, when we see just how fucked we're gonna be for the next couple of years. But what the rally demonstrated to him was that there is a very large demographic that is not being served by the media, that there is a void in the coverage of politics. It's not about moderation or even lack of action. It's about honesty and fairness (genuine fairness, not Fox "news"-mitigated fairness). What Stewart and The Daily Show do is demonstrate just how fucking easy it is to state facts, no matter which side those facts are good or bad for. A news network that can do that will be rewarded with as loyal a following. In some ways, it's a pipe dream, but is there anything wrong with wanting Walter Cronkite back? (A new Walter Cronkite, not the zombie of the old one, although it'd be great to see him eat Bill Hemmer's face.)
You can ask, and truly, you should, "Really? That's it? That's why everyone went to hipster Woodstock this weekend?" And the answer is, "No, but yeah." It's a sign of how degraded our mainstream discourse has become that to merely ask for the news to stop being polarizing is something that's kind of radical. And if the message seems leftist (even if the montages Stewart presents criticize Ed Schultz and others), well, fuck, maybe that's because it's the right that started this fire by attacking and undermining the press after Watergate. It's the right that attempts to manipulate or discredit things like, well, science. It also seems leftist because to be vaguely moderate in this reactionary age is seen as capitulating to Stalin's phantom while Hitler strangles Lady Liberty.
The election tomorrow is a clear example of the triumph of lies. Teabaggers get an amount of coverage that's disproportionate to their actual, factual numbers. Sarah Palin is presented as an expert on things that she simply doesn't know about. Corporations control what we see. Glenn Beck simply creates an alternate reality. We all have our prisms that create our viewpoints. But there are things that are simply true, Stewart says. And we have to be able to agree on those in order to move forward. The people at the rally were sick of being told that truth is fiction. So why not use fiction in order to get to truth?
(That sign above was on a park police horse trailer in DC on Saturday. It apparently fell over onto the ramp when the doors opened, and a horse shit on Glenn Beck's face. The Rude Pundit hopes it was a commentary by the cops on the previous rally on the Mall. Tip o' the rude hat to pal Dean T. for the photo [and the weekend lodging].)
Sure, there was a lot to be irritated about with the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear this weekend in DC. Obviously, the entire event was calculated to be for a stadium-sized audience of about 50-60,000 people. If you weren't well east of 7th Street, you couldn't see a goddamn thing, not even the Jumbotrons. Obviously, The Daily Show and Colbert Report organizers didn't anticipate that at least a quarter million people would show up for what was, really, an exaggerated, glorified version of the TV shows, a kind of Comedy Central on Ice. It's hard to tell how many people would have been there because the Rude Pundit saw a line of about a thousand people waiting in a line outside the Vienna Metro stop. Obviously, it was meant to be a little something for the fans at the end of a brutal, awful campaign season where Hope got raped by Hate; you could bring funny signs, dress up, and have a ball. And maybe get something out of it: irony does not denote a lack of sincerity. What it became, though, was something much more significant, something that was missed by nearly everyone covering the event.
The Rude Pundit went to the rally just to get a laugh, maybe see a decent musical act or two. Once he realized he wouldn't get to watch it outdoors, he traversed the tightly-packed mid-section of the crowd, where, yeah, there were a bunch of signs of varying degrees of funny, a lot of douchebags and smug fucks, costumes ranging from a dude who brown-faced himself to be John Boehner to full Flying Spaghetti Monster regalia, and a good many people who were just trying to listen. He watched a bit from outside the Newseum and then ended up at the Iron Horse Tap Room, which was full to capacity with every television in the joint showing the rally. And that drunk crowd (the state of which the Rude Pundit joined quickly) laughed and listened; we even clapped when John Oliver skipped around in Peter Pan drag, wanting everyone to applaud to save Stewart (just watch it online), and we went silent to hear Stewart's closing words and Tony Bennett's a cappella "America the Beautiful," even the sloshed Teletubby (it was LaLa).
Look, these are cynical, awful times right now. The shrieking noise of this nasty campaign season has us all thinking that being trapped in a mine in Chile for a while might not be a bad deal. The rally didn't exist to solve any problems. That wasn't promised and that wasn't what was delivered. It wasn't there to direct people to do anything specific. You can't fault an event for delivering exactly what Stewart said it was going to be: a nice day on the National Mall. Instead, it achieved something else. The Rude Pundit had more actual face-to-face conservations with people from all over the United States about politics than he's had in a long, long time. He met people from Texas, Kansas, Illinois, and elsewhere, all of whom seemed genuinely interested, and even surprised, at how one could communicate, face-to-face, with each other, as if public, civic discourse, unmediated and un-interneted, was a rare commodity nowadays.
The Rude Pundit's not some naive rube. He doesn't think that a couple of hours of facetious Kumbaya changes anything for tomorrow, when we see just how fucked we're gonna be for the next couple of years. But what the rally demonstrated to him was that there is a very large demographic that is not being served by the media, that there is a void in the coverage of politics. It's not about moderation or even lack of action. It's about honesty and fairness (genuine fairness, not Fox "news"-mitigated fairness). What Stewart and The Daily Show do is demonstrate just how fucking easy it is to state facts, no matter which side those facts are good or bad for. A news network that can do that will be rewarded with as loyal a following. In some ways, it's a pipe dream, but is there anything wrong with wanting Walter Cronkite back? (A new Walter Cronkite, not the zombie of the old one, although it'd be great to see him eat Bill Hemmer's face.)
You can ask, and truly, you should, "Really? That's it? That's why everyone went to hipster Woodstock this weekend?" And the answer is, "No, but yeah." It's a sign of how degraded our mainstream discourse has become that to merely ask for the news to stop being polarizing is something that's kind of radical. And if the message seems leftist (even if the montages Stewart presents criticize Ed Schultz and others), well, fuck, maybe that's because it's the right that started this fire by attacking and undermining the press after Watergate. It's the right that attempts to manipulate or discredit things like, well, science. It also seems leftist because to be vaguely moderate in this reactionary age is seen as capitulating to Stalin's phantom while Hitler strangles Lady Liberty.
The election tomorrow is a clear example of the triumph of lies. Teabaggers get an amount of coverage that's disproportionate to their actual, factual numbers. Sarah Palin is presented as an expert on things that she simply doesn't know about. Corporations control what we see. Glenn Beck simply creates an alternate reality. We all have our prisms that create our viewpoints. But there are things that are simply true, Stewart says. And we have to be able to agree on those in order to move forward. The people at the rally were sick of being told that truth is fiction. So why not use fiction in order to get to truth?
(That sign above was on a park police horse trailer in DC on Saturday. It apparently fell over onto the ramp when the doors opened, and a horse shit on Glenn Beck's face. The Rude Pundit hopes it was a commentary by the cops on the previous rally on the Mall. Tip o' the rude hat to pal Dean T. for the photo [and the weekend lodging].)
Friday, October 29, 2010
A Photo of a Group of Soon-To-Be Dead People:
This is the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling. The members were appointed by President Barack Obama.
Yesterday, the commission released findings that stated that Halliburton did not complete a crucial test on the cement that would be used to seal the oil well during a blow out. This directly contributed to the severity of the oil spill. Halliburton has admitted it neglected this test but was not responsible for the blow out.
While they have recovered some since yesterday, the cost of shares in Halliburton have plunged as much as 16% since the news. That means that Dick Cheney has already sent out ninjas to secretly kill each member of the commission in a horrible, but poetic way, probably involving drills, gas pumps, and dead pelicans, using their organs to decorate the dying trees and rotting jack-o'-lanterns just in time for Halloween.
This is the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling. The members were appointed by President Barack Obama.
Yesterday, the commission released findings that stated that Halliburton did not complete a crucial test on the cement that would be used to seal the oil well during a blow out. This directly contributed to the severity of the oil spill. Halliburton has admitted it neglected this test but was not responsible for the blow out.
While they have recovered some since yesterday, the cost of shares in Halliburton have plunged as much as 16% since the news. That means that Dick Cheney has already sent out ninjas to secretly kill each member of the commission in a horrible, but poetic way, probably involving drills, gas pumps, and dead pelicans, using their organs to decorate the dying trees and rotting jack-o'-lanterns just in time for Halloween.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
If Republicans Lose on Tuesday, There Will Be Blood:
Since we in the so-called business of so-called punditry are supposed to be Jean Dixon-esque prognosticators upon occasion, making wildly inaccurate predictions about what will probably not happen, but, boy, if it did, won't we look fucking brilliant, let the Rude Pundit toss one into the pile: if, as the most optimistic polling shows is possible, the Republicans don't win back the House of Representatives and lose a good many of the close Senate races next Tuesday, the reaction on the right will be violent. There will be a number of instances of Democratic headquarters vandalized, people who support Democrats will be assaulted, bomb threats will be called in, and there may even be an alarmingly well-organized, but supposedly grassroots and spontaneous, riot or two.
The Rude Pundit is not doing a William Kristol here (definition: A "William Kristol" is "pulling a turd out of your ass and showing it to everyone as if you just laid a golden egg when, in reality, it's just a piece of shit"). Look at the behavior of angry white people when there was a chance that George W. Bush was going to lose Florida in 2000 (which, you know, he did). The thugs in suits intimidated a legal body from completing its mandated task. And they won with just shouting and shoving.
Look at the landscape out there. The self-proclaimed rhetorical leaders of the right are already hetting up the blood of their followers. Michelle Malkin, who really ought to be caged like rabid shih-tzu, is conjuring the chimera of voter fraud. Any small instance of anyone who looks Democratic (which means, you know, black or Hispanic) doing something suspicious (which means, you know, showing up to vote) will be blown up as the complete tyrannical takeover of our democratic process by illegal alien communists. Saying that you're gonna have poll-watchers out there is also a fine voter-suppression method.
The number of incidents of violence and intimidation by the right in this election cycle have been pretty stunning, the small individual ones like the Kentucky Stomper and the big ones like the guy who wanted to shoot up the Tides Foundation. Hell, Glenn Beck is trying to walk back the violent rhetoric, saying that "on the right, [violence] instantly destroys the republic. Why? Because it forces the president to take more power and more freedoms away." Dude, you can't put the genie back in the bottle until all the wishes are complete.
Beck and Limbaugh are both pushing the power of the ballot box as the solution right now. Why? Because it seems like they're gonna win. Fuck, Sean Hannity is already referring to "Speaker Boehner." So right now they believe that the election is going to be the Republican re-ascendance, but they are planting the seeds for uprising if that fails, if, say, the cell phone factor comes into play and polls are just wildly wrong.
Then you can bet that the teabaggers and other nutzoids will start thinking that they better use their Second Amendment remedies.
Since we in the so-called business of so-called punditry are supposed to be Jean Dixon-esque prognosticators upon occasion, making wildly inaccurate predictions about what will probably not happen, but, boy, if it did, won't we look fucking brilliant, let the Rude Pundit toss one into the pile: if, as the most optimistic polling shows is possible, the Republicans don't win back the House of Representatives and lose a good many of the close Senate races next Tuesday, the reaction on the right will be violent. There will be a number of instances of Democratic headquarters vandalized, people who support Democrats will be assaulted, bomb threats will be called in, and there may even be an alarmingly well-organized, but supposedly grassroots and spontaneous, riot or two.
The Rude Pundit is not doing a William Kristol here (definition: A "William Kristol" is "pulling a turd out of your ass and showing it to everyone as if you just laid a golden egg when, in reality, it's just a piece of shit"). Look at the behavior of angry white people when there was a chance that George W. Bush was going to lose Florida in 2000 (which, you know, he did). The thugs in suits intimidated a legal body from completing its mandated task. And they won with just shouting and shoving.
Look at the landscape out there. The self-proclaimed rhetorical leaders of the right are already hetting up the blood of their followers. Michelle Malkin, who really ought to be caged like rabid shih-tzu, is conjuring the chimera of voter fraud. Any small instance of anyone who looks Democratic (which means, you know, black or Hispanic) doing something suspicious (which means, you know, showing up to vote) will be blown up as the complete tyrannical takeover of our democratic process by illegal alien communists. Saying that you're gonna have poll-watchers out there is also a fine voter-suppression method.
The number of incidents of violence and intimidation by the right in this election cycle have been pretty stunning, the small individual ones like the Kentucky Stomper and the big ones like the guy who wanted to shoot up the Tides Foundation. Hell, Glenn Beck is trying to walk back the violent rhetoric, saying that "on the right, [violence] instantly destroys the republic. Why? Because it forces the president to take more power and more freedoms away." Dude, you can't put the genie back in the bottle until all the wishes are complete.
Beck and Limbaugh are both pushing the power of the ballot box as the solution right now. Why? Because it seems like they're gonna win. Fuck, Sean Hannity is already referring to "Speaker Boehner." So right now they believe that the election is going to be the Republican re-ascendance, but they are planting the seeds for uprising if that fails, if, say, the cell phone factor comes into play and polls are just wildly wrong.
Then you can bet that the teabaggers and other nutzoids will start thinking that they better use their Second Amendment remedies.
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Regarding the Kentucky Stomping and Juan Williams (Updated):
Well, at least the thugs aren't wearing jackboots. It's white sneakers and loose-fit jeans and belly-clinging t-shirts for the speech-suppressing motherfuckers. When Tim Profitt, the former Rand Paul campaign coordinator for Bourbon County (motto: "Suburban backwards ass country fucks voting against our interests"), stomped on the shoulder and head of a Paul protester, he revealed the ugly heart of the Tea Party, the flames fanned by an endless radio and Fox "news" loop of conspiracy theories and hatemongering the likes of which would make Joseph McCarthy say, "Whoa, are you fucking serious?"
Look at Profitt before his foot of doom strikes Lauren Valle. He thinks about it. He pauses, and his simian brain is flooded by disembodied voices crying out in his head that democracy's vampire tree needs blood to be satisfied. He wants a piece of this fuckin' action, man. You can see him make that decision. How often can a man have a chance to kick the shit out of some short-haired, lesbohippie cunt? And this one's already on the ground, just begging for it. "Yeah," you know he thought, seeing Valle tackled and assaulted by other good Paul nutsuckers, "I gotta get in on that shit." So he stomps, slowly, allowing the feeling of sole hitting shoulder to course through his muscles and bone, a charge that's electric, giving him that barbaric violent surge in his deadened cock, yeah, feeling like this is the way, man, this is the way, so he slides his foot down to her head and pushes, the helpless Valle unable to even shove a redneck asshole's size 7 off her skull.
You can bet that, in the days before, Profitt was jacking off his flaccid, scabby dick to Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly's outrage over the Juan Williams firing, listening to how it violates free speech, how liberals can't stand it when they hear an opinion that doesn't suit their agenda, how hateful and despicable the left is to silence this man because he simply said something that was not politically correct. You can bet that he came, just a little, and wiped his prick with a copy of the Bill of Rights that he understands so fucking well.
The Rude Pundit wants to know how many of the nutzoids who were joyous at Valle's treatment, who said that she deserved it because she was there to, you know, speak against Rand Paul by dressing up to give him a mock award, who expressed in the yahoo-driven comment sections that it was "about time" someone took down a liberal, were more than a little outraged at NPR's treatment of Juan Williams. Oh, wait, that's easy to find out.
Stinking fuckbag Jim Hoft of the conservative shitbasket known as Gateway Pundit was apoplectic about Williams. "What is it with these leftists? When anyone disagrees with them they accuse them of being crazy," he said about NPR execs. But Valle, who disagrees with Hoft over whether or not Rand Paul should be in the Senate, is an "unhinged leftist," according to the aforementioned fuckbag. Remember: Juan Williams was lynched. Lauren Valle got what she deserved (the rape implications there being intentional).
We are in for dark, dark times. The crazies and the inbreds are taking over, flush with corporate cash, talking about "freedom" like it's just another channel on the cable box.
Update: As if to prove the point, a week ago, leather-clad geriatric thugs forced a DNC campaign tracker to leave a public event for Florida Republican Senate candidate Allen West, who had identified him and told him to go. When he is near his car, while the biker grandpas are taking his license plate number, he asks them why. One says to him, "It's a free country." These bastards wouldn't know freedom if it fucked their faces.
(Tip o' the rude hat to Shoq.)
Well, at least the thugs aren't wearing jackboots. It's white sneakers and loose-fit jeans and belly-clinging t-shirts for the speech-suppressing motherfuckers. When Tim Profitt, the former Rand Paul campaign coordinator for Bourbon County (motto: "Suburban backwards ass country fucks voting against our interests"), stomped on the shoulder and head of a Paul protester, he revealed the ugly heart of the Tea Party, the flames fanned by an endless radio and Fox "news" loop of conspiracy theories and hatemongering the likes of which would make Joseph McCarthy say, "Whoa, are you fucking serious?"
Look at Profitt before his foot of doom strikes Lauren Valle. He thinks about it. He pauses, and his simian brain is flooded by disembodied voices crying out in his head that democracy's vampire tree needs blood to be satisfied. He wants a piece of this fuckin' action, man. You can see him make that decision. How often can a man have a chance to kick the shit out of some short-haired, lesbohippie cunt? And this one's already on the ground, just begging for it. "Yeah," you know he thought, seeing Valle tackled and assaulted by other good Paul nutsuckers, "I gotta get in on that shit." So he stomps, slowly, allowing the feeling of sole hitting shoulder to course through his muscles and bone, a charge that's electric, giving him that barbaric violent surge in his deadened cock, yeah, feeling like this is the way, man, this is the way, so he slides his foot down to her head and pushes, the helpless Valle unable to even shove a redneck asshole's size 7 off her skull.
You can bet that, in the days before, Profitt was jacking off his flaccid, scabby dick to Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly's outrage over the Juan Williams firing, listening to how it violates free speech, how liberals can't stand it when they hear an opinion that doesn't suit their agenda, how hateful and despicable the left is to silence this man because he simply said something that was not politically correct. You can bet that he came, just a little, and wiped his prick with a copy of the Bill of Rights that he understands so fucking well.
The Rude Pundit wants to know how many of the nutzoids who were joyous at Valle's treatment, who said that she deserved it because she was there to, you know, speak against Rand Paul by dressing up to give him a mock award, who expressed in the yahoo-driven comment sections that it was "about time" someone took down a liberal, were more than a little outraged at NPR's treatment of Juan Williams. Oh, wait, that's easy to find out.
Stinking fuckbag Jim Hoft of the conservative shitbasket known as Gateway Pundit was apoplectic about Williams. "What is it with these leftists? When anyone disagrees with them they accuse them of being crazy," he said about NPR execs. But Valle, who disagrees with Hoft over whether or not Rand Paul should be in the Senate, is an "unhinged leftist," according to the aforementioned fuckbag. Remember: Juan Williams was lynched. Lauren Valle got what she deserved (the rape implications there being intentional).
We are in for dark, dark times. The crazies and the inbreds are taking over, flush with corporate cash, talking about "freedom" like it's just another channel on the cable box.
Update: As if to prove the point, a week ago, leather-clad geriatric thugs forced a DNC campaign tracker to leave a public event for Florida Republican Senate candidate Allen West, who had identified him and told him to go. When he is near his car, while the biker grandpas are taking his license plate number, he asks them why. One says to him, "It's a free country." These bastards wouldn't know freedom if it fucked their faces.
(Tip o' the rude hat to Shoq.)
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
A True Tale of the Corruption of Campaign Finance Laws:
Sometimes, you have to use a small story, a parable, if you will, in order to explain the big picture. The corrupt state of our contemporary politics is such an enormous, overwhelming issue. Trying to take in the extent of the influx of outside money and its influence on elections is enough to make most citizens just flip the "off" switch in their brains. When you get past the money flood caused by the loathsome Citizens United decision, you're left with attempting to explain how all the other funds that are raised for our ludicrously long election cycles make it impossible to have anything approaching actual democracy, and that discussion is usually met with the listeners putting their hands over their ears and yelling, "Lalala, I can't hear you." It's just easier to pretend, ya know.
So let's microcosm this for a moment. Let's take a single story about one person in a relatively small town and demonstrate what exactly is happening. For the tale of Ora Leonard is as clear an example of the destructive effects of our campaign finance laws on a personal level. It has the advantage of also being illustrative of the complete cruelty of our mortgage and finance system and the desperation of local governments.
Follow the bouncing ball here for a little while: In Decatur, Illinois, we have the Dennis Ballinger Real Estate Company. Its stated mission is to buy properties in foreclosure proceedings, force them to finish, and then re-sell the property at a profit: "We specialize in the completion of foreclosed residential, commercial and industrial properties and conveying ownership to investors and business owners eager to purchase at below market prices." Charming as that is, Ballinger has another business, Empire Tax Corporation, which buys the unpaid property taxes from Illinois county governments and then pursues the property owner for compensation plus a percentage extra for its trouble. If the property owner doesn't pay the money to the company that it now owes the debt to, the company can take the property. One can see how this would be advantageous to Dennis Ballinger's aforementioned real estate business.
The percentage a tax buyer can charge in "penalties" is set during auctions of the taxes by the treasurers in each county. Other counties in Illinois average a 1%-5% mark-up, like in Champaign County. Madison County averaged the state maximum of 18%. You can see how someone could make a nice bit of change there.
Here's how this works: "The penalty rate goes up by the same percentage every six months. For example, if the winning penalty bid is 18 percent, the property owner has to pay a 36 percent penalty if he pays up within 6-12 months, a 54 percent penalty if he pays up within the following six months, and so forth. A tax buyer can take the property after three years, sometimes sooner." Some might call this "cruelty."
Now let's make this personal: Venice, Illinois, is a small, poor town in Madison County, on the Mississippi River, across from St. Louis. It's heavily African-American. The average income and home prices are a fraction of the state average. That's where 73 year-old Ora Leonard lived in her home on Broadway for over 20 years. She received a letter last year from Ballinger telling her to pay her 2005 property taxes or risk losing her house. Leonard had no idea she owed the taxes, she says, thinking that her escrow account at her bank would still pay. Ballinger bought the taxes, along with her 2009 ones, at an auction of taxes conducted by Madison County Treasurer Fred Bathon. The penalty rate is a bid received by Bathon at the auction. Leonard should owe $3343. But the interest, compounded from 2005 on that bill, as well as other penalties, make it so she owes $6000.
So isn't this just about a poor woman who might lose her house because of greed and the crappy economy? Isn't it about a pretty odious practice that just invites cruelty? What the hell does this have to do with Citizens United or campaign finance at all?
In his campaign for county treasurer, Fred Bathon's number one contributor was Dennis Ballinger. He gave $29,100 to Bathon's campaign. Ballinger's companies made over $200,000 on tax sales due, in large part, to the high penalty rate. If you do math, that'd be one hell of a return on his investment. At the tax auction, the practice is to let buyers bid against each other for what tax penalty they'd buy for. So one buyer might yell, "18%" while another would yell "17" and on down, like Name That Tune. Bathon's practice at the tax auction was to close bidding after the first bid so that the highest rate was always the one imposed.
By the way, the top four contributors to Bathon were registered tax buyers (you have to register as a tax buyer to participate in the auction). By the way, Bathon is now retired, the tax sales under him are under investigation by the state, and the penalty rate for tax sales averages 9% in Madison County. By the way, in Champaign County, candidates for treasurer are barred from receiving donations from tax buyers. The state legislator is working to change the entire system of tax sales so that tax buyers can't contribute at all and so homeowners like Ora Leonard don't have to negotiate a bureaucratic maze to try to get the tax sale canceled.
So let's put this together: A government official deliberately used his authority to directly enrich his highest campaign donors, which caused poor homeowners to either plunge further into debt or lose their houses. That's an absolute direct correlation between money and action. Yet this was just for a couple hundred thousand dollars at a county level with the names and jobs of the donors identified.
Now, up it to a national level. And up the money involved to hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars. And the requirement of disclosure of donors to certain groups eliminated by the Supreme Court. And then you realize that it's not just Ora Leonard's house at stake. It's the whole goddamn country.
Sometimes, you have to use a small story, a parable, if you will, in order to explain the big picture. The corrupt state of our contemporary politics is such an enormous, overwhelming issue. Trying to take in the extent of the influx of outside money and its influence on elections is enough to make most citizens just flip the "off" switch in their brains. When you get past the money flood caused by the loathsome Citizens United decision, you're left with attempting to explain how all the other funds that are raised for our ludicrously long election cycles make it impossible to have anything approaching actual democracy, and that discussion is usually met with the listeners putting their hands over their ears and yelling, "Lalala, I can't hear you." It's just easier to pretend, ya know.
So let's microcosm this for a moment. Let's take a single story about one person in a relatively small town and demonstrate what exactly is happening. For the tale of Ora Leonard is as clear an example of the destructive effects of our campaign finance laws on a personal level. It has the advantage of also being illustrative of the complete cruelty of our mortgage and finance system and the desperation of local governments.
Follow the bouncing ball here for a little while: In Decatur, Illinois, we have the Dennis Ballinger Real Estate Company. Its stated mission is to buy properties in foreclosure proceedings, force them to finish, and then re-sell the property at a profit: "We specialize in the completion of foreclosed residential, commercial and industrial properties and conveying ownership to investors and business owners eager to purchase at below market prices." Charming as that is, Ballinger has another business, Empire Tax Corporation, which buys the unpaid property taxes from Illinois county governments and then pursues the property owner for compensation plus a percentage extra for its trouble. If the property owner doesn't pay the money to the company that it now owes the debt to, the company can take the property. One can see how this would be advantageous to Dennis Ballinger's aforementioned real estate business.
The percentage a tax buyer can charge in "penalties" is set during auctions of the taxes by the treasurers in each county. Other counties in Illinois average a 1%-5% mark-up, like in Champaign County. Madison County averaged the state maximum of 18%. You can see how someone could make a nice bit of change there.
Here's how this works: "The penalty rate goes up by the same percentage every six months. For example, if the winning penalty bid is 18 percent, the property owner has to pay a 36 percent penalty if he pays up within 6-12 months, a 54 percent penalty if he pays up within the following six months, and so forth. A tax buyer can take the property after three years, sometimes sooner." Some might call this "cruelty."
Now let's make this personal: Venice, Illinois, is a small, poor town in Madison County, on the Mississippi River, across from St. Louis. It's heavily African-American. The average income and home prices are a fraction of the state average. That's where 73 year-old Ora Leonard lived in her home on Broadway for over 20 years. She received a letter last year from Ballinger telling her to pay her 2005 property taxes or risk losing her house. Leonard had no idea she owed the taxes, she says, thinking that her escrow account at her bank would still pay. Ballinger bought the taxes, along with her 2009 ones, at an auction of taxes conducted by Madison County Treasurer Fred Bathon. The penalty rate is a bid received by Bathon at the auction. Leonard should owe $3343. But the interest, compounded from 2005 on that bill, as well as other penalties, make it so she owes $6000.
So isn't this just about a poor woman who might lose her house because of greed and the crappy economy? Isn't it about a pretty odious practice that just invites cruelty? What the hell does this have to do with Citizens United or campaign finance at all?
In his campaign for county treasurer, Fred Bathon's number one contributor was Dennis Ballinger. He gave $29,100 to Bathon's campaign. Ballinger's companies made over $200,000 on tax sales due, in large part, to the high penalty rate. If you do math, that'd be one hell of a return on his investment. At the tax auction, the practice is to let buyers bid against each other for what tax penalty they'd buy for. So one buyer might yell, "18%" while another would yell "17" and on down, like Name That Tune. Bathon's practice at the tax auction was to close bidding after the first bid so that the highest rate was always the one imposed.
By the way, the top four contributors to Bathon were registered tax buyers (you have to register as a tax buyer to participate in the auction). By the way, Bathon is now retired, the tax sales under him are under investigation by the state, and the penalty rate for tax sales averages 9% in Madison County. By the way, in Champaign County, candidates for treasurer are barred from receiving donations from tax buyers. The state legislator is working to change the entire system of tax sales so that tax buyers can't contribute at all and so homeowners like Ora Leonard don't have to negotiate a bureaucratic maze to try to get the tax sale canceled.
So let's put this together: A government official deliberately used his authority to directly enrich his highest campaign donors, which caused poor homeowners to either plunge further into debt or lose their houses. That's an absolute direct correlation between money and action. Yet this was just for a couple hundred thousand dollars at a county level with the names and jobs of the donors identified.
Now, up it to a national level. And up the money involved to hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars. And the requirement of disclosure of donors to certain groups eliminated by the Supreme Court. And then you realize that it's not just Ora Leonard's house at stake. It's the whole goddamn country.
Monday, October 25, 2010
We Haven't Even Begun to See the Destruction the GOP Will Do (Part 1):
One of the particularly repellent themes that's emerging strongly in the last days of this absurd election is that President Obama didn't do enough to "work with" Republicans. It's been something that the GOP has pushed for a while, but now, with the potential that the House will be given, wrapped in a ribbon, to the semen-encrusted, gnarled hands of the Republicans, more and more articles are coming out about how in the world Obama will work with the opposition.
As anyone in American with an attention span longer than an episode of Jersey Shore can tell you, this is, on its face, utter horseshit. We who have not handed our souls over to Sarah Palin or Fox "news" (which, you know, are pretty much one and the same) understand that the stimulus might have been much bigger and not larded with tax cuts; that the health care bill might not have been such a reacharound to hospitals and Big Pharma, so busy buggering us all endlessly; that there might have been a bipartisan climate bill; that confirmations of judges and administration officials might not have slowed to a near-halt had it not been for the White House's constant reaching out to Republicans. But that, apparently, wasn't enough. Cooperation and compromise are possible only if they include capitulation to Republican whims. All of them. And that bar you met? We're moving higher, motherfucker.
So Sheryl Gay Stolberg can write in the very liberal New York Times that it's all Obama's fault because he didn't stroke Mitch McConnell's anus while he was blowing the minority leader: "It took President Obama 18 months to invite the Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, to the White House for a one-on-one chat." On a daily basis, McConnell was promising to filibuster everything that the President was proposing. Republicans negotiated in bad faith when they even bothered to negotiate at all. And yet: "Before Mr. Obama and Republicans can secure each other's cooperation, people in both parties say, they must first figure out a way to secure mutual trust."
That mutual trust took one hell of a hit when McConnell told National Journal, "The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president." You got that? Not jobs. Not the war. Not health care. Not education. Not immigration. Ah, the beautiful ship Bipartisan sails again.
And the Republicans are setting the tone already for a session of sunshine and hand holding. Here's Indiana's Mike Pence (Campaign slogan: "I'm a motherfucker, but at least I'm honest about being a motherfucker") on what will happen if his party wins the House: "Look, the time to go along and get along is over...Look, there will be no compromise on stopping runaway spending, deficits and debt. There will be no compromise on repealing Obamacare. There will be no compromise on stopping Democrats from growing government and raising taxes. And if I haven’t been clear enough yet, let me say again: No compromise."
So, yeah, awesome. Goddamn, it's about time that Barack Obama is forced to listen to those poor Republicans who have offered no ideas, given no ground, and stated that they will do everything possible to stop anything that the President wants, even if they happen to agree with it. In other words, if Republicans win one or both houses of Congress, it will be like King Kong has come to town. That giant ape is gonna run around and just shit on everything, on the Capitol, on the White House, on the Mall, shitting all over the place, because it's just easier to do that than to make the effort to climb, say, the Washington Monument and reach for the sky.
One of the particularly repellent themes that's emerging strongly in the last days of this absurd election is that President Obama didn't do enough to "work with" Republicans. It's been something that the GOP has pushed for a while, but now, with the potential that the House will be given, wrapped in a ribbon, to the semen-encrusted, gnarled hands of the Republicans, more and more articles are coming out about how in the world Obama will work with the opposition.
As anyone in American with an attention span longer than an episode of Jersey Shore can tell you, this is, on its face, utter horseshit. We who have not handed our souls over to Sarah Palin or Fox "news" (which, you know, are pretty much one and the same) understand that the stimulus might have been much bigger and not larded with tax cuts; that the health care bill might not have been such a reacharound to hospitals and Big Pharma, so busy buggering us all endlessly; that there might have been a bipartisan climate bill; that confirmations of judges and administration officials might not have slowed to a near-halt had it not been for the White House's constant reaching out to Republicans. But that, apparently, wasn't enough. Cooperation and compromise are possible only if they include capitulation to Republican whims. All of them. And that bar you met? We're moving higher, motherfucker.
So Sheryl Gay Stolberg can write in the very liberal New York Times that it's all Obama's fault because he didn't stroke Mitch McConnell's anus while he was blowing the minority leader: "It took President Obama 18 months to invite the Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, to the White House for a one-on-one chat." On a daily basis, McConnell was promising to filibuster everything that the President was proposing. Republicans negotiated in bad faith when they even bothered to negotiate at all. And yet: "Before Mr. Obama and Republicans can secure each other's cooperation, people in both parties say, they must first figure out a way to secure mutual trust."
That mutual trust took one hell of a hit when McConnell told National Journal, "The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president." You got that? Not jobs. Not the war. Not health care. Not education. Not immigration. Ah, the beautiful ship Bipartisan sails again.
And the Republicans are setting the tone already for a session of sunshine and hand holding. Here's Indiana's Mike Pence (Campaign slogan: "I'm a motherfucker, but at least I'm honest about being a motherfucker") on what will happen if his party wins the House: "Look, the time to go along and get along is over...Look, there will be no compromise on stopping runaway spending, deficits and debt. There will be no compromise on repealing Obamacare. There will be no compromise on stopping Democrats from growing government and raising taxes. And if I haven’t been clear enough yet, let me say again: No compromise."
So, yeah, awesome. Goddamn, it's about time that Barack Obama is forced to listen to those poor Republicans who have offered no ideas, given no ground, and stated that they will do everything possible to stop anything that the President wants, even if they happen to agree with it. In other words, if Republicans win one or both houses of Congress, it will be like King Kong has come to town. That giant ape is gonna run around and just shit on everything, on the Capitol, on the White House, on the Mall, shitting all over the place, because it's just easier to do that than to make the effort to climb, say, the Washington Monument and reach for the sky.
Friday, October 22, 2010
Sharron Angle Is Running the Most Hateful Senate Campaign Out There:
So what's the proper response to "Man up," the emasculating slogan now being used as a near chant by Nevada Republican Sharron Angle in her campaign speeches? Ever since she said it at her lugubrious debate with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Angle has been acting like an old porn star who just got vaginoplasty and wants to show her newly-tucked pussy to everyone. At a rally yesterday in Vegas, Angle said, "He needs to take some responsibility. He says it is not his fault on the economy. Man up, Harry Reid. He says there is no problem with Social Security. Man up, Harry Reid. He says this war is lost and your general is dishonest. You owe us an apology. Man up, Harry Reid."
The size of Reid's waxy mansack aside, Angle's campaign has essentially been trash-talking Reid in ways that you don't usually see a major party candidate trash-talking another. While Reid has been somewhat brutal to Angle, questioning her competence and intelligence (mostly by quoting newspapers that do so), Angle's website has statements that are so over-the-top in Reid hatred that you have to wonder if the secret undercurrent is that Angle or her Communications Director Jarrod Agen don't just want to get fucked by Harry's reed.
Two examples:
"Harry Reid is a national embarrassment and each day he gets more desperate and delusional...he was gutless and cowardly in his face-to-face debate with Sharron...Reid is a hated man and he knows it."- All from a single paragraph campaign press release from October 19.
"Nevada voters despise Senator Reid." - from an October 20th press release.
Of course, these are the craven last days of a ridiculous season of campaigning. And, of course, it's hard to expect any less from Jarrod Agen, who is a political consultant and previously was a spokesman for Rudy Giuliani's failed presidential campaign, which means he's a motherfucker with nothing that approaches what humans might call "ethics." He's also responsible for getting Angle to tamp down the real crazy that she showed during the primary.
So how to respond to Angle's "Man up" and other attacks? Probably the same way one would respond to that porn star: "Put your cunt away."
So what's the proper response to "Man up," the emasculating slogan now being used as a near chant by Nevada Republican Sharron Angle in her campaign speeches? Ever since she said it at her lugubrious debate with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Angle has been acting like an old porn star who just got vaginoplasty and wants to show her newly-tucked pussy to everyone. At a rally yesterday in Vegas, Angle said, "He needs to take some responsibility. He says it is not his fault on the economy. Man up, Harry Reid. He says there is no problem with Social Security. Man up, Harry Reid. He says this war is lost and your general is dishonest. You owe us an apology. Man up, Harry Reid."
The size of Reid's waxy mansack aside, Angle's campaign has essentially been trash-talking Reid in ways that you don't usually see a major party candidate trash-talking another. While Reid has been somewhat brutal to Angle, questioning her competence and intelligence (mostly by quoting newspapers that do so), Angle's website has statements that are so over-the-top in Reid hatred that you have to wonder if the secret undercurrent is that Angle or her Communications Director Jarrod Agen don't just want to get fucked by Harry's reed.
Two examples:
"Harry Reid is a national embarrassment and each day he gets more desperate and delusional...he was gutless and cowardly in his face-to-face debate with Sharron...Reid is a hated man and he knows it."- All from a single paragraph campaign press release from October 19.
"Nevada voters despise Senator Reid." - from an October 20th press release.
Of course, these are the craven last days of a ridiculous season of campaigning. And, of course, it's hard to expect any less from Jarrod Agen, who is a political consultant and previously was a spokesman for Rudy Giuliani's failed presidential campaign, which means he's a motherfucker with nothing that approaches what humans might call "ethics." He's also responsible for getting Angle to tamp down the real crazy that she showed during the primary.
So how to respond to Angle's "Man up" and other attacks? Probably the same way one would respond to that porn star: "Put your cunt away."
Thursday, October 21, 2010
A Defense of Juan Williams and Other Media Idiots:
First off, the line that more than likely got Juan Williams fired from National Public Radio was not his little tangent into how he's had it with these motherfucking Muslims on his motherfucking planes. Said Williams to Bill O'Reilly on Fox "news", "I'm not a bigot. You know the kind of books I've written about the civil rights movement in this country. But when I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous."
Now, sure, that was a pretty idiotic thing to express, but it wasn't what got him fired. O'Reilly actually dropped the bomb that blew up in Williams's face when the falafel enthusiast said right after Williams revealed his bigotry, "[Y]ou live in the liberal precincts. You actually work for NPR, OK?" NPR hated having its name associated with Fox "news", and especially on Fox's blatant opinion-based programs, like The O'Reilly Folly. The worst thing about it? The whole segment was another attempt for O'Reilly to get hand-jobbed by everyone for his own bigoted remarks on The View. Seriously, O'Reilly's ego makes him like the most aggressive crack whore on the block: "C'mon, Juan, I'll suck your dick so good if you say I'm right."
In Slate, William Saletan compares NPR's actions to the firing of Shirley Sherrod, in that the larger context of Williams's remarks could be seen as painting a different picture. But the comparison fails beyond the idea that people should be given a full hearing. If any government employee said what the right fantasized Sherrod said, he or she should be fired. There's a gulf of difference, though, between what's allowable for someone whose job is to work fairly with the public and what's allowable for some fucker who makes a living by mouthing off on news shows (or, you know, blogs).
This follows on the heels of Rick Sanchez, Octavia Nasr, and Helen Thomas, all of whom lost their jobs because they said something that pissed off some Jews. Most ludicrous of these is Nasr, who got some yarmulkes in a knot because she tweeted that she was sorry for the death of a relatively moderate and pro-woman ayatollah in Lebanon. Would another journalist lose his or her job for saying they were sad that a cardinal or pope died? Sanchez was a loudmouth dumbass who simply acted like a loudmouth dumbass. And as for Thomas, well, let's just say there were people who waited a long time for her to fuck up in a way that allowed them to get some revenge.
Glenn Greenwald is right when he says, "If we're going to fire or otherwise punish people for expressing Prohibited Ideas against various groups, it's long overdue that those standards be applied equally to anti-Muslim animus." But, in a thoughtful piece on the Williams matter, he also offers, "Those who endorse speech-based punishments invariably end up watching as the list of Prohibited Ideas expands far beyond the initial or desired scope, often subsuming their own beliefs. That's a good reason to oppose all forms of speech-based punishment in the first place." When the first person's fired for saying mean things about the Tea Party, we can all protest loudly.
One part of the picture that's missing here is that the journalistic landscape has changed. Now, news anchors on all three of the news networks regularly offer commentary on the stories that they're reading off the teleprompter. You can't watch CNN without John Roberts or Tony Harris scoffing at something. And while Fox may have started the smearing of the line between news and punditry, CNN and MSNBC just as surely have stuck their fingers on the painting. That distinction is so blurred now that Wolf Blitzer seems quaint in his attempts to keep objectivity against a full-blown Cafferty assault.
If you're gonna blur that line, if you're gonna encourage your news people to mouth off, if you're gonna tell your commentators to push the boundaries, then don't be surprised if they say something offensive. It's like if you have a lover who wants you to do all kinds of crazy, kinky stuff to him: shoving huge dildos in his ass, stomping his balls, making him wear nipple clamps and a cock ring, jacking him off while he hangs by hooks through his skin, shitting on his chest. But then you punch him in the face and he says, "Whoa, whoa, too far" and breaks it off. How the hell were you to know what was too far at that point? Rick Sanchez's show was essentially about what giant self-righteous douchebag Rick Sanchez was. And they were surprised when he acted like a giant self-righteous douchebag elsewhere? And Williams has said tons of backwards ass shit on Fox over the years, most recently about the Park 51 community center, which he emphatically opposes.
Free speech ain't pretty. It's not supposed to be. But as long as it doesn't get in the way of you doing the job that you have been hired to do, the only combat for it ought to be more speech. And, sure, in the abstract, NPR has a right to fire someone they find offensive, but you know what else it could have done? A story about how a pretty smart guy (even if you disagree with him) can have the kinds of fears and prejudices that Williams talked about. But that would have been more about exploring an issue than having a knee-jerk reaction to anything that might piss off people. NPR was looking for a way to get rid of Williams. Mara Liasson better watch her ass.
First off, the line that more than likely got Juan Williams fired from National Public Radio was not his little tangent into how he's had it with these motherfucking Muslims on his motherfucking planes. Said Williams to Bill O'Reilly on Fox "news", "I'm not a bigot. You know the kind of books I've written about the civil rights movement in this country. But when I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous."
Now, sure, that was a pretty idiotic thing to express, but it wasn't what got him fired. O'Reilly actually dropped the bomb that blew up in Williams's face when the falafel enthusiast said right after Williams revealed his bigotry, "[Y]ou live in the liberal precincts. You actually work for NPR, OK?" NPR hated having its name associated with Fox "news", and especially on Fox's blatant opinion-based programs, like The O'Reilly Folly. The worst thing about it? The whole segment was another attempt for O'Reilly to get hand-jobbed by everyone for his own bigoted remarks on The View. Seriously, O'Reilly's ego makes him like the most aggressive crack whore on the block: "C'mon, Juan, I'll suck your dick so good if you say I'm right."
In Slate, William Saletan compares NPR's actions to the firing of Shirley Sherrod, in that the larger context of Williams's remarks could be seen as painting a different picture. But the comparison fails beyond the idea that people should be given a full hearing. If any government employee said what the right fantasized Sherrod said, he or she should be fired. There's a gulf of difference, though, between what's allowable for someone whose job is to work fairly with the public and what's allowable for some fucker who makes a living by mouthing off on news shows (or, you know, blogs).
This follows on the heels of Rick Sanchez, Octavia Nasr, and Helen Thomas, all of whom lost their jobs because they said something that pissed off some Jews. Most ludicrous of these is Nasr, who got some yarmulkes in a knot because she tweeted that she was sorry for the death of a relatively moderate and pro-woman ayatollah in Lebanon. Would another journalist lose his or her job for saying they were sad that a cardinal or pope died? Sanchez was a loudmouth dumbass who simply acted like a loudmouth dumbass. And as for Thomas, well, let's just say there were people who waited a long time for her to fuck up in a way that allowed them to get some revenge.
Glenn Greenwald is right when he says, "If we're going to fire or otherwise punish people for expressing Prohibited Ideas against various groups, it's long overdue that those standards be applied equally to anti-Muslim animus." But, in a thoughtful piece on the Williams matter, he also offers, "Those who endorse speech-based punishments invariably end up watching as the list of Prohibited Ideas expands far beyond the initial or desired scope, often subsuming their own beliefs. That's a good reason to oppose all forms of speech-based punishment in the first place." When the first person's fired for saying mean things about the Tea Party, we can all protest loudly.
One part of the picture that's missing here is that the journalistic landscape has changed. Now, news anchors on all three of the news networks regularly offer commentary on the stories that they're reading off the teleprompter. You can't watch CNN without John Roberts or Tony Harris scoffing at something. And while Fox may have started the smearing of the line between news and punditry, CNN and MSNBC just as surely have stuck their fingers on the painting. That distinction is so blurred now that Wolf Blitzer seems quaint in his attempts to keep objectivity against a full-blown Cafferty assault.
If you're gonna blur that line, if you're gonna encourage your news people to mouth off, if you're gonna tell your commentators to push the boundaries, then don't be surprised if they say something offensive. It's like if you have a lover who wants you to do all kinds of crazy, kinky stuff to him: shoving huge dildos in his ass, stomping his balls, making him wear nipple clamps and a cock ring, jacking him off while he hangs by hooks through his skin, shitting on his chest. But then you punch him in the face and he says, "Whoa, whoa, too far" and breaks it off. How the hell were you to know what was too far at that point? Rick Sanchez's show was essentially about what giant self-righteous douchebag Rick Sanchez was. And they were surprised when he acted like a giant self-righteous douchebag elsewhere? And Williams has said tons of backwards ass shit on Fox over the years, most recently about the Park 51 community center, which he emphatically opposes.
Free speech ain't pretty. It's not supposed to be. But as long as it doesn't get in the way of you doing the job that you have been hired to do, the only combat for it ought to be more speech. And, sure, in the abstract, NPR has a right to fire someone they find offensive, but you know what else it could have done? A story about how a pretty smart guy (even if you disagree with him) can have the kinds of fears and prejudices that Williams talked about. But that would have been more about exploring an issue than having a knee-jerk reaction to anything that might piss off people. NPR was looking for a way to get rid of Williams. Mara Liasson better watch her ass.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Regarding Tea Party Senate Candidates, the Best Explanations Are Always the Simplest:
At a debate yesterday, Delaware Republican and a woman who is you because you apparently have picnicked on a satanic altar, Christine O'Donnell, expressed shock at the idea that the separation of church and state was "in" the First Amendment to the Constitution. As her opponent, Chris Coons, pointed out, it's been pretty damn well-decided that the wall between religion and government derives from the establishment clause of the First Amendment. The kindest reading of O'Donnell's smug, self-satisfied, "gotcha" look is that she was asking about the exact phrase "separation of church and state," which is what her campaign said she meant. She was defended by Rush Limbaugh, who immediately popped a Viagra so he was ready to fuck his wife's ass as she wore the O'Donnell mask on the back of her head. And the right was knee-jerk defending the new cute chick.
The scramble was on in the mainstream media for a way to present O'Donnell's statements without saying the truth. Last night, on Anderson Cooper 360 (motto: "AC doesn't think his sexuality is any of your goddamn business"), Paul Begala and Jeffrey Toobin came preciously close, but still tiptoed around the obvious explanation: Christine O'Donnell is a fucking idiot, so fucking dumb that she has to remind herself to breathe. It's the 800 pound motherfucker just sitting there: she's too fucking stupid to be a Senator.
It ought to be okay to say that. It's actually important information for voters. Brian Williams ought to be able to declare, "By any objective measure, by any stretch of the imagination, Christine O'Donnell isn't qualified to be elected Cart Wrangler of the Month at Wal-Mart. Because she's just a fucking idiot." Now, there's a good chance people will still vote for her because, yeah, there are idiots who do see themselves in O'Donnell.
There's no mystery here. All the answers are plain to see when it comes to the array of bizarre and unqualified Republican candidates who are in the running for senator, which we used to consider an important position. Let the freaks and phonies huckster their way in the House, which is a Fellini film set of midgets, geeks, and contortionists.
For instance, Alaska's Joe Miller has a security detail of moonlighting active-duty military men who feel it's okay to harass and detain reporters at his rallies, he has a weird appreciation for the Berlin Wall, and he has a scuzzy beard that makes him look like an axe murderer or a man who eats moose pussy. Sure, his tyrannical tendencies and beliefs are important. But the truth of the matter is that Joe Miller is a fucking asshole. He's a paranoid fucking douchebag whose employers have fucking despised.
His "guards" are survivalist AK-47 fellaters who are begging for conflict. And you don't hang out with those people unless you're one of 'em. His former law firm boss said, "We at this firm were not eager to have him stay, and so when he announced he was leaving, we were relieved." Katie Couric should say, "By all accounts, from many people who have worked with him and from his own admissions, Joe Miller is a bushel of dicks and a gun fetishist who wants to wreck the Constitution."
So it could go. Sharron Angle? Fucking crazy. Rand Paul? Fucking psycho.
A real media would have eviscerated this collection of buffoons and bastards. The fact that we are talking about three of them as serious candidates means we are skidding toward the edge of a very steep cliff and that we are a very unserious electorate. The look on the face of Chris Coons in that debate with O'Donnell said it all. It was the look of a man who thought he had come for a debate to help voters decide who is going to be one of the most powerful people in the country. But when he showed up, it was a pie-eating contest.
At a debate yesterday, Delaware Republican and a woman who is you because you apparently have picnicked on a satanic altar, Christine O'Donnell, expressed shock at the idea that the separation of church and state was "in" the First Amendment to the Constitution. As her opponent, Chris Coons, pointed out, it's been pretty damn well-decided that the wall between religion and government derives from the establishment clause of the First Amendment. The kindest reading of O'Donnell's smug, self-satisfied, "gotcha" look is that she was asking about the exact phrase "separation of church and state," which is what her campaign said she meant. She was defended by Rush Limbaugh, who immediately popped a Viagra so he was ready to fuck his wife's ass as she wore the O'Donnell mask on the back of her head. And the right was knee-jerk defending the new cute chick.
The scramble was on in the mainstream media for a way to present O'Donnell's statements without saying the truth. Last night, on Anderson Cooper 360 (motto: "AC doesn't think his sexuality is any of your goddamn business"), Paul Begala and Jeffrey Toobin came preciously close, but still tiptoed around the obvious explanation: Christine O'Donnell is a fucking idiot, so fucking dumb that she has to remind herself to breathe. It's the 800 pound motherfucker just sitting there: she's too fucking stupid to be a Senator.
It ought to be okay to say that. It's actually important information for voters. Brian Williams ought to be able to declare, "By any objective measure, by any stretch of the imagination, Christine O'Donnell isn't qualified to be elected Cart Wrangler of the Month at Wal-Mart. Because she's just a fucking idiot." Now, there's a good chance people will still vote for her because, yeah, there are idiots who do see themselves in O'Donnell.
There's no mystery here. All the answers are plain to see when it comes to the array of bizarre and unqualified Republican candidates who are in the running for senator, which we used to consider an important position. Let the freaks and phonies huckster their way in the House, which is a Fellini film set of midgets, geeks, and contortionists.
For instance, Alaska's Joe Miller has a security detail of moonlighting active-duty military men who feel it's okay to harass and detain reporters at his rallies, he has a weird appreciation for the Berlin Wall, and he has a scuzzy beard that makes him look like an axe murderer or a man who eats moose pussy. Sure, his tyrannical tendencies and beliefs are important. But the truth of the matter is that Joe Miller is a fucking asshole. He's a paranoid fucking douchebag whose employers have fucking despised.
His "guards" are survivalist AK-47 fellaters who are begging for conflict. And you don't hang out with those people unless you're one of 'em. His former law firm boss said, "We at this firm were not eager to have him stay, and so when he announced he was leaving, we were relieved." Katie Couric should say, "By all accounts, from many people who have worked with him and from his own admissions, Joe Miller is a bushel of dicks and a gun fetishist who wants to wreck the Constitution."
So it could go. Sharron Angle? Fucking crazy. Rand Paul? Fucking psycho.
A real media would have eviscerated this collection of buffoons and bastards. The fact that we are talking about three of them as serious candidates means we are skidding toward the edge of a very steep cliff and that we are a very unserious electorate. The look on the face of Chris Coons in that debate with O'Donnell said it all. It was the look of a man who thought he had come for a debate to help voters decide who is going to be one of the most powerful people in the country. But when he showed up, it was a pie-eating contest.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
The Rude Pundit on Yesterday's Stephanie Miller Show (and a Great CMJ Music Marathon Rec):
The Rude Pundit's good buddy, Addie Brownlee, a great singer/songwriter and the hot chick who can drink you under the table after she's stomped on your heart, is playing at the Living Room in NYC as part of the CMJ Music Marathon. She's got a matinee show at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday, and it's free. And, check it out, skinny-jeaned hipsters: she's playing a Paste magazine showcase. So take a late lunch.
And, on the way there, you can listen to the pod people version of the Rude Pundit's turn on Stephanie Miller's dance floor from yesterday:
The Rude Pundit's good buddy, Addie Brownlee, a great singer/songwriter and the hot chick who can drink you under the table after she's stomped on your heart, is playing at the Living Room in NYC as part of the CMJ Music Marathon. She's got a matinee show at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday, and it's free. And, check it out, skinny-jeaned hipsters: she's playing a Paste magazine showcase. So take a late lunch.
And, on the way there, you can listen to the pod people version of the Rude Pundit's turn on Stephanie Miller's dance floor from yesterday:
A Defense of Presidential "Arrogance":
You wouldn't think that Washington Post columnist Michael Gerson, a former speechwriter for George W. Bush, would have the delicate constitution of a 1950s virgin debutante horrified at seeing her first cock in a rowboat with her gentleman caller after the cotillion. Indeed, there are times that Gerson's been in the David Frum "reasonable conservative" camp (where, at night, Karl Rove sneaks over the fence so he can fondle the campers in their beds). However, in his panicky little barf of a column today, his garter gets all twisted over something President Obama said: "'Part of the reason that our politics seems so tough right now,' he recently told a group of Democratic donors in Massachusetts, 'and facts and science and argument [do] not seem to be winning the day all the time is because we're hard-wired not to always think clearly when we're scared. And the country is scared.'"
You may read that and think about some of the GOP candidates. Putting aside Christine O'Donnell or Carl Paladino, who don't have a chance in hell of being elected (although their states' Republicans saw fit to nominate them), you might think about Nevada candidate Sharron Angle's hysterical, hateful anti-immigrant ads, which don't reflect things like, you know, facts. Or you might think about West Virginia's John Raese, who proudly proclaims that he wants to eliminate the minimum wage. Or you might think, "Gee, there's deranged right wingers shooting people or wanting to shoot them because of bullshit they're being told by nutzoids with microphones." Or you might think, "Huh. If I were a man whose enemies routinely proclaimed him to be a socialist or Muslim or foreigner, I might think people are ignoring facts." But you are you and not Michael Gerson (unless you are, in which case: "Dude, seriously, leave shit like this to Thiessen"). To Gerson, "these are some of the most arrogant words ever uttered by an American president."
Really? Declaring that a country that is at war, has high unemployment and eroding infrastructure and massive foreclosures, and has airwaves filled with screeching commentators telling them that they are being led by a demonic force in a man's body is "scared" is "arrogant"?
Obama's comments at the fundraiser were actually pretty thoughtful. He spoke of what the nation has been through and is going through as a "trauma." And that ain't 9/11 he's speaking of: it's Gerson's old boss's presidency, the long anal rape that was the majority of the terrible first decade of the millennium. By invoking the word, Obama is starkly making a case that we are now a nation of trauma survivors. And what can one do? "You can respond in a couple of ways to a trauma like this," said the President. "One is to pull back, retrench, respond to your fears by pushing away challenges, looking backwards. And another is to say we can meet these challenges and we are going to move forward. And that's what this election is about."
All Obama meant by the loss of "facts and science and argument" is that, if we can't even agree on what reality is, then how can our collective recovery occur? In the Senate, for instance, the President is not dealing with a reasonable opposition; he's dealing with one that is unwilling to negotiate, one that merely exists to irrationally and without cause block votes on things that many of them supported before Barack Obama was president.
Just like Obama's comment about people clinging to guns and religion when they're worried about the future, it's not that he's wrong. It's that he said it. If anything, the rise of the Tea Party in the wake of Obama's election proved that he was remarkably prescient when he spoke that during the 2008 campaign. The problem for stupid people is not that Obama recognizes what they do. It's that he refuses to join them in their paranoia and delusions.
By the way, nothing that Obama said indicates that he was talking about a broad swath of the population or even everyday citizens. Prior to the remark that has Gerson pulling his panties out of his ass, Obama said, "In some ways what is remarkable is how despite this body blow that the country took, the country once again has proven more resilient and more adaptable and more dynamic than I think a lot of folks give us credit for."
Yep. The President called the American people "resilient" and "dynamic." Gerson neglects that part in favor of saying that Obama is "telling people their fears result from primitive irrationality. Obama may think that many of his fellow citizens can't reason. But they can still vote." And he calls Obama an "intellectual snob."
But as far as arrogance goes, it's kind of arrogant to think you can be president in the first place. To go further, we saw what an arrogant fucker without intellectual chops could do. We're now in the throes of the PTSD that his actions caused. So you know what? The Rude Pundit will take the intellectual snob any day.
You wouldn't think that Washington Post columnist Michael Gerson, a former speechwriter for George W. Bush, would have the delicate constitution of a 1950s virgin debutante horrified at seeing her first cock in a rowboat with her gentleman caller after the cotillion. Indeed, there are times that Gerson's been in the David Frum "reasonable conservative" camp (where, at night, Karl Rove sneaks over the fence so he can fondle the campers in their beds). However, in his panicky little barf of a column today, his garter gets all twisted over something President Obama said: "'Part of the reason that our politics seems so tough right now,' he recently told a group of Democratic donors in Massachusetts, 'and facts and science and argument [do] not seem to be winning the day all the time is because we're hard-wired not to always think clearly when we're scared. And the country is scared.'"
You may read that and think about some of the GOP candidates. Putting aside Christine O'Donnell or Carl Paladino, who don't have a chance in hell of being elected (although their states' Republicans saw fit to nominate them), you might think about Nevada candidate Sharron Angle's hysterical, hateful anti-immigrant ads, which don't reflect things like, you know, facts. Or you might think about West Virginia's John Raese, who proudly proclaims that he wants to eliminate the minimum wage. Or you might think, "Gee, there's deranged right wingers shooting people or wanting to shoot them because of bullshit they're being told by nutzoids with microphones." Or you might think, "Huh. If I were a man whose enemies routinely proclaimed him to be a socialist or Muslim or foreigner, I might think people are ignoring facts." But you are you and not Michael Gerson (unless you are, in which case: "Dude, seriously, leave shit like this to Thiessen"). To Gerson, "these are some of the most arrogant words ever uttered by an American president."
Really? Declaring that a country that is at war, has high unemployment and eroding infrastructure and massive foreclosures, and has airwaves filled with screeching commentators telling them that they are being led by a demonic force in a man's body is "scared" is "arrogant"?
Obama's comments at the fundraiser were actually pretty thoughtful. He spoke of what the nation has been through and is going through as a "trauma." And that ain't 9/11 he's speaking of: it's Gerson's old boss's presidency, the long anal rape that was the majority of the terrible first decade of the millennium. By invoking the word, Obama is starkly making a case that we are now a nation of trauma survivors. And what can one do? "You can respond in a couple of ways to a trauma like this," said the President. "One is to pull back, retrench, respond to your fears by pushing away challenges, looking backwards. And another is to say we can meet these challenges and we are going to move forward. And that's what this election is about."
All Obama meant by the loss of "facts and science and argument" is that, if we can't even agree on what reality is, then how can our collective recovery occur? In the Senate, for instance, the President is not dealing with a reasonable opposition; he's dealing with one that is unwilling to negotiate, one that merely exists to irrationally and without cause block votes on things that many of them supported before Barack Obama was president.
Just like Obama's comment about people clinging to guns and religion when they're worried about the future, it's not that he's wrong. It's that he said it. If anything, the rise of the Tea Party in the wake of Obama's election proved that he was remarkably prescient when he spoke that during the 2008 campaign. The problem for stupid people is not that Obama recognizes what they do. It's that he refuses to join them in their paranoia and delusions.
By the way, nothing that Obama said indicates that he was talking about a broad swath of the population or even everyday citizens. Prior to the remark that has Gerson pulling his panties out of his ass, Obama said, "In some ways what is remarkable is how despite this body blow that the country took, the country once again has proven more resilient and more adaptable and more dynamic than I think a lot of folks give us credit for."
Yep. The President called the American people "resilient" and "dynamic." Gerson neglects that part in favor of saying that Obama is "telling people their fears result from primitive irrationality. Obama may think that many of his fellow citizens can't reason. But they can still vote." And he calls Obama an "intellectual snob."
But as far as arrogance goes, it's kind of arrogant to think you can be president in the first place. To go further, we saw what an arrogant fucker without intellectual chops could do. We're now in the throes of the PTSD that his actions caused. So you know what? The Rude Pundit will take the intellectual snob any day.
Monday, October 18, 2010
Corporate Funding in Elections: If You Had the Money, You Could Do It, Too:
The Rude Pundit doesn't often go to these sorts of things because, inevitably, they end up depressing the hell out of him. But for various reason, last Friday night he found himself at the All Saints Unitarian Church in New York City for an event sponsored by the Big Apple Coffee Party. The title was "Should Corporations Decide Our Elections?", which was kind of a bullshit frame of a non-existent debate, there being no one present to take the affirmative side (something that GRITtv host and moderator Laura Flanders acknowledged at the outset), although it would have been fun as hell to have Ronald McDonald defending the golden arches.
Speaking were radio host and author Thom Hartmann and law professors Zephyr Teachout and Lawrence Lessig. All three were great speakers, but it was Lessig, as a prophet of doom, who truly stood out. The discussion centered around the Citizens United decision and the ludicrous notion of corporate personhood. (Remember: Citizens United was about whether or not a film that bashed Hillary Clinton could be advertised within 30 days of the primaries, in violation of a provision of the McCain-Feingold campaign financing act. The Supreme Court, in its infinite wisdom, said, "McCain can blow us and Feingold can work on our balls." And thus our elections are now filled with ads from mysterious groups that are accountable to no one.)
Lessig asked, compellingly (and all quotes are guaranteed to be correct only in spirit), "Even if Citizens United was overturned tomorrow, what would change?" His point, which the others did not disagree with, was that our election process, indeed, our entire governing process, is so encrusted with the filth of corporate funding that it is impossible for our elected representatives to, you know, represent us, the people. They end up representing primarily the interests of the corporations that fund their campaigns, and, as Lessig repeated brought up, a member of Congress spends around 40% (or more) of his or her time on the phone to major donors drumming up cash for elections. So who is Johnny or Jenny Senator gonna do shit for? You, Ms. Donates-a-hundred? Or that fat fuck over there who has a check for tens of thousands of dollars and a 501c4 ready to run attack ads?
The desire to please the corporate masters of our democracy was clearly at work in the creation of the Frankenstein's monster of health care legislation. It came down to which industries did they not want to piss off. If you ever wanted to vomit endlessly about how the legislative sausage is made, check out all the ground up pig anuses and tails revealed in Ryan Lizza's article from The New Yorker about the destructive compromises that had to be made on climate change legislation in order to avoid confrontations with the corporate organizations that had moneyed interests in the outcome. Fuck, when California senatorial candidate Carly Fiorina refused on Fox "news" yesterday to say what exact things she would cut from the federal budget, she was dancing as fast as she could to keep every donor happy. In other words, until corporate money is banned from elections, your vote is merely for which companies you want taken care of.
The reason the Rude Pundit avoids these gatherings is for a couple of reasons. The first is that the solutions are inevitably so radical as to seem impossible, which is depressing as hell. Lessig proposed that the states should call a constitutional convention in order to scare the Congress into acting. Yeah, that'd be pretty insane, but beyond amending the Constitution, what's the solution? Throw more money into the mix? Get other 501c4's to go on the attack? The Rude Pundit would like to figure out a way to play special interests against each other. Make them go to war and waste their resources on that.
The other reason is that, more often than not, the majority of attendees of these gatherings are just so fucking old. Where were the people under, say, 40? It's like the ones who know how to engage are the lefties old enough to remember life pre-Internet and pre-iPhone. As the speakers said, the only way for any change to occur is in face-to-face civic engagement, not through Facebook groups that you join and ignore and eventually block because they send too many updates. But it's easier to pretend you did something.
The Rude Pundit doesn't often go to these sorts of things because, inevitably, they end up depressing the hell out of him. But for various reason, last Friday night he found himself at the All Saints Unitarian Church in New York City for an event sponsored by the Big Apple Coffee Party. The title was "Should Corporations Decide Our Elections?", which was kind of a bullshit frame of a non-existent debate, there being no one present to take the affirmative side (something that GRITtv host and moderator Laura Flanders acknowledged at the outset), although it would have been fun as hell to have Ronald McDonald defending the golden arches.
Speaking were radio host and author Thom Hartmann and law professors Zephyr Teachout and Lawrence Lessig. All three were great speakers, but it was Lessig, as a prophet of doom, who truly stood out. The discussion centered around the Citizens United decision and the ludicrous notion of corporate personhood. (Remember: Citizens United was about whether or not a film that bashed Hillary Clinton could be advertised within 30 days of the primaries, in violation of a provision of the McCain-Feingold campaign financing act. The Supreme Court, in its infinite wisdom, said, "McCain can blow us and Feingold can work on our balls." And thus our elections are now filled with ads from mysterious groups that are accountable to no one.)
Lessig asked, compellingly (and all quotes are guaranteed to be correct only in spirit), "Even if Citizens United was overturned tomorrow, what would change?" His point, which the others did not disagree with, was that our election process, indeed, our entire governing process, is so encrusted with the filth of corporate funding that it is impossible for our elected representatives to, you know, represent us, the people. They end up representing primarily the interests of the corporations that fund their campaigns, and, as Lessig repeated brought up, a member of Congress spends around 40% (or more) of his or her time on the phone to major donors drumming up cash for elections. So who is Johnny or Jenny Senator gonna do shit for? You, Ms. Donates-a-hundred? Or that fat fuck over there who has a check for tens of thousands of dollars and a 501c4 ready to run attack ads?
The desire to please the corporate masters of our democracy was clearly at work in the creation of the Frankenstein's monster of health care legislation. It came down to which industries did they not want to piss off. If you ever wanted to vomit endlessly about how the legislative sausage is made, check out all the ground up pig anuses and tails revealed in Ryan Lizza's article from The New Yorker about the destructive compromises that had to be made on climate change legislation in order to avoid confrontations with the corporate organizations that had moneyed interests in the outcome. Fuck, when California senatorial candidate Carly Fiorina refused on Fox "news" yesterday to say what exact things she would cut from the federal budget, she was dancing as fast as she could to keep every donor happy. In other words, until corporate money is banned from elections, your vote is merely for which companies you want taken care of.
The reason the Rude Pundit avoids these gatherings is for a couple of reasons. The first is that the solutions are inevitably so radical as to seem impossible, which is depressing as hell. Lessig proposed that the states should call a constitutional convention in order to scare the Congress into acting. Yeah, that'd be pretty insane, but beyond amending the Constitution, what's the solution? Throw more money into the mix? Get other 501c4's to go on the attack? The Rude Pundit would like to figure out a way to play special interests against each other. Make them go to war and waste their resources on that.
The other reason is that, more often than not, the majority of attendees of these gatherings are just so fucking old. Where were the people under, say, 40? It's like the ones who know how to engage are the lefties old enough to remember life pre-Internet and pre-iPhone. As the speakers said, the only way for any change to occur is in face-to-face civic engagement, not through Facebook groups that you join and ignore and eventually block because they send too many updates. But it's easier to pretend you did something.
Friday, October 15, 2010
Photos That Make the Rude Pundit Wonder if Parents Can Be Aborted:
Oh, sweet little Allan Taylor of Silver Springs, Nevada. One or both of your parents have fed you a bundle of lies as surely as they have fed you a steady diet of frozen, lard-filled chicken nuggets and high fructose corn syrup-infused Sam's Choice cola. The 8 year-old in the yellow hoodie and running pants of elastic comfort holds a sign that reads "HANDS OFF MY MONEY OBAMA" in his little hands. And the inevitable question ought to be "What the fuck's a 'Money Obama'"?
However, other than the rules of punctuation, someone ought to explain a simple thing to Allan and his teabagger Mom and/or Dad who dragged the child to a Sharron Angle rally: money that you pay in taxes ain't your fucking money. Oh, sure, it's a good line, the kind of delicious hairy sack that Angle devours constantly. The Nevada Republican candidate for Senate did it last night at her "debate" (if by "debate," you mean, "Inarticulate tortoise fight") with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Discussing the Bush tax cuts, Angle said, "First of all, let's really talk about whose money that is. It's not the federal government's money, it's our money. And when he says we're squandering the federal money, the federal government's money, it's really squandering our money."
Listen, Allan: your parents are fucking idiots who probably shouldn't have bred in the first place, but since your scuzzy dad put his diseased cock into your imbecile mom's kooz and knocked her up, you may as well learn a thing or two. Angle seems to believe that taxes are an investment in the government and that, like if you put money into stocks or gold, you can take that money out and have the money again. That's not the way it works. Taxes are actually fees the government collects so that you can have nice things like Interstate 80, just north of you, which one day you'll hop on while telling your parents to kiss your ass. Once you pay 'em, it's not your money anymore. If you don't like how it's spent or how much is collected, well, that's what elections like this are for. But no matter how low taxes are, it ain't your money. (And if your sign means that you think Barack Obama is taking cash from your future, well, you should ask your parents where your money is gonna come from if taxes don't go up.)
A couple of other quick notes on the suicidally dull Reid/Angle debate:
1. Sharron Angle called herself "a teacher for 25 years." This is not true. Her own website bio states that she was a "substitute teacher" for those 25 years. Now, you can argue about the varying quality of subs, but one thing is clear: they sure as shit ain't teachers by any stretch of the imagination (lesson plans, anyone?). Angle didn't have the credentials to become a full-time teacher. Oh, she did teach "grades K-12 in a one-room Christian school of 24 students for two years." But, while Little House on the Prairie cosplay is charming, that ain't what she said.
2. What the fuck's with the Tea Party women's fixation on men acting manly? Angle told Reid to "Man up" about Social Security. Sarah Palin attacked Barack Obama's balls. Christine O'Donnell implies her male opponents are gay. Honestly, they all sound like they're just begging for a rough fucking.
3. Along those lines, Angle was a total cunt when she attacked Reid for his wealth. Isn't Reid's life story kind of the mythical American Dream in action? A miner dad and a mom who washed john jizz from the clothes of whores so their son could go to college, become a lawyer, earn a shitload of money, and devote the remainder of his life to public service?
Hell, young Allan Taylor, you'd be one lucky son of a bitch if your parents did that for you instead of making you think the big evil guvmint is gonna take your piggy bank.
Oh, sweet little Allan Taylor of Silver Springs, Nevada. One or both of your parents have fed you a bundle of lies as surely as they have fed you a steady diet of frozen, lard-filled chicken nuggets and high fructose corn syrup-infused Sam's Choice cola. The 8 year-old in the yellow hoodie and running pants of elastic comfort holds a sign that reads "HANDS OFF MY MONEY OBAMA" in his little hands. And the inevitable question ought to be "What the fuck's a 'Money Obama'"?
However, other than the rules of punctuation, someone ought to explain a simple thing to Allan and his teabagger Mom and/or Dad who dragged the child to a Sharron Angle rally: money that you pay in taxes ain't your fucking money. Oh, sure, it's a good line, the kind of delicious hairy sack that Angle devours constantly. The Nevada Republican candidate for Senate did it last night at her "debate" (if by "debate," you mean, "Inarticulate tortoise fight") with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Discussing the Bush tax cuts, Angle said, "First of all, let's really talk about whose money that is. It's not the federal government's money, it's our money. And when he says we're squandering the federal money, the federal government's money, it's really squandering our money."
Listen, Allan: your parents are fucking idiots who probably shouldn't have bred in the first place, but since your scuzzy dad put his diseased cock into your imbecile mom's kooz and knocked her up, you may as well learn a thing or two. Angle seems to believe that taxes are an investment in the government and that, like if you put money into stocks or gold, you can take that money out and have the money again. That's not the way it works. Taxes are actually fees the government collects so that you can have nice things like Interstate 80, just north of you, which one day you'll hop on while telling your parents to kiss your ass. Once you pay 'em, it's not your money anymore. If you don't like how it's spent or how much is collected, well, that's what elections like this are for. But no matter how low taxes are, it ain't your money. (And if your sign means that you think Barack Obama is taking cash from your future, well, you should ask your parents where your money is gonna come from if taxes don't go up.)
A couple of other quick notes on the suicidally dull Reid/Angle debate:
1. Sharron Angle called herself "a teacher for 25 years." This is not true. Her own website bio states that she was a "substitute teacher" for those 25 years. Now, you can argue about the varying quality of subs, but one thing is clear: they sure as shit ain't teachers by any stretch of the imagination (lesson plans, anyone?). Angle didn't have the credentials to become a full-time teacher. Oh, she did teach "grades K-12 in a one-room Christian school of 24 students for two years." But, while Little House on the Prairie cosplay is charming, that ain't what she said.
2. What the fuck's with the Tea Party women's fixation on men acting manly? Angle told Reid to "Man up" about Social Security. Sarah Palin attacked Barack Obama's balls. Christine O'Donnell implies her male opponents are gay. Honestly, they all sound like they're just begging for a rough fucking.
3. Along those lines, Angle was a total cunt when she attacked Reid for his wealth. Isn't Reid's life story kind of the mythical American Dream in action? A miner dad and a mom who washed john jizz from the clothes of whores so their son could go to college, become a lawyer, earn a shitload of money, and devote the remainder of his life to public service?
Hell, young Allan Taylor, you'd be one lucky son of a bitch if your parents did that for you instead of making you think the big evil guvmint is gonna take your piggy bank.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Candidates Say the Darnedest Things:
All quotes from this week's various debates in various races:
1. "[Y]ou writing an article saying that you learned your beliefs from an articulate, intelligent Marxist professor and that's what made you become a Democrat, that should send chills up the spine of every Delaware voter."- Christine O'Donnell, soon to lose the Senate race in Delaware, referring to Democrat Chris Coons's 1985 college newspaper column where he said that, while studying abroad in Kenya, "I studied under a bright and intelligent Marxist professor." Someone should probably inform O'Donnell that if she ever attended her college classes, she more than likely had several Marxist professors. By the way, the actual article was about how much he loves America.
2. "I don't like the idea of somebody in Washington deciding that Susie has two mommies is an appropriate family situation...That's what happens when we let things get to a federal level."- Rand Paul, debating Jack Conway at Northern Kentucky University. This was part of Paul's "logic" in eliminating the Department of Education: because obviously every student everywhere has to read about the gay penguins or mommies or Obama's gay stormtroopers sodomize their teachers in front of them.
3. "It's insulting to the millions of people who watch WWE every week ... to suggest that somehow it is less than quality entertainment." - Linda McMahon, debating Richard Blumenthal for the Senate seat of Christopher Dodd in Connecticut.
Umm...here's a description of the "quality entertainment" at the WWE NXT event occurring on the same night as the debate: "Last up is Maxine and she says that her topic tonight is disrespect. She says that last week Hornswoggle disrespected her by shoving a pie in her face, but nonetheless she was going to end up on top. Maxine turns her attention to Kaitlyn and says that Kaitlyn is actually lucky to have Vickie as her pro but she doesn’t appreciate it because she had to go and disrespect the relationship between Dolph and Vickie. Maxine calls Kaitlyn a homewrecker and says that is not how ladies conduct their business." One might argue that it's McMahon's company that insults millions of people every week.
4. "We have to hold employers accountable for hiring illegal workers." - Meg Whitman, debating Jerry Brown to be governor of California. Holding herself accountable, Whitman said in the same debate about having hired (and fired) an undocumented worker, "We went through an employment agency. We looked at three forms of identification. Our housekeeper falsified those documents and came to admit it nine years later. It broke my heart, but I had to fire her." Apparently for Whitman, "accountable" means "hopefully getting away with it." The penalty for Whitman? Well, until this came to light, not a goddamn thing.
5. And just 'cause she's so fucking dumb, which means she's so fucking funny, here's O'Donnell again, this time addressing the hypothetical situation of a sick person without insurance going for help in the emergency room of a hospital: "[R]ight now we're forcing them to. We're forcing them that they have to give care to illegal aliens. So this is something that we're already doing. What I'm proposing, you're also talking about a very small hypothetical using scare tactics to make people support this health care bill." Yep, that's right. One sentence after using the scary proposition of illegals using hospitals, she chided the moderators for using "scare tactics."
When is this absolutely endless shit over?
All quotes from this week's various debates in various races:
1. "[Y]ou writing an article saying that you learned your beliefs from an articulate, intelligent Marxist professor and that's what made you become a Democrat, that should send chills up the spine of every Delaware voter."- Christine O'Donnell, soon to lose the Senate race in Delaware, referring to Democrat Chris Coons's 1985 college newspaper column where he said that, while studying abroad in Kenya, "I studied under a bright and intelligent Marxist professor." Someone should probably inform O'Donnell that if she ever attended her college classes, she more than likely had several Marxist professors. By the way, the actual article was about how much he loves America.
2. "I don't like the idea of somebody in Washington deciding that Susie has two mommies is an appropriate family situation...That's what happens when we let things get to a federal level."- Rand Paul, debating Jack Conway at Northern Kentucky University. This was part of Paul's "logic" in eliminating the Department of Education: because obviously every student everywhere has to read about the gay penguins or mommies or Obama's gay stormtroopers sodomize their teachers in front of them.
3. "It's insulting to the millions of people who watch WWE every week ... to suggest that somehow it is less than quality entertainment." - Linda McMahon, debating Richard Blumenthal for the Senate seat of Christopher Dodd in Connecticut.
Umm...here's a description of the "quality entertainment" at the WWE NXT event occurring on the same night as the debate: "Last up is Maxine and she says that her topic tonight is disrespect. She says that last week Hornswoggle disrespected her by shoving a pie in her face, but nonetheless she was going to end up on top. Maxine turns her attention to Kaitlyn and says that Kaitlyn is actually lucky to have Vickie as her pro but she doesn’t appreciate it because she had to go and disrespect the relationship between Dolph and Vickie. Maxine calls Kaitlyn a homewrecker and says that is not how ladies conduct their business." One might argue that it's McMahon's company that insults millions of people every week.
4. "We have to hold employers accountable for hiring illegal workers." - Meg Whitman, debating Jerry Brown to be governor of California. Holding herself accountable, Whitman said in the same debate about having hired (and fired) an undocumented worker, "We went through an employment agency. We looked at three forms of identification. Our housekeeper falsified those documents and came to admit it nine years later. It broke my heart, but I had to fire her." Apparently for Whitman, "accountable" means "hopefully getting away with it." The penalty for Whitman? Well, until this came to light, not a goddamn thing.
5. And just 'cause she's so fucking dumb, which means she's so fucking funny, here's O'Donnell again, this time addressing the hypothetical situation of a sick person without insurance going for help in the emergency room of a hospital: "[R]ight now we're forcing them to. We're forcing them that they have to give care to illegal aliens. So this is something that we're already doing. What I'm proposing, you're also talking about a very small hypothetical using scare tactics to make people support this health care bill." Yep, that's right. One sentence after using the scary proposition of illegals using hospitals, she chided the moderators for using "scare tactics."
When is this absolutely endless shit over?
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Don't Appeal:
It would be so simple, and it would be like an anxious finger shoved against the joyful prostate of the logy Democratic base. All President Barack Obama has to do is do nothing and the Federal District Court in California's injunction against the military's absurd Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy would stand. Judge Virginia Phillips declared that it wasn't just unconstitutional, but that it was, in essence, like farting in the face the Constitution, declaring that "the act known as 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' infringes the fundamental rights of United States servicemembers and prospective servicemembers and violates (a) the substantive due process rights guaranteed under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, and (b) the rights to freedom of speech and to petition the Government for redress of grievances guaranteed by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution." Now, laugh if you will at the word "servicemembers," but the Rude Pundit's awesome math abilities calculate that you got three clauses within two Amendments violated. That seems like a pretty damn strong case.
This is a no-brainer, ain't it? You got an overwhelming majority of people out there who think the policy's bullshit. You got 21 senators, including ones from states like Louisiana and Colorado, writing to the President to let the ruling stand. You got a disheartened left that needs to get excited for the midterms and a large gay constituency who are righteously, mightily pissed at the empty promises from the administration. You want cover? Fuck, toss in the young people committing suicide over vicious, homophobic bullying. Add the gay-bashing that's erupting in places like New York fucking City. You got the perfect backdrop for standing up for the rights of people who wanna fight for the country. It ain't even controversial except among the 20% of the population who are dumb and prejudiced, skull-fucked by their pissy Jesus and left drooling imbeciles from the brain damage.
And what do you think the Obama administration will do? Will President "I Want to Repeal DADT" say, "Groovy. The Senate can go fuck itself now. Let's move on"?
Well, lookie here, hopeful knob-bobbers and clit-lickers. Given the chance to let stand the Massachusetts District Court's decision that the Defense of Marriage Act (aka "Queers are icky" Act) is unconstitutional, Obama is having his Justice Department file an appeal, saying that while the President wants to repeal DOMA, "The Justice Department is defending the statute, as it traditionally does when acts of Congress are challenged." Even though, you know, it is under no obligation to do so. It's not unakin to a New Orleans Saints fan saying that, as long as he's visiting Atlanta, he may as well root for the Falcons.
Sure, sure, the White House would say that it really, really wants Congress to take care of repealing both DOMA and DADT, but, as Andrew Sullivan says, what's the chance of that happening in the next generation as the GOP elects crazier and crazier motherfuckers? Or one could argue that, at some point, under some administration, these issues are gonna reach the Supreme Court, so why not just get it over with now? (And, frankly, that's not a terrible argument.)
Down in Florida last month, the District Court of Appeal threw out the state's draconian, three-decade old law banning gay adoption as blatantly unconstitutional. The secretary of the Department of Children and Families announced yesterday that he was not going to appeal the ruling, and that the plaintiff in the case, Frank Gill, had gone through enough just to keep the children he has raised and loved. The attorney general could still appeal, and since Bill McCollum had previously used George "Rent Boy" Rekers as an expert against gay adoption, it's up in the air, although, as the DCF said, "the depth, clarity and unanimity of the [court's] opinion -- and that of Miami-Dade Judge Cindy Lederman's original circuit court decision -- has made it evident that an appeal would have a less than limited chance of a different outcome." Governor Charlie Crist, who, you may have heard, is running for office, halted the ban after the initial decision.
See how easy that is? How easy it is to just do nothing and let the rights fall into place? How easy it is for hate to be shoved aside in favor of bringing a large segment of the population, finally, once and for all, into the American fold? Or are the potential Fox "news" outrage and a spitting Rush Limbaugh far more important than the base who got the President elected?
(By the way, the most homoerotic thing on TV right now? The image of that cock-shaped capsule in Chile plunging into and pulling out of the earth's orifice again and again. Yeah, it's a miracle, but it's a miracle that'd make an imaginative man horny.)
It would be so simple, and it would be like an anxious finger shoved against the joyful prostate of the logy Democratic base. All President Barack Obama has to do is do nothing and the Federal District Court in California's injunction against the military's absurd Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy would stand. Judge Virginia Phillips declared that it wasn't just unconstitutional, but that it was, in essence, like farting in the face the Constitution, declaring that "the act known as 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' infringes the fundamental rights of United States servicemembers and prospective servicemembers and violates (a) the substantive due process rights guaranteed under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, and (b) the rights to freedom of speech and to petition the Government for redress of grievances guaranteed by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution." Now, laugh if you will at the word "servicemembers," but the Rude Pundit's awesome math abilities calculate that you got three clauses within two Amendments violated. That seems like a pretty damn strong case.
This is a no-brainer, ain't it? You got an overwhelming majority of people out there who think the policy's bullshit. You got 21 senators, including ones from states like Louisiana and Colorado, writing to the President to let the ruling stand. You got a disheartened left that needs to get excited for the midterms and a large gay constituency who are righteously, mightily pissed at the empty promises from the administration. You want cover? Fuck, toss in the young people committing suicide over vicious, homophobic bullying. Add the gay-bashing that's erupting in places like New York fucking City. You got the perfect backdrop for standing up for the rights of people who wanna fight for the country. It ain't even controversial except among the 20% of the population who are dumb and prejudiced, skull-fucked by their pissy Jesus and left drooling imbeciles from the brain damage.
And what do you think the Obama administration will do? Will President "I Want to Repeal DADT" say, "Groovy. The Senate can go fuck itself now. Let's move on"?
Well, lookie here, hopeful knob-bobbers and clit-lickers. Given the chance to let stand the Massachusetts District Court's decision that the Defense of Marriage Act (aka "Queers are icky" Act) is unconstitutional, Obama is having his Justice Department file an appeal, saying that while the President wants to repeal DOMA, "The Justice Department is defending the statute, as it traditionally does when acts of Congress are challenged." Even though, you know, it is under no obligation to do so. It's not unakin to a New Orleans Saints fan saying that, as long as he's visiting Atlanta, he may as well root for the Falcons.
Sure, sure, the White House would say that it really, really wants Congress to take care of repealing both DOMA and DADT, but, as Andrew Sullivan says, what's the chance of that happening in the next generation as the GOP elects crazier and crazier motherfuckers? Or one could argue that, at some point, under some administration, these issues are gonna reach the Supreme Court, so why not just get it over with now? (And, frankly, that's not a terrible argument.)
Down in Florida last month, the District Court of Appeal threw out the state's draconian, three-decade old law banning gay adoption as blatantly unconstitutional. The secretary of the Department of Children and Families announced yesterday that he was not going to appeal the ruling, and that the plaintiff in the case, Frank Gill, had gone through enough just to keep the children he has raised and loved. The attorney general could still appeal, and since Bill McCollum had previously used George "Rent Boy" Rekers as an expert against gay adoption, it's up in the air, although, as the DCF said, "the depth, clarity and unanimity of the [court's] opinion -- and that of Miami-Dade Judge Cindy Lederman's original circuit court decision -- has made it evident that an appeal would have a less than limited chance of a different outcome." Governor Charlie Crist, who, you may have heard, is running for office, halted the ban after the initial decision.
See how easy that is? How easy it is to just do nothing and let the rights fall into place? How easy it is for hate to be shoved aside in favor of bringing a large segment of the population, finally, once and for all, into the American fold? Or are the potential Fox "news" outrage and a spitting Rush Limbaugh far more important than the base who got the President elected?
(By the way, the most homoerotic thing on TV right now? The image of that cock-shaped capsule in Chile plunging into and pulling out of the earth's orifice again and again. Yeah, it's a miracle, but it's a miracle that'd make an imaginative man horny.)
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
The Rude Pundit on Yesterday's Stephanie Miller Show:
On Monday, the Rude Pundit shared his anger with Stephanie Miller over the torture of three gay men by the totally not-gay members of a Bronx gang, and he wondered aloud, "When straight guys are beaten down, why aren't they sodomized?" Also, Carl Paladino sucks dog dicks. No, really.
You can get your weekly oral rudeness with no effort once you subscribe to the Rude Pundit's podcast. It's easy and free.
On Monday, the Rude Pundit shared his anger with Stephanie Miller over the torture of three gay men by the totally not-gay members of a Bronx gang, and he wondered aloud, "When straight guys are beaten down, why aren't they sodomized?" Also, Carl Paladino sucks dog dicks. No, really.
You can get your weekly oral rudeness with no effort once you subscribe to the Rude Pundit's podcast. It's easy and free.
For GOP Candidates, Having a Past Means Never Having to Say:
By the standards of the current crop of Republican candidates, Ted Bundy, if still alive, could run for office. Sure, sure, Bundy murdered dozens of young women and was one of the most notorious serial killers in American history, but he was a loyal Republican, even engaging in dirty tricks to help the re-election campaign of Washington Governor Daniel Evans in 1972. And if Bundy was running now and some pesky reporter asked him, say, "Howzabout all that raping and bludgeoning?" he could call it a "personal attack" and add, "We've drawn a line in the sand. You can ask me about background, you can ask me about personal issues. I'm not going to answer."
Which is exactly what Alaska Republican Joe Miller, the teabagger running for Senate, told the press yesterday. No, Miller hasn't been revealed as a serial killer (yet - but that skeevy beard reeks of backwoods burials), but the fiscal conservative who is anti-poverty programs owes about $100,000 in credit card debt and he and his family received low-income health care assistance. In other words, his actual life runs counter to his beliefs.
But his past is off-limits. Unless, of course, his past has some good shit in it. So, according to his website's bio, "Miller served as an officer in the United States Army. He was awarded the Bronze Star for his leadership in combat during the First Gulf War." That's within the realm of polite discussion and is an obvious qualification for public office, by Miller's standards. However, if he's a welfare user who can't keep his finances straight despite, as his bio states, having a Master's in economics? That is an "attack that is based upon avoiding the issues, where we're at as a state, where we're at as a nation and looking at other things that basically distract people's attention."
This whole idea that the actions of one's past have no bearing on the qualifications of a candidate is laughable for how it is conveniently deployed when something inconvenient comes up. George W. Bush ran several companies into the ground. He was a fucking failure who had a special name. But that was a no-go for discussion in 2000 and 2004. John McCain's ability to survive at the Hanoi Hilton was totally cool to bring up, though.
This year, though, it's particularly pronounced because so many of the Tea Party-supported or Palin-anointed candidates are either devoid of anything that might be considered qualifications for office, like Christine O'Donnell, or are simply incompetent, like Miller (although the Rude Pundit's sure he's got some literal and figurative dead hobos plastered in the walls of his house). Indeed, if you shitcan everything that O'Donnell has said in her wild and wacky past as a conservative bombthrower, she's done absolutely nothing with her life except accumulate a bunch of debt. Yet she's a major party's nominee to become a senator, which means, if elected, she could pull a DeMint and shut down the running of Congress. Seriously, the Rude Pundit thinks the main reason O'Donnell and Miller are even in the game is that senators pull down a pretty sweet salary and benefits.
Senate candidate Linda McMahon dismisses the fact that the corporation she ran, World Wrestling Entertainment, actively promoted violence against and the degradation of women. She's focused on the future for the voters of Connecticut. That part of her job doesn't matter, but, boy, didn't she make a lot of money and isn't making money awesome?
The sad part is that voters will probably see Miller's life story as emblematic of their own in Alaska (even if they don't have a Yale JD). The sadder part is that, for most Republicans, this shit just get's picked up off the lawn and tossed away. David Vitter balls hookers? Whatever. Newt Gingrich is a sleazy twatmonger? Run that motherfucker for President.
Of course, Democrats are held to a different standard. Their pasts are unforgivable. Rand Paul, a man who is lick-his-own-taint insane, derided Bill Clinton's support of his opponent. "I'm not sure I would trust a guy who had had sexual relations with an intern," said the man who looks perpetually like he just masturbated on a cat. (And if he's got that as a standard, Paul's gonna have a really hard time trusting anyone in DC.)
Shit, Barack Obama's past is a constant debate in GOP circles. And the one they've concocted isn't even his real one. But that's par for the course: if a politician's life is too honorable, you gotta just make shit up. Ask John Kerry.
By the standards of the current crop of Republican candidates, Ted Bundy, if still alive, could run for office. Sure, sure, Bundy murdered dozens of young women and was one of the most notorious serial killers in American history, but he was a loyal Republican, even engaging in dirty tricks to help the re-election campaign of Washington Governor Daniel Evans in 1972. And if Bundy was running now and some pesky reporter asked him, say, "Howzabout all that raping and bludgeoning?" he could call it a "personal attack" and add, "We've drawn a line in the sand. You can ask me about background, you can ask me about personal issues. I'm not going to answer."
Which is exactly what Alaska Republican Joe Miller, the teabagger running for Senate, told the press yesterday. No, Miller hasn't been revealed as a serial killer (yet - but that skeevy beard reeks of backwoods burials), but the fiscal conservative who is anti-poverty programs owes about $100,000 in credit card debt and he and his family received low-income health care assistance. In other words, his actual life runs counter to his beliefs.
But his past is off-limits. Unless, of course, his past has some good shit in it. So, according to his website's bio, "Miller served as an officer in the United States Army. He was awarded the Bronze Star for his leadership in combat during the First Gulf War." That's within the realm of polite discussion and is an obvious qualification for public office, by Miller's standards. However, if he's a welfare user who can't keep his finances straight despite, as his bio states, having a Master's in economics? That is an "attack that is based upon avoiding the issues, where we're at as a state, where we're at as a nation and looking at other things that basically distract people's attention."
This whole idea that the actions of one's past have no bearing on the qualifications of a candidate is laughable for how it is conveniently deployed when something inconvenient comes up. George W. Bush ran several companies into the ground. He was a fucking failure who had a special name. But that was a no-go for discussion in 2000 and 2004. John McCain's ability to survive at the Hanoi Hilton was totally cool to bring up, though.
This year, though, it's particularly pronounced because so many of the Tea Party-supported or Palin-anointed candidates are either devoid of anything that might be considered qualifications for office, like Christine O'Donnell, or are simply incompetent, like Miller (although the Rude Pundit's sure he's got some literal and figurative dead hobos plastered in the walls of his house). Indeed, if you shitcan everything that O'Donnell has said in her wild and wacky past as a conservative bombthrower, she's done absolutely nothing with her life except accumulate a bunch of debt. Yet she's a major party's nominee to become a senator, which means, if elected, she could pull a DeMint and shut down the running of Congress. Seriously, the Rude Pundit thinks the main reason O'Donnell and Miller are even in the game is that senators pull down a pretty sweet salary and benefits.
Senate candidate Linda McMahon dismisses the fact that the corporation she ran, World Wrestling Entertainment, actively promoted violence against and the degradation of women. She's focused on the future for the voters of Connecticut. That part of her job doesn't matter, but, boy, didn't she make a lot of money and isn't making money awesome?
The sad part is that voters will probably see Miller's life story as emblematic of their own in Alaska (even if they don't have a Yale JD). The sadder part is that, for most Republicans, this shit just get's picked up off the lawn and tossed away. David Vitter balls hookers? Whatever. Newt Gingrich is a sleazy twatmonger? Run that motherfucker for President.
Of course, Democrats are held to a different standard. Their pasts are unforgivable. Rand Paul, a man who is lick-his-own-taint insane, derided Bill Clinton's support of his opponent. "I'm not sure I would trust a guy who had had sexual relations with an intern," said the man who looks perpetually like he just masturbated on a cat. (And if he's got that as a standard, Paul's gonna have a really hard time trusting anyone in DC.)
Shit, Barack Obama's past is a constant debate in GOP circles. And the one they've concocted isn't even his real one. But that's par for the course: if a politician's life is too honorable, you gotta just make shit up. Ask John Kerry.
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